More on what is going on

First I want to give a big hug to all of you lovely people.  You have sent hugs, love, prayers, good wishes.  You have been fabulous at making me feeling loved and at feeling better.  Thank you.

I am going to give you all a little update on my exciting life.  My, my but I do have fun.  I seem to have a problem keeping my white blood cells at the right level, so I am getting an assist from technology.  Five days after my last round of chemo, I have gone in every day for 5 days to get a shot of Neupogen.(really only 4 so far, tomorrow is the 5th shot).  Monday they will do blood work to be sure it is working.  If all is well, then I can fight off infections and get on with the big fight against the cancer.

The next part is gross, so feel free to skip over it and say you don't need to know that much about my life.  Many things cause problems in life, and some are common problems that non cancer patients experience.  I am experiencing two opposites at the same time, constipation and diarrhea.  Didn't know one could do that.  It is awful, painful, and you don't trust your body's signals.  The pain is very much like giving birth.  The same condition from childbirth and the after effects of chemo is there to make life yucky,  hemorrhoids.  So today Marty bought me a present, a foam doughnut.  If you don't know what I am talking about, count yourself lucky.  At  least now I can sit without great pain.  Gross enough for you?

I did feel well enough to go to lunch with Marty today, I ate toast, one egg, and two pieces of bacon.  That is a huge meal for me.  Tonight Kirsten is bringing me an Italian Subway sandwich.  So a good day.

Again thanks for all the prayers and well wishes.  You folks make me happy and make me feel loved.

Again with the pretend grandchildren

Thursday we drove up to Davis again.  Friday was Grandparent's and Special Friends' Day at Hall's school.  No real grandparents were able to come out, so Marty and I had the privilege of attending. We took Hall to school and then signed in for the morning's events.  There would be a Mass, a reception, time in the classroom, and an assembly.

Now the Mass is always a problem.  We are not Catholic. We don't know when to stand or when to sit down.  And we don't know 90% of the responses.  Also Catholic services last longer than our protestant service.  Marty and I tend to tune out after 45 minutes.  We did OK, and didn't embarrass Hall.

This is Hall reading part of the prayers.  He was very composed.  Several hundred people were in the church.  My knees would have been knocking.  Amazing, he is only 8 years old.

              This is Marty and Hall in the classroom.  They are playing a math game.

Look at that evil grin on Hall's face.  He thinks he has beat Marty at the math game.  Guess who won.  That would be Aunt Janet.

This is the next project we did with Hall, a word search.  This thing was really tough.  It took all three of us to find the words.  They were up, down, frontwards, backwards, and oh hell on a slant.

 

Word search is finished.  Now he gets to color the picture.  We wore a picture of Hall as our visitor's badge.

I have three wonderful videos of the assembly.  For some reason none will load.  I have tried emailing them to family, that hasn't worked either.  I will have to call 1-800 Erik.  He posts videos on his blog, so surely he will be able to help me.  It may cost me cooking dinner for my son, but he will help Mom.  If we figure it out, I will post them later. 

After all the events, school was out around noon.  We had told Hall he could pick where we would have lunch.  He picked Subway.  He was so funny when we went in.  It was very clear he had been there often.  He went to the soft drink cooler, grabbed his drink.  Then he grabbed chips and got in line to order his sandwich. He knew the people standing behind him would pay. Everyone was ordering by name, the spicy Italian, turkey club.  Not Hall, he ordered the type bread untoasted, cheese, the two meats he wanted,tomatoes, onions, then the condiments he wanted.  He was precise.  The sandwich guy commented on how Hall knew what he wanted.  The sandwich he ordered sounded so good that I ordered it.

Thank you, Hall, for letting us be your grandparents for a day.  We love you very much.