Organization of the Week - Cancer Services of NM

The Cancer Services of NM recently put on a zoo night for kids with Cancer. This was our first introduction to this group and we had a roarin' good time at Zoo Night. It was in the Evening and the only folks there were the cancer patients and their families. They fed us dinner, allowed us time to walk around the zoo, had a drawing for some GREAT prizes

Mr. Polar Bear is sulking because NO one wanted to paint his face!!!
And he's not invited to the next event put on by this wonderful Organization: The Family Cancer Retreat in Glorietta , NM. OH, and he didn't get a goodie bag or free pizza from Papa John's, one of the Corporate Sponsors: BTW - this is a great place to thank all the Corporate Sponsors for caring about kids with cancer to sponsor events such as this one which blesses NM families dealing with the trials of having a child with cancer - Thank you Gap Inc, Papa John's, NW Optimists, Isotopes, Graphic Connection, Creamland, Advanced Communication & Electronics, Everest Digital Scanning, KRST 92.3, CheatCodes.com, and the Printer's press. You all are AWESOME!!!!


Beautiful Peacock was strutting his stuff at zoo night as well.
Alyssa strutted like a pea cock after winning a brand new Nintendo DS in the door prize drawing. Despite the humidity it was a lovely relaxing evening at the zoo. I hadn't been in a long time so I was kind of bummed that I didn't have time to walk around to all the exhibits. I guess that means that we will have to put that AWESOME family membership to use more often from my mom's boss - Thank you Again Maggie for that AWESOME gift!!!! And Thank you Cancer Services of NM for all you do!!!! If anyone wants to Donate to this worthy organization - you can go to their website at www.cancerservicesnm.org

My How They Grow.

At Quad show this doe seemed so small I was beginning to think maybe she was going to be a tiny little think. Well, Today I shaved her for the Bosque Farms Fair next week and look at the lovely girl I found under the hair. she has the nicest body capacity of any of my youngsters, a nice wide chest floor, good ribbing, long lovely neck

Good width from thurl to thurl and between the hocks. I can't wait to see how she freshens out this coming spring.

And is probably one of the most well put together does I've bred to date. This is with minimal setting up. I also love the beautiful head on this girl. IF Tirzah is not bred to Storm she will head out to have a date with Koko's sire PiddlinAcres KR Tapdance because Tirzah is Joie's half sister and I like this breeding so much I'd like to get another doe close to Koko if I can. IF she is pregnant she is due in Sept and I'll breed her to Tapdance in the spring.

I am thinking hard about breeding this doe to Lora's buck Nekoda or her new buck Warrick.

Probably will do Nekoda, since I've been wanting to breed a doe to him for a long time now.

LAST Radiation Treatment

Yesterda was Alyssa's LAST radiation treatment - WAHOOOOOOO!!!!! Remember back in the beginning we talked about her mask that bolted her head to the table so she couldn't move? Here it is. This is her souvenir for completing 14 radiation treatments. She is done. We go back in one month to do a Follow up with Dr. Liem and then they send us back over to Pediatric Oncology for her follow ups and tests there. Our next hurdles are the re-testing phase (I'm guessing PET/CT scan and XRays and Blood Tests.) and then the removal of her port with at least one or two all clear scans.
Yep - we are wanting to be done but it sure will be nice to not have to drive to ABQ daily and get those nasty radiation treatments. WE are doing the happy dance here!!!
I forgot to Thank some more folks for their support and stuff - Gwen - thank you for themeal and including the recipe - WE love the white chili. YUMMMY!!! I am glad you included the recipe because it is a great one to make for others when we do meals for folks. My kids loved it and so did I and we ended up eating more than once with it because it made so much.

Radiation Update/Post Op. Update.

This will be a last Post Op Update - I just had to tell everyone about a recent blessing. After my surgery I was craving Blueberry Pie (this is not a first for me - I LOVE Blueberry Pie) Anyway, my precious DH went looking for one and couldn't find one, even my wonderful mom called all over ABQ to see if they could find one NO ONE HAS A BLUEBERRY PIE!!!!! So I guess my parents were telling the Traegers, my cousin's inlaws at church on Sunday and Judy and her daughter made us - not one but TWO beautiful blueberry pies.

Thank you Judy and Girls!!!! If you look closely there is evidence that one pie has had some pieces snitched off - I DID NOT DO THIS - I was driving and watching my daughter snitch pieces of the pie - It was killing me!!!!!Judy's husband brought the pies over to the Cancer center while we were there getting Alyssa's 11th treatment - That's right folks - only 3 to go!!!!!

Post Op Update/Radiation Update

All of our medical stuff seems to go hand in hand these days. Alyssa had her appt with Radiology at 12:30pm today and then met with the Radiation Oncologist - Dr. Liem today. He seemed to be thinking pretty positively about how radiation was going - she doesn't seem to be having the side effects really but reiterated what to watch out for. WE are. 5 appts to go and we are done and will find out what next. We also had to go in and have her port flushed - it's always such an ordeal. It took about 1hour and 15 minutes to get a 5 minute port flush done. But it is done for another month. Then my follow up appt with Dr. Spafford (ENT Doc) was today. They said that I have a Follicular Adenoma - in plain English - A benign cyst AKA NOT CANCER!!!! PARTY time! I cried happy tears. I know waaaaaaay back in February when we were dealing with the
diagnostic stages of Alyssa's Lymphoma I mentioned that God had sent a Guardian Angel in the form of Dr. Ingle. Well, after not seeing him for a long time guess who showed up in ER for my surgery - the last thing I remember was him squeezing my arm and saying everything was going to be okay. Funny, I was flooded with peace from that moment on. I kind of knew when they sent me home that day that we probably weren't looking at cancer. I saw him again today and he gave me a big hug and said he was so glad it is not cancer and that he was really happy to hear Alyssa was almost done with Radiation. Thank you God for Guardian Angels.
I used to hate Dr's and the hospital and while I don't relish the nearly 3 hour visits we seem to be having - strangely the hospital isn't such a scary place any more. I am praying now that if the door opens I might go back to school at some point in time to pursue a nursing career - who knew how old I'd have to be before I realize what I REALLY wanted to be in life. But I am not pushing it either. I still have kids to homeschool and raise and a goat herd to manage etc. etc.
I guess when the time is right - the doors will open up.

Post Op and Radiation Update.

Today is 4 days post Op and I'm feeling good and getting antsy. I want to do so much but my neck reminds me that indeed I did have surgery. UGH. The swelling is reducing and I can swallow pretty well now. Dr. said walking was good so I went for a short walk with my neighbor's today (very short). I see all the chores I need to do and it's driving me crazy because I'm sure that most of them fall under the strenuous category which dr. orders say 3 weeks of not doing strenuous....GRRRRR. I'm sure all these chores will be here when I'm done though.
I sure found out a lot about Alyssa's Radiation this week when I wasn't there - like - the first Monday appt wasn't an actual radiation appt. Got marked and they did a dry run but no radiation was done. Also there is still a question as to whether or not we owe a copay at each appt. We were told yes, the office keeps saying they don't believe so. So far no one has given us a definitive answer. Alyssa was supposed to meet with Dr. Liem on Monday but he wasn't in so she met with Dr. Wong on Tuesday. She really likes Dr. Wong. I hope we can meet with him from now on. Oh, and because the Radiation Center was closed on Friday, we have to go for this coming full week and then the following monday so we won't be done until July 13th. DARN - we were hoping to be all done by July 9! Off to clean off the table and make some soap.

Post Op Update/Radiation Update.

For those of you who don't know yet - I'm home - got to come home late yesterday afternoon after surgery. I was wheeled in at 7:30am and I came too around 12:00. They only took out 1/2 the Thyroid and the nodule so it doesn't appear that they were overly concerned about it's being cancer. They sent the nodule to pathology and we should have results in about a week or so.
Aly is officially half done with radiation at this point and other than it makes her tired she's doing very well with it. I'm very proud of her. WE will be done with radiation on July 10.
My mom has had the kids this week and Aaron has been with me the whole time spoiling me rotten (there may be no living with me after this one - JUST KIDDING!!!) I am ready to get back to normal life already. I have more or less been asleep or reading from the time I got home till now and I'm finally starting to feel like a normal human again.