Spring at the Farm

Everything is blooming at the farm. Last weekend we got busy weeding and planting and making sure everything gets off to a good start for the growing season. I didnt get any pics of the kale and broccoli but they are about an inch tall! And so far the slugs have not gotten to them.

I've planted Kale, broccoli, cauliflower, brussels sprouts, beets, peas, zucchini, radishes, lettuces, spinach and arugula. Next weekend is cabbage, onions, leeks, shallots, beans, carrots, celery, etc. It's time!

Here are some pics of what is budding out right now!

Roses

Flowering Quince

Current

Arugula

Rhubarb

Pear Tree

Both pear trees are blooming

Got Kit this new flag for Christmas - it's huge and lovely!

Weeded out the raspberry beds

Blueberries are flowering like crazy

Apple blossoms! Woop woop!

Life is fantastic, isn't it?

My sister sent me this video yesterday, and it is so charming that I had to share it. I hope you love it too!

Checking in about Check ups

Sorry. Long time no bloggy - lot's to catch up on.

Friday the 28th of March was our big doctor's appointment where I learned everything there is to know about my particular breast cancer. And the first thing I learned is that there are lots and many and more than one kind of breast cancer. Some are estrogen based, some are lobular, some are ductal, you can read all over the internets about all the many many varieties. I only cared to learn about mine. Let me tell, after 2 long weeks of waiting to find out what and how bad my breast cancer was, the 28th could not have come soon enough, and at the same time I would have been ok with that day never coming. Ah, life. 

So, what I learned: My breast cancer is apparently exactly what my Mom's breast cancer was last year. Her2 Positive. That diagnosis 20 years ago would have been quite scary. Today, however, they know just about everything there is to know about it, other than why we get it. It is a ductal invasive type of cancer, and the Her2 positive means it has a protein based receptor that is aggressive - or something like that. Ok, before I go further I need to tell you that I don't officially know what the hell I'm talking about. So if you are they type of person that needs some scientific documentation, then get on line and look it up. I just listened to my doctor and tried to remember a couple of basic details, and I have NO INTENTION of jumping online to read more. I got it OK, and now let's deal with it, and move on. Any additional anecdotes of how mean this cancer is just wont do me a bit of good. I'm going with the basics. The doc says it responds super well to the drug therapy and we can kick it's ass. And that, my friends, is the action we are taking.

This is how it's going down. I start chemo tomorrow. Every other week for 8 weeks I get a combo of Adriamycin and Cytoxan - then when that is done I get Taxol I believe and that goes for something like once a week for 12 weeks. At the same time, every third week, I get Herceptin (for the Her2 protein) along with a new shiny drug called Perjita. After the 12 weeks I get a 4 week rest, then I have surgery. Surgery will either be a lumpectomy or a mastectomy - all depends on how well my tumor responded to treatment along with how the docs and we feel about the options. The lumpectomy can leave me with a 3-4% rate of reocurrance, while the mastectomy is more of a 1-2%  rate. I think we will cross that bridge when we come to it, because as of today I would say both those %'s are low, and a lumpectomy seems so less invasive - but again, I might feel differently in the summer. Decide later. Will also meet with a reconstructive doc to help get all the info. After surgery and the healing if surgery, I will start a program of radiation. That goes 7 weeks, every day M-F but it's a short appointment and doesn't have too lousy of side effects. After that, I will continue Herceptin until next year at this time. I know - it's a long haul. But, the first 12 weeks are the most harsh, and it lightens up after that. Because my mom just went thru this exact protocol, I can tell you that it hopefully wont be so bad. My mother is the original IRON LADY, but still, if I got anything from her (other than the bad gene for Her2 Pos), it is the tough cookie gene. I should be fine. Also, I understand that the drugs they give me to tolerate the chemo are so good now, that most of the time, people wont even know that I'm doing it. 

So, before I start chemo (tomorrow), I had to do a bunch of tests. First thing Monday, I needed a biopsy of my closest lymph node. They wanted to understand if the cancer had gone there. Luckily the biopsy was cancer free - so really good sign. Tuesday, I had a port installed below my collarbone. This is where all the chemo drugs will go in my body. It's pretty alien, but from a tech standpoint, it's a good thing. I don't want my arms all needled up over the year, so a port is a good way to administer drugs on a repeated basis. It is sort of weird and not that comfortable (yet) but I'm guessing I will adjust to it. It has a little spaghetti tube that goes up and into my vein and down toward my heart... apparently works like a champ. Ugh. Then on Wednesday I had to have a heart scan - the chemo drugs can make your heart pump slower, so they like to get a baseline of heart operations before I start. Mine is strong. I'm good. Then finally on Thursday I had a PET scan. That is just a different kind of scan to look at the tumor. I am part of a research study on imaging - so I will get more PET scans along the way. Then, finally on Thursday I met with my main nurse Kay, who gave me all the ins and outs about chemo and how it might make me feel and what kind of awesome things I can expect to happen. Things like nausea, hair loss, mouth sores, dry skin, constipation, acid reflux, early onset menopause, the worry of fever or infection - you know..the good stuff. Jesussssssssss- So, as of today, I'm pretty much ready.

Which brings me back to the subject of hair loss! On Friday I went wig shopping with my friend Mo. She has had a couple of friends that have had to go thru chemo, so she knew the right place to go in Seattle. We had an appointment at the William Collier Salon in Belltown. They are known for treating hair loss patients - whether from chronic conditions or chemo. They know what they are doing and were very nice. It was a big fat reality check though - even if all the medical stuff is scary, it's the vanity stuff that really makes me want to cry about it. The idea of shaving off all my hair because it's going anyway, and getting a wig and the potential of having no eyebrows or eyelashes for a freaking year - ugh, kind of gut wrenching. But, the good side is this.... I can order a wig with real hair and a real looking scalp, and they will match my color and my style of hair, so hopefully the transition will fool people. And, it will be much better to be prepared than to wake up some morning in the next 2 weeks to find all my hair on my pillow and not on my head - I called them yesterday and got that ordered. It's enormously expensive, but when I factor in all the cut and color appointments I will miss in the next year, I'm getting more and more ok with the $2,000 price tag. Seriously, it's good hair. And the time I can save in getting ready in the morning will be really helpful when I have to figure out how to draw on eyebrows. (LORD HELP ME!) 

Ok, so now you are fully up to date on "the cancer" - and I will get on with more interesting posts. 

NOW GO GET A MAMMOGRAM!

Arizona Golf

A few weeks ago we shot down to Phoenix for a little golf weekend. We stayed in a friends condo and planned to do nothing but play golf and get some sunshine. The weather was perfect, between 80 and 85 the whole time. We played on Saturday at Whirlwind Golf Course, which is near the Sheraton Resort in Chandler (or near Chandler). It was fine  -  not the most fancy, but the course was in good shape and the weather was great.

On Sunday we played at Las Sendas Golf Club in Mesa - which we loved. It was a really beautiful course along the hillside which is just so much more beautiful then the flat flat desert area of Chandler. I think we figured out that in future trips we will try to stick toward the more hilly terrain.

During our round on Sunday, I tried to cut over a little desert area to the green on one hole, and landed my ball right in a little rocky patch of desert. As I was searching around for it, I ran RIGHT INTO A RATTLESNAKE. Luckily, he wanted nothing to do with me, so he ran one way at about the same time I ran hysterically the other way. WOW! Insty-high blood pressure. Needless to say, I left my ball there and took a drop. And hit my next shot like crap because I was a total freaky snake hater. Whaaaaaaa- I've never seen a rattlesnake in real life before - kind of interesting, looking back, and having not been bitten. I wondered later why I hadn't seen any signs that said "Hey lady, there might be snakes, watch yourself!!!!" Super fun course though, and we'd go back there for sure.

Eating in Phoenix - not the best. It's an entire city of chain restaurants. We found a hole-in-the-wall brekkie place on Saturday am. Saturday night we drove up to Scottsdale to meet a friend at  Central Bistro for dinner. It was perfectly fine for Phoenix. Lots of "cougars" at the bar - haha. Well, maybe not cougars but chicks that were way more tight and naked than you see in Seattle. We giggled at the men too, in their uniforms of long sleeved shirts and jeans with tricked out back pockets - and gelled hair. Arizona is pretty funny.

On Sunday night we found a super hole in the wall authentic Mexican food place in Chandler. The atmosphere was pretty bad - a cross between dirty sticky kids and crazy looking men with side-arms. Well, maybe not side-arms, but seemed really likely. The food was pretty ok, but we were starving, so I might be going easy on them. I had shrimp tacos, Kit has pulled pork something - good enough.

Thanks Phoenix, for a quick weekend. See ya next time. 

Back to the Island

A few months back, I showed you the piece of live edge wood we bought in October for the top of our island at the condo. For about 8 weeks it sat at the place we got it - drying out. Then in December or January, we picked it up and since then it's been sitting in the garage at the farm, waiting for us start sanding it and making it island ready.

So, we got out the sanders, and got out the circular saw, and this project has BEGUN!!! First things first, we needed a new blade for the saw. We started out with the one we had, turned out that blade was USELESS, so we remedied that pretty fast. We also needed a chalk line so we could get a clear idea of what and where we wanted to cut. The funny thing about starting projects...... the minute you start you also start changing your mind. Originally I was planning to only have one side of the island with the raw edge, but as we kept drawing lines and trying to decide how we wanted it, we ended up liking the raw edge on both sides, so that's what we are doing now. 

We did cut across both ends for a nice finished end, and we've started with the first rough sand, 60 grit, to get rid of the original saw marks from the mill. Even after just the rough sand, it's starting to looks so pretty. I can't wait until it's done and in the condo. It will be beautiful in there.

Here are a few pics of the beginning of this project.

As is, upside down, drying out more in our garage.

Closer view

Guide lines and changing our minds

New blade

First pass at the sanding

Really starting to look pretty!

This weekend, forecast is completely crap, so will spend quality time with sander. Can't wait!

MRI or MR (cry)

On Wednesday I went in for my MRI. This is the first step in determining if my cancer is anywhere other than where it's been detected already by my mammo, ultrasound and biopsy. It's not a scary appointment unless you are an emotional wreck (which coincidentally I am!)

I got to SCCA (Seattle Cancer Care Alliance) at 11:15 - right on time. I've noticed at SCCA, they are pretty unlike normal doctors offices. They are the most efficient bunch of people ever. No waiting around wondering when they are going to call you, they are ON IT! So, I get in there, get my ID bracelet, fill out some papers, get called back immediately to change clothes in their little changing/locker area.

Then I go into a room with 3 dividers and a couple of nice nurses. Met 2 of them and absolutely have no idea what their names were because I was starting down the path of freaking out. And it's just basically a waiting room with cookies and juice. Holy crap! Get it together lady!

So, turns out, I get an IV put in for this, news to me. Apparently more for me to get nervous about. IV in with no prob - pheww. Chat with nurse, then sit and wait and try not to shake from nervousness. Then spend 5-10 minutes trying not to cry. WHAT? I know, grow up!  And this is not even close to a procedure that would require crying, this thing is all about just laying there. So, even though I knew that much, I was still hard pressed not to cry. After a couple of "buck-up self talks", I was ok. 

Then I got called into the MRI room. They asked me first what kind of music I wanted. I wasn't prepared, so I said whatever you have on is fine. So they gave me ear plugs because the MRI machine is going to be loud. Then I took off my shoes and hopped up on this contraption. And while you can't get a good idea from the picture, you can guess immediately where your boobs go on this thing. It basically looks like 2 giant cup holders for your "thirsty-two ouncer" or "supertanker" at 7 eleven. So, up I go, tit's in the holders, arms out like superman, headphones on, lame new age country music playing, panic button in hand and a few instructions to NOT MOVE for the next 30-40 minutes, and we're off. 

This is the contraption, and that's what I was doing. Good times. (ps, no that's not me!!)

It's pretty noisy - while it takes rapid fire images, bam bam bam bam bam - which I think are sort of like a bunch of cross cuts of your body in a bunch of directions. There are intervals of 1 or 2 or 5 minutes or so, and the tech person checks on me after each time, and gives me ideas of what's next and if it's going to be louder or shaky or hot. About halfway through they give me an injection in the IV that is some sort of thing that makes it easier for them to see my insides. It feels a little tingly at first, but overall not bad at all.

Then it's over. I get off the deal, go back into the nurses area, sit for 15 minutes to make sure I don't have any reaction to the injection, and then I get dressed and get out of there. All in a days doctor visit. 

I'm pretty sure that every "new" thing I have to do in the coming weeks will be scary, because I'm just not used to being in a hospital or doctors office - oh, and plus when someone says "you have cancer" - it really is fucking scary - and even if it's just the lightest version of cancer - it's still SUPER FUCKING SCARY. And that's enough about cancer for today.

We're going with friends up to the Teanaway this weekend, so expecting to get outside in the air for some snowshoeing our hiking - and will try to freaking relax. This god-damn cancer thing goes everywhere with me - it's exhausting. 

Have a good weekend!

Must all Blog Posts be Pleasing?

I read a lot of blogs. In fact, I really love reading blogs about furniture, fashion, DIY, lifestyle, interior design, travel and pretty much everything that is awesome and inspiring about what people are doing with their creative energy. 

I also notice that people are sharing the news of their lives between these posts about lipstick, or lamps or the lastest whatever. Most of the news is about babies. Seems like most bloggers are in the age of "baby on the way!" Fantastic, and so excited for all these people (who I don't know personally) who are having great things happen.

Does anyone post when the NOT GREAT THINGS happen? I can only point to one blog called - An Inch of Gray where I can recall reading  the most heartbreaking post (a couple of years ago). I had just gotten back from an east coast vacation as a storm was blowing up the coastal areas along the Carolina's and up toward Block Island where we were. I came across this blog post through another blog I was following, and here on the pages were the horrifying and super sad story of a blogger who had just lost her 12 year old boy in a drowning in a swollen creek near their house, during that same storm that I flew out of. It was so sad, and it was the first thing I'd ever read on this woman's blog, so probably not the time to get on board. I felt a lot like I was evesdropping on her tragedy, but then I thought she could probably use LOTS of support from all kinds of people right now, including people she didn't even know. I was cheering for her and wishing her well even if she didn't know it, and maybe that was helping her. I hope so.

What I'm getting at is this; I was planning to publish a blog full of ONLY great things, big and small that had to do with creative projects, DIY projects, farming, city life, etc... I didn't have anything planned that was going to make me wonder if it was appropriate for posting..... but then ALL OF A SUDDEN things changed big time for me and if I don't post this, then I'm a big fraud - one of those life-fakers. One of those people that pretend and edit too much on Facebook so that everyone thinks things are great for them all the time and they also only post pictures where they look the best and have no double chin. But for me, people, from here on out, you're getting the good, the bad and the ugly. And in some posts, all of them at once.

Here's the whopper - Last week, when my postings were non-existent, it was because I got some bad news and my hands were too clammy to type. I was diagnosed with breast cancer. Seriously. I know. Shocking. Here's how it went down. I think it was about 7 months ago when I posted that I'd had a funny mammogram and I had to get get another one and an ultrasound. That confirmed I was clean. So off I went, happy to be free and clear. Well, just a few weeks ago, I was in the shower and I found a lump, right breast, off to the right side at around 10 o'clock on the book dial if your nipple were the middle. So, I watched it for a week, and it didn't really go away, so I called my doctor and she made me see the Breast Specialist at the UW Womens Clinic. She confirmed that I had a lump (or mass, as she said) and marched me over to Seattle Cancer Care Alliance - which is where they do all follow up stuff. When I got there I had a mammogram (which hurts by the way when you have a "mass" in there), then an ultrasound - where they almost made me feel better because they thought it was most likely a cyst or a fibroid tumor. But, to be safe they wanted to do a biopsy, because I am 50, and also because my Mom has had breast cancer. So, good to be safe. I had the biopsy - and waited patiently (or not patiently) for the results. That was last week on Monday, and I got called back with the news on Wednesday am. AND NOT THE NEWS I WAS HOPING FOR. 

I can't really explain what it feels like, this limbo I'm in from hearing the news to understanding how bad or not bad it is, and knowing how to fix it. My next appointment is March 28th, and at that time I will meet my "team" which includes a surgeon and some others. I will also have an MRI and that will tell us more about whether the cancer is just in the one spot (which they say is the normal kind in the normal place - and I think I'm supposed to feel better about that - and I sort of do!) Until then, I just wait and I think adjust to the news. 

So, in the next however long, there might be some posts related to the idea that I actually have cancer. Again - so weird. I'm not at all sick, I've never been sick, I eat right, exercise, and take really good care of myself - and suddenly at age 50, never ever having been sick ever, I am a person that has breast cancer. The news alone is enough to make me puke and shit my pants - often. Oh, and I've been crying a little bit. I think that's probably normal.

I am not going to sugar coat it people, but I'm also not planning to post any of those artistic photos of the reality of surgery, etc. Especially because I'm not quite ready for that yet. Baby steps! Anyway, sorry for the downer news, but if my blog is going to be an authentic representation of what's going on around here, I thought you should know, right now things are a little sketchy! I'll keep you posted on future events, but I might leave out the puking and shitting my pants.

Oh, and ps. Cancer can fuck right off. :)

Tomorrow I promise ordinary stuff, like planting vegetables and doing crafts.