So, I saw this pic on Pinterest...

Decided I loved it and had to try it!

I have an old driftwood plank
that I was gonna stencil our address on
and hang it on the house.
(See guys, I do use those huge pieces
of wood you lug back to the car for me!)

But when I saw this,
I knew I had to use it for that.

So I had my hubby
get L brackets and screws...





And here's what we came up with...
Cool, huh?

I will change it some as I have
some vintage travel posters
of Glacier Park
and the red buses
that I'm gonna frame and hang!
(my cousin is the head guy at the red bus place
and I'm very proud of him!)

Now, on to burlap curtains with sheers!

Roundup Sunday

Kevin was here with the kids this weekend.
Therefore, I got to go to church!

I went to Bro. Jason Murphy's church,
Open Door Baptist Church.

They were having their Annual Roundup Sunday.
I sat there for the entire Sunday School service
when someone came up to me and said,
"We don't normally dress like this..."
"Dress like what?" I reply.
"This is our Roundup Sunday."

Sad thing is...
I didn't even notice.
I felt so at home...

Sadder yet...
I fit right in...
Jean skirt,
western shirt.


...yeah...

...i miss home...

Food Trucks!

Laura and I have a problem!

And it's in the form of a food truck.

The area we are in is about 2 blocks
from the Amazon.com group of buildings.

There's tons of restaurants...
Starbucks,

AND...
a myriad of food trucks on every corner.
Every. Single. Day.

Every kind of food you can think of...
and some you couldn't ever think of.
Chinese, Indian, Vegetarian, Barbecue,
Hamburgers, Tacos, Greek, etc.

So, we make some kind of excuse to go down there,
Something healthy...like the Farmer's Market...
then we walk all around looking for the perfect lunch.

We'll walk blocks, and blocks, and blocks,
checking out all the food trucks
before we make our all important gastronomic decisions!
Then we'll walk all the way back to the ones we like.
Never once complaining about how far we have walked
or all the hills we have had to climb.
(Which we normally complain about daily)

Today I decided on The Grilled Cheese Experience.
Then we went to the last corner and they had...

HOT WINGS!
MY VERY FAVORITE IN THE WORLD!
OMGOODNESS!!!
AND I JUST BOUGHT THAT STUPID
GRILLED CHEESE WITH AVOCADOS
AND GOUDA CHEESE!
ARRGGHHHH!!

I almost had a major meltdown!

But, then I remembered...

THEY'RE HERE EVERYDAY!
(of course, I'll have to walk who knows how far
til I find out where they have parked)
But who cares?
I'll probably lose weight with all this walking!!!!

Yeah, maybe not...

Day 'I Don't Know'

No, I have no idea what the date is.
We don't know what the day of the week is.
Yesterday, Laura thought it was Tuesday,
I thought it was Thursday.
It was Friday...sad...

But the good news is,
we DO know what year it is
and are pretty certain of the month.

We have to know what the day is because:
1.  We have to know if one of our husbands are coming,
      so we can be excited!

2.  We have to know when to tune in to
     streaming sermons!

3.  And, we have to know when the Farmer's Market is.

They give us a little schedule
that tells us what we are doing,
where we are going,
when we are going to be there.
(I say we...I mean her...I just follow along)
It does have the date on it,
but we really just look at it to see
if we get to sleep in the next day or not!
Very important!
We don't bother to look at the date.
Cause it doesn't really matter
Unless...(see above)

Every morning we wake up
to construction going on next door.
Yeah, imagine our glee when we realized
they were gonna be working on the entire
street for the next 2 years!

We get up and make a mad dash
for the shuttle.
The shuttle really is wonderful:
I can drink my coffee on it,
We can sleep on it.
The shuttle driver is Mac!
He's a super nice guy.
Unless, of course, you park
in the shuttle parking!
He then morphs into something scary.

We have the blood draw area figured out.
We get there...
she stands in line to let them know she is there
and I go grab a spot to sit.

Then we go upstairs to the infusion floor.
Beautiful waiting room.
Overlooks Lake Union.
You can sit and watch the pontoon planes
land on the lake. Very peaceful.
Until they call her into one of the rooms
so they can poke her with sharp things.
So she goes in and sleeps
and I go back to the Apt. and sleep.
Yep, we're an exciting group!

Then when they let her go,
I come back and get her,
(not that she needs me to do that,
but, I've usually finished my nap by then).

We walk all over South Lake Union.
We get bored...imagine that.
We actually found a Goodwill store
about 5 blocks from us.
(So, don't blame me if you get used stuff for Christmas.)
And about 10 blocks away
is a whole foods market
that we would camp next to if we could.
It's wonderful!!!
We found a wonderful bakery,
(not good)
and REI is about 8 blocks away.
(which is also not good, considering
their prices.)

We have a rooftop garden.
I love the rooftop garden.
I feel like it's mine.
When I'm up there...
I feel like all Seattle is mine!
Muahahahahahhaa!
Not that I would want all Seattle...
(too noisy, no mountains)
We have little friends on the roof.
They are gray and cute.
And if you feed them,
the apartment house will fine you $250.
They sit and stare at you while you sit there
reading your Bible.
And then they poop all over the roof!
(That kinda takes away from their cuteness...)

Today we are going to
walk all over Lake Union South...
again...
finding new places to spend our money,
new places to eat,
new things to laugh at...
...oblivious of the date, day, time,

...year...

...decade...

...century...

Day 15

It's day 15 and things are more familiar now.
Each day is pretty much the same.

She gives blood in the morning...
then goes to a number of appointments.
You never know how many or where they will be.

They give you a schedule that you have to follow.
They change it sometimes daily.
Everything is dependent on the last blood count
and the last test you had.
So you really can't plan ahead
because you never know if they are going
to change it...which they usually do.

You really aren't in control...they are.
At least that's how you feel if you are a patient.
So when we have a free afternoon
we go for a walk...check out as many
areas as we can.
Our exploration area gets bigger and bigger.
We keep walking a little farther.

I'm learning the lingo...
Infusion, (getting blood)
Conditioning, (that's chemo and irradiation you get
before your stem cell transplant),
Engraftment (this is after the transplant,
still not really sure what it is...I think it's
when your new stem cells begin to take hold).

We have to take classes...
food handling class, which is how to
clean foods, counters, etc.
Nutrition class, so we know what
she can eat and what she can't eat,
Managing Care at Home class, this is
what she can do and what she can't do,
where she can go and where she can't go.
We have to learn how to flush her lines
and how to run the little pump that will
give her fluids so she doesn't dehydrate.
Apparently you can dehydrate even if you
are drinking enough water.

All in all it is quite a different life altogether.
A life that you aren't in charge of...
A life where you don't feel in control...
yet, you are there because you want to be.
The SCCA is crowded with people
that one hundred years ago would
not have had a chance at life.
But now, their chances are very good!

First Week

I have been in Seattle for 6 days now
with a friend who is having a stem cell transplant.

They take her own stem cells out...
pretty much kill everything else going on in the body...
then put the healthy stem cells back in.
Pretty amazing.
I'm getting quite an education.
And a healthy respect
for the people going thru this.

There is a home you can stay in.
We're now in the Pete Gross house
after being in the SCCA House for a week.
Each house has a rooftop garden.
The SCCA House is like a motel.
But they have kitchens downstairs
for patients to use.
After you are done...everything
has to be sanitized.
We decided it wasn't really worth it!
And luckily, her grandma lives in town
and sends new meals every day!
The Pete Gross House is like a little apartment.
Kitchen and all!
But Grandma still sends food every day.
Bless her little heart!

SCCA stands for Seattle Cancer Care Alliance.
They're world renown
and I can see why.

They have their business down to a "T".
They treat the patients and caregivers
very well.
There's nutrition centers everywhere.
That's a little mini kitchen with all
kinds of snacks...for free!
(And not always nutritious...which is a good thing)

We spent the first of this week
waiting for her blood counts to go up
so they could begin to harvest her cells.

She has to be at the clinic every morning
to have blood taken.
after that, she waits an hour
to find out what the counts were.
Then she had to have a shot
to help her counts go up.
Then usually she had to have
blood or platelets put in.
This takes quite awhile.

When her counts were good,
it was time for harvesting or collecting.
That was a celebrating time!

So the first day of collecting
she was at the clinic for 12 hours,
way longer than we thought.
We had to move into the new house,
so I had to run all over getting keys,
packing up stuff, going back and forth
between houses.
I also managed to leave my purse
on one of the shuttles.
Almost had a major 
meltdown at this point.
But the shuttle guy brought my purse back.
I almost kissed him and gave him all the money in my purse!
(Not really on the kissing, and giving him all the money
in my purse would actually be the opposite of being grateful!)

Once we got in the new apartment
things smoothed out a little.
Her uncle brings us stuff from the store
as well as the cooked meals from her grama.
He has a jaguar...
I got to ride in it today,
and get to ride in it tomorrow.
Pretty much the highlight of my week...month...year...
well, you get the idea.

We have managed to do a couple of fun things.
We went to a little coffee place called Row House
and had a Iced Hazelnut Mocha...and...
we finished a 500 piece puzzle in about 2 hours.
Yes, we are a wild bunch!

We are both struggling with the fact
that we are without our families
and find we don't have a lot of drive
to do anything that we normally like to do.
She has an excuse to feel that way...I don't.
But its getting easier
and we are sure to spend plenty of time
in God's Word and we are praying
every day before going to the clinic.
She's very brave
and treats every day
as if she's going to the office
for a day of work!

In The News

So apparently they just finished up
a very lengthy, expensive study
and found out that if you let your children
watch filthy stuff on TV...
they'll become promiscuous
at an earlier age!

Wow! Really?

I could have told them that for half the price!

Also, in the news...
They found a 600 year old bra!
Yep! This is apparently news.

Looks like one of mine!



You heard it here first!