Back to school

Well, it's that time again...time to head back to school. We had a long summer vacation this year and I got to spend all of it with Gil. Was it good? eh...we had a few moments, but most of it was good.

Best thing has been exercising together. I would run while he would ride his bike. I / we have really seen an improvement in his energy level. Although, now that summer is over, I don't know how we will get through our days without a nap!

Ok, evidently I have this nack for overloading myself so to speak. This year is no exception. I am PAST president of PALMS (Pinellas Association for Library Media (or inforMation) Specilaists), so that takes a little off my plate, but I will still be involved. But this year my big project is Team in Training...training for the Disney 1/2 marathon (13.1 miles) in January 2008.
OK - here is the letter I sent out to everyone I had an address for...

OK kids, well, I’ve gone and done it again. I’ve entered myself in another race for a good cause. This time it’s a little more personal.

I’ve joined the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society’s Team in Training, the world's largest endurance sports training program that helps raise funds for research of blood borne cancers. I will be training for the Disney 1/2 marathon in January.

This will be the first time I’ve run with a group, let alone been “properly” trained for any event. I’m excited and a little nervous, but I figure, if Gil can endure 4 months of Chemo, 2 months of radiation and come out of it as well as he did, I can endure 13 miles.

But it’s not about me; it’s about those who are living with cancer. It’s about people like Gil, TNT’s honored teammates and all of us whose lives have been touched by cancer. It’s about the research so there will be new, better treatments, maybe even a cure. Imagine a world without cancer.

To train for this race I need to raise funds. This is where I need your help. I have a goal of $2,400, which is due by December 28th. 75% of the funds raised goes toward research, education, services and support to patients and families battling these cancers. Donations can be made safely online through the website, or you can send me a check that I will send them in.

My donation site is http://www.active.com/donate/tntscfl/CSterling.
While you are on the site, take a look around and check out what TNT and the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society is all about.

If sending a check, make it out to “The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society” with my name in the memo section.

I will do my best to keep you up to date on my fundraising and training.

Thank you for your help, prayers, and joining me on my journey. Together we can save lives, one mile at a time.

I will leave this entry at that. My next entry should be around Nov. 7th after Gil's CAT scan. Maybe sooner...the TNT kick off party is this Saturday. If anything interesting happens, I'll try to let you know.

Much love to all!

Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, ... let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Hebrews 12:1

Catching up...

OK, I realize I put St. Augustine ahead of some other things, so it's time to back peddle a bit.
Before we left there were a few other things we had done...

Creating our little Zen garden. Took some work...digging up all the old plants, rocks, trees; getting the fountain (and fixing a hole in it), putting in plants, trees, sand...and making it all work (priceless).


We also recently attended WAMP...our church's Worship Arts Ministry Picnic. Lots of fun, music and FOOD! The Lupton's Boggy Bottom Ranch in Plant City was quite a place and they put out quite a spread - mac & cheese, BBQ chicken, pulled pork, hot dogs, cole slaw, and people brought desserts (Gil made some great lemon cupcakes while I was patching the fountain). Free food, Jason!
They did water balloon tosses, hula hoop contest, sing-along and just a bunch of water fun.




Some just kind of made up games of their own.

SO, that's the stuff we did BEFORE St. Augustine.

Hello from St. Auggie

St. Augustine that is. Yup, this year for our "vacation" we decided to check out St. Augustine. We didn't quite get to do EVERYthing due to some weather, but we did a fair bit. We went on one of those little trolley tours, the alligator farm and on a walking ghost tour (well, I thought I was getting one of the trolley tours "Ghosts & gravestones" but, I signed us up for the wrong thing).







We also went to the lighthouse (that's where we had the tornado warning), then a little shopping down St. George street and the fort De San Marcos.



We had the dogs with us so we did some other things too, like walking to the Nombre de Dios park where the Spanish are said to have landed.



Well, tomorrow we head home. Feel kind of bad we didn't get to do more, but not sure we could have. Anyway, it's time to go take the dogs for a walk before going to bed. I hope to run tomorrow morning..should be fun!
c'ya

New Addition

OK, well, to start with, Gil had his PET scan and Dr. follow-up. All is good, so far. Because Dr. Ball in on maternity leave, Gil saw a partner who is new to the practice. He was a little rough feeling the lymph nodes on Gil and prefers CAT scans. So, Gil will be doing a CAT scan sometime in November, which means he has to drink these nasty little shakes that he has a really hard time with. Oh well, such is health care. Hopefully Dr. Ball will be back in time for his next follow-up.

In other news, Jason has flown home to Hong Kong. We don't know if this is permanent, but we think he would be happier if he can attend a College/University closer to home.

Gil and I went on our second paintball adventure. I got popped a couple of times, once when we weren't even in play. Those unexpected shots will give you a new respect for our troops overseas - it can happen anytime! I'll still be darned if I didn't get anyone out! It would be much more fun if I knew I shot someone. Does that sound wrong?

Now, as for the new addition, no I wasn't referring to the post as a new addition. We have adopted Christian, our church cat. He is a beautiful and very healthy Siamese, about 5 years old, and is trying very hard to figure out who is "boss" of our animal pack. I think he beginning to figure out that the dogs rule around here - sort of. If he picks a fight with Cleo, he may get a real good look at the dogs because that is THEIR kitty. Anyway, they are figuring things out.

School is quickly coming to an end. We are still working on inventory in the library. Advanced Placement testing is happenings all this week, then final exams are Thursday & Friday, with Graduation on Monday May 21. I have my summer projects kind of planned out. And in June (10 - 13) we will be taking the pups on vacation with us.

My Aunt Ruth is being taken care of by hospice. We don't know how much longer she will be with us, but I pray she is pain free. I know she doesn't like the way she is having to live right now, so ... I'm not sure what to hope for. I guess that her passing comes quickly and painlessly - she deserves to be free of all this.

Overdue for an update

Um...I guess I've been a little busy. I didn't realize how long it had been since I did an update.
Anyway, Gil is doing fine. He went for blood work early February, all is good. His Dr. (Dr. Ball) is pregnant and due sometime soon, so she is on leave. I'm not sure who will do the follow up after his PetScan on April 30th. I'm sure it will all go well though.

OK, on to some big news.
The print shop is closing after 26 years of service. It appears they have sold the business, and will be "closing" on April 13th. The new owners will be moving in April 30th or officially taking over May 1 (same difference, right). Gil is looking forward to some much needed time off before he worries about what to do next. He's looking, checking options, he applied for a job with the school system, but he's not really on the hunt just yet.

We have recently discovered the joys of Paintball! We even have our own markers (guns) and the whole set-up. We played for the first time March 31st and had a blast! It was a few people from church and us (Jason, Gil, me (Carol), David, John, and Sterling (our other nephew)). That was at the end of my spring break.

Jason is finishing up his first year of college. I'm so used to knowing how he was doing in High School, now I just have to count on him for how he's doing in college, but he is his own worst critic (in other words, he always thinks he's doing bad). He is looking forward to going home May 5th and is trying to get into a college back home or in Australia. We wish him all the best.

I'm dealing with the end of school. SRI (reading) testing for the month of April, last Principal's Brunch on the 18th, PALMS (Pinellas Association of Library Media Specialists) end of the year banquet on the 26th (of which I am president, but get to turn it all over to a new board), Senior Breakfast on May 11th, and last but not least INVENTORY (wwweeeeeeeee)!

Well, that's all the breaking news for now. Until May 8th after Gil's follow-up, TTFN!!

Happy Holy-days

As Christmas fast approaches (it’s Christmas eve as I write this), I’ve come to realize a couple of things.

First I want to apologize to all our friends & family for not sending out Christmas cards….again! I want you to know we do think of you often. To our family & friends here in Florida to family in New Jersey, Maryland, and Canada, across the country to California and anywhere our friends have ended up in between and the many kids we’ve hosted from overseas in Spain, Macedonia, Korea, Japan and the one in Hong Kong, we want to send much love and many Christmas wishes.

I also want to say, women who work and still keep the home are truly my heroes; especially those who have kids and go to school along with everything else. How you keep a home relationship is beyond me. Just trying to work and keep things running well at home has become so hard! Being dept. head for the library at school, President of PALMS (Pinellas Association of Media Specialists or inforMation Specialists), running, and just plain ol’ housework (including Gil & Jason)…. I can’t keep things organized. I wonder, now, how I kept it together last year when Gil was going through his treatments.

By the way, he is doing wonderfully. He sang in the church cantata (I helped with sound) and has been working on re-wiring the band set-up at church. Today we are hanging out with the McReynolds as there are 4 services at church today so, why bother going home to Clearwater when we just need to drive back to Tampa within a few hours.

But, back to the whole Christmas thing; I do want to thank everyone again for your support and love. We have really had a rough couple of years – Jason, 4 hurricanes, parents left “homeless” for 10 months, the loss of Nikita, Gil’s diagnosis and treatments, getting Jason through school and into college, I’m just muddling along, but we could not have done any of it without the support of our friends and family. We love you all very much.

Well, this may be a more personal blog on my side, but it's done; we are home, it's late, and it's time to go to bed.

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!

Happy Thanksgiving!!

Happy Thanksgiving!!
Well, on Thursday, Nov. 23 I ran the 5K Turkey Trot (known as the "WingDing") in 28 minutes 41 seconds (4 minutes faster than last year). Then Gil and I went home, cleaned up and headed to SouthPort Square in Pt. Charlotte to celebrate Thanksgiving with Mom & Dad, cousing Jim and Aunt Ruth. Jason decided to stay home and take care of the dogs.

December 1st was the Anniversary Gil's first Chemo session. It came and went without much notice. But as he says, "hopefully we'll never have to do it again". We are all very thankful that it is done and over with, and that Gil is in good health to this day.

Well, December is a very busy month....Christmas performances, holiday parties, shopping, taking kids to the airport, and picking them up (ok, that's in Jan, but...), Christmas services, anniversary...oh, yeah....

December 21st we will be celebrating our 15th wedding anniversary. Jason will be heading home Dec. 13th - we are very happy he will be able to spend the holidays with his friends and family in Hong Kong. We will be done with our Christmas cantata at church and on break from work by the time we celebrate our anniversary, so we are spending two nights at Inn at the Bay, a bed & breakfast in St. Petersburg. It will be a nice break, but we will also be looking forward to Jan...sort of.

Happy Halloween

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!

Well, Gil had his PET scan last Thursday. Monday he had his follow up with the Dr. and....YAHOO!!!....he is ahead of schedule. In fact, he won't have another PET scan until March (but he will continue to have blood work done every three months). There was even more significantly less swelling in the lymph nodes around the neck (ok, how many are there and how big are they supposed to be anyway?). So he is healing wonderfully, and his blood work looks great, which makes us very happy. Now, that wasn't so scary, was it?

Race for the cure

OK, I know it was a while back (Oct. 7th) and I'm not thrilled at the pictures (Running really isn't a glamorous sport), but I figured I would go ahead and make the post. On Oct. 7th I did the "Race for the Cure": a 5K to raise money for the Susan G. Koman foundation for Breast Cancer awareness. I'm #24; Geri Craven (the other orange shirt #26) was my partner representing Seminole High.
I know I did the run in 32 minutes (which is pretty good considering there were about 10,000 people probably in the race; walking & running!).

Fun, fun, fun!

Umm… don't ask who the guy is, we really don't know...he was just an innocent bystander who looked into the lens at an inopportune time.

It is Finished!?

Well, sort of.
The port is now out. The last vestiges of cancer treatment are gone. The only thing left is the scar on his chest and the patch of hair missing on the back of his head. Now, all we have to deal with are the follow-up exams - Oct. 24th is his next PET scan.
Such fun. I will try to get pictures soon...

De-ported?

That's what Gil keeps calling it. On August 24th around 10am, Gil will officially be rid of all remnants of cancer treatment - he gets the port out. YEAH! We are very excited about all this.

In the meantime, we now have to figure out how to keep his blood pressure up and his triglycerides (a component of cholesterol) down. Is that possible? Should be fun.

TTFN!

Free & Clear

"Free at last, free at last. Thank God Almighty, I'm free at last"
OK, Gil didn't say that (Martin Luther King Jr. did), but I think that's how he felt when Dr. Ball gave him the all clear. There is some swelling of lymph node(s) in the neck area but is suspected to be scarring and dormant, so he is cured. Now we are just waiting for an appointment to get the port out, and from here on out, it's just a matter of follow up exams (3 months until his next PET scan & Dr. appt).
So, CELEBRATE!
It's Over!

Oh, sorry...no pics yet. My goal is to get one of Gil & I, and one of David in his pretty pink cast (which will be sometime next week?).

About David...

OK, I promised a pic of Gil, but haven't managed it yet (someone out there also wants to see my hair and how it's grown, so...)... I will get it in time.

In the meantime...some "Breaking News"...Literally!
David broke his right ankle just a few hours ago while skateboarding. It seems he "dropped in" on the 4' half pipe (pike?) and, well, we're not really sure but we guess he came off the board on the slope. Anyway, at this time it looks to be a compound fracture and there will be surgery involved. Please pray for him and his family. He was supposed to be starting marching band this year, but now, will probably be out of commission about 2 months or more.

If you would like to send him anything, let us know. Also, if you do contact him, send him good, positive messages. He has already said he is giving up skateboarding, but he was also probably in a bit of shock at the time. I hate to see him give up an activity because of injury.

When you fall off the horse, ya' gotta pick yourself up, dust your self off and get right back on!

PET scan done!

PET scan is done. All went well...except for a couple of sore shoulders. Now we just wait for the results - which we won't get until July 31st when he has his follow-up appointment.
Please pray that all goes well, we can schedule to have the port removed, and resume a somewhat normal life.
Thank you all, again, for your prayers and support. Keep it comin'...we're not quite through yet.
Next post...I promise to have a pic of Gil (you gotta see his "new" hair).

re-schedule

The CAT scan/PET scan machine got fried in a lightning storm yesterday, so Gil's appointment has been moved to Friday the 14th (oooohhh...sounds almost scary).
He's one of about 10 people that needed to be rescheduled. Bummer...we were so looking forward to getting this done and scheduling the follow-up.
Waaaaa!

What we have been up to...

Ah the lazy day's of summer. Not much to do and no time schedule to get things done. I know I haven't posted in a while, but not much has been really going on. Let's see...

We painted/remodeled one of our bathrooms...





I (Carol) turned 40 on June 11th. That week I ran sound for VBS (vacation bible school) at our church...






That weekend we "demo'd" the youth room at church...







Then this last week of June we had David over for a skateboard camp at a skate park nearby (688 Skate park)....


And the small things like taking "training" classes, helping Jason get registered for classes at St. Petersburg College, Cleo (cat) having a massive urinary infection (pill & fluid therapy...I get to stick the cat with a needle...ewwww), having lunch with Gil at the print shop, Gil running the music for July 2nd service at church.

This week is July 4th - Happy Independence Day! Happy Birthday USA!! And July 5th is Gil's Birthday - Woo Hoo. Then on the 6th, he goes in for his PET scan...hopefully THE test that will bring us good news that this cancer ordeal is over.

Hope your having as much fun as we are!

Good News!

Now, for some really good news! Gil had his follow up appointment with the radiologist and he says everything looks very good. If there is anything there, he can't feel it. Gil does need to use moisturizer on the area, but that's about it. So - the radiologist say's he's clean! *sigh*

But that is not the definitive test. July 6th is the Pet Scan and those results will tell us what is next, if anything. So, hold your breath just a little longer...it's almost over.

Greetings from Key West

I finally got a chance to sign on and we are preparing to leave. Probably just as well I didn't sit on this thing all day. I am writing to you from a place called Bad A** Coffee drinking a frozen coffee thing and Gil is watching Law and Order on a flat screen. If there is air conditioning, I can't tell.
Anyway...here are a few pics....

Jason's graduation...YEAH!!

Just a few pics of Jason's big day... I couldn't get him to take the gown off (especially after he got a discount at Steak-n-Shake). Sorry - I couldn't get the pictures in the order they were taken - besides, he say's I don't take enough pics! HA!

The Mask

No, we are not talking about the Jim Carrey movie...but, silly me, I should have waited before making the previous post for this...

Jason had fun trying on Gil's radiation mask.

It's not quite what I expected, but now I understand what he meant about being locked down to a table. You can see the markings where he is supposed to get radiated in the second pic.
~WOW~!