Random thoughts and updates.

We're so glad it's cooling off. Don't get me wrong, we LOVE Summer but we're ready for it to cool off. I love the change of seasons. I truly enjoy each one! I had my doctor apt. to make it official that the pneumonia is GONE! While we were there Luke had his preschool check-up. WOW. He was so good, I was so proud of him! He tends to be shy and hide behind our leg. Well not that day, he had to do a standard eye test and he was so good. It was just cute. Luke will start preschool this Thursday. We are very excited. It's not "hard" for me, it's just weird to think that he's big/old enough for this next phase of his life. I think part of why I don't think that this is sad or difficult to see him go is because like I told Mike, I'm just glad to be here to see it. I'm not in a hurry for him to grow up but I'm anxious to be here and to see him do all those "firsts!" I'm just grateful to be HERE! He seems pretty excited about it, a bit leery. Luke doesn't just jump in with both feet when it comes to something new. So the first few days could be interesting. I'll keep you updated on how it goes.

I wish that I would post more often but my mind flip flops from one thing to another and it's hard for me to organize my thoughts enough to get them down into something halfway understandable. I feel like I need to go back to the days of high school and write and outline before I start typing. Ironic, I used to hate to have to do those outlines! Everything has been going well for us. I finished round #12 just before Labor Day so only two more left. As much as I've been so anxious to be done now I'm kind of nervous about being done. At my last Dr. apt. they told us that chemo often just makes brain tumors go dormant temporarily. So now I'm thinking maybe chemo isn't that bad at least we're doing something, being proactive right?! I'm kind of feeling like okay so now we just let this thing go and run ramped and then deal with it! No. That's not cool. Yes, I know have Faith. Well to be quite honest I've always had Faith that this would not take my life but I'm human and I'm weak at times. The other thought always on my mind is that I truly did not think "this" was going to take Leslie's away from her family either. I was reading a story last night about a guy who passed away to cancer and his wife wrote about how he was so positive and felt so sure that God would not take him away from his family. So, what the heck! Is this feeling of safety and security that God will allow me to be HERE with my family just a false sense of security???? Yeah, so I've had some questions for God here lately. I have been trying to remember some of the brain tumor survivor stories I found and stay thinking that I'm going to be one of those survivors.

Right now Luke is blowing a trumpet in my face! Yes, a real trumpet! Thanks to Rick's (my mom's friend) sister Barbara! :) He loves it and just got it last night. I'm hoping the excitement wears off very soon! Thanks (I think) Barbara !!! :)

One thing about being done with treatment that I am looking forward to is starting to shed these unwanted pounds that have come along with it!!!! I'm eating better than I ever have in my life and I'm chubbier than I've ever been too! Go figure. I've really tried to be "okay" with this end of it but it wears on a girl. Trust me, I know that it's small in the big picture but it's still hard for me at times. We recently had some family pictures done and they are very nice but it's hard for me to see myself, It's like I don't even recognize myself. Especially when I look back at our family pictures from two years ago, you wouldn't even know it was the same person. So hopefully being done with treatment will allow me some more energy to be able to get back in shape!

Oh, by the way we are now in the goldfish business! Luke "won" six fish at the fair. So after they lived in a cooking bowl for a week with no food we decided that they might actually make it and bought a fish tank and food. Luke loves it. We don't. We were laughing about it the other day and we were saying how it would have been cheaper to just go buy the fish at Wal-Mart as to playing those games at the fair! Oh-well.

On a heavier note, today the Grisier family has a big day and I hope that you can add them all to your prayers. Please pray for a successful surgery that is the first step to complete recovery.

Also, someone very near and dear to us on Mike's side of our family is going to have a biopsy this next week and we are praying that we will find that this "area" is NOT cancerous. I will update with more later.

Have a great week.

Love,
Jess