Monday March 19th

We are back from Salt Lake and had a blast! I took the kids over with my Mom to see my sister Toni and her husband Doug. On Wednesday night when I got the mail I had received this care package from a new friend I met in Oklahoma. Robyn had both her daughters Katelyn's and Madelyn's school classes and Katelyn's activity girls group at church write me get well cards. This was so neat. Kids are the cutest. They say the cutest things like your a great gal, cute little knock knock jokes, god is with you, don't be afraid, I love you, our prayers are with you, you're brave. I love it. Oh the faith of a child. I wish we could all be like that. Robyn also made me 2 little scrapbooks that are all decorated, all I have to do is add the pictures. I love them. Thanks Robyn! Thanks to everyone else that has sent cards and well wishes, you guys have really helped keep my spirits up and strong and I love you all!!
We left on Thursday at about 6am and had a long car ride over. After about an hour of turning around every 2 min to get the kids this or that my mom and I had to change places and she catered to their every need all the way over to Utah. I just couldn't keep doing that with all the stretching and just having surgery. Thank goodness for the DVD player in the car. What a life saver! When we got to Salt Lake we stopped to see my grandpa Harris. It was nice to be able to visit with him as I haven't seen him for a long time. I also got to see my Uncle Jim for a bit. It is always nice to be able to visit and see family. We only stayed for about an hour before leaving and heading down to Lehi where my sister lives. When we got there she took the kids over to the park to let them run around. She lives right by the railroad tracks so they also got to see a lot of trains. Cody was in heaven.
On Friday we took the kids to Cabella's in the morning to see all the stuffed animals and their fish tank. They kids enjoyed it and I know if Jon were there he would have been there for hours. (Poor guy has been working for 2 weeks straight and won't be back until Thursday) We also got to see a tiny bear cub that was there from Yellowstone Park. They sure are cute when they are small.

We took the kids home to nap (they had a horrible night) and Uncle Doug watched them while Toni and I went to Rod Works. It is this awesome home interiors store that I love. I wish we had one here. Click the words above to visit their home page. I bought some cute things to put up on the wall to display my kids pictures. I will take a picture of it when I finally put it up. That afternoon we took the kids to the Lehi city center pool. It is also awesome, I wish we had something like that here. They have park equipment in this zero entry pool that is only a foot and a half deep. They also have these foam slides that the kids can go up and down by themselves. If we had a pool like that here I would live at the pool. We met up with my cousin Corrine and her kids. I couldn't swim because of the surgery so I didn't get to visit much with her but it was still good to see her.

On Saturday we went the aquarium in Sandy. They had all sorts of fish, even Nemo and Dori! We also got to touch sting rays in their touch pool. I forgot my camera here so I have to get those pictures from my sister, but it was a lot of fun to see sharks and octopus and all sorts of fish. (I also posted more pictures on my link) After naps that afternoon we went to a place called Farm Country by my sister's house. They keep farm animals and the kids get to walk around and see and pet the animals. They had calfs, cows, horses, goats, sheep, a donkey, ducks, chicken, turkeys, and lamas.

They also got to go on a pony ride and a wagon ride that was pulled by a tractor.

Cody was in such a horrible mood and was throwing a fit the whole time we were there. In fact all my kids were high maintenance there. It was hard to have both my sister and her husband there to help me and have all the kids want me to hold them. We still had fun though. Afterwards we went to dinner at Applebee's. Since it was so nice there this weekend I went without a hat or scarf. It gets old having people stare at me all the time. I feel like they are thinking "Brittany Spears wannabe". I would prefer to wear a sign that says I have cancer, and no I am not voluntarily bald. Maybe I will get a shirt made :-) My sister reminded me of this movie line in The Labyrinth where a statue says "It's VERY rude to stare". That made me laugh. Maybe I will say that to someone sometime.....

We left Toni's on Sunday morning a little before 9am. We had only been on the road for an hour when Alex decided that she was going to get car sick and threw up in her car seat.....yum. Of course we had just past the rest stop and had to just pull over on the side of the interstate to clean her up. I kept having those images from police shows on TV where other cars slam into parked cars on the side of the interstate. Not a fun thing to do, pull over on the side of the road when the cars are passing by you at 75 plus miles an hour. Needless to say we survived and got back on the road. Of course I drove most of the way home again and the kids never fell asleep until about 10 min outside of Fort Collins which is about 30 min from the house. Those stinkers!! I was so exhausted last night that I could barley get out of bed when Cody started crying in the middle of the night. He has woken up on and off the last few weeks with nightmares I think. He always says "choo choos, choo choos", poor guy must be thinking that trains are coming to get him or something. Too bad he can't tell me what he is dreaming about.

Most of the day was just hanging around cleaning up from the trip today. Laundry, unpacking, dishes, etc. Olivia had school this morning and then played with the neighbors this afternoon. Which was nice because I took a nap with the twins. I ran errands this evening and have started doing the grocery game. After I have saved coupons for a few weeks it will really save me lots of money. Except when I went this evening and handed the checker my coupons, I was trying to keep track of 3 kids who wanted to ride the horse. By the time I got back to the house I realized she never scanned the coupons. So I have to go back to the store tomorrow and get refunded for the coupons. What a pain. This guys stopped me on the way out and said "Sorry to bother you Mame but I just wanted to say, keep fighting. You have to stay strong for you kids. You look like a fighter and I wish you luck." Random, so nice. Just when I think I am going to loose my mind because my kids have been at the grocery store too long, heavenly father sends me an angel to remind me that everything is going to be OK, keep your patience a little longer and you will be through this crappiest time.

I must say that I am recovering well and can do pretty much anything that needs to be done. I just can't things for too long. I can pick up the kids for awhile but can't be doing it all day. I am still taking Tylenol or ibuprofen but am feeling better and better everyday. I can't wait until Jon comes home on Thursday. I feel like I haven't seen him for months. Tomorrow I have an appointment with both my oncologist and my surgeon. Hopefully I will find out what the plan is for radiation so I can get that over with. My hair is now growing back all over my head. It has started to grow in all the spots that were bald only a few weeks ago and feels nice to have a little bit of hair covering my head. Only 3 weeks after my surgery I am already sick of stuffing my bra with pads. Good thing I am small breasted and don't have to come up with very much to fill out my bra. It is hard to look at myself in the mirror but I am so thankful that the cancer is gone and I get to be here with my kids, husband, and family. Now I just have to do everything I can to make sure that it stays gone......Darn Cancer!