Follicular Neoplasm

So they tell me. It is 2 x 5 cm. in size and is on my right thyroid gland. I felt a lump in my neck sometime in October. I was battling sore throat #23 of the season and I was rubbing my throat as I swallowed trying to see where it hurt the worst. At first I thought I was wrong, I must be pushing too hard on my throat and just think I feel a lump. But the lump was still there a few weeks later. ZoraLin had an appointment with one of our ENT's in December. So after he told me that her hearing was fine I asked him to just take a feel of my throat and tell me what he thought. He says, "Oh, there is definitely a lump, you should go see one of the endocrinologists." Of course, you can't just call the endo doc's office and get an appointment. You first have to see your primary physician who will decide what they want to do. (In this case, lab work and then a thyroid ultrasound.) Then you can get a referral to the endo Dr. who wanted to do a fine needle biopsy.

Then the endo doctor has the results of the biopsy. Next stop...back to the ENT surgeon who felt the lump in December! Surgery is scheduled for April 27th. They expect me to be off work for 2 to 3 weeks. Benign? Won't know until it is all removed and pathology has a chance to dissect it. Not exactly the vacation I was thinking of this summer. In fact, looks like it will be the only time off this summer because I don't have much extended illness time-off or vacation time to use. The endocrinologist tells me that for being a pretty simple procedure, it can really knock you for a loop. Just what I always wanted to be......loopy!!

Hard decisions....revisited.

Sometimes things don't always work the way we think they will. Take for instance, Pugston going to live somewhere else. The day that Pugston was supposed to go meet his new family, ice happened. Then work happened, then somehow I softened a little and maybe Pugston realized his days were numbered. After a new gate was installed to keep him out of the bedroom, bathroom and laundry room, we also "fixed" the stairs so he can not get down them. Of course, it is an extra step we must take to get around things too, but for Pugston and the girls....it is a great LEAP!



I'd say that Pugston may have figured things out at the right time and Mother Nature helped give him the extra time. He knows which girls to give his kisses too!

The latest Fashion.......

Kendalan has really been into picking out her own clothes lately. She gets very upset with Mom when I ignore her and pick out the clothes that I want her to wear. Sometimes she will listen to my reasoning of why she needs to wear play clothes to "play" and leave the dresses for a day when we are going somewhere. Somedays when she is not getting me to cooperate with her choices she will then ask me "Mom, do you work tomorrow?" Yes! She knows that Daddy will let her pick what she wants!

And then there are days that I am not sure what line of fashion she is trying to be in. Like these two outfits. Yes, she agreed that she was a bucket head while sporting the leftover Valentine's bucket. However, I thought she was a chef or surgeon or maybe a mix of both with the apron and surgical cap. She just put her hand on her hip and told me very matter of factly, "Mom, I'm just a people!" Okay sweetie, what ever you say punkin pie! Whatever she is....I think she looks pretty cute!!! Of course, I am kind of biased!!

Spring?

It seems like just a few days ago I was posting about new shelves in the garage and how nice the weather was.....oh yeah, it was just a few days ago! Gotta love Kansas weather! The saying is, "If you don't like the weather wait a few minutes and it will change!" And change it did! Good thing the girls wanted to get some sledding time in. They had ample time today before the snow melted. Now our backyard looks like a swamp!

Hard decisions........

Being a parent has many joys. Unfortunately along with all the fun there are decisions that we must make that can be hard not only on the parents, but on the children too. We have had to make one of those hard decisions here recently. As much as our family has enjoyed having a new pet, along with the good times come the bad. Pugston has become quite the problem dog. We had been told that he was "mostly" housebroken. Well, he has "mostly" decided that our basement is his bathroom. No matter how many times or how far the girls or I walk him, he evidently wants the privacy of the basement to do his "duty". He does poop outside some of the time, but we clean up fragrant piles downstairs several times each day too. I have also discovered that he has been peeing on things down there too. Eeewwww! ZoraLin was not very happy that he watered her pillow and blanket the other day. I never knew that Clorox could smell so good!


Seems he also has this chewing issue. We have spent a small fortune on toys and chew bones for him, but even so he has this infatuation with Berber carpet. He can get his teeth caught in the Berber and then shred the carpet. Bad Dog!!

He also pretends to not know us at times. Those times are when we think he needs to stretch his legs and we let him off his leash to run with Wyatt. He thinks he needs to visit the cows that live WAY across the busy street. No matter how loud we call him, off he goes without a care in the world! No matter how much traffic there is, he crosses the road without a sidewards glance! Even the girls are already tired of cleaning up after and walking him. So we have found someone who wants Pugston and we will be taking him there this weekend. I thought there would be more tears to deal with....everyone agrees with me on this one.

Bad blogger...........

I have been MIA lately :( We really haven't had anything "fun" to report on. Spring break came and went. Bubby stayed with us for a few days then he had to return home for his new job orientation. He is going to work at W*lMart! He thinks that all he is going to do is be a cart person, or is it retriever? Somehow I bet he will be doing other things, only time will tell.


During spring break my honey do list became much shorter. I hired a handyman to come do some of the most important things. What could the important things be you may ask?!! For one, my hubby was going to change the light bulbs in the laundry room one day. I know, How many hubby's does it take to change a light bulb? Well, I received a phone call at work from him later that day. He said, "I hope you can do the laundry in the dark?" Seems that it takes more than one hubby to change the light bulb! He managed to pull the whole light fixture down off the ceiling. Well, almost off the ceiling, it was basically hanging there by the wires! We have some funky florescent lights in our laundry room and above the island in the kitchen. I am sure that this was the cheapest lighting that the contractor could find. Don't even get me started on the wanna-be contractor who slapped our house together!


So now we have a beautiful new light above the kitchen island, I can actually see to do laundry again and we have shelves in the garage and laundry room! Our deck is much more safe now too as he replaced one of the support poles that was very dangerous! I was so excited to have shelves in the garage and in the laundry room, I spent the whole next day putting things on the shelves! The weather was almost summer like that day. It really put me in a spring cleaning frame of mind!

My new shelves!!!

BEFORE

AFTER

Out with the old.........

Isn't this much better?!!

The weather cooled off the next few days, so we played "dump" in the basement with the girls' toys. We had almost two big boxes full of toys that were broken or the cheap things from kids meals! I now have many things that I need to price for a garage sale and the girls have "found" many toys that they had forgotten all about!!

School carnival

Tonight was Carbondale's school carnival. Last year Mark was at a gun show in Wichita and I took the girls to the carnival. Hmmmm.....I see a pattern here, this year I took the girls and Mark was at a gun show in Wichita again! I had been on a spring cleaning streak around the house today. I was proud of all the dents I made in piles of things that I have wanted to move for some time. All that work and no play (or better yet, sleep) for Mommy makes Mom kind of grouchy. The girls were the least put off by my sending them the "evil eye" periodically. When they are having fun.....everyone should be having fun too!

So they had a wonderful time! It took them a while to get into the swing of things. The cake walk was kind of boring when you don't win something, but watch out when your number is called!! Jordis spent 5 minutes trying to pick out just the right item for winning. Soft sugar cookies with bright blue frosting and sprinkles won her over! The girls REALLY wanted to get their faces painted this year like they had last year, but the line for face painting was super long and not moving at the highest rate of speed. After 15 minutes of waiting in line and counting how many were in line in front of the girls, I convinced them that our time would be better spent winning things than waiting to get your face painted.

Most fun the girls had.....the ring toss to win cans or bottles of pop. It was a win-win situation. If you didn't get a ring around a can or bottle, then you received a consolation prize....candy! The biggest prize of the evening. Each classroom puts together a basket of items with a theme. Jordis' class did summer fun, ZoraLin's was hot wheels and RaeAnne's was fishing. RaeAnne, ZoraLin and Jordis each had three raffle tickets to put into the drawing for the basket of their choice. What do ya know.....RaeAnne's name was drawn for the Chocolate Basket!! Oh mercy!! The sugar highs are on their way!!!

It will be interesting to see what becomes of the carnival next year. The school is being divided into three schools. Kindergarten through 2nd grade will be in Overbrook, 3rd -5th will be in Scranton and 6th-8th will be at Carbondale. Can't wait to see what happens!!!