Dad at Jeeping 101

Here are photos of Dad hard at work at "jeeping 101". Tried to upload some of the movies he took, but doesn't seem to work here. He had a great time ... this group is sort of like internet dating, but for Jeepers. There are no meetings, no dues, no officers, - just his kind of group! They all meet online at http://arizonavirtualjeepclub.com (I think) and check out the photo album area.

We've had some some and high wind, but sun is out today. They had great weather for the outdoor workshop, thank goodness. Don't want to be in one of those washes when its raining!

Tamale festival in Phoenix

Sunday Dec 13 we went to Phoenix for the Tamale Festival. There was a Mariachi band and singer, lots of games for kids, Santa, and lots of Mexican food! These photos show the various cooking demonstations. One show a woman making the outer shell for husk tomales. She has a spreader tool in one hand that they use to spred the masa on the corn husk. Then the thicker inner base is laid down and on top of that is the meat filling. It is all rolled up and steamed for the finished tamale. They come in lots of flavors, pork, chicken, beef, red chili, green chili, pineapple too.

The lady with the deep fryer is making empanadas. They are like a Mexican ravioli, a tortilla like disk with a little filling, folded over and deep fried. You can see a woman adding the filling to the mini tortilla. They make a big bowl of the tortilla mixture, pinch off a little ball of it and put it into a regular tortilla press. Out comes the little mini tortilla, and then it is filled, folded over and deep fried.

Here is Santa arriving for the festival. There was a large crowd, lots of kids and families. We got there early enough to pick up tamales (a Christmas tradition for Mexicans and sold everywhere during the season) for the freezer, for Christmas eve dinner and for lunch that day.

Nov pictures

Jeeps lined up at breakfast place. One has to 'fuel' up before a jeep trip into the wilds of Arizona! There were a total of four Jeeps on this trip.














Here is a photo of the Jeepsters on the trail. Roger says road was rougher than this looks, and some of the hills were a challenge...

Above are the views the Jeepers saw from the top of the hills they travelled. Roger said they got to 5000 ft. I did not go along, as the passenger seat is not really comfy seat, tho I may go along another time. I did go along on his first trip out.

No Chemo - Pt 2

Well, I went in for chemo again yesterday - if you remember, the last time they sent me home because my blood counts were too low. This time my blood counts were good, so they got me all set up with some magnesium while the chemo was being made - I'm always low on magnesium; I think it has something to do with avoiding green leafy vegetables.

As soon as they started the first chemo, Gemzar, I started to get really hot and flushed and my left leg started to hurt - it felt like it was swelling up or something. The nurse was still in there - apparently even if epople don't have reactions in the first round they can develop them in the 2nd or 3rd rounds - she said that was especially true of the gemzar. She could se that my face was flushed and immediately stopped the chemo and put me on saline.

Then she called my nurse coordinator to see what they wanted her to do. The coordinater - Heidi/Holly (there are two of them and I can never keep them straight) - said that since it was 5pm and there would be minimal support available in case anything went really wrong, that she should stop the chemo. So, we just finished up some saline and some additional magnesium.

Jess and I kept ourselves entertained by mocking the people on Food Network - if you mimic the hand gestures that Rachel Ray makes you get quite a workout!

I suppose that Heidi/Holly is going to call me on Monday and figure what we're going to do. I'm hoping that I they set it up for next week, since I already told work that I wouldn't be in the office.

I'm going over to Jess's house tomorrow for Dawn's birthday - I got her something she's really going to love, but I can't post it here yet on the off chance that she reads this before the party. And I'm going to do something special with her cake - it's going to be awesome!

That's it for me - I hope to be posting with some good news early in the week!

More Fall activities....

True to my word, here is some more bloggin'......mostly just pictures of everything that's been going in on this fall.


Halloween

We did our normal Halloween routine again - take Max (Ben10...google it if you don't know) down town to trick or treat and then head over to Uncle Ryan & Auntie Jenny's house to hook up with Kyle (Power Ranger). Downtown was pretty neat, especially at the funeral home. They had two people from the local theater group dressed up as Mary Poppins and the chimney sweep guy. They were stationed at the front door and were singing songs from the movie. Quite a treat, not to mention that they were handing out FULL SIZE candy bars!!!


Gynastics

Max started gymnastics after soccer finished. They have it at the old King County fairground exhibit hall, along with wrestling. He goes two nights a week and is having a blast! According to Max, Tae Kwan Do (I have no idea how to spell that and no energy to look it up...) is up next when gymnastics is over.


Soccer

The soccer season is finally over! Max started to enjoy it more and more as the season progressed and he started to get the hang of the games. His coach was great and is planning on keeping all of the boys together for next year.

Max in action on the throw in!

The sidelines were always entertaining, too.

Max: Hey guys, what's up?
Cameron: Nothing, just doing some ballroom dancing to keep
warm, what's up with you?
Colter: Cameron!! Stop trying to lead!!

Max: Let me show you how to lead!


That's all for now, comment away!

Where to start...?

I know it's been a long time since I graced the blogoshpere with my pithy remarks, but I'm almost sure it's worth the wait...

Maris Farms

Back in October, we decided to head out to Maris Farms to get a few pumpkins. They really have this "Harvest Carnival" thing down pat out there. There are all kinds of things to do...and we did most of them (except the actual corn maze....maybe next year!)

Here's Max and Elsie

It's supposed to be a black widow.....

Max loses a tooth....

Well, after a couple of weeks of having a seriously loose tooth - I mean I don't know what was holding this thing in!! - I finally had to take it out.

More to come - Halloween, soccer, gymnastics - I promise!!

Becky fall down and go boom

Yes, it's true - I fell down. See, it's like this - I was running at work in my cape (yes, I have a cape) on Halloween and I fell down. I really biffed my left arm - I couldn't really move it for awhile. I got in x-rayed and they say it's no broken, I just strained something. So I've been taking it easy and trying not to move my arm. It's hard because it's my upper arm and those muscles are always working. I bruised my legs too - it was hard to walk and go up and down stairs for a few days, but they're better too. Yes, I'll stop running - at least I wasn't carrying scissors!

I got my new chemo appointment - it's 11/14 (next friday). My friend Jess is giving me a ride, so I'm all covered there (thanks, Jess!). I talked with the nurses about my new port and they said it's really up to me, that they could have the SCCA surgeon recommend a general surgeon at UW to do it (apparently they do it all the time). But the options aren't that great - something in the middle of my chest, something in my arm that probably won't work, or a dangler. None sound appealing and since it's up to me I said, "No thanks!" As long as they're able to get blood from my arm without having to stick me a billion times, I'm going to stay with the current process. I'll practice my speil to the blood draw people so that it comes out smoothly, "IneedmyportaccessedandIalsoneedablooddrawfrommyarmbecausemyportdoesn'tworkbutitsokayforinfusions.Thanks!"

Anyway - that's what's going on with me. What's going on with you?