The kids were so sad about leaving school, friends, and starting over at a new school in the middle of the year. I checked with the teachers and asked if I could bring in cupcakes for a "good-bye" party for each of them. Thinking that it would make it just a smidge easier. It worked. Below are pics of the kids with their teacher....Izzy's teacher was out sick that day so we have her class aid. Mrs. Wrath. 
I know this is LONG overdue....Evan turned 2 on October 14th! I can't believe it, these two years have gone by so fast. He had a little cold again just like last year. Here are a few of the pics that got. 
My cousin Michelle and her clan made it down for his Birthday dinner. He loves chocolate. He even says it....in his own little way. Must take after mom.
Yes, he is holding the ice cream with his hands. Never complained about it, loved every minute of it.
I don't know if you can tell in this picture...but when he blows he sticks his bottom lip out so the air shoots straight up and fluffs his hair. I think he kept wanting to touch the candle or cake, or something....Kris had to hold him back.
The first day of school went well. We were all very excited about the teachers that they got. I had a bunch cute things that Izzy got from being in Kindergarten...from the teacher. I tried to save them but since it is now the 4th week of school and I am just now posting this I of course can not find them. Enjoy the pics!
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So you know the beginning and the end and here is the middle....
Went in for surgery on Monday morning and I was such a BABY. I was scared out of my mind. When I was in holding I just wanted anyone to talk to me about anything. I was asking everyone odd questions just so they would talk. All the nurses handled it so well. One of them got the picture that I didn't want to be alone and went and got Kris and he got to stay with me until I was taken to the O.R. at one point I was so worked up that I asked him to say a quick prayer for me and at the very moment he ended his prayer I just had this calm feeling come over me. IT WAS GREAT! Going under was not near as bad as I had thought that it would be but waking up was! I thought that I did great on Monday. Our Bishop and his wife stopped by and later and I talked with her later that week, she surprised me by telling me that I was not doing good at all on Monday. Was I ever glad that she didn't see me on Tuesday. Perkacet kicked my rear. After that I didn't want anything. NEVER AGAIN will I take that nasty stuff....I have added on to my "allergy list" even though I am not really allergic to it. Such a bad reaction to it that I ended up staying an extra night in the hospital and then did fine on Wednesday with just Tylenol 3.
I went to see the Oncologist on Thursday but we didn't have any of the reports back from pathology yet. We had a plan, if it didn't spread to the lymph nodes I was fine and then would just have to see a dermatologist every 6 months and a the oncologist every year for so long. If it has spread they would do more test and chemo. I got the pathology reports back from the first doc on Friday. I kind of freaked out, Here is the exact working of it, I have added anything that is "( )".
Ten cross sections of four different lymph nodes are examined on multiple slides. All cross sections are immunostained for HMB45. On one slide only, slide B2, in a subcapsular location four cells exhibit immunoreactivity for HMB45 staining. The cells are not cytologically abnormal (not obvious cancer cells). I cannot say with certainty they represent malignant melanoma. They could represent nevus cells (mole cells) within a lymph node.
The first time that I met the surgeon I told her no matter what the results were I automatically wanted them sent somewhere else for a second opinion. Just to be sure. So everything was sent onto the Mayo Clinic. I hear that they really are the place to go for things like this. Yesterday the doc called and said what I wrote down in the previous post and then today I went in and got a copy of the actual pathology report from Mayo. Interesting. Here it is... word for word...even the things you probably don't care about....
"I am writing regarding the material that you sent from RB, a 32-year-old woman. These are very interesting and challenging slides (not something that you want to hear). I am in complete agreement with the original diagnosis of malignant melanoma on the right leg. There are occasional mitotic figures present with this lesion as well as the measured depth of 1.1 mm. Sentinel lymph node is quite interesting (there is that word again). on H&E, there is a clear-cut deposition of melanocytic type cells present within the capsule of the nevus. A few of these cells stain positive for HMB-45, but the vast majority of them do not stain for HMB-45. This is an interesting (again) pattern in that the majority of capsular melanocytic nevi are Melan-A/Mart-1 positive, but these cells as well as their architectural location that these are most consistent with a capsular melanocytic nevus.
The only other thing on the lab report that is worth sharing is....Thank you for sharing this difficult case with me in consultation. If I may be of any further assistance, please do not hesitate to contact me. (Difficult case??????)
So to some it up I was an interesting difficult case....and I have typical moles inside just like I do on the outside....hum? Interesting.
The surgeon says that I am healing nicely. If you want to see a really gross picture of the back of my leg...let me know. I only have it on my cell phone so I will have to text it as an attachment. It is REALLY GROSS.
Today is the day that I found out I DO NOT HAVE CANCER ANYMORE! Yippie! I wonder if I will remember August 5, 2010 for the rest of my life. I sure do remember July 21st, but this is an even better day.
Here is what the doctor had to say when she left her message...
"Ranisa, hi its Dr. "B" Hi how are you? Listen I got your stuff back from Mayo Clinic, it is all good news. So I just thought I would call and let you know they did not think that it is in the lymph nodes and I will give you a copy of the report tomorrow when I see you. But I had to call and let you know. Alright take care and I will see you guys tomorrow."
I missed the call!!! The phone rang when we were eating dinner with some friends and I panicked...."get the phone, it might be the doctor!". Somehow that phone call got messed up and we weren't able to answer it, but Kris flipped through caller-ID and noticed that the doctor had called 2 hours earlier. I was frantic, after listening to the message I AM SO EXCITED!!!!
I was wondering how I was going to tell the blog world about it, I wanted to post a picture of myself and say something about this being the face of a cancer free gal...but I didn't shower today! So you get to share in our excitement without seeing my super happy grin! PLEASE GET YOUR MOLES CHECKED!!!!
So here it is...in January I went in to the dermatologist and had some moles removed. With it being January I of course had on pants and didn't notice any of the moles on my legs. There was one mole on my side and under my arm that I wanted off and the doctor took the wrong one off and then told me that the one that I was wanting off was too big and that it need to be done in a surgical setting. No worries, I just needed to come in at a later date and have it taken care of. A few weeks later I noticed a mole that had changed on the back of my right calve. I didn't worry too much about it but realized that I would have to have it looked at when I had that other one taken off. I ended up back in the dermatology office on July 7th. After seeing the mole on my leg he said that he was worried about that one and that it needed to be taken off. Got them both removed and made an appointment to have the stitches taken out and went on my way. A week later the doctor calls and says that the mole on my leg has atypical results and wanted my permission to send it onto another lab for a second opinion. The other mole was fine. My follow up appointment was set for 2 weeks out. The day before the appointment the doctor called and left 2 messages on the phone asking me call him right away. We had gotten home from a trip pretty late and before I had a chance to call him in the morning he called and ask me to come in and made sure that I was bring Kris. When a doctor says "bring your husband" you know that it isn't good. We went in and the results of the biopsy are that I have stage 2 melanoma. A little info on melanoma...they measure the thickness of it, how deep it goes into your skin. Most of the mole was .88 mm, if the measurement is under 1 mm they considerate taken care of and you are good to go. However there is a extension of cells that reaches to 1.1 mm. So that extra .1 puts into the stage 2 category. We got lots of details and met with a surgeon the same day. We are following the standard procedure for stage 2 melanoma. I am scheduled to have a wide biopsy of the area on Monday morning. They will also inject some type of dye around the area and wait a bit for it to travel up to the lymph nodes, then take x-rays of it so that they know what lymphnodes to biopsy. Because the area of the wide biopsy is a few inches and too big to close with stitches they are doing a skin graft. I hear that is the most painful part. We will get the results from everything a couple days later.
Now for my feelings. Wednesday when I found out the news I was a bit shocked...really it is the worst news of my life to this point. I have a positive outlook and I am holding onto the fact that it is just .1 mm from being considered a stage 1. I will try to update the blog after surgery when I feel like I can function. Who knows maybe Kris will do it. Don't be too worried if it is a couple of days until this is updated. Please feel free to call. My parents are coming in to take care of things, be with me, and help out with the kids. Boy am I ever great full for that. We are also trying to get my brother home from Iraq. We have an appointment with an oncologist on Thursday. Maybe I will plan on updating after that.
Kris freaked out for awhile and is doing much better now.
We told the kids....we sat them down and asked them if they knew what cancer was. They said no, so I explained that we have good cells in our bodies and cancer is bad cells. When I had my mole removed they did some test on it and found that there were bad cells in it. Then explained that I am going to go and have surgery so that the doctors can take more out and make sure that they got all of those bad cells out. They understand that I will be 'lazy' laying around the couch and that there are people coming to help take care of them. Elaine at one point asked if I had to have surgery so that I didn't die. I told her that we didn't need to think about that right now, the doctors are doing what they can to help me.
We have a sense of humor about it. At the same are still worried a bit, and being positive all at the same time.
I tried to remember all the details about that day. There are a few things that are frozen in my mind, the elevator button on the wall as we went up stairs to the clinic. The fabric pattern on the chairs in the waiting room. Odd details. Yet it seems that some of the important things I forgot. This is the same clinic that I take my kids to, that I go see the OB/GYN at, that I see the family doctor at. I waiting to go back again and see all the the odd details in my mind and I am hoping that I don't have these odd flashbacks triggered by elevator buttons and pretty patterns of fabric on chairs.
Again call if you want to talk, we appreciate all the thoughts and prayers.
*Update....it is a stage 2A, for all of those that have looked info up.
*****NEW UPDATE******* Cancer was a 1B. What great news!!!! Derm guy din't know what he was talking about!
A few have not hear this. This happened right after we moved into this house. Boy am I ever glad that he has grown up a bit.....and Monster Truck races are on the TV really early in the morning.
Adventures of Drew
I love my son. I love my son. I love my son. I am grateful that he is still a happy little boy after this morning. So here's the story. We all know that everyday, yes everyday, Drew does something that makes a huge mess. I mean HUGE mess. Sunday it was spraying tile cleaner over every surface in main level of the house which included all of the computer stuff, luckily the only thing that no longer works is my computer keyboard, oh yeah and a few of the birthday card that I made for the ladies at church got a little wet, they might not even notice. Everything else survived. Monday it was those little instant oatmeal packages, you know the kind with all the extra sticky gooey flavors added to them. That was all over the freshly mopped kitchen. Yes I do watch him, but when I was mopping another part of the floor he got to the oatmeal in the kitchen. Tuesday, hum so long ago, what happened Tuesday? Don't recall, but since there is something everyday I do know that something did happen. Today was the fun one. I love soda, I seldom buy it. I believe I might buy a 12 pack of soda 2-3 times a year. Yesterday was one of those times. Some root beer sounded good. Love root beer. Left the case on the counter when I went to bed, didn't even think about what could possibly happen. I was so excited the rest of the house was clean and I was going to wake up to a clean house. Every housewife-every women knows what it is like to wake up to a clean house-it just starts your day of on the right foot. Drew often times gets up before I do. He is in stealth mode is what we call it. No one hears him, we don't even really know what time he really does get up. We just know that he is normally up before us. We have even thought of installing a little alarm on his bedroom door-when it goes off we would get up. Once again Drew is the first one up this morning. Today he decided to wake Elaine up. I get up and call Elaine upstairs to take a bath and get ready for school. She of course complains about Drew waking her up but doesn't tell me about the kitchen, maybe she didn't even know about the kitchen. She must have just went straight to the couch. After she is all ready for the day and go downstairs to get breakfast ready as I see Drew siting in the living room with a can of root beer-not so bad there doesn't seem to be any spilled on the carpet or couch. We can handle this. Enter the kitchen, I see what Drew's adventure was for the day. Hopeful this is the only one of the day. That pack of root beer-yes the hole pack is laying across the kitchen floor, a few of the cans are open and seem to be completely empty. The kitchen is covered in soda, I mean from about 2 1/2 feet down on everything. The walls, fridge, cabinets, dishwasher and the floor is flooded with root beer. I like to sleep as late as possible. So of course the morning has go smoothly minute by minute. This is the time for breakfast. We don't do anything else but eat. There is no time for anything else. I mange to tip toe around on what bare toe sized spots are clean on the floor. I get the kids breakfast and then wipe up the soda with a towel. Mop the floor twice-with the tile cleaner that we had left over from Sunday's adventure. The hardest thing to clean was the walls, they are textured, and the soda had started to dry. I was so happy that I manged to get it all cleaned up as fast and as easy as it was. We were even still running on schedule. I toss the mopping towel up on the counter, it tips over the white board which smashes into the candles (no broken ones) and yes the rest of the cans of root beer that where sitting beside the sink to get rinsed off. Once again a few of them fell onto the floor and because of the pressure thy burst open and spin in circles around the floor. Coating everything in the kitchen with root beer once again. Only this time it seemed to spray a little higher than two 1/2 feet, and I was standing in the middle of it all.
.....if any of the kids ever want a hair cut they just have to ask and it will be done. I mean done right away. I will pick up the phone and call that very minute. Even if it is just a pretend haircut....
I can hardly believe that my Izzy is 5! I know that I say that each time one of them has a birthday but really it feels weird for me. She got to have her first party with friends over.
Then we did cake and ice cream.
Then presents.
One of the funniest things is that my parents sent her a present but the package was a weird shape so my mom put it in a box....a cell phone box....you can guess what happened as soon as that paper was off she was jumping for joy that she got a cell phone! Good thing she wasn't terribly disappointed that it was really a My Little Pony.We had an Easter Egg hunt on Easter morning. I died eggs the night before....what a boring mom I am I sent the kids to bed and then did it, and yes you guessed it the died eggs are still in the fridge. Ah, maybe next year I can be fun! Here is our egg hunt. We didn't have church on Easter morning because of General Conference which was great, we got to sleep in and then be in P.J.'s for most the morning. I didn't get too many pics of the bigger kids, they had no interest in standing still for a picture. Evan however is starting to be quite the ham. 
The Easter Bunny and mom both forgot to get Easter baskets so the older kids used there trick or treat bags, and I just tossed Evan's eggs in his P.J.'s.
The other VERY exciting news of the day.....Drew lost his first tooth! He is 7....and was starting to feel a little left behind in his class. Heck there are kids in Izzy's preschool that have already lost teeth. He just takes after me......I was 7 too.
Why is it as mothers we are always doing things that we don't like but it really ends up being a situation where it is the lesser of two evils? Here is a great example.
I hate, and mean HATE those child safety locks for cabinets. I think that they are just a pain. When we moved into our house in Michigan the previous owner had them on every single thing that opened in the kitchen. I took them all off and told Elaine what drawer she could not touch, and she never did...yes she was the perfect baby. Drew came along and I had to reinstall all of them and then he broke them off by the time that he was 6 months. I don't recall how Izzy was about stuff. BUT Evan loves cereal. He always getting into the cabinet and taking a box of cereal out, pulling the bag out of the box, and then emptying the bag on the floor. He is the dogs best friend. Here is his latest cereal adventure. I am really tired of sweeping it all up...not to mention the expense of going through cereal so fast. The worst part in the itty bitty tiny crumbs that are left at the bottom of the bag. The broom doesn't get them all, and then the Swiffer only gets them if I see them and go over it. The worst is Life...those sugar crystals stick to everything......but mostly my socks. I am doing the happy dance. We now have a safety thing installed on that cabinet. I don't mind of they play with the pots and pans or the plastics. I can't wait to see how Evan is when he discovers he is no longer Master of the Cereal Mess.
Sad, sad, SAD day. Or maybe I should say sad week! Only about one thing (everything else is great)....my camera is broken. No repairing it, old and dead. I thought it was the battery, but I replaced it and it still doesn't work. Sad, sad. I think I might have to cry big crocodile tears. I have a big Birthday coming up for Izzy....I have to have a camera!!! Where are my really close friends so that I can barrow one??? Or better yet, when are we going to win the lottery that we don't play so that I can get a really awesome camera. I need some reviews. Tell me what kind of camera you have and if you like, and what about it you do like, AND let me know if it is going to break the bank.
