Christmas 2021

Florida - Thanksgiving 2021

 We had a lot to be thankful for this Thanksgiving & we got to do it in Florida. We had pretty good weather, even a semi-calm day where I floated out in the ocean. The boys boogie boarded and enjoyed the ocean a lot. The one cool day we had we ventured to Gumbo Limbo Nature Center to check out the animals in the sanctuary. We also did a walk at Arthur R Marshall Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge and found an alligator hanging out under a dock.

Colon Cancer Coalition Walk

 We did our first annual walk for the Colon Cancer Coalition. Our team raised over $3k in just over a week! Fred asked if there was a colon cancer walk a little over a week ago and I found out there was one on 8/29 - 9 days away. So I check with the fam and most were able to make it work and I made my pleas on Facebook and got so many generous donations - very humbling! This morning we had a gorgeous morning to walk and make room for the Cheesecake Factory (which we've all been hankering for since we haven't gotten to do the Breast Cancer Walk and our annual feasting at Cheesecake Factory after that).

AM's Backers - maybe by next year I'll figure out a better name

Mom made it 1.5 miles!

Cousins

Adrea excepting her top female finisher award.

Way to go Dre! She got AM's Backers ironed on her tank, so we may have to stick with that name!

So blessed that I was able to do this walk just over 2 weeks after surgery.

Defensive Player of the Games/Scrimmages

 Wyatt is playing tackle football and he's rocking the defensive line. They had their first scrimmages on Saturday morning and he got the "Defensive Player of the Game" chain for his tackles & sacks.

State Fair 2021

 We made it to opening day of the State Fair! Just 13 days after surgery and I was up for all the walking and eating that goes with a day at the fair. Rain was in the forecast, so we at as much as we could as early as we could. There was no 4-H show that first day, so that kind of threw off our rhythm, but we managed to wander around and enjoy the fair with crowds that were less than half what they usually are. We made it until about 2 when we were riding the Sky Ride & the rain and high winds alert came. Then we high tailed it out and made our way home. Wyatt and Jacob had commitments in the evening, so we'd planned on leaving about 4 anyway.

Grandkids on a bench!

Wyatt and Quinn

I look tired, but I hung in there pretty well and felt great.

A sampling of the foods we had - some new ones the flavored cheese curds, bison bites, blueberry mini-donuts, & (new to us) Dole float.

Jacob doing pull-ups for the Marines

Wyatt also showing his strength

Dashing to the car in our ponchos!

Pathology - Great news!

 I waited patiently all week for my surgeon to call with my pathology results. I finally talked to a friend on Thursday night who asked if the results were posted in my Allina on-line chart... ummm, I hadn't set that up yet. So, I go home and setup my chart and find my pathology results - that were posted on Tuesday! So, I sent the results to this friend, who happens to be an oncology professional, and she interprets all the great news for me. No evidence of cancer in any of the 24 lymph nodes they removed, clear margins, and classified as stage 1. Per recommendations from the cancer center it looks like no chemo for me, I will wait to to talk to my oncologist to fully celebrate that, but I remain hopeful on that possibility. I did make some calls on Friday and finally got a call back from the surgeon's PA who apologized and didn't understand how I hadn't been called with results earlier, but she also confirmed the news I'd received. 

SO, I AM CANCER FREE!!! Best news ever.

Survived Surgery

 I had surgery on Friday August 13th. Dr. Spencer and his team removed "just enough" of my colon/rectal tissue to remove the malignant mass. I was in the hospital until Monday afternoon. We are still awaiting pathology results from the surgery to see what the next steps in the battle are. 

Blommels & Michaels Weekend

Another fun Blommel / Michael weekend! We were up in Akeley on Howard Lake this year. We enjoyed time on the lake with the Michaels’ boat, the jetskis, & the Blommels’ pizza slices. Kids had fun playing tag, “keep it up”, bean bags, "tips", pool, and cards. As they get older a few choose to hang with the old folks a bit and join us in some card games and this year Trivia Pursuit. We also enjoyed time around the campfire with games of telephone & buzz & some attempted scary stories. It’s always so awesome to catch up with the families and see the kids pick up where they left off and have so much fun together.

We also spotted this eagle in a tree right down by the shore. He hung out there for about an hour. I missed him fly off, but it was cool to watch him.

Cancer

 It's been 3 weeks since I had a colonoscopy and the doctor said "we found a mass that we believe is malignant, we are going to set you up for a CT and an oncologist appointment". I knew when he wanted appointments set up before getting the biopsy back that he was pretty sure about what he saw. 

My colonoscopy was June 30th, the call came on July 2nd to confirm that yes it was cancer, but the abdomen scan came back to show that no other masses were present. After two nights of very little sleep, the knowledge that it appeared to be contained to one spot, helped me sleep again and relax a little. We told the boys about the cancer and there were some tears, but we believe that it's a very curable cancer and let them know that too.

I've had an oncology appointment, another CT scan to make sure my lungs were clear, an MRI to try to determine exact location and see if any lymph nodes are involved, and an appointment with a surgeon. The MRI was inconclusive about the lymph nodes. I will have to wait until surgery on August 13th to get final staging and determine if any lymph nodes appear to be involved. I'm feeling very optimistic about the outcome of all of this. Depending on results from surgery, we'll make a treatment plan after that - chemo is likely, but not guaranteed.

You learn you have cancer and you want to attack it and get it out as fast as you can, but that's not exactly how things go. The part that gives me comfort is that I had signs (blood when I wiped after a bowel movement, sorry TMI) since last summer (I don't recommend waiting and if you ever have this symptom and think - oh, it's red blood (not dried), so it's harmless (like I did), still get it checked out), so I don't think its growing or spreading at a fast rate - so 3 more weeks to wait for it to come out are probably not going to make a difference (per the surgeon, not just me). 

Prayers and positive vibes appreciated.

Baseball Season

Wyatt's baseball team had a tough year, recording just one win during the regular season. He pitched (lots of strikes, but sometimes not at the right time) and he did an excellent job catching. The team's fielding was shaky at best, so being the pitcher was often rougher than it needed to be. This past weekend was the year end tournament and the team finished strong. Most of us expected to be done on Saturday - 2 losses and you are out. But they came to play Saturday morning and the game ended in a tie and even after an extra inning it was tied and the tourney needed to move on - so they decided the "winner" with a coin flip - we lost. Then we played our second game and it was exciting. We came from behind, Wyatt pitched a 6 run inning (more so due to fielding than pitching), and then we came from behind again and held them and WON! So fun for the boys (and parents). We got to play another game on Sunday morning and they hit, they pitched, a couple fielding errors and we lost, but I think they all felt better about their baseball season after the tournament and we didn't have to sit at the hot baseball field all day Sunday, so I think everyone was happy.

Fred did the book most games.

Our little catcher

He was always easy to spot with his flowing locks.

A happy team after the win in the tournament.

Minneopa

 We had seen the falls a few years ago, but we decided to make another trip down to Minneopa State Park and check out the bison. We hiked down to the base of the waterfall and Coop showed us he’s good at parkour.

Jacob Umps

Jacob didn't think he wanted to ump, but after his friends were doing it and making $40 per game (or more), he thought maybe he could. He didn't get on it early enough to get many games on the schedule, but his first one was Wyatt's game! Fred assistant coaching, Wyatt playing, & Jacob umping. Gav & I cheering them all on. 

Valleyfair

 Middendorf day at Valleyfair - Corey, Logan, Riley, Parker, Jill, Riley, Julie, Jordan, Fred, Amber, Jacob, Gavin & Wyatt. It was a hot day, we moved kind of slow & spent some time at the water park.

Wyatt transforms

 Wyatt had been growing his hair all thru the pandemic. He said at one point that he'd cut it once we didn't have to wear masks anymore. So once he was done with school, we found some time to cut off his ponytails and send them in to Kids with Hair Loss.

He was pretty cute with pig tails.

The first snips!

Looked pretty funky with just the ponies lopped off.

And then she just kept cutting!

The cut ended up shorter then he'd hoped, but he got used to it pretty quickly.

For his effort, he got a certificate & a t-shirt.