Loving...and updates

Loving that my birthday boy settled for a racing car cake instead of Ben 10. With a rainbow surprise inside! Loving this neat little boy who was happy without a party and enjoyed special one on one time instead. Coffee (for me) and hot chocolate and smiley face cookies and a trip to the $2 shop and back home to play. Another whole day with dad, doing BOY STUFF. He was a happy little man. Love his little warm body climbing into my bed every morning and giving me a big squeeze. Love when he hears a cool guitar riff he runs to his room to pick up his guitar and put on a show for us. Love that he takes his Truck magazine to kindy for reading time. Love that he makes everyone feel special with his lovely hugs and kisses and cheeky sense of humour. Love his good nature, easy going friendliness and gentleness. Love that he also takes risks and lives life to the full as all kids should.

Only another year and he will be at school :(
Doing my best to make the most of it.


Other thing...lots of health updates.

Finished Herceptin. YES! One more thing ticked off the list.

Got a call from the breast reconstruction nurse specialist. I'm booked in 4 months to meet with a plastic surgeon to go over my options. Again. We already decided last time I saw a surgeon (before my mastectomy, when we thought I'd have an immediate reconstruction) but I might not be having the same surgeon, so its best to go through the options again. At this stage I'm going for a silicone implant, not the TRAM flap operation. Click on the link if you are interested in what that is. So, roughly six months after that I'll have my surgery, if all goes well (i.e. the waitlist doesn't change). Its great to know I'm in the system now and its within my grasp!

The other cool thing is I got a phone call this morning from the hospital to say they had a portacath removal cancellation, and I was the only person they could find to fill the spot! So I'm booked in for Monday to have this removed. Less than a week after my last infusion, crazy fast! I thought I'd be waiting a few months for that. If you don't know what a portacath is, its a device that was put in my chest during my mastectomy surgery last year and it was so they could get my chemo drugs through this instead of finding veins in my arms. It looks like this...

and this

Me having chemotherapy...

And finally, the other thing that has taken up my brain space this week has been the fact that I have been offered to go on a clinical trial. This is for a new drug called Neratinib which is a tyrosine kinase inhibitor. In short, its a follow on from Herceptin which the drug company Pfizer are hoping will break the blood/brain barrier that Herceptin does not do and lessen the recurrence of brain mets. So I've signed up. I might get the actual drug, I might get the placebo but in either case I take it for a year, and then have four years of follow up. I get looked after really well, as obviously they don't want me to develop any mets while on the study. Funny that...neither do I! Haha. There are side effects. In fact there's a few but I figured I'd sign up and we'll see where it goes from there. Will keep you posted on this.

Graduate of the Year

I've been AWOL from the blog for a bit longer than usual, however it was all for a good reason.

My amazing talented husband was competing this weekend for the Graduate of the Year title for green keeping. This is a big deal in the world of sports turf management (the official proper title for green keeping) and is the sports turf management equivalent of the Young Farmers award I suppose.

For Owen, dropping out of high school at 16 and working hard from apprentice to qualified car painter, then finding dissatisfaction and risks in that role and then being successfully self employed, to then starting again as an apprentice in a new profession in something he is ultimately passionate about...well its been a long slog. Its had its ups and downs, and much has been sacrificed. Every year of his 3 year studies he's acheived top marks and merits and was the first to ever achieve 3 merits in the Level 4 course. The most satisfying was last years merit for work completed on time and at a high standard even in the midst of our heartbreak and my sickness. And it doesn't stop there, as he is now aiming for the diploma - which when finished will have been 7 years of study.

So I was there and beaming proudly when he won the award for Graduate of the Year on Sunday. Recognition of someone who is truly unique and destined for great things. We've been buzzing ever since.


In 2 weeks we go down to Hamilton for Owen to officially accept his award at the Turf Conference. Which means I get to dress up! (yay!) He is also getting offered a trip to Melbourne at the end of the year  (even bigger yay!) to work at Royal Melbourne Golf Club for the Presidents Cup, the first time this major golf event has been held outside the USA and has all the big names in golf playing. At this stage I'm planning to tag along and stay with my brother and his girlfriend as, to be honest, golf doesn't excite me in quite the same way! But shopping does.


So yeah, I just wanted to share with you how awesome my man is and how proud of him we all are. Of course this means the opportunities now open to him in this industry are huge and it means that ahead of us are changes which will be very exciting. So its a matter of watch this space I guess.

Delissilinks

The perfect panna cotta recipe via David Lebovitz. I made this for pudding last night at Owens request, with a lime and Midori jelly. Went down a treat and was very simple to make. Post to come with pics...

Next Monday my little man is turning 4. As a Ben 10 obsessed fan he has requested a Ben 10 Cake. Thanks kid. Here's what I found on Flickr to get some inspiration...hmm we'll see how we go.

This cool post from The Busy Budgeting Mama with some neat cake inspiration. Natalie is also having a tough time dealing with the death of her best friend just recently. Any thoughts and prayers going her way are so appreciated.