Oh and by the way

What better than this wonderful time of year to jump back in here and update all of you out here in blog land.

It’s been a crazy whirlwind of a year and we just got caught up in our own lives and couldn’t find the time to read your blogs, let alone post to our own.

First and foremost, I know most of you are concerned about The Cowboy and his battle with cancer. To refresh - he was diagnosed with throat cancer last winter. We were fortunate enough to be here in the Rio Grande Valley and about a day’s drive away from the biggest and best cancer center in the world – M D Anderson in Houston. He underwent 33 radiation and 5 chemo treatments. To our new readers - you can read all about that in much more detail in our previous posts.

The good news is that today he is cancer free. We drove down to Houston in August for his 3 month check up and all reports were good. As we made our travel plans to head south this winter we worked it around his 6 month follow up in late November. Same great results. No signs of cancer. Words cannot express how grateful we are!

The bad news is he still hasn’t regained control of his voice. There was a lot of damage as a result of the radiation; the muscles on his voice box are still not working properly. Following the November appointments we went back to Houston the first week in December for a few days for more testing. Following a very thorough video strobe the rest of the time was spent with a speech pathologist. She gave him more exercises and they also prescribed a steroid. I wish I could say that, with the therapy and drugs, we’ve seen an improvement but in all honesty, I can’t. Some days are better than others and we are still very hopeful that he will be singing like Johnny Cash any day now. We both feel that if this is the worst case scenario – then so be it.

So much has happened since I last posted that I don’t even know where to start. Over the next few days of downtime we will try to get everyone caught up and The Cowboy will be sharing some of his experiences with you as well.

 

However, at this time, we hope y’all are surrounded by your loved ones.

We are sending our warmest wishes for Love, Peace and Joy . . . this Christmas Season and always.

 

 

 

(P.S. We did find the time to get married.)

For many reasons this will be a very special Christmas for us. We hope it is for you too.

Ahhhhh ! Home :-)))

Well, that overnight stop in Dayton, Ohio was just a thought . . . we made good time and decided to just keep right on a truckin’. A total of about 760 miles yesterday landed us in our own bed last night about 11 o’clock. Even at that hour we still had friends here in the park welcoming us back with hugs and congratulations! Since then it has been non-stop with neighbours and friends stopping by with sincere best wishes. We are so fortunate to be surrounded by such wonderful people and to be included in this great community.

It feels good to get our land legs back and we spent the day just relaxing and orienting ourselves. Unpacking will wait till tomorrow.

Hope everyone is staying healthy and safe out there.

Again, thanks again for all your positive thoughts and prayers. There are no words to express the gratitude and love we feel from all of you.

God Bless.

We’re half way there!

As we head out this morning we are about 50 miles south of Nashville and at day’s end we will be just north of Dayton, Ohio leaving about 340 miles left to travel on Sunday – the final leg of our journey.

We’ve learned a lot on this trip – even some things about each other       *Sigh*

The biggest discovery is that we are really poor packers. First of all, we don’t even own a suitcase. Haven’t had the need for one while living in our motorhome. We simply take everything with us when we go.

Think about that . . .  what do you take with you when you go?

There will be more about all of this later but we just wanted everyone to know that we are still safe and travelling north.

Take Care everyone!

Still travelling

Just a very quick post to let everyone know we are safe and still travelling.

Left Houston, taking I-10 through Louisiana and ended up for the night at Brookhaven, Mississippi. Tonight should find us just south of Nashville.

Great news for the day – Rocky’s results = CANCER FREE!

Thank You for all of your prayers. They’re working. We Thank God everyday.

We Came, We Saw, We Conquered!

And tomorrow we will be merrily on our way back to our family and friends back in Ontario – feeling a whole lot lighter now that such a big weight has been lifted from our shoulders and our hearts.

Dr Phan confirmed today what the surgeon and the chemo oncologist told us on Monday. The cancer is completely gone.

He’s very pleased with The Cowboy’s progress and told us to keep on doing what we’re doing. The doctor was compassionate but not concerned about the soreness in The Cowboy’s throat. He said it is just is just taking a little longer to heal and could take up to a year before he regains his voice and that’s okay – we’ll settle for the whisper – and be thankful.

I’ve always suspected that The Cowboy is a horse whisperer – animals, especially dogs are always drawn to him – like moths to a flame, like magnetic poles are attracted to their opposites, like Icarus to the sun. Oops, sorry. I’ve been reading the 50 Shades trilogy and kinda got carried away.

Monday was a full day – leaving the motel room at 5:30 am and not finishing at MD until 5 pm. No appointments Tuesday and only one today at 2:15 so we’ve had some free time.

One of the main highlights of that time was meeting up with Rocky and Cindy. You can click on their names and read the post about our connecting up with this wonderful couple back in March.

The guys were both receiving treatment at the same time for the same type of cancer. We’ve kept in touch with them and when we found out that Rocky’s follow up appointments were the same time as The Cowboy’s we made plans to get together.

We got together and had a wonderful visit before heading over to the Golden Corral where Rocky treated us to dinner. Discovering that it was Cindy’s birthday made for an even better celebration. Thanks Rocky – our turn next time and Happy Birthday Cindy!

Below are a few shots of how we spent the rest of our free time over the last couple of days.

And Yes Ladies! I know how lucky I am to have a man that likes to shop.

BIG TEXAS THANK YOU ALL AGAIN for all of your kind words in the Comments, emails, texts and phone calls.

‘Bye Houston. It’s been a heck of a ride . . . See you in November.

Negative is usually . . . well, a negative word

But not today!

The results of The Cowboy’s CT Scan today came back – Negative!

All very positive results with all his tests. Blood pressure is good along with all the other numbers. All of the doctors and specialists are extremely happy with what they are seeing.

We’ll have more details on Wednesday after we see Dr. Phan, the radiation oncologist, but right now we are just enjoying the good news. We celebrated with a beautiful dinner at Olive Garden.

We are both extremely relieved and very grateful for all of your positive thoughts and prayers.

It’s late and I just wanted to send out a quick post to let everyone know the results of the tests.

So I would have ended this post here but then The Cowboy took over the keyboard and don’t say I didn’t warn you about ‘the cowboyisms’!

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The Princess always has a way of understating things. ‘Grateful’ is definitely one of those understated words. You need to understand the impact of the Doctors telling us that My CT scan and other tests indicated that they nailed this Cancer to the barn door and it is not coming back! The tears started falling like a “cow peeing on a flat rock”. We both had some concerns that perhaps it was not over with yet but what a relief knowing “All is well” and the doctors couldn’t ask for any better test results.

By the time we get back to Ontario next week we will have travelled 3,000 miles to get these tests from our doctors but it would have been worth it even if we would have had to walk the entire distance.

The damage to my throat is still healing and will continue for the next few months. My voice will not return until all is healed so The Princess will just have to continue to listen intently to every word I say.

We both consider ourselves SOOOOO lucky to believe in a loving GOD that cares for us and that we have such GREAT friends that have prayed for us and helped us through one of the hardest times of our lives.

THANK YOU ALL!

Houston! We have landed (again)!

And Yes! It is hot! Just like everywhere else in the nation.

We are here for The Cowboy’s follow up appointments at MD Anderson where he completed 34 radiation treatments ending on April 26th.

For those of you who are new to this site you can click here to read the post back in February where I first wrote about The Cowboy’s throat cancer diagnosis.

To update everyone else he still hasn’t regained his voice, it remains just a whisper, which means that I continue to win MOST arguments .

He remains positive with a great attitude and will be sharing more Cowboy words of wisdom (COWBOYISMS) soon. Even though his throat is still quite sore with medication offering temporary relief. He hasn’t regained his usual appetite so that has resulted in more weight loss. He’s started back on protein drinks to help supplement – I’ll have numbers tomorrow after he gets weighed in.

We left Ontario last Wednesday to travel the 1500 miles down here. We chose not to bring the motorhome on this trip driving our Grand Vitara and staying in motels instead. The trip itself was pretty uneventful with the usual construction but no major traffic tie-ups. We arrived here early afternoon on Saturday and have set ourselves up in a nice efficiency room with a small fridge and microwave. Guess it’s a good thing we’re used to living in a small space eh?

Early start tomorrow with blood work at 6:15 AM and 6 more appointments following right up till 3 in the afternoon – so it’s a short post tonight.

I can’t close off without saying Thank You to all of you wonderful commenters out there. Your kind words and messages mean so much to us.  I apologize to my loyal followers for not posting regularly. I will really make more of an effort to keep you updated. I have a lot of blog reading to catch up on too.

We hope everyone is enjoying their summer.

Thank You all for your wonderful thoughts and prayers.

Good Things Gro–o-o-w . . . in Ontario

Well, I finally got my fresh Ontario strawberries!

They followed this mouth watering Prime Rib . . .

Grilled to perfection by The Cowboy along with garlic baked potatoes & onions – another of The Cowboy’s specialties. I was too busy eating to take photos but the sides of fresh asparagus and tomato/cucumber salad with Italian dressing and feta cheese were scrumptious as well!

Joining us for this summer-time meal was Nancy and her daughter, Suzanne.

Remember what I said about the camera? It’s like everybody froze – mid air!

The other pretty lady at the table is our niece Natalie.

Lots of good food, visiting and chatting with lots of laughs . . . that is until the camera comes out!

And that busy little girl in the background is Natalie’s daughter – our great niece Kiera.

As soon as dinner is over – what else is there to do in a campground?

Well it must be time to roast marshmallows.

Sounds easy right?

Well first off we need to be very patient and wait for the fire to be started:

then the perfect giant roasting stick had to be found for the giant marshmallows:

Ahhhh . . . the anticipation . . . VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

 

Finally the tasting!

and the Sharing . . .

Now that’s what summer is all about!

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Now for a little photography fun

My everyday ‘go-to’ camera is a Lumix Panasonic that has taken literally, thousands of pictures.

 

 

It’s a mid sized camera with a 12X zoom that’s easy to grab and just point and shoot.

 

Then every once in a while I put on my big girl panties and reach for this one:

 

My Nikon D-80 DSLR with a wide angle lens as well as a zoom lens.

I haven’t taken the time to experiment much with it and the settings are still on ‘Auto’.

 

A friend of mine even gave me a couple of filters for it – I have no idea what the filters will do!

It’s a much larger camera and not as easy to carry around – especially for the type of photos that I take. I prefer candid as opposed to posed shots preferring behind the scenes rather than shooting the main event. I think you can capture the more natural side of people.

Admittedly, it’s hard to be inconspicuous when you’re lugging around a 10 pound piece of equipment

Yesterday I shot a few flowers - next to kids, my favourite subject . . .

That one is SOOC – Straight out of the camera.

Then with a little editing in Picasa, the next 3 are the same photo.

Now a simple Tiger Lily – same thing – the first one is SOOC:

Just a few more random shots:

Hope everyone is having a wonderful day out there and doing exactly what your heart desires.

Thanks to all of you who follow our blog and encouraging us to continue blogging by leaving your beautiful comments.

We Love You All!

With a little help from our friends . . .

That should actually read ‘with a WHOLE LOTTA help from our friends’ but I don’t think that’s a song title.

Ron & Carla and their two little boys were the previous residents of our current site. They purchased a large mobile home next door and are making that their summer cottage. They had this gazebo set up on this lot but have no use for it in their new space so we bought it from them.

 

The frame was already erected and here’s Ron helping us attach the netting and canvas walls.

 

 

A bit intimidating but this is what our next project looked like.

Kennedy and Elizabeth, here in the park replaced these patio stones with a nice large wooden deck on their park model. Fitting in with The Cowboy’s future plans for our site and always on the look out for a bargain we made a deal and bought all 174 of them!

 

At the very least we saved the delivery charge since the stones were already here in the park.

 

 

 

 

Well, they were here in the park but not exactly on our site so we loaded up our trusty little red pick up truck (several times) and with the help of our neighbours managed to get a few of them in place and the rest of them stacked up for future projects.

Our ‘Eveready’ friends Jim & Linda are always here to lend a helping hand.

Then there’s Nurse Nancy who is obviously no stranger to the runway. Proudly making her debut here with the very latest and trendiest style of work wear. Notice how the work gloves complement the socks and shoes? She is the epitome of Trailer Park fashion!

 

We wouldn’t normally put this much time and effort into just any site but we are really feeling that this is perhaps our permanent summer place.

If and when . . . and I’m sure a lot of our RV’er friends go through the same thought process . . . what’s next? When we are no longer able to drive the motorhome (notice I said ‘we’? – more on that later) we do have a Plan B.

 

Ideally, we would like to be set up with a place somewhere in the southern states with warmer climates where we can spend our winter months. The other 6 or 7 months would find us here in southern Ontario in our summer place.

We not only love our new site but we also think the location of this park is one of the best areas for our needs and wants at this time. (We know Shy and Dave feel it’s quite a drive from London but we also know that they feel the hour and a half drive is ‘soooo’ worth it.)

Among other things we are only about 10 minutes away from the greatest fishing and boating spots on Lake Erie. There will be more on the ‘great fishing’ in a later post as Bass Season opens here on Saturday.

I just hope my camera has a large enough lens to capture all the shots of The Cowboy’s catch. He’s already told me they won’t be gone long. It should only take them an hour or so to catch their limit.

Early Dad’s Day

Blue skies with lots of sunshine surrounded our day on Saturday as we celebrated an early Father’s Day.

Son-In-Law Dave did an excellent job at grilling up some burgers to go along with our baked beans and potato salad. The kids even supplied the burgers and buns.

Since Shy & Dave have been together we try and double up on the family events when we can so Dave’s Dad – Dave Senior and Lynn also joined us for the day. Puzzled as to how to refer to our son-in-law’s Dad?!? When we first met we discovered that we have a great deal in common and have become very good friends – so we just call him ‘Friend’ and he is a good one at that!  We always have a great time when we are together.

The Cowboy has plans to build a big shed on our lot so Shy crafted up a sign that seems very appropriate.

She also gave her Dad this hint . . . She has given us so many wedding decorations and Cowboy themed gifts for our upcoming nuptials – What is it with kids these days that seem to think their parents should be married? Sheesh!

And no we have not set a date yet – but when we do – trust me! I will let everyone know.

After dinner had settled a bit we enjoyed some dessert around the campfire – fresh strawberry shortcake – oh wait a minute . . . no we didn’t. My (favourite?) son-in-law Dave didn’t bring the strawberries so we had angel food cake with lemon & dream whip frosting with slivered almonds topping it off. Delicious – but would have been much better with fresh strawberries.

Why does everyone completely ignore me when I have the camera in my hand?

Well, before the end of the day I was able to find some subjects that weren’t quite so camera shy.

We were treated to some cute little tricksters. It was Halloween for the little people at Trillium Court.

I wasn’t able to get pictures of all of them but I did snag a few.

We had about 30 little visitors . . .  some a bit scary . . .

while some were just darn cute!

This little guy was dressed up as his favourite animal – a beaver. (I didn’t really notice until I inserted this photo his little beaver mouth – too cute!)

And isn’t it amazing what lengths some people will go to for a candy apple?

 

Sure makes ya wonder what else she’s got in that loot bag!

Ah well – the trailer park life

 

What happens in Trillium Court – Stays in Trillium Court!

 

 

 

As the day came to a close we did manage to sneak in a few more photos for our memory albums.

Dave Senior and Dave Junior:

The Cowboy and Shy:

The wonderful loving bond of father and daughter.

A belated wish to all of the men out there . . . whether you are a Dad, Grandfather, a wanna-be Father or play the role of a Dad . . .we hope you had a great day and spent it doing the things you wanted to do with the ones you Love!