Man oh man what I see outside of our front window!

It's not the great pumpin Charlie Brown but.....

This morning we had about 30 turkeys come to the bird feeders. They do come two or three times a day but today a nice big tom was with them and here he is-

Now, the great thing about a digital camera is that you can shoot loads of pictures not having to worry about the cost of film. The bad thing, for me, is that I have a real difficult time deleting any picture that I have shot unless it is really bad! So there I sat this morning shooting tons of pictures of the group of turkeys that were in the yard and in the bird feeders. Here's a few-

The first time that I realized that we had turkeys coming in I was backing my car out of the garage when something HUGE came flying across the hood. There was not only one but many and they scared the crap out of me!

Tackla, our big dog, is so well trained that she can be laying on the deck, the turkeys will come, and she does not go after them. Peeko is getting to that point but is taking a bit longer. He is more willfull and deliberate! However, you put a squirrel in the feeder and there is no stopping them. Here are some window shots that I have gotten of the squirrels-

Our squirrels are very fat and happy.....

Loving to bury their corn and peanuts in not only our yard but in our neighbor's yards!

The other day David looked out to see a hawk sitting outside the window on a log-

And then there is this picture of the masked racoon family that came to the feeders during the night. We knew that the racoons were coming to the feeders becuase the dogs had been barking. On this night I stepped outside the front door, turned on the outside light and here they were.

And the various birds-

We also get Orioles and Hummingbirds but boy they are hard to get pictures of.

On this last day of October-the month of breast cancer awareness I am going to close with the latest picture of that wonderful bunch of roses that David surprised me with last week. the flowers are fully opened and they are still very pretty. Thank you all who have supported finding a cure for breast cancer. And thank those of you who have always been a support to me. Good friends are hard to find and I must say I do have some.

Message for today: Enjoy what you have right outside of your window.

Talk about a deer caught in the headlights......

While setting up the stelth cam in our woods he must have wanted to see if it works or some danged thing or another. Now I love my husband BUT...I would much rather see pictures of the deer in the woods....Our friend Mikey will appreciate this one!

The shed is in progress. It was a bit more work I suspect than they thought it would be and they didnt have the crew that they had hoped. Now I think I understand why things dont get done as quickly in the northwoods as it may in other parts of this state. I mean absolutly no disrespect to anyone who lives in that area (heck we will be residents soon) but it is more of a laid back attitude and what doesnt get done today MAY get done tomorrow. Come to think about it it is a way of life that more of us should adopt, certainly is less stressful. So, below are a few pictures of the garage/shed/place for David to put stuff/ in progress. The roof will be green and when it is completed it will be nice. The first picture shows the where the shed will sitin relation to the cabin. This is taken from the woods looking at our bedroom. The second picture is of the opposite side of the shed.

David and I and Peeko took a walk in the woods one afternoon. Even though it was mostly cloudy and the woods are not colorful this time of year, you can always find something to take a picture of if you are just patient and keep your eyes open. I caught these as the sun was poking out.

This is my favorite time of year in the woods. I love being able to see through the trees, love the crispness in the air. The next picture is of an old boat that is in our woods. When we finally get the 'junk' cleaned out of the woods this boat will go as well. If it didnt have trees growning out of it I would save it and have it placed in our yard somewhere.

This past weekend, as the crew worked on the garage, David got some work done in the cabin. He trimmed out the living room and started on our bedroom. We were able to get stuff cleaned out of the living room so that I could take a picture of it. This picture shows the wood walls and vaulted ceiling. The cabin is small but our hope is to 'minimize' and live with less than we THINK we need currently. Oh and by the way, this is also the room that will be my hunting shack next weekend! Nice huh?

While David was working inside I was enjoying myself outside making do with what we had. We were staying in a hotel (cabin is not yet heated and ready for cold weather living) and really didnt want to eat out every night. So I kept a roaring campfire going, cooked the garage workers lunch and I cooked us up our suppers that we took back to the hotel and warmed up in the microwave. As I was doing this I thought of my mom lots. It is just the sort of thing that she would have loved doing. I am sure that she was there with me while I was happily stoking the fire. I still miss her everyday but I am now able to smile when I think about her as opposed to the sadness that once overcame me. I find myself doing something or saying a particular phrase ofrmaking a particular gesture and I think my goodness that is just what mom would have said or done. I have become my mother's daughter that is for sure and I am damned proud of it.

Speaking of becoming my mother's daughter, I am posting some pictures of my mother's grandson. He is sooooo like her. These are a few engagement pictures that he and Kelly (his fiance) had taken at Minnehaha Falls. The first one is so Lenny. Jeans frayed at the bottom and sandals.

I love the presentation of the next picture. Something about the stone wall that just really makes this nice.

I am closing today with a picture of two pumpkins that were harvested from our pumpkin patch. Lenny called me one day wanting to know if I had fed the pumpkins steriods! Apparantly they are very thick on the inside, lots of meat. Now dont think that they are so talented that they can carve those pumpkins so perfectly on their own....nope they used stencils...haha. But they do look very nice dont they my steriod pumpkins.

Enjoy and celebrate each and every day of your life.

Celebrate Celebrate Dance To The Music!

OK OK so me dancing would not be much more pathetic than my attempting to apply lipstick!

But we are celebrating today because as of today I am one year NED. NED happens to stand for no evidence of disease. It was one year ago today that Dr Deaconson removed all of the cancer that I had growing in me and found no cancer in my lymphnodes. Wooooo Whoooo huh?

So the opening picture is of the roses that my wonderful husband and soulmate had sent to my chemo infusion yesterday to surprise me and congratulate me/us for our year journey. Even the onc nurses said they too loved him.......If only they REALLY knew him huh Mikey? Just kidding. He is fabulous he is so there, as are the rest of my family and the people that I am fortunate to call my true friends. Thank you all for supporting me during this leg of my journey.

In a previous post I talked some about perhaps thinking too much about the possibilty of reaccurrance and wondering if certain aches and pains were maybe cancer. I did talk to Dr Cockerill about this yesterday and it felt like my very own counseling session with a bonafide pshycologist! He reassured me that in my case the percentage of the cancer reaccuring is much lower than it is to never reaccur. He also said that I should monitor the ache in my hip for a bit and maybe stop jogging and just walk the dogs for a week to see if that helps and then let him know how I feel. If I want an Xray he will certainly do that but really feels as if it is the fact that I am coming close (oh so close) to the age of 50 that is causing some of these minor aches and pains.

So I made a decision while driving to the northland last night-

MOVE OVER CANCER BECAUSE HERE I COME WITH THE REST OF MY LIFE. GET THE HELL OUT OF MY WAY.

So having said that here I am on my/our one year anniversary at a wonderful little coffee shop in Longville called the Common Grounds drinking coffee and blogging on my laptop. Ummmmm, it doesnt get much better than this does it?

David has been here since Wednesday. We have a crew up that is putting up the shed. Thus far they have the poles in and yesterday the rafters went up. I will be sure to get pictures today of the progress.

Last night, as I approached Longville (it was getting quite dark) a nice big doe ambled across the road, I had to beep the horn to get her to move out of the way. Just as she began to move a bigger yet 6 to 8 point buck ran across from the opposite direction. A bit farther down another large doe sat on the side of the road just looking at me like she would like a ride. They are in the rutting season and are certainly not afraid of vehicles. Peeko and I took a walk once we got to the hotel and for petes sake....I swear people do not live in this town, deer do. We saw many deer running across streets and into parks etc. As I said before, it just doesnt get much better than this!

I am closing today with a picture of a doe and her fawn that we captured this spring on our stelth cam. This was taken in our woods in the northland. Enjoy and be sure to celebrate every day of your life.

Why I Wore Lipstick To My Mastectomy
Was a great movie in my opinion. It dealt with almost every raw emotion that you feel when diagnosed. Both David and I watched it and both liked it. Even though she is more than 20 years younger than I some of it is the same no matter what age you are. The beginning was a gut grabber for me, brought it all back. The mamo, then ultra sound and the docs really thinking that it was nothing until the biopsy....me totally. I especially liked the scene where her husband, after assuring everyone else that he was OK and it would be OK, went into a hallway and broke down. I am so glad that this movie remembered those that are our caretakers.
I do like how she dealt with her journey. She took control and marched on with humor. It is how I like to think I have dealt with my journey....minus the lipstick of course. My goodness can you imagine ME attempting to apply lipstick! We did both agree though that we are glad we chose the shave the head route as opposed to watching it fall out. And of course I got lucky and didnt get sick with the chemo. In fact I really didnt loose my taste for anything except veggie omletes at Baker's Square. We stopped there after one treatment and had a veggie omlete. It tasted really bad to me afer the chemo and even now thinking about it is making my stomach quesy!
If you didnt get to see the movie it will be aired again. I think on Saturday in fact. If you know someone with breast cancer or you yourself have been diagnosed, watch it.
I am ending this post with one of the most fun pictures I have gotten. David and I were taking our usual evening deer drive and happened to see this nice big boy. He is beautiful isnt he. But where the heck are the big ones during hunting season for goodness sake!

Continued. Humm you must be able to say only so much or post only so many pictures each time as I could not add anything more to the last blog entry. Still learning folks!

Anyway this weekend we also had an eagle swoop down in front of the truck as we were driving out of Longville. I was unable to get a picture because it went too quickly (or was it David that was going too quickly??) so I thought I would share this picture. It was taken a year ago this past weekend. We were on our way back from the Lost 40 and drove upon two very large eagles feasting on a road kill deer. They are awesome in flight but even more awesome on the ground up close. My son in law (Rachel's husband Melvin) and I share a passion for these majestic creatures.

Today I have a MUGA scan done. This is a test that meassures how your heart is functioning. Herceptin (and the initial chemotherapy drugs) can cause heart damage so this is one of the tests that I have periodically. So far the ole heart is doing just fine!

Thursday I see my oncologist. I am going to talk to him about reaccurrance and how do we watch for it in my case. I realize that the closer I come to the end of my infusions I am wondering more about is the cancer coming back. I know too that this is normal, many people go through this. But I do find myself thinking about it probably too much. I dont mean to sound negative because I'm really not. I think maybe just realistic. If I do have a reacurrance I know that we will fight that just like we fought this. So my message for today is ask the questions, don't be afraid to. Knowledge is power.

I am closing with another picture that I took this weekend. This is one of my favorite picture taking spots right outside of Longville. It had snowed and was a foggy day. Makes for a pretty cool picture.

It was a cold weekend in the northland. But we had to go close up the camper and get a bit done on the cabin. I HAVE to share a picture of what we drove up on when we entered our property. Our friends Mikey and Jan will appreciate this...Mikey I can just see you shaking your head!

This is what happens when you procastinate closing up a camper in the northland! While we were gone they got about 2 inches of nice heavy snow and apparantly an awning cannot handle that sort of snow load! So as you can see it ripped away from the end.

We did get some work done in the cabin though. Below are pictures from the outside and inside. We are anxious now to get going on the inside this winter. On Wednesday our shed/garage/David's place to put STUFF will be built-finally. So we will be able to take the crap out of the cabin and store it in the shed.

In an effort to dress up the entryway David made stencils that he then painted and attached on either side of the doorway. He hand drew these folks! Talented guy I am married to.

And a picture of the new living room with the new pine walls and ceiling.

And the 'original' part of the cabin with it's original pine boards. This is the kitchen area. Slowly but surely it is coming along.

David and I did take some time to drive around looking for the perfect photo ops and did find a few. I love old outhouses and we found an old old abandonded one. David took the door off of it and we are going to use the boards to finish up a corner shelf that he made out of another old door. I had to get a picture of the inside, this outhouse was old and was a great find!

So.......one year ago today I found out that I have/had breast cancer. I wasnt going to blog about it today because I realized that I was rather emotional about it and was trying to bury all of the emotions I guess, so I hadnt said a thing to anyone. UNTIL tonight during David's pool league. He shoots pool with a great bunch of guys that are pretty much Lenny's age and accept us two old folks like we are one of them. They are a lot of fun and keep us young. In recognition of breast cancer awareness month Bill requested a pink wrist band which I gave him tonight. I then told Lenny, Kelly and David that one year ago today I was diagnosed. Hugs from all and I now feel better emotionally than I have in a week. Gotta learn to live by my own words I guess....TALK ABOUT IT!

A reminder to watch the Lifetime Movie Network movie on Monday-Why I Wore Lipstick To My Mastectomy. JB, you'll have to let me know how you like it you old LMN person you...haha.

David and I are off to the northland tomorrow after treatment to close up the camper, yes it is officially the end of the season...RATZ huh.

In closing tonight I am sharing a fun picture. This is myself and my cousins all with our naturally curly hair. What a crew huh? Enjoy.

So because it's do danged cold out.....I decided to blog rather than take the dogs for a walk/run. Instead I just think I will blog about our dogs. How's that for a trade off. Ok Ok so blogging doesnt get me the exercise that I need but maybe (and I say maybe) I will get them out later in the day when it warms up a bit.

Before I begin I need to let everyone know about a movie that is going to be on the Lifetime Movie Network. It is titled 'Why I Wore Lipstick To My Mastectomy' and will be aired on 10-23 at 8:00pm. This is a story written by a person with breast cancer and how she deals with it.......humor. Might be worth watching even if you are not a Life time fan (husband, son!!!!) JB make sure you catch it huh?

So we have two dogs. One is an 80 pound Huskey Golden Retreiver mix. Her age is debatable, none of us can remember how old she is. So anywhere from 11-14 I guess. Her name is Tackla and we got her from David's mom who was helping out a friend when her dog (Tack's mom) had babies. As I remember the puppies were born looking almost hairless. Tack was the only female in the bunch. At that time we had a poodle at home (GiGi) that Lenny and I had had for years. GiGi didnt shed and we knew that Tack would so Tack was originally meant to be a basement dog where Lenny had his bedroom and she was supposed to be Lenny's dog. None of this lasted long because one day David brought the puppy upstairs to sit on the couch with him! Since then GiGi has passed and we have moved and now Tack has her very own bedroom with her very own bed-picture below.

Now Tack likes her sheets changed weekly and as you can see she loves to spend her days looking out her window at whatever wildlife may come to the birdfeeders out front.

Tackla got her name from hockey equipement. Lenny was in hockey at the time that we got her so there you have it. She is smart as a whip, loyal and has been a great companion. She has never had REAL pups but has a basketful of 'babies' in her bedroom. These 'babies' are groomed by her regularly, played with and when she is finished she puts them back. In fact she frequently feeds them. She will take a mouthful of her food and drop it next to the basket of babies. Of course they dont eat the food and after a minute or two she will eat it. She is very protective of her babies and of her bed.

Enter Peeko. His life started out pretty bleak. From what I have been told his first owners kept him in their basement for one reason or another. He was not house trained and I would suspect didnt have much socialization (which is a MUST for a dog). At 10 months of age my mother in law inherited him. She has two other dogs and a cat or two. Peeko came to her untrained and despite her efforts she could not completely house train him. The first time that I saw him I wanted him but David said no as did Lenny -having many good reasons the biggest one is that this is Tackla's house and she would not like an intruder. So there came a time when David's mom was going to be gone for a few days and needed a sitter for Peeko. I of course jumped at the opportunity thinking in the back of my head, 'once he is here David will love him too and wont let him go'. Peeko didnt leave after that babysitting weekend. Picture of Peeko when we got him prior to his first haircut.

He seriously had the softest curls ever but we knew he had to be groomed. Below is the groomed Peeko.

Peeko is the most gentle boy and is the ultimate lap dog. David and Lenny have eaten their words and love him too. Tackla is very accepting of him. In fact she shares her babies with him (only certain ones mind you!) and her bed on occassion. Tackla has been very good for Peeko we have come to realize. We think that it is because of her that he no longer poops or pees in the house. He sees that she does not do it and sees where she does go so he follows suit. He always looks for Tack when outside and allows her to be dominant. This next picture is of Tackla corraling Peeko in the computer room so that he cannot get out into the living room to be with us!

Too funny.

Our neighborhood is dog heaven actually. We have four houses in this area and all four of us have dogs. Three of us regularly babysit each other's dogs and our dogs play together like kids in a neighborhood for goodness sake! So having said that I cant sign off without posting pictures of Peeko and Tackla's 'friends'.

Below is a picture of Pixie who I have mentioned in previous posts. Pix spends half of her time with us and the other half with the person who owns her (Jessica). As stated in previous posts Pix loves to be photograped and always seems to be posing. This picture of her is one of my favorites. She is up north with us (oh and Jess is as well) sitting by the campfire when she decides if her mom can have a beer she too will try it!

And this picture.....do you think she could make a ton in beer commercials? I do.

Below are Peeko and Tackla's other two friends, Buster and Buffy Marie. They belong to Brent and Chrissy. Buster and Buffy dont have the run of the place like the other three dogs do because they just dont stay away from the road dang it. But they are just as spoiled as their friends are.

Buffy Marie loves to soak up the sun and Buster loves the snow. And you think I spoil ours....Brent and Chrissy leave lights and either the radio or TV on for their dogs when they are gone! Oh what we do for our animals huh?

Our fourth neighbor has doberman's one of which is an attack dog. Needless to say we have nothing to do with those dogs. One of them attacked Pixie last year when Pixie was on a chain in her yard. The dog did some pretty severe damage to poor Pix. I love animals but those two really need to not be here....... Believe it or not they now have a baby or a miniture pincher. I do know that the big dogs are either kept in the garage or out back in the fenced in yard and are not let upstairs as the baby dog would be at risk. Talk about lack of socialization.....I dont like the dogs but I also dont like the way in which they spend their days.

Last picture is of David and I at Itasca State Park this year. We have so few pictures of the two of us that I had to post this one. It's not bad actually.

In signing off today I want to remind all to buy pink. YES big corps do profit but hey so does breast cancer research.

And watch the movie On Lifetime Movie network (get over it those of you that think LMN is a dorky channel...Ok Ok so it is but really this is a worth watching movie) titled Why I Wore Lipstick To My Matectomy. Not only will it be entertaining but educational as well. It certainly talks about the feelings that one goes through when diagnosed. It is on on 10-23-06 at 8pm.

Bobbi