There hasn't been anything super exciting in the last few days to report. The tumor is still trying to come out, it still hurts like bad words and we are starting to explore options of surgery and who to do it. I didn't like my options of surgery 6 1/2 years ago here in the Phoenix area and we are hoping to find that that situation has changed since I could continue treatments sooner after surgery with no travel involved. Our insurance is in Texas - which could possibly lead us to MD Anderson in Houston (the #2 sarcoma center in the nation) - but I would have to stay and recuperate longer before travelling and continuing treatments back in Mesa. If worst comes to worst, Dr. Lodi still knows people in New York from when he was at Columbia University, but travelling there and back would not be pleasant not to mention the expense of getting it done there and staying there - whew! We will do whatever is best. The infection is back - raging full force and I was pretty sick last weekend. And there are new sores on my leg where the tumor is trying to come through. That is why we are going to look in all the surgery options. Surgery can be a death-sentence for sarcomas, but I have IPT now (the form of administering chemo) that we didn't have before and we will be trusting in that a lot. We'll see.

A couple funny from the kids in the last few days:

On Monday, Rick gathered the kids around to talk about Memorial Day. He had spent time reading about all the wars from the Revolutionary War to present talking about the number of people who fought and died and the history behind Memorial Day. We also read Uncle Randy's great email and looked at the pictures he sent. When we got to talking about the Middle East, Grandma brought up how fast we got to Baghdad and how the whole world watched it on tv, Caleb piped with how fast the bad guys got out of there and how they had to hurry "ON THEIR CAMELS." He is so smart and knows so much about so many things, it was so fun to see that there is still little boy in there with him thinking that they all ride camels over there in this day and age. My Mom and I were giggling as quietly as we could without him seeing. "Giddy-up camels, hurry, hurry, the U.S. are coming!"

Last night when I was putting Emma to bed she had a wind-up teddy-bear with her that played a nifty little version of "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star". She likes me to sing to her after we read to snuggle for a minute, so she said, "Let it go for a minute, Mom, it plays 3 songs: Twinkle, Twinkle, Baa Baa Black Sheep, and ABC's". I was thinking it must have played little variations. I listened to it a few times before I started singing with it and each time it played the same thing. I cracked up thinking that SHE heard 3 different songs just by what she sang. So I sang each one for her to the same tune and she was happy as a lark that she got al three songs.

Okay, so I think they are cute kids. I will keep them. It has also been nice to have Rick here. He has been so helpful and has fixed food, played with kids, and has been getting up at 5:00 to start work by 7:00am Austin-time. Nice for me, because then I didn't feel bad asking him to stop yesterday at 3:45, knowing that it was almost 6:00pm Austin-time. :) He's tuckered by 8:00pm, so I better start getting to bed earlier with him.