My Life

This photo very much represents my life at this time ...

On August 9th, I had a meeting with a multi-specialty team of four doctors and a genetic counselor, plus a mental health counselor to determine a course of action to deal with cancer cells that lay beyond the area that was excised by my recent lumpectomy.  Several options were offered. Most of them involved more surgery, but only one would guarantee that I wouldn't be back for additional surgery within a few years ... that missed cancer cells wouldn't migrate to other areas to cause major problems. 

I sensed a relief from my surgeon when I chose the one solution that would most likely get me free of cancer ... a double mastectomy. Fortunately my lymph nodes are free of cancer cells, so a "simple" rather than "radical" operation took place this past Wednesday, August 15th.  Having this surgery also means that I will NOT have chemotherapy nor radiation treatments. Also, since I've opted NOT to have reconstructive procedures the healing time is faster.

My post-0p meeting before we left for Colorado had freaked me out more than a little. I'm grateful to have had the 5 weeks to think about and consider my options ... in particular living breast free.

I'm back at the cottage being well cared for by Lee, Terra, and Alicia. Other family members will be here over the next few weeks to tend to everyday tasks, too. I feel loved and well cared for by them. The good thoughts, prayers, and encouragement coming my way are very much appreciated. I'm in good hands and good spirits, and am looking forward to getting back in the swing of things soon.

Tropical Garden Finished

Jeong's Tiki Garden - 44"x 28"

Up through the day that I left Michigan, I worked to get this tropical garden quilt finished so it could be shipped on our way out of town. It's created as a gift in appreciation to special friends who live in Hawaii. The guys had met way back in 1957 when my husband had lived there for a year while his father was a visiting professor. We have visited and been royally entertained by the Jeong's on quite a few trips to Hawaii over the years since.

The tiki has special meaning. Lee's mother had made a shirt with fabric that had been hand block printed with it for him back when Lee and Kawiki met. Quite a few years later Lee had out grown it, so it became a part of my wardrobe for a number of summers. Now 55 years later, the shirt fabric is too fragile to wear. So I cut out the tiki and layered it with tulle netting to become a feature in this tropical garden.

This quilted tropical garden features my favorite Hawaiian flowers … Plumeria, Hibiscus, Orchids, Bird of Paradise, and Ginger along with the amazing Ti plants and foliage. The border of Impatience along the bottom edge were included especially for David. That plant being the answer he gave me when I asked him his favorite flower.

It's amazing how a swipe of pastels and a touch of paint brings the flowers and leaves to life.

Tucked in among all that tropical splendor are images of our all time favorite Rock 'n Roll singer, Elvis who also loved Hawaii.

I'm fond of this picture taken of it hanging on my clothes line with the trees and foliage of Michigan in the background.

I hang my work on the line to spray coatings of acrylic protectorate on the surface. This gets done at intervals during their construction. I like to use Krylon. It protects against dirt and fading of colors.

Getting lost in this project has also been my refuge during this period of time dealing with breast cancer. There's more surgery in my future to get rid of stray cancer cells.

Good News

 Through the Door  26"x20 (2002)

Just before we left Knoxville in mid-May, an irregularity showed up in a mammogram. A sonogram a few days later showed that further investigation was necessary. I decided to have that done in Michigan just in case....  Not that I don't have good friends in Tennessee, but I have a number of longtime friends here, as well as family close by. And then too, the summer weather on the shoreline of Lake Michigan is a lot more preferable than the sweltering heat of Tennessee.

A needle core biopsy was performed on June 13th at the Betty Ford Breast Center in Grand Rapids. The pathology report indicated cancer. My husband and I had a meeting with the surgeon the next day to find out the extent of the cancer and my options for getting it "out of there." The cancer was small, about 1 centimeter. Although it was an invasive one, it was encapsulated (contained) within a milk duct and slow growing. I had an MRI on both breasts to make sure it's the only one and to give the surgeon more specific information about it's location and size.

Surgery was two days ago and all went well. The cancer being encapsulated in a duct could be removed by a lumpectomy along with just 2 lymph nodes.  I'm grateful for that rather than a mastectomy and many more lymph nodes having to be taken out. I'm lucky it was small and had not spread.

I'm to take it easy for a couple of weeks while the two incisions heal. I feel okay right now, but then I'm on pain pills. The only ill effect so far was nausea until the anesthesia wore off. In August, six weeks of radiation will start. Those daily treatments will ensure that no loose cancer cells have survived.

The prognosis for me getting through this and going full steam again is really good. One day at a time will get me there. My feelings are reflected in the quilt at the top of this post ... it's a little bit dark, as well as stark, in the room where I'm standing, but I'll soon step across the threshold into the sun filled one.

Never again will I be reluctant to have a mammogram. I had this one as part of a physical ... which I got only because I had turned 70. I urge each of  you who read my blog to have one if you, too, have been putting it off.

Tropical Garden Layout

Today I finally got some actual work done on the tropical garden piece for which I had composed and sewn the first layer of work in my Tennessee studio.

The leaves, flowers, and tiki are just laid in place. I consider this to be an initial layout. There will more plants in the foreground and upper corners as well as those you see getting more refined. I see at least two more layers of work before it's finished. Here's an example of the layers for one of the panels of "Prairie Performance"...

All the leaves and flowers are laid over the background (first photo) in the center picture. In the third one, most of them are placed under a layer of tulle netting to hold them in place while some of them are stitched on top of the tulle to give depth and dimension to the piece.

It feels good to actually have gotten some actual elements on that background after the hours spent doing the prep work of gathering foliage and flower petals as well as researching information about particular plants.

Pink Sunsets

Dramatic pink sunsets have lit up the sky over Lake Michigan last evening and this one.

These magical and seemingly unreal effects always amaze me and I hesitate to portray such "outlandish" effects in my lake series. Going back through the photos of that series I found that I had done so in these three:

 "Lake #26"

 "Lake #56"

"Lake #62"

Reality can be amazing! This pink and violet sunset with a lightening strike happened a few weeks ago. If I portrayed this in an art piece it would look so UNreal.