Tonight, I got my chest xray and liver panel back...all clean!!  I'm ecstatic about this.  So I'm ready for this process now. 

My "staging surgery" is scheduled for Jan 24 where they will remove the tumor and some tissue and my sentinel lymph node/s on my right side.  After this goes to pathology, they will know if they need to remove more tissue or breast.  I feel good about it.  I'm ready.

Living is good.  I'm happy to be here and so so so fortunate to know so many wonderful and caring people like you! 

I've been laughing a lot today.  Chase and I made fart sounds until we nearly wet ourselves!

Hugs and love to you all.  Thank you for your thoughts and kindness.

Lisa

 

 

 

Thank you friends, for thinking of me and sending your prayers.  I found out tonight that I have breast cancer.  I don't have many details as of yet but my tumor is fairly small and the doctor thinks that most likely it hasn't spread; but he can't guarantee it.   I will find out more on Thursday after some more tests and we'll go from there.  It's hard to type this without crying. 

It's hard tonight.  I knew inside that it was cancer but I didn't want to hear it.  I know also that it won't kill me.  I just feel it.  And I'm going to fight with everything I have.  I love life and all of the good and bad things about it.  I know that I will change inside and it will be good.  I know that blessings, rich treasures will come from this, also.

Love to you all.

 

Thanks so much for your prayers and thoughts!  It means a lot to me.

I saw the surgeon yesterday and I am scheduled for a needle biopsy tomorrow evening.  I won't know the results of the test until early next week.  I like my surgeon, though.  He seems very competent and is very up to date with technology.  I had been doing some research on the steps that are taken to rule out breast cancer and so I kind of knew the standard of treatment.  This is a really important thing when you live in a small town...sometimes the selection of doctors is subpar in a smaller place.  I'm happy with this guy so far.

Strange...the places my mind can take me when something like this is happening.  I have noticed some little control issues popping up for me.  Little things like Jim telling me to do something and me saying, I really need to not be told what to do right now.  Jim is very understanding about all of it, too.  I recognize that it's about the uncertainty that I'm facing that makes me feel helpless.  But you know, I feel okay for the most part.  I know that in some strange way, everything will be okay no matter the outcome. 

I will post an update as soon as I know something.  

---

In the meantime, here is a picture of what happens when your toaster oven malfunctions and you're trying to cure polymer clay! 

Poor little babies! 

I hardly know what to write tonight.  I guess I'm going to write the truth so that if anyone reading my blog wants to send prayers or good thoughts my way, they can do it.

I went to have a mammogram and ultra sound today (it seems like days ago) because I found a lump in my breast.  It appears that I have a tumor but whether it's cancerous or not, we don't know.  I have an appointment with a surgeon on Tuesday. 

I'm tired tonight.  I have gone through so many emotions today that my mind is exhausted.  I'm going to hold on to the quote that I posted on my Christmas card.  Yes, miracles.  Whatever those look like.  I guess great love is a miracle in itself!  

---

This is a vessel that I made for my parents for Christmas.  It's polymer clay over a glass vase. I really enjoyed making it.

 

  
Wishing you joy and blessings this holiday!

This was the Christmas Card that Robin made for me this year.

Things are busy...and relatively good.  My website is really taking off.  I hired a web designer and had hoped to have my new site online by January 1st but unfortunately, the webbies live in Seattle and have been without power so thy're running behind.

My new site is going to be called, Creativity College Online to accomodate the expanding media that I'm adding.  Some big names coming: Priscilla Hauser, Christi Friesen, Dayle Doroshow, possibly Maureen Carlson (we're in negotiations right now). 

I'm looking to add a basketry and a felting department.  Also Some jewelry and beading.  It's turned out to be much bigger than I had imagined!

And yes, I am going to Hawaii in March!!  Here are a couple of pics from one of Marilyn's last retreats.  I'm going to sit in my pareau, visit turtles, and make stuff!

We're leaving for my mom's house tomorrow and I'm really looking forward to it.  I didn't decorate for Christmas this year for the first time in my life!  Just too busy and Jim has come down with Pneumonia.  He's recovering, though, so we're still leaving town.  He can sleep just as well at Mom's house. 

Christmas is lean, lean, lean for us this year.  Jim's disability benefits were cut off a month ago so basically we have no income except what I'm bringing in.  He wants to get back to work but between pain, pneumonia, and needing another blood transfusion for anemia, it's not looking promising any time soon. 

Gourd College Online (creativity college online) will get us through by the end of January.  I had been thinking about starting this for almost two years and something....something just told me that it was the right time.  So I listened. 

I hope you all have a wonderful holiday.  I will visit soon.

Lisa

  

Busy Busy!

I have 2 weeks till my Litho class finishes and I'm rushing to get my finals done next week. 

Gourd College is going well...I'm going to be expanding in January to include some other mediums.  I have an incredible dollmaker who likes gourds that will be teaching for me in January....Marilyn Radzat.  She makes OUTRAGEOUS things!  I'm considering going to her creativity retreat in March...at her house on the beach in Hawaii!!  I want my mom to go with me because I think that she really needs something wonderful in her life right now.  Neither of us have been to Hawaii.

http://www.marilynradzat.com/

Another Doll and Gourd Artist who will be teaching in January is Sherry Goshon: She does incredible things with many different materials.  She is the one who inspired me to start Gourd College Online.

http://www.picturetrail.com/innerchildslg

And Polymer Artist Christi Friesen:

I'm excited!

Robin, Chase and I are going to Boise after Christmas.  Then Spring semester starts for me on the 15th of January.  I guess it's all better than being bored!

Blessings.

The Life of a Table

I once heard about psychics who can touch objects and sense things about people who owned them or held them in the past.  I believe that these kinds of things can happen.  I have had the experience many times of knowing things before I could have possibly known them and knowing places before I've been there.  This subject content sounds like it would have been better posted on Halloween!

One reason that I was thinking of this tonight is that Chase and I were coloring on my kitchen table yesterday and his marker marks were going off the page and onto the table.  They're washable markers but I don't worry too much about it.  I wondered if my table will hold the energy and memories of so many things being made on it's surface?

We've had the table, a really thick, solid, bench-type table, for almost 20 years.  It was given to me by my ex inlaws because we didn't have a good one at the time.  I was careful with it for a while.  But the kids colored on it, painted on it, I painted on it.  We drew and sometimes were too heavy with the pencil lead, causing impressions into the wood surface.  I scrubbed off paint and glue.  I wedged clay on it and built many ceramic objects.  Chase likes to use polymer clay on it.  Sometimes I have to get the clay off with a plastic paint scraper!  The finish is coming off in places. 

Have you ever seen those pre-aged wood pieces made to look like they've been around for a long, long time?  They look quaint but they have few memories of contact with people.  The wood may have memories of its own life, growing in a forest somewhere.  Then came the saw!!  (I wonder if the tree screamed?)  Then came the planers and sanders.  The carpenters.  And the people who distressed the wood.  What is their job title? Batterer?  "I hit wood".

If my table holds memories, hopefully it will be inspirational to whoever owns it in the future, whether it's a member of my family or someone else.  May it never become firewood.

 Still here...

I've had a very busy few months since I last blogged. 

I started an online gourd class website called, Gourd College Online.  This has kept me busy getting everything set up and trying to fine tune all of my record keeping and schedules.  I have about 15 teachers at my site and I teach classes also.  It's been frustrating because I would have rather started out with hiring a tech to do all of the web set up but didn't have much of a budget.  So I learned more than I really wanted to...I would have rather spent my time on art. 

I have been busy in my Lithography class.  The process is so different from anything that I have done before that I feel like an idiot!  I make mistakes on every print but I guess that's part of the learning process.  I love drawing on stone and I'm going to stick with the class for at least one more semester.

This print is called, "Aspen Markings" and shows my  the bear marks that I see on the trees in Mineral King.  It faded out a bit at the top but I understand why now.  This is a very big print; it's
15"X 11".

Our family went to Boise in September for Desert Rose's daughter's wedding.  We had a total blast!  I think it's been about 15 years since I had that much fun! I visited the campus at Boise State University and am pretty impressed with the art department.  I plan on transferring there sometime in the future.

             Robin, Sarah, Shannon, and Lindsay          Cathy and I crying through the father-daughter dance

Chase is in the middle, Jake on the right,          Erin sang, "Come Away with Me" and 
 Cathy's granson, Riley on the left                                              I played guitar                

It was an incredibly beautiful and meaningful wedding.  I will cherish it forever!

That's enough news for now...I'll get around to all your sites soon!

Hugs.

 

This is what I'll be doing this weekend.  Selling pottery and gourds and helping my mom with her booth. 

I haven't had much time to sit still lately with school, the Peddler's Fair, and life in general.  The online English class is pretty much a killer...it's a lot of work.  There is a lot of interesting discussion going on about the topic of Social Class in America.  I don't usually think about that too much, I would like to think that class in America doesn't exist but it does.

Of course since it's our focus in English right now, I'm seeing all kinds of things that I usually don't notice.  An article that we read called, A Touchy Subject, talked about the fact that when people get irritated about the subject and don't want to talk about class, they probably are in the middle class.  I define people by their character and try real hard not to look at class signals but unfortunately, the world DOES look at those things.

Any thoughts?

 

Theme in White, 1954 by Luigi Lucioni. Etching.

I found this print to be very interesting because in my lithography class yesterday, I began a drawing of Aspen trunks.  I had never paid much attention to printmaking before beginning this class.  Strange how we notice things that we never saw before once we focus on something new. 

I think I'm going to love the class.  I love the feeling of drawing on stone!!  Hopefully, I'll have my first prints by the end of next week.  Last week my brain was overloaded with new information but this week, I'm excited!