Jen's Grandmother
The past few weeks have been rough for our household. Right before Christmas my grandmother was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. For those not familiar with this cancer, it's the most physically painful one you can get and there is no cure. Especially for an 84 year old with heart problems. We are now nearing the end. Honestly, I'm happy for her, happy that her pain will soon be at an end. The hard part is watching her suffer and deteriorate. She's not only been talking about my grandfather and saying that she sees him, but she's been asking for her mother too. Unfortunately this week she is at the point where she can no longer speak or care for herself at all. We are just praying that the end will come quickly without pain and suffering.

Please keep the family in your thoughts and prayers. The stress is putting everyone on edge and there have already been quite a few arguments and misunderstandings.


Our New Toy
On a happier note, Tom and I did make a change in our household last week. After much discussion we decided two things: We need a bigger vehicle and we should trade in the hybrid. In a few years we were looking a having to put out a significant amount of money to replace the battery unit, so now was a good time to trade it in. Yes we loved the gas mileage we were getting, but that did not outweigh the cost of repairs. So we started looking around. Checked out a few options, consumer reports, test drives, and settled on the Honda CR-V. Amazingly the dealer was able to give us a better deal on a brand new one versus a used one. So we are now the proud owners of a brand new 2008 Honda CR-V. Tom's even surprised at how much he likes it, not as much as the Jeep, but close :)

Cucumber has already learned to recognize the new car and is greeting me at the window when I get home from work.

But the story doesn't end there. Four days after we bought it, I went out to lunch with my team at work. While eating, a woman pulled into the spot next to me and hit our PARKED! brand new car. Thankfully they were good people and left their name and number so their insurance company will be paying to repair it.


Not just pictures anymore... Videos!
For those that have explored our Flickr photos when clicking on one of the links, you will be excited to hear that flickr now allows you to upload videos! So with the Flip Video Camera that Mom & Dad (aka, Nancy & Denny) got us for Christmas, you will be able to see our videos there as well. :) There's two loaded now, one of Cucumber and one of my cousin Conner (believe it or not, he's only 9 months old and huge! They are projecting he'll be way over 6 feet tall). We'll continue to take more videos, although we are both camera shy so few will contain us, but we'll post them as we go.

So that's the latest and greatest with us! Until next month!

The stress finally got to us. The moving, the loading, the unloading, the moving... never ending!! We slept in and got take-out from I HOP. I rode in the car with him and so did Cucumber. It was a family affair :)

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Today was also the last day of the apartment! That also means we've got everything from the apartment into the house. Not unpacked yet, but in the house!!!! Tom went and did the walk through and turned in the keys. They got us on two things: they said the oven wasn't clean enough for them, and Cucumber tore two screens. All in all, for two years of living there, not bad. We'll still get the majority of our security deposit back.

Random updates:
1. Cucumber is continuing to heal well from her surgery.
2. Mom is doing well at her new job with my company and everyone loves her!!
3. My grandmother is continuing to deteriorate because of the cancer
4. Our new couch and chair should be here this weekend (please, please, please)
5. I cut my hair off a few weeks ago.
6. We bought a grill and it snowed on it.
7. We are goofs! :)

Tom and I took some video of Cucumber playing. They were playing the other day and she started "walking" the rail, and this morning she did it again. It was great! So we thought we'd share :)

( Click this link to see the videos )

First, a little background. More than a year ago I found a squishy lump on cucumber's neck. Needless to say it freaked me out. I took her thevet, they aspirated it and the cells looked fine. Months later, even after the lump got bigger, it just disappeared. About six months later another lump formed in the same spot. Again, we got this one checked and everything looked fine, but we needed to keep an eye on it. Since then, it's gotten bigger and harder.

We took her to the veterinary hospital to get checked out mid-October. Thankfully, the lump was not near her lymph nodes. That being said, they didn't like the firmness of thelump and given all the details we decided the best thing to do was tos chedule Cucumber for surgery. We scheduled her for the 19th of November.


Monday morning the, 5th of November, Cucumber was not herself. She stayed on the bed instead of following me around. She didn't come down the steps for food when I went down to leave for work. Both which are part of her normal routine. I felt the lump on her neck and it also felt different too. Instead of hard and long, it was squishy and round. We called the Vet's office and they were concerned too. Surgery was scheduled for Wednesday.

The scary part ofthe surgery was that the lump was on her jugular vein.  Thankfully the Vet was able to remove it without hitting the vein.  His initial suspicionis were that it had something to do with her thyroid but he wasn't sure. The mass was sent off for testing.

She was extremely disoriented from the anesthisia when I picked her up the afternoon of surgery and her pupils were dialated. She was kind of comical and pathetic at the same time. She seemed to be acting fairlynormal, but I could tell she was tired but she wouldn't keep still or lay down and sleep. Instead she would sit down, stare at a spot on the wall, and did that jerking motion with her head and eyes like when you are trying notto fall asleep at your desk. That was quite comical. :) Trying to keep a cat still is a HARD job. But we are making it ;) She stays in a good sized crate during the day and has to for the next few days before the Vet is ok with her having free reign of the house. Thankfully she's sleeping now instead of starring at a spot on the wall. And she's sleeping A LOT. She slept on my lap the other night for 5 hours and snored :)

The incision was and is SO much bigger than I had originally imagined, but apparently the mass was alot bigger than we had imagined too. She looks funny because since she won't keep still we cut a tube portion of a sock and put it over her head onto her neck. She keeps head butting things (which means she's happy) but it also means she could snag her staples.

The Vet called tonight. At first I thought they were just calling tocheck on cucumber. We took her in yesterday because we were concerned about an open section on her incision. Dr. Forrest asked how she was, I told him about our concerns with her incision etc and that it looked better and had re-scabbed over. Then he said the words....

We got the pathology results back.

I breathed in and held my breath. First words out of his mouth were... It's benign. I breathed out. Then listened intently as he told me that as a fetus they have something like gills on their neck and that sometimes if development is "off" they can form these kind of masses. They are benign but they just get bigger and bigger and press on the jugular vein. He said we got it at a good time, they got all the mass. And it shouldn't come back.

I was so relieved when the phone call ended that my arms were numb. And then I laughed and smiled. All we have to do now is get through the healing process and she'll be fine. We'll continue the antibiodics they gave us yesterday so no infection occurs.

She doesn't have cancer.She's doesn't have some kind of condition with her thyroid. She's going to continue to be a healthy happy cat.

Yeah for Cucumber! Thank God!

Halloween was fun this year. The day before we carved our pumpkins - a new experience for Cucumber so she was VERY attentive during the entire process. Sorry forgot to take pictures of the guts!

On Halloween, Tom's office had a chili cookoff at work. We entered by Turkey & Black bean chili and won first place by a landslide!!!! For the night it was fun with friends. Tom and I just started leading a smallgroup (aka bible study) for our church on Wednesday nights a few weeks ago. The one we were attending got too big so we split the group. Anyway, with it being Halloween and all, it was Mexican food and movies while handing out candy to the trick-o-treaters! We had some pretty good costumes - batman (my fav), love bug, princesses - all adorable!

How was your Halloween?

Click the Picture to see more of our Halloween fun, including carving, Cucumber bing nosy, and our decorations :)






And for some new pictures of Cucumber click this picture!

Much has happened since I last posted an update.

Christmas
We drove out to Illinois for two weeks and got to see everyone for the first time since Tom and I became husband and wife. We had a good time, but it was very busy. We drove home with three days still left to just be at home. We very much needed that. You can see some of the pictures from our first Christmas together here.

New Beginnings
In mid January I (jen) started a new job with EMA, a company in Southern Maryland which does alot of work with the Navy Base. It's been two weeks on the new job and so far it seems perfect. Much better work environment than my last job (amazing difference), interesting work, great people... it's definitely made life in general less stressful.

Tom is still working at Manned Flight Simulator and putting the finishing touches on a project he's been working on for quite awhile. Now the slightly stressful part of starting a new project!

Family Concerns
My family has been plagued with health issues: My Aunt had a stent put in her heart, My Uncle having both major leg arteries cleared out as there were almost totally blocked, and my grandmother had a minor stroke... Lots of prayer going on to keep them healthy. And Erin has some kind stomach bug which is worrying Dawn a bit.

Life in General
Tom and I are doing well. We are keeping busy with projects. He's working on a computer network idea that might work well for school labs. We finally hung pictures in the last room that needed it - our bedroom. A friend and I threw a Baby Shower for our friends whose baby is due in March, and I'm now gearing up for Wedding related parties for my best friend Jess ( she's my maid of honor and getting married May 5th). In all that, we make/find time to spend time together watching our favorite TV shows - Heroes, Stargate, and Battlestar Gallactica - cooking dinner together, and playing computer games ;o)

Of course, Cucumber is happy. She loves chasing Tom around and playing tag. And, as always, cuddles with me. In fact, she's walking around me right now as I type! and about to curl up next to me.

We hope you are all doing well. Time for me to go to sleep. :)

So I finally got all the recent pictures off my camera and figured I should share. However, since there are A TON of pictures I but them behind a link in case anyone is on dialup and needed to wait for a better time to view the pictures. Just click on the link below to see the pictures!

( Oh Christmas Tree... with cake? )