2017

2016 ended on a high note. Jeff and his girlfriend Julie announced their engagement in November. We've loved Julie every since Jeff first brought her home for a visit. We had just been waiting for them to officially decide. Then we had a wonderful time in December and January when all the kids came home for the December holidays.  

But here I am, halfway through 2017 and no blog posts. This past year has had a lot going on and I just haven't had the motivation. 

Not too long after the Marathon trip, Dad had more and more serious health setbacks. Scans showed that his cancer had spread, and he was past the point where treatment would help. We needed to focus on the time we had left with him. We brought the 2 younger kids out to Oregon for a quick visit before they went back to school. Jeff was planning a visit as well. I flew out again in early February, as did Jeff, and be there with Dad and Mom. Dad passed on February 13, after a day surrounded by Mom, all 5 of his kids, and a few grandkids as well. 

Dad didn't want a funeral, he wanted a party. So Mom's focus in the following months was on planning the celebration. We all tried to help from a distance, and shared some good stories and lots of pictures of Dad throughout his life. All 5 kids, along with spouses and grandkids, were there for the Celebration of Life. It was a good day with lots of friends and family. 

Since one of the reasons I started this blog was to talk about knitting and sewing projects, I need to mention some of the small knitting projects that I finished up in the last year or so. One was for Dad, last year when he was having some health complications. I made him a hat to keep his head warm last winter.

That kind of sums up how I feel about cancer in general, and Dad's prostate cancer in particular. The hat has been passed along to my brother, who was recently diagnosed with prostate cancer. He has since had his prostate removed and currently has no evidence of remaining cancer. Yay!

I have more sad news to report on the cancer front. The "yarn hug for Miriam" that I talked about knitting in my post of August 2015 did eventually get finished, and was sent to and worn by Miriam. The picture above is the finished piece just before I sent it. She reached the end of her treatment options last spring and passed away surrounded by her family. I was able to fly out to attend her funeral and speak briefly there about the wonderful friend and woman that she was. 

In more positive news, we adopted 3 cats, sisters, from a local shelter, back in December 2015. They are very cute, 2 of them are fluffy, and they are very silly. We're still working on socialization. We have once again ended up adopting the "scaredy cats" from the shelter, who were not used to people and are a bit skittish. They've made a fair amount of progress, but there is still a ways to go. Two of the kids are home this summer to help me with that. 

happy girl with cat

watching chipmunks

That's about all I can fit in this post. More later.

Shelley in CT