Vernon Volumes text

Vernon Volumes text

Monday, August 26, 2019

Tara's 50th birthday - Ruth's Chris steakhouse



On Saturday evening we went downtown to Ruth's Chris to celebrate Tara's 50th birthday. I have never been to Ruth's Chris before so we ordered a variety of drinks, appetizers, steaks and even dessert. Andrea has been to the one in KC. Good food and good times with friends. Happy birthday Tara!










Lizards and swimming with Emily


Paige's friend Emily came over on Saturday and they had a lot of fun in the pool on a hot day. They enjoyed capturing the lizards in the lanai and took them out on the floats in the pool. Not sure if the lizards loved it, but after they were released maybe they reconsidered their choice of residence.


Chemotherapy 2 of 4 - TNBC/IDC/BRCA2


On Tuesday, August 20th, Andrea and I went to Mayo for her second round of chemotherapy. It took an extra hour since they didn't have the Paxman unit running beforehand. Andrea's head hurt quite a bit when they first started running the Paxman, until it got numb. After round 1 of chemo, Andrea had some neuropathy in her hands and feet, so we tried hard to be sure her hands and feet stayed chilled as much as possible.

Andrea's been feeling pretty good after round 2, but she is a little upset about the first major shed of hair about 19 days after the first round of chemo. We'd been hopeful that the Paxman would prevent much hair loss, but we'd estimate that she's lost possibly 40-50% of her hair at this point. Much of the hair loss is on the top and back in the center of her head. It isn't very noticeable yet, but it's difficult as it sheds since the hair that's falling out gets tangled in to the remaining hair. Her Paxman kit came with a brush, but it's very difficult to work the tangles out and we've found it's easier to just be gentle and patient and use our fingers to untangle a little at a time. It's also hard since Andrea's not supposed to wash her hair often and she's only been washing it a couple times per week.

Andrea's been experimenting with a couple of hats and head wraps and isn't comfortable leaving the house any longer without something to cover her head. We're hoping the hair loss won't progress much further.

New car - Tesla Model X


On Monday August 19th, we picked up our new car, a Tesla Model X. We have been considering the Model X for years and actually had one of the first deposits on the car when it first came out. I think I might have gotten one of the first Model X's in Jacksonville if we'd gone through and purchased it back in 2016, but we ended up moving in to our PVB house in 2016 and decided to put it off. For the past year we've been kicking around the idea again and I'd been really debating whether to buy a late model used Model X, but it was a hard decision since the newer manufactured cars had some additional features. In the end we went with a new car, which is exciting for both of us since we've only ever purchased used cars. We figured that at least once in our lives, it would be fun to have a new cool car, and we have really been enjoying it so far.



Monday, August 19, 2019

Paige playing Roblox with Graydon



Paige is quite a gamer girl and loves her PC setup. After she got her phone, she will do a Facetime call with her friends so she can see and talk to them while they play together. She plays quite a bit with her friend Emily P from school and also plays a lot with Graydon. They were working on her "Welcome to Bloxburg" house/diner the other night and I took a short video of them together just as Graydon was being called down for dinner.

Back to school and back to tennis for Andrea - TNBC/IDC/BRCA2


Monday, August 12th, was the first day of school for the kids and it was also a big day for Andrea as it was her first day back to playing tennis since May. After Andrea's cancer diagnosis she had a biopsy which prevented her from playing tennis, and shortly after that she had her surgery and chemo. She's finally healed well enough following surgery to start tennis again and was excited to get back out on the courts. Last week she was able to play tennis a few times and it's great to see her back out having fun while getting exercise. Her second chemo treatment is coming up on 8/20/2019, but hopefully Andrea will continue to feel well enough to play tennis.

Summer Memories 2019


On the last day of summer break, the kids wrote down some of their favorite summer memories for the 2019 summer. We had them each read their list, and the lists are also posted so we can always remember all the fun we had this summer.











Saturday, August 10, 2019

First day of school 2019



The first day of school for the kids is Monday August 12th. We decided to get the "Back to School" pics of the kids on Friday since it's super hard to get the pics on the actual first day of school. Connor has to get up before 6am and his bus arrives at 6:45am. Paige gets up shortly after Connor leaves and her bus arrives around 7:30. It is tough to get them up, breakfast, ready and snap pics, especially since they're getting up at different times. Anyways, that's why we decided to get their back to school pics a little early.





I put together the back to school collage and it really kind of hit me how much they have grown and changed over the years. The first pic is Connor getting ready for his first day of kindergarten and the last pic is Connor getting ready for 7th grade and Paige getting ready for 4th grade. We love these two so much! It's amazing how fast they change.


Meet the teacher day


Friday, August 9th was "Meet the Teacher" day for our school district and we went to Paige's school first to meet her new teachers. We picked up her schedule and planner in the cafeteria and then went to Ms Link's classroom, which will be Paige's homeroom where they learn Science and Math. Paige switches in the afternoon with the classroom nextdoor and has Ms Brady for Language Arts and Social Studies.









After we finished meeting Paige's teachers, we went to Landrum to meet Connor's. Last year when he was in sixth grade and it was our first time at the Middle School we were all a bit overwhelmed trying to find our way around and meet all the teachers. It was such a difference this year. Connor got his schedule in the cafeteria and then he found his way easily to every classroom.


Connor did an amazing job, not just finding all the classrooms, but introducing himself to the teachers and talking to them about the different subjects. It's awesome that he's so comfortable in his school.




Looking forwards to the school year!



Adventure Landing with Logan and Abby


On Thursday, Logan invited Connor to go to Adventure Landing with his family. I decided it would be fun to go along with them and Paige wanted to bring a friend so we picked up Abby and headed over to Adventure Landing for the 5-8pm Waterpark evening special. It was apparently quite the popular event and there was a super long line that took about 30 minutes just to get the tickets and wristbands to get in. I let the boys go off on their own and stuck with Paige and Abby. We rode some of the slides and went around the lazy river for quite a while. The wave pool was nice too, but after doing the tidal wave pool at the Disney Typhoon Lagoon, it was not super exciting. The kids had fun and we stayed until the park closed. It was fun to see Logan while he was in town.







Chicago visit for Great Grandma Delores's 89th birthday


On Friday, August 2nd, I flew to Chicago with Connor and Paige. Since Andrea had just done chemo on Tuesday, she wasn't able to come with us and stayed at the house with Abby. Grandma Delores turned 89 on Friday and everyone went over to Uncle Roger's house in the afternoon and evening to celebrate. We walked around in their big backyard garden, played checkers and piano, went on a walk with the dogs, played games, ate dinner, and then enjoyed a birthday cake that Aunt Wendy baked for Grandma.


















On Saturday morning we went back over to Rog and Wendy's house for some Belgian waffles and played with some more of their toys. Connor fell in love with the marble race track and we built all kinds of race courses and would see which marbles were fastest (red always won). Paige played piano a lot at Rog's house and had a neat app on her phone that gave her some piano instruction and it actually would have songs that she could play along with and it would listen to her performance and would grade her and keep track as she progressed.













In the afternoon we went over to Aunt Sharon's house and enjoyed the relatively cool weather. The kids played outside quite a bit when we arrived until Connor got a blister playing basketball in his sandals. Paige played with the Cozy Coupe car and with Erin's kids Caleb and Emmy.















The favorite part of my day was going on a nice long walk with Max. He rode a scooter and we went all the way down to the end of the road in the neighborhood and then back. We found a big beetle bug, some birds, a sweet honeysuckle flower and a big metal bolt. It was quite the adventure and I enjoyed chatting with him. He had so much to say and is at such a fun age.






As it got dark, we played a super competitive game of four square until the mosquitoes got a little too bad, someone broke a glass, and it got dark.


The kids practiced some drums with Uncle Lee and put on a little performance for Alex, Laura, and myself.


Then, it was time to say goodnight and goodbye to everyone!


On Sunday morning we went back over to Rog and Wendy's after breakfast and hung out for about an hour before our flight. We made one more marble track and then we packed up and said goodbye to everyone. 




We had a nice visit in Chicago, it was short and quite a bit of effort for such a short weekend trip, but I was happy we were able to see Grandma Delores on her birthday and were able to see all the family that was around as well. The kids were so fun to travel with, they are so easy going and wonderful.