The Blanding Bugle

Volume 18 Issue 9

September 2009

5x6 = A LOT!

For the past five years Doreen has been promising her children each a birthday party.  She has been so busy with other things that the parties have never happened.  It seemed like every Family Council the kids would bring up the fact that Doreen owed them a party from 2004.  If you do the math that is six kids time five years equals THIRTY parties! 

To get the monkey off her back Doreen came up with a brilliant plan: A Blanding Birthday Bash! It had been so hot in July (shattered the high temperature records) that it was decided that a huge party would be held at one of their favorite beaches and they could each invite five friends (one for each year).  Invitations were sent, party planned and it was one great BLANDING BIRTHDAY BASH!

A cake for SIX!


Debt paid!
Steve & Alex
This was actually taken on July 4th but same beach.

Fun + Family = Good Times!

Almost every August you can find the Blanding family in Long Beach, Washington. We LOVE IT THERE!

This year the "Blanding" family was almost 30 members strong!  Steve's family met in Long Beach for a family reunion.  It was so much fun!  The only bad part was Julie & Paul weren't able to make it.  Maybe next time! Oh, the other bad part was in Liz got very sick on the last day. Thankfully she was able to make it home and see a doctor: just strep. While she was in bed her children were able to have a great time with us!

We happened to catch the very end of the kite festival (what fun) and then spend the first part of the week with the sand and the wind all to ourselves. We were supposed to have awful weather, but it turned out to be just perfect! It only rained during the night which kept the dust/sand down!

We can not thank Steve's parents enough. We had a wonderful time. The food was great! The company even better and of course you can never beat being with family!

I took over 2000 photos, so will spare you and only show a few on this page. Click here for more. For the Blanding members of the family: you'll get a disc with these at full resolution so don't worry. It will be coming.

Look at this 2002 and 2009!

Matt, Chris & Jessie back in 2002

Jessie, Matt & Chris in 2009

As much as things change they stay the same!

14 Grandkids!

Everyone except Paul & Julie
 

Mike, Kray & Chris body surfing.

Matt calling it quits.
The Pacific is COLD!

"Grandpa's Angels"

Matt & Chris trying to right themselves.

Emma
What else do you do at the beach but
dig a hole and get in it!

Taking a break on the board walk

The Three Amigos
Mike, Spencer & Jason

Grandma, Lauren, Jon & Grandpa

Brothers!

A walk to breakfast

Jessie & Matt walking to the beach

Jessie

 A little pain in the back side

The first week of July saw my boys head off to scout camp and I got a pain in my back.  It wasn't too bad, but within a few hours it grew so that I couldn't handle it.  I called my ob-gyn and got an appointment for early the next week.  Of course he was out delivering a baby and I had to see a nurse. An ultrasound ruled out anything wrong there so off I went to a urologist.  After a CT scan and some x-rays it was determined that it was kidney stones.  I have some kidney stones in both kidneys but nothing was in the ducts.  I was to wait two weeks and if the pain continued go see my general doctor.  I made an appointment to see him because the pain hadn't gone away. 

The only way the pain would stop was if I was moving or heavily drugged.  I spent a lot of time walking my neighborhood, standing up and "dancing".  At night I would pop a nice little pill and drift of to dream land. Poor Steve found out what is like sleeping in a washing machine.

My doctor sent me for another round of x-rays and they came back clean. So a MRI was ordered.  It was while I was in the MRI machine that a mass was discovered in my back. This mass is sitting on my T12 and in my parispinal muscle.  

Through a long two week process of test after test and visiting many doctors (my new hobby is collecting doctor's & clinic's business cards--I'm up to 10) and finally a biopsy I was diagnosed with Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma.  We don't know the type or the stage.  Those results will come in September. For now we are upbeat and positive that we will beat this!

Is you would like to follow "My Journey to Recovery" you can find me at http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/doreenblanding

Takin' photos

We also spent a good hour on the beach with Jon taking family pictures our last night there.  Because this month is already loaded with photos, I'll wait to post those and I would hate to run the surprise of our family Christmas card.

I also did a photo session for Kray's Senior photos.  Those too will be posted later when we finish our session in Redmond. They turned out GREAT!

Being behind the camera, you don't always have many shots of yourself.  One morning when I couldn't sleep because of the pain, I got up and tried out the timer on my camera. I was messing around but actually came up with one half way decent shot.  I kind of like this shot because it might be the last shot of me and my long hair and I love the smirk on my face.  Chemo will probably make me go bald.