A serious validation of Facebook - "We Love Jenna"

Jenna and her family - Summer 2012

I grew up being sent to a very large Evangelical Christian church.  This was before the mega-churches that exist today.  Jenna is the younger sister of two of my peers from high school youth group, church, summer camp and High School.  She was always very cool. Not in an elite sense but fun and funny and outgoing.  She is only a few years younger than I am and is the proud mama of 3 kids today.

Jenna has been fighting pancreatic cancer over the last couple of years.  She was treated with a good outcome but the cancer came back with a vengance.   I don't know her prognosis but Jenna has publicly shared her struggle on Facebook and via the CaringBridge forum (what a wonderful use of technology). 

Jenna is in hospice care and down to approximately 70lbs.  70lbs!  A human skeleton - it hardly resembles her.  I recognize her by that crazy hair!  During Christmas she asked for prayers so she could muster strength to attend Christmas service with her family. She made it!    But her end is eminent and her time here on earth is a matter of days, weeks if she's lucky. 

Jenna's high school BFF (Tara) started a closed Facebook group called "We Love Jenna".  Many people from near, far, past and present have posted comments about their fond memories of Jenna so Jenna has them around her in her final days and moments. It kills me.  I'm not close with Jenna nor her family.  I know her from my youth as kids and her family as well. Although we aren't tight we go waaaaay back. 

I love the idea of using Facebook as a progressive tool so Jenna can read, for herself, the good memories people have of her.  It has messed with me.  The true destination of "say it to my face".  And how lucky WE are for that.

The difficult part for me in all this is accepting the fact that there is no rooting for Jenna.  There is no encouraging  or hoping for her recovery. She is going to die.  Very soon. Her young children are watching their mother emaciate away... slip away on the recliner.   This conjures debilitating sadness in me.  But Jenna does not feel this way.  When newly diagnosed she admits to 5 minutes of sobbing asking "why me".  After the tears  exhausted, she had a moment of clarity and said "why not me?"  I do not like this sentiment but Jenna has a great point.  She can do it.  I just don't want her to!   I'm amazed by her strength, peace and grace.  Jenna Mitchell.  Mark's and Sarah's little sister, Andrew's big sister.  Daughter to Leith.   Back in the day, who knew her life would end this way.  Jenna, skinny legged and crazy hair.

Each time I check my Facebook messages I'm haunted that I will be informed of her passing.  I love and hate Facebook. 

I haven't found the right voice for my feelings.  I struggle for words to say to Jenna.  In this paralysis I feel saying something is better than nothing.  So I say it plain:  that I'm thinking and praying for she and her family.  I suck. 

Please remember Jenna in your prayers. 

20

Life, real life, a full life is crazy.  It changes all the time.  These last two years have been the bearer of many big life events; selling a house, Aislin hospitalized, moving, going back to school, applying and getting into graduate school, my sister having a sudden brain aneurysm, the death of a different sister and then this past May, suffering a herniated disc.  Lots of things out of my control.  As imagined I put on some fat. I intentionally did not use the word "weight". That accompanied the fat gain but I was still very strong and competing in Olympic lifting.  At the end of August I decided I had some time I could dedicate to myself.   After losing 20lbs, I participated in a Body composition class at Windy City Crossfit. 1 hour 2 x a week. That's it.  The results are posted below.  I am in my undies people, but honestly does it look that much different than a bikini?  I don't think so.  I post these not to taut any kind of superiority but rather to show strength and to mark the new beginning.  The fat accumulated with all the stress from the past two years is pretty much gone.  I've learned to deal with stress better and to appreciate the journey I'm on and the goals that seem just a hairs breadth out of reach.   I am strong and can string together about 3 chin ups.  My body fat is around 14.5% which I'm told is pretty good. Cellulite, stretch marks and stretched out skin from having babies remains.

I continue to work out, started to train Parkour and will be getting back into Olympic lifting as soon as I think the ol' back is ready.  I'm feeling good and deal with back discomfort nearly every day.  I get Active Release Therapy via my chiropractor which has been immensely helpful (and expensive, sigh).   It's the muscles attached near my spine and hips that are too tight and cause problems.  I am disciplined to never play the pain med game for this old back. But that was the domain in which I was headed. I took hold of the wheel, turned hard and decided to steer where I wanted to go, not where circumstance has led me.

In January I begin Graduate Nursing School at DePaul.  Instead of being worried, I am so excited to learn and am ready to grab it by the horns and enjoy the journey.

In Strength and Intention,

Shout out to Roxanne Engstrom for taking the "hot" photos.  She rocks and can take some hot photos of you too!

End of Aug 2012

After losing 18 lbs - about 16.5% body fat

20 lbs down after body comp class.  No dietary restrictions.

Girl Scout Cookie Sale

Both of my daughters are selling Girl Scout Cookies for the first time.  Orders will be taken until Jan. 25th.  Please support my girls and the Scouts!  If you don't eat the cookies, buy some for your Mom, Dad, Grandparents, Coworkers or boss!  They'll love you for it!   $4 per box..  You can also donate a box of cookies. They will be given to Yellow Ribbon Operation Moms & USO Navel.

Girl Scouts of America advises to receive payment up-front if possible. This is preferred and appreciated.  Check can be made payable to:  Girl Scouts GCNWI.   Thanks for considering!  Distribution is Feb. 17, 2012.

Holiday Decorations

My sister, Sally, asked me to post pictures of my holiday decorations.  Instead I'm including a small picture essay of things we've done this holiday season.  I have not been the best photo taker but hope to improve this in the new year.  Me and the girls have had some really fun times.

Merry Christmas!

Peanut Butter and Chocolate Bar cookies.  Our fav!  We use mini candy bars b/c they pack better than Hershey's kisses.  Yes and I said "pack" but truly, they don't last long enough to pack.

After sectioning off part of the front window, I had the girls paint winter scenes in acrylic paint.  I peeled the tape away for an easy, festive decorative touch. The girls loved it too.  They felt a bit rebellious for painting on the glass window.   Why not?!

I love poinsettias.  Every year on Black Friday, Lowe's sells them for $1/each.  I bought 15, gave away some as gifts and used about 10 to decorate the house, including each of our bedrooms.  Yikes, I think both photos are of Indigo as a baby.  Poor Ais.  Gotta swap that out pronto.

I love the Christmas Village. I also have a wooden Nativity set complete with animal figurines, a manger and hay.  My children love it and I think it's a very practical way to make the Christmas story real.  As a kid I loved setting up our Nativity set.  It was that odd paper mache stuff from the 60s with glitter.  It lasted, somehow.  I recently inherited a ceramic lighted Christmas village set from someone who was throwing it all out in it's protective original packaging!  Thanks Chris.  It's given us some charming holiday light.

Merry Christmas.

Baking Design

I'm slowly immersing myself into blogging again.  Right now, I'm focused on getting my Christmas activities done.  I'm a good baker.  This year, my 8 yo daughter, and I will be making a cream puff topiary.  Our plan this Christmas Day is to have a "silly/fancy supper" complete with fancy dresses, pretend wine, fancy desserts, etc.  My kids don't eat any real food, so I decided to make "Chinese turkey" for myself and some fancy form of chicken nuggets and french fries for them.  It's all in the arrangement. I'm thinking of of how I'll arrange it now.  Perhaps in a crown format.  It's all in the presentation.  And  have a story to prove it.

This summer I was in charge of a cupcake decorating station.  Rather than spend too much money on supplies and allow everyone to go nuts, I created three designs and a "freestyle" category.  I posted photos of examples that I have created earlier in the day.  It was a huge hit.  I received compliments from Moms too. The kids liked being shown how to create interesting cupcakes. I listed instructions too. Parents got a chance to interact with their kids helping them make fancy cupcakes, without having to go through the hassle if thinking about all it.  Personally, I thought all this baking design stuff was passe given all the TV shows dedicated to it.

A confession:  I ordered cupcakes from our grocery store, Jewel, and asked them to decorate with plain chocolate and white butter cream.   After doing the math, ordering from Jewel was about $5 more than had I baked and iced them myself.  Well worth it to me as I used 48 cupcakes.  I initially bought all the ingredients at Aldi and was surprised by the price.  So I returned all that stuff and ordered from Jewel.  Smartest thing I've done in awhile (remember I was in school this summer).

Panda bear. Crushed oreos coat the outside of the icing.  Mini oreos for ears, whit choc chips or M&Ms for eyes and nose.

Circus Cupcake.  Not a great photo, I know, but you get the idea.  It looks too simple, but the kids loved this one.  Non pareils on white icing remind of the circus so I took that inspiration and added animal crackers. 

The last one not shown was "worms in dirt".  A good ol' standby.  The cupcake icing was rolled in crushed Oreos (generic work great) which I stored in square tupperware and it was perfect.  One package makes a LOT of crumbs.  Use half.   Gummi worms are added as the worms.  Cut them in half with clean sharp scissors - they will be too long otherwise.  Kids kept swiping the gummi worms and eating them outright. So have extra on hand.