Sassypants Stitches

OK this is a subject off the beaten seams of sewing.

I hate cancer. Did you get that? I hate, hate, hate cancer! I lost my dad to cancer a little over a year ago and various other family members throughout the years to this dreaded disease. Thankfully cancer does not win out every time and I'm happy to say that I have a great friend, Sonya, who is a breast cancer survivor and doing wonderfully! She is getting ready to go through her reconstructive surgery process this week, so everyone keep her in your thoughts and prayers during this survival achievement.

My neighbor across the street is truly an inspiration to me. She is a single mother of four young children who had been ill for a couple of years before finally being diagnosed with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. She began her treatment shortly after we bought the house across the street from her and became friends and our children are great friends also. Unfortunately, her treatment has not been very successful to this point (her cancer is now stage 4) and she came out the other night for one of many of our "sidewalk chats" to let me know that soon she will be admitted to the hospital for a month to undergo a more intensive type of treatment. During the course of our discussion she said that she has been upset over the fact that she has no recent pictures of her and the kids to take with her to the hospital. I said, "Well, then let's just take some."

Let's take a look at a few pictures that define family love and a strong single mother:

Of course we had to do a couple of fun ones. Getting the kids situated for this one was WORK. :)

Trying to get some of the sillies out so we could get some good smiles.

This was one of the "better smiles" I got out of this little guy.

Mom and middle son after persuading him to take his glasses off...they kept giving a glare.

Check out these two beauties...

The oldest is so proud and protective of his mom and it really shines through in this picture:

I love how the littlest one is snuggled up tight to his mom's shoulder here:

What a beautiful family...