A different weekend, chemo starts tomorrow

This has been a very different weekend for Dick and me. It's his weekend to work, so of course we're in State College. But we're here alone!! On Saturday I played with Austin while they packed for a weekend trip to Baltimore area. The weather was just amazing, so we spent some time swinging.

He loved standing at the screen door, but he's a little rough neck, and I don't know if the screen will be safe for long with him pounding on it! He's already been trying to slide the door, and believe me, it doesn't slide easily. But he can do it, the little Brutus!

They left about 2:00. Lori has a childhood friend whose husband is a pastor in the Baltimore area. The church was having some kind of anniversary celebration this weekend. Lori's friend had never yet seen Austin, so I'm sure they've been having a grand time. They'll come home tomorrow sometime.

Soon after they left I headed to downtown State College to a store called Rapid Transit Sports. It came highly recommended to me by Anthony and Lori. While I did say on Monday that my foot felt better, that was not the case the rest of the week. I took very short walks with Austin on Monday and Tuesday and was in a good bit of pain the rest of the week. I was doing everything imaginable to help it - ice, regular ibuprofen, pulling my toes up with a belt several times a day, the night splint. So on Saturday I went to Rapid Transit and explained to the salesperson the issues I'm dealing with. He was very patient, in spite of the store being a complete mad house of people and shoes. I tried many pairs of shoes on, he even wanted me to walk out on the side walk in them. I settled on a pair of Sauconys that felt better than any of the others.

I wore them to shop for groceries, something I wasn't sure I could possibly do. I pretty much wore them the rest of the day and most of today (not for church though!) Another thing he told me was not to use ice too much. In fact he said I should try putting my foot in warm water first thing in the morning, which I did today. This evening Dick and I had to go to Walmart for a few things and I was able to do the most pain-free (almost anyway) walking in almost two weeks. I realize that this has not been a normal two days of being on my feet, but I still feel very encouraged that these shoes are going to add greatly to my ability to recover from this plantar fasciitis.

Tomorrow Dick will begin his next and last round of maintenance chemo. Four Mondays in a row. After he's finished tomorrow we will head for Lancaster County. He's going to buy the pickup truck from my brother's business. We'll sleep at our Lititz house tomorrow night, then Tuesday morning I'll head back up here. Dick has Tuesday off, so he'll stay down there and use that pickup truck to haul all that stuff out of my office!

Sometime this week I'm going to advertise our Lititz house on here with pictures. If any of you Lancaster County readers should happen to know anyone over 55 who wants to scale down and live economically, our house is just the ticket.