Cancer: Finally some good news!

I came back from Boston last week with some good news! The trial seemed to be working finally! The large right lung tumour had shrunk in the latest CT scan - not in millimeters but with the naked eye in centimeters! The cancer trial medication doctor agreed that it was proceeding in the positive direction.

The plan is to continue with the trial drug and I will be going to Boston again in Feb. I really hope that the trial drug will come to my home town to cut down cost and time away from my family. My daughter has been asking me not to go to Boston anymore. It's really difficult emotionally for me when my 7 year old beg me not to leave.

But as for the change in my health I thank you Lord, and all the prayers and good vibes from my friends and family! I will continue to pray and I hope my friends/family will continue to pray and send good thoughts for my family and I.


Wishing you all a Healthy and Joyful 2019!! :-)

I have been busy....

I have been busy! I made a whole bunch of fashion jewelry for friends, family and the nurses at the chemo centre. There is 1 male nurse at the chemo centre so I made a few wooden bead things for him to choose from. I'm really enjoying this! It's creative, I love giving gifts to people I know, I love seeing my creations being worn, it keeps me busy from silly thoughts, it used up lots of beading supplies that I have, it requires less physical exertion, etc. It's a perfect pass-time while being ill!

Here are some of the gifts I made. I forgot to take a picture of the 20+ pieces of jewelry that I gave to the chemo centre. My kids drew the designed the fabric ones for me to make and my son asked for the Snoopy:

I made many custom pieces for friends and family because I knew them well and I knew mainly what they like. As for acquaintances, I made mostly earrings as gifts because sizes don't matter much. Necklaces are not as bad but people do have preferences for long or short necklaces. Bracelets are the hardest. I have a very thin wrist so most bracelets fall off me and don't look good. So it's hard to figure out if something will look nice on someone else with a different shape or size of wrists (meaty, bony, prominent bone, etc). And I find that a lot of people will take a lot of fashion risks with their earrings but not so much with the other types of jewelry.

I still haven't heard back from my queries about using my jewelry for fundraising for my local chemo centre. I need to check that again. I would love to raise some funds for chemo centre, even if it's only $100. I need to talk to the chemo nurses for sure.

Only the kids are decorating the tree this year

In previous years, we would let the kids decorate the x'mas tree with whatever they like. Then after they had gone to bed, my husband and I would do a major edit to the tree decor. This year, I decided to just let the kids decorate everything and not edit anything. It's much more 'organic' that way. They used their Lego to decorate the bottom of the tree. They put their little stuffed toy into the branches. And they put the beaded and fabric ornament I recently made onto the tree too!

Tree decoration in progress by the kids

X'mas decor continues.....

I continue too make decorations for our x'mas tree. I have used up almost all the beading wire:

I guess I need to make some stuffed ornaments now! Or should I go buy some beading wire?

My cancer story on the local newspaper

My cancer journey is now posted on the local online newspaper:

https://www.yorkregion.com/news-story/9066210-markham-mom-with-stage-4-lung-cancer-needs-support-for-u-s-clinical-trials/

I hope this will bring attention to our Go Fund Me Campaign as well as patients like me who are stuck between the provincial health insurance program and no insurance. I'm sure there are lots of patients with serious illnesses like me in Canada, even though we have a basic universal health care program. How do we solve this problem, especially with complicated medical illness like cancer, with medical treatments that advanced much faster than the legislation can follow.

DIY Holiday decorations

I started making fabric and beaded holiday decorations for our x'mas tree. If I make 1 a day there should be about 20 new ornaments for the tree. The kids had also drew things on paper for me to make into stuffed 'whatever'. My daughter drew a cloud and asked me to make it into a stuffed cloud. My son drew a puppy's head and asked me to make it into a stuffed puppy head.

More added pockets for practicality

This blue wool tweed cap sleeves jacket was made a few years back. I love the fabric and the cardigan shape:

After adding pockets, a closure and some waist shaping, it becomes much more wearable:

It's great for travelling and stylish too!

Cancer post - what is my new role?

I'm continuing to go to Boston for the cancer trial drug first week of Dec. The last cycle in Nov resulted in a 'no change' situation - there were no increase in number or size of cancer tumours but also no reduction in number or size either.  It could be taken as an encouraging sign that things are not worse. Or it could be interpreted that the trial drug had stopped working.

The Boston trial only eliminates a participant if the cancer has progressed 2 months in a row - if the cancer tumours have grown in number or sizes. So that seems a while to wait for someone who's not sick enough to lie in bed all day, nor well enough to be able to even change a bedsheet by herself without having a breathing issue.

My mind is coherent enough to be super bored right now but my body is not well enough to resume 95% of what I used to do before my cancer diagnosis. It's a really frustrating place to be for a person who used to be very busy and like being useful. I don't know what my new role should be. I also cannot count on myself each day to be consistent - same energy/health level to deal with the kids or housework. Some days when the kids come home from school, I had the energy to deal with them. Some days I dread the sound of them coming home. How is this inconsistency good for the children? I also don't want them to have a heavy emotional reliant on me in case the cancer takes a turn for the worse quickly and unexpectedly.

I just want to be the old mom again. I can't right now. I don't know what my role is right now. I don't know what to do.............

New Fashion Jewelry - beaded tassel necklace

I love making crafts - Jewelry making, sewing, paper crafts, home decorating, etc. Lately I have been clearing up my jewelry making supplies and decided to make some new fashion jewelry. This was what was created:

I think this will look good with a nice sweater or sweater dress!

Refashioned: Plaid wool woven dress to tunic

I entered this plaid wool mix dress late last year into the PatternReview.com contest. I had only worn it once at a school Christmas concert. So I thought it would be more useful as a tunic top. I simply just cut it midriff and I had already worn it twice. Not bad for something that I made a year ago!

Before:

After:

Adding a closure to the Purple Reversible Faux Fur vest

I have been feeling well and not well depending on the day. So when I do feel good on a day I would like to take the opportunity to do something I enjoy: jewelry making, sewing, refashioning, etc.

Since I have to go to Boston now on a monthly basis, I wanted to make the clothes that I currently own more practical. This purple reversible faux fur vest was made late last year. It was warm and cozy except it required a closure. So some quick remnant denim and 2 buttons made the vest warmer and practical:

Before:

After:

Now it's even warmer and cozier to wear!

Chemotherapy hats for fundraising

I sweat shopped myself this weekend and made some chemotherapy hats for funding raising. I'm fundraising for my chemo centre as well as myself. I have made 2 Small sizes and 2 Large sizes. I will make 2 more Medium ones and then move onto tote bags. I think the bags may be easier to sell. I'm going to talk to the chemo nurses on Monday and see what the rules are for fundraising just for the chemo centre. I emailed the local hospital foundation but they didn't reply back. I think I will need to talk to a real person to figure this out.

Please spread the word - Go Fund Me

For those blogger friends who had been following my blog, you would have known that I have been diagnosed with non-smoker stage 4 lung cancer this March. I went through a whole range of cancer drugs approved by Health Canada but nothing worked. The tumours kept spreading got larger and larger.

A new drug treatment that has shown success recently but is only available on a trial basis in the US has finally started showing benefits for me but not without requiring a extremely large amount of money to pay for the US scans/tests, medication, medical staff and an unfortunate and unplanned visit to the emergency in the US.

If you are able, please donate what you can to help recover my expenses and stay alive as long as possible. The anticipated costs to continue treatment will reach at least $310,000CAD. The goal is to give me more time to spend with her family and help ease the financial implications. In addition, my mother has Alzheimer's and I would like to be alive and well enough to participate in my mom's Alzheimer treatment plan.

Please spread the word and share my story to help reach our goal.


http://www.gofundme.com/keep-darmeen-alive

Pikachu girl

My daughter suddenly developed a love of the character Pikachu this summer. For the school year 2018-2019, she bought a yellow Pikichu hoodie and wore it almost daily. She saw that I had some remnant of yellow fleece and begged me to make her a pair of yellow pants to complete the all-yellow Pikachu outfit.

For a few weeks I asked to make sure that she would wear the yellow pants outside - not just for dressing up inside the house. If it's just for dress up then I don't want to waste my limited energy to make the dress up pants. She assured me for a few weeks that she would wear it outside, she would wear it to school.

So today I was feeling well enough to use the sewing machine. I quickly used a pair of my daughter's pants as a template and made the yellow pants. My daughter put the pants on right away with her yellow Pikachu hoodie to go to a family outing. I thought she would look like a giant banana at first but it didn't look that bad. Perhaps she could wear that to school. What do you think?

Learning to make better hats - Fundraising for my Chemo Centre

I have been bitten by the bug to make better hats! I think I'll search through the web to learn about making better and more durable hats. I'll try to learn how to stiffen them and decorate them.

One of the problems of making hats and bags, etc, is that I will end up accumulating too many of them. When I was making lots of bags and jewelry for my Handmade by Lovenicky store, at least I could sell some of them at craft sales or give some of them as gifts. Hats will be harder to sell because of their specific sizes and styles. I guess I could go to my local Chemo Centre and see if chemo patients are interested but it's still kinda awkward perhaps make chemo patients feel uncomfortable that I see them with no hair. (I'm not sensitive about my bald head but hair seems to be very very important to a lot of women).

What do you think I should do? I would like to give the hats as a nice gift or perhaps make a small fundraising event for my local Chemo Centre. How should I approach this?

TV costumes - Frankie Drake Mysteries

It seems I have been hit with 1920 fashion fever! I'm watching this CBC original 1920's drama series 'Frankie Drake Mysteries' and I love the costumes. Of course BBC has the series 'Miss Fisher' with a much more sumptuous fashion collection. I realized that I have already collected a couple of these Oriental-esque outfits myself. And I would probably be able to make another with all the trims that I have been collecting in my stash too! Too bad it would probably be too 'costume-y' to wear them outside. Well, I guess I can still make some wool 1920's style hats for the fall for chemo patients.

www.pinterest.com

www.pinterest.com

www.pinterest.com

www.pinterest.com

www.pinterest.com

www.pinterest.com

www.pinterest.com

More Chemo Hats - Red Linen Cloche

I'm making more chemo hats! This is a a Red Linen Remnant Cloche - Very easy to make. I lined it with remnant fat quarter cotton fabrics. I had been collecting different types of clasps and applied it to this Cloche. It's very easy and very breezy to wear. Easier than tying a scarf for my head!

Now what other styles of chemo hats can I make?

Chemo Hats for Summer - Butterick 3687

Oh how I miss sewing and creating! I made this floral hat in an hour while being mad at myself for having to late night laundry (long story).

I got tired of trying to tie the headscarves different ways before they become all wonky. I thought a light weight hat would stay on the head better. So hat sewing here we go!

This is an Out of Print hat pattern that I have made before. I made View F. The reason it's a tried and true pattern is because I have a larger than normal head comparing to other women. Usually the large sizes are 23". This one is 24"! Yay for me.

I used a remnant outdoor black and white floral fabric, added a black trim and black buttons, and a white poly cotton broadcloth lining. Everything from my sewing stash. Didn't need to buy anything at all. Voila! I thought at first the floral pattern looked more like a brain but the kids assured me that they saw nothing but floral. And I even brought this hat to my Boston trip!

So remember! When one is sad, mad, or restless, run to your sewing machine!! LOL!

See my review on PatternReview.com.

Another Wedding Anniversary Milestone!

I forgot to mention that I went out with my husband for a wedding anniversary this past weekend! The actual date is in the middle of the week. We went to a slightly hip restaurant that we usually wouldn't go with the kids (e.g. no kid's menu kind of restaurant). We shared a fun appetizer, my husband had a full entree and we shared a yummy dessert. It was fun!

I tried to dress up for it. The problem is that I'm very thin right now. I have a sick person's body. I wore all my self-made stuff for this lunch date: white lace refashioned dress, men's jeans to women cropped refashioned jacket, a pair thrifted red Brazilian made knee high boots to hide my scrawny legs, and a carnelian pendant necklace.

Even the borrowed cane matched my outfit!

• The ironic thing is that when I was healthy I was trying to have a thinner body. I wasn't obsessed with it. But when I took a shower I would look at my lumps and bumps. Now I understand that I too got deceived and overwhelmed by the daily bombardment of men/women trying to put so much emphasis on 'looking thin' than 'being healthy'. Although I made almost all my clothes (much better fitting than RTW could ever achieve), I was not immune to the overwhelming societal messages. I hope I can keep instilling in my daughter that being healthy is so much more important than looking a certain way that society said we should look like. She tends to be insecure about her looks. In the summer, it's not as much of a problem. But once school starts, I'm worried that the kids at school would make her feel insecure again.

Simplicity 9457 Girl Ball skirt Done!!

After slaving an afternoon, the Simplicity 9457 Girl Ball skirt is done! I knew I didn't have the type of materials to make it really puffy but my daughter likes it anyway. She asked me to buy her navy blue dressy shoes to go with this skirt. Sorry this is just for dressing up purpose. I'm not buying any shoes for it! Thank goodness I lengthened the skirt because my daughter is a bit tall for her age. I'm not showing the underskirt because it's a real mess! LOL!

My camera is failing me......