Every day is better than the last

“I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practise resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms.”
― Henry David Thoreau, Walden: Or, Life in the Woods

Don't we all wish that we could say "every day is better than the last"... well, that is the update on Chelsa tonight. It has been about a week and a half since we escaped the hospital and each day we are celebrating little victories... many of which are related to food since she has hardly been able to eat anything for the past month and has mainly survived on toast and apples. A few recent victories have included:  eating an egg, eating potstickers from the neighborhood Thai spot, and recently eating meat for the first time in the form of a Trader Joe beef tamale.  The most exciting victory came yesterday in the form of going for a walk... OUTSIDE !!! ...in the beautiful sunshine we enjoyed this whole weekend. It has been very encouraging to have these little signs of progress every day.

We also had our first follow up with the doctor and got great blood test results! All of Chelsa's red cells, white cells, platelets, etc. are just about up to a normal range. Her doc even said that she can go back to work in a couple of weeks if she is feeling ready ...not full-time yet as her energy and stamina will still need a few months of rebounding, but she is still VERY excited to get back to coordinating the wholesale orders for all of the great letterpress stuff at Constellation & Co.  

*Note that despite the great counts, she still has to be VERY careful of exposure to germs right now. 

We were also able to drop off a new load of movies at the hospital's cancer center visitors lounge during our follow up. Honestly, we lost count, but if I had to guess, I would say that you all have donated close to 150 movies! WOW! ...and good ones too! It has been a pretty wide diversity... here's just a few titles: Cadillac Man, The Man With No Name triology, 40-year-old-virgin, Kill Bill 1&2, The House of Eliott, all of the Pirates of the Caribbean movies (I had not idea there were so many!), many seasons of the Friends TV show, some James Bond, several Jurassic Park, so many copies of Godzilla (?), some great b-movies.. Piranha, Don't Mess With My Sister, Tarantulas: The Deadly Cargo... and some more wholesome classics... like Radiant Fireplace 2. The patients and visitors at Swedish will have more choices than they know what to do with... I can envision them sitting by their television with that radiant fireplace blazing now.  ...we were also able to bring some thank-you gifts from Bakery Nouveau (our FAVORITE) for the nurses... have we mentioned how great they were? ...even got BIG HUGS when we dropped them off.


We also have to say THANK YOU to all who have brought Chelsa such amazing hats! She has a better hat collection than LL Cool J now! (He's the only one I could think of with cool hats)... from fancy Cashmere stocking cap, to hip hand-sewn library-patterned beanie, to cute headbands... she is owning the cute bald look, but conflicted with so many cute hat options to choose from now too. Mostly, she has just felt so LOVED.

So for the time being, we are laying pretty low at home, recovering well, and finding lots of small things to enjoy and be thankful for.
~Matt & Chelsa

Still loving this quilt -- hand-sewn by her friend Tracey and her talented crafty friends.