My Apologies

In the last few years, for a few different reasons, I've become really good at apologies. So I can't understand why this is so hard for me. 

I need to apologize to those who have emailed/called me about photo sessions over the fall, and really starting at the end of the summer. I know, this is long overdue. It's awful, flaky, whatever you want to call it. But, I have good reasons. 

You see, my family is famous for health problems. And I am, conveniently, at a point in my life where I can pop around and help out where I am needed. This time, I was/am needed for an extended period of time. And let me tell you, I am very happy that I can do this. My grandmother had surgery to remove a section of her colon, and so I stayed with her while she recovered. Prior to that I had been helping my sweet mom with everything around the house, because she had spinal stenosis , so she had a hard time doing all of the things that she loved to do, let alone the daily things that needed to be done. A week after I came home from my grandmother's farm, in the middle of nowhere (she only has dial up and my phone only gets dead air there...), my mom had her surgery. That was two days before Thanksgiving. Don't worry, she got to eat pie. The next week, I went with my darling dad to a doctors appointment. He had been feeling really weak and he had had to have two infusions of blood because of internal bleeding. Long story short, we found out that he has cancer again. 

Two years ago my dad was diagnosed with stage IV Melanoma. Now, for those of you who don't know, melanoma is one of the deadliest kinds of cancer. Fun, right. No. Wear sunscreen. He had a full year of chemotherapy - Interferon. All of his doctors said that if anything would help him, that would do the trick. It was a rough road. But he made it through and was finally starting to feel better this summer. And then, around September, he just started to feel tired. Now we know why. His diagnosis is stage IV recurrent melanoma. Since his appointment, there have been a lot of doctor appointments, surgery, more doctor appointments, radiation procedures, and more doctor appointments. All the while my mom couldn't drive to anything, and when she finally could drive she got too exhausted. 

Oh, and did I mention, my parents put their house up for sale too? 

Anyway. I just thought that you might like to have an explanation to go along with my apology. It's been crazy here, but, we still have fun. I hope to be back and taking pictures soon, though. 

Thank you for understanding. 

This is my new motto by the way: