I’m trying to keep her spirits up, but we are both quite worried. She is eighty years old and is not sure that she has the strength to battle the “big C.” Regardless, it will be a long road ahead. I don’t want to lose my mom.

Anyway, today my mother asked me to go with her to a doctor’s appointment to take notes about what the doctor said. I did go with her (and it’s a good thing I did, there were a lot of notes to take!) and on the way home she asked me if I had ever eaten at a Perkins restaurant. I told her that I had not, but have always wanted to try one. So, we ate at Perkins! The food was good, the wait staff was very friendly and helpful, and we brought a freshly baked cherry pie home with us to share with my hubby. I hope to go back there and eat there again in the future. It was a good experience.

At least now I don’t feel quite so bad when I ask people to repeat themselves – the doctor has given me a very good reason for not being able to hear very well!

The cookies are called “Newton’s Fruit Thins.” I noticed they have a honey and fig flavor, a cranberry orange flavor and a blueberry flavor. I decided to try the fig and honey – after all, that is what makes fig newton’s famous.

I was expecting a soft cakey cookie, like the fig newtons, but these are more like graham crackers. The bag says that the cookie part is whole grain, only 5 grams of fat per serving (three big cookies equal one serving) and no high fructose corn syrup is used.

I tasted one after I got home and I like it, but it is NOT your mama’s fig newton.

The dryer balls do seem to work the way that they are supposed to work. However, I am a little bit disappointed in how quickly they break and fall apart! And since I bought them at the store I’ve read some articles about how some dryer balls are made of a product that people really should be avoiding. Since then I’ve bought some of the dryer balls over the Internet that are supposed to be made of a safe product, and hopefully last longer. The biggest problem that I have with them now, though, is that when I empty the dryer, the dryer balls are sometimes hiding inside the clothing that I am taking out and plays hard-to-get. Overall, though, I plan to keep using them, I think that they are a good investment.

Over the past years I’ve gained about twenty pounds and I have been forced to buy some new clothes to wear. I was hoping to lose the weight before summer came so I would not have to buy a new summer wardrobe, but the weight is a lot harder to lose than it is to find!

So anyway, I was looking at the website and saw a yummy recipe for making some raspberry truffle cheesecake. Loving recipes as I do, I went ahead and clicked on the link and was seeing how easy it would be to make my own from scratch. I found myself wondering if I would be able to substitute the cream cheese with fat free cream cheese, and substitute the sugar with Splenda or Truvia, and perhaps make the cheesecake a little bit healthier. Have you tried doing that yourself? If so, were you happy with the results?

I usually wear a size 6 1/2 shoe, but my foot is wide, so I decided to go ahead and order the boots a couple of sizes larger than I usually wear. I’d rather have boots on my feet that are a little bit too large than too small. Well, I went ahead and ordered size 8 1/2, thinking that would be leaving me plenty of room to wear some nice heavy socks. The boots arrived today, and they are almost too small! I can wear them with regular socks, but I will not be able to wear them with heavy socks. That is a true aggravation – ordering something a couple of sizes larger with the thought that they will be too large, and then having them arrive almost too small! I guess I should just be really glad that I did not order my regular size!

By the time I was sixteen, it finally became clear to the eye doctors that I really did need glasses for school. My first pair of prescription glasses was wire-rimmed and I thought I looked so “cool” – like some of the rock stars of the decade. Eventually the thrill of wearing glasses faded and suddenly all of the “cool” people were wearing contact lenses. I tried contacts a couple of different times but I had a very difficult time getting them to fit right because of my astigmatism, and had an even more difficult time getting them to come out. Eventually I found out that due to my need for prism in my prescription that I was going to need to wear glasses anyway unless I have a surgical procedure done on the muscles in my eyes. From what I understand my insurance will not pay for that procedure, so I am guess that I will just continue to wear glasses for many years to come.