Long time no blog!

Hello all!

Although October is a time that our blog should be kickin' with activity, as you can see I have not made a single entry since mid September! Cearly I do not have time to blog during breast cancer awareness month, The Pink Ribbon Shop's busiest time of year. (I've also accepted the fact that neither do I have the time to decorate the house for Halloween, but that's another matter!) We've been working day and night to get the orders out in a timely manner, and whew, things are finally slowing down a bit!

Another aspect of my life that has suffered during this crazy busy time is my half-marathon training. I am hanging on to my endurance by a mere thread, only running ONE day a week, and that's just my weekend long run. Not cutting it! Consequently my knee has been bothering me. Really pushing myself on Saturday mornings (9 miles this past Saturday) without adequate training during the week is not good on the body. Must ... run ... more ... during the week! I can do it, I will, I will!! Running a 5K this weekend: Addi's Walk by Faith, benefitting Addi's Faith Foundation. It's for a great cause, check it out and donate.

On Saturday's run, I got acquainted with another half-marathon trainee and we got on the subject of breast cancer ... I always wear my New Balance pink ribbon items, including my pink running shoes, so the subject tends to comes up a lot. She asked "How do you know when you have it?" Great question! I am always more than willing to tell my story to whoever will listen! Sadly, I was NOT a regular checker of my breasts. In fact I hardly EVER did breast self-exams. Thankfully God made my "lump" hurt so that I would feel for it. My advice is to KNOW YOUR BREASTS! The more you know what your breasts normally feel like, the more likely you are to recognize when something is not right. Plain and simple. So here I am, living with stage IV breast cancer at age 40-something. One can only wonder where I would be now if I had regularly checked myself and had found the lump earlier, before it had spread to the lymph nodes ... it's something to think about!