Catchin' up

Wow, it has been almost 3months since my last "real" post. Man, time flies when things are going crazy. Lets see where to being.....The last weekend of January my Dad married my now Step mom. She's great. I now have 4step sister in addition to my own 3 sisters. My Dad now has 7girls! Her girls are great. Both families love getting together. We are all so similar that it is a real blast. My step mom is a great cook, so my Dad now has a gut! He's always been so thin. He doesn't seem to mind and Step mom loves that he appreciates her cooking so much!
Most of February and March had my fam sick with the stomach flu, the real flu, strep throat, and sinus infections! It was the crappiest month ever! We are all on the mend now and enjoying the weather, thank God. To add to February's crap factor my Step mom found out she has lymphoma, a type of cancer. She received her diagnosis about 2 weeks, or less, after she and my dad were married. She called me personally to tell me, which I thought was very thoughtful. She said from the day of the biopsy on God has given her a peace about the cancer. She believes God is going to use her sickness to bring my Dad closer to God. I think she is right. For instance, the Sunday following the diagnosis my Dad wanted to go to church with her. He WANTED to go! The church she and I go to is progressive, by dad was raised southern Baptist, that is the reason he usually states for not wanting to go to church with her. Well he goes to church and the second song they sing is and old gospel song, sang like he grew up hearing it, and my dad had been singing it to himself ALOT in the days following Stepmom's diagnosis. He was floored. He turned to Stepmom, with tears in his eyes, and told her about the songs significance to him. She was very touched. Having said that, he has only been to church 2 other times in the past 2 and half months. That may not sound like a lot, but that is more than he has been to church in the past 10+ years, so I am very happy!
My Stepmom had further work done in March and it turns out that they believe she has very little of the cancer in her body. We were all happy to hear about that,but she does have to receive treatment. She started radiation therapy about 2weeks ago. It has left her tired. I'm not sure how often she will receive radiation or for how long. She and my Dad are very quiet on all the details. So I just pray for her and figure they will let me known stuff when they feel comfortable. Any prayers any of you would like to offer would be greatly appreciated.

On a lighter note my sisters and I went on a road trip to Philly last weekend. Man was it crazy. I sat the fence for a month or two before deciding ,a week before our departing date, that I would in fact be going. My sisters were really cool about my hesitations, but they were also really great at persuading me to go . Now, before I go any further I will name my sisters, for clarification purposes. I will not be using my sisters real names to "protect the innocent or not so innocent" :) My middle sis,will be Middlesis,and my youngest sis will be Babysis.(I'm a genius, I know)
The car ride was slated to begin at 7am last Friday. My sisters and I are notoriously NOT morning people. Notorious. So I figured we would miss the slot, and we did. Middle sis and myself promptly arrived a Babysis's house at 7:30am. We were on the road and hitting a Starbucks by 8am only to realize we were going the wrong way, we hit traffic, tried to take a "short cut" got lost, found our way back to Babysis's house to use the bathroom, and start out on the road again!! This would frustrate some, but these crazy things are to be expected by my sisters and I so we just laughed it off and off we went!
There is nothing like a 9 hour car ride to bring siblings closer and to find out how different you really are. We all three have such different musical taste. Middlesis loves classic country, some new country, R&B, and classic hippy music. Babysis likes classic country, Japanese music, 80's music, and some music that I have never heard of. Then there is me. I like some classic country, love the 80's, 90's, British rock, hippy rock, new and emerging artist, things like that. Out of fairness to each other we started a cd system in the car. Babysis could put in the first CD, since it was her birthday road trip, then me, then Middlesis. It worked out well. I think we all tolerated each others taste on the way to Philly. On the way home Sirius was king.
Baby sis made all the arrangements for the trip, being as it was her long time dream. We had a great hotel in the center of town. We could walk or bus to anything. There was a Starbucks on every corner.(Shocker, I know) So we were set. We visited Ben Franklin's grave, the Liberty bell, the halls were the Declaration was signed, the house that Tomas Jefferson wrote the Declaration in. We visited China town and had lunch there. China Town was by far the best! It is a close nit community. They were very friendly. There were a lot of families walking around. It was one of the few places that we felt safe. It is also one of the few place that we didn't observe any homeless people or people asking for change. After China town my sisters and I meet up with a couple of Babysis's friends that live near Philly. Everyone went to see the Mutter Museum of Medical oddities. YUCK! Mutter is part of the PennState medical school and its main purpose is education and research. Middle sis is a nurse so she was looking forward to the Mutter so she could learn some new things. Babysis had just always wanted to go, and her friends were of the same mind. Not me , no way! I sat in a nice comfy chair in the lobby away from all of it. When they came out of the museum they all said it was great, but I wouldn't have been able to handle it. I agree and I haven't any regrets.
After we arrived home on Sunday babysis did some further research on Philly. It seems it has the 3rd largest murder rate in the country! They had 7murders in our area on Saturday Night, thus explaining why Middle and Baby kept being woken by sirens! We had a good laugh and all agreed that it was a blessing that 3people went, instead of 2. We also agreed that it had been a great idea to say in after dark, even thought the streets were alive with all types of people and it had been so tempting to go out at night.
The trip was invaluable on so many levels. I learned so much about my sisters. So much of their hurts, their stubbornness, what I need to pray for when it comes to them....That part was kind of sad actually. I wish there lives were in such a state that I would just have to thank God for them. But they are not. My sisters have a lot of pain stored up from our childhoods and our parents divorce and post divorce. In a way it is a gift to be able to know these things that I have suspected for so long. I think the trip, at least for Babysis and I, was a time of understanding each other better and getting closer. I hope Middle sis feels the same.
So there you have it the condensed version of my life during my 3month hiatus. Hopefully I will be able to write more often. I am also hoping to bring more to the blog than just my life. We'll see how that goes. :)