A run in with a mole...

The only major event this month is that my darling daughter Ally had a nasty run in with a mole or "poly...blah, blah, blah, noma" the word "cancer" entered our lives and then quickly vanished. Praise God. Luckily, she is doing fine. Long story short (alright, who are we kidding here??) long story, long..... Ally had a growth suddenly appear on her neck. In the past few weeks it grew in size and became very red. We thought it was a mole, but I secretly worried it was more. Took her to the doc and he said, well it could be two things...a "poly-something-noma" or the beginnings of a precancerous growth. Alright, hearing the word "precancerous" or cancerous anything and my four year old daughter didn't really bode well with me. At any rate, he said it would have to be removed. Which I have to say, I was happy about since kids were asking her what it was since it was in a visable place and pretty nasty looking. All that to say, called the dermatologist and we were told that December 20th was the earliest appointment. Oy vey. So, I took an appt. for sometime next week with an unknown doctor b/c I was not about to let her live with this little appendage for that long. Funny thing is...two days later, Ally got out of the shower. I wrapped her in a towel and when I turned around to take the towel from her, I noticed the entire front of her chest was covered in blood. Ok, not one to panic....I quickly started dabbing the little growth. She had itched it with the towel and broken it open. That thing had a heart beat of its own. Not to be gross, but it bled like the dickens. We tried to contain the bleeding without freaking her out. I wanted to wait for her pediatrician since they work with kids. We waited, and they brought us in immediately. Four washclothes later, 3 t-shirts and a whole lotta gauze bandages and we were in the pediatrician's office. He cauterized the site, and then called his friend the dermatologist and sent us immediately to his office. I believe the Lord had Ally in His hands this day b/c before I could finish paying for the visit, they had called her back. He was amazing with her. They numbed the site with a patch and then proceeded to put a knarly looking needle in her neck. Ally never even flinched, shed a tear or even looked scared. I watched as they removed the "poly-whatever-noma" and cauterize the site. She has a little scab now, but is doing great. The words, this is NOT cancerous and probably will not return was all I needed to hear. Our dear daughter is fine. We celebrated with a milkshake at the Claim Jumper. Matt on the other hand went to school with lots of stories about his sister's neck bleeding like mad. All this to say, we've dodged yet another bullet in the Helfer household. I guess I never realized that with the birth of each child, the number of visits to the doctor's office multiplies exponentially. Luckily, we've met great docs, who really care about our kids....Praise the Lord.

I've also attached some pictures of our Halloween decorating bonanza.

And lastly, Taylor has taken up playing the maracca. She is quite good at it and we all enjoy her tremendous shaking talent. She also prefers to play from underneath her swing or spinny seat. Enjoy!