The late Tepa Mostert

The late Tepa Mostert
With Birthday Flowers

Tuesday, December 08, 2009

MERRY CHRISTMAS

Time to get the Christmas letters ready and sent. Now if only I can find my address book.

I wish you all a Merry C hristmas and a Happy New Year.

Thursday, October 29, 2009

Compressing pictures

I don't know about you but I often hgave a need to make my pictures smaller. I had a friend recommend to me a program called Advanced JPEG Compressor from a company called
WinSoftMagic.com it really works.

Friday, October 09, 2009

Mostert Family Blog

It looks like winter is just around the corner in Champaign. September was warm and pleasant until late in the month and ever since the weather has turned cold and rainy and now the weatherman is saying we may get snow as soon as Sunday Oct. 11th. I was able to add the chemicals needed to close the pool this morning (Friday the 9th). I need to clean out a few leaves and then lower the depth of the water to below the outflow. Then I have to take our big pool cover out of the attic of the cabana and cover the pool. It is a tough job, but I have been able to do it before.

Sunday, September 20, 2009

Friday, September 18, 2009

Mostert Family Blog

Mostert Family Blog
September 15
Warm September
After a rather chilly July and August, September has been surprisingly warm. Each day's high has been near or at 80 degrees.I've been able to swim every day (except Sundays). The water is cooling off, but still not bad. Actually it is quite invigorating.I try to swim 100 yards each day. Makes up for my not walking as much as I used to. I get most of my walking during mowing the lawn or grocery shopping. I figure I get a real workout when I shop at Sam's Club.Tepa has not been able to get out for several weeks now. No church, no shopping, no doctor appointments. Her arthritis reallybothers her, especially like today where we are anticipating a rain storm. She has always been able to sense a change in the weather.I've been skyping Mika and Kari recently. Mika is working in California for a company called Energy Innovations located in Pasadena.Kari is attending a year of advanced training (on his way to become a Colonel) in Washington, D.,C. Gina was able to go visit him from their home in Columbia, South Carolina, over the long Labor Day weekend. Kristian is at home preparing to go on an LDS mission to Las Vegas, Nevada in October, via Provo, Utah where he will spend several weeks learning more Spanish at the Missionary Training Center.We are very proud of our family's first third generation missionary

Tuesday, September 15, 2009

Tuesday, August 04, 2009

It has been a cold summer

Greetings from Mostert's Mini-Mansion on the Prairie.

We'll see if August is warmer, but we just had one of the coldest Julys on record for our part of Illinois. Plays havoc with using the swimming pool. We had a terrific thunder and lightning show during the night with lots of rain. I had to go out today and pick up the pool sun cover and its roller as the wind had blown it several feet and turned it over.

Here's a brand new picture of me...WITH HAIR!

Wednesday, June 10, 2009

It's Swimming, Summer Time. I FEEL GOOD!

I feel terrific! Last Sunday I was able to sit through the entire three hour church block of meetings in our Champaign Ward. First time I have attended a church meeting in 7 months. Hooray!

The diarrhea which has kept me out of meetings has almost totally disappeared. It is wonderful not having to make a bathroom run every hour or even half hour as happened most of the 7 months I was receiving chemo-therapy. I am still weak, but that's to be expected when you lose one third of your body weight, including most muscles. I am down around 200 pounds for the first time in 20 years.

Went swimming this afternoon. really felt good in 80 degree weather. Looking to do that every week day weather permitting. It was been a wet and cold Spring so, although I got the pool ready early, I have only been swimming 4 or 5 times. Usually I try to go twice a day once it is warm enough. Great exercise. I usually try to swim 100 yards, different strokes, each time I am in the pool.

Tepa sat in the shade watching me swim. Tomorrow after her doctor's appointment we will try to get her in the water, if it is warm enough. I suspect it may not be. We'll see.

Had a wonderful talk with my sister today. She said it has been cool in Arizona, only in the 90s. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Andre & Lymphoma

It has been a hectic Fall and Winter here at the Mostert's Mini-Mansion on the Prairie.

On November 14th, I (Andre) became very sick and Blaine Edlefsen, our LDS neighbor, rushed me to the Carle Hospital Emergency Room where they took most of the day to decide that I had a full blockage of my bowels and needed a tube jammed down my left nostril to drain out bile, etc, from my stomach. Later, following a CAT Scan, they were able to determine that I had a large growth down in my abdomen. A sampling was taken which showed it was Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma. At first no one wanted to cut, they just wanted to go in and try to extract the growth, but ultimately it was found that the sampling had ruptured some segments of the bowels and so surgery was required.

The lump, described as everything from a grapefruit to a cantaloupe to a small football was removed by an outstanding surgeon camed Olliphant who looks more like a football offensive lineman, but has the greatest touch.

They learned about the rupture from a PET Scan I was given. Avoid those if you can, they are painful, but it may have saved my life. Several segments of bowel were removed along with the football and a lot of nasty, stinking stuff..

I came home on Thanksgiving Day and have been home since. There have been dozens of trips to the Carle Wound Center, where they have worked at closing a fist sized hole in my lower abdomen. Almost healed.

Early in January I started Chemo-therapy, which runs for 3 days every three weeks. There are preliminary labs and medicines the day before, the main day of Chemo and then a followup shot of something the third day. Two sessions down and four more to go.

I have been blessed by wonderful support from Tepa and all of our family members. Sherry, Mika, Kari and Gina have all spent time with us helping us muddle through. Gina was here for two weeks driving from and to South Carolina by herself. What a nurse she would have made. Mika has come over from Ann Arbour, MI several times. Sherry came down from Wisconsin and Kari came here a couple of times as he visited his Air Force Headquarters in Dayton, Ohio.

Our Champaign First Ward members have brought us evening meals, kept the house cleaned, and shopped for food for our table throughout thsi long period. We love all of them.

I am doing very well...according to all my doctors. I had my head shaved as the chemo was causing hair to fall out all over the place. So check out my "Bald" look. Tepa is about the same. Her Degenerative Arthritis continues to give her a great deal of pain making it difficult to be up and about. She rarely leaves the house now. I, fortunately, can now do the shopping and meal prepartion when it is not brought in.

Somehow Tepa had a birthday which turned her one year older than me, but on January 29th I caught up and now we are both 73 together.

Uncle Andy/Dad Mostert