The Great and Random Ramblings of Cannwin

About 95% of women diagnosed with Breast Cancer are over the age of 40. Breast Cancer is most common in Caucasion women followed by African-American and then Asian-American. However, African-American women are most likely to die from Breast Cancer. Every 69 seconds a woman dies of Breast Cancer. I gotta tell you guys... Breast Cancer scares me. A few years ago I found a lump just under inside my armpit and panicked. I immediately went into the doctor and was kindly informed that as the body gets older it begins to produce more lumps. I was okay, but I needed to watch the lump closely in case of any sudden growth. The doctor told me that what I wanted to look for is lumps that weren't perfectly round and/or that grew rapidly. We are bombarded with the phrase 'Breast Cancer' but are rarely given the knowledge needed to help ourselves. When they say lump, what exactly do they mean? What are my chances of getting Breast Cancer? Am I more likely to get it because...

I'm sure you've all seen the pink that's starting rearing it's glorious head in everyone nook and cranny of the shopping world. Did you know that Breast Cancer is the second leading type of cancer within women (Skin Cancer is #1). It's some serious business. This month, in my effort to 'make a difference' in my little corner of the blogosphere, I've decided to make Breast Cancer Awareness my topic of discussion. I'll also be featuring some of my favorite 'October Pink' products. Like Ford's Warriors in Pink product line. 100% of the net proceeds goes to the Susan G. Komen foundation. Here are some of their gorgeous products ( for all products click here ) 2010 Warrior Scarf - $33.00 Warrior Key Ring - $7.50 (My favorite product... I have a thing for key rings) Warrior Getaway Bag - $20.00 Stay tuned for more about Breast Cancer and more places to shop. If you have a survivor story you'd like to share, em...

The final story I want to share with you does not involve a parent and a child. It is the story of a young girl who fell in love with the wrong man. One of the number one questions people want the answer to regarding abuse is 'Why would any one stay!?' I hope this story gives you a better understanding of why. I was raised in an abusive home so I knew what abuse was first hand.  I always told myself I would never let anyone treat me that way or stay in a relationship that was abusive. I consider myself a pretty headstrong person when I want to be and that was one thing I would not budge on. I was living in Montana when I met him. He was the most attractive man I had ever seen, with sky blue eyes that took my breath away and a smile that made me weak in the knees. I was doing pretty well for myself at the time, I had my dream job, a nice place, and a beautiful dog. He and I were in the same group of friends. We hung out and over time I ...

The last two people I had talk to you guys about abuse were women, both struggled with a father's emotional and physical abuse. Today I am bringing to your attention the power of a father's abuse has on his sons. It is significantly different than the resulting life of a girl. Fathers are the example for a boy on how he is supposed to be. Imagine, if you will, a complete lack thereof. How would you cope if you lost your life's guide? How would you handle having to figure out correct behavior by yourself? “Without continual growth and progress, such words as improvement, achievement, and success have no meaning.” - Benjamin Franklin I have thought of that quote often as I have ventured through my life.   When I was very young I realized that my world was different than other kids.  When I got a bad grade or when I said something wrong, I was spanked, and many times hit. While at home I had to deal with, physical, emotional, spiritual, and psychological abuse.   T...

Searching for survivor's of domestic violence wasn't hard. Finding people willing to talk about their experiences was a different story. The stipulation of all of my blog 'guests' was that their stories remain anonymous. Some of these people I have known personally, others I have contact with on the internet, all are scared of the repercussions of their identities becoming known. Today's guest describes herself as a 'survivor' and truly she is. My father was my hero. He was big and strong and brave. He could solve any problem. He was smart and loved art and music and dance. He climbed mountains and skied down them again. He'd come and pick me up at school on my birthday and take me out for lunch at his favorite steakhouse. I adored him, and once I understood that it was impossible to marry him when I grew up, I knew I wanted to marry someone just like him. My father was my boogeyman. We never knew quite what to expect from him, although we al...

This month is the beginning of my attempts at a more in depth blog. It felt appropriate to start here.... at domestic violence. Fifteen years ago this month, a teen girl did one of the bravest, most courageous things she would ever do in her life--she dialed 911. I've known this girl for as long as I can remember. She is one of my closest, dearest friends and I want to tell you her story. For obvious reasons, I'm keeping her identity to myself. I was a little surprised when I realized it was 15 years ago. Can it really be that long? It doesn't feel like that.   It's all pretty much burned into my memory banks. I remember so clearly being angry. Tired and angry and ready to be done with all the stupid games we played in that house. My mom warned me not to wake my dad and I just sort of snapped inside. What did I care if my dad woke up!? Why couldn't I just live my life without fear of how he would react. I was so MAD. So I yelled and woke him up. I w...

NOT found yesterday. Yesterday was one of those days. One of those tiring, messy, hot, aching, emotional, hormonal days where at the end you fall onto your bed and are out before you can manage to turn off a light (that would be at 7PM for me last night). Today I am determined to have a better one. Except I can't remember what I was going to blog about so I am going to have to wing it once again. One of the things that happened yesterday is that my floor mirror , that I have been 'making' for the last 4 months broke. It's my own darn fault and I could shoot myself for the waste of it. See, what happened is I finally found some wood to put on the back of the thing and frame it, so after the kids went to bed I immediately took the opportunity to liquid nail the mirror onto the wood. I set the mirror face down on the floor and then stood up to grab the screw driver. That's when I lost my balance. My foot instinctively shot out to catch myself... and I st...

The ' Best Blog to Follow ' poll closed today and boy am I proud of the ten of you who voted! Thanks for participating. But I have some bad news... it's a tie. And I'm not really in the mood for ties. I think we can do better, so I'm going to call those the semi-finals and give you the weekend to vote for the top three, whoever wins this one will get the reward of having us as their crazy followers. Our finalists are: PTSD: A Love Story The Rowdy Stroudy's Hanging by a Silver Lining <br /> <a href="http://polldaddy.com/poll/3649115/">Final Round: Favorite Blog</a><span style="font-size:9px;">&...

We're about two weeks into summer now and so far it's gone pretty well. The kids have done all the things on their chore charts for an entire week (and received a dollar for their hard work) and we've managed to stick to the schedule fairly well (minus yesterday when I slept with Remewin all day). The munchkins have played in the water, camped outside with their dad, tormented librarians, gone to softball games, toured the water treatment center and made lots of meaningless crafts. But they have also screamed "I hate you" at each other, tried to strangle one another, been grounded to each other (they had to hold hands all day), and caused my angry, ugly voice to be heard throughout the neighborhood. Today, as a consequence of excessive bickering, I am taking them on a bike ride. Hopefully the fresh air and exercise will do them some real good. Next week I am going to start them on a little project called the WinKid's Field Guide (a little knock-off of ...

 I've seen the 'bored' bucket  idea online before but have disliked it because people generally come up with a huge list of chores kids can do when the fateful words "I'm bored" pop out of their mouths. Since I'm generally a grumpy mom by nature (I'm sure none of you believe me, but it's true) I like to give my kids every opportunity to have good memories of me. So I decided to change the boredom bucket up a little bit by adding fun things for the kids to do. Thus far it's been a smash hit! I suppose that means that I hear "Mom, I'm bored!" a little more often than most but usually it's accompanied by a twinkle in the eye and an upturn of the lips. The absolute plus side about this variation is that they don't whine when they have to do what's on their slip of paper. So basically it's been great fun for all of us. Now all I have to do is come up with MORE things to put in the bucket (it's only about 1...

Fevers are one of those startlingly familiar relationships in our lives that can only be described as love/hate. When one has a fever one knows to expect certain things. For instance: 1. I know that when I'm burning up the only thing that truly feels good is to curl up in my bed and sleep. There are only a few things (newborns, excessive exercise) other than fever that bring such blissful joy in my own bed. 2. I know that a cold wet rag will bring me relief faster than a Tylenol. 3. I know how much I hate the feel of my hot breath against my pillow when I'm feverish. This comes in close second behind getting out from under my covers and being blasted by freezing cold air (that's really around 75*). Furthermore, fevers contain within them a myriad of memories brought forward through our lives. I can remember taking a shower and shaking so violently afterwards that my husband had to bury me in three blankets and then wrap his arms around me just to help...

Originally posted July 28, 2008. One year before Remewin's birth. It's strange to think that she wasn't even thought of at this point. I was convinced I would never have another girl and I was desperately sad about that. I have always felt that every girl needs a sister, every boy--a brother. It was hard for me to think that Vicbowin might never get that chance. BUT our Remewin came to us and made our family full and wonderful. None of that was even on my mind when I wrote this post. We were on the brink of a grand adventure and my mind was fully occupied with the events that would soon follow. This post was written only a few weeks (or days) before we moved to South Dakota. Enjoy. ♥ I am sitting on a fold out chair with my bum barely in it (actually I think my tailbone is the only thing holding me here), I have a big box marked ' BOX 25 BAKING PANS ' that my feet are propped up on and the laptop is sitting neatly in my lap. I am facing an open window and ...

Over Christmas break we drove to Utah to visit Ralexwin's family. When we were there I saw this little rock sitting outside my sister-in-laws front door. On one side it had a smiley face and the other there was a frown. Obviously I had to ask her why on earth she had a frowning rock on her doorstep. She explained to me that it told the neighborhood kids that her kids couldn't play. If the smile was facing up they could. This saved on excessive knocking. I loved the idea! So I made my own... of course. :) This was super easy. It took paper, mod-podge, spray paint, a piece of wood, and some ribbon. The hardest part was drilling the little holes for the ribbon to go through... and that was easy! I have yet to really try it out. Summer will be the true tester of it and I imagine there will be a transitioning stage for all of the neighborhood kids, but hopefully I won't have kids knocking on my door at 8:30 at night anymore! PS I moved it the day after I took this pictu...

I have a friend who says that it's funny how whenever I want to make something I seem to produce the most random objects out of nowhere--all of which fit exactly what I need. This would be one of those projects. What is needed? -Blocks from your childs toy box. -Scrapbooking letters. The big kind. (I got mine in this big book of paper letters at Wal-Mart... I use them for everything, totally worth buying) -Some thick wire I had lying around... okay, Ralexwin had in his tool box, but still. -Some ribbon, it can be the ugliest ribbon on earth, no one's going to see it. -Oh, and Mod-Podge. ----- 1.Mod-podge the letters to the blocks. Then sand edges if you want to have that rougher look. 2. Take the drill and put some holes into the tops of some of the blocks... use the size just smaller than the size of you wire. 3. Twist the wire around, making sure the end is sort of a flat spiral (like you would draw on paper). The spiral is what will hold the photo, so...

I figured I'd end the month with a week long celebration of crafts (minus Monday), which really just means I have more crafts I've made that I want to brag about. Like this one. About two weeks ago my friend and I heard that the next town over was having a city wide clean up. We got very excited because this was code for free stuff laying out on the curbs. So we took my truck over and loaded up on doors, windows, old chairs and what not. This little creation came out of that. It's a medicine cabinet door that I liked. The problem was, as I thought about it and stared at it I couldn't come up with anything to do with it. Then, as these things tend to happen for me, I was laying in bed one night and it came to me. I started working immediately the next morning and between motherly duties for the next two days I managed to put this little gem together. The hardest part was the stenciling because I literally printed out large words and pen knifed them out of the pa...

Now that you've seen the quantity of scrap wood I have around my place. It's not surprising that I have little pieces floating around as well. What better way to use them than on little projects. We do a family-home evening every week. This is a day we spend studying scriptures and talking about our beliefs with our children, as well as just being together, having fun and playing. We have a chart to keep track of whose in charge of what. This helps the kids get excited, and helps Ralexwin and I better share the load. The chart has always been made out of paper. Until recently when Vicbowin and I made this one. We took blocks from the toy box (one for each family member's name--or middle name) and drilled hooks into the tops. We did the same thing with the wood base. Vicbowin wrote the words and I did the drilling. It was a fun project to do together and now sits proudly in our living room waiting for each week to come so the kids can move their block to the next ...

 First off, taking a picture of a mirror is not an easy thing. I'm amazed that people succeed in this at all, but I've never claimed to be the best photographer in the world so you'll have to deal with these pictures. This is a half done project. I wan to add a 'frame' around the mirror to make it a floor mirror, but that means going to the lumber yard and, well as you may know... I avoid the lumber yard . So my mirror remains undone. I thought I'd share the 'so far' of it anyway. Background: You might be wondering how this project cost me nothing. Well, it's because this is an 'extra' mirror. I replaced it with a new one in the bathroom and Ralexwin refused to get rid of this one. So for months it sat in our bedroom until I ran across a mirror redo post on another blog. (The mirror was pretty beat up). So here's what I did: First get ready to get dirty... Then follow these steps-- 1) Lay the mirror on it's face and pu...

Note: I've decided to re-post some of my more favorite blogging memories. This is actually going to be my theme for May but I had a long night last night so I thought I'd get started early. Since tomorrow will mark the 9th month of Remewin's life (she'll have been in the world as long as she was in my belly... always a sad day for me) I thought I'd give you a reminder of what my first few months were like during her pregnancy. A friend of mine--who had been out of town at that time--noted to me that my blog posts during this period 'sounded like WW3 in my house.' It was bad. I was SOOO sick and the kids kept getting sick, and the Mischievite ended up in the hospital and my anti-nausea medicine wasn't working and Christmas was soon approaching. Hindsight being what it is I find it amusing to look back and see where it all began. I hope you do too. Originally posted December 11, 2008: List of things that happened yesterday: * Kept Vicbowin home from s...

I saw this really cute idea online the other day that, of course, came with a price tag. I spent a few minutes toying with the idea of buying it before I realized--'Hey! I sooo can make that.' Ah, freedom.   (it keeps coming out blurry... sorry)   Say goodbye to the repetitive "Mom,what's my phone number?" or "I need you to call Jane's mom so she can come over!" Say hello to the child calling card. I love this idea. It is so convenient, especially now, at the end of the school year. It would be great for when you are moving to a new area as well (to give to friends the kids will be leaving behind). All I need now is some sheets of business cards (or old school you could just print a sheet of them on card stock and cut out). You can have this one and tweak it for you or you can make your own! I used Paint.net (my photo-shopping tool of choice) as well as some extra fonts I found over at fonts for peas (the gum ball machine came from one ...

When we moved in to our current location Albowin was a devoted fan of The Hulk. His life revolved around the green man with the anger issues and all he wanted in life was to 'be green.' So when it came time to paint the bedrooms he was adamant about the color. . . even the hue. Then he grew disillusioned with The Hulk and decided he was scary. Down came the poster's and out went the toys. All that remained was the painted walls. I didn't mind the color, but it really needed something else. In comes my favorite past time... the blogging world... and I found the greatest idea . Circles of paper mod podged to ply wood and hung on the wall. So I did it! I actually had to print off the papers (which I'd accumulated on my computer from digifree ) that arguably cost some money in ink, but since I didn't have to buy ink any time soon after, I don't count it. The 'how to': Find the papers that you want. Well, I guess first figure out how big yo...