RIP Dad

Yesterday, our father, Stephen Bicigo Sr  (aka Wankel or Yooper) passed away.  Cancer had taken over his body these last few months and it was fast. 

We were there all morning doing projects for him and bringing him things he needed.  We left him all settled in on his couch to watch the Packer Game.  The Packers Won. And then Dad passed away. His good friend and nurse lady was there as he took his last breaths.  It was calm. 

Dad wanted to die in his log cabin in the woods.  He got his wish. 

We helped him build that cabin, log by log, board by board.

The last few years we had a bunch of projects to do,

and Dad did very well as a supervisor

After fixing the roof this last month, the family gathered in his famous garage to watch the Packer Game.

Yup, has a big beautiful log cabin,

but everyone gathers in the garage all the time....

Da Yoopers Garage

He will tell ya what to do

How to do it

or how you SHOULD have done it! 

Bye Dad, may there be log cabin garages in Heaven.

and Packer Games. 

The family is meeting today to make arrangements. 

Double Family Whammy and Living Room Floor is Done

Yes, it's now confirmed as we feared.  My step-father Lowell has pancreatic cancer.

My step dad is temporarily in Ohio with Mom in an apartment... they are close to the docs of his choice and his daughter and son.  Mom is trying to keep it all together, but we will probably head down there sometime soon to see if we can help and use up some vacation time.  They live in Florida, but chose docs in Ohio that my stepsister knows and works with and easier to get into than the VA in Florida. I don't know how my mom is going to get through this. This is gonna be rough for the holidays on all of us.

This news is on top of my father having lung/kidney/bladder cancer.  My father's name is Steve. Yes I am daughter of a Steve, sister to a Steve and also wife of a Steve.

We are helping Dad as best we can. My Steve is working Mon-Fri so we are still bound to staying by home during the week.  Running up to my dads is 250 miles round trip each time. I try to go up once a week during the week to help out.  I do all I can to set up things and handle stuff over the phone, or mailing up packages.  "You Fit It Ships" boxes are handy....  He is on Hospice, has visiting nurses, has Meals on Wheels now, and he is no longer driving or even walking outside to the mailbox.  My brother Steve was there on Wednesday and got him up to a doc appointment, and picked up things he needed.  We are so thankful that sibings can help out and take turns.  It is tough when we all live so far away.


Please keep us in your prayers and send kind thoughts our way as our family gets through this.  We are doing what we can to help, but the reality is that both father figures in my life are struggling with this horrible disease. Prayers and kind thoughts are most appreciated.



Trying to keep my mind busy and keep me from going crazy, I need to be "doing something"... ya know?  

Since Steve ripped out the wall-to-wall carpeting in the foyer, livingroom and diningroom, I have been slowly sanding, staining and sealing sections of the floors with coats of polyurethane.  Last week I finished the diningroom.  This week is the livingroom.

When Steve removed the carpeting, the floors were in great shape structurally.  No holes or warpage.  We cleaned them up and dampmopped them.  There are some water rings that left marks in the varnish around the fireplace.  The previous owner's daughter said that was probably from the Christmas tree stand.

 The varnish finish is "dimpled" with marks from the texture of the carpet padding.  
There are deep splotches of something near the pocket doors.

Although we already had put a large wool oriental rug in here, we really wanted to redo the wooden borders around the room.  The doorway into the foyer area was the worst, with some blotches of something that could not scrub off, it was through the varnish and into the wood.  

Some folks might wonder why don't we just bring in a big floor sander and start from scratch and redo the entire floor from raw wood on up?  Well, we could.   But.... (there is always a but)  you could never get that same golden/reddish hue of the old wood. There is a shine to the woodgrain that looks like that tigereye jewel stone.  Like you can look into the wood and see glints of gold down deep. 

You could never replicate the lights and darks of the 101 years of yellowing or gaining that patina that only old wood has.  If we sanded it all and stained with new, it would look like ... well... a new floor!    Call me crazy, but I wanted to do it this way. My way. 

Out came my little sander with the "finger" attachment that lets me sand just on the bad spots.  It lets me pick and choose and get in between the lines of the hardwood. This area between the livingroom and diningroom is the worst for wear and spots... some paint spots too from over the years were able to be sanded out as well as the blotches and scratches.  

You can see the definite line from an area rug that laid here for many years, 

with the outer edges of the room exposed to UV but the center protected.  

That isn't a problem because we are putting the big wool oriental rug back in here. 

I sanded some of the paint spots that were in the light areas too...

Even though I had done the foyer in the spring, there were two bad spots that I never really ground down on or restained. (I was too scared to mess with it back then)  but now that I know what I am doing, I also got those two areas completely redone too. 

Once I had all the sanding done, then I shop vacced it good, and tack cloth / damp mopped with a swifter pad too.  Now it was time for my "magic" of blending some Valspar red oak stain, and then some Olde Maple Minwax Polyshades... I am able to get close to the same color as the existing wood.  On some of the water mark rings I had to go a bit darker, but it covered them quite well.  

After letting that dry, then I did up two coats of quick drying floor poly.  It is low-odor and fast drying. I use a wide pad on a long handle and spread it evenly without causing bubbles.  I did the first coat in the evening and spread a second coat right before bed... so it could dry overnight. 

The floor just GLEAMED in the worklights...
and we gated off the way into the diningroom just in case the doggers got through.
See that part that I had sanded previously? It is all stained to match now...

It's a good thing we live in a house with two staircases.  We could use the kitchen and laundry area, and spend the evening upstairs in the bedroom.  We were cozy with our laptops, tv and the doggers on the bed.  They didn't seem to mind, eh? 

We awoke to let the dogs down in the early morning darkness to see what we did....

they wanted to know where their furniture, toys and comfy sheepskin were????

They were perplexed. 

Steve helped me put most of the furniture back. I still had to finish the little 8x3 spot where the couch had been the night before. It didn't take long and was dry by the time Steve got home from work.  Now it was time to put the room "back together" .... Steve cut and nailed in the quarter round trim strips (but we are short two lengths and have to go buy some more and stain/varnish them to match) 

I know the rug takes up a large portion of the room, but it also covers that transition from the dark to the light wood, and seems to pull it all together.  It's not a very big room.  The diningroom is actually larger. But when we close the pocket doors and light the gas fireplace, it's pretty cozy. 

We decided to switch around the two corners... and put Steve's chair by the window.

Moving the tv to the other corner made more sense, but we had to run a new antenna coax. 

Steve had that done in about five minutes, what a guy! 

The foyer came out much nicer this time... and I was able to remove the worn spot near the front door. It was made from many years of people standing in the same spot, and grabbing the doorknob to go out to get the mail.  It think all those years of pivoting with a shoe on the wood wore it down... Now that its refinished, I think because we wear socks, it will stay nicer.  I hope. 

The dogs were VERY happy to find their sheepskin
restored to it's original spot...

I had a tickle in my throat last night before bed... and this morning woke up with a congested chest, coughing and sore throat.  I am going to slather myself with Vicks now and head up to bed to rest.  I simmered chicken veggie soup all day, and the house smells great.  Hope I can kick this out of my system.  Steve is coming down with the same thing too.  If we are sick, we can't be much help to the other family members who need us so much more! 

Whitney Doing Better and Dad's Doc, and GoWise Electric Pressure Cooker

I am soooo happy to report that our little Whitney is finally producing her own blood platelets!   We are soooo thrilled and thankful and relieved.  Her little body is gaining weight and she seems to have kicked into normal operation for an almost-three-week-old baby.

Here she is all dolled up for going about town:

Friday afternoon, Steve and I drove up to help Dad with his new doc appt.  He seems to be happy with the local doc we hooked him up with. She is a native Yooper, from our old hometown of Iron River, MI.  She knew a lot of the same people and made Dad feel totally at ease.  (he also tried to ask her out on a date!) 

After an hour and half of going over his records, patiently talking about his upcoming care needs, and explaining his health situation, she only had to cut the appointment short because someone came in needing a gash stitched up.  LOL  Otherwise I think he would have kept her for another hour or two!  

From there we stopped at the store and got all the things he needed at home on his list, including cat food and kitty litter for his cantankerous old cat Isaiah.  Grumpy Cat ain't got nuttin on him! 

It's a 250 mile round trip journey for us, but well worth it to get him settled into his local medical clinic and doc nearby.  On Tuesday I will go back up as we meet with the county staff for setting up hospice and other services available in his area. 

I am hoping on the way back home to stop in for a snuggle and cuddle with little Whitney, and hug my big boy Jameson too. 

We woke up this morning to thunder, lightening, and downpours of rain! Can't see it in the pic, but it was pouring out and making such noise as the rain beat down.  That's okay, now I don't have to water my tomatoes! 

It was cozy and dry in our front porch, as we sipped our coffee and started to figure out what we wanted to do today.  The doggers were curled up next to me and not shuddering or shaking during the storm.  That is good.  Our old collie Ducky use to chatter her teeth and drool so bad during storms.... 

Soon the rain stopped and the sun poked out for about half an hour.  Now it clouded back up and seems to be a dismal morning after all.

I had picked a whole big bowl of my homegrown tomatoes yesterday, and wanted to try out something new to me.  A few weeks ago I bought a GoWise electric pressure cooker.  I have seen the infomercials on tv about using an electric pressure cooker.. and decided I wanted one.  I have cooked with a stove top pressure cooker for years and years.  The more I researched, the more I learned.  I decided that I didn't want the one offered on tv, nor the ones available in the stores locally. They all had teflon interiors.  Reviews say they peel and chip over time. I decided on the GoWise because it's stainless steel, and also was 8 quart instead of 5 or 6 quart.  

I ordered mine from Amazon, on sale from list price of $235.99 down to $99.00 with free shipping.  This week they are up to $109.99  Amazon's Go Wise 8 qt Electric Pressure Cooker

Some sources say you can't do canning in the electric pressure cookers, and others say you can do vegetables, but not meats. (I never do canning of meats anyhow)  I decided to try a couple quarts of tomatoes... it will fit four jars at a time in the future, but I only did two quarts to test it out. 

Wow.... 15 minutes of pressure and then 

5 minutes to let it depressurize 

and they were done!  

 The ones on the left are Better Boy tomatoes 

and the ones on the right are a blend of golden and red heirloom tomatoes. 

It sure beats fighting the heat and humidity of filling up a big 22 quart stove top canning kettle that has to run on two burners.... and waiting for the water to heat up and then hefting it over to the sink to dump it out later.  Also, I have a flat glass top electric stove and have been told a canning kettle riding over two burners can crack the glass! I have been lucky so far, but wanted to try something different. 

This electric pressure cooker only takes 5 quarts of cold water, and I just set in the cold jars and close the lid. 

I like the option of just doing a few jars at a time.... and not having to wait until I have enough ripe tomatoes for 7 jars at once to make it worth my while to haul out my big hot water bath stove top canning kettle. 

I think what I liked best about this electric pressure cooker is that I can set it and forget about tending it. I can walk away and be doing something else in the house, and not worry about something boiling over or not hot enough. I don't have to watch it or keep controlling the stove top burner to keep the pressure up at a set level.    This machine does that for me.

Here is the pretty stainless interior, and the center pot lifts out for cleaning.  The first thing I made was a frozen big lump of roast beef.  Threw it in totally frozen solid with some water, some steak sauce and slices of onion.  15 minutes, let off the pressure, add chunks of raw taters and carrots, close it up again. I set it for 45 more minutes like a normal roast beef recipe for pressure cookers. 70 minutes total from freezer to table.. perfectly done to fall apart tenderness. ahhhhhhhh

The next few meals I tried were boneless roast turkey breast, using the rack in the middle and chicken broth in the bottom.  Perfect!   How about a Beef Minestrone soup mix from Bear Creek with chunks of tenderloin steak and extra bowtie noodles and more veggies.  Yummmmmm can you taste it from the pic?

almost forgot to mention this one...

jasmine white rice steamed 8 min from start to finish

 rinse rice first and it comes fluffy and not sticky~ 

Well, it's noon now....

PACKER GAME ON TV~!  

(Sure, it's only pre-season, but it IS football!) 

Update on our baby Whitney and also on Dad

Well, our little grandbaby Whitney is holding her own.  Her visits to the doc are plentiful, and I am trying to go along with as many as I can to help our daughter Heather.

Whitney is gaining weight, but needs to gain more.  She isn't yet developing her own blood platletes, but will be going back again on Friday for more testing. All good thoughts, prayers and well wishes are welcomed for our sweet little gal.

We love her sooo much! 

As for my dad, while we were waiting for some tests on Friday, our nephew and his fiance stopped by with their two children for a visit.  Sometimes you just need a little laugh at times like this.... so we made a little movie clip in the hospital room:

We sprung Dad from the hospital on Saturday.  Once the doc mentioned discharge, he just about FLEW outta the bed, asking me to get his clothes!   Well, his IV was still attached and he had to wait for the paperwork to properly release him.

Once we got outside where he could breathe and walk and stretch, it was like letting an animal out of cage.  A smile was back on his face!  Just look at that smile!  (please, don't look at the worry on my face)

Our oldest brother brought him home to his snug little cabin in the woods. We helped him build this over 30 years ago, and this is where he wants to be. Who can blame him?

He got all settled in and my brother cut the grass and did some odd jobs around the place for him.  Then on Sunday our youngest brother, my sister and her husband (a cancer survivor himself) all went to visit and hang out and help with some projects.

They kept him occupied and he was happy to have company.  

I think this is a very good pic of my sister and my dad.....  

His phone was ringing off the hook of course, and he was glad to have contact with people now that he was sprung from the hospital.  I hope people keep contacting him to keep his spirits up.  No time frame, just knowing he will be home where he wants to be is good for him.

Steve and I will be going up on Friday to get him set up with his local doc and I am transferring all his hospital record stuff from the tests that were done (so he don't have to go through them all again)   Next week we meet with the county gal with info on hospice and other services available in the region.  She was so nice and helpful on the phone, and had a lot of information to give.


The bugger of it all is that I must have picked up a flu bug or virus at the hospital myself.  I am down and out here with fever, chills etc. and not doing so hot.  Today, I was supposed to pick up grandtots Allegra and Mason for an overnight visit, but I had to cancel, sadly.  I hate disappointing my wee ones....  I spent the day in bed, and this evening is the first I have wandered down to the couch and opened the laptop up. I think I am going back to bed....

If Grandma ain't doing good,

 she can't do good for others now,

 can she?

Sadly, the Big C strikes again

Our family has another encounter with the Big C... yes cancer.

My father has been ill for a while, and is suffering stomach problems even more severely as of late. He was thinking his appendix burst.... Thursday night he was in such pain, two of my brothers finally convinced him to contact 911 and get an ambulance ride.  (we all live 70-120 miles away)

After a long ambulance ride first to one local hospital, they did an MRI and sent him on via ambulance to a larger hospital in Green Bay.  We knew it wasn't good.

Our youngest brother took off in the middle of the night to drive down from Michigan to be there and find out what was what. He had to drive first to one hospital and then to the other one to track down where the ambulance drivers took our Dad.  He was up all night dealing with our Dad once he found him.  He is our hero! Our Dad can be rather "cantankerous" and our brothers handle him better than us sisters.

By 6 am I headed out to drive up to Green Bay and see what was next.  By noon the oldest brother made it after his night job, and was there in time to meet with the docs. Our sister who runs their own business was standing by on the phone waiting for all updates and giving moral support.  We tried to reach out to the last brother, but, oh well. It is what it is. 

After more tests, CT scans, scoping and conferring with docs, it has been determined that cancer has invaded his bladder, both kidneys, and one of his lungs.  He had a very nice doc who spelled it all out in plain language and didn't hold anything back. He could tell that Dad was a "give it to me straight" kind of guy, and could see that us siblings were allowing Dad to make his own choices and come to terms with the diagnosis.  We were back and forth on the phone with our sister, thank God for cell phones and texts and instant contact devices.

The nephew that lives closest also came by to lend support and bring some sunshine with his fiance and two little boys.  Sometimes you need a good smile at times like this.  Thank you Matt & Amanda, and Colin and little Matt.


Decisions were made today and he was given all the options of treatment. He is able to make his own choices and all of the siblings in contact agree with his choice.

He has chosen to go home and live out his time there.  

Hospice will be contacted and arrangements made to get him some help at home. He wants to be home with his cat, his coffee maker, his garage, in his log cabin in the woods.  He built it himself 30 years ago with the help of us kids. That is where he wants to be.


In between all of this, I left the one hospital to run over to the other hospital on the other side of town to help with our newest granddaughter Whitney. She had lab work done and I helped with her big brother Jameson while they were in with the doc.  Her blood platelets have not increased and she is being watched carefully and goes back again on Monday for more tests.  Then I ran back to the first hospital for dad.  And back again this morning. Our oldest brother took over now and gave us a break.  We came home and took a three hour nap this afternoon.

This is gonna be a tough time for our whole family.

Please keep our family in your prayers and thoughts??