Fast forward 4 years and I had a very large lump on my thigh that you could actually see through my clothes. Since my dad is a veterinarian, I had him look at it and he said that he thought is was a lipoma; a benign tumor that develops from too much adipose tissue. Now no one really knows how they form but one theory is trauma to the area in which the tumor grows. I vividly remember the trauma of hitting my thigh so I know that is how it formed. Finally after much trepidation (I hate going to the doctor), I went to my GP and had her take a look. Hoping for "It's no big deal, just an easy office removal" response, she took one look at it and said, "That's really large, you need to go to the surgeon". Long story short, the surgeon said although a lipoma is usually benign, it is a cancer and needs to come out. So, after putting it off for another 3 months, yesterday was the day.
When the surgery was over, the doctor told Steve that the tumor was larger than expected and misshapen. All in all, he removed a tumor the length(not around just the length) of a large orange from my leg. GROSS!!! I had no idea that something like that could even be part of me. I should have never waited that long. I guess I am just in denial that I am getting older and that these types of things start happening.
So here I sit, on the couch, barely able to hobble around. I am also on pain meds, so I hope this post is even coherent :) I would post pics but that would just be a little over the top :)
I think I will just start by sharing how we are mostly preparing for food self-sufficiency. We think this is not only the best way to start our journey of being prepared as well as stewardship of God's money. 
Here are some pictures of Steve and Ethan planning and building the raised beds. Thankfully due to the construction of the house, we really don't have any weeds to worry about or we would have laid down weed barrier first.
I started seeds yesterday as well as started the potato barrels. We are planting Roma and grape tomatoes, zucchini, yellow squash, okra, cucumbers, corn, carrots, onions, strawberries, bush beans, sugar snap peas, garlic, green and red peppers, jalapeno peppers, lettuce and cabbage, broccoli and red and yellow potatoes. All of the veggies will be grown in the garden while the potatoes and bush beans will be grown in barrels. We have never grown potatoes in a barrels before but I hear it is the best and easiest way to do it. I got my info here and we planted the bush beans with the potatoes b/c potatoes naturally ward off Mexican bean beetles while the bush beans naturally ward off the Colorado potato beetle. We will see ;) I have also planted all of my herbs in containers on the back porch. I know this is really hard in the Texas summer to keep watered but since it's so close to the house, I hope to keep on top of it.
Here are some pics of our seedlings, herbs and potatoes in the barrels
