Don't EVER lose your Blogger/Google+ password

Oh my goodness.

What an ordeal!

I last posted a blog on here in May. I usually blog at www.caringbridge.org/visit/beccalovesbrooklyn but have been trying to get back to Blogger. I had a busy summer and tried in September to log in but there was no little writing icon to make a new blog entry. Finally! Today they let me back in!

So, I have all kinds of things to say, but am getting ready to go fly to NYC tomorrow and am needing to do laundry, unpack from Thanksgiving and repack for tomorrow's trip.

I will sit down and write this weekend because I have a few things I want to get off my chest about the deaths of Eric Garner, Michael Brown, and that little boy in Cleveland to name a few.

Be back soon!

Please don't take God's Name in vain. And while you are at it, no racial slurs either.

Is it not 2014?

Check your calendars people. Two thousand and fourteen, right?

And yet some people still are ignorant enough to use racial slurs like The N Word and coon. Why? Do they not realize how stupid they sound when they say such words? It makes me (white girl from Kansas) feel sick to my stomach when I hear such things. Regardless of joking around or not, it is absolutely unacceptable. We are all created EQUAL and should not be judged or thought less of because of our skin color.

It is plain ugly to use racial slurs and it really just shows how uneducated you are with your lack of self-confidence if you have to resort to tearing someone else down based on pigment saturation.

And while I am here talking about what makes me sad to listen to, I want to add to the top of my list this: Taking the Lord's name in vain. Cussing with God. Really? God D**n and Jesus Christ along with some other colorful combinations are just so heartbreaking for me to hear. Who do you think you are that you can take the most sovereign and Holy Name and mix it in with profanity? I shake my head because there are no words. Every time I have ever heard someone do this - even since I was a little girl - I will whisper "Sorry, Jesus" on behalf of the person's hurtful words. I know my King hears me and feels the pain my ears have heard.

This was a short blog today because there is no point in elaborating on such awful things.

Be careful little ears what you hear......

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x-mKKMoNJ40

NED & PEG! No Evidence of Disease! Plenty of Evidence of God! (A Love Story)

Jesus LOVES me this I KNOW. For even though the Bible tells me so, it is by His Mercy that I REALLY know.

Every scan done Wednesday (5/21/14) came back "great" according to my Melanoma Oncologist, Dr. Gary Doolittle. He said I made his job easy that day. On my way to KU Med Thursday to get my results, I was so confident that they would all be clear and that there would be NO active tumors, that I stopped by my favorite Kansas City ice cream shop - Murray's - for a pre-celebration cone of Smitty's French Lemon. On all the melanoma message boards, Facebook forums, Twitter and Instagram groups that I am a part of having to do with all things Stage IV Melanoma, people OFTEN complain about "scanxiety" - being anxious about their scans and awaiting the results. I have certainly experienced that before, but this time was different. As I told Mom, not even 1% of me was worried. I had THAT PEACE - the peace that TRULY surpasses ALL earthly understanding. (Phil 4:7 "And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.")

With my clean results, I am now able to shout from the rooftops, CaringBridge and Facebook that I am NED. When you have cancer, you WANT to be NED. NED is No Evidence of Disease. Because of my LDH and white blood cells, I still have melanoma and will always be Stage IV melanoma, but right now there are NO active tumors and THAT is what I care about the most. As I wrote in my Jesus Calling devotional yesterday, that buys me more time to spend BEing Brooklyn's mom and her tour guide. It allows me to encourage more people and share Jesus with everyone I know. It allows God to bring a strong man into my life who will love me through my cancer and not be threatened by the dynamic duo of The Pendarvis Girls. It allows me to have a fully open heart and make myself vulnerable to be loved by a caring, kind, intelligent, affectionate, hard-working, gentle, funny and compassionate man. A man that cooks as good as he looks. ;)

In addition to having NED, I also have PEG - Plenty of Evidence of God. NED and PEG go together like peanut butter and jelly, Becca and NYC, Sharpie pens and blank paper, rainy days and naps or red wine and rare steak. PERFECTLY. Through the past almost 15 months since my Stage IV diagnosis, I have had an abundance of blessings from God. Most, not all, but most, have come through OTHER PEOPLE. God has used so many of you to BE His Hands and Feet to Brooklyn and me. Whether you have taken subways to meet me at doctor appointments in the city (Jill and Angie), driven in from CT to take care of me, go to the ER, do massive amounts of research (Heather), help me move MULTIPLE times in NYC (again, Angie, along with my Washington Heights TGC crew), given us a beautiful, free place to stay on Riverside Drive (Courtney and Jerry!), unpack me in Lindsborg (Mom & Ed's church friends), drive UP and DOWN, and UP and DOWN I-70 to KU Med appts with me (MOM!!), watch Brooklyn for me (CC & Steve and Lorrissa and Auntie J & Uncle Carl and others), take me to the ER in Salina (Mor Mor), care for me (Aunt Peg), send cards, notes, gifts and PRAYERS (too many of you to give shout-outs to), send FOUR PINTS of THE BEST ICE CREAM IN THE WORLD overnight to me on dry ice (Ample Hills Creamery gang) or just read this blog and left encouraging words here or on Facebook - YOU have been used by God to show me PEG. I see PEG in the AWESOME, INCREDIBLE care I have been given at Memorial Sloan Kettering (NYC) and at The University of Kansas Cancer Center (KC). I see PEG in being covered by Medicare at the age of 44 and having the $7,200 every year to pay my out-of-pocket costs for the health care I am getting, along with the chemotherapy that has ranged from $4,300 - $14,560 per MONTH. I see PEG at my beloved Vineyard Church and in her people, from Curt leading worship to Fred teaching and to all our dear friends there who love us so very much!

In a couple of weeks I am going to see another example of PEG up close. Brooklyn and I have been GIFTED with our first trip to Hawaii. A lovely couple named Holly and Rick saw our video (www.vimeo.com/75652656) and contacted me. They want to bless us with a peaceful getaway at their guest cottage on Kauai. We fly to Honolulu on June 17th and are literally counting down the days. To say we are excited is an understatement. The number one thing at the TOP of my Bucket List is to swim with dolphins. This wish was made LONG before my Stage IV diagnosis. And it is going to come TRUE in three weeks! PEG, PEG, PEG!

Another dream I have (that part of me is even scared to share with you) is to fall in love for the LAST time. I want to be married. I want a husband. I want to model godly, romantic love to Brooklyn and provide her with an example of TRUE love. Love that is patient and kind, not jealous or self-seeking, love that keeps no records of wrongs and is not easily angered, love that protects, hopes, trusts and perseveres. Love that cuddles and laughs, cooks together and seeks shade from the sun. A love that lasts as long as I am on this earth.

I KNOW that WITH God ALL things ARE possible - even sending a man that isn't intimidated by a strong independent single mom who loves her daughter more than she ever dreamt she could.

Here is to NED, PEG and LOVE.
And so it IS.

I'm Gonna Love You Through It- Martina McBride LYRICS

Everything's OK - by Lenka ~ Illustrations by Soomin Sook ~ I am obsessed with this song!

A little inspirational reading...

Standing in belief that all my needs will be met, I'm preparing myself to be at the Inspired Writer's Retreat next month in Utah. New York Times best-selling author M. Bridget Cook is hosting it and she has told me it is TIME to share my story. I've schlepped this Power to Write book around for 20 years. I think I'll start reading it right now! If you want to donate to my fundraiser, please go to www.rockethub.com/41988 Every dollar helps! Thank you!

Jesus Calling - April 7 - I Am the Potter, you are the clay

"My everlasting Love is at work in every event of your life...As you move through the turbulent stream with Me, let circumstances mold you into the one I desire you to be." #JesusCalling #SarahYoung #devotional

Me, A Spontaneous Idealist? Sounds just about right!

I love internet quizzes that show up in my Facebook News Feed. Like this personality quiz on ipersonic.com

This one really hit home in so many ways. The results told me things that people who know me have literally said to me before. I am open-minded and creative and I do have a zest for life. An extra-large zest, if you ask my Auntie J. I love to communicate and have been called a wordsmith. I become bored and need the thrill of a big, gorgeous city like New York or Chicago to feed my soul. But the thing that resonated the most was "You appreciate receiving new stimulation, meeting new people, and continuously collecting unique experiences." Can I get an Amen up in here?

Last summer my cousin Elaine had come to visit me in NYC and stayed for a few days. Long enough for her to observe me in my own natural habitat and to offer up the following theory. "You are a collector of things. You live to experience things and do new things and you collect experiences" she said to me as we were crossing Riverside Drive. "Finally!" I thought. Someone who I am related to actually "gets" me. Elaine had cracked the code. While she didn't refer to me as a Spontaneous Idealist, she knew my number and that was enough to make me feel validated.

You can go to http://www.ipersonic.com and take your own quiz!

The Spontaneous Idealist

• My Type

Spontaneous Idealists are creative, lively and open-minded persons. They are humorous and dispose of a contagious zest for life. Their enthusiasm and sparkling energy inspires others and sweeps them along. They enjoy being together with other people and often have an uncanny intuition for their motivations and potential.

Spontaneous Idealists are masters of communication and very amusing and gifted entertainers. Fun and variety are guaranteed when they are around. However, they are sometimes somewhat too impulsive in dealing with others and can hurt people without really meaning to do so, due to their direct and sometimes critical nature.

This personality type is a keen and alert observer; they miss nothing which is going on around them. In extreme cases, they tend to be oversensitive and exaggeratedly alert and are inwardly always ready to jump. Life for them is an exciting drama full of emotionality. However, they quickly become bored when things repeat themselves and too much detailed work and care is required. Their creativity, their imaginativeness and their originality become most noticeable when developing new projects and ideas - they then leave the meticulous implementation of the whole to others. On the whole, Spontaneous Idealists attach great value to their inner and outward independence and do not like accepting a subordinate role. They therefore have problems with hierarchies and authorities.


If you have a Spontaneous Idealist as your friend, you will never be bored; with them, you can enjoy life to the full and celebrate the best parties. At the same time, they are warm, sensitive, attentive and always willing to help. If Spontaneous Idealists have just fallen in love, the sky is full of violins and their new partners are showered with attention and affection. This type then bubbles over with charm, tenderness and imagination. But, unfortunately, it soon becomes boring for them once the novelty has worn off. Boring everyday life in a partnership is not for them so that many Spontaneous Idealists slip from one affair into another. However, should the partner manage to keep their curiosity alive and not let routine and familiarity gain the upper hand, Spontaneous Idealists can be inspiring and loving partners.

Adjectives that describe your type
spontaneous, enthusiastic, idealistic, extroverted, theoretical, emotional, relaxed, friendly, optimistic, charming, helpful, independent, individualistic, creative, dynamic, lively, humorous, full of zest for life, imaginative, changeable, adaptable, loyal, sensitive, inspiring, sociable, communicative, erratic, curious, open, vulnerable

As a Spontaneous Idealist you are one of the extroverted personality types. You enjoy working in a colorfully diverse group of people who interest and inspire you. Working in a “secluded room” is not your thing. Your sense for the motivation of others is almost eerie. You constantly observe that which happens around you and have no problems noticing all sorts of things simultaneously or communicating with several people at the same time.

My Career

Your enthusiasm is contagious to others and that is why your colleagues and friends all appreciate you as an important member of your team. Your articulateness and your sensitive ear for nuances in conversations with others obviously play a role. For you, this team-oriented environment is very important because you need to receive positive feedback and recognition like other people need air to breathe. It would be practically impossible for you to contribute everything you need to maintain your high ideals, by yourself.

Variety, challenges and fun are important ingredients of your area of responsibility. You appreciate receiving new stimulation, meeting new people, and continuously collecting unique experiences. However, too much routine, too much detail work and the necessity to stick with one project for a very long time is not your thing. Your strength are creative problem solutions, discovering new ways and opportunities, the conceptualization of new ideas on one hand, but not so much their concrete implementation on the other. Ideally, you have a staff of capable colleagues that takes over your concepts and runs with them.

Tracy Chapman - Collection Full Album

Eight Years Ago Today Was My Last Blog Entry On Here (please excuse the dust!)

Eight years ago today was the last time I wrote on this "BeccaLovesBrooklyn" blog.  It was March 24, 2006 and I was living in Kansas City, Missouri. Today is March 24, 2014 and I am residing in Lindsborg, Kansas via Chicago, Illinois; Indianapolis, Indiana and the greatest city in the entire world: New York, New York. Eight years ago I was the single mom of a 2-1/2 year-old baby girl who is now 10-1/2 and in 4th grade. When I last blogged on here, I hadn't yet been diagnosed with Stage I Melanoma (skin cancer) but now I have Stage IV Metatastic Melanoma and am recovering from a lung lobectomy two months ago. Eight years ago I had never been married and now I wish I could say that I never was. Or, at least, not to the person I wasted my wedding vows on. Eight years ago I was working as a photographer and now I am working on my first book. Funny how life changes.

Eight years. Eight very fast and very long years.

I've had a lot of great things happen in that period of time and I've captured almost all of them through a photograph or a medical blog on my CaringBridge site.(http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/beccalovesbrooklyn) In that period of time, I have learned what Facebook is and used it for what it can be - an instantanious way to encourage people and do life together. Oftentimes I have referred to it as FAITHbook. I've seen the ways it can be used to hurt people, but I prefer looking at all the ways it can heal people and love on them from a distance. You can find me there almost every single day. I like to post the devotions I do in the morning from Jesus Calling by Sarah Young and Prayers For Emotional Wholeness by Stormie Omartian.

Something else life-changing happened just a week after my last entry on here. I found Vineyard Church, or rather, it found me. It was 2:30 pm on Saturday, April 1 and I went out to get the mail from our apartment at North Oak Crossing. There was a direct mail postcard from Vineyard Church that had the bare feet of a son, mom, dad and daughter under a puffy white down comforter and it said "Sleep in on Sundays!" Being in advertising and marketing, I pay a little more attention to "junk mail" than the average person. I thought it was cute and looked to find a spot for it on my already fully refrigerator. There were photos, inspirational messages, magnets from various trips and travels, appointment cards for doctor and dental visits and a Christmas-themed post card - on the first day of April. I thought I could bare to part with it and when I took it down I noticed that both it and the new post card were from a church called Vineyard. I smiled and thought it funny that I would want to display both of their mailings on my fridge, considering I had never been to that church before.

I looked closely at the new one and on the other side, to the left of my address with the words "Pendarvis Family" they advertised an exciting children's ministry and various service times, including a 4 pm Saturday service. I thought to myself "If Brooklyn wakes up in the next hour, we will go check this place out." We were Catholic - I had taken RCIA and converted when I lived in Ridgefield, Connecticut and was a nanny at the age of 21. Brooklyn was baptized Catholic on October 26, 2003 when she was just shy of two months old. Every Sunday morning we got up early and drove 40 minutes down to the inner-city, to our beloved Saint Theresa Little Flower and went to 9:15 mass. When I got the postcard from Vineyard Church, I thought "We can go there on Saturday and to St. Theresa on Sunday." Brooklyn woke within 20 - 30 minutes and because the mailing said to "Come as we are" - we went as we were. Me, holding a world of hurts and Brooklyn, easily won-over by the Dum-Dum lollipops given out after Sunday school. 

For the first time in my life, I experienced the feeling of the Holy Spirit - when your skin tingles and a still, small voice reassures you that you are in the right place and to just open up. With each word of the worship songs, I felt a part of my heart opening up in ways I hadn't felt since I gave birth to my daughter. The sermon was much more of a conversation/lesson from the incredibly anointed pastor, Fred Herron. Afterwards, I went up and introduced myself to him. I told him that if that was not the best sermon I had ever heard, it was for sure in the top three. I told him about getting the postcard from his church three hours earlier and deciding to just come. I told him we were Catholic and he said a lot of the people at the Saturday service were Catholics, too. He walked me up the aisle and out to the foyer to get a Journey Guide for me. He shared about a Bible study for moms. They were doing a study on the fruits of the spirit. I didn't know what those were, but his voice was so calming and reassuring when he told me to call a lady named Kate LaFrance who was co-leading the group.

I picked up Brooklyn from her Sunday school room and she joyfully picked out her first (of many!) lollipops. I was just as won-over with the free Roasterie coffee they had out, so I understood her happiness. From that point on, Brooklyn referred to Vineyard as the "Lollipop Church" and I couldn't argue, because by going there, our life became blessed by very sweet people who lived out the calling in the Bible to BE the hands and feet of Jesus and minister to one another. (1 Corinthians, ch. 12)

To this day I firmly, with 100% of my heart, believe that God knew what was ahead for us and that he sent us that Vineyard postcard knowing we would need our Vineyard family to help get us through things...things like cancer, releasing strongholds and relinquishing old hurts through Oaks of Righteousness, to moving, marrying an abusive, alcoholic, bi-polar mess-of-a-man, living in a domestic violence shelter, losing Grammy and getting a Stage IV cancer diagnosis in NYC and needing to move back to Kansas. Who knows what else the future holds, but I know our Vineyard family will be there to help us get through it with the grace of God. 

In the eight years I have been gone from here, I have been very much alive on CaringBridge. I can't say enough good things about the service CaringBridge provides when you are going through a major  health event. To be able to share updates and prayer requests and to get uplifting messages on the guestbook is beyond wonderful when you are going through something so emotionally and physically draining. I have started sharing things on my CaringBridge that would be better suited for a book, but for now I am going to start with blogging to give my writing a place to reside. Thanks for coming along for the ride.