I had planned to post a heavy-knit-content post with photos of what I've been working on but I got some news yesterday that has knocked me sideways. My sister was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia and has months to live. I have non-traditional family with children of different parents all calling each other sister and brother altho we are not, and we have relatively large gaps between ages. The person I refer to as my sister is the other child of my mother by a different father, and I grew up with her for my younger years. She is 14 years older than I. We only became relatively friendly after our mother died and we are not what I'd call busom buddies. I would have expected my elder brother (different mother, same father) who is 85 to go first. But my sister G has fought off breast cancer, which killed our mother. The chemo probably triggered the leukemia and the prognosis is not good. I was surprised how hard it hit me. I just got off the phone with her and she is doing as well as can be expected, and does not expect to see me before the end. I will go over for her memorial and she told me to wear a nice dress (!). When I told her I don't own a dress, she permitted me to wear slacks. While I had decided not to go to the states this year, it looks like I will be anyway, under different circumstances.

I didn't get much sleep last night and hope I can do better tonight.