Off Camera Flash

I went out yesterday fully equipped for the first time to take some pictures using off camera flash.  This is what I learned:

1. Carrying a lightstand, umbrella and speed-light in one hand and your camera in the other leaves no available hand to pick up poop.
2. There is a very small pocket of light that your subject needs to be in.  Coulee is fantastic at taking directions but she doesn't know how to move forward 2 steps or back 1 step... we have to work out a targeting system.
3. Umbrellas catch the slightest breeze and fall over - a sandbag, or something is definitely needed.  As is another arm to carry that with.
4. Putting her on something is a great way to get her to be exactly where you need her to be.
5. An assistant would really make things go smoother/faster.
6. I have a lot more to learn.

Winter's Last Fall?

I took Coulee out yesterday to enjoy what I hope was winter's last attempt to hang in there.

Update

We got the results last week - it was a grade 1 tumour that hadn't spread to her lymph node.  So it was the best we could have hoped for. We did not get clean margins (as expected) and it has a 12% chance of returning.  If that happens, we'll have to decide what to do then.  Our options would be to do radiation, remove the tumour again or take the whole leg.  We aren't going to worry about it unless it happens.

We went back this week for a bandage change and a recheck on the skin graft.  It's looking good.  She thinks it is still all alive.  :)

For the most part Lacey is doing well.  She isn't going too stir crazy, she doesn't pout in the cone and when I take it off, she doesn't lick at her bandages much. The stitches on her flank look fantastic and the ones from her lymph node are also doing OK.  She'll be in a cone for about another 1.5 weeks and then we'll get the stitches removed and she'll be able to go back to life as usual.

That's pretty much it. Life is feeling rather dull at the moment!

Backyard Snapshots

We brought Lacey home yesterday after her operation on Monday.  We don't really have much news yet.

Due to the location of the tumour, there was no way we could get clean margins (which is usually the goal of any tumour removal) without taking her entire leg.  We still might need to do that, but it will depend on the grade of the tumour.  Unfortunately you can't determine the grade of the tumour without removing it, and there was no point in removing it without taking as much as we could. If it is a low grade, it will hopefully be "good enough", at least for now.  But because of the location, it means they had to do a skin graft to seal up the area, which made things a little more complicated.  They took skin from her thigh and grafted it to her foot and leg.  She's gonna have a pretty hairy section if all goes well!  :)

They also took the nearest lymph node to determine if it had spread.  The node was definitely bigger than usual but that could have just been because it was working overtime to combat the tumour OR it could mean it's spread.

We should have results in a couple of days - hopefully by the end of the week.  The only decision we've actually made is that if it is a high grade, and hasn't already spread, we'll take her leg. I was really tempted to do it this time to save her a potential 2nd surgery but they really didn't want to do that if it was a grade 1 tumour.  Apparently for dogs that get Mast Cell Tumours repeatedly, they are usually all the same grade. As her first one was a grade 1 tumour we have high hopes that this one will be the same.

We haven't really figured out what we'll do if it has spread and we don't really know all our options yet either.  We are taking it one step at a time.

She's already feeling quite a bit better.  Yesterday she wasn't barking at anyone but today she not only barked at people in the park, but she picked up her favourite toy too.