Hello and welcome to today’s feature in the #SewPink ByAnnie blog hop! Check out the main post from ByAnnie here for more details, schedule, and ways to participate. I’m honored to be returning this year, and bringing more awareness to light to Glioblastoma.

You may be familiar with the initiatives to fundraiser and educate others around breast cancer. This year, ByAnnie expanded this efforts to the whole year of awareness, letting us focus on other areas of need.

This post is in honor and memory of Sue Timchack, also known as Stitchin’ with Sue on YouTube.

Sue passed way a little more than a year after her Glioblastoma diagnosis.

From the Mayo Clinic,

“Glioblastoma is a type of cancer that starts as a growth of cells in the brain or spinal cord. It grows quickly and can invade and destroy healthy tissue. Glioblastoma forms from cells called astrocytes that support nerve cells.

Glioblastoma can happen at any age. But it tends to happen more often in older adults. Glioblastoma symptoms may include headaches that keep getting worse, nausea and vomiting, blurred or double vision, trouble speaking, altered sense of touch, and seizures. There also may be trouble with balance, coordination, and moving parts of the face or body.”

It’s an awful illness with no cure, only treatment to slow the progression. There is no known actions that can be made to prevent this cancer. Below are the symptoms to watch for and yourself and others. For Sue, vision was impacted first along with headaches.

Symptoms

Signs and symptoms of glioblastoma may include:

• Headache, particularly one that hurts the most in the morning.
• Nausea and vomiting.
• Confusion or a decline in brain function, such as problems with thinking and understanding information.
• Memory loss.
• Personality changes or irritability.
• Vision changes, such as blurred vision, double vision or loss of peripheral vision.
• Speech difficulties.
• Trouble with balance or coordination.
• Muscle weakness in the face, arms or legs.
• Reduced sensation of touch.
• Seizures, especially in someone who hasn’t had seizures before.

Thank you to ByAnnie for sponsoring so the supplies, patterns and hardware for this post, and Lumin Fabrics for the Island Batik fabric.

The pattern I selected for this initiative was the On the Go 2.0. It’s a compact, over the shoulder strap bag with several helpful compartments for your ID and cards with room for essential items. I thought through all the doctor appointments and emergency room visits Sue endured, and how a little bag with everything ready to go would be a great resource for many.

When constructing this bag, I quilted all the fabric, with enough leftovers to make the standing bag from the Pint Size Pals Pattern.

This could be a wonderful little coordinating pouch to put a few travel items together in your On the Go 2.0 bag.

As final note on Glioblastoma, government funding has been entirely cut for 2025. With victims of this illness having so few options for quality of life between diagnosis and end of life, donations are greatly appreciated at the Glioblastoma Research Organization https://www.gbmresearch.org/blog/the-government-just-cut-100-of-funding-for-glioblastoma

There are still lots of posts coming up in #SewPink make sure to check the schedule and see what the other participants are contributing!