Many things keep many people up at night. A window screen rattling in the wind can keep me up for hours worrying. However, the number one worry I have is that someone I love will get cancer. Even the word, cancer, literally strikes fear in my heart as I type it.
Caroline Crocker Moore has faced this fear. She has Stage IV triple positive metastatic breast cancer. She is 35 years old, married to an amazing man, Hudson, and raising two children—Blake (3) and Genevieve (19 months). And with her family, Caroline has raised almost $300,000 for the Breast Cancer Research Foundation.
We sat down to talk about the “c” word, family, and the importance of advocating for yourself.
Your cancer story begins so dramatically—you were six months pregnant with your daughter when you found out you had a tumor on your spine. How did your journey start?
In April of 2017, we moved to St. Louis for my husband Hudson’s job. Almost immediately after we moved, we found out we were pregnant with our second child. So, we found ourselves pregnant for the second time, with a one-year old at home, in a new city, with no family or friends around. This was the backdrop against which I got cancer.
The sunflower fields are blooming (and just starting to fade) all around the edges of town. It’s a beautiful scene that always reminds me of a summer spent in France—riding trains and looking out the window as the view would alternate shades of gold, depending on whether we were passing flowers or fields of rolled hay. Now I can’t believe that they’re practically in our backyard. I’ve included a few older, but still favorite, photos from when the kids were younger, below.
Fun fact? A UC Davis professor taught us how sunflowers follow the sun. Another fun fact? According the the National Sunflower Association, most sunflowers are grown in the Dakotas but 95% of the seeds for all sunflower farms come from California—specially the Sacramento Valley. In terms of acreage, it’s the number-one seed crop in the state.
I have a system for dealing with my weakness for design books (and cookbooks). When I hear or read about a book I’m intrigued by, I first go online and borrow it from the library. When it comes, if I find I just skim through it, it’s a no. If I pore over the photos and read the text the way I would read a novel, I either buy it right away it or put it on my wish list.
Here, in no particular order, is a round-up of four beautiful, wish-listed design books (including one purchase!)…
