CRANBERRY TWP — At times, Frances Landis's sense of humor is her defining characteristic.

To undergo an unexpected blood transfusion last month, the Cranberry Township mother told family members she needed a pair of fangs.

And she can't down her combination drug "cocktails" without first donning martini glass-shaped sunglasses.

Landis, 49, was diagnosed in July with stage 4 lung cancer and given three to six months to live.

Stage 4 is the final stage, meaning the cancer has spread to another lobe of the lung from where it started or to another part of the body.

Making light of her condition with friends and family gets Landis through many tough days.

But the ability to share those moments with her younger son, Ethan, would make them all more memorable.

Ethan Landis, 22, graduated Aug. 10 from U.S. Army basic training in Fort Campbell, Ky.

Unlike his brother, Frank S. Bosancic, 22, who is moving home this week to be with his mother, Ethan Landis will remain at Fort Campbell until his unit is deployed to Iraq in March.

"With Ethan being in the Army, he can't just come home when he wants to," said Landis's niece, Kim Pletz of Patterson Township, Beaver County.

"He doesn't have that choice."

So family members have devised a plan to keep mother and son connected: laptop computers with Internet-accessible cameras that would allow mother and son to chat virtually any time Ethan Landis is available. A collection drive to raise money to buy the equipment is under way.

"That way he doesn't have to take our word for it, about how his mom is doing," said Cranberry resident Bill McComb, Landis's brother-in-law.

"He can see for himself."

For about a year, Landis suffered with a terrible cough and began losing weight rapidly in February, she said.

A doctor told her she had pneumonia, a symptom of what she would later learn was lung cancer.

"I didn't even know I had pneumonia," Landis said.

Landis chose to break the news to her two sons following Ethan Landis's basic training graduation party.

"It was like a brick hit me in the face," Ethan Landis said of hearing his mother's diagnosis. "I didn't hear anything after that. I just blacked out."

Bosancic immediately chose to leave his position at the Shriners Hospital for Children in Philadelphia, where he has been living for the past two years, Pletz said.

"When he was told about his mom, that was it, he was coming home," Pletz said.

For Ethan Landis, the desire to return home is obvious, but the choice isn't his to make.

Even if he is granted extended leave, Ethan Landis can't come home. He recently received vaccinations for smallpox and will remain in quarantine for the disease for about two months, McComb said.

Now that Ethan Landis is finished with basic training, he will continue air assault training at Fort Campbell, jumping out of a moving helicopter. He can call home via his cell phone, and he calls as often as possible, Landis said.

"Too many times," she said.

But the calls aren't enough for the young soldier.

"On the phone he doesn't believe me," Landis said of her assurances to her son that she is doing well that day.

Having a laptop computer would enable him to contact his family from anywhere he is stationed, including the Middle East, his mother said.

By the same token, she will be able to chat with her son whether she is moving around the house on a good day or lying down on a bad day, Pletz said.

Landis could even take the computer with her if she is again admitted to the hospital.

The ability to see her son often would also help keep Landis' spirits high.

"He says he's doing OK, but it's really good to be able to see your son's face," Pletz said.

She appealed directly to Apple, Gateway and other computer manufacturers to donate laptops and Webcams for the Landises to communicate, but had no luck.

"This is not something we have a year to do," Pletz said.

McComb and his wife, Elizabeth, Landis' sister, placed collection jugs around the community, including inside King's Restaurant, Gordon's Mini Mart and the Freedom Road Sunoco in Cranberry and at Good Old Uncle Bob's restaurant in Mars.

Elizabeth McComb said her trunk is full of empty jugs she hasn't distributed yet.

Family members also opened an account at West View Savings Bank on Route 19 in Cranberry, and have collected about $300 so far, she said.

The least expensive laptops seen so far cost about $400 each, not including the cameras, Elizabeth McComb said.

Though the cost is high, having laptops to communicate would be "awesome," Ethan Landis said.

"I wouldn't talk to anybody else on it. She's a great lady for raising two kids on her own," he said.

In addition to the laptops and cameras, Landis's family would also like to buy her a wig to mask the effects of her chemotherapy and a hospital bed with an air mattress so she doesn't have to sleep in a reclining chair, the only piece of furniture that provides her some rest, Pletz said.

Donations could also cover Landis's mounting medical bills.

Insurance only covers one hour of her prescribed five-hour chemotherapy sessions, and a few of her 10 prescribed medications cost around $150 per month. A 10-minute Positron Emission Tomography scan, which produced a three-dimensional image of Landis's body, ran about $8,000.

Landis balked slightly at the lofty goals set by her family members, but they are optimistic at least some can be reached.

"You shoot for the stars and see what you get, and you go from there," Elizabeth McComb said.

Though Landis's illness has been difficult for everyone, they agree the circumstances have brought their family closer together.

Elizabeth McComb said she and her sister had grown apart a little, but reconnected just before Landis was diagnosed "and we automatically picked up right where we left off," she said.

"We've always been a close family and close families have their ups and downs," Pletz said.

"But any time anyone has needed anything, they're there."

HOW TO HELP

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• WHAT: Frances Landis Cancer Fund

• WHERE: West View Savings Bank, Route 19, Cranberry Township

• INFO: The fund will finance laptop computers and Webcams so Landis can see and talk to her son, Ethan, an Army engineer stationed at Fort Campbell, Ky.