Cancer Sucks – Page 4

Angelica’s Month 20 Update….

I’m downstairs hiding in my bedroom. Well, I guess that it can’t really be considered hiding because more than half of my family knows where I am but for this ONE MOMENT….no one is hanging off of me or asking me to do anything and aside from the muffled bangs and stomps of little feet up on the main floor….it’s fairly quiet.

It’s also freezing cold down here but that’s another story. I’m ever so grateful for that cold in the summer. And seeing as I’d LOVE for it snow and for us to actually have a WINTER…I really shouldn’t complain if my basement bedroom is a little on the chilly side. I think I just need to put on my parka and make myself a pair of fingerless gloves…..sounds good – I’ll get right on it….in all my spare time. HA HA HA!

Things in the Culley house are going well. I have almost ZERO personal time, BUT…..

Things feel peaceful. We are slowly finding our rhythm and after this last chaotic season of life that we’ve been through…..finding that rhythm again is bliss.

I thought that I’d post a quick update about how Angelica’s doing….

Geli is holding steady. I’d say that compared to a normal teenager, physically she is capable of about 40-50% activity wise, strength wise, stamina wise… She is still finding it difficult to walk and is still hobbling around like an old woman a fair amount of the time, but for the most part her spirits are good. She recently attempted to ride her bike and while she made it from our house to the high school, “the hill” up to the stores proved to be too much for her. I’m just thrilled that she’s interested in trying to do “normal” things. We were told that she would start to stabilize and normalize after about 6 months on Maintenance and well….I hope that we are seeing things start to get better and moving towards a more normal life.

Her hair is growing in and it’s so curly….

….we keep dying it blond. I think she looks adorable with it….she sometimes gets frustrated with the curls, but I think it’s just because sometimes they stick out at the ends and she’s never learned how to “do” curly hair because….well…..she’s never had to…or never had the opportunity to…..regardless…she looks so cute and it’s so nice to see her with hair.

She did have a rough moment last week. Jon and I were getting ready for bed one night and Geli came down stairs to talk to us. She was crying and couldn’t sleep. Sleep is one thing that is SO IMPORTANT! And when it’s elusive…..it makes life that much more difficult. She is taking daily chemo and basically her body is fighting to repair and heal itself non-stop. All her energy is going into healing and so she doesn’t have a lot of extra energy for much of anything else…. Sleep is one time when it requires no energy to heal nd without sleep…she is so depleted, both physically and mentally. Anyway, She came downstairs and she was sobbing and sobbing; and I held her and asked what was bothering her…was she sick, was she in pain….what was the problem. She just kept repeating, “I HATE Cancer! I HATE Cancer! I HATE Cancer!” It’s so heart breaking to watch your child in so much emotional pain. Finally, she explained that she’s lost a year of her life….and she hates that. A whole year….gone! She didn’t get to be a 13 year old with all the fun 13 yr old things. She’s going getting better and is able to breathe a little and is starting to realize what she’s lost. She is going to school now and hears the girls talk about the things they’ve done or the places they’ve been or even the insignificant things….and she missed out and she will never get that back.

We listened to her and let her share. We validated her feelings because…well….she did lose out on a year (more like 18 months) and no…she will never get that back….but….then we reminded her that……..SHE DID GET LIFE. She exchanged one year of her life and in return….she got to live. It’s a pretty high price, but the stakes are pretty high, no? The whole “Healing” thing is such a process. She needs to heal. She needs to grieve. She needs to process. She needs to live and all of it happens at the same time…..it’s a lot to deal with.

Eventually we got her settled and back in bed with some melatonin….and she drifted off. She is starting to feel better and along with that “healing” you end up with reality hitting you hard. When you are right in the middle of the battle….you can only see directly in front of you and it’s not until you can take a step back and breathe that you realize the things that you’ve lost or missed out on….or the things that you still cannot do. In a way, it’s a good thing, because it means that you are able to start processing things….and then with the limited emotional resources that you have…you must fight and fight some more.

This whole journey feels like such a fight….if you know a family going through an extended illness or a terminal illness or some other long term physical or mental journey…..please be gentle with them. It takes everything that they have to remain upright. And often there is little to no energy for anything else…..it’s tiring and lonely! Please take the time to encourage ones that you know and to let them know that you love them and that you are standing with them and that you haven’t forgotten about them. I guarantee you that it will mean the WORLD to them.

Angelica heads in to BC Children’s Hospital on Monday for another dose of Chemo along with a dose into her spinal fluid. It requires that she be sedated so please keep her in your prayers. She also starts the monthly round of steroids and those really wreak havoc on her sleep. So pray that she’s able to get rest. She just feels so wrecked while she’s on the steroids. Also, they are sending her for an MRI for her knees to make sure that all the pain in her knees is not from bone death……it can happen to kids on the steroids….and we really don’t want that to be the case.

Thanks again for all your prayers for Angelica and our family. It means so much to us.

“I just don’t know” with a side order of “panic”!

I don’t even know if it’s possible for me to get my thoughts and feelings out here in a calm, collected manner.

I’m pretty sure there is some sort of PTSD going on with me.

I went into a complete tailspin last night around 11:30pm when Judah woke up with a fever.

I’m not saying that it’s a good thing. In fact, I’m pretty sure that this whole situation is pretty much anything other than a good thing. Unfortunately, it is what it is and I can’t make it go away.

Oh how I wish!

Jon’s working a 9-5 job right now and it out of the house for 10 hours a day….with commute time. This past year we have been so SO blessed by so many people and still….the expenses of the last year have been such that we are behind….by a lot! and we cannot afford to have him not work. So where does that leave me…

How do I manage the kids at home if Geli needs to go to the hospital? If Judah was sick, how to I stay with him and take Angelica to the hospital. Her care is complex. There are decisions to be made and we want to be involved in her care because there are been too many times where things may have gone so differently were we not there to be watching. She is one child out of many that need care in the hospital and we believe that we have been given the job to care for and manage our daughter and her health. We need to counsel of the medical experts and together we come to the best decision for our child regardless of whether its the “popular” one or not. This plan has worked well for us in the care of all of our children and I’m not at a place where I feel that we can jus drop her off at the hospital and leave her there. She is only 14 years old….hospitals can be disconcerting for even adults, let alone a child who has been through as much as she has over the past year and a half. On the other hand, Judah is still a nursing baby. I can’t just leave him for a couple of days. And…I can’t be two places at once….

My biggest problem comes in not knowing how I would handle everything, if she had to go into the hospital.

Even if she just has a cold with a fever, and it’s just a virus that will run its course and they can’t give her any medication for it….she still has to go in for a 3-4 day stay.

I don’t know how I would handle it if that happened or what I would do.

There is a part of me that believed that because Jon got this job which has been such a blessing fro our family that somehow that meant that we wouldn’t end up in the hospital any more for the rest of her treatment. I can’t count on that. I don’t know that for sure. It’s foolish of me to just bury my head in the sand and hope for something. I need to at least think through what I would need to do and right now….I can’t figure it out.

And so when Judah woke up with a fever and the weight of this all hit me……I panicked.

I still don’t know how I might handle that situation, if it does present itself.

In some ways, I just wish that we could live in a bubble and just wait this out. And yet, I know how entirely foolish that is….and so we must carry on.

We have about 10 more months of this treatment.

I’ve got to figure something out…..

I’m Dreaming of…..

So I’m sitting in front of my happy light crying…..how ironic is that?

I do believe that I’m about due for that whole monthly thing within the next week (I apologize if that’s TMI for ya) but even knowing that doesn’t really make me feel that much better.

I don’t feel Christmas-y AT ALL! I’ve been going through the motions, trying to convince myself that “I’m SO EXCITED that its Christmas time” because….well….because I typically LOVE Christmas and maybe, just maybe I can convince myself into being happy and excited about Christmas instead of just wishing it were over already!

This is a tough year. We are still in the trenches of our fight against cancer, but the intensity of the situation has lifted just enough that we can look around a little and breathe. In some ways, that feels just as bad as when we were in the thick of it all and all we could really concentrate on was just getting through the day. At least then, we didn’t really have the time or energy to see what we “were” or “were not” doing. We were just trying to do our best and to “exist” through a very tough time. Not that I have a lot of time or energy right now, but I do have a little bit more than I did back then…..YAH for small victories….sorta!

I was listening to the radio as I drove the kids to school this morning and a story came on about a little boy who was diagnosed with Leukemia when he was 4. He’s now five and the the radio station was raising money to help make this an amazing Christmas for him and his family. They mentioned the part where he’s been in treatment for the past year and that he has another 2 years of treatment to go…..My first throught was…..That’s horrible! That’s such a long time. My second thought was…..Oh Yah! That’s where we are at!

We don’t have to go through two more years of treatment, but we do have to go through another year of treatment and it’s tough. I cried for that little boy’s family. I know what they are feeling. I know how tough it’s been for them. I cried for our family. It’s been a tough year and a half.

And so I cry. I try to pull myself together. I turn my Happy Light on and dream of sunshine and warm beaches…..

And then I’ve got to go and work on this……

Mount Laundry

Because it won’t fold itself, eh?

This and That and The Other Thing

I’m not sure why but the baby has started to take a nap on the couch. What I mean is that if I nurse him, he will fall asleep and then if I put him on the couch….he will stay asleep. If I put him into his crib….not so much. This makes no sense to me but if I can have a few minutes without someone whining and clinging to my pants legs…..then I’m just going to go with it.

~*~

I’m EXHAUSTED. I’ve been on the go since November the 13th because I’ve had one thing or another planned. First I was trying to get ready for the Craft Fair, and then I needed to get ready for a Christmas Party/Cookie Swap and I also was feeling quite a bit of stress about doing the whole Hospital/Chemo thing by myself….

Today is more or less a down day except I have to pile ALL the kids into the car and take Geli and Jeremy to see our Family Dr. later this afternoon. It always feels stressful when I have to take all of the kids somewhere especially when there is a fairly good opportunity to act out or misbehave.

~*~

I’m trying to figure out what we are going to do about Christmas this year. With Jon being laid off from work and the lag in getting his next paycheck, things are tight. I’m trying to figure out what I can make – as in homemade gifts – but there is always this guilt that the kids are going to be disappointed. I know that in the grand scheme of things that life and love and togetherness are the most important, but as parents we want to give our children special things, right? I have been talking with the kids about “giving” as opposed to receiving and I do know that things will work out okay. I just seem to do really well when I have a plan; when I know exactly what I’m going to do or what to expect….I’m still trying to figure things out and to be able to do it without feeling frazzled or stressed.

~*~

I’m really trying to eliminate stressors from my life. I want to be able to enjoy life and to not be stressing about too many things on my plate or about all the things that I could or should be doing. It’s not so easy to find the balance and yet I’m really working on it. I’m trying to live within my capabilities and to be able to really enjoy “living” life and not just existing. I’m trying to be present for my family and with my kids. This is also not as easy as it sounds like it could be and yet…I believe it’s doable. I’m also trying to embrace the season that I’m in.

I’m a mom. I have two little boys. I remember how much work it was when I had three little ones (Geli, Xani and Jeremy) because I’m right back in the thick of those early days. Siah is 4 and Judah is 1 and it’s not an easy phase. What I have going for me is that I know that it won’t last forever and that I want to really enjoy this time with them. It’s tough. It’s exhausting. It’s messy. There is a lot of whining and diaper changing and wiping runny noses and cleaning and tidying and doing the same things (like rescuing a child from on top of the table, building block towers, or reading the same 2 books) over and over and over again. There is little sleep and even less “me” time, and yet, when I look at these little boys….at all of my kids, I’m so thrilled that they are mine and I’m awed with the responsibility of raising them. I believe in them and will try my best to raise them to be amazing men and women. It’s a lot of work, but they are worth every bit of time and energy.

~*~

We had our day at the hospital yesterday and for whatever reason, the Oncology clinic was PACKED with kids and parents. At one point every seat was taken, inside and outside of the clinic and there were a TON of parents and kids standing. This meant that the 1 hour appt took 4 hours. Which SUCKS SO BAD! And, the whole deal with Angelica and the itching that she’s been experiencing…..nothing. They don’t believe that it has anything to do with the chemo or anything Oncology related and so we are just to Monitor it. That’s not so cool as far as I’m concerned. I don’t know what to do exactly and I’m just hoping that things will get better and not worse. I’m hoping that Geli will “test the waters” so to speak, tonight and we will see whether or not things are improving, holding steady or getting worse.

Aside from the itching, Angelica is doing okay. She is on the mend, but it taking longer than is normal or expected…..Normal is really not a good term for it….because really, what is normal?

~*~

I’d love it if you’d check out my shop. There are some great products, in there.

Simple Choices

I think the favorite products right now are tied between:

– the Lotion Bar – EVERYONE who has tried it has RAVED about it.
– the Calm Room Spray – it can be sprayed in kids bedrooms to help settle them down
– the Breathe Cream – to help with congestion, due to coughs and colds
– the Refresh Cream – to help with headaches, digestive issues, sore muscles and for a general “pick-me-up”

And everyone seems to LOVE the lip balms….the peppermint seems to be the winner right now.

~*~

I’m hoping to be able to make a gluten-free Gingerbread house with the kids in the next few weeks. We’ve been talking about making small ones. I hope it works out. You can get the MOST AMAZING gingerbread recipe over at Gluten-Free Girl’s website. I made a batch which makes around 72 cookies and my kids have DEVOURED them. I have less than 2 dozen left….they are just that good.

~*~

Do you have a favorite Christmas Cookie?

I love Whipped Shortbread, and those Gingerbread Cookies up above.

And, the baby just woke up and so I’m done for now…..

Big Day

Today we are headed into BC Children’s Hospital for Angelica’s monthly Chemo appointment.

This is both newsworthy and old news all at the same time.

Angelica will be receiving only one drug injection today. This is her “easy” month. She cycles in 3 month sets. The first two months, she receives an Lumbar Puncture with Chemo into her spinal fluid as well as another drug injected into her blood stream and a oral steroid. On the third month she gets the one drug injected into her blood stream and the steroid, but not the Lumbar Puncture or spinal injected chemo.

All of this is old news to her, and she knows exactly what to expect from today’s appointment.

On the other hand, I have no clue what I am doing.

Jon has done the gross majority of the chemo visits while I stayed home with the babies. Because Jon is working, I am the one who must take Geli in. My sister will be watching my boys and it should be a 3 hour trip – travel time included – from when we leave the house until we get home…..barring any problems or issues.

Angelica has been doing well. She is slowly getting stronger and stronger.

Physically, she has not gotten better as fast as she could, mostly because she has not put the extra effort in that it will require to strengthen her weakened and atrophied muscles.

There has been one weird side effect that we have been struggling with recently and that it intense skin itching…..to the point of pain. After she takes a shower or bath, her arms and legs start to itch and because we don’t know why it’s happening we don’t know how to prevent it. We are going to be talking with the Dr. today about this and hopefully they have some idea….

It’s emotionally brutal because she does not want to bathe or shower and obviously that is not an option…she knows that it’s going to itch to the point of pain and then when it starts to itch, she falls apart. It’s tough because we have no idea why this is happening or how to fix it.

I have read a little bit and and we have been trying a few things and it’s possible that they might be helping. We have noticed some improvement, but we will hopefully know more later.

Pray for us today….I’m feeling nervous. I’m sure that everything will be okay, but right now…..yah, I’m nervous.

Community

I had the opportunity this morning to speak with an amazing group of ladies at a church here in Langley.

This church has supported us in so many incredible ways and I was so thankful for the opportunity to “give back” and to share some of our story and some of my story.

I had 15 minutes to share on community and our walk through life with others.

I used 3 key points that I shared from.

– Shame and Fear will trap us and keep us isolated and feeling alone.
– Vulnerability and Authenticity are the keys to building relationship and community
– Knowing your True Worth is the key to allowing yourself to be vulnerable in front of others.

I shared on how in the past, my insecurities (read that as Shame and Fear) kept me from wanting to be in relationship with other people. About 7 years ago, We went to this amazing church out in Abbotsford that challenged that belief that I had about myself. They challenged me to see myself the way that God sees me, to see that I am worth being accepted and loved and supported and encouraged. Slowly I started to believe that I was worth more than I was believing about myself. I wanted to live in relationship and community with people and to not be isolated.

In my own personal journey, I had taken many steps forward away from Shame and Fear and Isolation and then, last June, Angelica was diagnosed with Cancer. My world shrunk down and for a year I was in basically a forced isolation within my house. I realized that I didn’t like the isolation. Somewhere along my journey, I had gotten some emotional healing and grown to the point that I liked being in community and it took a forced isolation to really cement it home in my life that I WANT TO LIVE IN COMMUNITY AND RELATIONSHIP and not in isolation.

During the past year, I realized that I could not handle the pressure and stress of what we were going through alone and after fighting against shame and fear…..I reached outside of myself. I was vulnerable and I asked for help.

The response was incredible and overwhelming.

We received enough help that I felt like I could finally breathe again. It was overwhelming and quite literally a life saver.

Without starting to grasp a hold of the concept that I was worth being accepted and love and supported….if I hadn’t started to realize that I was worthy of all of those things….I would have never been able to ask for help. I would have never been able to open up and say that I was less than perfect. I would never have been able to admit that couldn’t handle it all on my own. But in being vulnerable and open about myself and our situation…..I received even more than I had asked for.

In our society today, we are so busy and there are so many opportunities to hide behind our insecurities and fears and as a result, be, or at the very least “feel” alone. I also believe that we as people are craving opportunities to connect and to live within community.

Being open, transparent, vulnerable allows others into our lives and in turn, we are then a part of their lives…..building community, building relationships. I’ve found that being open encourages others to also be open which sets the stage for deeper and more meaningful relationships. Vulnerability is not always easy, but it is SO WORTH IT!

You are worth being loved.
You are worth being accepted.
You are worth being supported.
You are worth being encouraged.
You have so much value and worth.

It was amazing to actually meet this group of ladies, to see them face to face and to be able to thank them for all their support and love.

I’m not sure, but I think I was within my 15 minute time frame……I hope! The Music Team sang a fabulous song when I was finished talking and the whole morning just came together so well.

I am SO thankful to be apart of this community. The Community of Walnut Grove, the Alex Hope elementary School and North Langley Community Church…..has supported and blessed us so much and cannot thank you enough.

I’m so grateful to be apart of this amazing community!

Wrap Up – FINALLY!

I’m finally getting to the last day of our Wish Trip and while I think that no one really cares about our flight home, there were enough things that I want to make note of and remember that even though it was over a month ago, I’m going to go ahead and wrap it all up.

We had to have our luggage out in the hallway on the Friday night by 10pm or else we had to carry it with us and let me tell you, luggage for 7 people….you don’t really want to be carrying that around especially when you have two adults, one weak teenager, one mostly helpful teenager, a curious child with ADHD, a useless but fun loving 4 year old and a 30lb baby! It’s enough work just to get ourselves from point A to point B without thinking about and wrestling luggage as well.

The weather was bad the whole night and the boat shifted and pitched and rocked. While it was the coolest feeling, I was also awake to feel it and the awake part of that equation…not so cool!

On Saturday morning, we had to be down in the restaurant for breakfast by 6:45am. We made it there by 6:50am and so that’s a win in my books!

We were TIRED! See the CRANKY baby! Cranky babies are fun to travel with, NOT!

Jeremy was pretty sad that the cruise was over and he whined and moped his way through breakfast.

After breakfast, we were scheduled to disembark at 8am and so we lined up and eventually got off the boat. We went through the cruise security, picked up our luggage and got onto the bus to head back to the airport. We got to the Airport around 10:30ish, needed to re-pack a few things and then attempted to check in for our flight.

Unfortunately, we were not allowed to check in until 4 hours prior to our flight and so we needed to waste some time. Yup, our flight wasn’t leaving until later that afternoon and WHEE!!!!!! we were hanging out in the Orlando Airport OH THE JOY!

It had been such a good trip and at the same time we were so ready to go home.

We walked around a bit, we hunted down some gluten free food, we looked through the stores, we walked some more….and finally the time was close enough that we could head down to our gate.

I had really been hoping that Judah would stay awake until we got on the plane and then sleep the whole first plane trip but it didn’t work out that way.

Siah was done by about this point and fortunately, the people that were all around us had also been on the cruise, with children, and completely understood Siah’s limp frog routine on the floor….fortunately it was a fairly quiet performance and so we just left him to have at it.

We waited until everyone else had boarded before we got on…I figured it would help (everyone) if we weren’t on the plane for an extra half an hour.

Judah woke up about half an hour after the plane took off but Siah had HAD it and he slept HARD for most of the flight from Orlando to Denver.

We had a two hour layover in Denver and seeing as Jon used to work in the Denver Airport, we went to a little taco stand that he knew of….the food was very yummy and between eating and looking for souvenirs, the time flew by fairly quickly. Pretty soon we were waiting at our gate for the flight to Vancouver…

The flight was just a short flight and there was no movie planned but when the flight attendants heard that Angelica had been on a Wish Trip, they wanted to make this flight home special for her. They showed her the movie listing and got her to choose a movie as the in-flight movie. That was pretty fun. Towards the end of the flight one of the attendants came up and asked if Geli and the kids would like to see the cockpit after the flight landed. Jeremy and Geli were really excited about that and so when we landed and everyone else had left the plane, the pilot brought Jeremy and Angelica into the cockpit…

It was a pretty neat experience…

And a great way to end the trip.

Jon’s parents met us at the airport and drove us and all our luggage home.

We got home, dumped everything inside the front door, threw pajamas on everyone and jumped into bed, so thankful to be sleeping in our own beds.

It was an amazing trip and we were so thankful to have been blessed by the Children’s Wish Foundation. This is and was truly the experience of a life time.

Magnets And Gas

So there I was…..doing pretty good. I posted every day for a while and then…BAM! Life kinda took over!

But, It’s all okay NOW!

Last Sunday we had some people over for lunch and one person brought their super cool magnetic necklace, block, toy thingy. This thing is so cool.

It was getting passed around and looked at and played with and somehow 5 of the little tiny magnetic balls got lost. I managed to find 1 of them which left 4……I’m pretty good at Math, aren’t I?

I wasn’t too worried because I had swept every square inch of my floor and I didn’t figure that Judah had been around when it was getting passed around and so there was no way that he had gotten into or near any of these tiny – BUT STRONG – magnets.

Everyone left and I said that I’d keep a look out for the other 4 magnetic balls and carried on my way.

Monday was just a normal day and Tuesday looked like it was shaping up to be more of the same…..until the afternoon. I went to change Judah’s diaper and when I did……something looked oddly shiny and most definitely out of place. Yup, It was one of those magnetic balls.

I was a bit shocked and super upset because if there was one…what’s to say there wasn’t more than one and how would I know that two magnets hadn’t stuck together inside of his intestines and were going to cause some major problems….if you know me at all, I went straight to the “worse case scenario”. It was pretty sad. I couldn’t fathom a million hour ER visit and so we called our family Dr to see if they could possibly fit us in. They couldn’t so then we called the walk in clinic and seeing as he was happy and had no fever and didn’t seem to be in any discomfort, they said to bring him in first thing in the morning and they’d check him out and send us for an X-ray. Of course they gave us the whole “fever, blood, blah, blah, blah speech – do not pass go, do not collect $200, go directly to the ER” spiel.

Long story short, on Wednesday morning, we hit the clinic at 8am….hit the X-ray facility at 9:am and were back at home at 10:30am waiting to either hear or not to hear…in this case, no news was good news.

As soon as I got home, Siah met me in the garage complaining about a sick tummy. This was weird because he was fine when I left. Over the next hour, he got progressively worse to the point where he was sitting on the floor crying in pain. When asked where it hurt, he kept pointing at the lower right side of his abdomen…..heck, between cancer, ADHD, ODD, No Gluten, No Dairy, No Soy and now possibly a Magnetic Gut…..heck, lets just throw some appendicitis in there as well.

Jon took him up to the clinic and fortunately the wait time was only about half an hour. After about 15 minutes, Siah burped about 4 times, and then “miraculously” his tummy ache went away.

And just to be safe, Jon did stay to see the Dr. The appointment went a little something like this…

Dr: Nice to see you guys again. This little guy didn’t swallow any magnets, did he?

Jon: No, and he burped about 15 minutes ago and then everything stopped hurting…..so sorry for wasting your time. My son has gas.

Dr: Well, it’s always good to get it checked out anyway.

but you all know he was thinking…..”stupid parents, bringing their kids in because of a little gas.”

And then basically, my week just kind of blew up after that.

In all seriousness, I feel a bit traumatized about the whole hospital thing. When we found the magnet in Judah’s diaper, all I could think of was which hospital should we go to? And what about Jon’s new job and how would I handle caring for the kids by myself and would it be better to go to Children’s or to be closer to home….and what might they have to do to Judah if there were magnets stuck inside of him…..and how would we deal with the whole Gluten Free thing and well, it was not fun….

The whole hospital thing with Geli has not played nice with my emotions and I hate being confronted with how “unstable” I feel over the possibility of a hospital visit. Not Cool, cancer. NOT COOL!

The rest of the week didn’t have any medical craziness in it, but we did pull apart Jeremy’s room, the girls closet, the garage, the boys room, the TV room, ALL (as in every single toy that we own) the toys, and our storage closet. It was quite the undertaking and yet…..we did it!

This is the boy’s room that is right beside ours, down stairs in the basement. We currently have all three of the boys sleeping in this room. Fun times, there! (oh, the wall border and color….original to the house. not my choice, just haven’t changed it yet, but I did want to mention that I do NOT like the decor…carry on, please)

We made two dump runs and put away 15 separate bins of toys. No, they are not all HUGE boxes of toys, but all the toys we own are separated out into their own groupings…..Hot Wheels, Mr Potato Head, Playmobile, Little People, Infant Toys, Wooden Blocks, Tinker Toys….you get my drift.

We’ve put the majority of them away and I think that will cut down on the mess in the rooms. That’s the idea any way. We’ll see how well it plays out over the next couple of months.

Here is Jeremy’s upstairs room…

(I have NO Idea why it’s so stinking small. I thought I used the same camera on my phone, but obviously not…sorry about the mini view…just squint and then it should be all good! and again with the house’s previous occupants decor….lovely, ain’t it?)

The carpet is a bit thrashed but it’s the original carpeting from 15+ years ago and it just needs to get replaced, so other than a quick vacuum….I’m not even trying to clean that sucker.

Probably an even bigger miracle than just cleaning things out…was that we also managed to finish off each day of cleaning with a totally clean house.

Do you ever start to clean something and then find that the job is too big and you end up with a mess at the end of things that you pulled out, but have no current home and so you end up with a big a mess just in a different location in your house. Yah, it was my goal to not have that happen. YAY US!

Part of my push to get this done was because Jon starts his new job tomorrow morning and it was my hope that if we cleared things out and got rid of a bunch of junk that it would make it easier to keep things clean. Again, I’m really hoping that’s the case. Only time will tell, right?!?

What are your tricks for keeping a clean house? Do you have any tips to share?

Day 7 – Castaway Cay

We woke up on Friday morning and rushed outside to our balcony because we knew that we should be close to Castaway Cay.

We were close. Once we docked, there was still some time before we were allowed to get off the ship. I snapped a few more pictures as we got a little bit closer…it looked SO INCREDIBLE and we were so excited. We went and had breakast and then got our stuff together and got ready to hit the beach. WHEEEEE!!!!

We docked over on the far right in the picture and went to the second beach over on the left in the picture. There is a little tram that takes you to the different locations on the island.

We found some chairs and umbrellas and dumped all our stuff off and the kids headed out to play in the sand and the water.

The weather was INCREDIBLE and I was a bit worried about us getting fried to a crisp. Angelica demonstrates perfect sunscreen application and technique in this next photo..

The kids were so happy and excited to actually be here. We’d been talking and dreaming about Castaway Cay for a long time and the day had finally arrived.

And they did amazing at wearing their shirts when I started to get worried about too much sun….

I really do have amazing kids. It was highlighted to me on this trip, just how great these kids of mine are. See, I’ve spent so much of this past year inside of my house and I’ve not been able to see the kids interacting with others. It’s been a very isolated year. I see them bickering with each other and not listening to me and fussing or whining or disobeying and because we are together SO MUCH, I’m sure that they get as sick of each other and me as I do of them….I’m not saying that I don’t love my kids, because I love them fiercely and desperately, but sometimes we all need to be able to have “breathing” time and that time has been sadly lacking from our family over this past year and a bit…..

I’ve seen their faults highlighted by our small insular world and to see how polite they were on the ship and to see how well they handled themselves in interesting and challenging situations…..to see them help others and give to others and be caring and compassionate and gentle and loving and respectful….it was so nice to see all of their positive attributes highlighted like that. It was even more special to have the table beside ours comment to us about our children and how they recognized how much work we must put into them to have them be such well behaved and respectful children. And they sat beside us for the entire week so it wasn’t just one good day….hee hee!

Judah got a bit cranky and so I put him to sleep….and then Jon transferred him to a beach chair to sleep for a while. If I try to put him down, 9 times out of 10 he will wake up. If Jon takes him and then puts him down, he will stay sleeping……I have no idea why this is? Any ideas? – it drives me nuts!

Jeremy was once again is HEAVEN collecting shells and he even found a whole bunch of live crab thingy’s in their shells…they were just teeny, tiny, but J was SO excited. He and a few of the kids that we played with at the other beaches spent a HUGE portion of time building a sand castle for these little sea creatures.

It was the most amazing day and there was even a bit of cloud cover so we weren’t scorching hot. Doens’t that picture look UNBELIEVABLE!

The Baby woke up…..and wanted to play in the sand almost immediately..

We were right beside a Lifeguard station and he crawled over to the tower and right under the chair there was a huge coconut that he wanted to play with…

We started to get a bit warm and so we all went back down to the water to splash around a little…

The lagoon was so shallow and Siah was so excited to be able to swim “all on his own”. I swear that kid is part fish the way that he LOVES the water.

Speaking of fish…..can you see this fish? There were these “almost translucent” fish swimming around and the kids had a ton of fun trying to “catch” one. It was so funny to watch.

This was such an incredible adventure for our family and such a HUGE blessing for Angelica. This felt like the beginning of a new part in our lives and the end of a terrible time.

We are not finished this journey that we are on, but Geli has continued to get stronger and stronger and we are so confident that she will overcome EVERY negative aspect of these past 17 months.

When we did get back to the ship we had to hurry because we had been invited to a very “special” event that was happening for the Wish Kids and their families. There were 2 other Wish kids and Families other than ours that were on the ship.

We had a private meet and greet with Captain Mickey and Angelica was given a special Captain Mickey doll!

This was a day that we will remember for a long time. It was an incredible way to finish up an unbelievable trip.

We are so thankful to Children’s Wish for turning this trip from a dream into a reality for Angelica and our whole family.

If you are interested in seeing the rest of the photos from Castaway Cay, please click here!

There were some pretty cool things that happened on our trip home and so I do have ONE more post about our day of travel home, so check back for the trip round up.

Thanks for all your support and love and prayers for us, over this past year and while we were on the trip. You really do mean so much to us and we are so thankful!

Orlando and Day 1 of the Disney Cruise

We woke up on Saturday morning and sometime in the night we had played musical beds…

Well, actually just Geli and Jon switched rooms because apparently Jeremy was breathing heavy and it was bothering Angelica.

As it was the beginning of one of her chemo cycles, she was on the steroid Prednisone for 5 days and it makes sleeping difficult…so little annoyances become HUGE annoyances. Anyway, she crawled into bed with me and Judah; and Jon went and slept in the other room with Jer.

We got everyone up and repacked all our stuff because we had to have it ready for pick up at 8:30am as that is when it was being picked up to be sent to the boat. We grabbed a quick breakfast and then headed out to where the shuttle would take us to the ship.

It was about an hour’s bus ride from the airport to Port Canaveral and when we got there we got in touch with my cousin who lives in Florida. She lives about 2-3 hours away from Port Canaveral but Charlene and Jeff and all 4 of their kids had piled into their van early that morning and drove up to see us. We snapped a quick picture while we were waiting to connect with them…

It was SO HOT! So much hotter and WAY MORE HUMID than we were used to, but it was WONDERFUL at the same time. We were LOVING the heat and the sun. This next picture has nothing really to do with the story, but my little dude is just so cute so I had to throw it in….

Charlene picked us up and we drove to the closest Mcdonalds as we figured that would be the easiest and most comfortable place for all “9” of our kids to hang out and burn off some energy while we (the adults) got a chance to connect and chat.

Cousins

It was SO AWESOME to be able to connect and hang out and see them and chat and…..well, I could just go on and on. It was such a HUGE bonus to this already wonderful trip and I am so grateful and thankful that we got the opportunity and that Charlene and Jeff went so out of their way. You guys are amazing!

We managed to get a few pictures of both Char and I and of all 8 million of our children…

We even got some nice stranger to take one with the Jon and Jeff included….

I so wish that we lived closer to each other. It would be so fun to be able to get together more often. Jeff and Charlene are amazing people and their kids are such cool little people!

They took us back to the Port because the kids were starting to freak out about “getting on the boat” and so very reluctantly we said good bye.

It took a while to get signed in and registered and our pictures taken and all of the other stuff required to get us on the boat and the kids were thankful for the couches and movies playing all over the Disney Terminal.

Finally, FINALLY…it was time. All the papers were signed and the kids were registered and we could go onto the boat….You walk through that Mickey and into the walkway that takes you right into the boat.

And with that, our Cruise…..Angelica’s Wish Trip officially started. It was SO exciting. We went up to the Promenade to be apart of the big Kick off Party….

There was music and dancing and shiny metallic streamers to shake and…….. well, it was pretty emotional to just be there.

Right in the middle of all of all the excitement and partying, Judah just couldn’t take it any more and he just fell straight asleep. My sweet boy, he’d done so well with all the travel and the different planes and bus ride and hotel and he just couldn’t take it one moment longer.

To say that we were excited is such an understatement. It was AMAZING to just be there. We sat up on the deck while the party carried on and watched the boat push off from the dock. It was a bit surreal to realize that we were finally here after months of thinking and dreaming.

It had been a pretty exhausting 2 days of travel and so we just sat for a moment and relaxed….

Then it was time to go and get dressed for dinner. They require you to dress up a little for dinners and I loved it….it made the dinners just a little bit extra special to have to get dressed nice and then the kids were on their best behavior because it felt extra special…We were seated at table 28 and it was RIGHT BY THE WINDOW. Just after we sat down to eat, we were treated to an AMAZING sun set..

That first day is a bit of a blur because we were so tired, but we basically walked around the ship a bit after dinner and then we headed back to our rooms and finally with much effort (because they were a little buzzed on the excitement of it all) got the kids into bed. The next day we were going to be getting off the boat at Key West and we couldn’t wait to go and see what Key West was like….

If you’re interested in seeing the rest of the pictures from that day, click here!

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