Gotcha!

One year ago today, I walked in to a small yellow room with 3 cribs and 5 babies. In the crib directly in front of me laid my sweet sleeping daughter. Her little face was facing away from me, at first glance, I could only see the shiny black hair I stroked when she was 3 weeks old. I will never forget that moment. I will never forget the raw emotions, and overwhelming joy, what it felt like to hold her again after 8 months, the answered pray that she knew me when I picked her up and she looked at me, smiled and then nuzzled her face in my shoulder. I will never forget the tears rolling down my face and her special Mother as we were reunited, the softness of her hair on my cheek, the tininess of her hands and feet. I will never forget the smile on her Daddy's face when he held her that first time in 8 months, the desperateness of our reliance on God, and the relationship we grew in Christ. I will never "never forget what God has done, for it is marvelous in our eye's". It has been the sweetest year despite all we have been through.

It was not the day I planned or hoped for. Our morning started off slow, and quickly abrupted into busyness. I had planned to dress Bella in a special outfit, meet Daddy for lunch in celebration of this day, read books, play at the park and lay in the sun beam in my family room on the floor with Bella in my arms praising God as I did so many day's while praying and believing her home. Instead, I found my self in the car dealership for an apt. I forgot about, running around town for Electrical plugs, showing the handyman around my home for all the "little things" that needed repair, driving the boys here and there for all their events, finalizing details for a listing sold and dealing with a crying and emotional baby girl on steroids. One year ago the day was magical and utterly joyful, a year later...I was still blessed and much is to be praised, for Bella is home. Yet I find myself at the end of the day disappointed that I was not able to enjoy this special day more in the physical realm, but I know that I know that my spirit is rejoicing with God and all His angels in what was accomplished one year ago today and what has been manifested since.

I am so tempted to pick that sweet little girl up and rock her back and forth and sing...
"I'll love you forever, I'll like you for always, as long as I'm living, my baby you'll be".

This is from the book "I'll love you forever", I read this to all my babies and made a tune to go with the words and I sing it to this day to all of them.

On Sunday we will celebrate our Forever Family Day. This is the day one year ago that Dave and I brought Bella home to her brothers, grand parents, cousins, all extended family and friends. I have a video from that glorious moment that I have never posted and plan to do on Sunday. We are still trying to figure out how we want to celebrate that day as we also have a "First Communion" to celebrate with my niece. I am confident God will show us the perfect way to glorify Him and celebrate in the victory and promise that He did.

One year ago today.....I am still crying and standing in His glory. How great is our God!

Can you Guess?

For all those following my blog since last year....can you guess what tomorrow is? Yes....tomorrow is clinic day for Bella, she has a physical, bone marrow aspiration (spinal tap) chemo, and we have our consultation regarding maintenance, but there is something even more important to celebrate tomorrow, leave me a post and tell me what you think it is?

I was hoping to upload a few pics of Bella with her boys and new toys, but my son downloaded them and now we cant find them. So tomorrow I will post pics. :)

Blessings,

Finally the Park and Maintenance!

Yes...it's true, we received official word on Monday that Bella will begin 1 1/2 years of Chemo maintenance on Monday the 27th! I find it interesting that Monday is also the one year anniversary of the day we left to pick Bella up for good. We will begin the day with a physical for Bella, discussion on what maintenance will entail and then she will have another spinal tap and chemo. Maintenance will still involve chemo, but not as often. By mid June, we will go from twice a week apt's to once a month with a few blood counts in between. According to our nurse, our life will start to resume a little more normalcy. Dave and I are just so thrilled to have the toughest part behind us, Bella is so herself again, strong, happy, laughing and walking. It's good to be "normal" again.

Today, I was finally able to take Bella to the park. She has not had any chemo for 2 weeks now, so I took advantage of her normal blood counts and we spent some time climbing and swinging. I just feel so incredibly blessed and hugged by God to have had this last year with Bella. I am not sure what our life would have been like with out Leukemia her first year home, but I do know that God gave me back all the time I lost with her when she was in Guatemala.

Today is our 1 year anniversary of receiving our PINK from US Embassy....will post more later today.

Transfusion ..... Maintenance?

Bella with "her boys" and cousin Collin Easter Morning.

We had a nice weekend with family over Easter. Bella really has been doing well other than a cold and low Hemoglobin. I knew over Easter Weekend that she would most likely need blood on Monday morning and I was right. She was looking pale, and although she is a very good baby, she was exceptionally calm. Her hemoglobin was the lowest its been since December, 6.6. So hour 1 hour apt turned into an all day affair at the hospital on Monday.

The big news is.....her team of doctors are discussing starting MAINTENANCE!!!!! Could a more normal life and schedule be around the corner? We are so excited. Irregardless, the worst of the the chemo is over. We are also discussing with doctors on removing her broviach and replacing it with a port so that she can be active in the water this summer. About 6 more weeks till "The Cottage" opening....we are counting down the days.

We are also talking about our "Forever Family Day" and what we want to do for that. For us, that day is May 3rd, that is the day we walked off the airplane and placed Bella in to the arms of her brothers, Grandparents, Aunts, Uncles and Cousins. I think that pretty much sums up "family day".

As always, I love that you check in.

Blessings!

P.R.A.Y.

Pray....we hear this all the time, "pray for me, pray for others, pray, pray, pray. In the last couple of years, I have really come to understand what prayer is, but never have I heard it put so simply until recently.

How simple....it's not the ritual prayers we speak, its not church every Sunday, but ever day relationship with our Creator and Father.

P raise
R epent
A sk
Y ield

Exactly how Jesus instructed us to pray through what we now know as the "Lord's Prayer".
I loved this simple explanation of how to pray, and I can't help but think how many more of us would spend time in prayer if we simply took a few minutes to praise, repent, ask and yield. I know the world would be better for it.

Birthdays and update

Bella and her new Easter Basket....I think it's one size too big.

Susie and Jake

My Jacob celebrated his 12th birthday yesterday and I celebrated my 41st today. I don't feel 41 and my baby still feels like my baby even though he is twelve. God did promise that "my youth was renewed every day", so that's my story and I am sticking to it.

Bella continues to do well, she has a little cold and kindly passed it on to the rest of us. Last week she had an unexpected transfusion on Wednesday...the day after I had the stomach flu. It was a long day at the hospital, but today, her blood counts were great other than her ANC (absolute nutrifil count) which is to be expected from the chemo. So its a low key Spring Break for us as she is highly susceptible to catching germs. We do our part, God does the rest...its all good.

I placed a descent order last week from the "pretty lady" line at Gymboree and it came today. I am not a big Gymboree girl, Baby Luly is my favorite, but the Lady Bug line was all to perfect and PINK. It all came today and it was a wonderful birthday present. Cant wait to spend a morning trying the outfits on her. She was walking around the house this afternoon carrying them all around in her arms...that's my girl.

I hope to post tomorrow on something I heard about PRAYER this past weekend, it brought it all in to perspective for me and made praying so simple and perfect.

Hugs!!!

Sweet Child O Mine!

Oh ya.....these our boys! Are they awesome or what?!!! I am so incredibly proud of Nate and Jake as well as their other band members Luke and Brian. They performed for their school last Thursday for the middle school and rocked them out. Nate is the guitarist (black hat with purplish shirt on) and Jake is the drummer. The boys actually performed the same song twice as the first performance was for "You Tube". The second performance was because the kids were screaming for more and the teachers approved. Nate and I worked on a mix of both those videos. They had way too much fun that day and so did I. I am one proud Mama.

Crafty Fun and more

2 Weeks....that's all we have left for "Delayed Intensification" and were back to round 2 (60 days) of "Interim Maintenance" and then on too "Maintenance"! Wow, cant even believe that its been almost 6 months since diagnosis. We are constantly being asked with very sullen faces "how are you? How is it going"? I know people are truly concerned and care and honestly, they probably cant even imagine being in the same position as we are, but are answer is always...GREAT! Were really doing great, sure, Bella has had some dark days, not all the treatments are easy, but we have not had any admittance in to the hospital since last December and that is rare. We are living in the constant glory of God's living Word and promises and this little girl is HEALED! Around the middle of June, Bella will start about 16 months of "Maintenance" treatments which means we should only be at the clinic once a month rather than twice a week. :) We will also be changing her "broviach" to a port which is under the skin so that she can be in water. This will create just a slight poke for her when receiving treatments or having blood draws, but it far out weights the benefits of enjoying cottage life with her cousins. Can you imagine trying to keep an almost 2 year old out of the sand and beach all summer when its 10 feet from your back door? Not me, and I have no interest in doing it. Bella's mood is great when she has the 4 days off of the intervenious chemo I admit in to her port, but on the "on day's" she is rather moody and nauitious and struggles to keep anything in. She has had absolutly no effects from the oral chemo she is currently taking. Thursday she starts back up on the intervenious chemo for 4 days.

We did a few crafts with Bella this past week, playdough and stamping. I have not seen my stamps or stamp pads in about 7 years now, so it was wonderful to get out that old investment and watch Bella and the boys have fun with them. Bella absolutely loves playdough....I think she enjoys carrying the containers around just as much as she enjoys the playdough.

Spring Break starts Friday this week, we will be home as we cant travel at this time with Bella's treatment. Believing God for great Michigan weather! My Sammy had his spider dance at school today and the other two boys have the "Variety Show" at school on Thursday. Nate plays electric guitar and my Jake drums. Get this, they are playing "Sweet Child of Mine" by Guns n Roses! They have a small band but no singer, I have volunteered my great vocals, but it was a resounding No! Bummer, I just no I can screetch with the best of them. I will be posting both videos this week, I am so proud of my boys.

Love to all,

Run dont walk in to the Adventure

Oh Bug...

It turns out Bella did have the stomach flu as I have been spending quality time with our bathroom today. Fortunately, Bella is doing much better, just really wore out and no appetite. For 2 weeks I nursed 4 children and a husband, now they are nursing me. My sweet husband stayed home this morning to care for Bella and called my good friend Sue to get the boys from school. Stomach bug and all, I am still blessed. :) Tomorrow is Bella's all day drip chemo. It was postponed last week as her counts were too low. Back to getting some rest.

Scractching our Heads

Bella has been "under the weather" the last few days. Were not sure if its the stomach flu or a "toxicity" reaction from the chemo. It's hard to say as her symptoms are the same for both. We have not been able to keep anything in her system, it just comes right back out one end or the other. Fortunately, her spirits are good, she looks good, just a little extra tired and snugly. As I type, I hear her screaming at her brothers because she is trying to come up the stairs to me and they wont let her. So as you can read, she still has her spunk. :)

a Little Laugh

Turn up the volume...this will make you smile. :) Yes, its Bella you hear.

Irish Eyes are Smiling....

3 Leprechauns and 1 Wild Irish Rose

I just love these chubby little fingers, and she sure loves McDonald's Nuggets.

Yup, were Irish! Well at least the boys and I, Dave and Bella are adopted into the Irish Heritage. It was the most beautiful St. Patrick's Day I ever remember, 72 degrees, sunny and blue skies! Bella and I had a McDonald's picnic on the front porch, we all went on a bike ride and we ended the day with green "Guatemalan Corn Cake". Last year I spent an entire day cooking Irish food and nobody liked it, green cake is much easier.

Tomorrow starts round 2 of "Dealyed Intensification", not only does Bella get a spinal tap, but an all day chemo drip...it will be a long day and I am going prepared with things for both of us to do. Also, to clarify things and not confuse any one, "Delayed Intensification lasts 4 weeks", it is the last round of the intense chemo, but we still have 1 year and 8 months of treatment after this. I think I may have confused some of you when I said only 3 more treatments left. However, its my understanding that come the middle of June, our life can resume more "normalcy" as the hard part will be behind us. Yet again, we just give Praise to God for being faithful to His Word, Bella has done remarkably well, quit honestly, after the first two months, the worst part has been the steroids.

I am trying to figure out how to shorten some of my video clips so that I can post them. I have a really cute one yesterday of Bella laughing so hard at her brothers jumping on the tramp. Stinking cute!

Our Bald Beauty!

First and foremost, YES, I am ok! Yet I admit, it was a little hard on me this morning when I got her out of bed.

Bella continued to loose hair after her hair cut, I was constantly having to change her sheets and the hair was still getting in her food and eyes. So Saturday evening, Dave and I both decided it was time for it all to go. Believe it or not, I used a personal hair clipper to remove it, that's how little their was. The majority of her remaining hair outlined her face and it just made her look sickly and she's NOT! A funny little side note on these photos, Bella loves to look at the digital camera after we take photos. When we ask her "who is this" pointing to her, she always say's "Baba" (Bella), today we asked her and she looked at it for a second and then said "Baby". She didn't even know it was herself.

We had a beautiful weekend, clear blue sunny skies and high 50's low sixties....I do believe Spring has sprung.

Dana, It was a complete privilege to talk with you again today. Your wisdom and words encourage me and strengthen my spirit. You are truly a gift to all who know you.

Thanks everyone for checking in, Bella only has 3 more intense chemo treatments left, praising God for his continued blessings in His Word.

Rock A Bye Baby....

Our sweet baby girl. This has been a little bit rougher week with chemo and steroids, but overall, she has done amazingly well, were home and NOT in the hospital and I am not expecting to go back! That's my confession and I am sticking to it.

Bella was not feeling well today and just wanted to be rocked, this is tonight after an hour long cry in my arms in the rocking chair. I would not have traded this moment for anything in the world, in fact, she fell asleep with in 10 minutes after rocking her to sleep and I continued to rock her for an hour. As I looked down at her sweet little face and bald head, all I could see was my baby. The same baby I held at 3 weeks of age. I knew her hair loss would be difficult, and the first day it started to fall, it was, but now, I find joy in seeing my baby again, of touching her perfectly smooth little head and I rejoice in the fact that this time I will be given the privilege of watching all that beautiful shiny black hair grow in the months to come. I missed that her first 8 months. I knew with all my heart that God would replace the time lost, I just had no idea that it would be so perfectly wonderful. Isn't that crazy? Who would ever have thought that chemo side effects would have joy. Yet He promised there was joy in all things...I love looking for those moments every day.