Steps for Brady

My Baby is 3!

2011-11-05T21:48:00.027-04:00

Tomorrow is Allison's official birthday. Today we officially celebrated!

The theme of her party was owls. It was so much fun for me to plan. It seemed that everywhere I went, I saw owls!

Here was her party invite. I purchased a pdf from etsy.com I think I paid $11.95 for the designer to personalize the card and then email me the pdf. I then saved it, took it to Target, and printed the invites out as a regular picture size for 32 cents I think.

My mom and I were shopping at Walmart the other day, and I saw this silly bat pinata on clearance for $5.00. As soon as I saw it I knew I could transform this little bat into a beautiful owl! My mom has the before picture on her phone...all I have is the after picture. The kids and I named her Ollie the owl!
She was WAY too cute to let the kids whack with a bat. So instead, she was our centerpiece in the kitchen. I used a woven basket as her "nest", turned my stock pot upside down inside the basket, covered that with a brown fleece blanket, and then added a few sticks we had collected earlier in the week. Cara was happy to lend Ollie one of her bright pink hair pretties to wear! I think she may have to find a permanent home in the girls' room!

Here are a few more owl touches that were around the house!

These were just some foam owls that I bought in a pack from JoAnn Fabric for under $4.

I also used the foam owls to make a garland. I had several great pictures of Allie wearing her owl hat on a recent trip to a pumpkin patch with her preschool.

Unfortunately, most of my pictures don't have our friends and family in them! I'm always so busy during the party, that I take many of my pictures before it even starts! My awesomely talented photographer-sister-in-law will share some great pictures with me soon! I'll have to update with more "people shots" later.

I found these cute foam owl hats at Michael's.
One of my favorite details was the adorable owl pitcher that I found at Christmas Tree Shop (love that place) for only $1.00! I filled it with gummy worms. They were a HUGE hit with the kids. I am definitely going to keep this cute little piece out somewhere in the house.

If you haven't tried pinterest yet, what are you waiting for?!? I love gathering ideas. Gathering recipes. Gathering quotes. Pinterest is a place to store all of the wonderful tidbits of creativity that you find online. I saw someone use branches as a centerpiece on pinterest, and that is where I got the idea for these. The tiny owl ornaments that I found at JoAnns were the perfect touch!

Allie gave owl notepads to the girls and green owl bags to the boys.
Here is the birthday girl!
Certainly the CUTEST detail at the party was the awesome cake made by Jen Kirkum of Kirkum Cakes.

Brace yourself for some serious adorable-ness!

I just set it right on the cake stand my mom gave Allie to use on all of her special occasions in life, and added some branches around the bottom!
This is what it looked like with a few up lights and when we lit the candles.
After we lit the candles, big-brother-Eli helped Allie blow them out. Allie yelled, "Eli, you are not supposed to blow the candles out!" So, we lit them again, and she got to do it all by herself!
For those of you who have known our family a while, you know that Allie's arrival into our family was a pretty big surprise! The triplets were only just over 9 months old when I found out I was pregnant with her. 9 months later I found myself with 4 kids under 2! Then just two and a half months after that, Brady was diagnosed with cancer. That first year of her life was really consumed by Brady's surgeries and treatment. In so many ways that makes me sad. Many of the wonderful memories I should have of her first months are clouded by all that occurred as we fought for Brady's life. However, I believe that God knew just what we needed during that dark time. We all needed a beautiful new baby to remind us that life goes on, happiness can always be found, and that we could still have some joy in the midst of darkness.

We love you Allison Elizabeth! It's okay that you are turning 3...but how about you hold off on getting any older for a long, long time:)

September Fun

2011-09-16T23:15:00.001-04:00

The big kids are in preschool each morning from 8:30 until 11. This means that I get lots of one on one time with my baby, I mean almost 3 year old, Allie.

I absolutely love it.

I love just being able to get things done and have her alongside me. I love just having one small person making demands, messes, and noises rather than 4 for at least part of my day.

Things like just sitting in the kitchen, her eating an apple and me catching up on work, make me so happy.

She can be a handful in the group, but one on one she is delightful and affectionate. I get many kisses, lots of hugs, and we can talk to each other uninterrupted.

Eli, Cara, and Brady have only been in UPK for a week and a half, but I have already seen so many changes in them. They spend a lot of time singing their songs from school, telling me how cool it is when I say “s” words as it is their letter of the week, and then there have been little surprises like this…

Eli couldn’t wait to show me this! I told him how impressed I was that he could tell me the names of these letters. He responded, “No mommy. I wrote this for you. It says Mommy Loves Eli.”

Wow. He’s a genius. A very, very sweet genius.

This afternoon the kids and I went to Brown’s Berry Patch with some other local moms. It was a gorgeous day and I really wanted to get some great pictures of the kids. Mission accomplished!

Apple picking

On our way there, I told the kids that we would be picking apples and there would be a playground. A few minutes later, Eli said from the back seat, “Okay Mom. I have a plan. You can pick the apples and we will play on the playground.”

Pictures like this will forever be etched in my memory.

This next one made me laugh. Triplets +1

Lemonade Succes

2011-09-12T23:32:00.002-04:00

Oh gosh. I haven't updated about the lemonade stand!

Well, we had great success again.

Not because of anything we did, but because of the wonderful support of our friends, family, and community.

With all of that support, we raised $1,065 during our two day event. All of that money has been sent to the Alex's Lemonade Stand Foundation in honor of our survivor Brady Andrew Williams.

It was a strange weekend, weather wise. It was muggy and sunny, then cloudy and breezy, then it was rainy, quite rainy and cold.

Despite all the changes in weather conditions, we stuck it out and sold out of all of our baked goods and sold lemonade as best we could!

Our 3 year total in donations is now over $5,000. I'm just thrilled about that.

Thank you to each and every person who donated, volunteered, baked, and purchased something. I got to share our story several times and proudly displayed our family's testimony on a sign for all to see. To God be the glory:)

School Days

2011-09-08T22:24:00.002-04:00

When I was pregnant with the triplets, I had this recurring dream.

In my dream I was looking out the front door of our home on a rainy September day.

I was looking out the door and just down the brick walk were my three kids walking away from the house toward the school bus.

In my dream they were standing side by side, with backpacks on, holding hands on their way to school.

I didn’t get it then. I didn’t get how it would feel once I actually knew those three kids. I didn’t know how my heart would break in such a happy/sad way as I let them go away from the safety of our home and my arms.

Flash forward 4 and 1/2 years later. My triplets didn’t ride the bus to school this week, but they did leave their mommy to start UPK 5 mornings a week in the big school!

That same dream crossed my mind so many times when Brady was sick. I can’t tell you how fearful I was that I would never see that dream come true.

But it did, even though it looked a little different than I thought. And with the joy I felt on Wednesday came a sense of guilt and sadness that so many mommies have lost their precious babies before they can kiss them off to school. I know that is depressing. However I can’t be honest with you if I don’t tell you that every milestone we encounter is now a mix of happy/sad/guilt/joy. It just is.

I love these guys so much! They are so different, so uniquely perfect. I can’t wait to see what they accomplish and what adventures come their way!

And how awesome is God for giving me one more sweet child to hold on to…just for a little longer

Calling All Volunteers!

2011-08-15T22:06:00.001-04:00

Thank you to all who donated funds to purchase supplies for our stand! This event would not be possible without the generosity of those who give beforehand. Your donation will be multiplied many times over as we take our small budget and use it to generate a BIG donation to the Alex's Lemonade Stand Foundation! All proceeds from our 2 day lemonade stand and bake sale will go directly to the foundation!

The next goal is to have volunteers lined up to help with baking and for the two day event. Please see times below and let me know if you are interested!

Baking Day Volunteers: Saturday September 3rd 4pm until ? at the Oakfield United Methodist Church

I would love to have a team of 8 people to help bake.

1. Chris S.

2. Mom

3. Kristina C.

4. Sara B.

Stand Volunteers: Oakfield Town Park during the Community Days Celebration

Sunday September 4th

2:00-4:00 1.______________ 2.______________

4:00-6:00 1. ___________ 2.________________

6:00-8:00 1. __________ 2._________________

Monday September 5th

10:00-12:00 1._____________2.______________ 3.______________

12:00-2:00 1.____________2.____________ 3.__________________

2:00-4:00 1.__________ 2.______________

4:00-6:00 1.____________ 2.______________

6:00-8:00 1.__________2.___________

Thank you!

KIDS GET CANCER! YOU CAN HELP!

2011-08-07T21:02:00.001-04:00

Announcing Our 3rd Annual

Alex’s Lemonade Stand!

What: 3rd Annual Alex's Lemonade Stand and Bake Sale to benefit the Alex's Lemonade Stand Foundation. 100% of money raised will go to this foundation aimed at finding cures for pediatric cancers.

Where: Oakfield Community Days Celebration at the Town Park on Drake Street in Oakfield (formerly Labor Daze)

When: Sunday September 4 and Monday September 5

Why: In 2009 our family was introduced to the world of pediatric cancer when our son Brady was diagnosed with Neuroblastoma. Once you experience pediatric cancer firsthand, you are forever changed. We have committed ourselves to help raise money to find cures for children with cancer. There are many cancer organizations out there. Sadly, some of the biggest of these do not fund pediatric cancer research efforts in an equitable way when compared to adult cancers. We have chosen to support Alex's Lemonade Stand (among others) because they are a reputable organization with a 4 out of 4 star rating through Charity Navigator. This means that they minimize overhead and administrative costs and that the most money possible goes to fight pediatric cancer.

How can YOU help?

There are 3 ways to help:

1.Be a Stand Volunteer: We need stand volunteers willing to work a 2 hour shift(s) on Sunday September 4 and Monday September 5. I will post volunteer shifts soon! The job is easy...make lemonade, serve lemonade, swat away bees, and sell baked goods!

2. Be a Baking Volunteer: I need a team of people who enjoy baking to donate 4 hours of their time to help bake the products we will sell. We will be selling lemon cookies, lemon poppy seed muffins, and lemon bars. We will be baking at the Oakfield United Methodist Church and our baking day will most likely be Friday September 2 in the evening. Last year my team was AMAZING and I try very hard to have everything organized so that the process is efficient.

3. Be a Stand Sponsor: 100% of money earned doing the 2 day event will go to the foundation. Therefore, there is a need for $300 to be raised ahead of time to fund supplies. If you or your business/organization are willing to donate for this purpose, your contribution will be used to buy supplies (lemonade, cups, ice, packaging,paper products, ingredients for baked goods, fees).

In our first two years (2009 & 2010) we have raised a total of $4,181. It is our goal to exceed the $5,000 mark this year!

If you are willing to help in any of the above ways, please let me know. (FB message or email mwilliams91@rochester.rr.com)

At this point I am just trying to gather names of wonderful people who are willing to help. There will be details to follow!

Thank you SO very much-

Meg

Seabreeze

2011-07-30T23:04:00.001-04:00

It has been quite a while since I have stopped by. My friend recommended that I put a message on the blog that says, “Gone Fishing. See you in the Fall!”

As you may have guessed, my blog hiatus was due to the busyness of life and more specifically, summer!

The kids finished T ball and then started soccer. We have had play dates, VBS, and most recently a week with my sister and her family from Minnesota. It is always the best week of our summer, and this year did not disappoint!

I have many, many pictures to share and will have to do so a little at a time! Our first adventure was our annual trip to Seabreeze amusement park in Rochester. The 15 of us have such a great time there. I have written about my love for this place before, but I’ll say it again! Seabreeze is a wonderful place to go for families with any age children! This is something for everyone there and it is small enough to easily do everything in a day!

Here are a few pictures from our day starring my kids, my nieces Aubrey and Natalie, and my nephews Evan and Ryan.

I LOVE this picture of Brady and Ryan! Evan and Ryan take SUCH good care of their younger cousins. Brady was holding on for dear life and Ryan was holding him so tightly!

And how sweet is Allie blowing kisses at us! She was such a good girl. Did I mention we were there from 10:30am to 10pm?

My four goofballs. I’m so proud!

We actually did the waterpark first. We packed lunches and were able to eat right in the waterpark at a few picnic tables in the shade. It was awesome and another big reason why I love Seabreeze more than Darien Lake.

How funny are my boys kind of chasing each other down the waterslide!

What a great day! The kids were awesome for all 12+ hours of fun. There was a ton more fun planned for the week. More to come!

The Best is Ours

2011-06-19T20:58:00.004-04:00

Eli, Cara, Brady, and Allie have the best daddy in the world.

There is no one better to take them by the hand and lead them through life.

Happy Father's Day Matt. We all love you so much.

Minnesota

2011-06-15T14:39:00.001-04:00

Already the middle of June! Since I’ve last stopped in to blog (can’t believe it has been a few weeks!) we had our 3rd annual yard sale. It is an enormous amount of work, but very worth it in the end! We were blessed with one great day of sunshine for the sale and the second day was an exciting mix of rain, thunder, and lightning! It feels so good to earn some money and get rid of things!

Then just 5 days after the sale, Cara and I headed out to Minnesota for a long weekend with my sister and her family. They have a new home on a lake and we got to see everything for the first time. I am so glad that I decided to take one of the kids with me (and thanks to my sister and her hubby for Cara’s plane ticket!) I rarely get quality one on one time with any of the kids, other than doctor’s appointments. Cara did a great job traveling and enjoyed every minute of being doted on by my nephews!

Despite the fact that we packed a lot of fun into the 5 days we were there, I had a lot of mental down time. I wasn’t constantly attending to the needs of small people, preparing meals, cleaning up meals, doing laundry, or disciplining! It was a very nice change of pace.

Here are a few pictures from our trip:

Cara and my sister Melissa (Auntie Lissa)

My nephews Evan and Ryan with Cara at Battle Lake. They fought over who got to hold her hand, sit by her, and buckle her in her car seat!

Uncle Jerry farms 1,500 acres in Western Minnesota and has some pretty cool machinery. Cara and I became acquainted with our first John Deere combine.

Tell me this picture isn’t hilarious?!?! If you know me at all, you know that I’m not known for being an “outdoor girl!”

Uncle Jerry took Cara and Ryan for a 45 minute ride out to the farm in the combine! I hear that Cara colored in her princess coloring book for most of the ride.

My sister has a beautiful home that sits on the highest point around Ten Mile Lake. To get to the water, you have to walk down 50 steps to their dock. I think I may have been lamenting about the walk back up the steps in this picture!

We had lots of fun fishing for bass and sunnies from the boat. We didn’t actually catch any because we weren’t the best at staying quiet. Cara, Auntie Lissa, and I did not care much for the leeches that were used as bait…ugh.

Ryan and Uncle Jerry did catch a few fish early one morning and had to bring Cara outside to show them off.

I have so many special memories from our trip. I am hoping to maybe bring the boys in the next year or so and hopefully our whole family someday! Although we joked that Uncle Jerry will need to buy a party boat if we all come

Heavy

2011-05-28T21:50:00.001-04:00

What an emotional week.

Lot of ups. Lots of downs.

Just a heavy, emotional week.

Cara’s first dance recital was Thursday and Friday nights.That meant 2 nights of dress rehearsals and 2 nights of performances. She did great each and every time. She tapped, she sang, and she let that big Cara personality shine! Of course the highlight for her was getting to wear makeup!

The best part was that Cara got to share the whole experience with cousin Aubrey.

We have our final MOPS (Mothers of Preschoolers) meeting this week. This is always a special time when we invite a speaker to share their personal testimony of faith with our ladies. It was a blessing to pray for a dear friend who shared this year. She did an amazing job and I know that hearts were changed! On the same day in the morning MOPS group, I shared my testimony. Even though I have done so quite a few times now, the process for preparing to share so personally is emotional. I had the opportunity to talk with several moms after the meeting who could identify with parts of my story. Many of them are suffering in areas of their life and were blessed by the hope I was able to share through my story.

A dear friend of mine is going through something unimaginably difficult in her life. She has been on my heart so heavily all week. It has been an honor to pray for her and to ask those in our church family to do the same.

We also had our final meeting with Brady’s physical therapist, Linda, this week. Brady has been seeing Linda for over 2 years now. During our first appointments with her in the spring of 2009, Brady was barely able to stand! Back then we were traveling twice a week to see her, about 50 minutes each way. She was able to establish such a great rapport with our reluctant boy back then. They were quick friends and Brady has looked forward to his “Linda” visits ever since. In the past year we have only been going to PT once a month, kind of like a maintenance visit. Brady has been achieving and exceeding goals almost every visit in this past year. Linda and I both knew that by the end of this school year he would no longer qualify for services. I shared a while back that Brady did indeed show that he was an “average joe” when Linda completed his annual review testing. It is a bittersweet accomplishment as we knew he no longer would need PT, but that we would have to say goodbye to our dear Linda. She made the trip from Rochester to see Brady at preschool on Thursday. I think I cried three or four times leading up to that morning! She is such a treasure and we are forever grateful for all that she has done for us!!!

Today Brady and I went to the Michael Napoleone Memorial Foundation’s Baseball Tournament. We have been blessed to participate for the past three years in the awareness ceremony at this event. To read more about this amazing local charity, click here. I was able to briefly share about our story and how this charity helped us financially and personally during Brady’s illness. Brady stood next to me the whole time enjoying his very first ring pop! Another special friend of ours, named Griffin, also shared his story as a cancer survivor! He is an amazing 4th grade boy who so eloquently and bravely spoke about how cancer affected his life. I couldn’t help but think ahead a few years and wonder if Brady will ever want to stand before a crowd like Griffin and advocate on behalf of pediatric cancer. It was just amazing.

That wasn’t all! As we were leaving a man approached me and told me and told me that he would be praying for Brady. He had tears in his eyes as he told me that his nephew also had Neuroblastoma. I asked this next question even though the pain in his eyes told me the answer, “How is your nephew doing?” He continued to tell me that his nephew had passed away after seeking treatment in Buffalo and in California. He told me that he understood what an awful disease Neuroblastoma is and how happy it made him to see Brady doing well. He repeated again that he would be praying for Brady and I thanked him. I don’t even know if this man was local, but I will never forget his kind face, the sadness in his eyes, and his sweet promise to pray. I’m always amazed when I’m able to connect with another person so powerfully, in such a brief moment…all because of cancer.

It has been heavy. My heart rejoiced and broke a few dozen times this week. Life is amazing like that, isn’t it?

2 Corinthians 1:3-4

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,

the Father of compassion

and the God of all comfort,

who comforts us in all our troubles,

so that we can comfort those in any trouble

with the comfort we ourselves receive from God.

T Ball or Comedy Show

2011-05-18T20:33:00.002-04:00

Being that my kids are the youngest on their T Ball team, I guess we shouldn't have expected all-star-like play from them. They are really trying hard and certainly we have seen some improvement since week one. In all honesty though, it is about 10% baseball and 90% comedy.

Take for example tonight's game.

1.We waded through the muddy baseball park to the field in the way-way back. We dropped the kids off in the dug out and went to sit on the bleachers. It was about 5 minutes later when I realized I still had Cara's glove. She had no idea whatsoever that she was missing anything.

2. Eli stepped up to the plate tonight and spent the first few minutes admiring the bat, the T, and anything else in sight. He finally got ready to swing and hit the ball a solid 8 feet or so! He took off for first base and about 10 steps in, the weight of that big batting helmet won the gravitational battle between it and all 32 pounds of his body. He tripped and fell helmet first on the ground. It was so funny, it really was. He got right up, straightened out the helmet, and made it to first base.

3. Sweet Cara. She is a piece of work. She gets up to bat and when she swings you would swear the bat weighed 100 pounds. It usually takes about 5 or 6 tries before the batting coach will just swing with her to hit it. The greatest part of the whole thing is when Cara does funny things like tell the coach that he needs to fix her hair first, or like tonight when she stopped and used the end of the bat to draw a line in the dirt on which to stand. No matter what she does at the plate, she always trots to first and then turns to us with the most pleased look on her face. She waves, she smiles, and she thinks she is fabulous. And she is.

4. Brady boy is a quiet boy on the field. He seems to pay the most attention to what is going on, but like Eli and Cara, isn't quite ready to field the ball. When it is his turn to bat, he usually gives it a pretty good hit after a few tries. The very best part about watching him, is to see his big smile as he runs to first base. Well, it's great to see his smile and to laugh as his pants start to fall down as he runs!

5. Our kids our usually the last ones in off the field. The coaches prod them along and tell them to "hustle." Tonight we all cracked up as we saw Eli pulling a reluctant Cara off the field by her ponytail!

So even though it is much more of a comedy show than anything else for our family, I'm happy they are playing baseball. They are learning the game, getting some fresh air, and making us laugh twice a week. Life is good.

A Full House

2011-05-14T22:12:00.001-04:00

It was kind of a madhouse here tonight. We invited our good friends over and also had our nieces for the evening. My philosophy is always “the more the merrier” when it comes to our home, and it was very merry.

Here is our quaint little dinner party for 4 adults and 8 children, all 4 and under.

If you don’t see child #8, he’s there in the car seat on the floor next to his momma

The kids ran, created messes, and were loud enough to make good conversation tough. It was great. The adults sat, snuggled the baby, and enjoyed a pot of coffee. That was great too!

After our company left for the evening, it was time for the kids and their cousins to get in their pjs. Several episodes of Tom and Jerry followed.

How many preschoolers fit on our couch? About 6.

60 toes to be exact.

There were kisses.

And best of all, a lot of love.

Family and friends are the best.

The Best Part?

2011-05-11T20:55:00.000-04:00

In the eyes of a 4 year old…

perhaps the best part of T Ball is…

Victory

2011-05-01T23:07:00.003-04:00

Back in 2009, weeks after Brady’s diagnosis, I kind of claimed a Bible verse to represent our family’s struggle.

2 Corinthians 5:7

FoFF For we walk by faith, not by sight.

As a Christian I knew that only by trusting in the Lord would I survive the nightmare we found ourselves in without being destroyed by it. So that is what I did. That is what we did.

We were told by a specialist in December of 2008 that because of suspected Cerebral Palsy that Brady would “hopefully learn to walk.” As a mother whose heart was breaking, I needed the doctor to clarify his diagnosis with in a more tangible way. I asked him, “Will he be able to normal things, like play T ball?”

He kind of looked to the side and answered, “Brady will find lots of things he is able to do, T ball just won’t be one of them.”

For the next month we mourned and we clung to our faith as our sight had been shattered.

On January 21, 2009 we once again sat in front of the same doctor who told us that his diagnosis was wrong. Not cerebral palsy. Cancer. A form of cancer with a disgusting 55% chance of survival.

How else could we carry on, but through faith? One day at a time. One step at a time. One prayer at a time.

2 years and 4 months later, we claim a victory in Jesus’ name. Victory over the limits of a diagnosis. Victory over a tumor that sought to paralyze Brady. Victory over the limits of our sight.

In the quiet of our hearts we celebrated this victory on Saturday, as we celebrated Eli, Cara, and Brady’s T ball parade and first game.

We had faith that we would see this day, even when we were limited by our sight.

Enjoy the pictures my sister in law (Kristen Hamm Photography) and I took.

Brady and mommy.

Brothers getting ready to bat.

The hats pushed the boys ears down and made then look a little like Dopey

The parade, followed by a 45 minute warm-up, and 1 1/2 hour game made for a boy who got tired out. Shortly after this photo was taken, Eli completely melted down and was done with T ball for the day.

Run Brady!

Proud Grandpa.

Sweet Eli hit the ball for the first time, promptly went picked it up, and then handed it to the pitcher.

Brady is in the helmet. Notice the size difference between he and some of the “big kids” on the team.

I wanted to ask the coach to make the triplets’ numbers 1, 2, and 3. Matt thought it was corny and didn’t want me to make a big deal that they are triplets. How much do I love their coach for coming up with this idea all on his own?!? Even daddy thought it was precious!

This picture is just going to be a classic. Ha!

Airplane overhead!

Come what may, we celebrate this victory!

A Weekend of Blessings

2011-04-24T22:27:00.001-04:00

It has been a weekend to remember! We have crammed a birthday celebration, Easter worship, and Easter dinner into the past two days and it has been wonderful!

We started off our Saturday letting Eli, Cara, and Brady open their presents from us. Even though their birthday wasn’t until Sunday, we celebrated it on Saturday.

For the quite a while, Cara has been telling us that all she wants for her birthday is a Rapunzel doll. She was so precious when she opened her present and saw Rapunzel. She actually said, “Mommy, all of my dreams are coming true!”

The boys each got a small present and they were equally thrilled! Brady got a Batman car and Eli a pirate set. I love the way Eli sat back and analyzed the box after he opened it!

After presents it was time for the kids to get dressed. Then they spent some time playing in the basement with Grandma and Grandpa so that we could get things set up!

The kids each selected a picture for their birthday cake. I bet this is the first time the lady at the store ever made a Spiderman/Ariel/Batman cake. The funniest thing about the cake is that when I picked it up I didn’t notice that Brady’s name was spelled wrong. It wasn’t until I was in line with 5 people behind me that I realized it said “Brody.” I just had to laugh because I had no time to go back and at that point, I was taking my Brody cake and going home. I was able to drag the tail of the cursive “o” with a toothpick and make it into an “a.” Needless to say, “Happy Birthday Brody” has become our new family joke. Not like the kid had a tough week or anything?!?

Party time!

Our adorable friend Jessica!

After brunch, our special guest The Easter Bunny arrived!

We had our indoor Easter egg hunt and then everyone snuggled up with the Easter Bunny for a group picture!

Next it was time for presents! Our friends and family are so generous…coming to a birthday party for triplets means three times the presents!

Eli caught himself a butterfly!

Time for cake! Of course we sung Happy Birthday three separate times for our three 4 year olds!

I couldn’t help but think of those American Cancer Society Happy Birthday commercials as everyone sung to Brady. Yes, we are SO thankful for another birthday!

With the birthday party over, Matt and I began the process of re-cleaning the house and preparing for Easter! We decided to ask the Easter Bunny to just put the kids’ baskets next to their beds. This allowed us a few extra minutes to rest in bed while the kids excitedly emptied their baskets! I love that they are so happy to get things like new socks, notebooks to write in, and maybe a few pieces of candy!

Then the marathon was on! Time to get the 6 of us dressed and out the door to church! With 2 minutes to spare I asked the kids to sit on the steps for a few pictures.

I can hardly stand how cute the boys were in their new boat shoes! They were definitely a size too big, but oh my, the cuteness!

There were a lot of special things going on at church today too! They big kids celebrated their birthday during Sunday school. Eli, Cara, and Brady also got to ring the church bell in honor of their birthday!

I adore this picture of Cara!

Youth Group of the future!

Amidst a weekend of presents, cake, Easter outfits, and time with family, we were able to focus our joy on the glorious resurrection of Savior, Jesus Christ! We serve a living God and the best gift of all is the HOPE, GRACE, and LIFE that He gave to us by sending His son to die on the cross.

Happy Easter to you and yours!

Smooth Sailing

2011-04-19T21:20:00.004-04:00

Aside from Matt and I oversleeping by an hour, everything went wonderfully today! We had planned on leaving extra early anyway, so the late start didn't affect our day too much.

Upon arriving at Strong at 9am, we dropped off Brady's urine sample at the lab. Next it was on to the hospital gift shop where we did some Easter and birthday shopping! We decided to go and check in a little bit early at the MRI department.

As soon as we got to the waiting room, the nurse came out to get us. When we walked into the anesthesia care unit, the anesthesiologist was there waiting for us. The best part? He was flipping through Brady's chart one page at a time. Can you imagine? An anesthesiologist reading through the entire chart?!? He had me at hello.

After reviewing our conversation from the day before, he assured us that the plan was to use gas to put Brady to sleep for the first 5 minutes, insert the IV, and then use propofol throughout. He also said that to prevent nausea, he would give him Zofran (anti-nausea) before he woke up. Matt and I were beyond ecstatic that he "got it." We felt very confident leaving Brady in his care.

Brady did great throughout the morning, despite being unable to eat anything. He is such a great sport about things, he really is. I'm continually astounded at how God has protected the level of trust he has in Matt and I. It is clear to see that he always knows things will be okay if we are near. Matt accompanied him back to the MRI room and held him as he went to sleep. He certainly doesn't like this part as he is very fearful of the mask they hold over his face. Thankfully he is only upset for a few seconds before falling asleep.

I'm so thankful that Matt is willing to protect me from this part of the process. I have done it before and it really upset me. I would do it again of course if need be, but the fact that Matt does this for me makes me love him all the more. I can never forget the days of walking Brady back to surgery that night he was diagnosed, holding him down during hour-long nuclear scans, holding his head to a table while a tube was forced down his nose and throat, being barely able to stand as I watched him be extubated and come off of a ventilator, and seeing his tears stream as drainage tubes were pulled from his chest and back. To spare me from more of these moments is a tremendous act of love!

He ended up going in 30 minutes early at 10am. At 1pm they came and got us. It was wonderful to come into the room and see that he was still sleeping. What a difference from last time when we could hear him screaming from the hallway and walked in to find him raging and covered with vomit. He woke up very, very groggy, but not sick. It took him about 20 minutes to be lucid and able to sit up and talk. His first request was for a cookie. That's my boy.

We were able to leave within about 45 minutes and were home around 3. On the way home, Brady ate a few chicken nuggets, some french fries, and two more cookies. He was making up for lost time. He even acted silly a few times which just made Matt and I so happy.

He made it all the way to bedtime without sleeping or resting! He was his good old self and wanted to carry on with his usual crazy-boy stuff. Things were pretty quiet in he and Eli's room as soon as lights went out.

And...
At 9pm tonight we got the call that makes us jump for joy. The oncologist called to say that things look, "rock solid normal." I didn't even compose myself to ask any specific questions. I just said, "THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR CALLING!" We are going to have a follow up appointment on Thursday, so I can save all of nitty gritty stuff for then. For tonight, I have 4 healthy and happy kids all tucked in their beds.

Thank you Lord!

Scan Day

2011-04-18T18:49:00.002-04:00

Tomorrow is Brady's 6 month scan. I can't believe it is here already again, but alas, it is time! I have been working hard to coordinate with an anesthesiologist ahead of time. A week's worth of phone calls to secretaries, coordinators, nurses, nurse practitioners, and finally an anesthesiologist himself have been made. I feel confident with the anesthesiologist we are assigned to tomorrow will listen to our concerns. I spoke with him directly tonight and after listening to our past experiences, he saw no reason why we can't proceed with using gas just to get Brady "under" and then use propofol throughout. He seemed to feel the whole situation was quite simple and clear to understand. I agreed and am hopeful that tomorrow will go a whole let better than last time. Brady's scan time isn't until 10:30 with us arriving at 9:30. I'm sad that sweet Brady won't be able to eat anything all morning. He has always surprised us with how tolerant he is of everything and I'm praying that this time he will do the same. We are going to leave the house around 7:45 and get to Rochester earlier than we need do. I thought maybe we could spend some time checking out toys at Walmart. Perhaps this will be a better distraction than sitting at home watching the other kids eat breakfast! With the three to four scan time, I'm hoping to be home by 4! Please pray for our strength as we hand Brady over to the MRI team and for the many hours he will be under anesthesia. That part just never gets easy for me. I hate letting him go and being without him for those long hours. Matt and I will spend our time on one of our famous "hospital dates." As twisted as it sounds, it usually is some of the best uninterrupted time with have together all year!!! Pray for Brady's comfort before, during, and after his scans. And of course, pray for a great report! We would love nothing more than to celebrate the kids' birthday this weekend and celebrate great health for each one!!

Mama's Busy

2011-04-13T20:53:00.002-04:00

I want to preface this post by saying, I wouldn't trade being a busy "stay at home mom" for any other job. At this point in life I much prefer being serving my family, being busy by choice, and being my own boss! But my oh my, I've never been busier. It's the type of busy where you can only tackle what needs to be done for the next day between the hours of 10pm and midnight. Anyone who knows me knows that I'm a planner and like to do things much in advance. However, amidst the current demands of life, I count my day a success if I manage to accomplish just the "must dos" for that day before my head hits the pillow around 12:30am. The kids' activities are starting to fill up my calendar, which has been an adjustment for me! Right now I'm attempting to keep up with their activities without crossing off any of my own. We will see how long I can keep that up! The kids seem to be enjoying T-ball! I haven't been able to go to a practice yet, but Matt has. I laugh so hard when he tells me stories of their attempts at running bases, catching, and throwing. Let's just say we have one boy who is very intent on listening and learning the game, one boy who runs the bases in any order he feels like it, and one girl who considers T-ball practice more of a social event. I just can't wait to share video of their first game which is coming up April 30th. I really need to start planning Eli, Cara, and Brady's birthday party which is less than 2 weeks away! They are just so excited this year and with their birthday falling on Easter, that whole weekend is going to be one big blessing. I can't wait! Brady's scans are next Tuesday. I was able to connect with a Nurse Practitioner at Strong who handles pediatric anesthesia consultations. She didn't feel it was worth my time to bring Brady in for a consult. She did, however, listen to all of my concerns, agreed that we needed to address them, and is working to connect us with a specific anesthesiologist that she works with and trusts. The plan is for this doctor to call me the day before the scans to thoroughly discuss past experiences and expectations for that day. We are praying for an early scan time given that Brady will be NPO after midnight. The older he gets, the harder the process seems to be. With age comes awareness, and with awareness comes fear, unfortunately. Thank you for keeping Brady, Matt, and I in your prayers in the coming week.

Silly Things My Kids Do

2011-04-07T20:46:00.001-04:00

Cara is just slightly obsessed with the character Rapunzel from Disney’s Tangled. At a play date a few weeks ago she adored trying on another little girl’s long blonde wig. Since we don’t have a long blond wig at our place, Cara had to improvise using a tan blanket and her brothers’ pirate scarf to hold everything in place. This picture cracks me up as she looks more like she belongs in a Christmas pageant.

Allie and Grandma Sandy came up with a game where Allie gets wrapped up like a taco. It is a riot to hear her say, “I’m an Allie taco!”

Keeping with the Rapunzel theme, the boys started pretending to be Flynn Rider. It was funny because one day I noticed they were running around with this old purse my mom brought over for the girls to play with. They were fighting over it and I asked them, "Why are you guys fighting over Cara’s purse?!?” That is why Eli stopped, put his hand up and said, “No mom, it’s not a purse. It’s a satchel! And I’m Flynn Rider!” Okay then.

Their imaginations continued to astound me as Eli opened his satchel to show me that they had “stolen” one of Cara’s princess crowns…just like in the movie.

The girl roommates in our house are starting to get into some serious mischief when they are supposed to be sleeping. Even though I was none too happy to find that Cara had climbed into Allie’s crib, I do absolutely love this cute picture!

The boys can often be found running around engaged in foam sword fights. Matt and I had to buy swords just to protect ourselves when they want to have a big play fight. Once in a while I will come around the corner and see this…

I think the words that came out of his mouth were, “Join my pirate crew mom, or WALK THE PLANK!”

Two Years Ago and Today

2011-04-05T21:30:00.003-04:00

Two years ago I was feeling like this as we were preparing for this life-changing day. Can you believe it has been two years? Honestly it does kind of seem like forever ago. Maybe you were one who prayed for us that day. If I haven't done so in the last two years, may I please take this opportunity to thank you. Thank you for interceeding on Brady's behalf. Certainly the outcome of that day is proof-positive that God does answer prayer! There was no way for me to know two years ago where we would find ourselves today. Little did I know (but I DID hope) that I would be spending the day with Brady, but a healthy and whole Brady! This little guy has quite the busy calendar this next month or so. After his appointment with Dr. Sanders a few weeks ago, next up on the line up was a PT appointment and his 4 year old well-child visit which we also counted as his pre-anesthesia physical. I went in with a list of 6 issues to discuss with the doctor (just trying to get my money's worth!). Brady continues to have fluid in his ears. I have been trying Nasonex every morning with him, which basically turns into a daily headlock. He absolutely hates it and there is no other way to get him to do it than to just hold him and get it done. Of course in true Brady-style, he is fine within 2 seconds after it is done. Despite trying this though, the fluid is still there. The doctor explained that after 3 months, Brady could be a candidate for tubes in his ears. So, it looks like we will add another specialist, this time an ENT, to Brady's impressive list. I knew it was time to ask for help with the anesthesia issue that comes up with each scan. The thought of going in there on April 19th and worry that once again we will have to try and fight to get our voices heard by anesthesiologists makes me sick. We are just unwilling to take this risk again, we have had far too many bad expereinces. Anesthesia is safe, but when complications arise, it just introduces the risk for potentially dangerous situations. So what to do... I explained my concerns and asked if there is some way for she and I to come up with a written document explaining past experiences and the bad reactions he has had. It seems ridduculous to even have to think about doing such a thing, as one woudl assume this is the information that is in his chart...the information that one woudl assume is read by the anesthesia team each time. But please trust me, this does not happen. I have seen one doctor go back and casually flip through his chart. It is shocking and to me, unacceptable. Her recommendation is that we contact the anesthesia department and set up a consultation in the next week or so. She suggests that we find one doctor we trust and have him go through his chart, document the bad reactions his has had, and write a reccomendation based on his professional opinion. I like this idea since it will be coming from an anesthesiologist, rather than just myself or the pediatrician. Now I just have to find out if such an appointment is even possible. She also commented that it woudl be wise to have such a plan in writing in case we need to document any malpractice. Yuck. I will have some phone calls to make in coming days to set up two more appointments for Brady boy! In happier news, we got to have lunch together, snuggled up close in a booth at a great diner. Of course, pancakes and bacon were on Brady's plate. He was quite disappointed that the syrup selection was limited to...maple!

A First

2011-03-30T20:37:00.001-04:00

There comes a time in every young life,

when you just have to face your fear,

put one foot in front of the other,

take a deep breath and just get it over with.

Do you see that ominous sign in the distance?!?

Today was Eli, Cara, and Brady’s first trip to the dentist!

After filling out 16 pages of new-patient paperwork, it was time for the kids to see what going to the dentist was all about!

I myself have always liked going to the dentist. However, the only concept of dentistry that my children have is from the few scenes in Finding Nemo where Nemo is trapped in the aquarium of an Australian dentist. My children have watched in horror as that dentist drills away mercilessly in the mouth of a screaming patient.

There were pretty leery of stepping foot inside a dentist’s office, but as I always try to do, I told them how interesting, easy, and fun it would be!?!

We had a great hygienist who showed the kids all of the instruments they would be using and also gave them choices along the way. I wonder if they make you take child behavior classes when you train for that job?

Brady was up first and had some reservations…

I was holding his hand with one hand and snapping pictures with the other. I wasn’t going to miss these priceless photo ops!

It was all going pretty well until the hygienist put on a mask and leaned toward Brady to get started. He instantly just froze up, then rolled over toward me and said, “NOOOOO!” The last thing that Brady sees before he goes under anesthesia for his scans is a room full of people wearing the same masks. He understandably is quite fearful of anyone wearing one. She so sweetly took off the mask, used some sort of antibacterial mouthwash so that she wouldn’t breath germs on him, and continued without the mask.

Eli was up next and I was surprised by how willingly he jumped up in the chair. Before she could start talking he said, “Wait!” and reached out for my hand. So sweet.

He was the only one who liked Mr. Thirsty (the spit-sucker thing).

I love, love how Eli assumed his usual foot position.

Cara was getting inpatient.

The hygienist could barely help Eli out of the chair before Cara leapt into it as fast as can be.

This girl does everything with intensity and gusto!

The kids’ teeth got a great report! No cavities and pretty good brushing all around! Next up we have to work on flossing and encouraging them to spit out after brushing.

Perhaps the best part of their day was getting to choose new toothbrushes and picking a sticker to take home.

On the way out, I asked the secretary if I could start a savings plan for braces!

Hip Hip Hooray!

2011-03-24T14:58:00.005-04:00

So happy. So thankful. So relieved. So encouraged.

I've felt discouraged lately. Life is hard. It gets me down.
God sends his mercy. God pours out his grace.

On the way to Brady's appointment today, I heard this song which was so encouraging to me.

Now onto the appointment. Brady's spine looks great! Can you believe it?
His scoliosis looks about the same (was 15 degrees, now somewhere between 12-18 degrees) and his kyphosis has improved (was 42 degrees, now around 35).

He had 3 Xrays and stood like a still soldier for all of them. Dr. Sanders was very encouraged by the results and thinks that Brady's muscles getting stronger in the past year or so has helped his spine hold steady as he grows. Considering his risk for instability (laminectomy at 5 levels) this is incredible. Some may say that this is "a great medical outcome," I choose to call it "answered prayer!"

I then asked the Dr. what, if any, restrictions Brady has in regard to physical activity. All of a sudden Tball is upon us, the kids love bounce houses, and of course there are the daily wrestling matches between brothers. Dr. Sanders looked at us and said, "No restrictions. Brady Williams have fun just being a kid!"

Tears of joy followed as I told him the story of that day, December 23, 2008 when the specialist told us that Brady would never play Tball because he was going to be permanently disabled with cerebral palsy. Two years and a few months later and we are a month away from opening day. A victory in Jesus that is contained in the 32 pound body of our little boy.

Thank you for continuing to pray for Brady. But for today, would you remember to thank God for what he continues to do for him? Now go listen to that song above:)

Praying for No Change

2011-03-23T20:46:00.002-04:00

It's not everyday that we pray for no changes in our lives.

Matt and I are praying for no changes when it comes to Brady's spine. His appointment with the orthopedic specialist is tomorrow. He will have a series of XRAYs to assess the status of his scoliosis and kyphosis. At his last appointment, in July, his scoliosis was 15 degrees and his kyphosis was 42 degrees. We are hoping and praying that there is not an increase in either of these curves. Children with spinal instability are at a greater risk of curve during years of rapid growth. Children up to age 4 are in a period of very rapid growth, then they slow down from 4 until puberty when they hit another period of growing. As Brady approaches turning 4 (1 month from tomorrow!), we are hopeful that he is getting "out of the woods" when it comes to further curve progression, at least for a few years.

I have noticed that the right side of his chest, around his collar bone and under it, seem to be bulging a little. Matt said that this could indicate some change in the curve, kind of pushing that part of his chest out. It is so hard to know if it has been like that for a while, or if it is something new. The XRAYs will give us a good idea of any changes since July.

If you would, please pray that God would protect Brady as he is exposed to radiation (again) tomorrow. Pray that Brady would be brave during the XRAYs as I no longer can stand right next to him because of all the exposure I have had. Pray that God's mighty hand will guide Brady's spine as he grows, keeping it as straight as possible. I'm also going to be asking the doctor what sort of limitations Brady has as far as physcial activity. The triplets are signed up for TBall and I want to make sure we have the go ahead for things like this.

Next up on our schedule in Brady's world are a trip to the eye specialist because of some repetitive blinking he has been doing, a pre-anesthesia physical with the pediatrician, his scans scheduled for April 19th, and his post-scan appointment with the oncologist April 21st. We are going to get all of that out of the way so that we can celebrate Eli, Cara, and Brady's 4th birthday with a whole lot less worry on our minds!

Pictures!

2011-03-19T21:53:00.001-04:00

I have been terrible about taking pictures lately. Since our DSLR broke before our Disney trip, I haven’t gotten back into the habit of using it regularly. It did get repaired, but it is stuck on some setting that isn’t right. Of course I have never used it in any other setting than “auto” so I have no clue how to fix it. It is nearly impossible to get good pictures of moving, squirming children with a point and shoot.

Nevertheless, here are a few pictures of recent happenings.

Brady called me into the playroom other day to show me the house he built out of blocks. I thought it was quite impressive and well thought out. Notice the steps out front and the small blocks around the outside. He told me that those were the bushes.

Admiring his work.

The triplets performed in their preschool’s Spring Program last weekend. They had to wear plaid shirts and at first I wasn’t sure what to put Cara in. Then it hit me…one of the benefits of being a triplet with 2 brothers, is that you have lots of boy clothes in your size should you ever need them. I grabbed a plaid shirt I had bought for one of the boys for spring, put a long sleeve shirt under it, stuck a bow in her hair and VOILA! Cara looked cute as can be.

Today my mom invited Cara and I to go with her and my nieces to see a local middle school production of Cinderella. It was a great show and hanging out with “our girls” was so much fun. I decided not to include Allie this time as she is not quite ready to sit in one spot for 2 hours!

First we stopped for an early lunch before the show.

My nieces Aubrey, Natalie, and my Cara.

I got to hold the biggest cuddle-bug in our family, Natalie throughout the whole show:)

My brother’s girls and our girls are so close in age. Aubrey will start Kindergarten next year, Cara will start the next year year, and Natalie and Allie will start the year after that!

Of course Cara had to bring her Disney crown and her Tinkerbell wand (renamed the Fairy Godmother wand after the show, naturally).

Silly Boys

2011-03-13T21:18:00.001-04:00

I mentioned that the boys and I had an outing together last week. Brady had PT and Eli tagged along. Of course any trip to Rochester must include a little shopping and if Brady has anything to say about it, lunch at I SPOT.

What, you have never heard of I SPOT?

I SPOT is Brady’s name for IHOP and I love it.

I took him here last month and the boy ate pancakes for an hour. He delighted in trying all of the different kinds of syrup. He tried Maple, Strawberry, Boysenberry, Blueberry, and Butter Pecan. He loved them all.

So after PT and a stop to find the boys Easter outfits, off to I SPOT we went.

And my two hungry, silly boys were with me.

Super silly warning.

On this day I was reminded that having triplets plus one isn’t the only exhausting parenting gig.

Spending the morning with two wiggly, goofy, hungry, needing-to-go-to-the-bathroom-every-15-minutes boys is quite exhausting too!

Here's What Shaking

2011-03-09T22:23:00.002-05:00

Hello out there?!? We are all alive and well. I have just been too caught up with life to find the time to write. I'll just go ahead and say the ever-popular excuse, "I've been busy!"

Here is a quick, unorganized, run-down of what has been happening in our lives as of late:

1. The kids are very anxious for spring. They want to be outside.

2. Matt and I realized recently that it had been quite a while since Brady has had an appointment with the orthopedic surgeon. This doctor's office has a "don't call us, we'll call you" policy when it comes to booking appointments. Well, they didn't call us. Come to find out, they were supposed to call us in January and there was a clerical/computer error. We now have an appointment later in the month to check the status of Brady's spine.

3. Scans are coming up in April. Cue the anxiety.

4. I signed the triplets up for T-Ball tonight.

5. I'm sharing my testimony and Brady's story with two groups this spring. I'm excited about what God has in store!

6. The triplets turn 4 on Easter Sunday this year!

7. We are battling a lot of disobedience in our house these days. It is exhausting work trying to shape all of these young minds and spirits all at once!

8. Matt and I have gotten into couponing. We might be total nerds, but our goal is saving money.

9. We had our heating ducts cleaned last week. The kids were thoroughly confused as we waited for the "duct guys" to get to our house. Brady finally asked me, "Will they have yellow feathers mommy?"

10. I let the kids draw all over our front door with markers and crayons (made for windows of course). Drive by and check out their artwork!

11. The Spring Consignemnt Sale and my garage sale have been scheduled. Bring on the cleaning out and sorting process!

12. Brady HATES using nasal spray daily.

13. Taking two almost-four-year-old boys shopping for Eater outfits is a real treat. I laughed and sweat my way through the process of trying on dress shirts, ties, and pants in a dressing room while trying to rangle two silly boys who were distracted by their own body parts.

That's the latest around here. I promise I will get some pictures up before the end of the week:)

Brady Hearing Update

2011-03-02T16:54:00.003-05:00

I took Brady to the pediatrician today to have his ears checked. We have been having concerns that maybe he isn't hearing very well as he says, "Huh?" and "What?" often. First the nurse did a brief hearing screen. Brady put on big "ear muffs" as he called them and had to listen for beeps. I thought he was doing a great job, but the nurse told me that he did have, "some hearing deficits in both ears." After the screening, we waited for the doctor to come in. My stomach was in knots as a I sat and watched him play. The poor boy. His ears were bright red and he had that line down his face from being hot. He also has been doing this strange eye tic thing and he was doing that over and over as he played. As we waited I just felt very sad and annoyed by all of these little lingering things that no one can really explain. Of course I also realized that all or some of these things may just be "normal" almost-four-year-old stuff.

The doctor came in and checked his ears and found a "considerable amount" of fluid in both ears. She explained that they were not infected, but that fluid in the ears can most definitely cause some level of hearing deficit. We talked about the possibility of allergies and that made sense to me as Brady does seem to sniff a lot. She recommended that we try a nasal spray once a day to try and open things up. If that doesn't work, then she will perscribe an allergy medicine like Claritin. If that does not work, then she will refer us to an ENT specialist. Sounds like a plan.

She did comment on his eye tic and recommended that we bring him to the pediatric eye specialist. We are in luck there! It just so happens that Cara goes to one every 6 months, so I will call and see if Brady can tag along for his own appointment.

I'm glad to know that I wasn't just imagining the hearing issue and most importantly that there could be a simple solution.

My Average Joe

2011-02-28T11:24:00.006-05:00

Right now I'm reading an old report from when Brady was evaluated by Early Intervention in October of 2008. This was the 2nd time we had requested that they come to evaluate Brady's gross motor skills. After all, he was 18 months old and not yet walking. Actually, he was having trouble pulling him self up, something he had done shortly after his 1st birthday.

This is what the therapist concluded after working with Brady and scoring his gross motor skills, "Brady is currently functioning in the 1st percentile and 2.0 standard deviations below the mean when compared to his same-aged peers." In layman terms, 99% of children had better gross motor skills than Brady did at that point. It was not good news.

Now I'm looking at a report completed by a Developmental Specialist at Strong Hospital two months later on Dec 23, 2008. Unsettled at the conclusion of the Early Intervention eval that his delay was probably because he was a triplet born prematurely, we decided to investigate further. After meeting with us and examining Brady, the Developmental Specialist concluded, "Brady has substantial lower extremity weakness, hyper-reflexia, and hypotonia affecting his walking. These findings point to mild spastic diplegia a form of cerebral palsy often seen in ex-premature babies." This was very bad news.

Fast forward 2 years and a few months. We all know what happened in those two years; a cancer diagnosis and the realization that Brady's spinal cord had been encapsulated by an aggressive tumor. Then came a surgery that would relieve the pressure caused by the tumor, removal of part of it, but also leaving Brady's spine at high risk for deformity in years to come. We would find that two rounds of chemotherapy would not change the size of the remaining tumor in Brady's chest. We sought surgery from a hospital in NYC with the surgeon was considered the best of the best in the Neuroblastoma world. Another life threatening surgery would end Brady's cancer treatment. To retell this story is to understand that there was a pretty bleak outlook for Brady to regain much of the motor function hindered by this tumor. With every surgery came risks of paralysis and we never knew just how much damage the entangled tumor did to his spine.

I've never been prouded to announce the results of Brady's most recent tests in gross motor function. Linda, Brady's PT whom he has worked with for almost 2 years, emailed me the results just yesterday. This is what she said, "He scored a 100, a perfect "average Joe" at the 50th percentile!" Can you even believe it? A score of 100 is completely, perfectly, miraculously, wonderfully AVERAGE! Never in my wildest dreams, prayers, and hopes did I think we would ever see Brady go from the 1st percentile to the 50th! Matt and I shed tears of joy knowing that our boy is average!

The purpose of the story is simply...HOPE! No matter where you find yourself today, there is HOPE! God doesn't need the opinion of specialists and doctors to do the impossible! His power isn't bound by test scores, diagnoses, or even tumors! I know of several families facing difficult situations today. One family I have been communicating with is in NYC this very morning and their daughter is having virtually the same surgery that Brady had to remove a NB in their daughter's spine. I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that God wants Brady' story told to bring HOPE to those who need it. Hey--even I need to remind myself of how far we have come to bring HOPE into my hopeless days:)

I hope you will join us in celebrating our "Average Joe!"

Brady on My Mind

2011-02-25T13:47:00.005-05:00

It's nap time here at the Williams Family Homestead. The snow is coming down outside, and by coming down I mean in piles! I haven't updated in several days and mostly its because I wanted to write about something wonderful that happened, but I was stuck thinking about something else that isn't so wonderful. Now that it is the end of the week, I've decided to just let it all out!

Last week Brady and I went for his monthly physical therapy session in Rochester. It is the time of year when testing needs to occur to measure his progress. Brady's amazing PT, Linda, had a list of skills that needed to be assessed. I got exhausted just watching the two of them go from one activity to another. It was just incredible to see Brady breezing through many of the tasks! Linda and I both remembered our first meeting with her, 2 years ago. Brady was only able to stand, wobbling in the middle of the floor. I remember her asking me what my goals where for him and me replying, "I want him to walk with as normal a gait as possible." Wow how that goal has been shattered! Look what Brady can do now, look what God has done!!!

I'm sure this is an incomplete list, but from what I remember from the appointment, this is what Brady can do!
1. Brady can walk up steps, alternating legs, without using a handrail.
2. He can do the same thing coming down steps!
3. Brady can jump forward 24 inches!
4. Brady can jump off steps as high as 24 inches and land on his feet!
5. Brady can walk across a balance beam, even on his tippy toes!
6. Brady can ride a tricycle!
7. This boy can run...fast!
and perhaps best of all...
Brady can do anything any other almost-four-year old can do!

It is simply stunning to see the difference when we are at PT. I'm so very grateful for the services he has received since we began this journey over 2 years ago. As I started to realize that perhaps he wouldn't need PT forever, I began to hope that by the time he entered school he could be done with services. It seems as though this prayer is being answered. We will have our meeting with the school district in the coming months, but looks like Brady Williams will be a proud PT graduate:)

Victories like this are so meaningful after a cancer diagnosis. I daily read about families who are in so many different places in their journey with pediatric cancer. Some parents are just dealing with a new diagnosis, others are trying to sort through the maze of different treatment options, while others are learning how to move on with their lives after watching cancer take their child from them. There are so many different outcomes, and so all cancer families have different victories to celebrate and challenges to overcome.

For us, our greatest victory is obviously that Brady is alive! We celebrate that his treatment, although intense, was brief compared to many. And of course we celebrate that he miraculously regained almost-full motor function after such a horrifying spinal cord injury.

For a while I didn't grasp that some of the challenges we would be faced with might not come all at once. We were so elated to be done with treatment and were kind of in a daze of happiness. After several months, we learned that Brady's spine issues would continue to be something we had to contend with. I settled on the fact that this was his "survivor issue" or what the cancer community calls "late effect of cancer." But what I'm learning as we continue on and new issues pop up, and as I continue to connect with other families and research, is that pediatric cancer is an enemy with a very far-reaching sting. It seems as though every child stricken with cancer, will deal with life-long issues. This puts a survivor's parents in a precarious place. We must constantly remain vigilant against relapse, up to date with current research, and continuously guiding Brady's care in the direction of best outcomes for him.

If you have read here for any length of time you know that for us, our hope is from the Lord. Our trust is in Him and He has been faithful. But trusting in a perfect God doesn't make us perfect!!! Dealing with the uncertainty and fear that goes along with life since 2009 has only magnified our own imperfections and caused us to depend upon His perfect strength even more.

This brings me to the not-so-wonderful things I mentioned I've been thinking about. Because I have to, I read about the late-effects of some of the chemotherapy that Brady received in February and March of 2009. If you remember, he only received two rounds of chemo and it did nothing to change the size of his tumor. Matt and I will never know if the chemo helped to mature the cancer cells or somehow make the tumor easier to resect, but we have never regretted our decision to stop chemo and research a different approach. So, as I scanned the awful list of dozens of different chemotherapy drugs, I found the 4 that Brady received and the potential (although not likely) side effects.

Carboplatin: 1. hearing loss 2. neuropathy 3. kidney damage 4. Leukemia
Cispltin: 1. hearing loss 2. infertility 3. neuropathy
Etoposide 1. Leukemia
Doxorubicin: 1. Leukemia 2. heart damage

I want to say loud and clear, that most kids with Neuroblastoma have many, many more rounds of chemotherapy than Brady did. Two rounds of chemo is not a lot! However, the risk is still there as you consider that two rounds was enough to make his hair fall out and to wipe his cell counts two times over. Plus, if you ever want to be shocked, spend some time reading about what is in some of these chemo drugs. It is just horrible.

We have a healthy awareness of these potential issues, but certainly haven't been paralyzed with fear over them either. But it was funny I should stumble upon this list of late effects because I noticed Brady boy doing something different recently.
In the past few weeks I have noticed Brady saying, "What?" and "Huh?" throughout the day. Certainly not unusual given that he is a 3 year old boy, but coupled with the fact that he looks at my lips a lot while I'm talking, there is a chance he may be having trouble hearing me. The rational side of me is assuming he has some ear wax built up since he has been sick a few times this winter. Yet on the flip side, I cannot just hope it is something normal and not investigate. Just as we did with the lumps in his neck a few weeks ago, we are going to the doctor next week to have his ears checked. Actually when I called the doctor's office and spoke with the nurse, she commented that she was surprised that his oncology team didn't have his hearing check post-treatment.

I feel as though this cycle of alarm, worry, and constant analyzing of what might be will never end for us. Where would I be without the constancy of a God whose promises are new each day and never fail?

Thank you for reading all of this (if you still are!) I never want it to seem as though all we think about is Brady and his cancer. We can go weeks and weeks without even talking about it these days. But as I described above, our battle is not over and we must remain on guard and always, always fight for this boy. He deserves it.

Our Disney Dancer

2011-02-20T13:39:00.003-05:00

Ask any of us what one of our favorite memories is of our Disney trip, and I bet most of us would recall this.

On Day 2 of our trip, after a long morning at Magic Kingdom, we all took a rest and were sitting enjoying the mid afternoon sun in front of the castle. Cara had just met the princesses earlier in the day and just seemed on cloud nine. She had the sweetest, most gentile spirit that day. As the adults sat and we took a few trips to the bathroom with the other kids, Cara just started dancing.

She kind of hopped along, twirled, and watched her shadow dance with her. People passed by and smiled at her. She didn't seem to even notice. She was a happy, carefree, beautiful girl and right in that moment she was all alone in front of the castle, just dancing.

I'm so glad Matt thought to capture this precious memory on tape.

Everyday Moments

2011-02-19T11:37:00.001-05:00

We have been enjoying our everyday moments since returning from our vacation. I don’t think we have had a day when everyone is healthy since vacation though! So we are spending these last weeks of winter snuggling up, finding ways to entertain ourselves indoors, and enjoying the unpredictable weather of Western New York.

Several mornings a week Allie will ask to help me put away the silverware from the dishwasher. I do the sharp knives first, and then she carefully sorts the rest. Her preschool days are only 6 months away:(

All dressed up in pink for church last weekend

Both of my beauties.

We reached temperatures in the 50s a few times this week. The triplets and I took a walk to the parking lot of the park to run around for a bit. Brady was practicing his balance beam skills using the parking lot lines.

And with a driveway free from ice and snow for the first time in months, it was time to get out the trikes!

How sweet is Cara as she helped Allie ride a trike for the first time, giving up her own bike to her for a few minutes:)

Eli somehow wound up in a mud puddle, getting his pants wet. He didn’t like the way that felt, so for a few minutes he stood with his pant legs rolled up. Grandma and I had a few laughs at this sight.

Allie’s boot fell off and she was not happy to discover that her sock got dirty.

On Fridays, the kids get to eat lunch at the counter, all while watching cartoons. Before we ate, they helped me make fruit salad. I love the way boys figure out how to make things fun for them. For example, I gave the boys a bunch of green grapes and asked them to gently pull them off and hand them to me. In their own all-boy-way, then pulled them off and then proceeded to shoot them across the counter at me. It actually turned out to be a really fun game.

Here are my goofballs showing off their watermelon-rind-smiles.

They wanted me to take a picture of their pretty fruit salad.

Everyday moments are the ones I try so hard not to take for granted. Everyday moments make me happy.

Trip Report: Day 8

2011-02-16T21:14:00.001-05:00

Our magic week was over so soon.

We booked our returning flight for as late in the day as we could, so we were scheduled to fly out at 6:45pm. The Magical Express Bus would be picking us up at the airport at around 3:30 which left us plenty of time to squeeze in just a bit more fun!

You probably have learned already that we are into family traditions. One of our favorite parts of our last trip to Disney was breakfast at 1900 Park Fare. Naturally on our last morning of the trip this year, we decided to do the same thing. This also gave us an excuse to go back and visit our beloved Grand Floridian.

We spent a few hours packing up our rooms, returning strollers to the bell men, and getting our bags checked for our return flight. That is another wonderful benefit of staying on Disney property. We were able to check our bags at our resort! We said goodbye to them that morning when we checked out and didn’t see them again until we were back in Buffalo! Isn’t that great:)

We hopped a bus to Magic Kingdom and then jumped on the monorail to the Grand Floridian. When you to go to WDW with toddlers, a big part of the fun is just riding that monorail!

Ahhh…the Grand Floridian. I missed this place!

It was time for our reservation at the 1900 Park Fare breakfast buffet. The food here is so, so, so yummy! We are still thinking about the Mickey waffles, bananas foster syrup, and this amazing vanilla sauce on top of the caramel pecan rolls. Oh my.

The character interaction at Park Fare is great too! Each character spent a lot of time with us and I love the way they playfully interact with the kids.

With our bellies full, we enjoyed one of the most beautiful lobbies in all of WDW.

We didn’t have any park tickets left, and not really enough time to go anyway. We thought it would be fun to check out one of the Vacation Club Resorts called Saratoga Springs. Disney has a time-share-like program called DVC (Disney Vacation Club) and some friends of ours are a part of it and encouraged us to check it out. A girl can dream, right?

The wonderful people at the DVC picked us up in two passenger vans and drove us over to the lovely Saratoga Springs Resort. While the Grandmas and the kids played in an awesome kids’ room (complete with toys, movies, and snacks), Matt, grandpa, and I learned more about the DVC and got to tour some deluxe rooms. This type of lovely vacationing isn’t in the cards for us now, but maybe some day! It was a wonderful way to learn about something new and spend some extra hours that we had:)

I’ll condense our “long trip home” story into just a few sentences. Our flight was supposed to leave at 6:45. Some strange and wild weather started in Orlando (tornado warnings, pounding rain, lightning). Our flight got delayed, and delayed some more. We didn’t take off until close to 9pm. The flight was long, the kids were tired, Allie cried a lot, we were all kind of sick of it! Eli started coming down with something, he had a fever by the time we made it to Buffalo at 11ish. It was a long, cold drive home.

There you have it! Disney 2011 in pictures and some very special memories!!!

We have a few really great videos that I’d like to get on the blog soon (ahem, Matt, pretty please?).

I hope you have enjoyed reading! Our kids are the best, our parents are the best, and you guessed it…this trip was the best!

Trip Report: Day 7

2011-02-13T21:50:00.001-05:00

Just as it is tradition to go to Magic Kingdom on the first day of our Disney trips, Matt and I like to end our trips there too. What better way to get our money’s worth than to spend 12 straight hours there. By this point we were kind of running on fumes, but there was so much fun left to be had!!!

We didn’t make it for rope drop that morning, but were still there early enough to avoid Fantasyland crowds by heading there first. Despite the fact that we once again got a lot done by going there first, the crowds were much, much heavier on this day than our first day there. There were large tour groups of kids everywhere. It just isn’t easy to navigate two double strollers through a crowded Magic Kingdom…so I apologize to everyone who was inadvertently run into by us!

Here are my cuties riding the carousel. Pictures in birth order:) And notice Little-Miss-Motion-Sickness on her first carousel ride…she did great!

If you ask the boys what their favorite ride at WDW is, they will tell you it is Peter Pan’s Flight. I really like that ride too, but read somewhere that it is one of the most low-tech rides in all of WDW, remaining essentially unchanged since it opened decades ago. Brady was bouncing around with excitement as we waited to ride.

Since there were heavy crowds, we spent a lot of time walking to get Fast Passes, then crossing to the other side of the park, only to walk all the way back later. We did that to avoid having to stand in lines. It seemed like we did a lot of walking this last day!

We spent some time in Toontown because we knew it was the last time we could ever do that. Toontown is now closed as part of the Fantasyland expansion. One ride we went on for the first time was Goofy’s Barnstormer. It was an adorable little rollercoaster that the big kids all loved. I have heard they are giving it a makeover as part of the expansion and turning it into a Snow White and Seven Dwarves' coaster.

We spent some time chatting with the Fairy Godmother just behind the castle in a quiet spot next to a lovely fountain.

Our two princesses…one of my favorite shots of the week!

And thank goodness we had our tour guides, Eli and Brady, to help us navigate.

We had the best lunch on Monday at Columbia Harbor House in Liberty Square. It was just a counter service place, but we found a quiet spot on the second floor to eat. There were no other people eating in this little room and we had a great view of Liberty Square from our table. It was just one of those sweet, peaceful moments that you are lucky to find at Magic Kingdom. (And the fried shrimp lunch was so delish!)

We caught the afternoon parade again! It is SUCH a great parade!

By far, the most crowded area was Tomorrowland. Last year we didn’t even go to Tomorrowland at all, but this year we wanted to check it out. Earlier in the day we had stopped by to get Fast Passes for Buzz Lightyear Ranger Spin, so we went back to ride that. Once again, the Toy Story ride was adorable and really exciting for the kids.

The line for the Astro Orbiter was really long, so we had to skip that. We also didn’t feel like waiting an hour to ride the Tomorrowland Speedway. This is one of the lessons we learned on this trip. It is impossible to see and do it all at WDW. We had a mental list of the things we wanted to make sure and do. The things with very long lines and no fast passes we sometimes had to skip, and that was okay! Luckily our kids are too young to know the difference. I’m not sure how easy it would be to convince a 7-10 year old that some rides have to be skipped!?!

One of the best moments of the trip for Cara was meeting Princess Tiana and Naveen from The Princess and the Frog. They were just the sweetest characters, I think my favorites of the week.

Eli was having a sad moment as we walked up to meet them (He was lamenting about the fact that Matt and I did not let him ride the Haunted Mansion with us. He wanted to see ghosts!). As we walked up to meet Tiana and Naveen, I was trying to coax Eli to come up and meet them. I said, “Naveen, do you have a sword that Eli could see?” He replied, “I don’t have a sword, but I do have GREAT HAIR! Check out my swoop? This is how I get all the ladies!” It was so funny!

Our Magic Kingdom day was coming to a close. We knew that we wanted to stay and see Wishes, the nighttime fireworks show. We had missed it our first night because Brady wasn’t feeling well.

We were able to snag our favorite spot to watch the fireworks. I’m not sure this spot even has a name, but it is a little pavilion to the right of the castle, down the brick pathway, kind of in front of Tomorrowland Terrace. There is a little winding path that leads you there, and inside are several tables and round chairs. It seems everyone wants to watch the fireworks on Main Street or right in the Hub in front of the castle. This spot is great because it is out of the way, you can sit, and there are barely any people there. The best part? Tinkerbell flies right overhead!!!

By this time, Eli had exhausted himself. He was sound asleep throughout.

Remember the crowds I was talking about? After the fireworks we would realize just how big the crowds were! I have never seen such a massive amount of people trying to leave MK at one time. We were at a standstill several times as we tried to make our way down Main Street. They had to divert part of the crowd to an alternate exit “backstage,” behind Main Street. We just kept inching our way out, in a wall to wall crowd, trying to stick together. I was so glad to have the kids safely in their strollers, but sorry about how my ankles I ran into.

The bus line back to POP Century was long, but we didn’t have to wait too long. Everyone just collapsed into bed. Everyone except for Matt and I!! We had a lot of packing to do! Tomorrow we would be leaving Disney and going back to our winter wonderland. We did have some fun planned before we left though. One more day of reporting to go!

Trip Report: Day 6

2011-02-10T20:46:00.002-05:00

Our trip was winding down so quickly! The plan for our Sunday was to go to Hollywood Studios. There were extra magic hours scheduled for HS on that day. Usually I would have planned to avoid extra magic hour day (all Disney resort guests get to stay in the park for 1 hour after the general public on specifically assigned days. Sometimes the extra magic hour is in the morning before regular opening time). I decided to schedule HS for that day because Matt and I would be going to dinner that night and wanted to have a chance to go back to a park afterward. We hadn’t paid extra for the park hopper option, so we had to go back to the park where we had spent the morning.

Before leaving for the park, it was time for our usual breakfast! Here was our little table for 4!

So there is this ride called Toy Story Mania. From what I read, it is the most popular ride in all of WDW, and being that it is at Hollywood Studios where there are not as many attractions for younger kids, this ride has created a frenzy. On a slow day, the regular line can be over two hours long! There is a fast pass line, but I read that fast passes are almost always gone for the day by 11am!

From everything I read, you had to be there at rope drop in the morning and send one person in your group to do their best speed walker imitation over to the ride to get a fast pass in what is likened to a running of the bulls. Being the crazy girl that I am, I happily volunteered. With our 8 park tickets in hand I said goodbye to the group and pushed ahead into the crowd once we went through the turnstiles. They had the crowd roped off a few hundred yards up Hollywood Boulevard. Everyone was packed in like sardines, there wasn’t any wiggle room. I ducked into a store along the left side of the street and walked as far down the street as I could and came out towards the front of the crowd. Then I just waited. People were pushing, people were mad when they got pushed, and I was just in shock that this was all about a Toy Story ride!

A few actors came out and did a little dialogue and then a countdown! By the time they got to zero, the crowd was moving. No one was running, but people were moving with a purpose. As I was doing my best to gain ground on the the slow walkers and those with large strollers (ha!), I laughed to myself at just how much of a departure this was compared to my usual moments in my every day life.

I made it to the ride and scoped out the fast pass line. They actually had a queue line set up just to get a fast pass! There were people just filing into the regular line to ride, and then there were 5 fast pass machines set up. I was about 10 people back in one of the fast pass lines. I looked behind me to see a line so long that I couldn’t see the end of it. I waited about 15 minutes to get our fast passes. In that 15 minutes I learned two important things:

#1 Don’t get in the line behind the Brazilian Tour Group Leader. There were thousands of teenagers from Brazil on holiday at Disney the last few days we were there. One of their tour group leaders was ahead of me in line and she needed 75 fast passes. She had to put each ticket into the machine one at a time.

#2 Don’t try and get fast passes for people who have not entered the park for the day. The guy ahead of me thought he had a great idea. He got to HS early, while his family slept in at their resort. He would get their fast passes using their tickets, and then meet them at the gate later in the morning to let them in. The only thing is, the machine doesn’t give you a FP unless that ticket has been used to enter the park that morning. He was not at all happy about this. You have to love a Disney Cast Member who refuses to get upset with an irate man who just wants his kids and wife to ride Toy Story Mania. The last thing I heard before they called security was, “You are going to give me my fast passes!” Yikes!

We would later learn that the fast pass distribution ride was over 45 minutes long and that they were completely distributed by 11am. The standby line was 150 minutes. Isn’t that crazy? Anyhoo—I had survived the experience, thought it was kind of fun, and was looking forward to coming back at 11am to ride with everyone.

Everyone else had gone to Voyage of the Little Mermaid and I was able to catch up with them before the show started. Cara just loves Ariel and this show is really cute.

Afterward we walked to far end of HS to find where there was a meet and greet for Lightning McQueen and Tow Mater! It blows my mind to think that last year the boys didn’t even really know who Buzz Lightyear, Woody, and the Cars characters were. This year…a different story!

Our next adventure would be meeting Buzz and Woody! This ended up being our longest wait of our vacation. We waited at least 45 minutes in this line, but the kids did great (other than when we lost Allie…yes, even with 5 adults along on our trip we lost a child for a few seconds!)

The funniest part about meeting characters is that they don’t talk! Of course the princesses talk, but all the rest of them are just completely mute! I think the kids are shocked by this and it sort of makes them clam up too. A lot of the time the kids just kind of walked up and stared at the characters. But when they were playful, the kids would be playful in return.

We had a lunch reservation at 11:30, and it was a little after 11, but we decided that while we were at that end of the park we would use our fast passes and ride Toy Story Mania!!! (I learned that restaurants at Disney will hold your reservation for up to 20 minutes!!)

I’m definitely not going to spoil this ride for anyone who might be going to Disney soon. I will give it two very enthusiastic thumbs up! Everyone in our group loved it!

I got to ride with Brady boy…how cute is he in his little 3D glasses?

Here is a shot of the boys enjoying their snack in the stroller. We saved so much money by packing snacks everyday!

We also went on the Backlot Tour that morning. I was kind of let down by this one. Perhaps it was the fact that Allie was pretty bored with it too. She was getting really antsy during the ride part, so we ended up taking pictures of ourselves. Do you think we look alike?

I would take a picture, show it to her, and she would say, “Again!”

We arrived at 50s Prime Time Cafe for lunch (a little late). There was some mix up with our reservation. They had us down for a table of 3, so we ended up waiting quite a while for one. This place is a lot of fun. As the name suggests, the atmosphere is from the 1950s, complete with a waitress who acts like your mom. She yelled at us to keep our elbows off the table, reminded us to eat our vegetables, and called Grandpa “Skippy!” The food was pretty good, but the milk shakes were great! Instead of ordering kids’ meals, I ordered one adult meal and split it among the kids. It felt good to give them meatloaf, mashed potatoes, and a vegetable instead of the usual chicken nuggets.

After lunch we caught the Beauty and the Beast stage show which was great! The only thing was, we didn’t allow enough time to get a spot for the parade. We were the family walking around only 15 minutes before trying to find a spot. We ended up having to stand behind a few rows of people and didn’t get the best view. Here are Cara and Matt making the best of it.

The parade was brand new the week before I think. It is a Pixar parade called Countdown to Fun. The songs have been stuck in my head since we got back.

After the parade it was time for Matt and I to have our long-awaited date night!!! I had surprised Matt with tickets to the Hoop Dee Doo Review, his all-time favorite thing to do at WDW. The first night of our honeymoon we went there for dinner based on the suggestion of a friend that it was a lot of fun. They sat us at a table for two in the very front row. The actors incorporated us into the show several times and we had the best time! Ever since then, Matt sings the Hoop Dee Doo song and talks about how he wants to go back! For Christmas he was so happy to open two tickets to our favorite show!

We took a bus to the Wilderness Lodge and from there took a boat to Fort Wilderness Campground. As we were being seated I just had this feeling as we walked further into the dining hall. Sure enough, we were seated at the exact same table for 2!!

Hoop Dee Doo is a corny, loud, and wonderful dinner show set with a pioneer/wild west theme. The jokes are bad, the food is great, and my stomach hurt from laughing so hard. I thought the first time was fun, but 7 years and four kids later, we had even more fun:) Matt and I both put Hoop Dee Doo on the top of our must-do list (I’m not sure I would have this opinion if my kids were with us. There are kids there, but it makes a great date night!)

After the dinner and the show, we hopped on a bus back to Hollywood Studios. I have to say that at this point I was exhausted, like barely putting one foot in front of the other exhausted. We had been going for days. When we returned to the hotel each night, I spent an hour or so unpacking, sorting, and repacking for the next day. Despite feeling like I needed to be carried, we tried to have some fun for a few hours.

Remember what I was saying about extra magic hours? Well, there were many, many extra people that had come to the park to enjoy the extra hours that night. It was so crowded. When we got there the line for the 8pm Fantasmic (the nightly show at HS) was thousands of people long and it was over an hour before the show started. We decided to skip that and check out the line for the Rock and Roller Coaster. I can’t remember exactly, but I think the line was at least an hour. We realized that we should have gotten fast passes before leaving earlier. In the end we went on The Great Movie Ride and also went to the Narnia attraction (two thumbs down on this one). And then…we left!

Besides, tomorrow we would be spending 12 hours at Magic Kingdom!

Real Life Update!

2011-02-07T20:28:00.003-05:00

It's been so fun to work on our Disney trip reports! I have 3 more days to go, but thought I'd take a day off and update on what has been happening in our real lives since returning home.

On our way home from the trip, Eli spiked a fever in the airport. From there on, sickness would be upon us for the next...well...until now. It has been 2 week of illness and we are just now getting out from under it. Cara ended up with pneumonia and Eli, Brady, and Allie all had the upper respiratory bug. Matt and I got somewhat sick too, but nothing compared to the poor kids. So upon returning, we didn't return to our normal activities until just this week! We have been housebound and just trying to get better.

The upside to all of this is that God did answer our prayers for health throughout our vacation! I was so relieved to have it happen once we were back home and among familiar surroundings. I'm also thankful that our schedule has been very light the past few weeks, allowing us time to rest up and take it easy!

We had another little bump in the road when we returned home. I didn't want to blog about it until we had more information. I really didn't want to cause panic or unnecessary worry. The weekend after we got home, we (actually my mother in law) noticed a lump in Brady's neck. It wasn't big, but of course we knew we had to get it checked out.

And so began the inner dialogue of every cancer parent.
"He has a lump."
"It's back. The cancer is back."
"No, it can't be. It's just nothing. Let's just ignore it and see if it goes away."
"No! We can't ignore it. Worst case scenario the cancer is active again and every day we wait to start treating it, is a day closer to not being able to beat it."
"I can't even stand the thought of more cancer treatment. What will we do? I can't handle that ever again!"
"The oncologist is going to think I'm crazy. I don't want to call about some little lump."
"I have to call. That's it, I'm calling."

It always goes something like that. Every strange complaint. Every lump and bump. That inner dialogue has such a stronghold. On one hand, I think that part of the dialogue is God's way of giving us insight to stay on top on things. On the other hand, I know that the Enemy wants to beat us down, keep us in this terrible state of fear. It is a delicate balance and one that I'm constantly praying for God to help me find.

So I called, and Brady's oncologist happily agreed to meet with us that Tuesday. We also brought along a new urine sample so that Brady's HVA/VMA levels could be tested (you may remember that his sample was "thrown out" by a lab before we left for vacation.) Our wonderfully compassionate doctor examined Brady's neck and told us that he felt lots of lumps, but that he thought that they were completely normal. He was very reassuring that if he had even the least bit of concern that it could be neuroblastoma then he would have sent us for further testing. But he wasn't, so I wasn't, and we all feel a lot better!

Two days later he called with the urine results and his words were, "rock solid normal." The best three words this momma could hear.

So onward we go with our boy with lumps in his neck, a small piece of possible tumor/possible scar tissue in his spine, curves in his spine, missing lamina in his spine, and rock solid normal urine results. Onward.

I started a new Beth Moore book this week (thank goodness) and one of the first things I read was that we have to be willing to let truth speak louder than our feelings, and long enough that our feelings finally agree. Those words are so powerful in my life. That is what I'm praying for as we continue onward.

So my friends, back to your regularly scheduled trip reporting tomorrow! Hopefully you can stand a few more days of pictures showing my kids with Disney characters:) Stay tuned...

Trip Report: Day 5

2011-02-05T16:05:00.002-05:00

We were over the halfway point of our trip. All of our bones and muscles were starting to feel it! But we pressed on, there was so much more to see. We have already decided that on our next Disney adventure we will schedule more down time. It is such a tough choice to make…but I think Disney World can be a great place to strike a balance between trip and vacation! You just have to be okay with missing some things for the sake of a little R&R.

It was Saturday and we knew it best to avoid Magic Kingdom on the weekend, so we went to EPCOT again to finish up what we didn’t get to on Thursday. Of course there was time for the family picture upon arriving. Notice the sun glaring in Allie’s face and me looking down with a fake smile on my face at the boys who were messing around….classic! And why is there like 5 feet between Matt and I? I think we were still feeling the love after 5 straight days together as a family:)

It seems funny to write this as I look outside at feet of snow on the ground, but day 5 of our trip was cold. It was a high of 60 and there was a brisk wind. Allie didn’t seem to mind the cooler temps!

The first ride of the day was Ellen’s Energy Adventure. We plugged our ears at all of the not-so-biblical explanations of our world and enjoyed the very cool dinosaur animatronics. This ride is pretty intense for little ones, but by this point, I think our brood was too tired to care!

Matt and his dad went on Test Track and we hung out with the kids and waited for a bit.

Next we started the journey around the world by going to the World Showcase. Our first stop was Mexico. It is a lot of fun just to browse through the shop inside the Mexico pavilion. I think everyone has this sombrero picture in their Disney scrapbook!

After riding on the Gran Fiesta boat ride in Mexico, it was time for lunch. Our options were Mexican (ha!) or Moroccan. We choose Mexican. We ate at the counter service stop called La Cantina. The food was authentic (read:not Taco Bell) so I wasn’t sure the kids would like it. We paid the highest amount that we had all week for lunch, close to $50, and to my surprise, the kids did eat it. This restaurant had a gorgeous view of the World Showcase.

I really think EPCOT is a cool place. The countries each offer a great deal of wonderful entertainment and interesting shopping and eating. However, I think if I had to skip one park for toddlers, this might be it. EPCOT is big, there aren’t many “rides”, and much of the cultural stuff is over their heads. We spent two days here this time because last year we hadn’t gone there at all. I think one day would be plenty if you were selective about what you did.

Matt and I both love the Norway ride. The whole viking theme just cracks me up and I also love this enormous troll that you walk by as you exit through the gift shop.

Allison, my sweet little viking.

Gotta love this boy!

While touring China, we were on the lookout for Mulan. She was very sweet and the kids loved meeting her as they had watched the movie before our trip.

Now is the time when I take a brief pause in talking about our day at EPCOT and tell you about caramel. You see, there is this new shop in Germany (you can read about it here) that is so amazingly, sinfully, lusciously fabulous that you must go there when you visit EPCOT. The shop specializes in caramel and offers everything from caramel dipped apples, to caramel and chocolate covered marshmallows, to caramel covered pecans. It is a little piece of heaven…trust me!

As we waited in line, we captured a few pictures of our faces filled with anticipation of the deliciousness about to come.

This place could really blow your food budget, I think we spent only about $14. Matt got a caramel and chocolate pecan cluster, I got marshmallows on a stick covered in chocolate and caramel, and the kids split a gigantic rice crispy treat covered in the what else…chocolate and caramel. The rice Krispy treat was a great buy (under $4) because it was the size of a brick (literally) and I asked the girl at the counter if she could cut it into four pieces. The kids loved it, and they also loved my marshmallow.

You probably won’t believe me when I say this, but I’m on the fence as to whether it was easier to have 4 kids in diapers at Disney last year than to have 3 potty trained and 1 in diapers. If I had a dollar for all of the trips to the potty we made in those 8 days, I’d be rich. Of course the kids never had to go all at the same time…and there is no convincing a three year old to go when he/she doesn’t “feel it coming!” Our diaper-change-stops last year were quick, efficient, and on our time schedule. This year we had urgent sprints to find a bathroom, like this one…

As we were finishing up our sweet treat, Brady grabs himself and says, “I have to go pottyyyyyyyy!” When this boy says he has to go, you have like 10 seconds to get him to the bathroom. Not wanting to miss a thing, he holds it until the last possible minute and then the rush is on to find a bathroom.

I picked him up and told the others that we would meet them in the toy shop. I looked around at my German surroundings, having no idea where the nearest bathroom was. I saw a sign for the Biergarten Restaurant and went running, carrying Brady who just kept saying, “Hurry!” I rushed past the hostess as she asked me if we had a reservation and suddenly we were running through a huge German banquet hall. There were people who looked like they stepped out of the Sound of Music performing on stage, and buffets of sausage and sauerkraut all around us. I saw the bathroom in the distance and just kept hustling my way through the crowd. We made it to the bathroom and I plopped Brady on the potty. We had made it! As I was waiting for Brady to finish and trying to catch my breath, Brady says, “Mommy, this place smells bad. Even the bathroom smells bad.” I think he was referring to the overwhelming smell of sauerkraut that yes, even stunk up the bathroom. This little bathroom trip in Germany will always be a funny memory of our 2011 trip!

We relaxed a little bit at the American Adventure Pavilion. The kids had some fun playing follow the leader in a garden next to the building.

Our final stop in the World Showcase was the United Kingdom. We spotted Alice in a pretty garden and got in line to meet her. I’ll never forget Eli saying to her, “Hey Alice in Wonderland, I’ve got a new toy.” To which she replied, “Oh, you have a Mickey!” Eli answered, “No, it’s a new stick!” He then showed her some random stick he had picked up along the way.

Grandma and Grandpa had a dinner reservation at Artist Pointe in the Wilderness Lodge, so they left us in the late afternoon. Right before we said goodbye to them, we got to meet Chip and Dale. They were some of the most fun and playful characters that we met all week!

We had completed the World Showcase, but we weren’t sure if we wanted to leave EPCOT just yet. We decided to redo some of the attractions that we saw earlier in the week. Crowds were very low, so we went on the Nemo ride again and explored the Living with the Seas Pavilion some more. I found a hidden Mickey in one of the large aquariums.

We grabbed dinner at the Electric Umbrella (very average) and jumped at Spaceship Earth one last time. It was really, really cold by this point and the kids were tired.

Sometime between Saturday and Sunday, Disney World got very busy! Tomorrow we would be shocked at how crowded everything had become. And I would take part in a my fist official race…the Toy Story Mania Fast Pass race! Stay tuned…

Trip Report: Day 4

2011-02-04T19:46:00.003-05:00

A trip to Disney would not be complete without a rainy day. For Matt and I it seems the bad weather day always corresponds with Animal Kingdom day. On our honeymoon it rained the day we were there, last year it was cold and windy, this year…rain again! Despite the weather, we managed to see and do everything that we wanted that day, other than the parade which got cancelled.

This is how we looked as we entered the park. Underneath the plastic wrapped stroller is Eli and Brady (by the way, you can request free rain covers when you rent through Magic Strollers) and I’m covered in my Dollar-Store poncho that didn’t fit my big head.

First on our list was to walk straight back through the park to Asia and get a fast pass for the Jungle Safari. When we got there, there was absolutely no line, so we took advantage and walked on. I was truly worried about my car-sick girl on this one. Allie did great though and we had some very close encounters with some amazing animals. And yes, unlike many Disney attractions, the animals on this one are all real!

Don’t look too fast at this next one, you might miss the baby elephant walking in front of his momma.

After the safari we decided to squeeze in the Festival of the Lion King show before our lunch reservation. Last year we saw the Nemo show at Animal Kingdom and didn’t get a chance to see the Lion King one. They both are amazing! The best part of this spectacle was that the big kids were chosen to be in the animal parade! I was so impressed that they weren’t scared to go with the performers who were a little intimidating. They marched all the way around the area, quite far from where we were sitting!

Outside of the show there are several character meet and greet areas. We got to once again meet Minnie and Mickey, but this time they were in their safari gear…adorable:)

We started a tradition last year, and for the sake of my mom who has a thing for their lettuce-cups, we had to once again go to lunch at Yak and Yeti’s. What a name, huh? Although they messed up our reservation this year and last year, we still love this place because they food is different and good. Plus, it is just hilarious to hear Allie say Yak and Yeti over and over again!

Cara loved the won ton soup!

Can you just hear her saying, “Yeti!”

One area we didn’t get to see last year was Dinoland. This is a really cute section of Animal Kingdom that is great for toddlers. The rollercoaster was closed, but the kids had fun on the Triceratops Spin, once again meeting Pluto, and playing in the Boneyard playground.

It was early afternoon and Allie decided she needed a snooze.

Matt and I took a break from the group for a few minutes and went on Dinosaur which is a really cool attraction (definitely not for little ones though). By the time we walked out of the ride, it was starting to rain. We caught up with everyone back in Dinoland and took cover at Restaurantosaurus. They have a really nice covered patio area that is quiet and secluded. We sat out there for quite a long time and just hoped that the rain would pass. Eli was fast asleep, we had a snack, some coffee, and just relaxed. Unexpected moments like this are part of my favorite memories of the week. Every 20 minutes we got to see Goofy and Pluto walk by for a 3 minute break from their meet and greet. They carried umbrellas and stayed in character until they got behind the restaurant out of sight. The kids thought it was so funny to see them with umbrellas!

The rain let up just a bit after about an hour or so. The parade had been cancelled and we decided to head back to the resort. On our way out we stopped at one of my favorite shops and I got Eli his souvenir for the trip….a Peter Pan play set. He was so sweet and thankful!

While we were shopping, both Brady and Cara fell asleep. All 4 kids had dozed off on this our 4th day of vacation, I think they were starting to feel the way the rest of us were!

Our day at Animal Kingdom was over. It was a great day, but it represented much more than a day of rides and memories at Disney. That day was January 21st, 2011. It had been exactly two years since Brady’s cancer diagnosis. On our bus ride home, as Brady slept, I whispered to Matt, “Two years ago we knew he had cancer and were waiting for them to take him into surgery.” Nothing else had to be said as we exchanged looks of sadness, but then thankfulness. Being at Disney World for the anniversary made it much easier to forget about the pain of that day. Seeing sweet Brady living his life without the worry of being sick was so priceless.

We love you Brady Andrew. We have held each day of the last two years so much closer to our hearts than we ever did before. May you always know the true miracle that you are:)

Disney Trip Report: Day 3

2011-02-02T21:47:00.001-05:00

You have to be flexible when you vacation at Disney. If the weather report is calling for two days of great weather, you alter your schedule to make sure you have some pool time on those days. I would rather be at the parks during bad weather, then stuck at the resort with nothing to do.

This was the case for the next day of our trip. Originally we had planned for Saturday to be our day at the pool, kind of a “day off.” However, we ended up buying 6 day passes because it was only a few dollars more to do so. This meant we could split up one of our longer days into two shorter days. By doing so on Thursday, we were able to schedule in some pool time on what was supposed to be a gorgeous day!

We got up early (again!) and headed to EPCOT. On our trip last year, we didn’t do EPCOT with the kids, other than a quick walk through one night. Certainly it isn’t the most popular park for toddlers, but there are a handful or attractions geared for them and many interesting sights. We decided to focus on Future World for this 1/2 day at EPCOT.

You always need to have a golf ball shot.

And of course the family shot with the golf ball behind you. Actually, it’s called Spaceship Earth.

There were two characters waiting right inside the gate and we were able to walk right up to meet them. My kids have never seen Lilo and Stitch before this trip, but they still thought Stitch was pretty cool. Since coming home, we started watching it, but honestly I wasn’t too happy with it for my kids at this age. We also met Daisy Duck!

I want to take a minute to talk about Fast Passes. If you have been to Disney in recent years, you are probably familiar with this system, but I thought I’d explain how we used it just in case someone might be unaware of how it works. There can be really long lines for certain attractions at Disney. Generally in each park there are 3-4 attractions that can typically have a 1-2 hour wait during normal park attendance. In order to cut down wait time, Disney offers Fast Passes. Basically you decide which rides you really want to ride that offer Fast Passes. For example, in Magic Kingdom we really wanted to ride Peter Pan’s Magic Flight, The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, and Matt and I wanted to ride Space Mountain. The park brochures tell you which rides offer Fast Passes. By getting a Fast Pass for a ride, you are given a ticket which dictates a return time window when you can come back and enter a shorter, must faster line to ride. For example, your Fast Pass might say, 10:45-11:25. You can come back anytime after 10:45 (even past 11:25) and ride the ride by using the faster line. You can’t get another fast pass until after the previous fast pass start time has expired. Using the previous example, you couldn’t get another fast pass until after 10:45.

With our group, if there was a ride we wanted fast passes for, I would take our 9 tickets, go the fast pass distribution area (outside the rides that offer fast pass), stick our tickets in a machine, and collect our fast passes. This did take a little bit of time, but was SO worth it! Later in the week we would learn just how important Fast Pass can be if you want to ride Toy Story Mania at Hollywood Studios!

So, as we entered EPCOT, I knew I wanted to take the Grandparents on Soarin at some point that morning. I took all the adults’ tickets and headed to the Living with the Land Pavilion to get our fast passes. While I was gone, the family found the character meet and greet pavilion that EPCOT has. I came back to find that the kids had met Mickey, Minnie, Pluto, Donald, and Goofy. This was a sacrifice people! I missed 90% of the meet and greet, but got our passes. Thank goodness for the grandmas taking pictures.

You’ll remember Allie’s infatuation with Pluto? Remember her Pluto 2nd birthday Party? The Pluto she sleeps with every night? This was her moment!

Cara just LOVES Minnie. She’s one of the only characters that Cara isn’t a little scared of!

While at Future World that morning we rode Spaceship Earth which the kids thought was amazing! That ride makes me laugh, one of the ones that just causes me to scratch my head and think, “Who came up with this idea?” It was even more amusing because Grandma Sandy and I accidentally selected Portuguese as the language for the 15 minute audio as we rode.

We rode on Journey Into Imagination with Figment and honestly this ride scared Allie more than any other. There were several loud, unexpected noises and it wasn’t her favorite. One of my best memories from the trip was Allie declaring on each ride either, “This scares me!” or “Oh, this is not scary! I not scared!” If she was scared, she would just snuggle up to whomever she was riding with. Quite precious.

Ahhh…the jumping water fountains. An EPCOT classic. The water jumps between these little round pods, and then jumps over from one section to another. I remember being amazed by this when I was little. My kids were too! Especially Brady who was determined to catch that water in his hat!

We went to the Living Seas and rode the Nemo ride for the first time. This ride had the longest cue line ever, but we walked right through it. I couldn’t help but think of how long that wait must be during busy season:(

After the ride, we tried to coax the kids to stick their heads into Bruce the Shark’s mouth. Grandma and I did, and then the boys reluctantly tried.

One of my favorite stops in Future World is the Land. I’m not sure why I love it so much, but I guess it is because I like that Living with the Land ride that takes you into the experimental greenhouses where Disney grows all sorts of interesting things. The food court there is also one of my favorites. We had lunch there that day and it was yummy! It was also time for us to use our Fast Passes to ride Soarin. Matt took his parents on first while mom and I waited with the kids, then we swapped.

Before we left EPCOT, we decided to stop for some ice cream. Miss Cara loved this idea because she ate all of hers and Allie’s. This is another area where I tried to save on cost. Instead of ordering each kid their own cone, I ordered one cone and asked for 4 dishes.

The kids were doing great in the first few days without having to take mid day naps. Allie would just doze off here and there if she needed it. Often if we were on a dark ride, we would notice that she would just fall asleep. Several times in the week the big kids would fall asleep in the stroller in the later afternoon. All they seemed to need was a 30-40 minute rest and they were good to go. Now, by 9pm most nights they were falling asleep on the bus ride to the resort! Allie did amazingly well despite missing her nap. She never got grouchy or had meltdowns…she kind of just went with the flow. She is such a good girl!

It was early afternoon and we were back at the resort. Matt’s two good friends from high school and their wives were going to come and visit us since they now live in Florida. Grandma Lynn and Grandpa Wes were also stopping by to say goodbye after spending their morning at a Magic Kingdom tour.

As we spent time with our guests, the kids couldn’t wait to get back to that Hippy Dippy Pool!

Matt’s friends were going to be joining us that evening, so we came up with a plan that didn’t require any park tickets. We took a bus to Magic Kingdom and from there took the monorail to the Polynesian Resort. Our plan was to watch the Magic Kingdom fireworks from the beach. It was kind of a good idea. There was a lot of bird poop on the beach chairs and the kids were getting kind of grouchy. A few minutes into the show it hit me that we would be running into huge crowds afterward that would be leaving MK and trying to get back to their resort by bus. We decided to leave and take the boat across the lagoon back to Magic Kingdom and beat the crowds.

I think we beat a big part of the crowd, but there was still a very long line for a bus back to POP Century. Being one of the bigger resorts and the fact that it is more inexpensive than others, the lines for POP always seemed to be the longest. The Disney transportation system is really quite efficient. They have 350 buses running on Disney property every day. The line was long and we probably waited 20-30 minutes as we had to wait for 2 buses before us. But then, 2 empty buses pulled up and we were able to get on. That was the longest we waiting for the bus the entire week. The kids were all asleep on that ride home.

Tomorrow we would head to Animal Kingdom, the kids would take part in the Festival of the Lion King, and we would get caught in a rain storm!

Trip Report: Day 2

2011-01-31T22:28:00.002-05:00

It has kind of become a tradition that we must go to the Magic Kingdom on the first full day and last full day of our trips to Disney. Nothing says Disney magic like this place! We set our alarm for 7am and planned to leave the resort by 8am.

Even though we had two hotel rooms for our family of 6, when we all were awake and trying to move around it was chaotic! We immediately set up some sort of organization that the kids could understand. We had a place for them to line up their shoes, a place for them to throw their dirty laundry, a diaper drawer for Allie, and we dragged our two chairs into their room so that there was a table with 4 chairs for them to eat at.

Before I tell about our wonderful first day at Magic Kingdom, I want to share a few tips about strollers. Last year we used the Disney double strollers that you can rent at each park. The Make a Wish Foundation gave us a pass that allowed us to rent them for free. This was a huge blessing because each double stroller costs $31 per day, or $27 a day for multiple days. Either way, renting two doubles for the 6 days we were at the parks would have cost us $350+. If we rented from Disney, the kids would have had to walk to and from the parks each day, and believe me after 8-10 hours at a park, the kids aren’t doing much walking after we leave the front gate!

This year I did some research and found a company called Magic Strollers. They are a non-Disney company that delivers your strollers right to your resort. We picked our strollers up from the luggage area the day we arrived, used them all week, then returned them the morning we left right at our resort. We used them when we weren’t at the parks, which is a huge advantage over renting at each front gate. They were very clean, so easy to collapse and push, and the kids were able to sleep in them which they didn’t last year in the Disney strollers. The best part? For two doubles, delivered to our resort, for 8 days, it cost only $219 including all taxes and optional theft/damage insurance! I know that sounds like a lot of money, but it was money well spent. We don’t have double strollers at home anymore, but the kids definitely still need them at their age at Disney.

Back to the trip…we arrived at Magic Kingdom with plenty of time for the rope-drop show! There is an adorable show every morning on the train station platform. Several of the characters arrive on the train at the end of the show, and then there is a mad dash to the front gate! So exciting:)

Here are the grandparents, every bit as excited as the kids!

Here is our first family shot, minus half of Matt’s head!

Here is the part in the trip report where I admit that I did quite a bit of planning before our trip. I didn’t want to have every minute planned out, but I know enough about Disney to know that if you want to maximize your fun time and minimize your wait time, then you need to kind of have an idea of what to do and when. From everything I read, it is best to hustle to Fantasyland (where all the rides geared to small kids are) first thing in the morning. Most people arrive at the parks mid morning so by mid-day Fantasyland is packed, therefore hitting those rides first things is the best bet.

We followed this plan on our first day, and it worked out great! We rode pretty much every Fantasyland ride in the first hour that morning. There were virtually no lines at all! Later in our trip we would find out that the crowds would get much worse, but for Wednesday, the park was really slow!

Another awesome part of the low crowds that day was getting to meet many of the characters with little or no wait! Right after a bathroom break (I wish I could have kept track of how many bathroom breaks we had in 8 days!) we stumbled upon Pinocchio! I told Eli and Cara to hold hands to not get separated as we walked up to meet him. I’m so glad I did, because look how cute they looked!

While the big kids rode the carousel, I captured my favorite picture of Allie of the whole trip!

The evil stepsisters, two of the funniest characters at Disney.

One of the most exciting parts of our day was meeting up with honorary Grandma Lynn and Grandpa Wes who spend their winters in Florida! After they joined us, we were an even bigger, happier group of 11:)

After we finished up Fantasyland, we headed over to Adventureland. This is where we ran into a string of bad luck. We wanted to ride Pirates of the Caribbean, a Williams family favorite. We got in line, and then the line just kind of stopped. It moved again after 10 minutes, then it stopped again. It became clear that something was wrong with the ride, so after wasting 30 minutes, we decided to ditch the ride and try again later. The funny part was, we went through an exit door that was nearby…but it didn’t lead to the main park area. We ended up “backstage”, along with like 10 other people, in an area clearly only meant for employees. We eventually found our way out and back to Adventureland.

Our bad fortune didn’t end there. Last year we all really enjoyed eating at Liberty Tree Tavern, so we decided to cut over to Liberty Square to eat. As we went to cut through, we were stopped by several employees who told us that the area we were trying to get through was closed. We could see a fireman and several park personnel gathered around the building ahead. They asked where we were going, and they told us that the restaurant was closed down for whatever this emergency was too.

So in our first hour, we rode everything in Fantasyland, and in our second hour we had done absolutely nothing! We eventually ended up at Pecos Bill Cafe for lunch. It is a counter service place and I thought that the food was pretty good! On average, we were able to feed our family of 6 at counter service places for around $36-$38. Matt and I each ordered a meal & drink for around $10-12 a piece, and then the kids split two kids’ meals for $5-6 a piece. I would then purchase two extra drinks for the kids and we were all set. Sometimes it wasn’t enough food to split among the kids, other times it was WAY more than enough. We always had extra food on our plates to share with them. If you consider that we ate breakfast in our room and packed our snacks, we spent roughly $80 a day to feed our family of 6 at Disney. Not too shabby.

After lunch we had a big surprise for the boys! Given that Eli and Brady are so into pirates these days, we knew that we had to take them to the Pirates League. This isn’t included in your park admission, but we splurged a little and took them to get their very own pirate makeovers. They each got a pirate name, their face painted like a pirate by a pirate, took a pirate oath, received swords, scarves, & medallions, and got to go into the secret treasure room. They both were quite stunned throughout the entire experience, a combination of being overwhelmed and exhausted.

Here they are getting their new pirate names…Nathaniel Sunbane and Jason Lockmonger. I brought their pirate shirts from home, rather than pay extra to buy one there.

Eli chose a pirate with a black eye and scar. The pirate lady doing his make up started off by holding her fist to him and saying, “Do you want your black eye the old fashioned way?” He promptly winced and started to cry, “No!!!” I nicely told her that she was dealing with a sensitive pirate…after that, she toned it down:)

Brady chose the Captain Hook look.

After their faces got painted, they had to take the Pirate Oath. Can you see that cute little smile underneath that beard and scarf?

The four of us got to go into the secret treasure room, but no cameras were allowed!

And here they are…my little pirates…Nathaniel and Jason. Can’t wait to show them this picture in 15 years!

While Matt, the boys, and I were having all of this fun doing boy stuff, the girls and the other 5 adults were over at Mickey’s Toon Town Fair. I thought a great use of time would be for the girls to wait in line to meet the princesses. I had read that this line can be up to an hour and a half, but they only waited 20 minutes! Allie had fallen asleep in her stroller, so Grandpa and Wes waited outside with her. Cara had Grandma Kathy, Grandma Sandy, and Gramma Lynn all to herself! I’m slightly devastated that I missed it all, but am so glad that we have the pictures and video! Mom said that the princesses each really took their time with Cara. Actually, every character we met spent a lot of time with the kids. We never, ever felt rushed. These pictures are so precious to me.

For the next few days, Cara just took on this gentle, graceful, princess-like way about her. She was just adorable!

Once our group met up again, we rode Pirates of the Caribbean with our own two pirates, The Magic Carpets, and the Jungle Cruise.

At 3pm we watched the Share a Dream Come True Parade for the first time ever! Last trip we took a mid day break each day for the kids’ to nap. This year, we just kind of pushed through each day, which allowed us to see the parade! It was so worth it…the kids loved it and so did we! Allie got to see her beloved Pluto for the first time! Grandma Kathy had bought an adorable Pluto charm necklace for her, and she just proudly held that necklace up when she saw Pluto in the parade. I’ll never forget it!

I only have one picture for the whole rest of our day. Honestly, Brady didn’t feel all that great throughout the day. He was kind of reserved and had a few episodes of diarrhea after lunch. After changing him a few times, I was out of extra clothes! It was dinner time, we were all exhausted and he wasn’t feeling well. We had planned to stay through to the 8pm fireworks, but decided that we had all had enough.

We headed back to Pop Century to get dinner and get Brady settled in. After we ate dinner, I brought dinner up to Matt and Brady who were back in the room. Cara, Eli, and Allie got to be in the Pop Century Parade which takes place nightly in the main building. This resort plays the best music…all the best songs from the 50s-90s. For the parade, they carry a big radio playing a fun song and all the kids follow along banging on instruments. They walk all through the food court, store, and check in area.

That was the longest day recap ever! We definitely fit a lot into our first full day! Oh wait, there was more to Wednesday. After the kids settled in bed, I went and did laundry! I started to panic that we would run out of underwear for everyone:) A momma’s work never ends!

Tomorrow we would take on Epcot and have some more special visitors!

Disney 2011 Trip Report: Day One

2011-01-27T15:10:00.024-05:00

Welcome to our Disney 2011 Trip Report! Keep reading if you want to know the details of our 8 day trip. Matt and I LOVE Disney, so sharing our trips on the blog is fun for us and a great way to capture our memories. We also hope it might help other families planning Disney trips, or at least encourage some to consider a trip to the most Magical Place on Earth! Skip to the pictures if you want the short version:)

Here is an overview of our trip.

When:January 18-25th

Who:Our family (Matt, me, Eli, Cara, Brady, & Allie), my mom, and Matt's Parents for a grand total of 9

Where: POP Century (a Disney value resort). A far cry from last year's Grand Floridian accommodations, but a very fun place to stay if you are traveling with kids!

Why: What better place to vacation with 4 kids under 4? Disney is the perfect place to vacation with toddlers. We were able to take advantage of almost-free airfare using credit card points and also had a great discount on our rooms through a friend (we need two rooms due to the size of our family, so this discount was key to us affording our trip!). We packed all of our snacks, ate breakfast in our room, and only bought the kids one souvenir each. Disney can be affordable!

Day One: Travel Day
Our flight was out of Buffalo at 8:45am flying JetBlue. We left our house at around 6:30am. In total, our family had 6 suitcases, 2 carry on suitcases, 5 backpacks, and my tote bag. I worked for weeks trying to meticulously pack things in order to stay more organized than last year. I put each child's clothes for each day in a gallon size Ziploc bag (including shorts/pants, shirt, undies, undershirt, socks). I thought this system would be flawless and would allow us to just easily pull out 4 Ziplocs for each day of our trip. After day 1 though, I realized that I had forgotten to account for all of the extra clothes the kids go through in a week. I was constantly pulling extra undies or shirts from the bags after swim time, bath time, or when they kids got dirty. I think I would use this system again, but would keep undies and socks in a separate bag!
We gave Allie some anti nausea medicine before leaving the house. We knew our biggest challenge with her motion sickness would be the 40 minute car ride to the airport. We were right on that one. Just as we pulled into the airport, she threw up all over. I thought I would just about lose it as we had to pull up to departing flights and unload all the kids and all 13 of our bags quickly so that Matt could bring the van to long term parking. Now I had to change Allie's clothes standing next to the car, clean up as much throw up as I could from the car that would be sitting there for the next 8 days, and get us all inside. It worked out okay, and Allie was a trooper despite being undressed when it was only 25-30 degrees outside.

The kids were super excited and we were too!!! We got checked in without incident and through security easily. The man checking tickets at security asked each of the kids how old they were. The triplets each answered, "3" and when he asked Allie, she smiled and said, "I'm 5!" Oi.

We were seated 3 to a row in 3 consecutive rows on the plane. Grandma and Grandpa sat with Brady, Matt and I sat with Allie, and my mom sat with Cara and Eli. I had packed the kids' backpacks with inexpensive but "new" things for them to do. They each had stickers, a small tub of playdoh, a Disney themed fun pack, a small puzzle, snacks, and a few other things. The flight was smooth and the kids did great. Allie is always a little challenging, but even she was a good girl for the 2 1/2 hour flight.

Allie sitting between Matt and I. It takes two to tango with this little terror!

We kept holding the "barf bag" in front of her mouth. She just laughed, grabbed it from us, and used it as a puppet!

One of the biggest perks of staying at a Disney resort is being picked up at the airport by their free bus service called Magical Express. We checked our bags back in Buffalo and didn't have to worry about them until they were delivered to us at our resort! All we had to do was find the Magical Express line at the airport. After about a 10 minute wait, our bus pulled up and we were on our way with just our carry on bags!

We arrived at Pop Century and it was a wonderful 75 degrees with gorgeous sun! Our rooms weren't quite ready, so we grabbed lunch from the food court. After that we were able to check into our rooms. We paid a few extra dollars a night to be in a preferred location, meaning that we were close to the main building and the bus stop (a must for us because of the kids). Matt and I had an adjoining room with the kids, then my mom had a room, and then his parents. For 6 nights of our trip, Matt and I had no one on the other side of us, so it was a pretty quiet spot.
We pretty much dropped our bags and got the kids into their swimsuits. We weren't going to waste a minute of this beautiful weather considering we left freezing temps and snow behind that morning! We were off to the Hippy Dippy Pool, Pop Century's main swimming area. We never actually went in the main pool, but instead used the splash pool that is much better suited for toddlers. The kids LOVED it. Allie is still talking about the "Hippy Dippy!"

The kids totally just let loose! The girls have always been much more of water babies than the boys. They get right in and lay, run, and splash in the water. The boys liked to go in and out, and Brady especially needed to get out and dry off every few minutes. It was an awesome way to kick off our vacation:)

After swimming and dinner, we decided to walk around and explore our resort a bit more before getting to bed. Pop Century is themed based on each decade from 1950 to 1990. Each building is a 4 story motel-style unit with big iconic statues representing toys from that decade. It's not the most beautiful place on Disney property, but the kids loved it and it grew on me throughout the week.

After traveling all day, swimming, then walking around for an hour, we were all feeling like this...

It was time to get everyone tucked into bed. The boys shared a double bed (first time ever for them!), Cara had her own double bed, and Allie was in a pack and play. Of course we had packed a whole suitcase full of stuffed "friends", blankets, pillows, white-noise machines, and even Allie's beloved bumper that she uses as a pillow. It took a bit to get them to settle down, but this was the only night that was a problem. For the next 7 days we would completely exhaust them (and ourselves) having a wonderful time.

Tomorrow...Magic Kingdom and two little boys become pirates for the day!

Home!

2011-01-26T22:41:00.003-05:00

The Williams clan has returned from our Disney adventure!

Pictures and recap will be coming soon.

I'm trying to get out from underneath some laundry piles! There is also the task of getting the kids back on a normal, not-quite-so-magical routine:)

Here's a little sneak peek!

It's All about Perspective

2011-01-12T14:07:00.002-05:00

Some things really stink

Your camera (which is super awesome and takes great pictures without an annoying delay) breaks just before your family vacation. That stinks.

You drop your son's urine off at a lab 50 minutes from your house. This lab is on the back of the requisition that was given to you in regards to said urine. You wait a week to find out if your child's tumor is growing based on the results of that urine test only to find out that the lab you dropped it off at isn't equipped to run that test. The urine needs to be recollected and you have to start all over again. That stinks.

I had a few hours of pouting about my camera. The idea of using a traditional digital while on vacation makes me cringe. I'm mad that this lab didn't think to call me immediately upon realizing that they don't do this test so that I could deliver the sample to another lab. Grrr...

Then I stumble upon this link. This is when the minuscule annoyances of my life become so insignificant as my heart breaks for this family who is suffering unspeakably. This is when I'm humbled by the precious grace of God evidenced by the selfless act of these beautiful moms (at least one of whom I met while we were in NYC).

I don't want to be a whiny woman with a broken camera or a mom fed up with the inefficiency of a lab. I want to be like these moms...they truly get it.

Back on the Horse

2011-01-09T21:39:00.002-05:00

It seems as though every time I sit down to blog these days, I have less to say and more days have passed since I last said something!

Does this mean I have less going on, certainly it doesn't feel like that.
Does it mean I just have become a great big juggling act in recent months? I think that is more like it.

I also find myself much more pensive than I can ever recall being in my life. Certain seasons of life lend themselves to this more than others, I'm learning. Thinking about we've been, where we are, and where we going is often on my mind. Then I have this revelation that perhaps I should spend more time thinking about where I've been, where I am, and where I am going. But then there are meals to be made, laundry to fold, and books to be read. So with so little time for thinking, it is no wonder that time for writing is hard to come by!

We are nearing the two year anniversary of Brady's diagnosis and the beginning of this blogging adventure of mine. There are days when I can only vaguely recall the details of our "cancer-life" and there are days when I still weep for what we lost that day. Thankfully Matt always reminds me of how amazing Brady's recovery has been and what a miracle his progress has been in light of the seriousness of the injury to his spinal cord. I too spend many days relishing in the mighty work God has done through Brady. There are days when every jump across the floor that he makes, every sight of him playing musical chairs at preschool, and every sweet kiss he gives me makes me tingle all over with pure thankfulness.

So, please know that I'm not going anywhere. I'm going to continue writing, sharing, and telling our story. After all, there is a great Disney adventure on the horizon that I can't wait to tell you about:)

Our Life These Days

2011-01-04T21:43:00.004-05:00

We are back in the swing of things around here. I welcome the return of the routine, although it is hard to leave the memories of family time and holiday fun behind.

There has been a big change in our house in the last few weeks. Since Allie was born 2 years ago, we have always had a "triplet bedroom" and "Allie's bedroom." A few days after Christmas, I looked at Matt and told him, "today is the day we should move Cara into Allie's room." He agreed, and we went for it! We told Cara that it was time for she and Allie to share a girly room together! We moved several of of the girls' toys in there and a dresser. This of course made more room in the boys' room, so many of their boy toys got moved into their new room for two! So we have 2 in each room, clearly gender-defined, and Matt and I have reclaimed some space in our house. Not a lot of space, but some!

In Brady news, it is already time for his 3 month urine check. We collected the sample today (which was like a comedy routine with 3 small people watching!) and I am dropping it off at a lab tomorrow. I have some moments of worry lately (what else is new?) as Brady is quite clingy and also has been doing this strange eye tick thing. Some days I'm ready to drag him to the oncologist, and other days I'm able to reassure myself that he is fine. I'm very happy that we are doing this urine check. It will give us all piece of mind until our October scans.

The most exciting news in our house is that we are busy getting ready for an upcoming trip to Disney!!! We are going to be spending some amazing family time together, celebrating life!!! I never would have dreamed that after our trip in February we would be returning so soon, but we have been able to take advantage of some amazing deals and our schedule at this point in our lives makes it easier to get away. The kids are bouncing-off-the-walls excited and so are we! Our fabulous grandparents are joining us again and I think they are coutning down the days too:) Of course we will share pictures galore when we return.

Here is a great picture of the boys from the other day! My two little super heroes have the best time being brothers:)

It Was a Good Year

2011-01-02T13:58:00.016-05:00

2010 was a good year. Well, anything that followed 2009 had to be good, right?

Instead of dealing with major health issues, this past year centered around the normal events of day to day life with our 4 under 4. The normalcy was a tremendous blessing.

It was a year of firsts. We took our first family vacation. The triplets started preschool and Sunday school. Cara started dance class. And for the first time we went 6 months between Brady's oncology appointments.

I have many wishes and prayers for 2011. I pray that God will continue to bless our family with good health and safety as we navigate through the next year. I pray that God will continue to use Brady's story to bring others closer to Him. On a more personal level, I'm praying that my heart will be filled with more joy than fear and that I will do my best to savor these precious years.

Here is a look back at our year, with one picture for each month of 2010. Happy New Year to you all. May it be filled with hope for each one of you.

January 2010 Look at these babies! And is that a diaper Eli is wearing? Make that our biggest accomplishment of 2010...potty training triplets.

February 2010 Our Make a Wish Trip to Disney

March 2010 This past year, it finally started to seem a little easier to take all the kids out of the house. Not easy, but easier:)

April 2010 Our 3 turned 3 this year!

May 2010 By the end of May the heat had already arrived in our area! We celebrated Memorial Day with family and friends.

June 2010 Having two boys and two girls was so much fun this year. They really started to buddy off as brothers and sisters. Although sometimes, they still like to show a little love to the other gender:)

July 2010 One of my favorite pictures of the year.

August 2010 We found ways to beat the heat this summer. Central air topped my list.

September 2010 My big "babies" head off to preschool.

October 2010 Halloween was just SO much fun this year!
November 2010 Our baby turned 2, going on 6.

December 2010 We ended the year in the best possible way...celebrating with family, continuing family traditions, and looking forward to the year ahead.

Celebrating Christmas

2010-12-26T22:32:00.001-05:00

It has been a wild, wonderful, and whimsical past few days.

Christmas was such a joy with the kids and with our extended families.

Our children were spoiled, they were happy, and it is our hope that they also understood that all of the fanfare was for one very important reason…the birth of our Savior.

My camera was in hand as we played in the snow, opened presents, and gathered with family. I hope you enjoy these precious memories as much as I do:)

Time for food and treats!

Don’t forget some cookies for Santa and carrots for the reindeer!

Exactly how does he fit down here?

A family tradition…reading The Night Before Christmas on Christmas Eve of course. The copy we have is from my childhood

We also read a Christmas book that Matt had as a child! Brady held it close until it was time:)

Cousins Evan and Ryan were there to help share the excitement of Christmas Eve.

Santa arrived as all the kids were snug in the beds.

Christmas morning arrived, and so did some very excited children into the living room!

The girls were thrilled to find a doll house waiting for them!

And the boys found a pirate chest filled with all-things-pirate!

Grandma Sandy, Grandpa, and Great Grandma Vera were with us to share in all the joy that Christmas morning brings with 4 kids under 4:)

After brunch and a little nap, it was time to head to my mom’s house for more Christmas fun!

There was more exchanging of gifts and a little bit of Christmas chaos as the eight grandchildren tore into their new toys:)

It was two Christmases ago that we received news that something was seriously wrong with Brady. On December 23, 2008 we were told that Brady had Cerebral Palsy and that is why he wasn’t walking at age 20 months. We were truly heartbroken that Christmas, grieving over the loss of so much of what we had hoped for our child. Of course it was only a month later that we would learn that our pit was about to become much deeper and darker still.

That was our Christmas two years ago. The two Christmases we have lived since have been in stark contrast to that difficult time in our lives. I say all of this to maybe inspire hope to someone that may not feel joyful this Christmas season. What is supposed to be a happy season of celebration, is often a painful and lonely time for those who are hurting.

I hope that our story, one of faith and hope, can encourage you this Christmas season. To think of how far God has brought Brady and all of us in the span of just two Christmases just humbles me. We celebrate Jesus’ birth each year with joy in our hearts that replaces the despair we once felt.

May that same joy be yours this Christmas.

Good Tidings for Christmas

2010-12-19T22:39:00.003-05:00

In the span of about 3 minutes, I was able to flashback the past 3 1/2 years.

Today Eli, Cara, and Brady presented their part of our church's Christmas program. They recited their bible verse and sang a song, along with cousin Aubrey and good friend Carson. The 5 of them make quite an adorable group.

And during their brief time on stage, it was as though their whole life flashed before me.

As Brady took the microphone and recited his verse, I thought about the three of them in the days following their birth. They were tiny, had wires and tubes attached to them, and they each were snuggled up in their own isolette in the intensive care unit.

When Eli recited his verse I thought about going into their nursery at night, seeing the three of them asleep in three cribs, and remembered the tingles I would feel all over my body at the realization that they were all mine.

And when Cara proudly said her verse, I remembered the day that they were dedicated at church. Matt and I were so proud that day to present our three healthy babies to our church family.

Finally when they sang their song, my eyes welled with tears at the sight of them all together up there. So many memories...good times...tough times...brought us to this day. I would be lying if I said I didn't think about Brady's cancer journey as I watched them. The familiar ache in my heart was there as I recalled those first days after the diagnosis. I must have wondered a million times if we ever would get to days like today.

But we did get there. God knew just how much today would mean to us. Perhaps just another Christmas program to some. For us though, it was just another confirmation that God does indeed make everything beautiful. Ecclesiastes 3:11 (actually all of Ecclesiastes 3 is a great reminder of God's perfect providence!)

Their Big Debut

2010-12-16T21:36:00.001-05:00

The eldest Williams kids appeared in front of an audience for the first time last night. They joined their preschool classmates for the St. Paul Christmas Program. There were about 20 smiling and singing 3 and 4 year olds that started off the program with a few Christmas songs.

I had a few worries about my dear Eli as the big night drew closer. Standing still and not becoming distracted isn’t always easy for my sweet boy. But just as they always do, my trio surprised me. Eli stood up there and sang his little heart out and stood as still as you could expect any three year old boy to. Cara also stood there with a sweet smile, sang, and did all the arm movements.

Then there was this other boy with a smile on his face. Brady boy stood up there with this goofy little grin on his face. Instead of doing the arm movements that coordinated with the songs, Brady did this strange Little Drummer Boy imitation. It was actually quite funny, and distracting all at the same time. I was almost a little annoyed by him as he carried on with his arm movements throughout the whole performance. But then, my heart just swelled with pride that I had three healthy, happy kids up there among their peers. So you go right ahead and be silly Brady. You’ve earned it:)

ps This is the smile I was talking about!!!

Snow is Falling

2010-12-13T20:53:00.001-05:00

It feels a little bit like this here in Western New York these days.

This was me after coming in from the cold. Cara and I walked to her dance class which is literally only 3 doors and a parking lot down from my house. But boy, it seems much farther away when you are walking through snow, wind, and temps around 12 degrees. Cara was such a trooper.

I definitely am not complaining though! I so don’t enjoy the heat, and I certainly love when it looks like Christmas at Christmastime. So bring it on Old Man Winter!

My crew and I got a lot accomplished today. I like to think that this amount of work done amidst the usual whining, crying, and fighting that goes on in this house is quite remarkable. Maybe not, but I like to think it is! Sometimes the kids were helping, sometimes the kids thought they were helping, and other times I was thankful for some great Christmas cartoons which allowed me to work all by myself!

Here is what I checked off the to do list today!

We assembled a ginger bread house (thanks Schwartz family!)

Up next was a little cartoon time for the kids while I made some rice crispy treats. Yummy.

Then it was time for mommy to “bake” some cookies. Am I allowed to use the excuse that I have 4 kids under 4 to explain why I use premade cookie dough?

After lunch, the kids got to decorate their own cookies.

Next, 40 fingernails and 40 toe nails got cut. Then 20 fingernails got painted with sparkle polish.

Finally nap time. I finished up our Christmas cards and decorated the cookies we baked in the morning.

After nap and snack time, it was time for homework! Yes, my dear preschoolers have a little homework. Nothing big, just cutting out 5-6 pictures for the color of the week. However, 3, 3 year olds with scissors and their 2 year old sister wanting to have scissors too, can be quite interesting!

Then it was time for a quick dinner and Cara and I headed off to dance. 45 minutes later we were home and it was time for baths, which Matt so graciously handled so that I could make some reminder phone calls for our MOPS meeting tomorrow night.

All in a day in the life.

Breakfast with Santa

2010-12-11T19:13:00.001-05:00

This morning we took our kids to the local community college where they were offering a breakfast with Santa that was free for kids 5 and under! This had our name all over it!!! There was a buffet breakfast, a craft table, and a sweet Santa there for the kids to meet. I was shocked at how few people were there at this event which only cost $10 total for Matt and I to eat.

We were one of the first families there, so we had a few minutes to waste after breakfast and before Santa arrived.

There were a few smooches.

A little bit of rough housing. (Can you say father & son?)

Some happy faces.

And lots of dirty plates!

Then, the moment arrived!

Remember the fairy godmother picture from Disney World with Cara holding her hand? This shot of Allie and Santa reminded me so much of that.

Then it was time to wait in line to sit on Santa’s lap! Some of us passed the time in line making sad and pathetic faces.

Brady told Santa that he wants something Spiderman for Christmas.

Cara told Santa that she wants an Ariel doll.

Eli told Santa that he wants a cannon and cannon balls for Christmas. Rumor has it that it took Santa two hours scouring Google to find something remotely close to this for Eli. I guess Santa’s elves don’t do cannonballs.

At this point I was starting to wonder if Santa had had enough of the crazy mom doing extreme close ups, but I had just a few more shots to take!

Allie told Santa that she wants pirate toys for Christmas. She only said that because the boys say that!

Finally, I had to include this blooper shot. Here are my sweet children staring at the elf taking pictures who had antlers on that lit up. I love Brady’s expression, Cara’s fake smile, Eli’s look of boredom, and Allie’s blank stare! Ha!

Holiday Happenings

2010-12-08T20:19:00.001-05:00

It’s been a bit since I have shared some pictures. Here is a little of what the kids have been up to this December.

I came into the dining room last week to find Cara with a chair pulled up next to the kids’ tree so that she could color.

Allie was laying on the floor rolling around in a blanket. When I asked her what she was doing she replied, “I’m baby Jesus layin in the hay!”

This is what happens when I try to put a great idea into action. “How cool it would be to have the kids hold up signs that say “Happy Birthday Grandpa Wes" and then email the picture to him. It’s the thought that counts.

Finally, here are some shots from Grandma and Grandpa’s day with the kids.

Eli and Brady had been planning all week to bring their toy chain saw and ax for the great Christmas tree hunt.

Talk about overwhelming poor Santa! "

Here is Eli wearing a hat that Matt wore when he was little. How cute is that.

Time to decorate the tree!

Notice the Allie is without her socks. Apparently at some point during the decorating, she decided to take her socks off and dip them in the water under the tree. That girl could find water to play with in the desert.

LOVE this one!

We are really in the Christmas spirit. Eli, especially, wants to deck every hall in our house. He asks me at least a hundred times a day, “Mom, where can we put up more things to make it even more Christmas-y in here?”

I Would Love to be a Rockette

2010-12-06T09:11:00.007-05:00

Stop laughing!

Where am I going with all of this?

It was just a good lead in to this post, that's where! I've been away from the blog for several days because of a few things. The first being that I was sick last week. I had the old stuffy nose, sinus pain, hacking cough, achy bones and chills-type-thing that is going around. I was still functional but cut out many extra curricular activities for a few days, including blogging:)

The kids had milder versions of this cold throughout the week, but we all seem to be feeling better now.

So back to the Rockettes. A while back my mom asked me if I wanted to tag along on one of her bus trips that she escorts quite often First Choice Travel. She travels all over the US, usually on longer trips, but she was going to be taking a group to NYC for just two days. The city at Christmastime is always amazing, so I took her up on her offer. By the way, if anyone is counting, I have been away from home for two consecutive weekends. This doesn't feel like my life?!?

We had a really good time doing all of the traditional Christmas stops in NYC. We saw Rockefeller Center complete with the 75 foot tree and ice skaters. We walked to Central Park, stopping along the way at Trump Tower, St. Patrick's, and to do some window shopping. Ever the cheapskate, I decided that we should not indulge the $50+ for 20 minutes in a horse-drawn carriage. Instead, we got 40 minutes for $40 in a rickshaw peddled by the sweetest 20-something from Ireland. It certainly was an experience. He wasn't a very large guy, so we had our doubts, but he did manage to take us all around lower Central Park and give us some NYC facts (1/2 of which were completely made up). We spent most of the time laughing and huddling together for warmth, but it was a priceless memory for sure!

Okay, finally the part about the Rockettes! Sunday morning we went to Radio City Music Hall to see their Christmas Spectacular show starring those amazing Rockettes! Honestly, if I had the body, skill, and a completely different life, I think it would be amazing to be one of them! Throughout the entire show you just sit there and marvel at it all. This is the 2nd time I have seen it and if I could I would see it every year for the rest of my life! Those girls work hard and are so great at what they do! Mom and I had to sit in completely different sections of the theater. My seat was unbelievable. I was sitting in the 3rd mezzanine, the very top, in the very last row, dead center. I could see everything perfectly, including the different sections of the stage moving up and down. The show concludes with a Living Nativity that is just breathtaking. What a way to start the Christmas season.

We spent the rest of yesterday at Macy's and then of course, traveling home to a snowy Genesee County. I was very ready to be home and missed my kids like crazy. They had spent Saturday with Grandma and Grandpa going to get a Christmas tree, meeting Santa, and then helping decorate the tree. Yesterday Matt got them all up and out the door to church. That is no easy job. What a guy!

Today we are just spending the day lounging around and getting caught up on some things. I might spend some time practicing my kick line:) Okay, now you can laugh.

The Prophetic Prayer

2010-11-30T20:21:00.003-05:00

The prayer went something like this.

Eli: "Dear Jesus. Thank you for my daddy, my mommy, Brady, Cara, and Allie. Thank you for our wonderful day."

"Oh, and thank you for the candy canes that mommy will give me for Christmas. Amen."

Okay buddy. Point taken:)

2 Days of Shopping and 1 ER Visit Later

2010-11-27T21:18:00.003-05:00

It was that time of year again! Time for Megan and Matt's annual 2 day shopping trip extravaganza!

As Matt said this weekend, "I look forward to these two days all year!" Me too! We leave our kids behind and spend the night near some sort of shopping area. Usually we go to Syracuse to catch an Orangemen game, but this year, they didn't have a home game. Instead we headed to Rochester to one of our favorite malls.

But alas, it is never that easy to leave this house. In a twist of fate, as we were just about to bid our offspring adieu, I heard a thud and a shrieking cry from the dining room. Who could it be? But of course, our brave hero Brady. While running to show grandma our newly decorated tree, he slipped on his socks (he had just taken his slippers off against the advice of his momma) and bonked his head on either the hutch or the chair in the dining room.

Since his treatment days, Brady goes into instant duck and cover mode with any boo boo. When I got to him Grandma was holding him and he was holding his hands tightly over his forehead and left eye. As I carried him into the kitchen I knew that a few minutes of snuggling would get my boy back to normal.

That is, until I saw blood oozing from between his tightly clasped fingers.

When I finally convinced him to let me see it, I called for Grandma by saying, "Well, we have B-L-O-O-D!" She took a look at it, I got tears in my eyes knowing where we were headed, and she agreed that indeed this gash warranted a trip to the ER.

So off we went, Matt, Brady, and I. Brady can be melodramatic. Brady can be whiny. But my oh my, that kid can pull it together when it counts. This, I think, is his 3rd ER trip in the past year or so, and combined with his cancer days, he handles the hospital like a pro. We left for the ER at 10am and got home around 1:15pm...so things went slowly, very slowly once we got there.

I was praying that there would be no needles and thread involved in the fixing process. Thanks be to God that my prayers were answered. A very nice PA examined the wound and agreed that some of that super-cool glue stuff would do the trick. A few minutes later she reappeared with the glue and another nurse. The other nurse told me that I would have to let go of Brady who was laying with his head in my lap watching TV. She wanted me to hold his legs while she held down his arms so that the PA could apply the glue. I thought about this for about...3 seconds...and then politely asked if they could just do their job while I held Brady. I tried my best not to play the cancer card, but did say that given his sorted medical history that we try to minimize scary hospital situations as much as possible. I also told them that I was confident that Brady would not have to be restrained. After all, he is super duper brave! Remember the time he just laid there while they did a CT of his head after a fall?!?!

The nice PA agreed that we could do it my way. She said that she had read his history and understood my concerns. So I held Brady boy, who true to my word, didn't move a muscle and only whimpered momentarily once or twice.

He is now sporting a hockey-style eyebrow gash covered in crusty glue. I'm sure his preschool friends will be impressed. I'm just relieved that I already have their Christmas card pictures done. Phew...

In the end our shopping trip started off about 4 hours later than expected. I'm just thankful that we were home when all of this happened!

We shopped til we dropped, ate meals just the two of us, and laughed a few times about how this is what life was like "before kids." It was fun while it lasted, but coming home to our babies was even better.

Happy Thanksgiving to All

2010-11-25T22:19:00.001-05:00

I think that my four little turkeys enjoyed themselves today.

We started our day by watching the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade and putting up our Christmas tree.

We got all dressed up, took a quick nap, and then headed off to grandma’s for dinner.

The food was great…

But the time with family was even better.

It’s hard not to look around our Thanksgiving table and be thankful.

Thankful for health. Thankful for the blessing of children. Thankful for our family. Thankful for our Savior and for His continued love for us.

Have you counted your blessings today?

Mommy, I Didn’t Do It!

2010-11-23T22:20:00.001-05:00

Can you guess the story behind this picture?

Better yet, can you guess the WHO involved in the story behind this picture?

A certain child of mine calls scotch tape, sticky tape.

And this certain child often stumbles upon the sticky tape and has a little fun pulling it so that 5-10 feet of it is stretched out and twisted up in a big sticky wad.

Which brings me to this story.

This darling child of mine came to me in the living room yesterday and said, “Mommy, I didn’t pull out the sticky tape on your table. I didn’t!”

Besides the fact that this child was lying through her teeth right to my face, I found this admission of non guilt very cute and certainly hilarious. Before going to investigate what had happened, of course I went and got my camera.

And do you know what I found?

This cute, I mean guilty, little face!

“Look mommy! Your sticky tape!” That is all she could say:)

I Couldn’t Help Myself

2010-11-20T22:14:00.001-05:00

I know, I know. It isn’t even Thanksgiving yet.

But my schedule allowed for a little time to start the process of Christmas decorating!

I decided to start a new tradition this year. I set up a tiny tree in our dining room and told the kids that it would be “their tree.” I bought some tiny ornaments and they helped me decorate it this afternoon.

They could barely contain their excitement as they got to hang each little ornament. It was all going perfectly until Allie saw the white ball ornaments that I had bought. She picked one up and shouted, “Look mommy, little eyeballs!”

Oh my, I laughed so hard my belly hurt.

After we hung up all of the tiny stockings, cupcakes, and even eyeballs, we had nothing left to do but turn off the light and enjoy the pretty glow.

You may not agree, but I think a little Christmas cheer a week or so ahead of schedule is a great thing:)