Getting ready for horse back riding
Yes, I know we take too long between updates on this site. We are working on posting more regularly. If you are a Facebook user you will get more frequent updates as Abigail posts small blurbs and pictures every other day.
The Make-A-Wish trip was absolutely amazing. We had a great time. We stayed at the Give Kids the World Village, which is a village set up just for kids with life threatening illnesses. Foundations such as the Make-A-Wish foundation and others sponsor the kids so they can stay there. The village is run by mostly volunteers, about 1,400 per week offer their time. It is a very eye opening experience to be there. Everything at the village is set up just for kids, zero entry pool, archade, train rides, castle, carosel, spa for kids, charater visits (Mickey and Minnie Mouse, Goofy and others), and horse back riding. So there was always something to do everyday at our village if we wanted. However, we spent most of our time at the Disney Parks, Sea World, and Universal, where I found out that apparently I can't ride big roller coasters without almost hurling.
Magic Kingdom was the most fun for Gabrielle, because the rides were all her size and their was so much for her to do. One of the things we will miss most about this trip and the visit to the parks was our special pass we had which allowed us to pretty much go to the front of any line. Gabs was able to bypass the 2 hour line to get her picture with Rapunzel, where she was so excited she took three large leap frog jumps toward Rapunzel and her little shorts dropped to her ankels on the third jump. She didn't seem to mind she just picked them up and went on with her business. I think I am forever ruined to go to the parks without the pass again.
There is so much to write about from the trip that it would easily fill a book, so I will post some pictures in a couple days to tell the story. I will say that poor Gabs did get sick the morning of our flight and threw up at the hotel, the airport check-in line, and twice on the plane. She was very matter of fact about it and never complained. Luckily she recovered quickly and it didn't cut much into her fun time in Florida.
I'm going to add a couple other udates while I'm here. First, is the polar bear plunge for a princess fundraiser going on this Saturday at Hawk Island park in Lansing. Our amazing pediatrician offered to put on this event for Gabrielle, she has been a great friend and big blessing to our family along with all of our other friends and family who have supported us through prayers, gifts, money, food, friendship, and more. They created a facebook page for the event that can be found at: http://www.facebook.com/#!/events/278107948920900/ I personally am not raising money for the plunge but will diving into the water in support of all the other plungers who have raised money.
Lastly, we met with our oncologist and surgeon this past Friday. One of the options that was on the table a month or so back was attempting to surgically go in and remove the residual tumors. However, after further consideration that would carry some risk of nerve damage due to their locations, along with other potential complications of a big surgery, add to that that the surgeon doesn't know if he would be able to successfully find all of the tumors because they are so small. One option that is being discussed right now, is if the resisual spots continue to grow at a slow rate, the surgeon will wait until they get large enough to remove or until they potentially cause a problem pushing up against neighboring tissue. As a side note, because these tumors are slow growing, chemotherapy may have limited impact on them, so in the short-term that seems to be taken of the table. To summarize as I alluded to in the previous post, we are going to observe at the time. We have another scan coming up in May and we will see if the residual spots are still growing or if they are remaining stable.
The Make-A-Wish trip was absolutely amazing. We had a great time. We stayed at the Give Kids the World Village, which is a village set up just for kids with life threatening illnesses. Foundations such as the Make-A-Wish foundation and others sponsor the kids so they can stay there. The village is run by mostly volunteers, about 1,400 per week offer their time. It is a very eye opening experience to be there. Everything at the village is set up just for kids, zero entry pool, archade, train rides, castle, carosel, spa for kids, charater visits (Mickey and Minnie Mouse, Goofy and others), and horse back riding. So there was always something to do everyday at our village if we wanted. However, we spent most of our time at the Disney Parks, Sea World, and Universal, where I found out that apparently I can't ride big roller coasters without almost hurling.
Magic Kingdom was the most fun for Gabrielle, because the rides were all her size and their was so much for her to do. One of the things we will miss most about this trip and the visit to the parks was our special pass we had which allowed us to pretty much go to the front of any line. Gabs was able to bypass the 2 hour line to get her picture with Rapunzel, where she was so excited she took three large leap frog jumps toward Rapunzel and her little shorts dropped to her ankels on the third jump. She didn't seem to mind she just picked them up and went on with her business. I think I am forever ruined to go to the parks without the pass again.
There is so much to write about from the trip that it would easily fill a book, so I will post some pictures in a couple days to tell the story. I will say that poor Gabs did get sick the morning of our flight and threw up at the hotel, the airport check-in line, and twice on the plane. She was very matter of fact about it and never complained. Luckily she recovered quickly and it didn't cut much into her fun time in Florida.
I'm going to add a couple other udates while I'm here. First, is the polar bear plunge for a princess fundraiser going on this Saturday at Hawk Island park in Lansing. Our amazing pediatrician offered to put on this event for Gabrielle, she has been a great friend and big blessing to our family along with all of our other friends and family who have supported us through prayers, gifts, money, food, friendship, and more. They created a facebook page for the event that can be found at: http://www.facebook.com/#!/events/278107948920900/ I personally am not raising money for the plunge but will diving into the water in support of all the other plungers who have raised money.
Lastly, we met with our oncologist and surgeon this past Friday. One of the options that was on the table a month or so back was attempting to surgically go in and remove the residual tumors. However, after further consideration that would carry some risk of nerve damage due to their locations, along with other potential complications of a big surgery, add to that that the surgeon doesn't know if he would be able to successfully find all of the tumors because they are so small. One option that is being discussed right now, is if the resisual spots continue to grow at a slow rate, the surgeon will wait until they get large enough to remove or until they potentially cause a problem pushing up against neighboring tissue. As a side note, because these tumors are slow growing, chemotherapy may have limited impact on them, so in the short-term that seems to be taken of the table. To summarize as I alluded to in the previous post, we are going to observe at the time. We have another scan coming up in May and we will see if the residual spots are still growing or if they are remaining stable.