Wow!

Cole was one of the first to see my mom when she emerged groggily from anesthesia this past Tuesday. He watched her raise a triumphant fist in the air when she received the news that left us all, including her doctors, a bit baffled. The mass that had spoken such doom to us in the imaging they did last week, along with the incredibly high cancer markers in her blood, was nowhere to be found. Instead they removed a sickly uterus, fallopian tubes, and ovaries. Today we received more astounding news as the biopsies of the surrounding organs proved clean of any malignancies. Of all people I think my mom was resigned to the will of our Father in Heaven. I know that with all her celebrating she felt a twinge of guilt at the suffering that she has been spared when she has watched so many others tremble under that same suffering. No chemo, no more surgery. She should be out of the hospital tomorrow. A lot of gratitude. My Mom is asking why her. Why were our prayers answered as they were? Maybe those answers will come. But we are all truly grateful.

Giving Thanks

Tonight my Family gathered for a home evening given by my Dad. He passed a bowl of paper around the room and asked us to tear off pieces as we each remembered the hardest thing we've had to face in our lives. After the bowl was full of shredded paper he dumped it on the floor and said "we could look at this pile and think,'these are the broken pieces of my life, I could have done so much if not for all these horrible things that had happened to me' or we can look at them in an entirely different way." He picked up the shreds and put them back in the bowl then he started throwing them into the air. " These shreds could also be confetti, and we could celebrate every hard thing we have conquered and every experience that has enriched our character and our capacity for compassion and feeling."
Then all the priesthood holders in our family gathered around my mom to give her a blessing. After over a year of seemingly random suffering the docs finally found the source it seems and she will have surgery to remove and stage the cancer and to see what needs to be done tomorrow. It's amazing how the spirit can refine us and something that could turn us bitter and small can enlarge our souls. My mom has been an amazing example of that this past year as she put her suffering aside and went to work doing all she could, as she always has, for others. I am so grateful for the legacy she has made for all of us and for her sure knowledge of the plan of salvation. She is so at peace with her life and so at peace with the thought of stepping through the door to the next.

Random Acts of Cuteness

Having fun with cousin Mathew. This boy seems to bring out the playful side in everybody. He has the biggest personality and we love being around him.

Holloween Parade

We went trick-or-treating in my sister's neighborhood. We made our own parade with nine of my parents twelve grandchildren. It was intense. These amazing costumes were all engineered by my amazing mother who put them together in less than two weeks.

Shailee's 5th Birthday

Pictures curtousy my sister's camera. Here are some long overdue photos of Shailee's B-day. Instead of throwing a party this year we let the babies pick a fun place to go. Shailee chose the children's museum. We got there and it was closed! Such a bummer. But we headed over to the Aquarium/Botanical Gardens instead and my sister treated us all. They have a "children's garden" with everything giant size. The bugs, the rocks, the vegtable garden, There is a pumpkin you can walk through and a bird nest you can sit in. The aquarium has sharks, sea turtles, jelly fish etc. We had a great time with Shailee's Aunt Elissa and cousin Mathew.
Shailee is five and adds so much spice to our family. She is intelligent and compassionate and funny and so full of Zest for life. She experiences everything dramatically. I love this about her, although I have to admit that sometimes she requires more energy than I have, I wouldn't change her unique qualities and I'm so grateful to have her in our home. Her life is a singing, dancing, musical experience and I can't wait to see who she becomes.