Ryan

Christmas

Christmas morning

Ryan and Adman

She lost her first tooth!!

Kyle and I at Light the Night

Ryan at Light the Night

Ryan in her soccer uniform..."Sparklers"

The first day of school!

How weird it is to think a year and a half ago we were saying several daily prayers for Ryan to pull through this. She is doing FANTASTIC, so obviously all the prayers have worked. Other than her appointments once a month down to UCLA, and taking chemo pills daily, she is like any other 5 and 1/2 year old little girl. She was able to start Kindergarten when she was supposed to in the fall. She is doing great! We just received her second report card of the year and she is father ahead then she should be. No signs of any delays (which is a concern and we have her teachers look for that due to the chemotherapy). Her hair has grown in sooooooo cute. Although, unfortunately I think she has her fathers hair. It is curly and course! Thicker than it was before and a little darker, but very cute on her. She has been such a great sport through all this! We put her hair into a pony-tail the other day, she was so excited. She has been wearing cute pig-tails to school, but the pony-tail was a huge deal. There has only been one hospital stay and it was just due a fever and low "counts". We have not even had to take her out of school for low "counts", like we had expected. She did have a dental procedure done on New Years Eve. She had a lot of cavities that needed to be filled (a side effect of the chemo/Leukemia). Her dentist (and I) thought it would be better to have her sedated and just get it all done at one time instead of breaking it into several visits. Everything went great! She recovered well from the anesthesia and it feels great to have that all done and over with.

Over the holidays we had some visitors. Grandma Gabe came for Thanksgiving which we hosted at our house. We had a great time with her Tie-dying shirts and doing lots of fun activities. We sure wish she lived closer! Grandpa came also right before Christmas. We had an awesome visit with him also. Logan had the whole menu planned out within 30 min of him being here. She loves to cook in the kitchen with her Grandpa, all of them do!! He was able to make it down to UCLA with us for one of Ryan's appointments. I like it when he can come because I think it makes him feel more a part of everything going on with her. He likes to ask questions and hear it from the docs as well as us. Overall, it was another great visit with Grandpa!!!!

We just received some great news that Sarah and their family will be moving back to Bakersfield. We are so excited! This will be great to have all of us in one town again! I said to Kyle the other day now all 7 of your siblings will be up in the stands cheering for you at your soccer games, imagine the noise we can all make :)!!

Overall things have been great! Please continue to pray that there are no serious side effects from the medications that Ryan is taking. I hear rumors of a meeting with the doctors after she is all done (August 12th, 2010) where they explain exactly what long term side effects there can be. We will continue to take our chances considering the alternative, I just hope that God continues to guide her through this as unaffected as possible.

I am hoping to turn this into a family blog at some point, just not sure when :P?! We appreciate all the continued support and hope this update finds everyone doing well!

Love to all XOXO!!!

Welcome to our Team's Homepage

Welcome to our Team's Homepage

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Summer Fun Part 2

While we were visiting the Leonard family we decided to take a little side trip up to Whidbey Island. Matthew and I were both stationed there while we were in the Navy and I wanted the kids to see it! After spending the day with Sarah and the kids in Seattle at the aquarium we headed towards Deception Pass. Deception Pass is incredible, although only Kyle, Logan, and I got out because the little ones were sleeping. We went into Oak Harbor and spent the night. We remebered there was a drive-in there so we took the kids to Harry Potter. No one except Matthew and Kyle made it all the way through. Even I feel asleep! The next morning we took them to the base, although we could not get on unless we were escorted by someone we knew that was active duty...bummer :(! It was still neat to see. Then we drove down the island and stopped off at Fort Casey for a little hiking and exploring. We had a blast! We then took the ferry accross which is what I was really excited for. I thought the kids would love it!

The kiddos at the drive-in

The back seat flips over.....perfect for a drive-in ;)!!

Our hike at Fort Casey

A fort we found on the beach

Of course there were a variety of weapons of wood found on the beach

Logan

Ryan with her pockets full of rocks, and her magic wand!

Princess Ryan

Summer Fun

Hello! Hope this update finds everyone well?! We have had an awesome summer! Last year we had planned on driving Kyle up to WA for his summer visit, and we were not able to because that is when Ryan had started showing symptoms. Well, this year we decide to take that trip!!!! Sarah and Jaime had offered us a place to stay if we came, so we loaded the kiddos up in the van and started driving. We had a great time! It was so nice to visit their home, and finally be able to put a picture to the place. Not to mention seeing Kyle after several weeks. We also were able to get all of the kids together. Including Ella who is also there for the summers. We had not seen her in 3 or more years. We went to the park, the beach, hiking..kinda, and most importantly just hung out together and let the kids play!

ALL the kids!

Top-Ryan, Kyle, Adam, Logan

Bottom-Christian, Cait, Shamus, Ella

Silly Faces

Sarah and Christian

No words

The little men having a serious talk...they sat there

for at least 5-10 minutes talking...I love this one ;)

Kyle and Logan

Kyle...King of the Castle

The Castle that has a "Warning Hazordous" Sign

My Beautiful Girls!

Logan- the future outdoors woman

Ryan Paige

The boys takin a rest

Kyle up in a tree

Adam hiding during their game of hide-and-seek at the park

The Awesomest Dad/Husband!

Christian climbing a tree

Shamus...the cutest little man ever ;)

Ryan and Cait at the park

All the kiddos again

Thank you so much to the whole Leonard Family for opening your home to all of us. We had a great time and look forward to the next visit! We miss you all already!

Heeelllloooo!

Hellllllooooo!!!  I can not believe how long it has been since I have posted.  It has been crazy busy for us and I am happy to report that currently all is well.  Lets see....where to begin????!!!...

Ryan at Relay for Life

The kiddos at the Fire station on Easter

Ryan with her friend Payton at preschool

Ryan at the station on the back of the fire truck

Ryan at school for her Easter party

Ryan Riding a two wheeler!

The kiddos acting goofy 

We were seeing the I-max feature while down in LA

Ryan had a birthday at the end of March.  March 30th was her birthday and Adams was on the 10th of March so we had a huge birthday bash for both of them on the 29th of March.  It was a Hawiian theme, and we had a huge bounce house, arts and crafts table and a whole lot of fun! We had a great time and there were probably 20-25 kids running around...it was great.

Beautiful girls!!!

Unfortunately, we had to post-pone our trip to Disney World through Make-A-Wish.  Ryan had her longest hospital stay since she was first diagnosed.  She got her counts drawn on a Monday and they were only 400, by Tuesday she had a temperature, and off to Memorial Hospital we went.  Her labs kept giving us crazy results and her counts continued to drop...so, there we sat. Finally, after 3 days, she was released from the hospital....that night she spiked another fever. Back to the hospital we went for another 3 days. She got discharged the day before we were due to leave for our trip.  With the swine flu going on and her counts just not high enough to take her on an airplane (I would have been a nervous nellie the whole time), we decided to wait on the trip.  Matthew called Make-A-Wish....they were incredible.  Very understanding!  The kids were bummed, but also very understanding.  What great kids we have!

So, since then she has been home and doing well.  We just had her counts drawn this past Monday and they are now up to 1600...AWESOME.  We also had her appointment down at UCLA on Tuesday and all went well.  They started her back on her oral chemo.  (When her counts drop so low they stop all chemo). Now she is back on them and we will see how well she does.  I may have explained this before so I will just recap.  The goal is to have her on as much as her body can tolerate, without having her counts "in the toilet".  The goal range is between 750 and 1500. So, they take it week by week and increase it by 25% each week.

I am so excited to report...the little boy that I had asked everyone to pray for a while back, Ryan Wilson, had his bone marrow transplant from his sister and is doing very well.  After many weeks in the hospital at UCLA, he is now home and doing great!  Thank you to all those who prayed for him.  He is such a cutie!  

We are all excited for summer, right around the corner.  Sarah, Kyle's mom and their family will be coming down here for Kyle's graduation.  We can not wait to see them.  At the end of the summer we have a trip planned to Michigan, and can not wait to get back there.  It has been 2 years since we have been back there to see everyone.  We miss them all so much!  

I promise I will not let this much time pass before my next entry.  Thank you to everyone who continues to pray for Ryan.  June 16th will be 1 year since she was diagnosed and I plan to make a tribute video.  We are about a year and a half from the "cure date."  All is going according to plan so far and we just pray for all to stay on track.  Hope this entry finds everyone well!

Love to all!

More pictures!

The kids playing outside

My beautiful Mom

My sister and her "man" Mike

Julie, Me, Mom, and Matt

Ryan at our UCLA appt on the 10th of Feb

We are fans for obvious reasons!

Adam reading to Ryan from Mommy's book

I love these moments!