Tuesday Morning

A fellow Leukemia patient’s mom April wrote me an email saying

" Our Heavenly Father has to be our ultimate Doctor. Our faith in God and His plans for our lives and our children’s lives is were our heads need to stay. But we have to remember we are human. Our faith will be tested over and over again and at times we will fail and we will question and we will not trust. But we will always come back to the truth. HIS WORD."

Just this last Tuesday morning my faith was put to test in a way that April said would happen.....

While I was in the other room, Kaitlyn fell out of her seat onto her head. When I found her she was awake but limp and began to throw up. Her eyes were dilated and I knew she was not good. We rushed her to CHOC were they began a C.A.T. scan to see if there was internal bleeding. In many ways they were preparing us for that. The nurses and Doctor's felt something was not good. Eric stood out side of the ex-ray room and prayed with all his might!! It was a scary time for all of us!!
With in an hour we found out everything was fine!! Praise God!! She was monitored for the day and we were sent home Tuesday night....
Kaitlyn is amazing! By the time we left she was running around the hospital talking to her favorite nurses like nothing ever happened. She is so tuff and so full of life! This is what makes up Kaitlyn and makes her such a fighter! We are so blessed that she is such a normal active two year old.
Our faith was tested and we are still dealing with such an emotional day....
Thank you for all your prayers and support for those that heard and please continue to pray that we will trust God with what ever up's and down's continue to come!
We are quoting GOD's words....
"Be strong and courageous. Do not be terrified, do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go." Joshua 1:9

 

Just showing off my big smile!!

"Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the holy spirit. " Rom. 5:5

Praise God we are doing good. Kaitlyn is in interim maintenance a period of a few weeks were her counts are good and we can get out and do some "normal things" We have been trying to make this time as fun as possible. We called up all her friends to play with her and so far she has been having a blast!! Praise God.She is as joyfull and independent as ever. Two times she developed a cold and we thought for sure we would end up in the hospital but by God's mercy she was able to fight off the infections (which can be done but is not common)
I have kept the website pictures to our family but this time I had to show some of her best friends who make this journey possible for her!!
Haley, Chloe, Phoebe, Gracie, Haley Noel, Jordan, Jeremy, Jackson, Justin, Jadon, Kylee, Jonas, Kaden, Kaia.....
Kaitlyn is so blessed with so many loving friends and family that I can't even begin to put enough pictures up! Thank you so much for all your prayers and support!!
We will begin Delayed intensification in mid October. God has a plan that we can not predict but we will trust him all the way!! The name for this part of the road map speaks for it's self from what we have heard it is extremely hard and intense. Please continue to keep our Kait Kait in your



 

Playing at home with my sister

 

Hanging with my friends

 

Going to Balboa Island with my friends

 

Playing in the water with my friends

 

At the park with my friends

 

Proverbs 16:9

9 In his heart a man plans his course,
but the LORD determines his steps.



That verse really spoke to me this morning.. any way I just wanted to update you all. Kaitlyn's counts were hovering around 100-200. She was supposed to start another round of treatment two Thursday's ago, but her counts needed to be >700. Last week the counts rose, but only to 500ish, so again the treatment was postponed (the Dr's mentioned that it is very common that if they miss one week that they will miss the second.)

That brings us to yesterday, he counts were 2200+ so she will begin treatment again. The only thing is that now she has a few procedures that need to take place, and the clinic is full on Thursday, so there is a chance the procedures will have to be done in the hospital and that is no bueno...

The clinic

"But let all those who take refuge in you be glad, let them ever sing for joy. Spread your protection over them, that those who love your name may rejoice in you." Psalms 5:10-12NIV

I wanted to send pictures of the clinic so that you could see our day to day. I wrote this verse about joy because as you can see Kaitlyn never ceases to smile! Her joy is so contagious! She spreads God's love every day with out even realizing it. I know God has great plans for her and I'm so excited to be apart of her journey even now make such a difference!! This last week we spent 4 hours waiting to be seen at the clinic. Normally we will wait any were from 30min. to 2 hours!! It was insane! When we walked into the clinic and it was standing room only I knew we were in for a long day.... But God is so good! Even though my attitude was grumpy Kaitlyn was an angel!! She played and laughed and talked her way through the entire day with no problems at all! God really is working on my heart, I know that I need to go with the flow and have joy in any circumstance!! The prayers of so many really get us through thees day to day grinds! Thank you Thank you we feel your prayers!!


 

Sisters

A few pictures of the girls together...at home Madeline is such a big help with her sister, she is always taking her off to play. She never looks at her and thinks Leukemia instead she sees sister, playmate, partner in crime, and best friend!! I prayed that God would show me how to keep Kaitlyn active and He answered that in Madeline.... they really never stop. God has brought so many days of joy and fun into our day to day stuck at home. Eric and I are so blessed and our hearts swell with pride when we look at pictures of our two girls together!! Thank you God for bringing thees girls into our lives and for allowing them to teach us so much about your love for us!! p.s. the one of them sleeping is real.... they actually slept for hours holding hands!! So cute!!

Hottest Day Ever!!!

Daddy grew up in Wasco California, so having the weather well into the 100* is nothing knew for our "farm boy" us girls on the other hand did not know what to do!! Daddy took us for Slurpee's and a drive in the air conditioned car.... what a day! God was watching out for us even then when we prayed like crazy she wouldn't have to go in to the hospital with a fever due to the weather!! Thank you so much for all your prayers!!

Our smiles

So I know that the girls look like Eric but maybe they have my smile? No matter what I think us cotter girls just love to smile for Daddy!!!

Few pics from the backyard

Ok I had a tough day at work, so what better to do than
come home and take pictures of my beatiful family

Here ya go ;-)



 

No news is good news (i guess)

First of all I wanted to thank God for where we are in Kaitlyn’s treatment. I was sitting by her bed last night watching her sleep, praying for, and rubbing her head. God is totally in control of this situation and we thank him for each day.

I really apologize for not updating you all but the thing is that we don’t know much either. Throughout this journey, it seems that we have only received “real detailed” info when she is not doing well. On the outside that doesn’t seem like a big deal, but as parents it is almost harder to process the unknown then the “bad known”. Please pray for us in the continued weeks/months in regards to this issue. For me this has been one of the most challenging weeks….

4th o'july

First of all I am sorry I/we haven't posted in a while.. but to be honest that is a great reflection of how things have been.. Basically just a grind, i think this might be our most challenging times as a family because this battle becomes so monotonous. On the good side you can know nothing bad is happening. Kaitlyn (and Heather) have a pretty long week ahead with a few "in hospital" treatments and a few 7 hour ones.. please keep them in prayer this week.

Well here is Kaitlyn's 4th of July outfit.. Notice she still hasn't lost 100% of her hair, some kids don't until 3 months, some do at day 5.. Ya never know