One Year Anniversary- Happy End of Chemo Day!

One year ago on December 22nd, we had a wonderful celebration. It was Natalie's last day of chemo and an organization called Heroes For Children threw an amazing surprise Princess Ball to help us celebrate the milestone. Here are a few of my favorite moments of the night.




I loved when David and Natalie were dancing. In the newspaper there was a fabulous picture of this dance where David lifted his Princess off her feet. It is my favorite picture of the night.
The last few weeks I have been driving David's car because my car went in for some repairs and we haven't bothered moving the car seats back. I noticed an old newspaper tucked between his seat and the inner console of the car. I pulled it out and it was the newspaper article from the Princess Ball with him and Natalie dancing together. The paper was worn, it looks JUST like it has been there for an entire year. I thought of how many times he has probably cleaned his car out over an entire years time. He hasn't thrown it out or even brought it inside to put away, he keeps it close by. It really touched me that it was there. I know how special that night was to him.



Coincidently, Natalie's monthly CBC and her exam by the oncologist happened to fall on the 22nd. For some reason that made me a little nervous when I thought of it a week ago, but I was feeling better about it yesterday. Her blood work looks great, a year later and still cancer free as we hope and believe she will always continue to be.
She chose "Christmas colors" for her bandage for her pokie. Here she is practicing writing, she is writing "all the names of people we love."

We decided to start a couple of new traditions to celebrate this special day, all of them were surprises for our girl. The first was special peopcorn to help us remember her Princess Ball. The color combination we wanted was all out of stock (probably the only disappointment of the day), but we will plan further in advance next year. Either way, we still enjoyed starting a new tradition and no one cared that it wasn't quite right.


The Nutcracker has been a special tradition in David's family since before he was born. He introduced his tradition to me the first year we were dating and right away I fell in love with the performance. We have gone almost every year since we met. For us it almost isn't Christmas without it. The first Christmas after Natalie got sick, we did not make it to a performance that year, instead I bought her the movie Barbie and the Nutcracker and we watched that movie over and over on 'hard days.'
Two Christmases ago, Natalie spent most of the month in the hospital, but somehow we made it to a performace after we were invited by Candlelighters to come to a showing normally put on for kids. The Colonel was just a few months old and he seemed to love the show. That year, Natalie also performed a number from the Nutcracker for her little dance class recital, making it even more special to us.
Isn't she cute. Poor baby was so tired, she had a hard time keeping up. She had just gotten out of the hospital the night before. I think the only reason they let her out was because they knew how important her show was to her. She was SO excited about it, she had been practicing all fall. That evening she ended up in ICU, crazy!


It occurred to me, that making the 22nd the night we always go to the Nutcracker would be perfect. Sadly, we felt that The Colonel wouldn't be able to hold still for the show and we left him at home. We hate excluding him, but he had fun with his cousins. We had a perfect night with Our Princess. She wore her ball gown, which made it even more special!

Natalie loved the stairs, she thought it was so fun to wlk down them like a princess, which meant holding her hands like that in front of her and keeping a demure, straight face. She was walking like that from the car too. So adorable.
Natalie got so many compliments on her dress, how pretty she was, and was told by several people that she looked just like Clara. I think at least 20 people stopped her and gave her compliments, and if I had to count the number of people who said something as she walked by to me or to their group, it would be over a hundred. She seemed to create a buzz whereever she went. It is a gorgeous, amazing dress...and she is a gorgeous little lady as well. We're going to have to make sure these things don't go to her head:)
She LOVED this Nutcracker. She also loved taking her picture with the Nutcracker prince and two of the mice during intermission, I don't have that picture scanned yet, but she looks cute. David bought her a special Nutcracker. We had a hard time picking it out because they were all so great, in the end I got to decide and I picked a unique gold Nutcracker.
Natalie loved the show, she was entertained the entire time and every one around could tell from her body language how much she loved it. She was disappointed when she found out we couldn't "record the entire show." We were in balcony seats and Natalie was in front of David and I up against the railing, she could see everything very well and it was perfect for David and I; she was close enough we could touch her easily and whisper answers to some of her questions and at the same time we could watch her reactions to everything.
Here she is posing with this present ornament that she got for me. It was interesting, David was having Natalie pick out which one she wanted (she was in love with them from the MOMENT she saw them) and was all ready to buy it. The lady just grinned and told us to just take it, she was giving it to Natalie. It was very sweet. Sometimes you get used to people doing nice things BECAUSE your kid has cancer, but this lady didn't know anything about Natalie and she just gave it to her (maybe just because she is so cute).

It's kind of funny, because yesterday after clinic we stopped at the Starbucks in the hospital skybridge. I was treating Natalie to a big brownie and Naked Juice (which she thought was a very funny name). Right after I finished paying she asked for a little bag of nuts that were next to the register. I told her sorry since I had already paid. The lady looked at her and whispered, go ahead and just take them. Another kindness. And, in true Natalie style she ignored that brownie and ate those nuts instead. I'm not sure Natalie gets how special it is when people do such nice things for her, but I do and I am especially conscious of it at this time of year.

Just last week, we were coming out of the GI clinic and the valet (he was an old man of about 80-I love older people) bent down and asked her, "are you married? (implying he might like to ask for her hand)" Then he grinned and said, "cause' your pretty cute, ya know." Oh she loved that. I really appreciate all the people who take their time to be so kind and make my children feel so special. Kind words and compliments really do mean a lot, and so many people seem so willing to give those to my children. I will always be grateful for the kindness of strangers and hope that I might be able to remember to do the same for others.

She held her Nutcracker up for the entire show so he could see too and when we went down the stairs she would have me hold him (so she wouldn't drop him) until the last step and then she would take him back and carry him down that one last step. She is so funny.

Natalie loved the show. Her favorite part turned out to be the same as part David and I love--the Russian dancer. When the music started for that part she very excitedly whispered, "Dad, this it THE music of the whole show!"
We couldn't have had a better night, it was perfect. David and I were in heaven watching her loving it so much, especially because it is something we love too. I also loved glancing over and watching David's face light up as he watched our precious baby. I could see the glimmer and happiness in his eyes, it felt so good and made me so happy. For a moment, I remembered one of the worst moments in my life...hearing and watching David tell his family on the phone that his baby had cancer. We had just found out 15 minutes before and we didn't know much yet, to hear his voice say those words and hear his heart breaking and hear him crying was one of the worst moments in my life. I felt the same, but it was devestating to know of his hurt too, it was one of the moments that I will never forget. And last night was such a contrast to that.

We are so very, very grateful (more than words can say) for Natalie's health and happiness. One year later and she has come so far. She gets stonger every day, in fact on Monday she was able to climb the little rock wall at our park for the first time ever. Stength has always been something Natalie has lacked since the beginning of her chemo. I think many younger children could climb that wall, but now she can do it too. It is a cycle, the more she can do the stonger she gets and the more she can do. She has truly come miles and miles and we celebrate each victory with her.

I was trying to find a certain video clip of Natalie reciting the Night Before Christmas. My videos are all disorganized and I had to look through a lot of things to find it. As I did, I came across some videos I have not seen in a long, long time. I thought I would share a few, to show WHY we are SO grateful for her to be done with chemo and why it is such a celebration.
Her darn abdominal pain, she has come so far here even though as we saw last month it can still come back easily. This was the hardest thing for her and for us to watch.
Isn't she cute in these socks, trying to be like Daddy. But sad that she knows about the hospital.
Learnign to walk again, her physical therapy is making a big difference, so is ending the month steroids. She couldn't even sit up for a while, and here she is getting close to walking again.