Happy 7th Birthday, Zoe!
Zoe turned 7 on April 7th, her Golden Birthday! We surprised her the day before her birthday with her first gift and a day trip with cousins. We decided to give her an American Girl doll this year. We’ve had it for years after buying it through a Today Show deal like we did with Ava’s doll. We originally said she had to learn how to read the books to be able to get an American Girl doll but after missing the window on Ava wanting to play with dolls for long, we decided to go ahead and give Zoe her doll this year even though she isn’t reading chapter books yet. She was so excited to open the box and see Melody. It was so cute when she compared her skin color to Melody’s skin and see the joy in her face that the doll matched her. Then we told her we were meeting her cousins in Charlotte for lunch and shopping at the American Girl store. She had a blast celebrating with her cousins and shopping, complete with BFF necklaces for her and Karla. For Zoe’s actual birthday, we celebrated with dinner at Cheesecake Factory and she got her first (and probably last) taste of cheesecake. She loved the design they made on the plate around her birthday cheesecake but was not a fan of the actual cake. We had so much fun celebrating our big 7 year old all weekend!!
Easter 2024
We spent Easter with my family again this year. My mom, grandmother, aunt and uncle came over for lunch. After lunch we all enjoyed an Easter egg hunt that ended same as always with one egg missing. Hopefully Zoe will find it eventually this year like last year. It was a special day celebrating Easter with my family.
Bring Your Grownup to Dance
I joined Zoe in her acro class at the end of March for Bring Your Grownup to Dance day. That class is no joke! I was sore for days from it. It was fun to get to enjoy the class with Zoe!
Radiation
After 30 daily weekday trips to the cancer institute, DJ finished radiation on March 20th! Overall, the whole process went really smoothly. There was only 1 day that the machine wasn’t working to delay treatment. He had fatigue but it was manageable. He did lose some hair but it is easily covered by his other hair. It was a long 6 weeks but we are so thankful to have this step behind us. Now we have a break before chemo starts on April 22.
Spring Break 2024
As with most things this year, spring break looked very different. We wanted to take the girls for an overnight trip but with DJ’s fatigue from radiation, we decided that wasn’t the best option. Instead, I took each girl for a day trip to Charlotte. Ava and I spent our day shopping (no pictures from that day). Zoe and I spent our day at Discovery Place. She loved the science themed museum and especially loved the recycled crafting area.
We ended spring break with ice skating at the Pavilion. Zoe was determined to teach herself how to skate. She took a few pointers from me and Ava but she actually did figure it out on her own. I don’t have any pics of her once she mastered it but here she is zooming by with the walker. She can’t wait to go skate again!
Riverbanks with the Cousins
The girls and I met up with Tiff and the kids at Riverbanks for a cousins’ day at the zoo. These crazy kids had a great time together! I’m going to post all of these pictures because this whole attempt to get a picture of the 5 of them was pure chaos and hilarious.
Random Pics of Ava from Winter
Now it’s Ava’s turn for some random pics from the past few months.
She took this selfie and I can’t get over how grown up she looks. We decided not to get her ears pierced again after the holes filled in immediately but she loves her clip on hoops!
We started full on home school with Ava this semester. It’s been fun to go on field trips with her. This was a trip to walk around the lake with Sookie. We also went to the Botanical Gardens in Clemson.
Ava started horse back riding this winter. She absolutely loves the horses and is excited to learn more about them and about riding.
Random Pics of Zoe from Winter
To minimize the number of posts, here are some random pictures of Zoe from the past few months.
She is determined to master the handstand!
Ready for her Valentine’s Day party at school with her Valentine’s from her daddy.
All snuggled up with her babies, Bobby and Bun Bun for watching TV on a Saturday morning.
Hiking at Table Rock
We decided to take the girls to Table Rock for a picnic and short hike. We took Winnie along with us and she loved every minute of it.
Marshmallow Fun
We’ve been trying to do more campfires recently and the girls are loving roasting marshmallows. Ava also discovered the fun of putting marshmallows in the microwave.
Belated Family Christmas
Christmas looked so different this year after DJ’s surgery. We are thankful we celebrated the 4 of us before surgery. We also had actual Christmas day together and did a smaller version of our brunch. My mom was with us and the girls opened a couple gifts from her. We opened the remaining gifts and celebrated with my grandmother, Eric, Jenn and Piper later in February. Unfortunately, I did not get any pictures that day. We also celebrated with DJ’s side of the family in January. Nothing looked normal this Christmas but the girls had a great time with our family and we were all so thankful to be together after such a hard few weeks.
A New Year Visit
We had a very special visit around New Year’s. Mat and Janet, the missionaries that DJ and Gunkin lived with in Malawi for 4 months, came to SC to see the guys. They have wanted to come visit for years and when they heard about DJ’s tumor, they decided it was time to make the trip. It was so good to see them. DJ and Gunkin loved talking about their time with them in Malawi and reliving so many amazing memories from those 4 months.
Holiday Lost Teeth
Zoe ended 2023 with 2 lost teeth! She lost her first tooth (well the first lost naturally…she had one pulled years ago) on Christmas day. Then she lost the 2nd tooth on New Year’s Eve. She was so excited to get a visit from the Tooth Fairy. Ava started the tooth fairy letters with Zoe a couple months ago and Zoe latched on to her fairy, Nova. She writes her all the time and loves getting letters back from her. She was so excited to finally lose a tooth and get a prize from Nova! What a way to celebrate those holidays!
DJ’s Surgery
Two nights before DJ’s surgery, our pastor, the elders, deacons, my Bible Study leaders and a few friends came over to pray for DJ. It was a beautiful time of praying bold prayers for miraculous results and for doctors to be amazed.
On December 14th, DJ had his surgery and those prayers were answered. His neurosurgeon literally said to me that it was nothing short of a miracle when he came into recovery with us. DJ spent a couple of nights in the ICU as a precaution but he was by far the healthiest person in the ICU. He had one more night in the hospital as they were trying to track seizure activity. Then on December 17th we were released to go home. Everyone was amazed at how well he was doing an the fact that he had no deficits from the surgery.
While we were in the hospital, our family and church family took great care of our girls. We had gifts, meals and groceries delivered from church friends. We are so blessed by our loving community!
It took a few weeks to get all the pathology results back from DJ’s tumor but in the end it was a low grade tumor that responds well to treatment. When we met with the medical oncologist for the first time, he said if you are going to have a brain tumor this is the one to have. DJ will go through 30 rounds of daily radiation and then 12 rounds of chemo (that are 28 days each). It is still a very long road ahead of us but we are so thankful for all the prayers that have been answered to far.
Family Portraits 2023
I was not planning on a professional family portrait session this year. The fall was hectic and I just never scheduled anything. Well, when we got DJ’s diagnosis, I asked our friend Nicole if she could take some pictures for us because we did not want to have any regrets going into surgery. She came out to our house and got some amazing shots, the dogs even got to be included. We will cherish these pictures forever!
Our Christmas 2023
Christmas this year was VERY different! Not knowing what the outcome of DJ’s surgery on the 14th would be, we decided to go ahead and celebrate Christmas early. We had our traditional brunch after opening gifts. I hadn’t had a chance to make gingerbread cookies with the girls yet so we did that as well. It was a sweet day together as a family before heading into the unknown of surgery. There was definitely a cloud over it all but it was a special day to be together.
Zoe’s Christmas Recital 2023
We were so thankful to be able to attend Zoe’s Christmas recital on Dec 7th, just a day after being released from the hospital. There was a time when we weren’t sure we’d make it. So, this recital was extra special! Zoe’s acro class danced to a medley of songs from Home Alone. At one point they all yelled out “KEVIN!” It was a cute routine and Zoe did an amazing job with her cartwheels and teddy bear handstands. We were so proud of her for doing those solo across the stage. She loves acro and it shows in her dedication to practicing the skills. We are so proud of our little acro star!
December 5, 2023
December 5th started out as a normal day but it is the day that our whole world turned upside down and is the reason the blog is so behind. The day started with getting Zoe off to school. DJ drove her to school, came home and worked out. I had just gone into the bathroom to start drying my hair to get ready for a routine doctor appointment when I heard a cookie sheet fall on the floor. Sookie was barking incessantly. I kept yelling at her from the bathroom and just assumed she had knocked stuff off the counter and that DJ was outside which was why she would not stop barking. When she wouldn’t listen to me yelling, I came out to try to get her to stop only to find DJ on the floor having a seizure. I immediately grabbed his phone and called 911. It was the scariest moment of my life. Thankfully, we live super close to the fire department and EMS arrived at our house in 5 minutes. He was conscious by the time they got there and was so confused as to what was going on. They took him to the hospital where he had a CT scan done. In all of this, I texted our 2 doctor friends from church. Dave, who works at Greenville Memorial in the ER, texted back that he was coming. He took over our care and he was the one to read the CT scan results that showed that DJ had a brain tumor. We truly cannot thank him enough for being there with us because we cannot imagine that news coming from a total stranger. We were admitted to the hospital because they thought DJ might need surgery the next day. The next day we saw the neurosurgeon who is the top one for brain tumors. He gave us some pretty scary possibilities and said he wanted to do surgery the next week. We were completely rocked by all of this but were thankful he was not heading straight to major surgery with no time to really prepare for it. We went home with a week to talk to the girls about things and get things in order for him to have surgery on the 14th.
This was such a shock to us and has consumed our lives for the past few months. But, even in all the hard we’ve seen God’s hand carrying us through it all. From the timing of the seizure (after he got home from driving Zoe but before I left and Ava was still asleep so she didn’t see it), to Dave being in the ER, to getting the best neurosurgeon we could get, to our family, church family and friends stepping up in huge ways to help us. It’s not the road we want to be on but we are thankful to have the support we have to walk this road with us. We’ve also seen so many prayers answered so far through it all.
Christmas Tree 2023
This year I did something I never thought I would do (and it turned out to be the best timing - more later)….I gave in and we got a FAKE Christmas tree! I know my dad is laughing at me and just saying I told you so. I still remember being so upset when my parents got a fake tree when I was in college. I truly did not think I’d ever get to the point of wanting one because I love picking out the tree and cutting it down. But, after dealing with the lights last year and dealing with spiders multiple years, I was ready to be done with the real tree. So, I did a lot of searching to find a fake tree I was happy with and found one at Hobby Lobby. It was a very different experience but the tree looked awesome and I didn’t have to string lights, water it or search for spider nests. I finally understand the benefits and desire for a fake tree.
Grace’s Birthday in Charlotte
Grace invited us girls to celebrate her birthday at the American Girl store and show in Charlotte this year. The girls had fun shopping at the mall and then enjoyed the cute show at the Knight Theater in uptown. It was a fun girls day out in Charlotte!
