Zoe's therapy dog...

After much consideration.....we now have a 12 week old Standard poodle. We have been seeing Standard poodles as 'therapy' dogs in the last couple of years at different places. Zoe does 2-3 hours of therapy everyday. Sometimes it is hard to always have someone sitting with her to keep her company. Sooooo the therapy dog idea came into the picture!
This was last year when we talked about it with Zoe. She was very interested. BUT...we couldn't find one for less than $1000.00 !! The average price was $1500.00!! Obviously, we dropped the idea.
Last week, while going to sleep, Zoe had what we call a 'meltdown'. She was crying, very sad and upset. She wanted a 'therapy' dog, to keep her company during treatments, one she could call her own, to love her. I felt soooo bad. Yes, I am a guppy.
Now, the magic of all this....we get this free local paper every week in the mail. I have NEVER seen an ad for Standard poodles in this paper. This week there was one!! Not only that, but they were CKC registered white 11 week old pups. For ONLY $250.00!!! I called the lady immediately...yes, she had 3 females left...so Alex and I secretly hit the road to go get one! One of the pups (the one that we both liked the best),,came over to us and layed right next to us....she picked US!
Zoe was soooo happy!!!
We will train Lilly to sit with Zoe during all of her treatments. We think this will be a great thing for Zoe.

Christmas 2010

Christmas was beautiful this year! We had a houseful.....it was quite busy! As most of our readers know, my best friend, Mel, passed away 1 year ago. Her daughter, Jazmine, has become a member of our family...we love her just like our own! This year she was able to spend her Christmas vacation with us. This was a very special time for all of us. A super Thank You goes out to all of Mel's friends that sent Jazzy Christmas gifts, cards, letters...everyone was read and cherished by Jazzy. I can truly say she had a memorable Christmas.

All of our grown children made it home also! They all took their vacation times to spend 10-12 days with us. We stayed up late Christmas Eve, wrapping presents, laughing, hugging and totally enjoying each other's company.

Christmas day took about 5 hours to open gifts! We have a tradition where we start with the youngest, watch her open one gift, then go to the next person. Soooo when you have 13 people in your house....it takes a while to watch everyone open their gifts! It was lovely!!

During the two week time, we played a lot of cards, board games, pool, ping pong....tons of jumping on the new trampoline (everyone realized then how out of shape they were)...cooking, eating, drinking, staying up way too late and sleeping in way too late...laughed and hugged a ton...

For New Year's Eve, we all got to be treated like royalty at the movie theater. Elaine, our new friend who works at the CFF office, also works at the Regal theater. She arranged a lovely experience for all of us. 16 of us (all staying at our home at the time) arrived at the theater, Elaine greeted us with warm smiles and hugs, then we had a tour of the upstairs where they have the films. It was amazing! All the movies are in one long room. At this theater, most of the movies are still real film, only one was digital. Zoe was the special guest, so everyone else went down to the 'reserved' section for us to watch the new Narnia movie. Zoe stayed up top with Dad and Mom, to wave at everyone through the window, then push the button to start our movie! It was fantastic! After, Elaine had Narnia t-shirts, silly bands, notebooks and posters for all! Thank you Elaine!

Then a lovely dinner at Pepper's Mexican Cantina....fireworks and champagne at our home later to bring in 2011!!

The luggage 'piggy tags' were special to give to Jazzy for her new luggage(thanks to gift cards from Mel's friends)...they were mine and everytime I went to Mel's house, she was always wanting my 'piggy tags' for her luggage. So, I gave them to Jazzy and told her the story. We both were in tears....


It was a magical time...as my sister-in-law, Courtney sais....I LOVE MY LIFE!!!

slideshow above

Bad news for a drug that we all thought was promising...

A drug, Denufosol, that all in the CF community was hoping was going to help with CF, just failed its Phase 3 trials. This is the first 'promising' drug that has failed in such late Phases since Zoe's diagnosis. I feel very saddened by this loss....that wasn't even here yet. Hope....crushed.

http://www.newsobserver.com/2011/01/04/898053/clinical-trials-let-down-inspire.html

Fall......

It has been an eventful fall for our house…wonderful…but busy! I think it has been so much fun because our “CF” life seems to be stabling out. Now, I’ve been told, WARNED, I should say, that this is the “honeymoon” stage of CF for us. I’m trying not to think of it that way. It has officially been a glorious 2 years since Zoe has been in the hospital! I’m not in denial….I KNOW first hand how CF can take over very quickly….I watched it with my best friend last year at this exact time. Then she died. December 10th. 4:28 a.m…..as I held her hand. So, I KNOW. But I’m going to take this time of good health and ENJOY every minute of it!
I’m going to try to cap what we did to kind of follow the slideshow!
Fall started off with warm, sunny breezes…
I think I put the pics of Graves visiting out of order....but...he did visit us in early fall. Graves is a very dear friend of mine and now our family. He lost his best friend to CF also. He also was very good friends with Mel, my bestfriend. He was there via phone/text the whole time I was in the hospital with Mel. Then he spent the whole weekend with me and my son/daughter in law after Mel died. We drove through tons of ice and snow...all to get to Mel's funeral. Love ya Graves!

Our oldest daughter, Tara came to visit with us for a week! That was wonderful…GIRL time finally for me!
Caleb (our 19 yr. old son) had his birthday while Tara was here, we ate and celebrated at our favorite Mexican restaurant. Caleb also got a job…we are very happy for him!
Austin (our 17 yr. old son, the only one in public school) was inducted into the Beta National Honor Society! We are so proud of him!
We have not been to either sets of parents houses since Zoe’s birth. My parents (grandma and grandpa) live in East Tn., the mountains. Scott’s parents (nana and pa) live in southwest Florida in the winter, Vermont in the summer. Zoe has always gotten so car sick, she throws up constantly. We discovered Dramamine! Oh my, what a miracle drug for Zoe. She can finally travel without throwing u,p. So we decided to hit the road this fall and visit both homes! We did my parents first…my sister, (Alana, Taylor and Brandon) and her 2 children joined us. We rented a 12 passenger van and hit the road! By some wonderful miracle, it snowed the first 2 days we were there! Zoe’s big wish was to see snow…she had never seen it before. It was beautiful. It was so good to see my mom and dad, brother Andrew, his lovely wife, Courtney and their 2 precious children, Trenton and Jax. It was a wonderful visit of great food, dominoes, horse riding, candy shopping, playing in the snow and plenty of talking & laughter!
When we got home, it was time for Scott’s parents to come through on their drive from Vt. To Fl….it just happened to be the weekend of one of our favorite CFF events, Moonlight Martinis. My sis, Alana, joined us also. It was a wonderful event with plenty of donations given to the CFF!
Then there was Halloween…the dressing up…going to a Starlight Foundation hayride, corn maize, candy, etc… By the way, if your child has CF, look up the Starlight Foundation, they have branches all over. They do super fun, nice things for your whole family once a month! Then the CFF Singles pumpkin painting.
CFF Singles greatest night was next. CFF Singles is a group of single, professionals from the Jax. Area that commit to the CFF to raise at least $1500.00 each. Some raise a lot more. They get placed on one of 4 teams that has an Ambassador. Zoe has been an Ambassador for a few years now. Team Zoe! They are a great bunch of people. The greatest night celebrates all the money they raised. We are so fortunate to have so many wonderful people working towards a cure for CF!

Next was going to Scott’s parents in southwest Fl. It was beautiful weather…warm and sunny! They welcomed us with open arms…tons of great food, cocktails, card games (nana and I didn’t win…uughh! Maybe next time!). Then they had a few events planned for us. First a nice beach day, collecting shells and sharks teeth, then ice cream at a cute little shoppe. The next day was Thanksgiving meal….YUMMY! It was wonderful! Next was a ferry ride to a private island….the ferry driver was so nice, he let Zoe drive the ferry! She was all grins! Then a nice walk and pics on the beautiful beach, dinner in the island restaurant. It was all terrific and we felt spoiled!
After all that….we came home to decorate for Christmas! My favorite time of year!
Zoe did get sick after all the travels….but her docs had already called her in a huge bottle of Bactrim. She has been on it for a couple of weeks now. Her sinuses are still pretty yucky, so we will give her the full 3 week course and go from there.
Well, if you read all this…congratulations! This is what happens when I don’t update often enough. So sorry!
Take care of you and yours….
Jada