Our Trip to Spokane

Well, as I mentioned in my post before, we went to Spokane at the end of June for Matthew to do a bone marrow transplant. He was feeling pretty crummy, but he still went out an did things with us all week.

Here is Daddy and Parker on our shuttle in the airport parking lot.

Me and Parker on the airplane... This was Little Man's first airplane ride!

 He asked what the bags were for and I told him. After that he started pretending to throw up. Eeeww!

We didn't have a car while we were there, so everything we did had to be within walking distance of our hotel. (Otherwise we would have had to take taxis which would have been fine, but we would have been left with a car seat to lug around town.) This ended up not being a problem because our hotel was right on the river walk. Talk about a great location!

We arrived right in the middle of Hoop Fest... I have never seen anything like it before! Almost all the streets and parking lots in downtown were closed and hundreds and hundreds of basketball hoops were set up for 3 on 3 tournaments. They even had big bridges closed down and hoops set up on them. It was cool to see, but also crazy. They said 250,000+ people go to Spokane for Hoop Fest.

We were a little worried about keeping Parker entertained while we were there, but that was not hard to accomplish at all! He loved walking on the paths by the river either in his stroller on wearing his monkey backpack. He also fell in love with the carousel. We rode it every day, sometimes twice a day! We rode the Sky Tram that takes you over the falls. He got a little nervous a few times, but still had lots of fun. We also fed the ducks almost every day... Parker and I even got chased by them! It was a little scary. Matt went to bed a little early one night and Parker and I went out to do stuff. We were feeding the geese when some really aggressive big white ones came over and started chasing us. They chased us up some stairs and halfway across a bridge before I finally threw some bread to deter them and then booked it away as fast as I could go. They were not going to give up! I have to say that his favorite part of the trip was going to the children's museum. There were so many fun activities to do. We had to trick him to get him to leave. (Evil, I know.) We also took him to see Cars 2. I'll be honest... It was a little bit of a letdown. I thought the best part of the movie was the Toy Story short film at the beginning. Haha!

 Well, here are some pictures from our trip...

Parker feeding the ducks, geese and seagulls.

 Here are a few from the museum.

Parker and Daddy digging

(They were to busy digging to look at the camera.)

 On a wiggle rider in the little city they had set up

 His first time painting. He LOVED it!

 This carousel has a pretty cool history behind it and how it ended in Spokane. All of the animals are hand carved. The horses even have real hair for tails!

 Here we are!

 Yep, he was having a ball!

 This was a really cool slide.

The biggest Radio Flyer I have ever seen!

Parker being cute

Having fun on our last night there.

Well, since there is so much that we DIDN'T do or see, we want to go back for a family vacation... With a car so we can really explore and experience all that beautiful Spokane has to offer.

A Hero

So! I pretty much have an amazing husband who had the opportunity to donate bone marrow... AGAIN! And he was willing to do this for a complete stranger. He is awesome.

He has been on the National Bone Marrow Registry since he was in high school. There was a sick little boy here in town and they held a bone marrow drive and he signed up to be on the registry.

The first time he was called and asked to donate was in 2004. It was such an amazing experience... Especially a year later when we had the chance to meet the man and his family that Matthew so unselfishly helped. 

We have since become great friends with that family and hope and pray for the same outcome for the recipient of this donation.

At the end of June they started the process here in Pocatello by giving him his first two rounds of injections of the growth hormone. After that we flew down to Spokane where they finished the injections and harvested his stem cells and platelets. The injections that they gave him were to make his bones mass produce stem cells that would enter his blood stream. It was the same procedure as his first donation, and the cells were taken via his blood stream. When most people thing of a bone marrow donation they think of it being taken from the hip bones. Depending on the type of illness this process seems to work better. 

They picked up Matthew a little after 4 am and got the party started. This was him around 10:30 when I got there with Parker. 

 His blood was taken from his left arm and this machine would separate the stem cells and platelets (the good stuff) and put the rest back into his right arm. (Which was strapped down to the bed because the first time he donated he didn't want the nurse to see him going potty and bent his arm too much during the procedure and messed up the return blood needle and caused an hour delay while they had to re-do all the lines and clean the machine because he had contaminated it. They didn't want that to happen again because they were on a very tight schedule to finish the procedure and get it to the airport on time.)

 Parker was a little worried about Daddy at first, but quickly got over it. :)

 The return line. The gave him more fluids than they took out (they added saline), but he was left with a critically low level of platelets. It usually takes 2-3 weeks for the counts to build back up.

 Matthew with his team. He sent me a text that morning stating that he had lost his wedding ring and asked me to look for it. (He was guessing it was in the pool because he had taken Parker swimming the day before and had gotten sunscreen on his hands.) But when I got to the center and saw him with all these cougars I decided he had conveniently just forgotten it that morning. LOL! JK! Good thing a little boy at the hotel found it and turned it in to the front desk.

 This is Matthew with the goods! It is hard to believe that this much fluid can be life saving! His counts were twice as high as they were hoping for, so they were able to give half to the recipient immediately and freeze the other half for later. How cool is that?!?

Well there you have it... The reason for our trip to Spokane. Matthew will be taken off the registry now because they don't have the research available for how these hormones affect the donor long term after more than two donations. The only reasons they would allow him to donate again would be for and immediate family member or for a previous recipient. 

I'll be honest... I am so proud of him, but I am really glad that he (FINGERS CROSSED!) won't have to go through this again. He was in a lot of pain from the hormones leading up to the donation, and in a lot of pain for about a week after. It also really affected his lungs this time making it hard for him to breath.

Good job, Honey! I know you don't like it when people call you this, but you really are a hero!

If you are interested in becoming part of the national registry, you can do so by going to www.marrow.org and they will send you a kit for you to do a cheek swab and return to them. Or you can attend a local bone morrow drive. 

It's Great To Be Three!

Happy Birthday!

To my sweet Little Man & nephew, Tucker.

Their big days are a week shy of being a year apart. Parker turned 3 and Tucker turned 2. 

This year Grammie and Grandpa decided to take the boys to see Thomas in Heber City. (Parker loved it so much last year, and this year he loved it too!)

Here is Parker and me during our ride. We had a window seat, and you better believe he was pretty much hanging out the window the whole time!

 Parker and Grandpa

 Parker and Grandpa @ the hay maze... Right after this picture we noticed the signs that said not to sit or stand on the hay. Oops!

 Parker with Sir Topham Hatt. I think that it is so funny that this guy doesn't creep him out. 

I started Parker out young and let him get a tattoo.

Tucker got one too. Here are the boys comparing their new ink.

 The main attraction! It amazes me that this engine can cause so much excitement.

 Trying to get these two to both look at the camera at the same time is pretty exciting.

 Me and my Little Man. He's sporting his new birthday hat from Grammie and Grandpa.

That night we had a party for the boys at Grammie and Grandpa's house. 

 Oh boy! Cake is on the way!

 I love the Jackson Family tradition of putting a toy on the cake... Well, in this case two toys - for two cute boys!

He loved these tools from Great Papa and GG!

 These two got so spoiled! It was like Christmas morning with wrapping paper and toys everywhere!

 And when I say 'it was like Christmas morning,' I mean it! We looked outside and it was snowing... At the end of May! The next morning we woke up to this horrible site! LOTS OF SNOW! YUCK!

 The fresh 4" of snow we woke up to on May 29th. Not cool, Mother Nature. Not Cool!

So other than all that snow it was a great weekend. The weather was actually perfect for going to visit Thomas. The boys both had a ball. (Well, actually, Parker got a little cranky and hit another kid at the imagination station. YIKES! But in his defense there was about 100 kids all gathered around the tables trying to play with 70 trains. But still, it was NOT okay!)

Thanks, Mom and Dad! I know my little man had a great time and we had a really fun weekend with you.

When Parker and I headed home on Monday LaRae called and had us come out to the house and have cupcakes with the family. They had the house decorated and threw him a little Party. He loved it. :) I wish I would have had my camera... The SD card was full. I had to borrow Caity's when we were in Wyoming. I guess that means it's time to clean it off.

Big Announcement!!!

(No, we are NOT expecting... Check back later for that announcement.)

We're Moving!

Someday... Hopefully soon!

FOR SALE! 

4 beds, 3 baths, 2 car garage, open floor plan, vaulted ceilings, large yard (we more than doubled the size of our backyard with lots more room for it to grow.) 

All this in a quite neighborhood.

P.S. It also has brand-new carpet through the ENTIRE house! It looks amazing!

And our dogs are living in Boise with Aunt Vicki for the time being... So they haven't even had the chance to mess the new carpet up! Thanks, Aunt Vicki! You are a life saver! We love you!

So Matthew applied for a new job and got it... In Salt Lake. 

He is still working for Union Pacific, but his no longer on the trains. He is now teaching! Yay! He is teaching new-hire classes.

He will travel quite a bit - especially in the first year since they have hired so many new employees.

So... He is in Salt Lake (and all over the country - He was in Illinois during all the tornado craziness that was going on) and I am still here... Trying to sell our house. I hope that it sells soon. I don't like being a single mom. And Parker misses his Daddy. And I miss my Hubby.

I have some pretty mixed emotions about all of this. 

I am very excited for something new and different. I am excited to be so close to so much... Basketball games, soccer games, baseball games, concerts, museums, amusement parks, zoos, MY FAMILY (Rikki and Rory will be right there, and my parents will be just over an hour away.)...

But I'm also sad. We will miss Matt's family. And all of our amazing friends. And I feel like this is the end of my career. I've worked REALLY hard building my clientele... And now I feel like I'm walking away from it all... After 7 years of hard work. 
It makes me sad. Really sad.
I hope all of this works out... And I just want our house to sell so that it won't all be unknown anymore. 
So, I will keep you posted. 
And please pray for us. 
Thanks. :)

Let's Cruise, Baby!

Warning:

This post has a million-ish pictures.

(But in my defense, I didn't even post a 10th of the pictures I took.) :) 

So in March we went on a Western Caribbean cruise with our friends Matt & Jerrica. 

We had a ball!

I love, love, LOVE our cruise partners and can't wait till round 2! Jerrica and I got to know each other pretty well just before she got put in YW with me and then we became even better friends after. We started talking about going on a vacation together and finally booked a cruise in January... And hoped that our hubbies would get along. Good thing that they did. We teased them that they were on a mancation or a Mattcation. 

So my mom was awesome enough to take Parker for us for the week, and Matt and I had the time of our lives... Although we REALLY missed little man. (I cried when we dropped him off.)

Well, here are a *few* pictures of our amazing week in paradise.

This is us just messing around on the ship waiting to be able to get into our cabins before we set sail.

 Our Cruise Partners: Jerrica and Matt

 Us @ dinner on the first night

Us with our cruise director, George

 Us @ our first port-of-call in Cozumel

 Matt getting ready to para sail 

 It's my turn!

 Aaaahhh! I want to go back!

Yummy!

Us having and 'unBELIZEable' time in Belize... We are getting ready to go cave-tubing.

 Me in one of the caves

 Matt in one of the caves

 My favorite port-of-call... Isla Roatan, Honduras

 All harnessed in and ready to go zip-lining!

Yikes!

 Matt and his new furry friend

 Us with our assistant waiter, Alexander... He was so dang cute!

 Our head waiter, Erika with Jerrica and Matt

 A view of our ship from Grand Cayman... The Carnival Glory

 Yay! We went swimming with Dolphins...

And sting-rays!

 Look out behind you!

 I love Ray!

 Aaawww! What a sweet kiss.

 Us @ dinner on one of the formal nights

 Hanging out in Miami waiting to fly home. 

I know! These pictures do NOT do our vacation justice! It is so hard to choose just one or two from each event to show your whole vacation.

Like I said, I can't wait to go again! 

Our first cruise was so much fun and so relaxing, but this cruise was fun in a different way. It was so fun to have friends there to eat dinner, go to shows, play games, and make awesome memories. Yay for having a good time!

Everyone who said they were going next time... You better start saving your pennies! I'm saving mine! ;)