On the road again

Seems like just yesterday Dad was packing the car for their trip to Florida. Now it's packed again for the trip back to North Carolina. Time flies when you're having fun!!! And they have had a GREAT time in Florida! It was a much needed break from the stress of the past few months and the daily trips to Duke for treatment. But like all fun it has to come to an end and it's back to reality. Monday it's back to Duke for Mom's first follow up visit. The day starts with an 8:15 appointment. It will be a long day with scans, ultrasounds, blood work and meetings with the Dr's. We have been praying that the outcome of her first round of chemo and radiation will bring very positive results. She has been doing awesome and feels great. Nathan and I will be going Monday with her and Dad. As you can guess we are all very nervous so if you can remember to pray for us Monday morning that God will calm those nerves and give us a peace as we get the results and plan the next steps.
Now on a selfish note......I'm glad their coming home!! I've missed them!!!

S & P....

........AND IT'S NOT WALL STREET!!!!

Shantel and Parker.

Parker is my nephew who lives in Ft. Worth, Texas. When my family was all here for Christmas Shantel and Parker formed a little friendship.....which to me was very cool! One of the things I always have worried about it the fact that Shantel has never had any friends that aren't adults. Her entire life has been in and out of the hospital. She rarely has had the opportunity to attend school long enough to form friendships and when she is in the hospital she is on isolation so she's not allowed with other kids.

The night Shantel came home from Duke for Christmas Parker had stayed at the house to meet Shantel and stay with her and Grandma. Kristy and I had gone shopping and Dad and the rest of the boys went to a ball game. When we came home they were upstairs playing a game and talking. After they left for the night Shantel couldn't stop talking about Parker. She kept saying how nice he was and when she was doing her treatments he left the room but kept coming back to check on her and he even brought her a drink. Of course Shantel is a Nintendo nut so that was right up Parker's ally! So when Parker got his Nintendo for Christmas they really had something in common. So the other day Shantel is playing her Mario game and says with a huge sigh, "I need to call Parker." I said "you need to call Parker, why?" ......... "well, he's the only one who can get me unstuck from level six" Who knew!!!!!!

Thanks Parker for being so sweet and so thoughtful!!! Your a special kid!! I'm so proud of you for being so kind and wanting to hang out with Shantel!!

Tea...for two.....plus 90....

..........was the surprise Mom received last week!!! She had been telling me she was going to a Bible study and woman's tea with Julie Witchie and she was a little nervous because she didn't know a lot of the ladies. See, you have to know my Mom. She hates being the center of anything and I think she was more nervous that she hadn't seen a lot of these people since her cancer diagnosis and she didn't want to have people fussing over her. We all encouraged her to go and have a good time......which she always does once she gets out. Plus we knew it would be good for her to be around other people.
Well, to Moms surprise the tea was in her honor! She was very shocked and surprised.....as were all us kids since Dad kept it quiet!!! There were 90 some women there and they had a great time. They presented her a basket full of cards and notes and a couple gifts.
Thank you Ladies at Word Of Life RV Park for making a special day for my Mom!!! You will never fully realize how much it meant to her!!! This has not been an easy time for her but she has totally enjoyed the fellowship these past three weeks being in Florida!
Please continue to pray for her. The future is a little scary for all of us right now but we know God has a great plan!

BACK AT DUKE

Shantel has been admitted again at Duke. We were so happy to have her home for the past seven days!! Her CF is just so advanced at this point that small things like temperature change can make it difficult for her to breath. We pretty much have this going to the hospital routine down pat! Shantel just amazes me. She faces every set back head on and never complains. She's more worried about leaving her dog Molly than she is about herself! I remember when we told her Mom had cancer. She was going through a third round of kidney stones and was in step down. The kid was in unreal amounts of pain and on painkillers but she was more concerned about how Mom was doing. She's just that way......super kind, considerate, always thinking of others and sweet!
We had our first transplant clinic visit yesterday. More to come on that!

LET IT SNOW.....

Snow isn't a common event here so it was pretty exciting to see 4 inches of the white stuff. Shantel was BEGGING to go outside but since it would have put her into broncho spasms that was a no! So the next best thing was to take pictures through the window......not exactly the same but still fun. Molly wasn't sure what to do at first. After she figured out she could eat the snow it was a whole different ballgame! All I can say is thank goodness I live in North Carolina and snow is rare!!!

A Very Merry Shantel Christmas

We had a super fantastic Christmas! Shantel was discharged from Duke on the Monday before Christmas.....something we were very thankful for but wasn't for sure would happen. Although Duke does wonderful things for the kids that have to be there over the holidays it's a whole lot nicer to be home!!! Shantel was so excited to see all the decorations and the presents under the tree. She's so funny. She remembers small things like the Bath and Body peppermint hand soap we used last year and drinking egg nog. Shantel and Deb were able to come over to Nathan's for a few hours on Christmas day. She was very excited to see all my nieces and nephews. Seems they had a little Nintendo DS game playing going on!

Thanks to all our family and friends for making Shantel's Christmas so special! We are so blessed to have this precious little girl in our lives!!!

Shantel with her dog Molly

Christmas day at Nathan's

Her favorite group....Little Big Town

Now I can have my camera back!

Shantel, Angie and Friends

Shantel had a very special Christmas surprise this year. Angie, a good friend and a step down nurse came to Deb and asked if her church group could "adopt" Shantel this year. This group of friends takes 3 or so kids that are hospitalized over the Christmas holidays and brings them gifts.....not just physical presents but the gift of love. We had so much fun meeting new friends and hanging out.
Thanks Angie and friends for taking the time to show God's love and make a little girl feel so special! We love you all!!



Angie's church group with Shantel


Angie's husband with Shantel

Angie and Shantel

very cool gifts!

Home

We are so excited......Shantel gets to come home today! She'll be coming home on IV's and will have a nurse while Deb and I are at work. It's a pretty intense medication and treatment schedule so it forces us to be very organized! Next Friday we have an appointment with the transplant team and it looks like she may be listed at that time. We'll keep you posted.

Florida

Dad and Mom are spending the next couple weeks at Word Of Life Florida. Since Mom has a small break from her treatments it was the perfect time. When they arrived they found fresh fruit, juice, breakfast danish and some other food already in the refrigerator. Thank you to the kind people at the Word Of Life park for being so thoughtful! They are having a wonderful time seeing friends and going to the beach to watch the sunset. Monday they are heading to Disney with Nathan, Heather and the girls.
It's been a long couple months and I'm so thankful Mom is feeling so well that they could do this! As much as I miss them a change of scenery is just what was needed.

We love Sarah

The Saturday before the elections Dad, Mom, Nathan, Heather, Maddy, Rachael, Scott and I had the awesome opportunity to attend a Sarah Palin rally in Raleigh. As you can see Mom and Dad were two of about 10 people that had the privilege after the event of having their picture taken with the Palins.

It was pretty amazing.....here is a lady that might have been the VP of our country and she took the time to talk with Mom and Dad, didn't act rushed and told Mom they would be praying for her. David sent me a photo of Sarah and I had 5 8x10 copies made and she signed all 5! Nathan had his signed picture in their living room and one morning Rachael (who's 3) got up, saw the picture and said "oh, Sarah Payton....she's so pretty!"

Too bad Sarah Payton's not VP!!!!

Christmas......North Carolina style

The Bagg bunch:
left: Scott, Kristy, Parker, Alex, Landry and Luke
In the back: Tim, me, Dad and Mom
Nathan holding Madaline, Heather (expecting#3 in April)
and Rachael(in blue dress)
right: David, Kathy and Elijah, Lauren (in pink), Kelsey
and Ella


The kids in their jammies




Rachael(nathan's) with her tinkerbell pez





2008 was our first family Christmas together in a very long time. Nathan and Heather who live in Winston Salem, NC were gracious enough and offered to host the big event......no small undertaking with 10 adults and 10 kids all 12 and under! They worked very hard getting all decorated inside and out.
Scott, Kristy and their 4 boys were the first to arrive on Sunday from Texas. Since Mom's last chemo and radiation treatment was on Christmas Eve they came to Cary first to hang out with Dad. Mom and me. My cousin Melissa and her husband Glen were leaving for Florida for the holiday so they offered their house to Scott and Kristy for those couple days......thanks Glen and Melissa!!! Scott, Dad and 3 of the boys attended a NC State b-ball game, Kristy and I went shopping, Parker stayed home and hung out with Grandma and Shantel, Kristy, Deb and I helped Mom do some baking and they all went with Mom to Duke for one of her treatments and of course had to tour where the number one college basketball is played.......DUKE!!!!
David, Kathy, their 3 girls and little boy along with my brother Tim dodged a snow storm as they made their way from upstate New York. They arrived Tuesday night.
Christmas Eve we have a family tradition of having a little party. We always have shrimp dip, maggot salad (not as bad as it sounds!), finger sandwiches, meatballs in alfredo sauce, hot cheese dip and chips, fruit with this amazing sauce you put over it that Mom makes, cookies, layered salad and hot cider. This year the kids watched Polar Express and the adults got a couple hours of uninterrupted conversation in........which pretty much was the last!!! After the movie the kids each opened one present which was new PJ's and set out milk and cookies for Santa. Dad read the Christmas story from the Bible and off to bed the kids went. We still had stockings to fill and clean up to do before any adults went to bed!
Christmas morning started with breakfast and then we opened gifts. The kids were so calm I couldn't believe it! We started out by taking turns opening a gift and trying to keep up with the paper and boxes. By the end....well you know....stuff was all over the place! It really was fun to watch the kids. They were having such a good time and they were so good! Christmas dinner was awesome, ham, mashed potatoes, I think 4 veggies, a couple salads, bread and homemade pies. We put Scott and David at the kids table (can you guess why) which was set up in the living room and the rest of us were able to squeeze around the dining room table.
Nathan set up a hayride through the "Festival of Lights". This is a state park that they decorate with Christmas scenes with thousands of lights and and you drive through it or in our case we rode on a hay wagon. It was pretty chilly the night we did this but it was so beautiful.
On Sunday my Mom's sister Linda and her husband and our cousin Renee and her family drove over from Raleigh for the afternoon. There's always a lot of laughing going on when we all get in one room!
Some very special friends of Dad and Mom's gave them a gift of a hotel room. This was so perfect for them! With Mom being at the end of her treatments she was very tired and needed to have the quiet so she could rest and the kids got to go swimming at the pool!!
The rest of our time together was filled with trips to the mall, a visit to the museum, putting a puzzle together, talking, watching football, eating, more talking and just enjoying being together. That's the one thing I miss is not being able to see everyone very often because we live so far away from each other. It was awesome being together even in close quarters.
There is nothing like family!!!!

more Christmas

kids watching Nathan's Polar Express train


Alex(scott's)


Kelsey(david's) holding Madaline(nathan's)


Scott and his friend????

Alex

This is my nephew Alex. He just turned 12 and is really an impressive young man! I had the privilege of spending some quality time with him over Christmas. My brother Tim and I got up early and would take breakfast to Mom and Dad at their hotel. One morning Alex asked if he could go with us. I told him we would be staying a while and he might be bored but he wanted to go with us anyway. We stopped and got breakfast and headed to the hotel to eat. Well, we ended up spending the whole day together. He swam in the hotel pool, tried out all the equipment in the workout room, we went for a hamburger for lunch and sat in the lobby by the fireplace to eat, had some ice cream, and I think there was an errand run to Walmart someplace in there. He had the opportunity to go to the museum with the other kids but chose to stay with me and I'm glad he did. We had a great time!! Alex is kind, polite and thoughtful. Thanks Alex for hanging out with me.........now if I could just get you to wear a Duke shirt!!!!

Family pics

The Bagg kids at Dad and Mom's retirement dinner
from Word Of Life.......May 2008
David, Melodie, Tim, Scott and Nathan
Good looking bunch, huh!!!


Dad and Mom.....May 2008

can you believe.....

.......this is the same child??!!

left: Christmas 2008

above: first day of school Sept. 2006

Shantel

Let me give some background about Shantel. Shantel came to live with us in Sept.2006 as a foster child. She has been a patient at Duke since she was a baby when she was diagnosed with Cystic Fibrosis. Cystic Fibrosis is a terminal lung disease. For more information on CF please go to the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation website....CFF.org. In Aug.2006 she was admitted at Duke in very poor condition and by Sept. the Dept. of Social Services (DSS) removed her from her home. Deb had Shantel as a physical therapy patient for 8 years and had developed a bond with her and didn't want her to go into foster care to a home that didn't know anything about CF. Plus Deb knew she would be very scared. I'll never forget coming home and seeing this little 50 pound sad little girl sitting in the lazyboy. She was so small! I knew very little about CF except what Deb did at Duke and I knew the kids died so I was excited and hesitant at the same time. I couldn't believe the amount of meds this little girl took! One entire kitchen cabinet was transformed into a med cabinet. Then there was the breathing treatment machines, nebulizer pots, insulin, O2, g-tube feeds, 4 hours a day of breathing treatments, etc.
Needless to say my life as I knew it changed! It really took me some time to adjust to having a child but I was loving it! You couldn't have asked for a sweeter, well behaved child. Shantel had some adjustment issues because she couldn't understand why she couldn't go home. She was always polite but a little sad at the same time. We enrolled her in school and worked really hard to make things as "normal" as possible. She did awesome and made the honer roll. She came home from school one day with a certificate that she made the honer roll. Of course we made a huge deal out of it and she just stood there looking at us funny. I said that's so awesome aren't you excited? She answered me with "what does that mean?" I almost cried. She'd never been told what a good job she was doing in school. Well once she knew what it was all about she worked her heart out and has made the honer roll ever since! I'm the Awana Cubbies Director at church so she went to Awana TnT which she loved. She worked in her Awana book non-stop. She loves going to church. We decided to take her to Build a Bear so she could make something that was just hers and our thought was that it would be her "buddy" and have something to take care of. She named her first bear Princess......and it's a purple bear! She has since added Punkin, Precious and Peanut. Her first b-day party was a Cheetah Girls theme which was very fun. A friend of ours made her cake and a cake for Princess. It was awesome. We had a great time.
Since her future is so uncertain we've tried to do all sorts of different things with her. She's been to the beach, Christmas in Texas, a summer trip to NY, the North Carolina State Fair, took swimming lessons, been to museums, Disney on Ice, the circus, Sugarland, Little Big Town and Martina McBride concerts. She loves to shop, have her picture taken, play Nintendo ds, wii, play on her computer and watch movies. (her favorite is 7th Heaven series which she watches over and over......can I just say I never want to see another 7th Heaven episode!!!!)
Shantel over the past 2 and a half years has turned into a happy, well adjusted young lady who has a tough road ahead of her. In 2008 she spend over 200 days at Duke as her disease has progressively worsened. We have now moved into another whole part of our lives......double lung transplant. She has been accepted at University of North Carolina Hospital to be followed by their lung transplant team until she's listed. Duke doesn't do pediatric transplants so we are fortunate to have UNC also in our back yard. Please keep us in your prayers as we know there are no guarantees. We are praying the transplant will be a success and she'll be given the gift of a few years of a "normal" life.

The reason for this blog.....

I never thought I'd find myself in the "blogging world" but it seems to be the best route for getting information out to those that are interested. Thank you to my sister-in-law Kristy for helping me get this blog set up.
As you can gather from the blog name the posts will mainly contain information about two very special people that I love dearly......my Mom, who was diagnosed with gall bladder cancer on Oct.1, 2008, and Shantel, a little girl with Cystic Fibrosis that I was awarded legal custody of in Nov.2007.
Hopefully this will be a tool to keep you updated but also as a reminder of how precious and short life is! I trust you will find it not only informative but maybe even funny at times. Our family covets your thoughts and prayers as we travel down this difficult road.