What a beautiful day!

It's 70 degrees today and the sun is shining bright! Only five more days until Eli is feeling right :) Yes, I am trying to rhyme today... what a dork!
He will be going into the hospital on Sunday to prepare him for the surgery, we are so thankful for that! I feel more at peace when he is around a medical team that can help him at a moments notice.
Have a beautiful day, wherever you are!!!

It's around the corner...

YES, six more days until the transplant!!! I am getting excited for Eli! Oh, the places he will go...

"When you forgive, you in no way change the past - but you sure do change the future." Bernard Meltzer

Transplant Date is December 23, 2009

It is official! The transplant is in TWO WEEKS! Thank you all for your love and support over the last 16 months!
I want Jimmy to know how much I love him and his selfless act to save my son's life. Thank you Jimmy, words cannot ever express my gratitude for your sacrifice.
It has been an extremely emotional day.
Love to All!
Malaine

Happy Birthday Mr. Teenager!

We know it's a little late bud, but we wanted you to know how much we love and appreciate you!
You bring so much laughter and joy into our home, we are proud of the young man you have become and look forward to many more days of Michael Jackson impressions :)
(p.s. just because you are thirteen doesn't mean you are way too cool to hug your mom goodbye in the morning! really, nobody is watching...)


We love you Graysoni!

LOVE is a tender act of endless
forgiveness, a tender look which becomes a habit.
Peter Ustinov

Happy Birthday Elijah Caine!

Here it is, the big TWO-ZERO!


Your Peeps love you! Love, Becca and Grayson



A Mother's love is something
that no one can explain,
It is made of deep devotion
and of sacrifice and pain,

It is endless and unselfish
and enduring come what may
For nothing can destroy it
or take that love away . . .

It is patient and forgiving
when all others are forsaking,
And it never fails or falters
even though the heart is breaking . . .

It believes beyond believing
when the world around condemns,
And it glows with all the beauty
of the rarest, brightest gems . . .

It is far beyond defining,
it defies all explanation,
And it still remains a secret
like the mysteries of creation . . .

A many splendoured miracle
man cannot understand
And another wondrous evidence
of God's tender guiding hand.
~Helen Steiner Rice

I love you Eli...

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday Becca Boo!

Today is Becca's tenth birthday! I hope the next year is full of happiness... I adore your smile and the freckles that sprinkle across your nose. You are growing so fast! You are such an intelligent, gentle and kind girl. I am so thankful for YOU! I took lots of pics of the party. I hope to get to the store tomorrow and get them transferred to a disk. That is the only way I can figure out how to download them to the new computer, I've lost all of my cords from my camera, or should I say, haven't unpacked them. I'm not very computer savvy :)

I hate that life just keeps going when you have a son that is so ill. I want to stop time, get Eli better, then start the clock again. I know how silly that sounds, sometimes I am driving alone and start thinking too much, i guess.

Eli is doing ok... has not gone back to the hospital. He is taking an arsenal of medication, which seems to be working better. I think he takes 26 pills a day. He has no appetite so the eating is not going very well. I made pancakes and bacon for Becca's birthday dinner and he ate five! woohoo! (I will make pancakes every day if I need to)

Meatballs with Lingonberry Sauce... too yummy!

I was able to meet Connie at IKEA today! We had such a blast just hanging out and looking at all the fun things. We had dinner there and it was scrumptious! Oh, the chocolate cake was very good too... Can you tell I don't get out much anymore? (I just had to put up a picture of the meal!) It was exciting!

A Bright Light

We found out today that the transplant will take place in December... Jimmy Shreeve is donating a kidney to Eli!


The hero is the one who kindles a great light in the world, who sets up blazing torches in the dark streets of life for men to see by. The saint is the man who walks through the dark paths of the world, himself a light. -Felix Adler

Jimmy, thank you for being a light for our family... i love you. malaine

Our second home... the kids love their big brother!

Feeling very blessed today!

Today has been such a wonderful day... I knew I needed to sit down and write a little bit. We have been here in Casa Grande for three weeks now. It has been an easy transition, Gregg and I were just joking about it tonight. His exact words were "I keep thinking we are on vacation"... I think it's because of the pool, maybe?
I have been having a lot of stress with getting the children into school. It seems that everyone I talk to has a different suggestion about a "good" school. I feel very bad that we moved them from their familiar surroundings, especially Grayson. He starts seventh grade this year! Becca will be attending Legacy Traditional School. She is excited to meet new friends, not so excited about the uniforms!
The school that I have been wanting to get Grayson into finally called today! YAY! He starts Villago Middle School first thing in the morning :) I guess vacation is over.
Eli just walked in from hemodialysis... He is doing so well. His blood pressure has stabilized quite a bit, it is almost too low! What a turnaround! The doctors say it is because he is getting better dialysis. There is a lot to say for clean blood :) He goes every other day for around four hours. His energy level is much higher and his mood is much better! He has some coloring again, he doesn't look like I took him out back and blackened his eyes. He still doesn't have much of an appetite. His 40 pound weight loss is shocking to most that haven't seen him in awhile.
Our ward in Saint Johns showed up in droves to help us pack the Uhaul! It went so fast! We are so thankful for all of the amazing people that have helped and supported us through all of this. Yesterday was the one year anniversary of finding out about Eli's kidney failure. It has been a year of many twists and turns... I don't like to think back because I want to focus on the future :) Which brings me to Jimmy.
This is where I have a hard time... I can start bawling in an instant when I think of him. Many of you know him, he graduated with Eli. They have been friends since Mrs. Proctor's sixth grade class, when they would argue with their friends which was better - the gamecube or the play station.
We went for the crossmatch on Monday. It was such a great day! I love listening to them reminiscing about the past (maybe because I like to do that a lot too). They are so fun to be around, I hope I get to go on all of the appointments! I have such admiration for this 19 year old boy who so willingly wants to help his friend.

Hemodialysis

Eli is currently in recovery in the hospital. He had another catheter put in to start hemodialysis, in his neck. He is doing well. We hope his levels start going down after his first hemo exchange. I will update later in the day when I get more information...

Good Morning!

Hey Everybody! I just wanted to let you know that Eli was air evac'd to Phoenix on Friday. He just can't seem to get over this mystery virus hacky cough and his blood pressure is a roller coaster. He had a fever of 103 too. He can't keep any food down. They are trying to hold off one more day on the hemo dialysis. He is having peritineal dialysis every four hours now. Gregg is down with him. He was supposed to start his new job today. I am home packing a house by myself. One day we will look back and laugh at this ( I hope ) This is such a sounding board for me... I drove to Mesa and back yesterday to take Gregg his truck so he would have some wheels. Thank you so much to my wonderful friend Latisha for following me in my van so we could come home and pack, pack, pack! Must get started...

Moving Moving Moving

This is going to be a quick update, Eli went into the hospital on Saturday and found out he has pneumonia. He is very sick on top of everything. If this move happens it will be a MIRACLE!!! I will keep packing for now and trying to staying positive. We had a WONDERFUL time in UTAH! I will be posting pics soon! I just want to tell you all that I think of you so much! Love, Malaine

Becca Softball 2009

Thanks Coach Crosby!!!

Casa Grande here we come! Gregg has been offered a position in Casa Grande :) He accepted! Yay!

" Destiny is not a matter of chance, it is a matter of choice; it is not a thing to be waited for, it is a thing to be achieved." William Jennings Bryan

Don't let someone become a priority in your life, when you are only an option for them.

(I heard this quite awhile ago and I didn't want to forget it, so I thought I would write it down :) )

This makes me chuckle... I love it!

Eli and I just got home from another trip to Mesa. He is now giving himself injections three times a week. They are Epogen injections that stimulate red blood cell growth. His red blood cell count went down, if this does not help then he will have to have blood transfusions every month.
He is also having problems with his catheter site. His nurse had to chemically burn around the tube to prevent infection. We will have to go down again in a few weeks to have finish the procedure.
All in all he is doing well :)
Thanks to all of you that helped with Becca and Grayson while we were gone! I don't know what I would do without such amazing friends to count on!

All is well...

We had a scare this week with Eli. His blood pressure spiked to over 190 and he had to be taken to the hospital by ambulance once again, he had some tiny seizures but they were controllable. They changed his medication once again, he seems to be leveling out. The only thing that frightens me was something the nurse said as we were leaving. She said that when it gets over 180 he is very likely to have a stroke! When he was over 200 and had four grand mal seizures they were baffled that he didn't have multiple strokes... I feel the prayers of each and everyone of you. We are so blessed during this trying time.

Becca and Grayson started Little League! Grayson won his first game last night :) Yay! They are pretty good little players, that must be the "Bargo" in them because their Mom is not an athlete at all... although I was pretty good at badminton :)

Becca had her music program today, she sang and danced away... she did a great job. Although my camera ran out of batteries, I did get a couple on my phone. I will try to get them on here this weekend :) One of her best little girlfriends moved to South Dakota today. She is heartbroken. I told her that she will always have a special place in her heart for her :) (I don't think that helped much) I remember moving from Bullhead and being so broken hearted. What would I have done if my parents didn't make that move? All of the amazing friendships I would have missed out on :)

I love you guys!

Words to live by...

"Live life fully while you're here. Experience everything. Take care of yourself and your friends. Have fun, be crazy, be weird. Go out and screw up! You're going to anyway, so you might as well enjoy the process. Take the opportunity to learn from your mistakes: find the cause of your problem and eliminate it. Don't try to be perfect;just be an excellent example of being human."
- Anthony Robbins

Eli update... Here kitty, kitty, kitty...

Hey everybody!
I wanted to give you all an update on Eli :) We just got back from the Valley... Eli had a couple of doctors appointments.
Let me first tell you that he had a bad week last week. It culminated on Friday, he had a terrible blood pressure headache. We checked his blood pressure and it was very high.(161/128) He was in bed all day. Saturday came and he said he felt better, he was still pretty shaky and weak. He finally got into the shower so that we could go out to eat. I heard the shower go off and a minute later I heard him yelling "Mom"... I answered "Do you need a towel"... I heard a louder "MOM" again. I said "I am getting one!" BOOM! I heard the worst crashing noise. I ran to the bathroom and tried to shove the door open. I couldn't. Gregg heard me yelling for Eli, he ran in and got the door open. I could see his legs shaking. I was so scared that he was having another seizure.
He slowly came to... He had fainted. Whew!
His blood pressure has plummeted since then...
At his doctors appt. yesterday it was 106/70.
His doctor has taken him off of one of his high blood pressure prescriptions... He needs to get stabilized.
He has not had an appetite. I try and shove food in front of him and he just doesn't want to eat. He took Grayson to lunch today and did eat some dinner, hopefully he is getting his appetite back :)
Rebecca wanted me to let you all know that she is a Grandma! Her kitty had her babies on Sunday! We haven't found them though :( We have this big field behind our house that we think she has them stashed... She is such a sweet kitty, we hope we can find her babies soon. :) We will look again tomorrow!

Grayson Spring School Picture 2009

Becca Spring School Picture 2009

Becca is ready to go... what is taking so long?

Hi hO hI Ho... a camping we will go... SOON :) Wanna come?

Hey everyone! I don't know what I am doing wrong on this site, all of a sudden, but I can't put words with my pictures???

We took the kids to see the new camper we bought today... We are all a little excited (haha A LOT excited)... The kids can't wait to have slumber parties in it!

A quick update on Eli...
Gregg was ruled out as a donor due to some potential health issues in the future. Our sweet niece Brianna was tested and she can't do it at this time :) Thanks so much for trying Bri! We love you! Our fabulous nephew Nick is being tested right now... we are holding our breath!
We know that this is all going to work out... We need to have patience and faith. We appreciate your support... it means the world to our family. Eli looks good and feels great, he is having questions about why he is feeling so good? This is such a hard disease... One day he feels great and the next he feels exhausted and sick. This week he has sure enjoyed having old friends over and hanging out with them! Thanks guys!

Misc. photos... Thanks for such an awesome week! We Love You Guys!

Primrose Retreat... What a day with the cousins! The pink hot chocolate and pink champagne cupcake topped it off!

A Fun Day At Jumpin' Jacks! Grayson finds a basketball everywhere he goes!!!

Does the FUN ever end?

More Spring Break Madness! What a Blast!