A gift for Santa and the “ultimate” Christmas

I’m not sure you’ve ever seen a child so excited to meet Santa. She’s been preparing for weeks😂. When Charlotte discovered a bag of old Christmas wrapping paper, ribbons, bows and tags...well let’s just say her eyes sparkled with wonder. She dug right in with a pair of preschooler scissors, glue, glitter, stickers, tape, markers, whatever you can imagine. Watching her I ask, what are you making Charlotte? And with a huge smile she says “I makin’ cards for people” in a tone like come on mom isn’t it obvious. The next thing we know, she’s discovered Christmas gift bags we kept to recycle. After a while, I find her stuffing 2 of them with several of her homemade cards, rocks and shells she has collected, and tissue paper. “What are doing now?”, I ask tentatively because evidently I should know these things😂. “Makin’ Santa a present. Santa never gets presents. I’m makin’ him one.” Be still our hearts. And don’t you know it...Day we go to meet Santa, she grabs her bags from under our tree to bring with her. She sat on Santas lap and talked to him like she was talking to a friend. Of course she talked about her wish list, which consists of 1. A motorcycle 2. A camera with video 3. A pretty rainbow dress 3. Barbies and Kens to marry with some wedding stuff. But first, she gave Santa his gifts and helped him opened those bags she made with all her heart. I wish every single one of you could have been there in that moment. The JOY we felt watching her get to experience this Christmas Joy was such a gift! In that moment, watching her in this innocent and precious moment, I was over come with emotion and I chocked back tears best I could. I had a momentary flash back to this time last year when Santa came to visit the Bone Marrow Transplant Unit at Duke Childrens. I remembered him dressed in a yellow gown over his suit, a mask and blue gloves coming into Charlotte’s room because she was on isolation and unable to leave her room. In a flash, I was back in that room holding her as we all were just holding on. And now, now we are here all together in this moment and in all the moments that will be this Christmas. And watching Taylor and Parker next to their little sister, Brian and I felt more then can be spoken or written. But in going back to look at some pictures that our family friend snapped of us, we could see, as clear as day, a beam of light arching over our heads similar to a rainbow! But instead of a rainbow full of colors, there is this beam of peaceful almost heavenly light! When I first saw this light in this picture that I’ll share below, my heart skipped a beat. However, we didn’t need to see that light to know what we felt. But wow, seeing it is sometimes believing it. We felt God’s presence. And I want to, need to believe, its a sign, a blessing before her scans next week.

In the meantime, we are loving this holiday season and for once I don’t wish to fast forward to the scans. I mean, I kind of wish they were already here and gone, but I’m relishing these days all home together. Taylor and Parker have tracked out of school as of Dec 1 and don’t return until Jan 2! Brian will likely take the week of Christmas off, first week off work non-treatment related in almost 2 years. I feel like a kid on Christmas mornings most days and am probably really annoyingly joyful 🤣. In fact, the kids and Brian have coined the term “Ultimate Christmas” in response to all the “ultra Christmasness” in the air. Every single decoration is out, even our Christmas plates and tea cups my mom gave us 10 years ago and we have hardly used. Those are in the daily plate cabinet. Every light, every ornament, every decoration is out. Even my car is dressed as Rudolph. Christmas music had been played in kitchen, in car, on piano or guitar for weeks already. Lord I hope we don’t get Christmas’d Out 🤣. I can’t help it. I’m overcome with Christmas spirit and cheer this year. And maybe I’m over doing it a bit early, but maybe I’m not. Our Taylor turns 9 next week, and we usually do a good job at pausing everything Christmas to celebrate her and we will definitely be doing that and have even done some of that already last weekend when we have her an early gift of some horse back riding lessons at a nearby stable who will allow her to drop in ocassionally for lessons over this next year...fulfilling her young hearts dream of riding horses. And today, Charlotte got to fulfill one of her hearts desires too! She began a ballet class and was just as adorable as you could possibly imagine. It’s her turn! After years and months of watching on the side lines, she finally gets to participate in whatever she wishes! Whatever the occasion, Taylor’s birthday, Christmas Eve and Christmas, New Years Eve and Day, all of which we were hospitalized during last year, we feel the special tenderness even deeper then ever possible. Lord knows we don’t know what next week holds, none of us do. We believe in our faith that Charlotte’s scans will be clear. But no matter what tomorrow or next week or next month or next year holds, I will never, ever forget what I’ve already felt this Christmas. And it’s only December 6. God has truly blessed us and I am so grateful if any of what we’ve felt can be shared and enjoyed by any of you, our amazing and loving village of prayer warriors. Merry Christmas

Rainbow?

Telling him everything

Giving Santa his loot🤣

Our first baby

Parkers list was this lego catalog 😂

Still lugging his gifts around (a gift for Ms. C too of course!)

Hauling Santa’s loot

With the Stalnaker’s!

On a bike ride with mom

Taylor, Parker and Taylor’s friend Abby came up with an impromptu driveway stand where they had lemonade and cranberry orange bars yesterday! They accepted donations to be sent to Alex’s Lemonade Stand for pediatric cancer research❤️They raised about $60 in 3 hours and were so proud