Hello Everyone,

We are happy to report that Millie had routine scans two weeks ago and they were clear! No evidence of disease in her brain or spine.  Phew! There is so much scanxiety and sleep deprivation leading up to the scans, but its all worth it for the peace of mind that follows hearing the scans are clear. You don't realize how long you've been holding your breath until you hear those words.  This officially marks two years of remission for Millie! I met with her oncologist after the MRI and he was so excited to see Millie and see how big she has gotten. Actually everyone in the office was excited to see her and many nurses stopped by to say hi. The oncologist kept reiterating how big of a deal it was for Millie to make it to the two year mark, especially because she never got radiation.  He kept knocking on wood in hopes she never will need it. Radiation is the best treatment for Medulloblastoma and Millie was too young to get it when she was first diagnosed.  We always new that radiation was an important piece of treatment that Millie wasn't getting, but like my mother-in-law said, "how much worry can one mind/heart/body hold all at once" so we didn't spend much time thinking about it.  Seeing how happy the oncologist was for Millie and hearing him say this is a BIG deal made me quite emotional.   Considering that Millie's little brain had an orange sized tumor along with countless little tumors and knowing that she couldn't undergo the preferred treatment protocol for Medulloblastoma, I have no doubt Millie is a miracle.  Thank you for contributing to her healing through your thoughts, prayers, and support.  

Millie's next scan will be in six months and only a brain scan will be necessary. This is also good news.  Although nothing can give you the peace of mind clear scans can, it is good sign they are spacing them out. 

All the girls have been relatively healthy and we haven't had to spend much time in hospitals or doctor offices which is a nice change since the last time we wrote on here.  Millie did have a follow-up with her ear doctor to check on the tubes and her hearing and she said everything looks great. They will continue to check her hearing and her ear tubes every six months.  

We've had some fun experiences the past couple of weeks.  The girls probably had their most memorable Easter to date this year.  We babysat some baby chicks for some friends over Easter weekend.  The girls were elated! They started and ended each day with holding and playing with the baby chicks, as well as many times throughout the day.  Actually Matt and I got some extra sleep the days we had the baby chicks because the girls would go straight to the chicks once they got up and wouldn't come get us for quite some time.  On the last day we had the chicks, Lucy requested that we wake her up at 5:30 so she could spend some time with the chicks and say goodbye before going to school. 

That wasn't the only early morning we've had around here.  Last weekend Matt went to DC for our niece's senior recital at CUA.  On the morning of the day he left I heard noises coming from the dining room/kitchen area.  I woke up Matt so he could go check it out. Before he even got close to the dining room Sadie came running out to stop him and say he couldn't go any farther because she and Willa were working on a surprise.  So Matt came back to bed and said, "it's just Sadie and Willa" and went back to sleep.  I thought, "it's 5 am!" I went out to check on Sadie and Willa, who were dressed and ready for school.  They were making Matt going away cards.  I asked them why they got up so early and Sadie said she set her internal clock for 5 am and woke up at 4:48. She told me to go back to bed and not to worry about getting breakfast together because they were going to do that too.  And they did.  They had the table set and breakfast ready by the time our normal wake-up rolled around. Sadie did admit later that making the cards didn't take as long as they expected so they went upstairs and read Little House on the Prairie for an hour before getting breakfast ready. 

Thanks to Heroes for Children we all got to attend a Texas Legends basketball game at the end of March.  The Legends are the NBA G League affiliate team for the Dallas Mavericks. We had a lot of fun.  The girls got to sit on home bench while the players shot around before the game.  They got to meet a bunch of the players and Lucy was able to go in the locker room.   Lucy and Millie stood at center court for a presentation before the game started and they got to stand by the team for player introductions.  It was a great game, but they ended up losing by one in the final seconds of the game.  All of the Legends players had special jerseys on that said Heroes for Children and then they had the name of a cancer warrior on the back.  The starting point guard had Millie's name on his jersey.  We got to meet him after the game.  Thankful for organizations like this that bring families of children with cancer together for fun activities and camaraderie.

Dallas was in line for totality for the solar eclipse.  I think it is a day our family will remember forever.  We picked the girls up from school early so we could experience it together as a family.  It was amazing and beautiful.  We now understand why people travel such long distances to witness it.  The hardest part of the day was making sure Millie kept her glasses on while looking at the sun.  She kept saying, "someone took a bite out of the sun!"

Thank you, as always, for continuing to follow us on our journey.  Matt and I have contemplated many times about whether or not we should keep posting on here.  Our writing has definitely shifted away from chemo drugs and blood counts to our post cancer everyday life and family adventures. We first started writing on here because it was therapeutic for us to write about what we were going through and we wanted to have it written down so that one day Millie and her sisters could read it and see how incredibly brave they all were.  The writing is still therapeutic and these are experiences and stories we still want the girls to remember, so I guess we'll keep writing now.  It means so much to us that you take the time to read these (sometimes long) posts.

Cheers to two years!  

Up next - Millie's 4th birthday!