Thursday- It was off to the beach. It wasn't too cold, and 5 or 6 dolphins were so close the coast guard was flying over and sending the fishing boats away. The kids buried dad, built a sand castle (well, tried), and searched for seashells. We met family there too, and ate lunch on the beach. The kids had never seen the ocean before so it was amazing to them. It was so much fun we didn't want to leave, but we had to get back to the hotel and get cleaned up for our dinner at Medieval times. We had to wait in line at the ticket counter, and Cloey said "Why we have to wait in line for?" it was so cute, since we hadn't waited in line for two days. Our family met us there too, so we filled up a whole row for the green knight. Cal really liked the jousting especially when the wooden shield broke into little pieces. Although he did ask me "mom. it's real swords and fake blood right?" just to be sure. and there wasn't even fake blood. When the green knight came to our section to throw flowers to the crowd, our whole row stood up and pointed to Cloey, so she got the flower. she immediately turned to me and said "He loves me!". After it was over we were leaving and the narrator was telling everyone goodbye. Cloey was looking for the green knight, I told her "maybe he will know where the green knight is" he heard me and started to say that the knights only comes out after the second show, then he noticed Cloey's shirt and said. "wait here. I'll see what I can do" shortly after, the green knight came out and took pictures with her and spend some extra time talking to her. She was thrilled to be his princess!

Friday- We woke up and went to a character breakfast at the Paradise Pier Hotel. They met several other characters including stitch who did all kinds of funny things like "pick" daddy's nose and wipe it on Cal's head. They both really liked that, but Lainey wouldn't get near any characters, she was fine watching them, but didn't want to get near them or have them touch her at all. Kinda like she is with people :) Next was Universal Studios. We were in traffic for a long time before we got there and Ty & I were joking that we needed a cut in line pass for the traffic. When we got there we had front of the line passes waiting for us at the will call counter. As we were going into the park, there was a line to take your picture with the Simpson family, Cloey doesn't watch the show but loves seeing characters, so Ty took her up to see them. They all made a big deal over her and she loved it. Then it was over to the Simpsons ride. Cloey, Ty, and Emily went on it. I really had no interest in it. Lainey was asleep and Cal was traumatized and refusing all rides. It quickly became Cloey's favorite, in total she went on 4 or 5 times, and I even went on once with her, but Cal could never be convinced. I did make him go on the Shreck ride because otherwise he would not be able to do anything at universal. He was screaming and crying when we were waiting to get on, then when we were inside and he had the 3D glasses on I saw him laughing and grabbing at the candy that was "thrown" into the audience. but when we were leaving he said "actually I didn't like it" so that was the end of rides for Cal. After the Shreck ride, we got to meet Spongebob Squarepants. Cloey was so excited she started jumping up and down. Then Spongebob starting jumping too! He was really playing with Cloey. Right next to Spongebob was Curious George, so of course we stopped to say hi to him too. Then Spongebob came over as a special treat and tapped her on the shoulder. Pretty soon they were all jumping up and down. Cloey was definitely the star of the show to the large crowd of people who had gathered to see Spongebob and Curious George together. Mostly Emily, Ty & I traded off to go on the big rides and that was fun. I got to take Ty on Backdraft which was cool , but I have to say it was more impressive the last time I was on it, when I was about 9 years old. Cloey rode Simpsons one last time and I broke down and got her a Simpsons t-shirt since she loved the ride so much.

Saturday- we rushed to pack and get off to the airport. When we checked out the Cast members were very nice and wanted to make sure we had a magical time. The man who was helping us load our luggage gave each of the kids an 8x10 signed portrait of some of the characters. When we arrived at the airport our wish granter was there to meet us, and the "princess car" took us home.

I know this is extremely long, but I still feel I haven't described how truly magical it all was. The Make a Wish organization is outstanding. It wasn't about how much money they spent or what we got, but about making a wish come true. We didn't have to worry about anything. Everywhere we went it was all taken care of. It was so easy to check in, pick up tickets, cars etc. It was like we had fairy godparents watching over us. As I watched the other kids and realized they all will probably be back several times over their lifetime, not to mention all the dreams they will be able to make come true for themselves, I was filled with the most bittersweet feelings and a heart full of gratitude for being able to spend this extra special time with my Cloey. We will remember this for the rest of our lives. Cloey has now left her mark all over Disneyland and whenever we have the chance to visit again we will see our princess smiling in that castle where her wish came true.

I'm too excited to sleep! We are headed to Disneyland to meet the princesses tomorrow at 11am and will be gone until Sat afternoon. We can't wait to be there to see Cloey get her wish. We will take lots of pictures and make sure to post all the details.

Besides the excitement of getting ready for our trip we have been going to swim lessons, tumbling, karate & a trip to the High School Musical at Gammage auditorium. Cloey was really impressed and didn't even mind that it was a different cast then she is used to. Lainey really likes the little trampoline, my little daredevil. Ty & I celebrated our 8th wedding anniversary with a full night out at the Carefree Resort. It was really relaxing. We had a couple say "oh, look at the newlyweds" ands we both started laughing out loud, so we had to explain that it was our anniversary and our 3 kids were at home. but it was really nice to just be "us" for a while. Ty has been working for a temp agency so his hours have been a little crazy, but after not working for 2 weeks we are just thankful for the work. The most recent bummer is that our van died, completely. we still owe money on It so we are not sure yet what we are going to do, bit it will still be broken when we get back so we'll deal with it then.

An organization called Songs of Love writes personalized songs for medically fragile kids. They wrote one for Cloey and you can download the song or ring tone at songsoflove.org. email me at megan.g@cox.net for her record #. It's a really cute song and perks Cloey right up. That's whats up with us, more to come after Disneyland.

Spring Break 2008

Been Gone To Long.....

I can't believe I haven't updated since Christmas! We have been keeping busy as usual. I am not going to even try to update on everything, just be sure to check out the pictures. Our Most recent blessing is Ty has passed the interview process for the Tempe Fire Department! Hopefully he will be in the Academy this fall (pending background check, etc.) We are so excited we can't even think straight!

Cloey's wish was granted! She wished to meet all the Disney Princesses, so Make-A-Wish is generously sending us to to Disneyland California on July 7th, for 6 days and 5 nights! Again can't think straight! The kids are excited and they don't have the slightest idea how cool it really is. Ty & I are excited too, we have never been able to go on a family vacation and we are really looking forward to it.

Cloey is amazing. Although we had to turn up her rates on the machine at night (meaning she is becoming more dependant on it), and she is starting to struggle in the afternoons (getting tired, using all her energy to breath, and being very crabby to the point we have begun to restrict our afternoon activities), She is still our smiling angel. Our hearts ache a little all the time. We are doing our best to count our blessings. One of which is that for now she is here with us and there is nothing imminent that would change that. She is as happy & as comfortable as possible, and that is what matters. We will continue to love her, enjoy time with her, and soak in her sweet spirit in the months to come. We are so blessed with all of the love and support that surrounds us. Not to mention the lessons we are learning about how precious this life is and that we must handle it with care. We have become much more laid back and loving and for that I am truly grateful.
Love from us- Ty, Megan, Cloey, Cal & Lainey

our winter so far

We had a surprisingly good Christmas. While it was strange without family, it was kinda fun to have a white Christmas. Thanks to generous and kind people all around us we were given enough gifts and money to make Santa come all the way to Ronald McDonald House for the kids. We all had lots of fun shopping and playing with all the gifts. The House put on an amazing dinner with China and linens and all the trimmings. Santa also visited the house and one little boy (named Cal) had all kinds of questions for him, like "where are your reindeer?" It was great. We flew home late New Years Eve, in fact we were some where between time zones to ring in 2008.




At Mayo we discovered that the problem with Cloey's breathing lies in her brain. It means there is nothing we can do to "fix" it, but it also means there were no surprise conditions or unexpected surgeries, truly a blessing. She came home on a Bipap ST machine in a last ditch effort to avoid putting her on a ventilator. Unfortunately it did not work and Cloey was placed on the vent about two weeks ago. This is a machine that is breathing for her, which makes her eligible for the Make A Wish program, so we have started that process. There are many complications that could arise with the vent, the most concerning being that she may eventually become completely dependant on the machine to breathe. That would make it hard for her to continue to go to school, church, and participate in so many other things that she loves about life. This pulls on our hearts and we have been on our knees in prayer trying to make the best decisions for our sweetheart. For now, she is only on the machine at night and is doing well on it. It is giving her the support she needs to sleep and wake up to be Cloey all day. We will take it one step at a time and continue to live our life. Whether it's buying a house, taking a job, having a baby or whatever. We don't want to sit stagnant waiting for Cloey to leave us, hopefully she won't, and we don't want life to pass us by in the meantime. That being said we are making sure we spent lots of time together as a family. We hope to go to the beach, camping, Disneyland and all the things we have not been able to do because we are always getting ready or recovering from some surgery or something. Our focus is now on Cloey's quality of life. There-It's all said and you can take a break to cry if you want to.




-sigh-

Ty is applying at various cities around the valley, we are hopeful it will happen this year now that he has his degree. In the meantime he is working as an electricians helper and looking for a part time job to supplement our income. He is also really enjoying the Wii that he got for a graduation present. He was released from the Elders Quorum and will now be the scouting program Chairman. Thanks to Uncle Albert and Aunt Robin he got to take Cal to monster trucks, once again he came home with more pictures of the trucks than my son, so I think it is safe to say they had a good time. Ty and I have recently come to the realization that we are old. Friday will be 10 years since we met, and St Patrick's day will be 10 years of being together, crazy. So I changed my hair and got a pedicure :)







As if we didn't get enough snow in MN, the kids had an ice skating field trip where they had a lot of fun. Our amazing Ward did it again with huge yard sale benefiting Cloey's medical care. It was even in the local papers. There is no way we would make it to Mayo without that help. It is so comforting to see how much good is around us, so many people put so much effort into the sale just to help one little family. Words can't describe the spirit that was felt by all involved. We are all recovered from the flu and bronchitis we had two weeks ago, it was horrible. Cloey was in the hospital and Ty was rationing my cough syrup with codeine because I was so miserable I kept asking him to bring me some. Little Lainey had her tonsils and adenoids removed on Mon. She had to stay overnight because she is under 4 and has asthma, but she is doing much better now. It is amazing she is already not snoring! She has snored like an old man since she was born. We think she will start feeling better and maybe gain some weight now. Now that Grandma Hall has helped us out with a computer, hopefully I will be able to update more often. We love and miss everybody we don't see nearly enough.
Pass on your blog to us if you have one!

We made it!

Ty's party was a huge success! He really had no idea, and was very glad to see everyone. It was all we could talk about on the plane. Thanks to everyone that came and helped keep it a secret. Now he just has to get hired ......

We made it here ok, and only forgot a few things. Cloey is having back to back tests done and we really don't know anything yet. We do know we will have to go to the hospital on Christmas Day and have a PH probe (tube down Cloey's nose) removed and go over the results with the doctor. That is at 11am, so we will be able to have the morning together and will be back by 1pm for the house dinner. There is also supposed to be a snow storm this weekend, so that will be a lot of fun for the kids. (me, not so much)

We miss everyone, and will let you know how things are going after Christmas when some of the tests will be back and we have a better idea of what is going on with Cloey

Merry Christmas
love the Gibsons

Getting Ready

We are finally updating our blog!
Right now I am
frantically packing and getting ready to head back to Mayo with Cloey. The short of it is that Cloey is still having problems breathing even after the trach. We are facing having to put her on a ventilator (breathing machine) at night. The information I have is that she will slowly become more and more dependant on the machine and require more and more time on it, significantly limiting her quality of life. We have made great efforts to give her a "normal" life, she is mainstreamed in kindergarten, goes to church, plays with other kids, gives hugs, makes jokes, runs, plays at the park, and is very much a part of a lot of people's lives. Being placed on this machine would make all of those things difficult if not impossible. We are hoping that Mayo will be able to find something else, or some other answer. We find ourselves at a crossroads with our little angel, and decisions way heavily at on our hearts. ok, I have to stop there, that is all I can say about that.

To raise the stress level a notch, little Lainey was in the hospital last week. after coughing for three months, it was determined that she has asthma. We started breathing treatments, and she kept getting worse. I took her into the pediatricians office, who gave her a steroid shot and another breathing treatment. It did nothing and she was visibly struggling to breath, so she was admitted straight to the hospital. She was there for 2 days of round the clock steroids and treatments, before she was doing better and sent home with 5 more days of the same. Now she is doing great and will get a breathing treatment twice a day for the rest of the winter. It ended up being bronchiolitis aggravated by her asthma.

On a lighter note-

Ty will graduate tomorrow on Dec 14th. I don't know if excited or relieved is a better word.

Cal is really excited about Santa this year, and keeps asking "how many more days?" He is also preoccupied with learning to read and write and is always asking "what does that say?" and "what letter does ______ sound with?"

In my attempt to keep up with blogging here are some fun pictures from this year, enjoy!

12-13-07
Megan