Running In Circles

This post by Aunt Anna:
I was trying to film Callie walking today but caught Rachel running in circles. It was too cute not to share, she is so funny. Sorry you have to turn your head to the left to view, I am new at this.

Latest MRI

Sorry I haven't posted in a while. Things have been pretty crazy!! We had another MRI on Nov. 6th. We got more good news that her cancer has not grown at all since the last MRI. We are thrilled with this news and the doctors have been pretty much amazed with Rach. When they told us she had cancer there was a 1 in 4 chance that she could survive it at her age and the doctors are pleasantly shocked that she's not only surviving but thriving. She is gaining weight at a good rate thanks to the G-tube and she's running around like a normal 2 year old. We have not had to give her any pain meds in months and none of the doctors thought that she'd be able to walk without them! She is in physical therapy and she just got moved from 2 days a week to one because they don't think she needs as much help anymore. The chemo combo that she takes is a relatively new one and that has really helped her beat the odds. Traditionally, her tumor type couldn't be stopped with chemo and her tumor has not grown very much at all (less than 10%) this whole year. We feel truly blessed that she's doing so well and we appreciate everyone's thoughts and prayers- please keep it up because it's working!

It's another girl :)

My pregnancy has been going good so far. No complications or problems have arisen. The baby is getting big, as you can tell from the pics of me on the blog! We found out that we are having another girl and we're very excited that Rach is going to have a sister. We don't know how much of it she understands but she pats my belly all the time and says, "baby". I hope she'll be that nice when her sister arrives in February! We haven't decided on a name but there are a few that we really like.

Day outside in the Hill Country

Michael took last Monday off and we went with his parents and some family friends, the Garcias, to Lost Maples State Park and Fredericksburg to do some shopping. Cade came too because his parents were out of town. The kids had a great time and they wore themselves and us out!!

Shopping in Fredericksburg




Hiking at Lost Maples way out in the Hill country. It was beautiful with all of the trees changing colors for fall- we're not used to that!





Cade wasn't sure why Rach was falling behind!


Cade had fun riding on Mike's shoulders.

Cade was a little too big for the stroller but Rach prettty much lives in hers and was not going to part with the big one!




She was very excited to run around after the 1 1/2 hr. car ride
Dad, I'll drive us home!

Making a mess with frosting

Rachel pretty much lives on condiments and she had a little too much fun this night with her frosting! :)

Wurstfest

We took Rachel to an annual festival in our hometown called Wurstfest. It's a German festival with lots of food, music, and beer so it 's a good time! She had a great time and liked dancing to the music.

She didn't like sharing her hat with Dan!
She loved the carousel. :)

This is her dancing but she's in between moves!

Posing with Liz & David

Enjoying the Weather at the park

Rachel chased the train down because she knew she was supposed to get on but it went past her! She was yelling at the train to come back.

Halloween

Halloween was pretty low key. Both sets of grandparents, Anna, Cade, Callie, Austin, & Marissa all came over for dinner and we went trick or treating afterward. The kids had a great time and Cade didn't stop until he fell asleep in the wagon! This was Rachel's first Halloween with her daddy because he was in Iraq last year so he took her to every door. I think he had just as much fun as she did. :)











Rachel kept going through her candy and handing it to Cade.
Everytime she had to take it from a bowl she would thumb through all of it before making a decision.