Phone call from Minnesota, we have a Bone Marrow Date!!!

My heart is beating mighty fast, my eyes are swelling with tears and I am excited and scared to death. It is weird how you can experience those two emotions at the same time. I am happy, sad, excited, scared, feel like jumping up and down and yet crying. I just got off the phone with the Search Coordinator at the Minnesota Children's Hospital. She was just calling to let me know that they got approval from the donor on the dates they requested. So drum roll please.......The dates are as follows:  The donor has an appointment next week to have his physical done, Minnesota should have the results on Tuesday July 16th. If the donor gets clearance which we are praying he does, we will have to be in clinic in Minnesota first thing Monday morning July 22nd (which means we will fly out the day before). We will spend two weeks doing her work up in clinic each day and then she will be admitted on August 1st to start chemotherapy and will have the Bone Marrow Transplant done on August 8th.  I will be getting on the Internet shortly to book airfare and a hotel.  So everyone wonders if this is for sure!  We'll I have learned the hard way that nothing in this life is for sure.  But we are moving forward, booking airfare, hotel and praying that everything goes smoothly and it all works out. Yes there is a 10% chance that they may find something during the physical that may make the donor unable to donate. But we are hoping and praying our donor is in the 90% that things work out just fine.  WOW!!!!   This is definitely making it seem more real. We are excited to get things rolling, but I also feel bad that Ariauna will be in the hospital having chemotherapy on her birthday. What a way to spend your birthday. Hopefully we can take a Taxi and go do something fun one night before she gets admitted. Also, this is even more bazaar, her real birthday and her new bone marrow birthday will only be 3 days apart.  I just wanted to post really quick the update. So much to do and only a few weeks to do it in, I guess I best be for getting busy. I am planning to do a "Wish Ariauna Well" party right before we go, so once I get airfare booked, I will let you know the date so you can all come. Please continue to pray for us and Ariauna's donor, we need all the prayers we can get!

I also wanted to post these beautiful pictures of Ariauna. I just got these today from Primary Children's Hospital. While we were there for 5 weeks in March/April they had a professional photographer come through and take pictures of a few children who are fighting rare diseases. They may be using these pictures in upcoming books/pamphlets. Anyway, I think they are beautiful and wanted to share them with you.

I love this girl more than life itself and wish so bad I could take her place in the journey she has to face soon. I love you Ariauna, always and forever!