Day +81

Today's daily photo is brought to you by Ariauna's Uncle Josh and his BIG bucks!!!  Love you Josh and appreciate you helping us with our daily photo's....

Today makes it 110 days away from home for us. Just out of curiosity today we decided to figure out what it would have cost us just to have a place to sleep in Minnesota if it was not for the Ronald McDonald House. If we were having to stay in a hotel, the cheapest one we had found and that had a hospital discounted rate was for $79.99 a night. So times that by 110 nights and it would be $8,798.90. Unbelievable!!  I am so grateful that we only had to pay for a hotel for 5 nights and am so grateful for the Ronald McDonald House and what it means to me and my family. Today we had to get up bright and early because I had Sadie signed up to go to the Sibshop at the Amplatz Children's hospital. Sibshop is a special workshop they set up for siblings of a child who has a chronic or life threatening disease. I had taken the kids to one in Utah back in April when Ariauna was inpatient there for five weeks and the kids had a blast. Austin and Sadie actually went last month and Sadie absolutely loved it, Austin not so much. So this time, Sadie was the only one we signed up. I left Austin in charge while I took Sadie over to the hospital and dropped her off. Here she is doing the welcoming activity while they waited for the other kids to get there.

You can not tell very well, but she was coloring and decorating an apron. The theme for this sibshop was cooking so I am sure she will have a blast. I took the shuttle back to the RMH because her workshop is from 9-12:30 and parents can not be in the classes. I went back to the RMH and went up to check on the kids before I went downstairs to do what I had been nervous the past 24 hours for. Yesterday, Katie in the program office called and asked me if I would please be on their Fall "Raking Event" video. They wanted me to be interviewed by someone at the RMH and be video taped while talking about the RMH and what it means to me and my family. Ugh! I am not really much of a camera type of a person, and especially when it comes to something that will make me cry. I knew I would cry during the interview, but I am sure that just makes the video that much more meaningful. Today at the Ronald McDonald House it is their yearly "Rake Event" where they have a lot of volunteers who come to help do all the yard work, clean up and raking around the grounds of the houses. They wanted me to come down at 10:00. I headed down and they took me in a separate room (one of the common family rooms) and interviewed and video taped me. I was a nervous wreck and am so glad it is over. They mainly asked what brought us to Minnesota which immediately made me tear up, then we talked a lot about the Ronald McDonald House, our experience here and what it means to us. I think I did okay, I know I was nervous and ended up looking down a lot not directly at the camera or the lady who interviewed me. But I know part of that was because I was teary and trying to control my feelings. Anyway, I was the only one they interviewed today, but they have interviewed plenty of other families for other videos they have made. The video is suppose to be posted on the Ronald McDonald House Upper Midwest website and their face book page and in time might go viral on you tube. I will keep you all posted if and when I see it come out. Once that was over, I felt like I could breath again and enjoy the rest of my day. By then it was about time for brunch so I got the kids and we headed down to eat. Right about the time we finished up our lunch, there was a surprise visitor that popped in. Oh my gosh all the kids at the house were so excited.

This is only the second time since we have been here that Ronald has came to the house. It is so much fun when he just shows up and the kids don't know. This next picture is of our friends Molly, Coco and Nana.

Here is a couple of the RMH interns- Jessica and Rachel who are working at the RMH for the Fall. The kids absolutely love them, they are the one's that help carry out some of the activities around the house. The kids in the picture with them are Mason, Abby, Alyssa, Coco, Nana, Ariauna and Jaxon.

The kids ended up staying and working on making some fun turkey's with Rachel while I ran and picked Sadie up from the hospital. Sadie had a great time at Sibshop and they did so many fun things. They made home made ice cream, went on a walk to DiVani's (which is a little Italian restaurant across from the hospital) and a few other activities. She was very glad she had gone. While I was at the hospital, we ran upstairs to the 4th floor and said hello to Steven one of our neighbors at the RMH who is currently going through chemo for a rare type of cancer. He was doing rather well and we even got a smile out of him. Then we headed back to the RMH house to see how the kids' turkey craft went.

Jaxon let Rachel do his hands and was the only kid that would let her do his feet with the paint. Ariauna ended up just painting hers with a brush, but I think they both turned out really cute!

The kids played for a chunk of the afternoon, then I laid Ariauna and Jaxon down for a short nap before dinner. Dinner tonight was the company that does Black Peppered Salmon for dinner. They do dinner several times a year and always do the same dinner and it is one of the favorites. They serve Salmon cooked a couple of different ways, they had skewers of shrimp tonight, skewers of chicken and vegtables, roasted potatoes, roasted beets, salad, rolls and desserts. It is an excellent meal and I took a picture of the salmon just to make anyone who likes salmon jealous.

It was excellent and we even got Ariauna to taste a bite. After dinner we spent the evening over by the fire, lounging around, working on the puzzles and just hanging out with some friends.

Last but not least for the day, we were all upstairs about midnight getting the kids ready to get in bed and Jaxon was in one of his funny, hysterical moods (probably because he was so tired). Before we left to come to Minnesota he walked up to me one day and said he was pregnant and pushed his belly out as far as he could. Well he still does it and it cracks us all up so much we thought we would share it. I don't think I have ever seen a little kid that can shove his tummy out that far. You can also see how Jaxon can be such great medicine for Ariauna. I love my kids and am so grateful to have them all with me now!

One last picture of what Daddy has been busy doing at home and an update on how much closer he is getting to having our home remodel project done.

Today I am so grateful for the Ronald McDonald House. I know I have said this before, and I am sure I will say it a million more times. But with me doing the interview today, It really made me stop and think about why we are here in Minnesota, what the Ronald McDonald house has done for us and what it means to me and my family. I can not even talk about the RMH without tears coming to my eyes. I never knew that much about the RMH, I knew it existed and I knew there was one in Salt Lake, but I had no idea what a wonderful program it was and the extent they go to for the families that have a sick child. I can not even imagine what our bills would be by now if it were not for this wonderful program. I also can not imagine what it would have been like for Ariauna and I to go through this process, alone in a little tiny hotel room. We have made friendships and met so many wonderful people that have touched our life forever. We are very lucky to have been blessed by this wonderful program and look forward to being able to pay it forward in service to the RMH at home.