Emery Update

It's been quite a while since my last post, but I'm sure most of you know why! Here's a short version of what has been our life for the past three weeks. We took our precious baby to the hospital January 5th with a fever and a droopy eye. After a series of tests and a roller coaster of emotions we were informed that our brand new baby, who we were already more in love with than we could ever imagine, has a rare infant cancer, called a neuroblastoma. We could not believe what we were hearing and had no idea what the future was going to hold. What we have found over the past three weeks is that we are surrounded by people who love us and Emery so much. Emery has thousands of people all over the country praying for her to be healed. People have brought us meals, sent us cards, sent over friends of friends to pray with us in Houston, and generously donated money to a foundation started in Emery's name. The generosity has been endless and we could not be more grateful.

Here are some pictures of what is going on back home. We are so blessed to work at a place where everyone comes together when someone is in need. Not only do we work with a wonderful faculty and staff but we also have tremendous students with huge hearts. The student council came up with a fund raiser in Emery's honor. The students can buy paper links to write a note to us and Emery on. All the links have been put together forming a chain that is hanging in the hallways. I can't wait to see what the students wrote on each link. I love that we will have it to show Emery when she is older. The students came up with this, and many of the links were purchased by students David nor I have ever taught. How awesome is that? I am so proud to be an AHS Sandie!


Hanging the Emery chain in the hallways at school! It looks so long! I wish we could see it in person.

This was the beginning of the chain. Our friend Patty, the student council sponsor, sent us these pictures. Thank you AHS for loving us and Emery so much. We miss you all and look forward to getting back!

I loaded a bunch of pictures but not in any particular order...

These are Emery's favorite doctors, Dr. Thompson and Dr. Javi. They have been so great to us and Emery. They love giving David a hard time about everything and you can tell they truly love what they do. Dr. Javi is always playing with Emery and making cute little noises at her and Dr. Thompson is always emphasizing how he wants us to get back to being a normal family. I love that he doesn't want us thinking of Emery as a sick baby and just wants us to get back to living life like we used to. We couldn't be happier with our doctors.

Here's Emery hanging out at Dan and Lauren's house. Lauren's mom went shopping and bought Emery lots of new clothes...those of you who have seen her closet at home know that she is not in need of more clothes, but I didn't pack very well when we were rushed off to Houston. I'm very thankful for the clothes because I didn't pack much for little miss Emery!


My dear friend, Ashley came to visit us on Friday! It was so good to see her again. She got to see Emery when she was about a week old in Amarillo. We love you Ashley!

This is Allison, Emery's favorite nurse! She was with us for three nights in PCU. A couple of those nights were really rough! Emery was really fussy and had the worst diaper rash possible. Allison helped us in so many ways. She brought us a swing for Emery, a toy for her crib that played lullabies, doctored up her diaper rash, and gave her some cute little headbands so that she looked like a girl when she was wearing the hospital issued t-shirts. We loved Allison and wish she could be with us every night!


Here are a couple of shots of Emery smiling! She has been all smiles lately! It's amazing to me that she is still so happy despite everything she has been put through. She's such a sweet girl!


Thanks to everyone who is praying for us and Emery. We appreciate that more than anything. We will head back to the hospital on Wednesday to see Dr. Thompson. We will be admitted either Wednesday or Thursday for Emery's second round of chemo. She will have one chemo treatment and then they will need to monitor her for a day or two. A week and a half later, they will do an MRI to look at the tumor again. There is a chance we will go home after that, but they still want to do another MRI at the end of the 21 day cycle. I have a feeling we'll be in Houston until then. I am going to try to keep blogging, so stay tuned!