March 16, 2011 (and please pray.....)

*disclaimer -all of the italicized words have no special meaning, it is all totally random, courtesy of Noah :0)

We have been enjoying our time here at Ronald McDonald House; it has everything a kid could wish for and more. Video games, a foosball table, a huge flat screen tv and LOTS of movies, and most importantly to Noah, an abundance of food! (Who is this kid??)
We have a small room with a queen sized bed and a mattress on the floor, a sink, a dresser and a closet. We have a small tv with a dvd player as well. On our floor there are 3 large communal bathrooms, a small library, a computer area with a printer and iMac and also a laundry room. There are 7 rooms on this floor. Everyone pitches in to help with keeping the place clean. For example, every time anyone uses the bathroom, we have to disinfect the sink and toilet and dry it off - apparently water droplets are breeding grounds for bacteria, so here there are none! Each room is responsible for one chore a day; today my job was to mop the floors and clean the toilets in the bathrooms on our floor, and yesterday it was vacuuming the carpets and sweeping the floors in the hallway on our floor (Noah did the sweeping part). Everyone helps with everything and it all runs very smoothly.
We have also had some visitors! Yesterday Lynnea Vis came to visit all afternoon, and Rick, Kathleen and Nathan Vandenberg came to visit and were able to stay and partake in our amazing meal last night (!) some of the chefs at the Delta Hotel came and cooked a delicious meal for us - chicken and steak and beautiful salads and veggies and breads.... It was sssoooooo good! AND there were enough leftovers to feed everyone lunch and supper! Noah and Nathan took on Rick and Lynnea in foosball, then Noah and Nathan enjoyed a bit of NHL 06 on the Xbox before supper. It was very nice to see them.
Today the Novakowski family came to visit us all the way from Kamloops! It was great to spend the afternoon with them at the Vancouver Aquarium! We saw a 4D show where they poke you and spray you and blow air on you, etc while you are wearing 3D glasses and watching a movie. It was really neat. Noah loved all the different fish, dolphins and frogs. That place is right up his alley.
We do have a prayer request for all you pray-ers out there:
Noah went to the hospital for blood work today and we received the results of Friday's bone marrow biopsy; it is not going as quickly as they had hoped. When we arrived, Noah's bone marrow was 90% full of Blast cells, (the immature white cells) and on Friday it was still at 68% full. The goal for this month is remission, which means the bone marrow has less than 5% blast cells. (Sometimes kids go from 90-5% in the first week of treatment.) This means that Noah is so far not responding as well as they would like to the treatment, and we need you to pray that he would respond quickly, that the treatment to kill the leukemia cells will be effective.
What this may also mean is that we would need to stay here longer for an "extended induction" phase of treatment, and also that the treatment as a whole (the protocol) would take us down a longer, more aggressive road. We are really hoping that he will respond well enough that we would be able to come home for the first week of April before the next phase begins. He will have another bone marrow biopsy on Friday to check up on it - wouldn't it be amazing if it were at 5%?? I am almost afraid to ask for that! But as my good friend Billie Hoving (Grandma Firefly) always says, "You don't have if you don't ask!" So, please join me in praying that Noah's bone marrow would be less than 5% blast cells... For we know that nothing is impossible with God!
Please also pray that Noah would have peace that God is really working in this situation; when he heard this news this morning he became quite worried that it meant the treatment wasn't working at all. We sat and talked and prayed for a while, discussing what it means to put on your armor everyday - especially "the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one ..." those thoughts and feelings that God can't /won't bring healing, and actually, this evil cancer itself is a flaming arrow but it can and will be extinguished! Thanks be to God!
We have been so overwhelmed by everyone's generosity: we received a cheque from our church from all of your donations to the fund (wow! Thank you!) and the meals and gifts for our family every day are such a blessing! We really appreciate all of your support and don't really know what to say, except "Thank you!".
I especially want to thank Debbie Groot, Teresa Mager and Anne VanderHeyden for the very special way they took care of Emily on her birthday with a cake, and decorations for the chalet and gifts, etc while we were in 100 Mile House. It brought tears to my eyes to witness this love for her when I couldn't be there in the way I wanted to be for her. Thanks also to my Aunt Helene for bringing me there so I could watch her play hockey and spend her 13th birthday with her. Last but not least, thank you to Barb Bandstra who is hosting a birthday party for Emily tomorrow. I hope you all have a lot of fun! (Please take pictures...)

I have been reading the Goertzen family's blog at http://samsconqueringofall-goertzens.blogspot.com and I came across this paragraph that sums up exactly what I have been feeling/thinking about, but could never put into words as eloquently:

"We want to focus our thoughts on God and submit to his plans for Sam {Noah} and our family in all of this, knowing he is carrying us through each moment of every day. We also choose to be thankful, remembering daily all that God has provided, and are awe struck when he surprises us with moments and situations that cannot be attributed to "coincidence." It seems like unexpected acts of kindness come our way every day. He delights us over and over with small and big things that constantly remind us that he loves us so specifically and intimately, as he does you!"

We are really feeling God holding us in His big, awesome and mighty hands....
Good night everyone.
Stacey