Farewell My Longtime Room...

Well, here it is on the eve of Spartacus' debut and I'm waiting for monitoring before trying to get a decent night's sleep. I've had a parade of nurses and even my friend who cleans my room each day come in and say goodbye, an early congratulations and good luck. I've really been blessed with dear friends who work here at St. Lukes. Byron and my dad gave me a priesthood blessing this afternoon-- so I really feel calm and am not fearful or anxious about tomorrow. I've thrown some pictures on I'd thought you'd enjoy. Here's my wall of certificates (the nurses gave me for each week in here). We took them all down today.
I can count on two things with each family visit: first, Reese will snuggle in bed with me. Second, she will likely be wearing her favorite blue skirt and blouse. I think in the ten plus weeks I've been in here, she's worn this outfit every visit except for 4 times.

This is the dry erase board in my bathroom, where like a prisoner, I've been keeping hatch marks of each day I survive.

Yesterday (Saturday), my family held a "Cowgirl Roundup" for the girls in the family. It started out with each girl getting her hair braided and freckles painted on.

My mom made little cowgirl vests and embroidered horse purses for every girl.

On top of the vests and bags, Aunt Rachel made each of the girls "Sheriff's Badges" with their names on them: Ropin' Reese, Giddyup Greer and Howdy Holland. Here's all the girls doing their very best Yeehaw!

They did about a bazillion activities. Grammy (Saint Dee) is helping Reese "bedazzle" a bandanna.

Portraits were taken of each girl and each family in Aunt Dana's barn.

On top of taking care of my kids, Saint Dee was in charge of all the food-- gotta love the jello horse head (I like to think of it as an ode to the Godfather trilogy).

Nanny (Aunt Dana's mom who is an artist) had all the girls make clay Indian pottery. That's my niece, "Atta girl" Addison in the forefront.

Games, stick horse relays etc. were played in the yard. Here's GiGi playing horseshoes.

Holland (Miss Competitive) who pouted after losing one of the contests, came back to win the horseshoe competition.

Don't laugh, but all the younger girls stripped off their shirts to paint miniature horses.

This has nothing to do with the Cowgirl Roundup... but I loved this picture of Reese doing Natalie's hair. Natalie is Dana's only niece-- and her family is now part of our family.

After the girl festivities, the dads and the few nephews in our family were welcomed home with a pretty fancy dinner. Saint Dee had a horse pinata for all the kids. Because, as my girls say, you can't have a real party without a pinata. Good advice for all you singles out there.

Finally, here's Reese sitting on our dog Zoe. Notice how all is right with the world until...Yup, you guessed it. The Z dog tossed her. It's hard being 3.
But Grandpa's can always make everything right again.

Here's to tomorrow. Thank you, thank you, thank you for all of your love. I'm approaching tomorrow with an army of support!