We're Back!!

The boys on the subway

OK, we are back! Vacations rock, don't they?! We had an AMAZING time in Washington DC. We had 2 days for traveling and 9 days for sightseeing. We took a day off right in the middle to rest our weary feet, but we did and saw A LOT.

Dave showcasing some fossils

We had four of the kids with us the whole time, with the fifth coming over for 4 days at the beginning of our trip. It was so wonderful having the whole family together, warms my heart. We all experienced our first subway ride on the Metro, quite the experience. Day 1 we left the hotel with plans for the zoo, as we boarded the Metro we saw tons of people all decked out in St. Paddy's attire. We found out the was a shamrock festival at RFK stadium. Hmmmm, sounds like fun, right? Well, as the train filled with the revelers, some had begun the "celebrations" already and were quite loud and merry. Upon second thought, we surmised it would probably be better to find something to do that didn't involve thousands of drunk people. We got off at Metro Center station and headed for the Museum of Natural History. It was amazing, as I am sure I will describe everything, amazing! After that we had some yummy burgers at Ollie Burgers, the dude reminded me of the soup nazi. :)

Iwo Jima Memorial

Arlington

Day 2 Davis flew in on a red eye and as soon as he got there we headed out to Arlington Cemetery. It is so beautiful there. Lots of walking up a big hill but we made it up, wheelchair and all, just in time to see the changing of the guard and the Tomb of the Unknown Soldiers. Then we saw the Iwo Jima memorial. I always forget how big it is, and so beautiful.
Day 3 we hit the National Archives, which was awesome. How amazing to see all those documents that birthed our country. Then we headed to the Air and Space Museum. Again, the history is so amazing! I love seeing all the supplies the first astronauts had with them, and the story of the Wright brothers.
Day 4 was spent at the Holocaust Museum. All I can say is wow. It always amazes me that it started with one evil man and that he attained so much power. To think that one evil man is responsible for so much death and destruction, unbelievable. I pray we never let that happen again.
Day 5 was spent RESTING our weary feet! I've never walked so much in my life!

Day 6 was TONS more walking but so worth it. We saw the Washington monument, the WWII memorial, which was beautiful. The reflecting pool was all torn up, redoing the bottom, so that was a bit of a bummer. Then we saw the Lincoln memorial, one of my favorites. Then we walked through the Korean memorial and the Vietnam memorial, again, beautiful. I think that was the day we walked by the White House and I got a great picture of the family standing in front of a big bus (with the White House behind it of course). It drove by at just the wrong time! We also discover a Law Enforcement Memorial that we didn't know was there. Dave found a couple of names of officers he knew and he had attended their funerals. I'm really glad we found that.
Day 7 was spent at the Museum of American History, I loved all the pop culture stuff, Dorothy's shoes, Archie and Edith's chairs, the original muppets, etc.

Molly and Isaiah overlooking the Potomac

Day 8 we rented a car for the weekend and drove to Mt. Vernon, Gen. George Washington's estate. Wow, it was so amazing. The view of the Potomac River is beautiful, they have kept the opposite shore line from being built up and it still looks like it did 250 years ago! I guess at one time someone wanted to build a waste treatment plant over there and thank God it didn't happen. The Mansion and his tomb were my favorite. At one time he had 8000 acres, the property is currently 500 acres.
Day 9 we drove to Gettysburg, PA. My favorite day of the trip. Although we were all a bit tired and grumpy, the pivotal battle there during the civil war just fascinates me. We took a self guided tour of the battlefield with a CD that took about 2 1/2 hours. The battlefield had more than 1400 memorials to different battalions and platoons and companies, some very small and some spectacular. There was also a great museum about the civil war.

Goofy on the plane home

Truly, the trip of a lifetime. Memories that will never be forgotten. It was such a blessing to have spent so much time with my family and the only thing that would have made it better is if Davis could have spent the whole time with us.
P.S. The best food day was s'mores table side at Cosi.

mmmmmmmmm, s'mores

If you're brave, come browse ALL the photos!

Love and Marriage 5

Well, Dave came home. As I said I was not super fond of him at this time. One thing I had learned from all of this is that Love is a choice. It is not something that just happens to us. There is the initial attraction and passion, but for long term it must be a choice. We had both chosen to stop loving the other, to stop putting the others needs before ours. Instead of listening for God's still small voice I had been proclaiming loudly for two years, once you divorce me, it's over. After the divorce, I made the choice not to love him anymore. So now I had to make the choice to love again. It wasn't all that difficult to start feeling after I had starting acting on it. Sometimes our actions need to precede the feelings. Sometimes we wait around for those feeling to come, I believe acting them out brings them to us faster. God is faithful, I prayed that the love would come, that I would not fight it, and it did. We began planning our wedding and discussing our future. I was confident that divorce would never be an option again, but that takes faith too. I can't make Dave's decisions for him, but I believed his renewed commitment was more than a passing feeling, that he too had chosen to love me, forever.

the newly reunited family

Dad walking me down, with sister Stephanie watching

You may kiss the big tall bride! Mom wiping a tear. I love this pic of the boys. Shows their personalities perfectly.

All the fam with some close friends.

My sister Stephanie, my cousin Angie, GG, Me, Mom, sister Kristi, cousin Mariah.
We were told to be goofy, not everyone complied.....

Click on the pics to enlarge!

Recovery

Back to Dave's story. I really want to get caught up. This is a picture of him the day before we went home, after his first surgery. Like I said before, we had help from my sister and my parents. What I didn't expect was the amazing, overwhelming support of the community. I literally didn't have to cook for four months. Two freezers were given to us and are now completely filled with meat and veggies and prepared food. Officer Jackie from the department Dave retired from organized three fundraisers that raised an amazing amount of money for medical bills. Sergeant Kevin organized a softball tournament at the last minute that was awesome. And officer Stephanie made some awesome t- shirts and sold about 300 of them! A local auto body shop GAVE us their loner van to replace our totaled one. A local orthodontist GAVE us Molly's braces. It was overwhelming. I didn't know how to properly say thank you to these amazing gifts. We also received tons of cards, lots with checks included, unbelievable. Some of the people sending money, the last contact they had with Dave was being arrested! That is the impact he made on that city. After 21 1/2 years of giving to the people, they were now giving back. God is good. My provider. And they were all praying, friends, family, accuaintances, strangers, Facebook family. The support was amazing, and has kept us going. Please don't stop praying!
Dave recovered well but slowly. He had some major twitching in his hands that took a couple of months to go away, he did everything slower, walking, talking, eating. He went back to work about six weeks after the surgery, at the same time chemotherapy and radiation started. The first week proved to be too much and he ended up working part time during treatment. His main side effect of treatment was extreme fatigue. He had 33 radiation treatments. Monday through Friday for 6 1/2 weeks, and took oral chemotherapy every day for those 6 1/2 weeks. His last treatment was the day before Thanksgiving. We had a wonderful holiday with all of our kids and our oldest brought his girlfriend. It was a great and truly blessed day.

Recent family pics

New Family Pics!!! Christmas 2010!

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Family Photo, circa 2008

just wanted to share a pic of the family. It's old, about 3 yrs ago in Frisco.