He'll Be Home For Christmas

That's right, Walt's getting out tomorrow. His white blood cell count was 3.8 today and he's packing his bags. He's very excited. Now Alice is going to be on duty around the clock. It's so much better at home, though.

Let it snow, Let it snow, Let it snow!

We got dumped on this weekend. Bryson was trying to make his way through the snow and look how deep it was!Just kidding. He was on his knees in the picture. But is was still really deep. Almost 18 inches at our house!

This picture gives a little more realistic perspective on how deep the snow is. That's our picnic table in the backyard.

So of course we had to take advantage of it. Tubing at the High School!

David

Bryson

Chris (Me)

McKay

Nathan and Rachel arrived home from Arizona between snow storms on Saturday and joined us for tubing last night.

My little (ha,ha 6 foot tall) sister, Jaime, came to visit Tuesday from Arizona. As she put it, "It's cheaper for me to fly out and buy your Christmas presents than it is for me to ship them." She works for one of the airlines, so it's really true. Plus we get to hang out together and go shopping. The only problem was that neither of us likes to shop. So we finally kicked ourselves out of the house around 11 to face the stores. We were done (fed up with shopping and got what we needed) by 2 and that included a stop for lunch. The rest of the day was spent as "Candy Fest 2008". We made lots of my Grandma Spykerman's candy recipes. Carmels, fudge, mints, candied pecans, etc. We had a great time! That night she wrapped the presents and asked if she really had to wrap mine. Of course she did. Watching her try to wrap it was as much fun as getting it! Check it out.

Aren't sisters great!?!

Worth the wait...

Good news! Walt's white blood cell count is finally coming back up. During Chemo, the count was around 0.2 to 0.3. On Thursday, day 21, the count was 0.4. We were guardedly optimistic. Friday was 0.5 and today 0.8. We can now confidently say his counts are going up. Yea! Normal range is 4.3 t0 10.8 if my I have my units correct. Once it starts to come back it usually comes back pretty quickly. It's not clear whether he'll be home for Christmas, but we're hoping.

And there was light...

We were without power from late Thursday night until Saturday evening. What a refreshing sight when we came home from the Ward (church) Christmas Party last night and our Christmas lights were on.

The freezing rain caused trees down all over the area leaving tens of thousands without power for more than 24 hours and many still without power. The branches in the picture above fell ON the van and did remarkably little damage. All the schools were closed Friday and the boys had the worst snow day ever because there was no power (no movies, tv, computer, video games, etc.), the house was down to 60 degrees, and we wouldn't let them go outside at all because we didn't want to open and close the doors unnecessarily and lose heat to the house. They occupied themselves most of the day playing Monopoly by candle light and then cleaning the house to soften up the parents so we would take them to a movie. It worked and David took to boys out to a nice warm movie theater and dinner while I want in to be with Walt at the hospital.

Saturday as the temperature reached 50 degrees in the house, we decided we better start trying to put some heat in the house because it could be days before the power was restored. We rigged up our car, which has a spectacular heater, to the house to blow some hot air in. Check it out.

Amazing what a little dryer vent and duct tape can do. We also set up a camp stove on the back porch for cooking and warmed water to put in the house to put more heat in the house (and for hot chocolate).

We got the house up a couple of degrees before leaving for warm showers at the YMCA and the Ward Christmas Party.

Freezing rain storms can be quite beautiful and a menace at the same time.

We were planning to decorate the Christmas tree downstairs by head lamp when he got home from the party, but the power was on. We were all a little disappointed, so we turned off the lights and did it anyway.

Day 12 Post Chemo- Walt's doing great!

Walt has been looking great the past couple of days. This time around with Chemo he hasn't even lost his hair. He's very happy about that. His color is good, his spirits are up, he is doing more walking than he did the last round in the hospital. All around he has been very blessed (again).

The bone marrow biopsy results are back and everything looks good with the exception of some fibrous material found in the sample. The doctor thinks it's nothing to worry about and it could be scarring from a past injury to his bone in that localized spot. They did not find leukemic cells. Yea!

Over the weekend he got the cardiologists all excited with episodes of a soaring heart rate, but everything seems to be fine now. They have been monitoring his heart around the clock for several days, now, and seem to be satisfied that he is not in any danger. He also got to meet one of the hospital's pulmonologists when they discovered fluid collecting in his chest cavity that was limiting his lung capacity. They drained off 1 liter of the fluid and sent some of it off for testing. They said it looked good; it didn't appear to be infected. We don't have the results from the tests, yet.

Despite some possible scares over the weekend which both turned out fine, the doctor thinks his blood count will be coming back by the end of this week and a few days later they'll have to kick him out of the hospital because he's doing so well. The doctor says the middle of next week is possible. I think the end of next week or the beginning of the following week is more realistic based on how long it took for his counts to come back last time. The magic day for us is day 17 post chemo. That's when they came back last time. Pray for no infections or other serious complications and we'll have him home well before Christmas!

David's back in town and fulfilling his Dad-tucking-in responsibilities most nights this week.

A good day for Walt

I didn't get to stop by and see Walt today, but I talked to Alice and it sounds like Walt had a good day today. By the time she got there in the morning, he was sitting up in the chair in his room and ready to take a walk. For those that have been on walks with him, you'll know that making it to the windows and back is sometimes a big deal. Not today. He walked to the windows, out to the waiting room, and back to his room without stopping! Wow! He was all cleaned up and ready for the day around 9am (usually he's just begun his struggle to eat breakfast by this time, luckily right now he's on a mostly liquid diet, so drinking his nutrition isn't as big of a deal).

Part of his motivation for getting all ready early today was because he had a bone marrow biopsy scheduled and he didn't know when they were going to come to take him for it. They didn't do the biopsy until the afternoon while Jen was there. He hates having this done, but I think he was probably excited to get the results from it. We won't have the results for a day or two. This should give us some early indication how effective the treatment was. The person taking the biopsy gave an initial indication that the sample looked like it should, so we're hoping all will be as good as we've been praying for.

We have had several people from work go in and visit with him this week and they seem to energize him more than the family does. Around us he can be tired, comfortable, and stubborn, but around them he is energized and animated. I know he likes to stay in the loop with what his scientists are doing, so it makes him feel better when they come visit him.

David is in China, again, right now wrapping up a business deal. He left on Tuesday and will be back Friday night. What kind of crazy person plans a trip like that?

Indian War Whoop!

I had to post this. It's hilarious. I know Mia will post one, too.

Happy Birthday Ethan!

We put Ethan, Edward, and Mia on a plane back to Austin today, Ethan's 4th Birthday. We had a party for him before he left. Happy Birthday big guy! While they were here, one of Edward's favorite activities was to pull all the tupperware out of the cabinet. Caught ya!

We found a knome in the front yard!

Edward had way too much fun taking a bath in the sink.

Bryson and Ethan built a snowman with barely any snow. Impressive!

Edward: "Are you sure mom said I could play with a balloon?"

Grandpa: "It's OK. I'm sure she won't mind."

I know I'm cool, but I can't date until I'm 16. Leave me your number; I'll call you then.

We'll miss having them around.

Life...

I haven't had much chance to blog in the past couple of weeks. Mainly because life dealt us another blow with David's Dad having a recurrence of his leukemia. Part of me thinks, "he's had this twice before and after weeks in the hospital and some touch-and-go days, he came back stronger each time." Then there's always that nagging feeling of "how many more chances are we going to get?" Well we are fighting for a couple more chances, starting with this battle. Walt has been through 14 days of one chemo and 4 days (simultaneously) of another chemo. This regimen has been recommended for older patients and is very new for treating leukemia and we are all praying for the best.

We attribute a lot of the success of his previous treatments to great medical staff and the family spending almost every waking minute with Walt at the hospital. Between this and having Mia and her boys here for almost two weeks and Nathan popping in for a day to see his Grandpa, (oh, and don't forget a holiday, the microwave breaking, and now the fridge on the blink) I've had no time for blogging.

Walt's white blood cell count is down to zero and now we wait while his body repairs the damage the chemo has done and starts to create red blood cells, white blood cells, and platelets again. Last time it took longer than expected (like 3 weeks), so the waiting game is on. Hopefully he'll be home by Christmas so we don't have to patch him in by webcam like we did for Thanksgiving. (See picture below - Walt is at the head of the table on the monitor and speaker phone from his hospital room)

Day 1 (Nov 1). Nathan and I started on the North Rim of the Grand Canyon.













We descended the North Kaibab Trail.

The Park Service closes services on the North Rim Oct 15 due to weather, and we were warned to be prepared for 0 degree weather. Guess the crampons, 3 levels of thermals, 0 degree sleeping bag, etc weren't necessary.


Dropped 4,000 feet in elevation the first day.
As we were carrying about 50 lbs each, descending was hard work.















Nathan and I taking photos of each other from successive curves. This part of the trail is not Disneyfied.





















Day 2. Breakfast at Cottonwood Campground. The freeze-dried food was pretty good. And since you add boiled water to the pouch, the only thing to clean is the spork (titanium of course).



The descent is more gentle between here and the river. Throughout Day 2 there is a stream next to the trail. So we could carry a little less than the 5 liters of water we each had the first day as it was possible to treat the water from the stream for drinking.























Ribbon Falls was a side trip. The mound at the bottom has been built up by deposits of calcium carbonate.

















The side trails were not sidewalks.





















Bright Angel Canyon gets a lot tighter at the Narrows.



We didn't see the main canyon until the end of the second day. And we only saw a few people all Day 2 until we reached the river area.









Although we were in a desert, the running water can creat an oasis with considerable wildlife.








The end of Day 2 we saw the Colorado. Apparently the natural river was usually very brown, but now due to Lake Powell being upstream, the river is generally not muddy.

Just past Phantom Ranch but still north of the river was Bright Angel Campground. The nicest thing about the major campgrounds is the toilets; because from anywhere else you have to pack out your used toilet paper.

The food and all plastic bags have to be kept in the ammo cans to keep it away from the animals.

For example in this area the mule dear were all over.

Day 3 we crossed the Colorado River and started up the Bright Angel Trail towards the South Rim.

Lots of very interesting rocks the entire trip. But I will spare you except for this one.

Some of the switchbacks we had just come up.

Views from Plateau Point down to the river. Upstream, the first photo is to the right (east), downstream to the left.

From Plateau Point, looking south over the cottonwoods of Indian Garden Campground where we would stay the night and toward the climb for the next and last day. The faint zig -zags are the visible parts of the switchbacks on the way up.

Day 4, looking back (north). When we started the climb that morning we were still in the shadow of the South Rim. The trail in the center of the picture leads out to Plateau Point.

The packs seemed much lighter, but it was really that we were stronger.

Everything has to come in on someone's back or by mule. The south rim trails are much more traveled - lots of day hikers go down a little way from the rim. So the trails are more prepared. This is the toilet-paper delivery mule train.

This photo covers the whole trip: from the far North Rim, down Bright Angel Canyon in the background, to the river which is out of site, Plateau Point, the cottonwoods of Indian Garden, and up the canyon in the foreground to the South Rim.

A great experience. And a great companion.

We started. We finished. Everything else is just details.

We started.
We finished.
More details to come...

This is the first message I got from David, so I'm passing it along. I'll have him fill in the gap in the middle when he is settled in DC. He's flying from Phoenix to DC right now. No rest for the weary.