Cousin's Visit

Thanks for all your prayers for Maddie. She just finished her first round of chemo. The treatment plan is in place so please continue to pray for her and for their family as she goes through a few cycles of chemo over the next few months. (All you 80's fans will appreciate the side ponytail that I put in Maddie's hair the last time we saw her before she started her hospital stays.) We pray that she stays healthy throughout this process and that the result is that the chemo wipes out all the cancer cells so she can be cancer-free and done with the hospital for a long time! Here is a picture of the boys and Kenz while we waited in the hospital for Maddie to get done in a surgery:While Maddie was in the hospital last week, we had the pleasure of having Mackenzie at our house so Jill and Mark could focus on Maddie's treatments and not worry about Kenzie. We had a wonderful week together. The boys loved having a little "sister" around for a few days, and all grandkids enjoyed the attentions of Grandma B. who is also visiting this month (and I enjoyed the help of Gma B. as well--no dishes for me all week so thanks, Mom!). For the most part the kids just had fun with each other. Towards the end of the visit, the cousins were acting more brother/sisterish and were annoying each other a little bit more which was actually funny to observe. (Our boys think Mackenzie needs so much help since she is so little. The first few days she was okay with all the attention and help but wanted her space and independence by the final day. ;-)

She definitely kept up with the boys and was in the middle of everything they did. (She insisted on getting her own baseball cap to wear when she saw theirs--hence the pirate hat in the picture above.) She loved playing with cars with the boys and especially found great joy in the bouncy house (thanks again, Vicki!). She mimicked a lot of what the boys said and did so sorry, M & J, if she comes home with some new phrases!
It was fun having a little girl in the house (but fixing her hair reminded me that God intended for me to have boys and not girls!). I actually put braids in her hair at one point, and they turned out halfway decent. I know it helps that Kenzie is so stinkin' cute that any hairdo would look cute on her, but I had to pat myself on the back at least once for keeping her hair out of her face for the most part that week. We even got one day of swimming in though Kenz liked sitting on the side a lot more than being in the water with the boys!