A Wishing Place

Just in case you were wondering, brain surgeries aren't fun. They're right up there with MRIs, doctor appointments, physical therapy exercises, IVs and long hours and hours of treatment time. Luckily, there are few people who realized that 25 years ago and came up with a way to make life a little more enjoyable for kids stuck with a seriously miserable condition.

We found out last month that Sada gets to have a wish granted by Make A Wish! Last year, she was reading about brain tumor kids and heard about the Make A Wish organization. Since then she has researched everything she could find about them and all the wishes they've granted throughout the US. We were invited up to their amazing building, called A Wishing Place, in Salt Lake last Tuesday and she gave the volunteers and workers a perfect summary of MAW's history - love that girl. They gave our family a tour of the place, we played a wish game to narrow down what wishes were really most important to her, and then she got to unlock the Wishing Tower with her wish key (imagine an indoor waterfall, fairy lights, chimes, glowing glass floor - pretty spiffy) and write down her top wishes and send them on to the wish wizard.

They'll keep in touch with us while figuring out how to make one of her wishes come true - right now, she's wishing for a motorhome and has two dozen reasons why she wants one, but I'm pretty sure their policy is no vehicles with motors that run so we'll see what they come up with.

This past month has been truly amazing - receiving support from people who don't have to be involved in our chaos but want to help make life a little more enjoyable is an incredible blessing.

Don't let me push, don't let me pull.....

Physical therapy started last week. We waited though the summer to see how Sada would recover on her own just running around outside, and to give Zach a little time to grow up and make the hours of appointments a little more feasible, and because Now I Can was booked up with out-of-town clients while school was out. Sada is doing good for having had her head examined from the inside out a few months ago, but she's still pretty tipsy at the most inopportune times.

Our friendly neighborhood physical therapist Sergio was waiting at Now I Can with mats, stairs and Kinesio tape. She's in for months of resistance training, balance and coordination exercise, taping for structural support and by this winter she'll be so used to hearing Sergio telling her "Don't let me push, don't let me pull, don't let me push, don't let me pull....." she'll probably share her newfound exercise knowledge with Zach to get him walking sooner. After 2 sessions, we could see a difference in her walk and posture - that place make miracles happen!

Now I Can had a concert tonight at the Scera Shell to help fund their scholarship program for families that can't afford the full cost of their session and all their clients were invited. Since it was going to be a late night, Grandma put the younger kids to bed and Mom and Dad got a night out with Sada and Alexis (and Zach 'cause he's cute). The music was great, they raised an amazing amount of money, and Zach loved dancing with his sisters under the stars.