Last Round EVER (Lord willing)

Sorry this took so long in coming, And that this update is brief.

Lilyana in Derek's Bob chair holding mummies dolly

Teeth cleaning time

Enjoying Opa

Stories with great uncle Hillary

Monday July 7 - Today Lilyana had bloods tested, which came back all good, meaning all good for chemotherapy to go ahead. Because she has no line anymore, we have to go in tomorrow to have one put in. Lord willing we will be able to start chemotherapy tomorrow and finish on Thursday, really praying for this. If plan A doesn't work she will start Wednesday and finish Friday, however we have tickets to fly to Christchurch Friday morning. Really looking forward to spending a weekend down south with my brothers and sister and their families and most of all my parents. Please pray for our week, with so much travelling back and forth between home and starship and Lilyana's surgery tomorrow. 


Tuesday July 8 - Arrived at hospital at 7am all ready for the possibility of surgery at 8am. Sadly Lilyana ended up being further down the list and didn't get in till 2pm. But surgery went well and recovery was fast. Chemotherapy started at 3pm. Four hours later, home time. Home 8:15pm. Long day. Thanks for your prayers.

Last round of chemotherapy. Through a picc line this time. Like her pig hat?

Wednesday July 9 - Only one more day of chemotherapy for like forever, Lord willing. Today went well. Lilyana slept a lot and had lots of cuddles with all the nurses. The clinic was very quiet, so nurses had time to talk and play with the kids. Our little three year old friend, Moosh, came and played again today. I played hide and seek with her while Lilyana slept and her mum was busy with her little brother. A lot of fun. The hat ladies visited too, needless to say we have an amazing range of hats that should last a few years.

Nearly our whole hat selection for both Derek and Lilyana.

Lilyana eating Derek siblings courage beads, while wearing half a ball on her head  :-)

Derek practising his photography skills

Thursday July 10 - FINISHED. Lilyana did very well today considering she wasn't feeling very well. She even manage to do a big poo (she had been blocked up). When she went to sleep this afternoon I left to go get some food, with instructions to the nurses that if she woke up to call me, they responded with no, because they wanted more cuddles with Lilyana! We played hide and seek again with our friend Moosh, but we were too easy to find. Not enough places an adult, a baby and a pole can hide. Moosh cried when she found out we wouldn't be there tomorrow, such a sweetie.
Well our bags are all packed, we are ready to fly to Christchurch early tomorrow morning.


Tuesday July 22 - We had a great time in Christchurch with a few highlights. The whole family showed up at the hospital for pizza night on the Friday (our wedding anniversary) and it was great to meet other families there. The whole family went to Willowbank on Saturday, Dad (granddad) came in his electric wheel chair and taxi. After looking at most of the animals we had a lunch in the cafe. A lot of fun, Derek loved the roosters and the donkey ride, Lilyana loved eating Ephraim's chips for lunch. And on Sunday we had family photos in the garden outside Dad's room, big thanks to Uncle Allan.

We went as a family to church on Sunday, amazing feeling. Have really really missed worshipping together.

We have an appointment with the oncologist for Lilyana on Monday July 28th, to see where she is at. We will also hopefully find out the long term care plan and get the picc line removed.

We thank God daily how well Lilyana has been through chemotherapy. After spending so much time at Starship, we have seen many kids who get bad side affects and even kids who react very very badly to the chemotherapy drugs with allergic reactions. We have been blessed.

We now pray that the cancer doesn't return and that the operation of the removal of the tumour has done no lasting damage to her control of number ones and twos (something we won't know for a while)

Lilyana's beads of courage, each colour represents something different. White is the days of chemotherapy.