Happy Birthday, Georgia Lee!

Twelve years old today and ready to celebrate her two-years-since-diagnosis day tomorrow!

We hope you're enjoying very happy holidays with your families, and we'll "see" you next year!

Christmas 2011

It's a Wonderful Life, indeed.

Christmas 2010

 

Last year, we chose a LIVESTRONG card that said, "Happy Healthy Holiday" on the front. The message I wrote inside holds true for this year as well:

What a year we have had and what amazing love and incredible support we have been given. 

Georgia continues to inspire us every day, and we couldn't be more pleased with her progress and the care she has received. Ivy stands ever-steadfast by Georgia's side - comforting her, cheering her on, and entertaining us all. We are so proud of both of them.

We want to thank you for Keepin' Georgia on Your Mind and for taking this journey with our family. You donated more than $10,000 to cancer research and over 150 units of blood in honor of our girl. And while Georgia continues with treatment, the Peachy Keens will be raising awareness, funds, and hope every step of the way. We have learned many things this year, but the biggest is this: we are blessed.

We wish you Happy Happy Holidays and a Healthy Hopeful New Year!

Much love and gratitude,
Trevor, Courtney, Georgia Lee, and Ivy Francis

SURPRISE!

We interrupt this Twelve Years of Christmas series to bring you Georgia's Surprise Early Birthday Party!

Surprise!

Six of her best Parkside pals conspired with me to make this "the BEST birthday" Georgia ever had, and I daresay, we pulled it off! The girls were eager to practice hiding and surprising the Birthday Girl:

Once the guest of honor arrived, and was completely surprised (see above), we moved on to the pizza party portion of the night:

Next up, ice skating! At the beautiful Barton Creek Resort - where a portion of ticket sales is being donated to Make-A-Wish! Go, Austin friends! It's beautiful!

 

Then it was time for candles and cupcakes - and Mr. Spriggy pins for everyone, also to benefit Make-A-Wish!

Everyone had a great time, even though Mommy had to gulp when she saw that big number on top of the cupcakes!

Thank you, sweet friends!

Happy Early Birthday, my brave and beautiful girl!

Christmas 2009

The sweetest Candy Cane in The Nutcracker.

The sweetest sisters in the world. 

Two weeks later, Georgia was diagnosed with leukemia.

How far she has come!

READ All About It

... And on the ninth year of our Twelve Years of Christmas, my true loves looked like this:

Christmas 2008

 

And Georgia was a Waltzing Flower in The Nutcracker

I neglected to mention in the last post that Georgia's appointment on Thursday was pretty uneventful - except that Dr. Neff has injured his back and had to leave early for his own appointment. Too much monkey walk, methinks. Anyway, we hope he feels better soon! As for our own patient, her meds were upped to 75% of her usual dose, which is up from the 50% dose she was on since restarting her meds two weeks ago. It seems that if you ever have to hold medicine during maintenance, like we did for the past month or so, you don't restart at the full dosage, but this doesn't effect the protocol timeline like it would (and did) in the first four phases of treatment. She does have an appointment in two weeks (we were hoping for four) to check counts, but it's not scheduled on her birthday or her diagnosis anniversary, which is good because we'll be too busy partying! All this to say, Georgia is quickly wrapping up her sixth cycle of maintenance and has approximately one and a half cycles to go! Say it with me folks, FOUR MONTHS!

As always, we are beyond thrilled and thankful for Georgia's success in treatment and the incredible loving care she has received from everyone at Dell Children's Medical Center and the Children's Blood and Cancer Center. It is our mission and our pleasure to acknowledge and support the amazing folks working in those halls and the warrior children they treat, so as a small gesture, we'd love for our local Friends of Georgia to consider donating a book to the Half Pint Library this Christmas:

I can't think of a better way to honor the biggest book lover we know and to share the joy of reading with some very special kids. Out-of-towners can send books to us, and we'll be happy to deliver them to the hospital. Thanks, y'all!

Of Mice and Angels

Christmas 2007

Since 2002, one of our Christmas traditions has been going to see The Nutcracker. In 2007, Georgia was in a production for the first time, playing two parts: an angel and a mouse.

As it happens, Ivy also played an angel that year in her Christmas dance class demonstration:

And this year, we've got a new angel on The Peachy Keens! Our dear friend, Emily, is celebrating her recent (second!) victory over breast cancer by participating in The Ultimate Hike - a 28.3 mile, 1-day hike that raises funds for CureSearch. Click on the link above to learn more about the hike or click HERE to support Emily's brave quest and make a difference in the lives of children fighting cancer. Thanks, y'all and thank you, thank you, Emily!

Christmas 2006

Christmas 2005

This Christmas, Georgia's name was picked out of a hat to play 

the part of Mary in the Good Shepherd Nativity Tableau.

Both kindergarten classes participated, and it was a very sweet way to start the holiday break.

Note to Georgia: I think it's okay to tell you now that, actually, the "pick" was rigged. Yours was the only name in the hat. The teachers had decided that you would be the perfect Mary.

And, indeed, you were.

We're (Post) #201!

Meaning, we've talked at you people more than 200 times - wow! Okay, moving on ...

Georgia once again donned her Awesome Spokeskid for Childhood Cancer Research cap last night and helped out on a documentary project to raise awareness about corporate giving. She had a great time with the crew - all crammed into her room with their super cool equipment - and did an excellent job of telling her story. She especially liked the part where we were eating pizza and trying to pretend that there wasn't a camera capturing our every bite!

We really appreciate being asked to participate, so thanks, guys, and good luck with the piece!

We're looking forward to a nice family weekend, full of holiday fun: Christmas movies, a dance recital, baking cookies, finalizing Christmas lists and getting them in the mail to Santa, and maybe some more decorating, because one can never have too much of that. Even though we've already spent 20 hours on the tree alone. 'Tis the season - have a great weekend, y'all!

Christmas 2004 - our first family Christmas picture.

New Life

Last December, we posted several holiday gift ideas that, in one way or another, benefited childhood cancer research, patient services, or survivorship. The most important post, Give Life, is one that we are reminded of nearly every day as we continue to learn of someone else in need of blood, bone marrow, or an organ. We have seen the miracles these gifts provide, so we again encourage everyone to please, please donate blood and register to be a bone marrow and organ donor. These truly are the gifts of life!

And now back to Christmas 2003: The Year We Had Our Elvis Baby.

On October 1st, Ivy Francis Moore came barreling into this world with a jet black mohawk, smooth olive skin, and dark chocolate eyes. Upon meeting her moments after birth (as I was nursing her for the first time), three-year-old Georgia Lee turned to her daddy and said, "Is she a mammal?" And so was born the greatest Sister Power team of all time.

Christmas 2002

The inspiration for the Twelve Years of Christmas series. Please observe the ringlets.

Christmas 2001

I wish I could say that this is one of those awkward poses that "trained" photographers always try to get you in - turn your head this way, turn your neck that way, hold your breath, count to a thousand, now SMILE! But actually, this was an Original Georgia pose, after she'd had enough of those awkward ones. The photographer wasn't even paying attention until I yelled, "Take it! Now!" And we ended up with one of my favorite pictures of all time - I think it's just hysterical. And you can see those little curls starting to sprout ...

Hairstory

Nearly every day, someone asks Georgia - or me - about her hair, now that it's all grown back. Was it this curly before? Did the chemo make it curly? Was it always this color? Even people that know her well seem to have forgotten that once our girl finally got some hair the first time around (at about 2), she was a regular Shirley Temple. Ringlets, y'all. Then, in the two or three years before she was diagnosed, her hair was longer and thicker, and the curl had relaxed some, but it still had a lot of body. When it started to come out at the beginning of treatment, we wondered aloud what it would look like when it came back, and the answer is -  Shirley Temple 2.0. In fact, when I picked her up today for her clinic appointment (Counts are up - back on meds, back on track - yay!), she was fresh out of PE, still sweating from a good hour of basketball drills (Yes!), with springy curls bursting all over her head. It reminded me of a Christmas card picture from when she was about three, and thus, a blog post series idea was born: The Twelve Years of Christmas.

Throughout this month, along with the regular news and holiday specials, I'm going to post our Christmas card pictures from Georgia's first Christmas to now. You can then observe the evolution of her hair, her smile, and the undeniable light that shines from within her. Sounds fun, right? I mean, kind of random, but fun, too, right? Yes. So we begin at the beginning.

Christmas 2000

Tick Tock

How is it December already?! Next thing you know, it'll be a very special girl's 12th birthday! Time does fly, indeed.

We had a lovely Thanksgiving in San Antonio with both of Georgia's great-grandmothers and cousins and aunts and uncles to spare. We've almost got all of the Christmas decorations up, and tomorrow, it's back to the clinic to check counts. It looks like Georgia will have two more appointments this month, but hopefully NOT on her birthday! Been there, done that.

In fact, we're nearing the two year anniversary of Georgia's diagnosis, which also happens to be the day after her birthday and New Year's Eve AND our wedding anniversary. We like to double- and triple-up on our special occasions around here - we're very organized like that. But it sure makes card-buying difficult. : )

So we're looking forward to the next few weeks of fun and festivities and will probably kick things off by watching one of our favorite holiday movies: Elf! And starting today, you can help Georgia's pal, Will, raise money for Cancer for College by entering to win an autographed copy of the movie!

See you next month!

Today and Every Day, We are Giving Thanks.

Because of all of our many blessings, especially Georgia's continued recovery and the love and support we've received from you, we are so very thankful this year. The St. Jude Thanks and Giving campaign is a wonderful reminder of just how blessed we are, so we encourage you to support one of the many retail partners that are raising funds for St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. And you might see this sweet trailer during your holiday movie excursions as well.

Another way to help is by making a donation to our friend, Claire, who is running the St. Jude Half Marathon in Memphis next weekend. Claire and her sister, Gail, have been devoted Friends of Georgia throughout her treatment, and we're so impressed by, and grateful for, their continued dedication to the fight against cancer. These girls live by the motto "Life is Good," and despite the ups and downs of this journey, the Peachy Keens wholeheartedly agree.

Good luck, girls!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Auction: Part Moo

Here are just a few of our favorite cows - really, they were all wonderful. Just prepare for pun overload! And the clip at the end is a video of the video Georgia made at the clinic. It's kind of hard to hear her over the auction crowd (we were all still processing the fact that ""Cowch" had just sold for $150,000!), so I'm hoping to get a copy of the original clip and will post it if I do.

In other news, yesterday's clinic visit went well, but Georgia's ANC is still pretty low (520), so we're holding her oral chemotherapy meds for two more weeks. She's had the croopy-coughy-crud (actual diagnosis, right?), so that's probably not helping anything, but hopefully, the time off - plus steroids and her antibiotic - will get that white count back up to normal. She's feeling good and brought home another straight-A report card. That girl!

Cowcycle

Hill Country BeauxVine and Cheese

Bat Cow!

Flamencow

Texas Moosicians

Gilded Lily

Insert Cow Pun Title Here

To say that the CowParade Austin Auction was a ginormous success (and a whole bunch of fun to boot) is a ginormous understatement. Two days later, we are still trying to come down from the rafters! After the herd of 40 live auction cows and 20+ silent auction cows were spoken for, nearly $1.5 million was raised for Superhero Kids and the Children's Blood and Cancer Center - amazing! The house was a-rockin' for sure, and we celebrated with friends old and new each time the gavel went down. There was just so much happening, I have to split my on-the-scene report into two posts - my fingers probably couldn't handle it all at once. So, we start at the top:

Samia and John Joseph, the founders of Superhero Kids, are two of the nicest, most gracious people you'll ever met. They were genuinely shocked by the wild success of the event, but I know they are thrilled with the amount of help they can offer families at the clinic well into the future. Congratulations and THANK YOU, Samia and John!

Georgia and Ivy test out "Cowch" - which turned out to be the world record-breaking cow,
fetching $150,000. I'm sure their little booty prints in the cushion are what did it.

True royalty. And Miss Austin was there, too.

Another $150K-er, the Vince Young Champion Longhorn - the only one ever created in over 70 cow auctions around the world. Which, I guess, explains why Georgia is making antlers on Ivy's head, and Ivy is flashing the "Hang Loose" sign. Where have I gone wrong?

 We were very pleasantly surprised to run into Dick and Tweety Eastland,

the directors of Camp Mystic - so great to catch up with them!

Georgia and the rest of the Superhero Kids (including our good friend, Caitlyn), 

presented a "Micro Moo" to one of the main event sponsors.

And this guy wanted a picture with Georgia.

More to come, including Georgia's video clip and some cow pictures. The artistry was very impressive - click here and scroll through the gallery to see some creative work!