Saturday, December 30, 2017

18


18 years today, and we're still tickled and amazed and grateful. 
Happiest Birthday, my young adult baby girl. The world is your oyster - go get it.

Monday, December 25, 2017

THE Month of Georgia

This particular Month of Georgia has been the busiest one ever, and boy, do we have BIG news! Georgia got a message from Trinity University, the first school she applied to, and ...

 She got IN!!!

 And she got a $25,000/yr scholarship! 
That's when the tears came.

The scholarship qualifies her to compete for a FULL ride scholarship in March, and she is SO excited to have her first acceptance in the bag. She has three applications due in the next month, and then we wait. Of course, we are proud of her and her hard work, and we know that she will end up in the perfect school. It's just hard to believe that we're here already! 

Like most people in these parts, we were pleasantly surprised to have a snow day earlier in the month, and the girls made sure to get some snowball-throwing in before it melted. Georgia might have to get used to colder weather next year, and if so, we will make sure she has more than a bathrobe to keep her warm.


She finished up the semester with her highest grades ever (no pumping the brakes for this senior!) and the most successful swim meet the Starfish have had. She also attended a planning meeting for the Dell Children's Patient Advisory Council, and she got to hear firsthand how much everyone appreciates her work on the Council logo.

Former patient, current advisor, perpetual champion!

The annual caroling party got everyone in the Christmas spirit and ready for the real deal.


They each got the other Studio Ghibli gifts!

Her favorite: a vintage Pentax camera.

It's been a whirlwind, with the two biggest days in the M of G to come. We hope you all are enjoying the holidays with your families, and we wish everyone a Happy, Healthy New Year!

Thursday, November 30, 2017

Buckle Up

Six months to graduation. 30 days to her 18th birthday ... 
Let the Month of Georgia begin!!!

She's fundraising until the end of the year, too, so if you'd like to kick off the Month of Georgia by honoring her 18th birthday or her 8th year past diagnosis, click HERE to donate. Thank you!

Wednesday, November 22, 2017

Attitude of Gratitude

We are especially stocked up on gratitude this Thanksgiving as Georgia continues her quest for world domination and all-around awesomeness. Consider just these latest achievements:

Georgia and the Starfish are still burning up the lanes in swim meets, including most recently at the Aggieland Invitational in College Station, where every girl on the team set a Personal Record in at least one event!



In her very first Youth and Government event, the bill she wrote and presented ("An act penalizing the use of pesticides harmful to Texas bees and other pollinating populations ...") unanimously passed committee and the Senate - and was named THE Outstanding Bill for the District 2 conference. And once again, the Ann Richards Stars swept every category of the awards and have their first-ever nominee for Governor at the state conference!



And THEN, at the national Journalism Education Association conference in Dallas last weekend, she received an Honorable Mention for her editorial cartoon (photo to come!), and the rest of the JFam (journalism family ; )) ran the table on those awards as well!



Georgia still has cards for sale to support the Ann Richards School journalism program, so let us know if you'd like some original Thank You notes! $5 for 4 assorted cards, featuring pictures from her adventures this summer at the Savannah College of Art and Design.


And in between all of these events and obligations, she's earning her highest grades ever and loving every minute of her classes and spending time with her Senior sisters. Her time at Ann Richards has been so wonderful, and we're all looking forward (wistfully, I might add) to more special moments and events to come.

One very special moment came yesterday in the form of Georgia's annual survivorship appointment. All reports were perfect, as we expected, but what we didn't expect was the excellent news that she can continue to be seen at the clinic until she is 22! As grateful as we are for her to be turning 18 next month(!!!), the thought of aging out of our familiar care routine - and leaving our dear care team! - was a lot to swallow, so it was a pleasant surprise to find out that we can stay this course for a while longer.

Finally, as we all give thanks tomorrow, we hope you'll consider giving back on #GivingTuesday, November 28th. As always, we appreciate your support of Georgia and the Peachy Keens on behalf of the St. Baldrick's Foundation, so if you'd like to make a year-end gift in honor of the bravest girl in the land, click HERE.

We wish all of our Friends of Georgia a very Happy Thanksgiving!


Tuesday, October 31, 2017

We Go To Eleven

We love Halloween, and we love Stranger Things, so ... all four of us dressed up as Eleven!

Happy Halloween!

Monday, October 16, 2017

And Away We Go!

As of Wednesday, Georgia has officially applied to college! Only one school so far, and for the rest, she has supplemental essay questions to complete and her portfolio to gather, but by November 1st, she will be finished with her applications! She may add another school or two after that, but she's really excited about the list she has now and would be very happy at any of them. Such an exciting time!

In other exciting news, the Best Sister in the Land turned 14 on October 1st! Ivy continues to amaze and amuse us, and we just love her so much. We celebrated with the family on her big day, and last weekend, she took her gaggle to the Texas Teen Book Festival, where they enjoyed some author panels, bought and talked books, and WON the costume contest with their excellent depiction of Percy Jackson and fellow demi-god campers from Camp Half-Blood. Happiest Birthday, Ivy Francis!



A Georgia original for the Birthday Girl

We were told that Senior Year was busy, but our girl has been running and gunning pretty much non-stop since school began. Just last week, she had a field trip to an architectural firm, where they were seeking creative input from Georgia and her fellow art students on a new installation project downtown. She was also gifted a press pass for the Austin City Limits Music Festival, so she spent some time on Friday touring behind-the-scenes at the festival and then got to enjoy the music with her friends as well. She was back at it on Sunday with her daddy for the fourth year in a row. Might be a good way to get her home in October next year!


And she's back in the pool for her senior season, with two meets under her belt already. As the captain, she's in charge of warm-ups on Thursday mornings, and now that the team has gone from 8 to 17 this year, it's a pretty big job! We have loved watching Georgia grow as a swimmer, and we're so grateful that she's had such a wonderful team experience. These Ann Richards girls stand by each other through thick and thin and are excellent examples of teamwork, sportsmanship, and leadership. We love our STARfish and are looking forward to a great season!

Say it with me now: Just keep swimming!

Friday, September 29, 2017

Action News

It's been a busy, ACTION-filled month!

Georgia and her gaggle joined us for a Back-to-School dinner with their families.
We started this when they were freshman, and now, here we are ...


 Georgia has been loving her time working with The Contemporary Austin's Teen Council - 
she even got her first paycheck!

Both Georgia and Ivy welcomed cousin Claire into the National
Junior Honor Society - these Moore girls are going to rule the world!


And between our Kendra Scott event, Georgia's latest Bald Georgia t-shirt run, and our shave at Fado Irish Pub, we raised over $3,000 for St. Baldrick's and childhood cancer research! Thank you to all of our donors, shavees, and volunteers - it was a great way to mark Childhood Cancer Awareness Month! So was this ...

In one month, she's applying to college.
xoxo

Sunday, September 10, 2017

September Action


While September is officially Childhood Caner Awareness Month, we like to think of it as ACTION Month. Last night, I hosted a Kendra Scott Give Back Event, and this weekend, we'll be back at Fado Irish Pub for another shave event! Our Little Free Library has gone gold:


And for the next two weeks, Bald Georgia shirts are back on sale! Click here to purchase yours!


In the meantime, we're still celebrating the incredible news that the FDA recently approved CAR T cell therapy for kids with ALL! We've been following this therapy for a while now, and the fact that it has been approved for kids before adults is practically unheard of - and very encouraging. Immunotherapy is a game-changer, and we'll be watching to see how these breakthroughs impact the future of cancer treatment.

We're ALSO celebrating the new grant funded by the Georgia and the Peachy Keens Hero Fund - meaning it was funded by all of YOU! For the next year, we'll be supporting the work of Dr. Naomi Winick, who is studying attention and working memory issues in survivors of ALL due to certain chemotherapy received during their treatment. It's so rewarding to see exactly what your donations can do, and we're excited to follow Dr. Winick's work - right up the road in Dallas.

Another thing your donations did this year is help bring St. Baldrick's overall total to $34 million raised so far for 2017! That's a lot of love and a lot of research funding, and the 46 Mommas were proud to share the news at our shave in Austin! Thank you, THANK YOU, Friends of Georgia - we couldn't do any of this without you!

Tuesday, August 29, 2017

The Last Go Rounds

It's been a busy few weeks, starting with Georgia's last term as a camper at Camp Mystic and ending with the beginning of her last year at Ann Richards. Already?! It appears so. It also appears that she is thoroughly enjoying every moment. And as bittersweet as it all is, so are we. 

Over the next two months, she'll be focused on college applications, a dual-credit science class, and her new position on the Teen Council for The Contemporary Austin, a fantastic local art museum. She'll be discussing and learning about art with other teens and planning events to encourage more teens to visit the museum. She actually gets paid a bit for her work, so she's calling it her first job - our little-ish working artist!

All good things are coming Georgia's way, and she deserves every one. She has worked so hard, grown so much, and made us prouder than proud. On the eve of Childhood Cancer Awareness Month, and in light of what many of our family and friends are enduring in Southeast Texas right now, we are beyond grateful. 

First first day/Last first day

In six years, the only time she got a top bunk!

Modeling the shirts she designed for Field Day - Go Kiowas!

Showing off her deck tennis skills ...

and her cooking skills ...

and her balancing skills, I guess?

Sassy!

Laughing during her Vespers presentation, having just swallowed a bug!

Last campfire.

Sweet friends.

More tribe art by the artist herself.

One more logo design - it was so close to the real deal, the t-shirt shop wouldn't print it! The inspiration is a song that the Aides perform in the dining hall using their serving trays as props, so she at least got to paint it on the board that will stay in the Aides' cabin for years to come. 

 Reunited!

And then she got home, and this happened:

First first day/Last first day at Ann Richards - with a Clementine photobomb.

Senior and 8th Grader!

Sister Power, indeed.

Senior flashmob. I cried.

It's going to be such a great year.