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In case any of you have not heard their story yet, the Schrandt family recently adopted their 2nd child from Korea and found out shortly after arriving home with their baby that he now has Stage IV Wilms (metastatic to liver), a childhood cancer. He has already lost 1 kidney, and is not responding well to chemo. His prognosis is not good, and the family needs support in the way of financial, prayers, and any other encouragement you can give. There’s a full summary of James’ illness on Margie’s blog, and this is the most recent medical update on James’ blog. What they are going through is unfathomable to me, and my heart truly goes out to James and his family.

From Margie’s blog, there are 2 ways to help:
1) Help the Schrandts with a gift or donation! They have set up a post office box so you can write to James and his family directly.
2) Write a letter to James, send drawings for his room, or send a family photo for the Schrandts to enjoy.

The Schrandt Family
PO Box 374
Rochester, MN 55903-0374

I saw this on Michelle’s blog and thought it’d be fun.  You can submit your blog to be critiqued by this guy at http://critiquemyblog.blogspot.com/, if anyone is interested.  Here are his thoughts on Journey to Jackson:

“What a beautiful story. These two high school sweethearts, Travis and Laurie, got married, are both in the medical field and have recently adopted a cool little boy from Vietnam. It’s reads like a Hallmark Hall Of Fame telemovie. The blog is full of stories about the life and times of Jackson, Travis and Laurie and photos to go with them. Truly a nice blog. Easy to read and draws you in. Nice job!”

That was nice, thanks CMB! 

Anyway, Georgetown, which is my medical school, had a nice run there all the way to the final 4.  Now it’s up to Trav’s alma mater to beat Ohio in yet another championship! 

“GO GATORS!”

Random picture I think is funny!  “Free the Beast!”

Disclaimer: he was in his cage by choice!

Just thought I’d share a little Travis humor that almost made me pee my pants today. Jax and I went to our Gymboree class and I was telling him about a few of the moms I met and enjoyed chatting with today. I told him how one of the moms is switching classes though b/c her little girl is moving up to the next development level. His response was so candid and so iconically Travis:
“WHAAAAT?? HER?!! That girl’s got NO skills. I want Jackson out of this class with these little clowns and into the big kid one.”
If you don’t know my husband, it’s appropriate that you think he sounds like a complete and total ass…and I guess if you do know him, it’s perhaps not a totally unreasonable thought either, but it’s just hysterical coming from him. He’s not serious, he’s just playful in a way that’s tough to explain unless you know him.
We also went to BabysRus this afternoon so Travis could pick out something for Jackson’s God-sister-to-be (Brad and Mel’s baby). I’ve never seen a grown man get so into shopping for a dress in my life! He cracks me up.

Here are some pictures for the O’Brien family that we took in the orphanage.Â

Here are some photos of the Rubich family.

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Hey guys,

sorry we haven’t updated in a few days.Â

Friday 12/15 11AM: Laurie and Jax are napping after a long morning at the doctor.Â

So I’d read this piece of adoption literature somewhere that parents adopting internationally should not assume that people from their child’s birth country be happy to hear of the adoption news, and that, perhaps there’d be some feelings of resentment, shame, sadness, etc. when, for example, a Vietnamese person sees 2 white parents with a child of Vietnamese ethnicity.Â

Hey Everyone!

After months of anticipation and some disbelief that the adoption was actually going to happen and we would actually become the mommy and daddy of this little sweatheart, we now have him safely snuggled in our arms.Â

12/13/2006 9PM: We have him.Â