PARTY of the Century

The King of Volunteers, Dave Bartholomew (in the blue shirt with Eden and her cake), arranged for Eden to have a very special birthday celebration. It was so special and planned so well that EDEN ADAMS was speechless! Now we all know that Eden always have something to say, so it was a priceless moment indeed. Our sincere thanks to Dave for putting together a once in a lifetime event for Eden’s 6th birthday.

Dave plans a lot of activities for the kids on J5, so he has some experience at making this kind of thing work well. He planned a surprise party for Eden, pizza and root beer floats, nurse face painting and an amazing scavenger hunt. Eden didn’t get settled down until 11 PM. Whew, those J5 people really know how to party!

Our most gracious pharmacy assistant, Jocelyn Patton, arranged with Kroger of New Albany to have a beautiful Princess cake donated so that we could have more then enough to share with every person on J5. Thanks to Jocelyn and to Kroger of New Albany for the awesome cake. It tasted great, looked wonderful and was a tremendous gift. Thank you! For those of you who do not know, Eden’s stepbrother, Rodger, is a cashier at Kroger, too.

Mommy and Aunt CeCe took care of the party decorations, with pink and white streamers everywhere. Nancy provided the coolest Princess Castle piñata ever made for the party. Dave got the plates and napkins and stuff, along with the root beer, ice cream, pizza and face painting supplies.

We had an awesome turn out in terms of guests for the party: most of the J5 patients and parents, nurses and PCA’s stopped by; Dr. Jason popped in; Tony, Bobbi and Roby; DJ, Stacey and Christian Gordon; Mindy, Chad and Ally McCollister; Jon and Jocelyn Patton; Aunt CeCe, Mommy, Daddy, Shelly, Riley and Rodger; Kailyn Baird and many others from all over the hospital.

Eden had a birthday that may never be topped. She had so many visitors and gifts that it was overwhelming for all of us. Our thanks to everyone who worked so hard and gave so much for this inpatient birthday to be so special.

Poppa Ron stopped by earlier in the day and Tasha McCoy (Children’s Foundation) came through when she got done with work for the day.

Mamu Joanne called, as did Stephanie Welches, Miss Diddle’s entire kindergarten class called and sang Happy Birthday and so many others that we cannot name them all here.

Eden was released from Children’s this morning. She is riding her bike, playing with anyone who will play with her and generally just glad to be home. The biggest problem that she deals with when she leaves the hospital for home is boredom. She is so used to having someone with her 24/7 at Children’s that it takes a while for her to adjust to being back home again.

Tomorrow is the big Club Libby Lu Princess party and then she is off to Mommy’s for a week. She will return to school on Monday, she has clinic and labs at noon on Tuesday, school on Wednesday, a radio interview at noon on Thursday and then clinic and labs at 10:30 on Friday.

She has a full schedule this week; in addition her counts will start dropping from the chemo so we will have to give her daily injections of Neupogen, which helps her white blood cells to increase quickly. We will have to be more careful of where Eden is and whom she is around when her counts drop, as she will be more susceptible to infection and fevers. She cannot be around anyone who is ill, so please visit responsibly!

Thank you so much for checking on Eden, for all the prayers and well wishes and all of the love!