Joel's Journey: Christmas in Florida part 1

Tuesday, December 27, 2011

Christmas in Florida part 1

Last Thursday, the 22nd on my birthday, 13 people, two vehicles, two doggies, 21 hours..... Florida bound!! We stopped at Cracker Barrel for my birthday meal. We drove about 10 hours and landed in Birmingham Alabama! A place we will never forget for the wrong reasons!! Basically it was like this, luggage unloaded, older ones went to Ihop, three rooms, the rest of us gathered in one room, one room the door was left cracked open, three luggage and an iPad stolen, police come, report given, wait for manager to get back from vacation to review cameras, don't go to sleep til after 2am, load up and travel on to Florida! Hey we got more room in our vehicle...haha!!

The sad part is that 3 of the guys, Andrew, Elijah, and Daniel had almost everything they owned in their bags now gone, only the clothes on their back! We went to kohls the next morning and got the necessities!! I felt the worse for Daniel, his iPad he just bought 2 days ago....gone! He had bought a new hiking backpack and had most everything he was taking to Australia in it, all his "summer" stuff he got for Christmas! The only thing they didn't take was his pillow, and if they new the value of it, guess they would have taken it too!! haha!

We were glad to get outta Birmingham!! Destination: Lutz Florida!!!

Cindy

1 comment:

Daniel and Jaynee Lockwood and Family said...: Oh, I am so sorry! Wow! Remember that God always works all things together for good and He had a purpose even in Daniel losing all he had. We've had things stolen from us a few times, too, and it's so sad, but the Lord is always faithful and good. I'll pray Daniel is able to get all he needs still for his trip and I'll pray that the thief will be caught or even better convicted in his heart and come to Christ.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, Morris Family!!; December 27, 2011 at 12:40 PM

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Joel's Story

Joel, our 11th of 13 and a twin of Josiah, at age 3 was diagnosed with Neuroblastoma, a childhood cancer, on December 6th, 2006. Joel had three perfect years of health and he and Josiah celebrated their 3rd birthday Sept. 13th, 2006. The first of Oct. Joel started having unexplained fevers for a few days and would return to active play. After the fourth round of fevers we took him to our family Dr. which they said his iron was low, so we treated that for a few weeks and took him back only to have his hemo. showing lower than before. We were referred to a hematologists and saw him a few weeks with blood checks twice a week. At a visit on Dec. 4th we showed the Dr. the bumps, (which were tumors but we did not know at the time) on Joel's head and he was very concerned and we were told we needed to admit him immediately and start extensive tests the following day. Joel went through rigorous testing and then the dreaded results were given. Joel was at a stage IV the most extensive stage, but we were hopeful that the Lord would use the means of Chemotherapy treatments to restore Joel's body. Joel endured 8 1/2 days in the hospital, came home for Christmas, and returned for his second round of chemo Jan. 3, 2007. Joel had a seizure that night after midnight and went into a coma due to a tumor bleeding in his head area and causing his brain to swell. After tests the following days, the Dr. declared Joel "brain dead" and took us to court to force us to take Joel off life support, as we did not agree with the medical field's definition of death. Our family sought to stand with the scripture, "life is in the blood,"and until Joel's heart quit beating naturally, he was living. We were making arrangements to bring him home and on January 23, 2007 his little heart stopped beating and he went to be with the Lord Jesus in heaven. Our lives are changed forever. God is faithful in the midst of this trial and we look with great hope to be with him someday.