Mattie Miracle Walk 2023 was a $131,249 success!

Mattie Miracle Cancer Foundation Promotional Video

Thank you for keeping Mattie's memory alive!

Dear Mattie Blog Readers,

It means a great deal to us that you take the time to write to us and to share your thoughts, feelings, and reflections on Mattie's battle and death. Your messages are very meaningful to us and help support us through very challenging times. To you we are forever grateful. As my readers know, I promised to write the blog for a year after Mattie's death, which would mean that I could technically stop writing on September 9, 2010. However, at the moment, I feel like our journey with grief still needs to be processed and fortunately I have a willing support network still committed to reading. Therefore, the blog continues on. If I should find the need to stop writing, I assure you I will give you advanced notice. In the mean time, thank you for reading, thank you for having the courage to share this journey with us, and most importantly thank you for keeping Mattie's memory alive.


As Mattie would say, Ooga Booga (meaning, I LOVE YOU)! Vicki and Peter



The Mattie Miracle Cancer Foundation celebrates its 7th anniversary!

The Mattie Miracle Cancer Foundation was created in the honor of Mattie.

We are a 501(c)(3) Public Charity. We are dedicated to increasing childhood cancer awareness, education, advocacy, research and psychosocial support services to children, their families and medical personnel. Children and their families will be supported throughout the cancer treatment journey, to ensure access to quality psychosocial and mental health care, and to enable children to cope with cancer so they can lead happy and productive lives. Please visit the website at: www.mattiemiracle.com and take some time to explore the site.

We have only gotten this far because of people like yourself, who have supported us through thick and thin. So thank you for your continued support and caring, and remember:

.... Let's Make the Miracle Happen and Stomp Out Childhood Cancer!

A Remembrance Video of Mattie

August 13, 2011

Saturday, August 13, 2011

Saturday, August 13, 2011

Tonight's picture was taken in August of 2003. Mattie was one year old and red was a color right from the start that he gravitated to. It just worked for him and his personality! In his right hand he was holding one of his stackable cups. I still have his cups that he used to play with, mainly because he LOVED them so much. You can stack with cups, fill them up with all sorts of things, and also watch them float. The perfect toy for Mattie and his curiosity!

Quote of the day: Tell me, how can I live without my Husband any longer? This is my first awakening thought each morning, and as I watch the waves of the turbulent lake under our windows I sometimes feel I should like to go under them. ~ Mary Todd Lincoln


On Friday evening, the ship had its second formal dinner night. As always I travel everywhere with my camera and Peter captured a picture of myself with my parents along with the ship’s presentation production of the Baked Alaska dessert. Princess Cruise’s signature farewell to passengers is this dessert dance. Literally all the lights in the dining room are lowered and the Macarena is usually blaring, while the assistant waiters walk around the entire parameter of the dining room displaying hundreds of Baked Alaska all light up.


Vicki and her parents













Our assistant waiter, Jomel, in the Baked Alaska parade!















At the end of the evening, we asked our head waiter, Jose from Portugal, and our assistant waiter, Jomel from the Philippians, to pose for a picture. The wait staff on large cruise ships works extremely hard. Try 13 hour days, constantly moving, and trying to please all sorts of people. These folks also do not get paid much and therefore rely heavily on the tips and gratuities of passengers. In fact if you knew how much these people were paid per month you would be appalled and then wonder how on earth they survive and also support their families. Actually I would love to go undercover and write an exposé on the true stories and lives of a cruise ship’s crew. There are times that I find myself feeling bad and guilty that so many passengers can afford to go on such a ship, and yet, the people helping us are working non-stop, for very little in return, just to try to get ahead and to support their families. This is a long and drawn out way of saying that I appreciate the people who have helped us this week.



This morning outside our cabin window we saw this sight! A sight Mattie would have absolutely loved. Dolphins as far as the eye could see, jumping in and out of the water. Everyone was outside admiring this wonderful and happy sight.







Peter zoomed in and got a close up of these wonderful creatures. I happen to love dolphins. I admire their intelligence and gentleness.











I just had to take a picture of my towel family, created for me this week. Mind you I am missing the monkey that Leonila (our cabin steward) created, but I kept the elephant, the dove, and the mouse. Mattie would have particularly LOVED the mouse.










Zumba picture We had a very active day on the ship. My mom and I started the day with Line dancing. Since I am been doing Zumba all week, I would have to say that line dancing seemed VERY slow. Despite that, I still like line dancing better. I suppose what I like about line dancing is that you have to use your mind to remember the routines, you are dancing in a coordinated fashion with others around you, and for the most part I prefer the music. After line dancing, we all participated in Bingo, and lost royally! After lunch, my mom and I went for a Zumba class. I am not sure I would recommend doing zumba after eating, but based on the ship’s packed entertainment schedule, this was the time of the class. Peter snapped a picture of the class in motion, and I have to say at times I got frustrated with this class because the instructor didn’t show us the movements ahead of time nor did she call out the movements while we were doing them. Top it off with the fact that most of us couldn’t see her feet, and it was quite a frustrating class for me. Nonetheless, I got a feeling for zumba this week and can definitely see how it would be good exercise.

Our final dance class was Salsa dancing. I have never done salsa dancing before and the funny part of this is I pretended to be the male in this partnership with my mom. So I stood in the line with the men and learned all the male dance steps, while my mom stood in the line with the other women and learned the female dance steps. At first I did not feel right about standing with the men, but I got over it quickly, and they got used to me standing with them and learning along. I can say that my mom and I learned to salsa today and though the male in this dance partnership is supposed to lead, I found it was better if my mom and I planned out steps together and followed a routine we both agreed upon. So in essence neither one of us was leading the other.

After three dance classes today, we all went for high tea on the ship. We hadn’t tried this all week, and I LOVE high tea, or hot tea in general. So this was a fun experience. While in the dining room, we happened to bump into Jomel, our assistant waiter, who came by to say hello to us. After observing me ALL week at our dining room table, he has learned that I love sugar and desserts. So he tracked down the dessert trays for me during high tea and sent them over in my direction. A man after my own heart!

It is Saturday evening, and we will be making our way to Seattle and arriving in port at 7am on Sunday. So it will be a very busy transit day for us and by the time I get to the blog tomorrow night, I will be lucky if I write three words. We won’t be getting home until around 11pm. But I have already told Peter, I plan on starting laundry at midnight and unpacking. Somehow coming home is never an easy process for me, but then again vacationing and day to day living without Mattie are equally challenging. I have seen many little boys on the ship this week, and naturally I can’t help but ask the continual haunting question…. Why Mattie?

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