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

July 17, 2020

Friday, July 17, 2020

Friday, July 17, 2020

Tonight's picture was taken in July of 2007. Mattie was five years old and by that age he was LOVING bath time. When Mattie was a baby and toddler, he hated taking a bath. It was like pulling teeth just to have water next to his skin. But as he got older, he found bath time to be a glorified play time and he couldn't get enough of it. When Mattie did this with soap suds, I always called him, "Santa Mattie." Which made him chuckle. 


Quote of the day: Today's coronavirus update from Johns Hopkins

  • number of people diagnosed with the virus: 3,626,500
  • number of people who died from the virus: 138,979


I maybe 2,500 miles away from my parents, but thanks to technology, I can get a lot accomplished. Today alone, (1) I spoke to the management company of the house my parents just moved out of, to check on when my parents would receive their rental deposit back, (2) I contacted my dad's occupational therapist to find out why he did not show up for his appointment time, (3) I managed an administrative issue for the caregiving company because they were expecting my mom to MAIL them a log of this week's caregiving hours (I don't think so, there are more efficient ways to do this.... starting with sending this information electronically!!!!), (4) I worked out the details on the catastrophic major medical plan and know what my dad's plan will cover regarding weekly caregiving hours, and the list goes on.  

However, it turns out my parents did get their rental deposit check back today in the mail. The owner of the former house they rented decided to deduct close to $200 for a broken kitchen sink disposal and $25 for dust in the garage. I almost lost it and I put my distaste for this decision in writing. First off, my parents never used the sink in the kitchen's island. Therefore there is NO WAY we broke the disposal. When my parents moved into that house in 2018, I was given an EXTENSIVE spreadsheet to test everything in the house. Which I did and made notations next to things that weren't working, were dinged, or had issues. I don't ever remember being asked to check that disposal (frankly I still to this day, did not know the sink in the island even had a disposal, much less where the switch is to turn it on). All I know is we couldn't have broken it as we never used that sink. Don't get me started with dust in the garage. I actually wanted to scream. Who doesn't have dust in their garage? If I knew we were going to get fined for this, I would have swept out the garage. As it is, I moved my parents out of the house, managed an extensive health crisis, and also found the time to CLEAN out the rented house. Yes I forgot to dust the garage, but in the grand scheme of things, a clean and untouched house was returned to the owner. That should have been good enough! I am NOT thrilled with the owner or his lack of compassion. 

On a brighter note.... the beauty of Sunny. He loves his walks, despite the heat. 
He may have been hot, but he is always happy to chase a squirrel up a tree. 
Still staring at the squirrel, but taking a water break before continuing on. 
My fun for today! I took the car to a car wash. Our car wash has become fully automated now. Even how you pay for the wash. You don't get out of your car. I haven't been inside a car wash like this since I was a little girl. So naturally I snapped photos! There were no lines and I was in and out within minutes. 

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