Journal entry from Leighton's mommy

I am so overwhelmed right now, I am sitting at my dest bawling (sp?) like a baby so proud of my awesome kids here at the club. When they heard about Leighton and Elijah they wanted to make get well cards. They felt bad and sad and wanted to do something to make them feel better. We could learn alot from kids.......this is the journal entry for today on Leighton's caringbridge page written by Laine (Leightons mommy) and my kids from the club are mentioned in it. I will make sure to read this to them and to tell them how proud I am to be able to say I work at The Boys & Girls Club of Benton County.



FRIDAY, OCTOBER 24, 2008 12:24 AM, CDT


I am not ready to talk about how hard my past day has been. I can say that Leighton is comfortable with a morphine drip and regularly scheduled adavan. He also looks much happier not having to grasp for air, the vent takes care of that. We have not heard much more then what we were told last night about his heart.

Today is my dad's birthday and he chose to spend it in Little Rock comforting us, and kissing Leighton. Rich made us tacos! We went to the grocery store and that was so much fun! Silly I know, but I have not been grochery shopping in months and it was pretty fun. Dinner was great. So Happy Birthday Dad!

Rich and I are staying at Katie and Hunter's tonight and it has been about a week since we stayed here... so we had a bit of mail piled up. It made our night, really we were laughing so hard we were in tears at times. My nephew Jackson in Georgia drew Leighton some pictures and aget well card. Gina Woods sent us some wonderful encouragement. Denise Wheeler send us such a sweet card. But I think the best thing we have gotten so far was a package from the Boys and Girls Club of Bentonville. We have over 20 home made cards for leighton and each child spent quite some time with art work and words of "wisdom" for our little man. We would like to share a few with you:"Get will soon, I hope you get will, I will pray", "Get well Leighton, I hope you look at this card and smile because we are praying for you!", "Get well soon, you are the best baby ever! I love you Leighton!", "Get well soon, I wish you the best of luck. For we may meet some day. If we do, I know my wish came true.", "A smile from me to you., I hope you get well, Get well very soon so you can have a lot of fun with family. My family is praying for you so get well soon!", To Leighton From XXX (no her name is not xxx, just being safe), I hop you get (the g is backwards) you'r hort back. BaBy Leighto I hop you get betr." "Leighton I hope you get better. Happy Birthday, crich or treat", "I hop you get a ful hort. I hop you get better littel baby srviv the opreashon get wel!" (on this one you can imagin the b's and g's backwards and on opreashon, the "on" at the end is on the next line with an arrow leading to the end of the word....), "Happy Halloween Leighton, I hope you geel better. You might have half a heart but your parents still love YOU", "Get well baby Leighton, You Rock!!!!!", "Leighton you are the best baby ever", and here is one last one "If you look at my name and you say it, it will be find with me! Take the stress off and know he will be fine, We are always waiting fo ryou. To the mom and dad don't give your hopes up!".

You have to imagine how wonderful each one of these card we get are for us. I have always LOVED getting mail as a child and then getting at my very own mail box, but this is even better. I really love the ones where letters are backwards and things are spelled how they sound because that is exactly how i used to do it and still do often. I also love it when there are drawings of little stick figures with wings and halos, and then hearts all over the page. I LOVE kids. Thank you boys and girls club for making our day so special. And thank you all for your prayers and thoughts. Times are really tough and I could not do it without you all.

Rich and I are both headed to NWA for the weekend together. My mom and dad are staying with Leighton and "making" us go home for a few days to do some house work, get the nursery fixed up more, and just have a little time at home. Time for bed. We did not get much sleep at all last night so its time for a nice rest. He is calm tonight. Good night little Leighton. You are the best baby ever and you rock.

LOVE ALWAYS- Mommy