Our Visit With The Kornegay Family in North Carolina

We took a little break from my families' farm in Georgia (I'll write the post on that soon) to travel to North Carolina and visit Sean's sister, Renee and her husband, John.

While we were there, we got to see Renee and John's youngest son, Cutler. We hadn't seen Sean's nephew since we got married in 1995. He was just a kid back then, but now he's a married man. He and his wife Cheryl, have two wonderful kids. He's also in the fight of his life, having been diagnosed with stage 3 brain cancer a few months back. He's just starting his chemo treatment; he's got the best doctors in the world at Duke University, on his side (same doc as Ted Kennedy). His prognosis is good. I know we're all keeping Cutler and his family close in our hearts as he goes through this. We love you Cutler! We so enjoyed seeing you and meeting your beautiful family!



The kids had a great time together. Nathan and Cai looked for ink berries out in the yard. Tristan chilled with Gabe, who wasn't feeling well, watching the Transformers movie. Cai put on a cute belly dance show for us. She is amazing in all kinds of ways, but she's got amazing parents, so Sean and I are not at all surprised. And then there were the fireworks. My kids are still talking about the fireworks.






Thanks for a great visit John and Renee. We love you guys!


Love, Lisa

Camping at El Capitan, Santa Barbara and Having Fun In Honor of Pablo

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This post is dedicated to Pablo Castelaz. Pablo was a six year old boy I came to learn about working at the Foundation at Children's Hospital Los Angeles. Pablo's family keeps a beautiful blog about Pablo and their journey, as a family, through his childhood cancer. http://getwellpablo.blogspot.com (see my blog list "Pablog"). Though we never met Pablo, my family fell in love with him through the stories and pictures the Castelaz family posted on their blog. On Friday, while getting ready for our family camping trip, I learned that Pablo was going home from Children's Hospital for the last time, with only days to live. So, it was with a very heavy heart that I left for our trip.

I wanted to honor Pablo and his family and their tremendous struggle, by trying my very best all weekend, to stay in the moment with my family. I enjoyed my beautiful boys; their laughter and silliness; their energy and sense of adventure. I focused only on the positive and let my heart fill with gratitude for those moments.

We had a beautiful view of the ocean from our camping spot (we saw a whale!) and Sean even warmed up to the idea of actually camping on asphalt! I was in heaven……NO DIRT TO CONSTANTLY SWEEP UP!

We biked and hiked. We built sand castles and played cards. We spent quiet time together looking out on the ocean and just being with nature. We were silly together and Nathan even wanted to dress like a pirate.














We had a nice, relaxing and loving weekend. I was tremendously saddened to learn upon our return that Pablo had passed away. I can't imagine the pain a parent must go through to lose a child. It truly makes these moments of family fun and quality time together all the more potent and meaningful.

I know that I will never forget this little boy named Pablo, who I’d never met, but who has taught me so much about enjoying and loving my own spirited boys.

RIP Sweet Pablo!


The Pablove Foundation was formed in Pablo's honor, to help fight childhood cancer. The Pablove foundation will make an annual contribution to Childrens Hospital Los Angeles. To read more about The Pablove Foundation or to make a donation please visit:

http://www.pablove.org/ (see my blog list)


Love, Lisa

A Beautiful Easter

The Hickey family had a fabulous Easter in beautiful Santa Barbara at Sean's sister, Roxie's home. Made all the more fabulous surrounded by our wonderful family members.

Roxie, Gigi, Rhonda and Shelly

Blair, Megan, Erin and Julie

Dee, Aunt Pat, Ryan

Ralinda and Shelly

Peter, Ralinda, Deanna

Todd and Brian

We shared a delicious Easter feast prepared by all, sitting around a lovely garden table. Roxie's organic garden is gorgeous!

Tristan and Nathan were exteremly excited to spend some time with their cousin Cole, and of course all of their other cousins too!

Rhonda, Cole, Nathan and Tristan

And then Aunt Roxie brought the eggs out for the egg toss. Wow, they really had a great time! I didn't get a shot of it, but trust me, they were real, raw eggs and a couple of people got it pretty good!

Adam, Nathan, and Cole

And the winners were the father and son team. Tristan looks so proud.

Sean and Tristan

The gang of cousins, all boys, got their bags and the instructions from Aunt Roxie regarding the treasure hunt.......

.......and the hunt was on.

And then it was over and the boys all sat down to look over their loot.

Based on the facial expressions, I think Nathan and Aiden found some good stuff!

Since our kids have one of the best Aunties in the world, the fun was not over yet. Aunt Roxie had more fun planned for them with a pinata filled with Easter sweets and she got them all fired up to take their best swings for the treats.

These are memories my family will cherish for a lifetime and so I'm going to take this time right now to tell all of you We Love You. Thank you for the memories.

I tell myself everyday "Life is here to be lived fully and authentically.....go ahead just take a huge giant bite out of it" Sometimes, I find it hard to follow my own advice, but Aiden - well, it looks like he knows exactly how to take a bite out of life!

Love, Lisa