We're part of a group here in Iowa City called Heart Friends that is run by 2 awesome nurse practitioners from the Pediatric Cardiology Department. We've met some wonderful families with children who also have heart defects. It's really nice to see the older children who are doing great and living normal lives after being very sick like Matthew was. In celebration of CHD Awareness Week they throw a party each year for the kids. Matthew had SO much fun!!! He was so excited when we got there that he started to do his little happy feet dance over and over. It was really, really cute!! They had the party set up like a carnival and the kids won prizes for each game. We made him a bag at the first station to hold all of his prizes.
This was supposed to be Matthew posing as a clown, but he didn't want to look up :)
He did really good at the bean bag toss...except it was more like a bean bag drop since he stood by the hole and dropped him in. I think he played this game about 3 times! He really liked it!
This was the highlight of the day. He LOVED the basketball hoop. Each time he put the ball into the hoop he would laugh and laugh. The volunteers laughing too because he was so cute and got so excited :)
I wish I would have gotten pictures of the duck game. You had to pick up a floating duck & see if there was a heart sticker. If there was then you win a prize, if not then you pick again until you get one. Matthew loved playing in the water! Then he thought it would be fun to pick up the prizes (candy bracelets) and give them out to the other people standing around. He's so goofy :) We had a wonderful time this morning and are really thankful to have such a wonderful group to be a part of. They're next function is the Annual Heart Walk in April to raise money for research. There's a huge need for money since out of every government dollar spent on medical funding less than 1 cent goes towards heart defects research yet it's the #1 birth defect and #1 cause of birth defect related deaths. If it's warm enough we'll definitely be there to help raise money!
I wish I would have gotten pictures of the duck game. You had to pick up a floating duck & see if there was a heart sticker. If there was then you win a prize, if not then you pick again until you get one. Matthew loved playing in the water! Then he thought it would be fun to pick up the prizes (candy bracelets) and give them out to the other people standing around. He's so goofy :) We had a wonderful time this morning and are really thankful to have such a wonderful group to be a part of. They're next function is the Annual Heart Walk in April to raise money for research. There's a huge need for money since out of every government dollar spent on medical funding less than 1 cent goes towards heart defects research yet it's the #1 birth defect and #1 cause of birth defect related deaths. If it's warm enough we'll definitely be there to help raise money!
2 comments:
matthew, papa jeff and i really enjoyed your album.you're a very fun guy to keep up with! i miss playing with you and reading to you and putting you to bed.... but soon we get to do it again when you come to visit. we send our love.
You should let us know when that walk is. Maybe we could walk with you if timing and weather cooperate. We're so thankful to have a healthy Matthew in our life.
Andrea and Mina
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