team libby bracelets.

no i am not trying to sell anything here. team libby bracelets can no longer be found on ebay. all that's left is a zip lock bag of about 20 bracelets that ava likes to play with. no need for a team libby anymore because we already won. my cancer is gone. but thank you for buying them and wearing them. it was an incredible gift that our family had a team behind us through cancer. many people we do not know and that means just a littlle bit more to us that people rallied around us who we have never met. but hope to someday. i love all the emails that start with..."you don't know me but..." no, i do not think its weird that people i do not know have so openly shared their heart with me through an email or a letter. it was more encouraging than i will ever be able to articulate. so thank you. i was given a rare oppourunity to get a glimpse into people's hearts and i am forever grateful. not everyone gets that chance and i consider it a gift.

back to the bracelets. since i was sick when most people starting buying them and wearing them i never really got the chance to see how many poeple in chesapeake we sporting a lime green bracelet. but now that i am getting back into the game i get a little chocked up when i see a freshman guy at young life club wearing a team libby bracelet. or a mom i barely know at the grocery store with one on. many who did not know me personally, but maybe knew justin. some i just met for the first time and many who know me better than i know myself. but thank you to all of you who wore a little team libby bracelet. thank you for being in this with us. i love it because that is what community is all about. we were never meant to do it all on our own. to try and make it without any help. its not how its supposed to be. even though asking and allowing people to help you can be hard...it was for me...i can now look back and understand more and more what it means to walk alongside people when they are struggling. that is how it was meant to be and i love that. i love that we were created to be in relationships with other people and when we try and do things on our own we rob people the chance to love us. and carry us. and enter into our pain and struggles. its okay to let people in. even when its not so pretty. because my house was messy and people cleaned it. i was throwing up and too sick to care for my daughter so other people came in and cared for her when i couldn't. with some resistance at times i was forced to allow people to pick up the pieces when i couldn't do it. and the bracelets. oh, the bracelets. what a gift they were. because it allowed people to feel like they were in this with us even if they did not see me for 8 months or are yet to meet us...they were in it. i love that. i love that many of you kept your bracelet on (that did not match anything you wore ever i am sure) to important business meetings, the opera, nice dinners, weddings, etc. that is cool. someone told me early on that they were not taking it off...not once...until i was cancer-free.  you will never know what that meant to me. 

i got a little emotional last night because i was campaigners (young life bible study with high school students) and i looked around the room and saw those bracelets. and it just hit me how thankful i am that people care. whether they knew me or not they cared about cancer and about our family and that means more to me than anyone will possibly ever understand.

important side note. many of you loved us, prayed for us, and helped us without wearing a team libby bracelet. we know that and that's cool. this is just a little blog post shot out to those of you with a lime green bracelet.

*one week since the pixie cut and i am lovin' it.