And….it’s been another year since many of you have heard from us.
Charlotte turns 15 today and she is finishing up her freshman year in High School. She’s been busy with several different band groups and went to the Nationals Competition for Archery earlier this month.
Hope you all have been well. Tell your friends and family that you appreciate them.
It’s hard to believe that it’s been another year since I last posted.
Today Charlotte turned 14! It has been a super busy month for our teenager! She was confirmed, graduated 8th grade, and had another fantastic birthday.
We’ve had another fun and exciting year. We adopted a rescue dog from Puerto Rico, and her name is Copper. She’s quite the handful but we love her anyway!
We spent a week in a rented lake home last summer with the Sun Prairie Elske family and Grandma and Grandpa Elske. We fished, went tubing, grilled out, played all sorts of board games and had a fun time at the lake.
Charlotte participated in Marching Band with the high schoolers last fall, and plans to this year as well. We had a fun family road trip to Universal Studios, Florida in January and returned home in time for another successful season with our Cardinals Unlimited NASP Archery Program. She took home the top female Middle School archer, and the Katniss award-presented to the top female archer in the whole Columbus program, grades 4-12.
Molly has signed up as well and claimed the top female Elementary School archer as well! I also joined as an assistant coach to keep the girls practicing!
Today we celebrated the 10 year anniversary of Charlotte’s stem cell transplant. We will be eternally grateful for Erin and the wonderful doctors and nurses that have helped Charlotte throughout her journey. She’s grown into a wonderful and happy young lady and an awesome big sister.
We are still enjoying our time together-still mostly stuck at home. But we’re thankful that we have our family and friends that share in our good health and are looking forward to some warmer, spring-like weather and fresh air!!
Please continue to stay safe and keep in touch with your friends and loved ones. Everyone is tired of being cooped up. Everyone wants a break from the same old-same old. Everyone would prefer to go back to the way things were. That’s not an excuse to put others at risk. We’re fortunate to live in a time when we’ve never had more technology, more tools, at our disposal for staying connected with those outside of our homes. Text your friends. Zoom your pastor. For heaven’s sake, call your sister. They are all just as bored as you are and would love to hear from you.
Charlotte’s Angels
by Amy Elske
10 years since diagnosis day!
As the years have gone by, I started to let myself dream of Charlotte celebrating 10 years of remission. I imagined a huge party where I could bring together each and every one of Charlotte’s Angels who supported us and cheered us on. I imagined having Charlotte’s dream team gathered together of her amazing doctors, nurses and bone marrow donor all in one fantastic picture. To have them stand together with Charlotte to celebrate the little 2 year old they saved.
But alas, due to COVID this just didn’t seem possible. So instead, to honor the 10 year anniversary of Charlotte’s diagnosis, we want to share pictures of the incredible people who helped us along the way. (I’m sad to say I do not have pictures of everyone!). I’m too nervous to try to name you all personally as I do not want to exclude anyone accidentally. Instead, I will simply say thank you (which doesn’t even begin to say enough) to each and every one of Charlotte’s Angels.
You are a Charlotte’s Angel if you:
And with a very special thanks to…..
After a long and unexcused hiatus, I’m back with another update!
And there’s no real update except we’re all here. We’re happy, healthy, and doing very well. Coronavirus has kept us secluded to our house most of the time as we’re trying to stay safe at home for the past several months.
Amy and I and the girls have been working/schooling from home since the middle of March. Charlotte and Molly only have 4 more days of “school” left this year and then they get to spend all day at home for the summer!!
The big news is that Charlotte turned 12 today! That’s another huge milestone for Charlotte and our family in her long journey! We’re so blessed and thankful for her health and the fact that we are able to watch her enjoy life as a tween!!
We hope everyone is staying healthy and safe!
Please take care, and be kind to one another. The world can’t have too much compassion.
Hello to everyone from the world of the Elske’s! Today is the 9th year since Charlotte was diagnosed and we’ve again had a wonderful and fun-filled summer with family and friends.
We’ve been doing all of the normal things that families do since the last time I posted. Traveling, swimming, camping, going up north, baseball and football games, exploring-all part of a balanced summer. Charlotte turned 11(!) in May and we’ve had a busy summer ever since. We’re also planning on seeing Erin again later this month so that will be another time to remember. Thank you all for following our story and being a part of our lives.
September is National Childhood Cancer Awareness Month so please be sure to consider supporting organizations like American Family Children’s Hospital, Be The Match, Badger Childhood Cancer Network, St Jude’s, Make-A-Wish, Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, Give Kids the World Village, Red Cross and many more.
It’s really hard to believe it’s been another 6 months since my last post. Things are still going as well as we could expect here.
Tracy, Charlotte, Dr Diamond and Amy at CJ’s checkup appt in December 2018.
Today marks the 8 year anniversary of Charlotte’s bone marrow transplant and we feel so blessed to have her here with us every day!
Things have been very busy over the last 6 months with our lives. Charlotte had her yearly oncology appointment with Dr Diamond in December and everything looked great again. 🙂 WBC count was 5.3, Hemoglobin was 12.1, 241k Platelets and Neutrophils were in at 2630. She is having a bone density test next week to see if there was any chemo damage to her bones but it’s purely a protocol related follow-up test.
Charlotte and Molly have been busy the last month spreading Girl Scout joy in the form of GS Cookie Sales. They’ve both been trying very hard to keep up with Mommy’s busy cookie booth schedule! The final results aren’t in, but it looks like both of them were able to achieve their personal goal of selling 300+ boxes each.
Charlotte has been involved in the NASP Archery program in Columbus again and has been in 5 tournaments so far this year. She has taken First Place once, Second Place three times(!) and came in fifth once. She only has one or two tournaments left this year but we’re very proud of how far she has come. She has been one of the top shooters in her division in the State!!! We’re already planning out our summer practice schedule since next year she will be up against 6, 7th and 8th graders.
We continue to keep in touch with Erin, Charlotte’s bone marrow donor, and have seen her twice over the last 6 months- including this past weekend. She was able to come to Wisconsin just in time to see Charlotte take over first place in the Portage tournament, beating out 33 other 4th and 5th grade girls. She eventually lost to another girl at the end of the night taking second overall. 
Erin was able to hang out with us for two days, really taking in the very best Wisconsin weather we have to offer. We started with a beautiful sunny day, then rain, then sleet, then very cold and windy blizzard conditions through the night!!! She has been missing the snow since she moved from Philly several years ago so we’re just glad we could come through on her request!
Please take a moment to tell the people in your life that you love them and take some time to volunteer to make the world a better place for those that are suffering. Many of us have been so very blessed and sometimes we just don’t know how special that is until our lives are interrupted and things just take a turn. Let’s all be grateful for what and who we have.
Peace and love,
Lon
It’s been another busy summer of me ignoring this blog! The girls had a wonderful and fun-filled summer and stayed busy enjoying time outside and swimming and playing with the dog. They are happy and healthy and I cannot ask for more. Harris, our dog, has been growing up just as sassy as Broadway was, but he really is trying to be a good boy as often as he can.
The four of us recently returned from a week long cruise to the Caribbean just before school started for the girls. It was a really nice way to end the summer! We had a really fun time and enjoyed visiting new places and seeing all of the sights. They spent a lot of time in the pool and water park on the ship while Amy and I relaxed in the sun and caught up on some reading. We swam with the stingrays and dolphins and went snorkeling and spent some real quality family time enjoying each other’s company in the small cabin. It was a well deserved rest and we won’t soon forget it!
Daddy protecting Molly from a stingray!!
I would like to take a moment to ask you for prayers for a favorite co-worker of mine, Rob Gonzales. He’s been diagnosed with a brain tumor, and it sounds like there is just no cure for it. He’s always been friendly and helpful to me and I wish him and his family the best and pray for them every night.
Thank you all for checking on us and please take the time to tell your friends and family members that you love them and are thankful that they are in your lives.
It’s been a long time since I’ve last posted here (keep up with Amy and the girls on Facebook!!) and we’ve had another several months worth of happy memories that we will all cherish. Charlotte’s annual appointment with Dr. Diamond went well and she is happy with how Charlotte is growing and progressing in school. Amy and I spent a week and a half at Disney World in December with the girls and we had a wonderful time . Charlotte and Molly have been enjoying school (save for homework) and spending time with friends and family around the holidays! Charlotte and Molly (and Mommy) just wrapped up another successful year of selling Girl Scout Cookies, with each girl making her personal goal! Charlotte has been active in archery in her school and she is becoming quite the marksman!! I’ve proud of her for sticking with it, even though she wasn’t terribly happy to have us sign her up! 🙂
Today marks the 7th year since Charlotte received her life-saving stem cell transplant from our real-life angel, Erin. We’ve been in constant contact with her and even seen her twice since my last update on this site. We met up with her while we were in Disney World and she spent this whole past weekend with us. She really has become part of our family and we’re so thankful for all she has given us. She has made our family complete and we wouldn’t be where we are without her.
CJ Elske's blog 