Books From Gabriel Follow Up

Ok so we had a huge success with our Book Drive!

Thank You to all who

helped!

First of all I want to share a note that was given to us.  We received many similar messages.
I was very touched by this one.
Mr. & Mrs Saville

My teaching assistant and I were touched by your article in the journal. Our classroom has been blessed with an abundance of books that we and our students wanted to share. It is with great love that we share our books to honor the memory of your son. We hope you don’t mind that they are gently used.

As I was preparing to bring these books to you my 10 year old daughter reminded me that older children are at the hospital and would need books as well. Her older sister spent a lot of time @ PMC last fall being critically ill. She wanted kids of all ages to have books so she is sending 50 of her loved books to share in your son’s name.

Sincerely,
Krista, Kambryn & Karla

This is the note from her daughter.

I hope those kids can read these books and like them. I read these when I was sick or a family member was. I hope you get great books! And if you ever need more books put an add in the newspaper and my family will send you some down. Hope you get great use out of these books! I really hope the kids can use these books to get through hard times.

Love,
The --- Family
XOXO

This little girl really touched my heart to donate 50 of her very own books to children who are sick or injured. I know the kids will enjoy them and that the books will be loved and used well.

Now on to our deliveries,

So most of you know how this got started but I’m going to recap anyway.
We wanted a way to celebrate Gabe’s life on his 2nd birthday and to keep us busy so we didn’t sit around crying. So when my mom suggested a book drive in honor of  Gabe we jumped at the idea. Gabriel loved to look at books and be read too. I felt sad that I never thought to take any books to the hospital with us to read to him. I believe we have fixed that problem for future parents with children in the Hospital. Our desire is that the nurses will have enough books on hand to give them out to patients, and I mean GIVE. Some of the books will remain in the hospital library to be read by several children but most will be given to the children who are sick or injured and their siblings. We wanted to give them a gift from Gabriel.

The end total was amazing, 1584. I had wondered if I would get enough books to donate to just one hospital. In the end we received enough to donate to 3 hospitals. The first hospital of course was Portneuf Regional Medical Center because that is where we said goodbye to our Gabie.  Portneuf ended up with 816 books from the book drive. All had been cleaned if they were used and all were labeled with a note from Gabe.  When we went to deliver the books it was very emotional. We had not been back to the hospital since losing Gabe. We were surrounded by loving smiles and lots of hugs. I made it all the way to the Pediatric Nursing station before the tears started. Then all the memories flooded back, it was hard! But what a w0nderful response we got. The staff was amazed at how many books we were able to donate and they were so excited to have them. They started right in on thinking of where and how to store them when they move to the new hospital in May. We were even able to directly give books to the current patients. One patient was a 15 year old girl named Cassidy who had been kicked in the stomach by a horse and had to have surgery. We didn’t’ get to meet her since she was asleep but I did give a book to her mother and a hug too. Then we met a little family who’s 8 week old baby was just getting ready to go home after he had been admitted because he had stopped breathing. His name was Jackson and we gave him two colorful and fun board books, we also gave his big sister Grace two books, a fairy board book and a Tangled book. She was shy but very excited to get the books.

Books in the Van at PRMC

This is everyone who delivered with us at PRMC.

Some of our family with Kristen & Anita (My contacts for the service, and great ladies)

Me and Cassidy’s mom (I know my eye’s are closed, I wasn’t ready and we didn’t’ re-shoot the photo, I was telling her our story)

Jackson was enjoying his lunch so I sat his books on the bed.

This is Grace, Jackson’s big sister with her books.

Like I said before a very emotional day.

After Portneuf on Wednesday we went to  Bingham Memorial Hospital and delivered their books. They only have around 100 Children admits a year so we took them 150 books. They two were very very happy with the donation. Going here was truly a great feeling. Portneuf was too but was also mixed with so many other emotions. At Bingham and Eastern Idaho Regional we weren’t fighting those tears from past memories. The staff’s at both Bingham and EIRMC were amazing loving and were very excited to use the books we brought them. At EIRMC we delivered 618 books, since they are much bigger than Bingham I’m sure they will be able to use every single one. We didn’t deliver books to individual patients at the other two hospitals but left the books in their very capable hands to make sure they get where they needed to go.

This is the staff and us at Bingham Memorial.

This is David & I with the Auxiliary board at Eastern Idaho Regional Medical Center.

Thank you to all of you who made this great service possible. And we plan on continuing this project annually as long as we have support.

Also on Wednesday after a very busy and emotional day we had a very small family Birthday party for Gabie. David made a balloon cake since we like to send Gabe balloons from time to time and Katie’s wonderful teacher bought us Pizza for dinner. (Thanks again Kay)

David Decorating..

The balloons.. Thanks Brock & Lacy for the one’s you brought with the cookies. We love you guys!

Gabriel’s 2nd Birthday Cake.