The Adventures of Big Red in Ireland!: January 2015

Wow! Sorry it's been so long! I've been having too much fun and not enough Wi-Fi, but man has this been one of the most memorable holiday seasons of my life. For both good and bad reasons.

The good: Yeah I went to Spain for 10 days. Zetus Lapetus Spain is so beautiful!! I went with my Au Pair friend Helena and her family was so kind to host me for the holiday. I'm sure they were sick of me after 10 days, lol. I met all of her friends and practiced my Spanish and ate THE best food ever! We went shopping and toured her city and went for the longest walk of my life, but it was beautiful! We went to her friends birthday party which was my favorite day :) Christmas was lovely! On Christmas Eve we went to her aunts house and did a 'secret Santa' with her whole family and stayed up til 1am eating yummy food and drinking wine. On Christmas Day, we slept in and had amazing food and sang karaoke!! And y'all know how much I love to sing!! Then Helena and I went for dinner with her cousin and their friends. They don't do a gift exchange on Christmas but they have one later in January. They did however, have a lovely Christmas Tree.

Then I came back to Ireland and we celebrated New Years in Dublin! It was myself, Hermance, Julie, Helena and her friend Alba! We went past a club that had a line a mile long and went to a nice pub that was free! Then we went back to the other night club and it was so packed, I felt like I was in Vegas, I couldn't move or dance or twerk and I hated it. But we had a really good night! The next night, the French girls and I went to a club and I ended up meeting some really nice guys from New Castle. I went with the guys to Harcourt street and had the best night just dancing my worries away! It was a fabulous way to ring in the new year! Since then, I haven't had time or energy to go anywhere else but soon, my travel light adventures will continue!!

The bad: Basically anyone's worst nightmare happened to my family. My dad was diagnosed with an aggressive form of non Hodgkin's lymphoma. There was also a tumor in his back which was keeping him from feeling his legs. After they ran a bunch of tests and went to a second hospital in San Francisco, we found out he had cancer. The next day they removed the tumor and surgery went perfectly. Daddy started chemo on Christmas Eve but luckily we found out that after the first round, his tumors shrunk! Praise God, my daddy is healing. The good news is that this is a very curable cancer and the doc is positive that my daddy will be fully cured! He can't really walk yet but the good news is we can take the wheelchair line at Disneyland now!! So please pray that his spine and nerves will reconnect so he can feel his legs and be able to walk again.

You may be asking yourself why I haven't gone back home now. It's because I have the two most amazing parents in the world and they don't want me losing this opportunity of traveling the world. Dad is going to get better and luckily, mom has amazing support from the First Baptist Choir, the Galt Police Department, Galt High School and her friends. The last month has been one of the hardest of my lives and I was struggling to enjoy my time here. It's gonna be a long year but dad will keep fighting. Dad didn't want me to come home and stare at him in the hospital bed, he said it would make him grumpy.

I will always remember 2014 as the year my life was changed but 2015 will be the year my dad fights and kicks cancer's ass!! We have a gofundme page just really to keep people updated but if y'all can keep my family in your prayers that's all I can truly ask for!

I really missed the kids on my break, but now I am so happy to report that the baby Cillian is finally sleeping through the night, oh and I am sick of their Christmas gift the movie Frozen, but the kids sure aren't.

Oh, it snowed today here in Louth so I won't be going outside much!!
Bye y'all!

http://www.gofundme.com/j3x874