9 Years and 4 Years

My angel, Cris Embleton, whom we are eternally grateful to for making it possible for the girls to come here. We love you Grandma Cris!!

What a celebratory day it is in our family. Josie and Teresa arrived conjoined at the head from Guatemala 9 years ago today. I never in my wildest dreams knew how much my life would change for the better when that plane touched down at Burbank airport and I was able to set my eyes, heart and hands on them for the first time. What a pleasure it has been to love these girls so much and to be surrounded by their greatness.




Happy 4th Birthday to my sweetest nephew, Luke Michael Richards. You are are bubbly, fun and energetic 4 year old!! You bring so much excitement and joy to our lives. It was another blessing that you also arrived in our lives on June 7th.


Look at how hard they hare laughing!! What joy these two have together.

Because they say things come in 3's, June 7th 8 years ago we got Josie out of the hospital after they returned to LA from Guatemala. This is the moment that she launched into my life for good. We Love June 7th!!! Thank you God for the blessings of this day and everyday. Love, Jenny and Josie

Adorable video of the girls laughing together. I thought Teresa was going to start belly laughing when Josie was doing this. I love these moments.

Doing well

Josie has been doing so well. She wanted me to write on her blog that she is doing really well in school. She is learning so much and loves to be with her friends. She is such a little peacekeeper. It is great to see the other kids embrace all of her abilities and adapt to her disabilities.

Tonight we went to Party City to get some supplies for her Girl Scout camp out on Friday night. I missed a great opportunity for a photo op. She was in her stander, glasses on, pink purse over her shoulder and her red super hero cap around her neck. Priceless.

She has been using her Polish walker with Joy at PE and really increasing her distance. She will be running with it soon, I hope. Thanks for checking in. Love, Jenny and Josie

This is dictated by Josie...PS. She loves school. The End.

Catching Up

Just to do a quick catch up on our lives...






My adorable Brownie troop did their bridging to become Girl Scouts. They are the cutest troop. We started in kindergarten as Daisys and then brownies and now girl scouts. The 7 in our troop have been together since kindergarten and we have such a good time together.







Here I took them to see the taping of Price is Right thanks to my brother-in-law, Mike, who is the executive producer. They normally don't let kids under 16 to come, but Mike made an exception for his niece, Josie. I renamed it as "take your niece to work day". The girls were so excited and extremely well mannered. They got to sit on set while they did the rehearsal. They loved standing on the side of the stage when they loaded the audience in. It was like a huge party with music and the crowd going wild. The girls were waving and dancing. Just before they started taping, we went backstage to watch from the green room. There they met Drew Carey and George, the new announcer. The girls thought they were big stuff to be sitting backstage. They are too young to be in the audience while they tape. The models were coming back to dance with them in the room. Afterwards they got to go back on stage and be with Mike and the models. It was so cute to watch them. Funny story... as we were driving home from the show we were talking about it and what fun things they wanted to do next year. I mentioned that maybe we should go camping. Here I think I am being so big and brave to camp with all of them and especially Josie. I mention this and at first they all thought that sounded really great. Then one of them says, "hey Jenny, do you think we could take and RV?" Seriously??!! I have to admit I do like their thinking. Now can you see me rolling down the highway with a huge RV and 7 nine year olds in back to go camping? A few seconds later one of them said, "maybe we should just go to your desert house instead." You have got to love my troop. They are smart enough to know that the best idea is comfort. Love them!




A little update on the walking front...We got to Liz's for therapy a couple of weeks ago and as we were coming into the room Liz was setting up the table for Josie. There in from of us was one of her old Polish walkers that she first used before canes. I set her down and put her hands on the walker so she could stand there until Liz was ready. All of a sudden she went darting across the room all by herself. So so the next 45 minutes she walked all over the clinic by herself. It was so amazing to see the joy and realization of complete independence come over her. So we became indian givers and took the walker right back. She now asks to walk. In fact today she walked in and out of the country club for lunch. She walked in Sport Chalet the other day and obviously is using it all over the house. She is still using the canes because we absolutely have to keep those up too. Fun to watch her enjoying walking.



Friday was Have lunch with your Kid Day at school. Luke got to come with me, which he loved. We had a picnic with a few of Josie's friends and her most wonderful aide Mrs. G. Mrs. G is beyond fabulous with Josie. They love to be together and I have peace of mind knowing she is safe with Mrs. G. All the kids love Mrs. G as well.



We have been to the desert a for couple weekends now. The weather has been great and so much fun to swim. Josie is in heaven out there. She even got to have a play date with her friends Sofia who has a house down the street from us.


We have been busy, but happy and Josie has been really healthy, thanks be to God. We do need some prayers though for 2 of my uncles. My dad's baby brother Greg was diagnosed 2 weeks ago with Multiple Myloma. My mom's brother Steve was diagnosed on Friday with Melanoma that has metastasised. Please keep both of them and all our families in your prayers. We know that prayers work. We have witnessed miracles. We are asking for 2 more.

Thanks for checking in with us. We are gratefully always for every one's support. It makes this journey such a special one. Cheers, Jenny and Josie

PS. Too tired to proof read this, so my apologies now for misused and/or misspelled words!! Night.

Good Day LA

This is just a little press release about an interview that Josie and I are doing tomorrow.
I will try to post it on here after we are done...if it turns out ok!!



Mending Kids story told on Fox 11 Good Day LA


Almost 10 years ago, Josie was born as a conjoined twin and was successfully separated by a huge team of surgeons at UCLA Medical Center. Tune in tomorrow between 8:00am - 10:00am to Fox 11 Good Day LA morning show to watch a wonderful interview with Jenny & Josie Hull and hear more about their incredible story.

Back at it

Josie was back in action today at therapy. Liz and she worked really well..as they do. We have just had to focus for so many months on walking for the runway that we had to push aside some other important components that now we can get back to. Jos's legs were like spaghetti at the end of her session. She was actually joyful in the car about this on the way home commenting that she worked so hard her legs couldn't stand any more. Good to watch her be proud of her hard work. She does know that it works.

She has been so much fun and so playful lately. We have had a great time laughing and being together. We usually do, she is just older and able to have more sophisticated conversations.

Cute story...Every morning when I drop her off at school, as I pull away I roll down the window and she yells at me good bye and I love you and I yell back and this goes on until she is out of ear shot. So cute. Well today I had a meeting to attend after I dropped her and she knew that is where I was going. As I rolled down the window I hear her usual, "hey mom". Today she pumps her fist in the air and shouts, "Mom, go make us some money!!" She just cracks me up. Always thinking that little one. Off to bed we go so we can tackle Friday tomorrow. Happy spring day to all. Jenny and Josie

The Lord's Supper

As we enter the last of days of Holy week, we get to remember and celebrate the Lord's Last Supper. Tonight is Josie's favorite church event of the whole year. It is tho night that the priest does the washing of the feet as Jesus did to his disciple's at the Last Supper. This important ritual for us started about 5 or 6 years ago. All the parishioners can go into these certain lines in church and the person in front of them washes their feet and then they do the next person, etc. Well, Josie want to do this and was the first one in the line. Back up a sec, let me set the stage for her to get prepared to get her feet washed. This was back in the day where she had huge leg braces on with A LOT of velcro. Just as the church gets completely quite, she decided to start the removal process of all of her shoe paraphernalia. Rip went one piece of velcro after the next. It was so loud yet she was so excited. She went prancing up to participate. The most wonderful thing is that the person who's feet she washed was Margaret Mortimore, her very first physical therapist. Do you know who we got Margaret?? The first Sunday I had Josie we went to church. After church, Margaret, who I had never met before, approached us and told us she was a pediatric physical therapist and she would love to help us out. Well, she did beyond words. She took us under her wing and guided us to where we needed to be. She worked with both girls for a very long time. We give her all the credit for getting us to Children's Hospital Los Angeles, to the best care we could ever have hoped to receive and more specifically to the orthopedic surgeons and the rehab department. Margaret's friendship and guidance has blessed us in so many ways and this all started by a kind stranger that happened to be sitting in church with us one day. We are eternally grateful to Margaret and she is truly a gift from God. So fast forwarding to the first washing of the feet, it was extra special that Josie was the one that washed Margaret's feet. The event was moving that after the ritual concluded the priest actually commented to the whole church on it. We have continued this tradition with Margaret every year since. It is a special and glorious night.

Tonight Josie just beemed as she sat up on the alter with Margaret once again by her side. We so blessed in so many ways by so many people.

I wish all of you the best as we enter the Passion and Resurrection of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Love, Jenny and Josie

Dear Przemek....

OK here goes my dear Przemek (Liz and Sylwia)letter...

Dear Przemek,

I have to confess that the past month has been undoubtedly the worst walking month that Josie has had in the 3 years she has been with you. My excuses are miles long, some legitimate like practically a month long of migraines where it was all I could do to get her to school and pick her up on the good days. Burn out after the fashion show was more than I thought we would encounter. And Hawaii...well, it just didn't get done. Great Grandma hurt her knee there so at least Rita got used by someone.

With that being said and the guilt a mile long, I knew after dinner tonight that I needed desperately to get her on her canes even for a short 15 foot walk. I knew she would be all over the place and I was prepared to begin the hard work up like never before. I have had her in the stander a lot in hopes that would give her passive muscle strengthening of some sort over the past month.

I set up the canes, expecting a huge argument and trying to wheel and deal her way out of it, instead she grabbed her canes and RAN, yes RAN, down the hallway. I didn't touch her once. There wasn't a wobble to be seen. I could have left the room and she would have been steady Eddy. There weren't even corrections to be made. We were both giddy with laughter. It was one of the first times I actually saw her enjoy her canes. She walked down the hall and went to get the towel out of the closet that cousin Jeanie made for her in Michigan. She balanced while she got the matching wash cloth out. She walked from there into her room and went over to the bed to check something out that was sitting there. Over to her dresser from there. When we got to the bump between rooms, I went to help her over it and she pushed me away saying that she could handle it and she did. On into my room where she got all the way to the bed and with holding one cane started to take her own clothes off to get in bed. As I picked her up to help her she said, "boy that was really fun." I thought my ears had deceived me. She then put her hands together, glanced upward and said thank you God, well and Przemek too. Priceless.

So I end my letter to you with apologies for the past month but with gratitude on always sticking by us. The 3 of you, Przemek, Slywia and Liz, have been our walking saviors. I wish you could be here in person to withness the fruits of your labors.

Gratefully yours,

Jenny and my wonderful sidekick, Josie.