Emily Pumpkin Pie & Much Much More...

We just got back from the hospital for the second time in less than two weeks. Caitlin was discharged last Wednesday night after meeting all the Dr.'s requirements. We brought her home and kept it pretty quiet for the rest of the week and weekend. Then yesterday when I came home from work Caitlin didn't even talk to me. She was awake but feeling so puny that she just laid on the couch and sort of half smiled at me. She had a low grade fever so I called the on call surgeon, who felt "borderline" about having her come in. We agreed to keep an eye on her condition and bring her in if it got worse. This morning it was a lot worse. 103.6 degree temp with Tylenol so into the ER we went. They took blood, and urine samples, ordered X-rays and hooked her up to an IV with a nothing by mouth order again...8 hours later we were sent home with some antibiotics. This poor child is so sick of hospitals and doctors and procedures and tests and medicine that when they checked her into the ER she just cuddled in my lap and cried over and over, "I just want to go home!" The good news is she seems to be recovering well from the surgery and if we can just get past this hurdle of a minor infection we'll hopefully be home free!

In other good news we adopted a new dog. She's a seven month old black lab puppy who is already potty trained and kennel trained. She's eager to please and quick to learn so we feel really happy with her as our newest family member. We picked her up on the Friday night before Caitlin's Monday morning surgery, which may seem like poor timing, but we decided that since we'd be home for two weeks solid it would really give us a chance to bond with her and do some basic training. So far it's worked out really well. She's a little skittish around other dogs, but daily (sometimes 2x) trips to the local dog park are helping to curb that fear. As she is Caitlin's dog we had very little to do with naming her. We suggested several names but in the end Caitlin insisted on calling her Emily Pumpkin Pie. She came to us with the name of Buckshot which fortunately she didn't respond to, (clearly she has some self respect) so for the last week we've been really working on helping her learn her new permanent name.

Our final piece of good news is that Caitlin should go back to school next Monday directly into the Spanish Immersion class. We met her new teacher last Friday, just a few days post surgery and observed the class for about a half an hour so Caitlin won't feel so scared we she comes back. This is a program that she'll be in from Kindergarten all the way through 5th grade and is really similar to the international school program where we had considered sending her before we found out that the local public school was going to offer it as an option. In effort to help her prepare she attended "hospital school" where they set her up with games and books in Spanish and we're continuing with similar activities at home as well. So as usual a lot has been going on around our neck of the woods, but fortunately most of it is good! I'm really happy about that and really looking forward to a productive and happy school year.