Another Tea Party

Taipan & Taisim wanted to make food today.  We started out making peanut butter toast and sandwiches, and then they got out some cookbooks to make recipes, which turned into wanting to make food and drinks for a tea party.


This tea party featured Danish Do's and Jawa Jive Smoothies from the Star Wars cookbook, and a princess cake, lady bug strawberries and smoothies from the princess and tea party cookbooks.


  
  
  

Tea & Bead Shop

I wanted to do something special with my mom during her last weekend in Ohio before she drove back to Orlando for a few months, so we went to lunch at Miss Molly's Tea Room, a place that Simi and I really enjoy.

After lunch we walked down down the block to The Potomac Bead Company. The three of us made bracelets, and Simi also made a necklace.

Post-op update

I waiting too long to finish my posts with the details on Taiko's hospital stay - it's all a blur now and I can't quite remember the exact timing of some of the things after Sunday. So, I'll have to summarize.

On the Tuesday following the surgery his second chest tube was removed. I think this was also when the pacer wires were removed, but that could have happened on Monday. Same thing for the femeral artery line - I think it came out on Monday, but am not 100% sure.

On Tuesday evening we were moved from the PICU to a regular recovery room. The only thing Taiko had at this point was an IV in his left leg, but it was "just in case". He was transitioned to oral medications - Lasix as a diuretic and regular ol' children's Tylenol for pain. He also had a pulse-ox monitor on his toe (very non-invasive) and leads taped on his chest, and we had a portable box that measured his heart rate (also non-invasive).

We only spent one night here! Our cardiologist stopped by around 10am on Wednesday morning and said we could be discharged. Woo hoo. Less than a week after the surgery and we could go home - it was a nice surprise. We were hoping to be discharged on Thursday, but were prepared in case they wanted us to stay until Friday. Taiko just had to get an echo done, and at 3:45pm we were on our way out of the hospital.

Coming home was nice - I missed Taisim and Taipan terribly. Taiko was happy to see them too. The first few days at home he was a little uncomfortable and clingy, and I was worried that he wasn't peeing enough. But by Saturday he seemed to turn a corner - more energy, more eating, and more pee.

We had a follow up appointment with the surgical team yesterday, and they removed his last bandages and the one suture that was not dis-solvable, and they said he's doing great. We have a follow up with the cardiologist next Friday, and he'll get another echo and then hopefully we're set for a while.

Tomorrow will be two weeks since the surgery and he is nearly 100%.

While he was in the hospital he cut his second tooth (also on the bottom). His sleeping pattern is different than it used to be - my guess it was due to change anyway. Now that I'm back to work we'll see if he falls back into our old pattern, or sticks with his new one.

The last thing I want to say is a big thank you to all of our friends and family that helped us over the past two weeks. My mom, Yuta's parents, my sister, Kathy, John, Erin, Hannah, Jeff, Chi Chi, Kimberly, Allie all helped with Taipan and Taisim and/or came to visit at the hospital and/or brought food. And then a whole host of folks that were providing support via email, video chats, facebook and texts. Not to mention the folks at my work and Yuta's that covered for us and went easy on us both leading up to and during the time of the surgery. We couldn't have done this without everyone's support.

I can't even begin to explain how light and relieved I feel now that we're past the surgery. Looking back on it I feel like it was just a blip - one that seemed insurmountable a month ago, but gets smaller every day.

Fourth of July

We had some friends over to celebrate the 4th this year - about 20 people were here (and some close friends were not able to come due to being sick, and they were missed dearly); there was some Rock Band, a little bit of Bananagrams, some video games, and a lot of running around outside and playing in the basement.


About an hour or two before dusk Muriel, Storm and Taipan helped me bring out the sparklers, smoke bombs and other goodies:


And right around dusk we decided to get things started. Yuta was again our master of ceremonies. We did a lot of smoke makers first, then some noise makers, and then sparklers:


When it got dark it was time to get down to business. My mom picked up some fireworks on her drive from Florida to Ohio. We had three boxes of them, and I wasn't quite sure what to expect, and they were pretty awesome. I took some video, but I don't have any pictures to share. They were louder than I expected, so I was a little nervous that one of our neighbors might not be too happy with us, but the only neighbors we saw were ones that wanted to come over and see them.

I do have pictures of the kids laying down while waiting to watch them:


And my main squeeze, in between lighting the fireworks:

The Basement is Done

The work to finish our basement was completed in early June - all of us are enjoying it quite a bit. We've got lots of room to run and play down there, and there are two rooms, so Taipan & Taisim has some space to themselves now. Taisim has set her room up with dolls, dress up clothes, a tea party and a play tent. Taipan's room is the base for his battle team, and is essentially an armory.