summer

Friends are in town. Visiting family, but we get to play, too.

Daily, this:We drive through the woods to Arendtsville, PA, to take lessons from Josie, the fantastic lady Sally took lessons from when she was a child. She told Audrey she was born for this, that she has beautiful long legs and arms, perfect for swimming, that "this is just her thing!" And Audrey is believing her. Blessed Josie.

Yesterday, this:(sharp eyes? the good news of my sister in that photo, too. more later!)

And a beautiful pack of children roaming the house and yard, busy with hours of non-stop imaginative play. A lot of Quidditch and Hogwarts (mostly 3rd year Ravenclaws here), which is appropriate.

Sally also helped me unpack my last, still hiding, batch of pottery, so she got to leave with this:Summer craft camp!

And now, I need to finish packing for this weekend's hospital stay. Reuben was scheduled for chemo earlier this week, but his white counts weren't quite there yet. I'm sad to spend 3 days of my sister's visit in the hospital, but glad that she got to spend a lot of time with pre-chemo Reuben baby, who is much happier than post-chemo Reuben. And I'm grateful the girls get aunt and cousin time while I'm gone. Because that baby is delicious, and they know it.

perfect

I was an early commenter on my sister-in-law's pay-it-forward blog offer, and she came up with something so perfect and timely and thoughtful that arrived in the mail today. Plus a new goat (we're both Goates) Can you guess what it is?

(hint: photos seen, for example, here or here or especially here, but extra points if you know before you peek)

Also loving the jungle animals because giraffes, hippos, and nightingales (3 birds to choose from, so we'll count one of them) are featured in some of R's favorite songs by--you guessed it!--Justin Roberts. Yup, the obsession continues. Even Nathan's in on this one.

wish I'd written instead of browsed tonight

But then I would have missed this illustrated rambling about mod-to-mom hair: http://www.electricboogaloo.net/wordpress/archives/2009/07/08/a-quick-trim-is-all/
(and while you're there, find a link to her nerdy baby line on etsy. seriously so awesome.)

...which was totally funny to me especially because I'm all about entering this:
http://macysmakeover.com/enter.html
because I so need it and I'm thinking maybe I could work the sympathy angle. What do you think? On the day I saw the signs about it I had just stopped for a quick 2nd look at couches I'm lusting after (the Ava loveseat on the left there, in "granite" and on extra sale next weekend). Here is a photo I took of myself right then, in Macy's, and looking my B-E-S-T in:*a $4.97 Old Navy special green shirt I wore for the second day in a row. After "sleeping" in it (I was on my way home from a 2 am-10 am stay in the ER. Not a lot of sleep).
*rolled-up cotton pants. One of my few pre-baby pants that still fit--because they're BBB (button below-belly. And, yes, I just made that up). One of the buttons at the bottom has torn through the cloth because I always catch my big toe on the roll-'em-up loop while I'm scrambling around.
*3-year-old Crocs
*no bra (getting R to nurse in the ER is complicated and I needed everything in my favor)
*no shower
*a pretty jade bracelet made by my seriously talented sister-in-law, Renae. The day before was Sunday, I'd finally (okay, partially) unpacked my jewelry, and thought I'd keep it on to entertain Reuben (the sparkle enchanted).
*the ubiquitous clipped-up bun. Total mom hair.

It says a lot about the pace of my weird life that I thought nothing of shopping on the way home from the ER. Hey, Macy's is an hour away from home. I can't just run there on a whim.

I'm afraid it says a lot about my hot-mama self that I was thinking this was a pretty good outfit: no knits! nothing from my husband's shelf!

And on days I shower and comb? Oh, look: more mom hair!

busy

My sweetheart mum was here for a week, and we were busy with summer goodness. Plus I always feel guilty to be on the computer while she's working. The week in review:
Reading
Berry picking (I happened on some wild blackberries, and a sweaty cycling cap was the only vessel in the car. Still De-Lish).
Bike riding (Me. New bike!)
Painting (the agonizing sort)
Painting (the fun sort)

Reuben has been misbehavin' a bit with a rouge fever that has wrecked havoc with my sleep schedule for the last couple of days. I did catch a record-setting 2 1/2 hours of sleep in the ER when we were there for most of Sunday night, but that just delayed our care: Mama stopped pushing the call button! Poor boy has been miserable and baking, but playful, too, which has kept us from health-panic. I'll post a video of a great new trick a little later today (assuming I can find our Flip), filmed as we self-entertained in the ER.

Good Things in the Middle

Hoping to get through my own breakfast, I poured Reuben a small pile of Cheerios. Sometimes he likes to crunch small bits with his 6 tiny teeth.

Nathan came by with a "Why do you put everything you see in your mouth, but not food?"
All of the Cheerios ended up here:Reuben was no longer happily distracted.
So I gave him a handful of Oh's.

They ended up here:Even he knows that Cheerios taste like cardboard*, while Honey Graham Oh's have Good Things in the Middle! (TM)

Cycle 3 went well. Reuben's heart tissue got a short break from doxorubicin, so we only pumped in one poison (ifosfamide), which was doubtless easier. He is already looking quite pale (see the dark circles?), enough so that we checked his hemoglobin levels just before leaving the hospital. I think I'll push for a cell counts and transfusion before that scheduled for the 10th. Did I tell you about his last transfusion? It was awesome: my heartachingly hollow-eyed baby was instantly ruddy and glowing. Makes you want to take your iron pills.


*though cardboard, too, goes straight in the mouth...but not real food that tastes like cardboard...?