12 down

We switched Ella's chemo day to Tuesday this week so that she'd be recovered and ready to eat birthday cake for her big day on Thursday. It's a good thing we did because this round made her very nauseous and sick, many times yesterday and some nausea today relieved by the Zofran.

She also feels like she has to use the bathroom at least every 20 minutes (but thankfully only about once during the night), we assume this is caused by the Vincristine affecting the nerves to her bladder somehow. She doesn't have a UTI, they checked yesterday just to be sure. The other side effect she's learning to live with is foot drop and loss of deep-tendon reflex (her leg doesn't jump when they hit her under the knee.) She can no longer walk on her heels and her feet just kind of slap down when she walks. When this started about a month ago she was falling a lot, but I think she's getting better at her new gait. They tell us she will recover fully once chemo is done.

This week was her 12th dose, that means in 3 weeks we get her 13th and (hopefully) final dose of chemo!!! 3 weeks after that we will go to the clinic for blood work, chest x-ray and ultrasound. If all looks good they will schedule Ella's surgery for port removal (this will be an outpatient surgery.) We will continue then to have x-rays and ultrasounds every 3 month for a year then every 6 months for a few years.

Merry Christmas

Ella all ready to deliver Christmas cookies to our neighbors.
Christmas Eve Day we made our gingerbread castle, such fun! On Christmas eve we braved taking Ella into a crowd and went to the Christmas eve service at our church as a family. Ella sang 2 songs with the other children at the front of the church which was so wonderful to see. It also amazed me how she hasn't seen her friends there for almost 5 months but kids just pick up as if no time has passed, no discussion needed, they were just off running around and pretending to be reindeer.
Ella's showing off her favorite gift, a new Magic Tree House book featuring a unicorn!

Christmas morning



Bini even got into opening gifts, although he often was most interested in trying to eat the paper.

A heart of Giving

I was talking to Ella about a family in town who is trying to raise money to adopt 3 siblings from Africa, just telling her some of the ideas that we had on ways to help them raise funds. Ella disappeared for a little while and then she returned announcing "I have an idea!" she held in front of her a basket full of change from her piggy bank. Yeah, I burst into tears.

December 2009

Ella and I had such a wonderful time today making and decorating Christmas cookies. We made 5 different kinds. Biniyam is an amazing sleeper so all the cookie making was done during his 2 hr morning nap and 3 hr afternoon nap. Tomorrow we'll bring some of the cookies around to our neighbors.
Here are some other pictures taken this month.
Decorating for Christmas



Outside with Lollipop.



The first snow of the season came while the kids were spending the night at my in-laws. Ella didn't have her snow pants with her but that didn't stop her from making snow angels.


Ella is really into making gifts for everyone this year. She spends so much time in her room working on secret cards/books/artwork and then wrapping them up for us. Here she is making dog biscuits for Summit.


rest time with Summit
I

This is the song Ella made up from her advent calendar.

He's scrumptious!

November Pictures

Bini and Summit have become good friends.
Out for a fall walk, Bini fell asleep in Greg's arms.


For Thanksgiving Ella made us all cards and was very excited to hand them out.

Ella found this in her Big Backyard magazine and decided we should make it.

I can't figure out why these pictures won't rotate but if you tip your head to the left they're pretty cute shots.

These cheeks! I love them, I can't help but constantly kiss them! And he's starting to get me back by covering my face with sloppy baby kisses. ( I love it!)

Feeding the ducks at Mimi and Pubah's
Bini slept through Thanksgiving dinner but when he awoke we were sure he got plenty of delicious food.

Wishing today were tomorrow

It's been a long time since I wished a day would just be over. But, yesterday I totally agreed with Ella's repeated cry that "I don't want today to be today, I want today to be tomorrow!" For me the angst started Saturday night when Ella awoke and threw up multiple times for no apparent reason. The fact that she was never really sick prior to diagnosis (the only medical issue she'd ever had was one ear infection) leaves us forever unsure of what is going on in her little body. Yesterday, Wednesday, we were scheduled for chemo as well as an ultrasound and x-ray to check for recurrence.

We're told recurrence is unlikely but we are dealing with the unlikely just in her having this tumor (less than 500 are diagnosed a year in the US) and why would they check if they occasionally didn't find more cancer.

So yesterday wasn't fun, but as always we are aware it could have been much worse! Ultrasound, x-ray and blood work all looked good (praise God!) Ella received both types of chemo and although she had some nausea last night she's been fine today. She also had to get another nasty flu swab to clear her from isolation when we are in the clinic.

Recently her two passions have been playing the game Sequence (which I think is fun too) and reading Magic Tree House books (or listening to them on CD.)

Here is some wisdom she's gained in her reading and has been quoting.

"If at first you don't succeed, try, try again"

"hold on to the good memories and let the bad ones go"

"today is a difficult day, tomorrow will be better" (from Lilly's purple plastic purse)

another thing she likes to say is "the sooner you do it, the sooner it's done"

Our little girl is learning a lot about life durning this time and I couldn't be more pleased with the outlook she's chosen.

Wishing on a star

Tonight Ella wished on a star that every child would have a home. I can not think of a more perfect wish myself.