Monday, April 12, 2010

News Flash!

We Have our usual family Easter picture. HI Everyone. We are well! We had a great Easter. The kids enjoyed the Easter bunny treats especially the sun glasses! We had a wonderful family day. Ron and I are great. We are really happy to say Ron is starting a new position as a program manager and engineer with an automotive supplier! He intervewed almost 6 weeks ago, and kind of thought it went well, but assumed they make other plans when they did not seem to be deciding. Once he quit wondering about it, they called him to meet the VP, and volia! Now this is going to sound funny, but we have not been both working full time since Erin was born. We thought when Josh went to school we would it would be a good time to make that change, so with Josh starting kindergarten in the fall, the timing is even good. We are currenlty running around like squirrels before winter. You have no idea! Schedule changes for me at the office, morning sitter for the little man and summer child care. The effort is Herculean! I am glad to see Ron enthused about the job. He will do well I am sure, and I feel kind of good that he got this job because he is highly skilled and well qualified. It helped that people he interviewed with know people he knows. (translation: being a good guy and skilled at your job DOES matter!) There may be hope in this world yet! Wish us luck it may be bumpy, but it will be awesome!

Monday, March 1, 2010

February

Josh is really watching the other guys to see if this is ok...! it is . it is a kid ride at sea world. Look at my guys! Bryan rocked it out as the big brother when we were gone.
Shammu...The big head variety of course Josh would not go near. He seemed harmless enough..
Here they are happy to be on vacation.
Ron's birthday! He opted for home made blueberry pie... we had a good little celebration!
February has been a good month. We celebrated Ron's birthday one day early, and the kids and I left for FLORIDA in the morning. We flew to Orlando and rented a van and made it to our hotel. We went to Sea World and really had fun. We missed Ron and it was great when he joined us 2 days later. We visited grandparents and Nanna and Nannu and went to Kennedy Space center. It was a really nice break. a tad too short but kinda squeezed in among various vacations and scheduled cases! Ron had an exam the day we got in and had a take home test to turn in while we were gone, but such is the life of a masters student...
I wanna tell you it was a funny site to see me in the airport with Bryan on one side of security check through and me and on the other with the other 3 in between and 5 pairs of shoes and 5 back packs and 5 jackets...You get the picture.

Sunday, January 31, 2010

January is cardiology month for us. Josh is great and he considers Mott hospital "my hospital". More like he owns it than he needs it. He had an ekg and an echo.There are essentially no changes. He is 40 lbs and 45 inches tall. He is thin and healthy! Dr Russell is really good with Josh and with Ron and I. I love that he answers my questions before I ask them.
Josh is in great shape. They were pleased that the echo appears stable. Functionally he is doing great. He is high energy and has never self limited his exertion. He eats like a truck driver and is learning well in preschool.
The gray area centers around his pulmonary valve. He has a trans-annular patch across his pulmonary valve so the valve was sacrificed during his surgery in 2007. He has lots of back flow through the valve back into the right ventricle. Eventually he will need to have this valve replaced.
The good news is this week, the FDA approved a device that is used to do pulmonary valve replacement through heart catheter procedure. This is big! if they perfect this technique, it would mean an overnight stay and sedation instead of open heart surgery! (we've been there before, and if possible would rather not go back!) Right now, it can only be done via catheter if people have a man made outflow track. Josh has half natural and half man made. If we play our cards right, he will not need a valve until the procedure can be done with his type of outflow tract.
The decision about when this valve replacement should take place is based on clinical condition and echo and MRI findings. Within the next year or 2 he will have an MRI to take these measurements and we'll see how he continues to do clinically.
For now we CELEBRATE!

Saturday, January 16, 2010

So moms... You may be able to relate to this story...True of course. Ron is out on the other side of town so I am doing the transient single parent thing. I get all 4 kids form two schools and we got home and had snacks. Josh "took care" of my keys for me but we found them relatively easily. Ron calls to say he is running late and could he meet us at the soccer game (he is coach Ron) instead of coming home to pick up Erin. I tell him that would be fine... and mobilize the troops.. Josh goes to the bathroom While Erin an Mally put on shoes and get the right things to bring to a 1 hour soccer game! Low and behold the toilet backs up so he does what every 4 year old would do to fix it. He flushes again and again....THEN calls for help! Now we are running late for the soccer game with gallons of dirty water all over the bathroom and an upset 5 year old with soaked pants through no fault of his own. I call for back up! Erin get me a towel!!!! Erin comes back with one square of paper towel and throws it on the floor... I was laughing... it might have been hysteria ... but it was funny. We managed to get the mess cleaned up and to soccer before kick-off... We had a debriefing which included proper protocol for toilets not flushing properly.