July 17, 2006

A week has passed since I last blogged and Leah has been keeping us busy. Our only true medical moment was a blood draw at Covenant last week. We are now done taking postassium. YAY! This was probably the most dreaded of Leah's medicines, although she really did not complain about it too much at all. So, we are still taking magnesium and fleet once a day and bactrim on Mon, Tues and Wed.

The highlights of the week have been VBS for Leah. She loved it! It was great for her to get to spend some time with kids, too, since that has not happened for her very much. We had a play date with Matthew and Annika Franzen last week as well. Matthew and Leah were special buddies from church before they moved two years ago, and even though Leah did not recognize him at church when she first saw him (probably because he is no longer "baby Matthew"), their friendship picked right up where it left off. Chris and I took both girls to see Cars (the movie) -our first family movie time. It was long and neither one of us loved it, but the girls were happy to munch on popcorn and drink pop. Friday we celebrated my mom's graduation from Viterbo's masters program with some pizza and an icecream cake. And yesterday my mom and I took the girls to Des Moines to stay with Aunt Suzanne overnight. We also shopped, visited the new library (probably not on most people's vacation itineraries) and the Science Center. It was just too hot for the zoo. After arriving home Leah wondered what else we could do tonight, so she and Chris are out for a run on the trail with the jogging stroller and then we will make a visit to DQ.

The big countdown for Montana has been happening here. Leah and Chris leave in just 3 days. Leah is getting more excited, and I am getting a little sad that I won't see her for five days. She has been my CONSTANT companion for seven months. However, this Chloe time will be nice, too, and she and Chris should have a great time.

In ten days we head back to Iowa City for a checkup. This will be when they take her AFP reading again. Of course I am worried about it and hope that everyone is praying for her continued health. She has had such great days and even seems a little squirrely that it is hard to think anything could be wrong, but obviously we need to keep right on top of this and keep praying that things are just fine.

Leah has had many things to say and each day I laugh at her vocabulary (or try to remind myself that she is almost a clone of me so I should watch what I am saying and how it sounds). She informed us last night that "it is important to drink a lot of liquids." She has been busy telling Chloe "Lady, you get right over here!" (this I am honestly not sure where she picked up). Her other favorite word is "deesgusting!" She gets up each day and makes a beeline for the computer to check her email. She usually can tell me who all my messages are from and if there are other junk items in my account. The downside of this is that there have been a few fights about who is in charge of the computer.

Please continue to check in on our website and pray for Leah as well -- we truly believe in the power of prayer and know that she is still in need of many for her continued healing on earth.