January Infusions Done!

Carey had her first infusion treatments on Jan. 11, 12 and 13. We were first told only an hour or two but they were 6-8 hours each day. Carey did very well (don't you love her face in the picture I took. She didn't want me to take it). She had a slight fever Monday and by Wednesday her calcium levels were low which we knew would happen so she received some calcium before she left. They have everything a kid could want in this room...dvd players, Nintendo DS's and their games, movies, crayons, paper, craft items etc. We met many families who have children with cancer and they were receiving chemo. It's very sad to see and we will continue to pray for all of them.

Carey received many gifts from her friends and swim teammates to help her pass the time while she's there. Keegan made an appearance a couple days to cheer her up. The last day all the chairs were taken with kids getting treatments so I didn't bring him in since the room isn't that big to begin with. Her next treatment is February 9th.

Last weekend I took the girls and 3 friends to the Farm Show. We had fun. It was crowded but we got to eat really good food that's bad for you and watch the high school rodeo and some other events. The Farm Show is held in January every year and farmers from all over the state come out for a week long event. You can watch it on PCN.

Emma has a gymnastics meet this weekend in Hanover. No swim meets for 2 weekends but we have gymnastics meets this weekend and next. Our tree is still up and probably will be until after gymnastics and swim meets are over. Oh well.

Hope everyone is well and keeping warm. Today it's up in the upper 40s....a heat wave! Haven't had much snow here since mid-December but it's been very cold and windy. Take care everyone.

Jenn

http://www.theredmondblog.blogspot.com/

Happy 2010!

Well, we have high hopes 2010 is going to be a better year than 2009 was! It started out well with Carey swimming her first meet since February 2009. She did great. She won her heat in the 50 meter freestyle and dropped her time by 4 seconds. She finished 2nd in her heat in the 50 meter backstroke and dropped her time by 4 seconds. 50 meter breaststroke she got tired and did not better her time but we were so proud she finished it! She's come a long way since this summer and we just are beaming with pride and joy for her. I posted the video of her 50 free.

Emma did very well too. She bettered her times in the 25 meter freestyle and breaststroke and competed for the first time in the 25 meter butterfly. She had a great time but we are waiting the official results because the butterfly is stroke that many kids get disqualified in and toward the end of her race she got tired and it was hard to see from the stands but she may have flutter kicked. But the fly is very difficult and we thought she did awesome for her first try! She has 2 big gymnastics meets coming up. January 16 she's in Hanover and then the next weekend at State College on PSU's campus for the Nittany Invitational. We are going on Saturday to watch the PSU women's gymnastics meet, spending the night at the hotel on campus and then getting up early for her meet at 8:30 a.m.

Carey has her infusion treatments scheduled January 11, 12 and 13th. Please pray all goes well, she doesn't get sick from the treatment and that the treatment starts working. Before Christmas we saw her nutrionist and eating disorder doctor and they feel with the A.D.D. medicine switch, her weight gain and her eating plan, she doesn't need to see them (unless we feel it's needed). Yay, one less monthly doctor visit! The eating plan has been very difficult to get right for her, and also to make it fair during meal times...everyone needs to finish their plate, which for Emma when it's a meal she's not too happy with (veggies) it can be difficult. Emma usually eats very well and often so sometimes skipping the veggies or maybe not eating everything wasn't a big deal but Carey is made to finish everything (and we have to log it) she has to also. So dinner time usually isn't pleasant in our house. We've been working on it since September and Carey has gained all the weight she lost this summer back and then some. She's been so strong physically and emotionally even though she has kids picking on her about her cheek.

Keegan is REALLY testing his boundaries. Arching his back and throwing himself down when he doesn't get his way is an hourly ritual right now. He also gets very dramatic and covers his face and buries his head. I taught him to say "We are...Penn State" the other day while we were watching the Bowl game. He continues to talk more and more and loves his new Diego toys from Christmas.

We'll keep you posted on Carey's progress and update you on all the kids activities. Happy New Year!!

Thanksgiving at the Beach

Once we had Carey's doctor's appt and he said it was okay to go away for the holiday we booked our trip to Hilton Head. With everything that has happened this year, we wanted to go again since it is our favorite place and Carey really enjoys it there. She's been a trooper through everything and she really wanted to go. We found a real deal...Hilton Head can be very expensive but there are nice places to go that you don't have to spend thousands of dollars to stay at. We found a place for $79 a night, 2 bedroom villa w/full kitchen, indoor pool and a boardwalk that leads to the ocean. It was a steal! I looked at many others in the same resort, not as nice as the one we rented and they were more expensive.

Thanksgiving Day was the best! We had great weather, spent the morning at the beach playing football and shelling and then we ate lunch, Keegs napped while me and the girls went to Lawton Stables for a trailride. This was Emma's first trailride...she graduated from pony rides! It was beautiful. Then we went to The Wreck of the Salty Dog for Thanksgiving dinner...it was good but we were missing one thing...Andy's (Grandpa Redmond's) stuffing. But it was still yummy!

Friday we went to Savannah to shop for Christmas gifts and eat at our favorite The Crab Shack on Tybee Island. We headed back to the Island for a holiday concert by Gregg Russell who is a children's entertainer. Em was called up on stage (again) to do the hand signals for the song "Green alligators and longneck geese, humpty back camels...." Saturday we did more Christmas shopping while Andy golfed and then we went to see Santa. Sunday was a LONG ride back...two accidents, one of which required a helicopter to take the injured to the hospital. Our 11 hour trip back was 13.5! But it was worth it to spend that quality time together in our favorite place on Earth.

We plan to come up to Erie at Christmas but I say this with caution depending on the doctors appts for Carey. I am not happy right now because I've called the rheumotologist twice and her scheduler is not helpful. I don't understand why when the referral is URGENT it's still not taken care of after receiving the referral 10 days ago. The scheduler said today "yes I have it when I have a few minutes I'll start scheduling the stack I have." What??? It's 10:30 a.m. and your job is a scheduler?? So I figured I'd get a call this afternoon but not. Tomorrow I'm going to have to be a B*tch and start screaming.

Here are a few pictures from our trip. Hope to see everyone at Christmas.

Video of Emma's Meet

Emma's First Gymnastics Meet

Emma did great at her first Level 4 meet. Though she didn't receive any medals (not expected at all since her team just learned the routines and really don't have all the skills in the routines yet) she did fabulous and once she masters some of the skills she needs, her scores will be much higher. She looked so darn cute in her leotard and ponytail. I can remember her running around the gym with a binky in her mouth doing forward rolls across the floor and now she's really competing for the first time.

Carey update: She is going to see a rheumotologist soon to discuss how to handle her osteomyelitis as they feel this is a rare form of this and it's related to the auto-immune system. She will also see her orthopaedic surgeon as well. Once we know more, we'll keep you updated.

I tried to post the video on here of Emma's meet but it's taking forever to process. If I have time another day I'll post it.

Have a nice Thanksgiving!

Love,

Andy, Jenn, Carey, Emma and Keegan

What's going on?

Well I have an update on Carey. After her biopsy, the results came back as chronic osteomyelitis. She had sub-acute osteomyelitis in her ankle earlier this year. We meet with the doctor on Friday so they can check her jaw and hopefully learn more about how they are going to tackle this. There is going to be a team of doctors from different specialities working on her case.

The kids had a great time trick or treating. Emma was a zombie bride, Carey was a nerdy boy and Keegs was Superman. He lasted almost the entire 2 hours. Carey also dressed up at Physical Therapy. All the PTs dress up and of course they thought it was funny she dressed up as well.

Emma and Andy went to Baltimore for the weekend for her birthday trip. They went to ESPN Zone where Andy had "Happy 7th Birthday Emma" on the ticker going across the restaurant, they played all the games there, had cheesecake from The Cheesecake Factory for dessert, swam in the hotel pool, watched the Hannah Montana Movie (Andy loved it...he gives it 4 stars, LOL), went to the Aquarium and Port Discovery Museum (children's museum). They had great fun!

Keegan is now saying "no" all the time. He does say more things but that seems to be his favorite word these days. His new activity is scaring the cat...he runs up to her and screams "Lila" and laughs when she runs away. At gymnastics he's learned how to do a log roll down the mat and he can walk across the balance beam. He still does not listen and has his own agenda but that's expected from a boy at 20 months. I'm waiting for the day he'll wait his turn and not run around all over the place and stay where he's supposed to....I'll be waiting a very long time.

I want to include a link to a very special family. Baby Ally is the niece of Keegan's godparents Steve and Amy. She has a rare disease called HLH and has been battling it most of her short life. Please keep Ally and her family in your prayers. This is such a difficult time for them and they've been in the hospital for 5 months straight, not including other hospital stays prior to her bone marrow transplant. They have been through so much and deserve to have a healthy Ally! Please pray for them. http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/allyjark

I hope everyone has a nice Thanksgiving and don't eat too much turkey. :)

Back from NYC

Carey and I had a blast in New York City this weekend. We took the train on Saturday, got to NYC about 11 a.m. and went to the Fashion Institute of Technology where they had a fashion museum. It was small, I think Carey was hoping it was bigger with more cool things to look at since she's into fashion and loves Project Runway and wants a sewing machine for Christmas so she can sew clothes for her dolls. We went into a HUGE baby store and let me tell you, every sippy cup, bottle, baby/toddler spoons and forks, diapers, thermometer, humidifier etc. made! I got Keegan a Yo Gabba Gabba tray since he loves that show. We took a cab up to our hotel which was at W56th and 6th not too far from all the 5th Avenue stores and American Girl Place. Our hotel had a pool which isn't too common in NYC and I got a great internet deal back in August so it was a $200 cheaper than the normal rate. Once we got settled, went to Dean and Deluca and a got an enormous cookie we headed down 5th Ave toward American Girl. It started to sprinkle and the forecast said it was going to rain. Luckily for us, we were inside the entire time! We were at American Girl for almost 4 hours and when we got out, the rain was done! She got her doll, clothes and doll's pet from all the money she received for her birthday. We had lunch there as well which was very good. Then we headed back to the hotel to take a swim. After that we washed up, got dressed and headed down to Times Square but stopped along the way at the stores. She loves to shop! She bought a "Coach" purse from a street vendor for $20! She knows it's fake but likes to tell everyone she got a Coach purse. We ate at Planet Hollywood, she loved that place. Lots of memoribilia from movies and of course handprints of all her faves...the Jonas Brothers, Ashley Tisdale, etc.

Sunday we went to the Today Show and she got her picture taken w/Jenna Wolfe. We saw Lester Holt as well but after the show was over, he went back in and Jenna stayed out to take pictures and chat with everyone. We went on an NBC Studio Tour and saw Saturday Night Live set, Late Night w/Jimmy Fallon and MSNBC and NBC Evening News studios. They asked for a volunteer for something, didn't say what and she raised her hand...she got to stand infront of the green screen and do the weather, reading from a prompter! She was so cute! She did a good job!

We loved the NBC Experience Store...got some goodies there. We went to Central Park and did the zoo and walked around and played on the playground. It was a beautiful day to enjoy the park. We saw lots of Cavalier King Charles Spaniels...Carey wants one but she's not getting one but it was nice for her to enjoy seeing them and petting them. They are adorable...it must be the dog of choice in NYC. On the train back, she met a girl from Mechanicsburg (15 minutes from us) and they had a blast. They were two peas in a pod! They exchanged phone numbers so hopefully they can get together again.

Right now, Carey is getting a Cat Scan for her swollen cheek. What we thought was dental, might be something else and with her history of osteomyelitis, the doctor wants to investigate this further. We're all a little nervous but hopefully there are some answers that will come from todays test.

Here are some pictures from the weekend. I'll update you when we know more about Carey's cheek.