8/20/2007

Back to the Grind

Andy's back to work today after a great two weeks off.

As Andy said in an earlier post, we hit the beach week-one just about everyday. Hannah's totally boogie boarding now, and Max runs around in the shallow waves and catches sand crabs. We dig a hole down by the water for Nic that serves as a pool and he plays there. Living this close to the beach is great!

This week we did Disneyland! All three kids loved it. Hands down favorite for Nic was the Buzz Lightyear ride (if you've been on it, you know why) with Small World holding a close second. Max graduated to Star Tours this year and just about came out of his skin - Star Wars fan that he is. Hannah moved up to the big-kid rides and did two rollercoasters: California Screamin' and Space Mountain (white knuckled on both but loved them just the same!). It is so fun to relive DLand through the eyes of your own kids. It really brings the magic alive.

I'll post photos over on Max's site of all the fun we had and you can read about how High School Musical 2 World Premier almost ruined our vacation on my blog.

8/12/2007

Article on Will Lacey

Patrick Lacey, father of Will, has become more and more involved in the MagicWater Project. A friend of his has organized a fundraising event to take place in September and the local newspaper wrote an article about the event. The link is below. Since the money raised is going to the MagicWater Project, the reporter wanted to speak to someone from the project as well, and so I spoke with the reporter on Thursday.

http://ledger.southofboston.com/articles/2007/08/11/news/news09.txt

8/09/2007

Quick update

Just a quick update here since I know its been awhile since our last post. We're 'on vacation' this week and next and have been having a blast. This week, we decided to stay at home and close by the hospital in case Max needed blood, etc, but as it turns out his counts have been great. On Monday he went to clinic and his #'s were:
ANC-1700
PLT-173K
WBC-2.4
Weight-17.4kg (up 1/2 kg in one week!)
His weight and energy levels are up. So is his LDH (one of the NB markers we follow), but his LDH has been up and down so much lately that I'm not concerned (yet). Waiting for his catecholamines from 7/30 and 8/6 (VMA/HVA) which were very good on 7/23 (VMA 7.1, lowest in months). Friday, Max goes to clinic once again for a final check before Disneyland next Mon-Thu (more on this later). Max has been tolerating his oral chemo very well. The irinotecan seems to upset his tummy a bit as he's NOT been throwing up on just the oral cytoxan.

This week, we've been enjoying being tourists in our own town. We hit the beach Sunday, Tuesday and are going again today and tomorrow with friends. Monday night we went to the Wild Animal Park for 'Park at Dark' which was fantastic. It was about 78 degrees when we left at 8pm and we had a wonderful time. The Wild Animal Park is in Escondido about 20 miles east of us in Del Mar and was originally built to allow for the reproduction of white rhinos (about 20 left in the world). It's now a full-fledged park and the best part is that it doesn't experience the crowds that the San Diego Zoo gets so its a nice relaxed time. The lions were especially active and were roaring as the sun went down which was incredibly chilling to hear. As we got off the tour that takes you around the park (the only way to see some of the animals), we stopped in front of the lions again and I swear the two females were looking for a way to jump the (too small) gap between them and us. I admit I was looking around as to where I might grab the kids and run to if one of them 'made it' ;). Last night we went to the San Diego Zoo. Tonight, tomorrow and Saturday night the kids will be rotating staying over at Melissa's parents house, giving us a kid-free night on Friday night to do as we please (go to dinner, have an adult conversation, sleep in).

Monday, we take off for four busy days at the Magical Kingdom. We're staying at the very nice Grand Californian hotel and are planning on 3 1/2 days at the park, taking off most of day 3 to kick it by the pool and in Downtown Disney. Max and Hannah are very excited and we will see how Nic handles the overstimulation. Since he's had to keep up with his older sibs since birth we think he'll do fine and will have loads of fun - much more than M or H would have had at his age.

We'll post pics soon. That's all folks!