We had our 1-year post-transplant Pittsburgh visit on Monday Nov. 22 and it was terrific. Shayna was her usual adorable, sweet self so got stickers, crayons and coloring books. She even let our transplant coordinator give her a hug before we left. They are pleased with her progress and labs so we even got to drop our evening anti-viral. Her weight hit the 50th%-ile, her height the 19th, and her head is somewhere around the 110th or so. They scheduled us to fix her belly button hernia this week but with the crazy weather, we're going to look into a locally recommend pediatric surgeon. Hopefully we'll get all that straighten out this week and she'll have a cute little belly button by my 30th birthday (Dec 31).
We drove to Pittsburgh (7 hrs) Sunday then drove straight to Newport News after the appointment Monday (almost 10hrs). Thank goodness for the dvd player in the new car. Shayna watched the10min portion of Finding Nemo where Nemo's dad and Dory hook up with the turtles, the 10min portion near the beginning where Nemo has his first day of school, and the PBS episode of Curious George and the Bunny Hunt each about 15 times. (She's picky about her tv; it has to have lots of action and nothing remotely scary.)
We got really lucky for Thanksgiving as my Uncle David and his wife Vickie were traveling to Newport News, VA to visit Vickie's sister Hollie and her husband Jack for the holiday. We'd never met Jack or Hollie but were invited to stay with them for the week anyway. What a wonderful trip! It was nearly vacation-like for me as Vickie and Hollie did 85% of all the kitchen duties. Shayna endeared herself to everyone with Jack offering to take her off our hands if we wanted at the end of our visit. One of Shayna's favorite things about the visit was Tilley the dog, an old, gentle mixed breed that isn't used to small children around. Shayna followed Tilley everywhere and mimicked about everything Tilley did.
She laid on the dog bed together.
They sat together to read books.
The most Tilley ever did was give her many looks of, "soooo, you're still here are you?" Thanksgiving dinner was one of the best I'd ever had. There was so much traditional food and it ALL tasted great.
We came home the following Friday to fall into the throws of Shayna's Liver Day party for Wed. Dec. 1st. Becca, Nahum, and I managed to pull off an amazing party even with my parents Michael and Melinda having to spend a night near Dullas. Winds forced their plane to land at Dullas instead of Roanoke on the 30th but they got here on the afternoon of the 1st. (Shayna was so excited the minute they got in the car with us.) We had a wonderful catered dinner with great friends, lots of happy kids, and an ice cream cake with a liver on it. We even got visits by two of Shayna's local doctors. It was such a magical time to see Shayna having so much fun.
We even sang "Happy Liver Day" before she blew out her candle.
Michael and Melinda left today. As Nahum is leaving to take them to the airport Shayna is saying, "with Shayna....with Shayna," in her most pathetic (but not winy) voice because she wants them to take her with them. Shayna had soooooo much fun with Grandpa and Grandma. Grandma even replaced Ima as Shayna's potty partner of choice. Besides having play buddies all day long at the house, we also went to the gymnastics studio Thursday,
the library for her first books Friday, and swimming on Saturday. Plus a little adult only outing Friday for sushi and the new Harry Potter movie (both were awesome).
Nahum is doing well and working hard. As mentioned, I've hit the exhausted part of the pregnancy. We're just over 7 months along, or 32 weeks. SJ seems to get bigger each day. He only hangs out on the right side and seems to enjoy having his butt wedged into my ribs frequently, but at least it's his butt and not his head. Every time we hit a new week, I tell Nahum something like, "only 8 more weeks until SJ is late." I learned not to hope for an early baby with Shayna but I can't wait to have my body back so I can be the bouncy, silly parent I used to be able to be with her.
So very exciting "graduating" to that one year liver mark! We are thrilled for you all and hope you have many more great Liver Days ahead. The cake picture was my favorite :)
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