Fist Pumping Babies!

Greetings and Salutations to one and all, the blogster has returned.

As we last detailed on Wednesday, we didn't start Chemo last week, so we had a week(ish) to get Amie to love her some food, and spend some time as a family.  We did this to our best extent...now the documentation.

I posted this on FB a few days ago as a Thanksgiving greeting from Amie, but wanted to include it here for those that are not on FB.  We have been making her whatever she wanted to eat, and she said she wanted "browns" which are mini-tater tots that Shelley just adores as replacement hash browns.  She always wants her "dip dip" for them, which is Ketchup.  Scrunchy Face of course makes it perfect.

We knew that Anya wanted to do normal Thanksgiving stuff, but that Amelie really ought not go out and about.  So my sister took Anya for a few days to do Thanksgiving with my parents, and then hang with the Garzas for a few days.  This was them on the way to see Rise of the Guardians, which she enjoyed.

Auntie Beth and Anya doing their best imitations of me.  I feel honored.

This is what it looks like outside my parents' house in Luna Pier, MI.  Allyssa is a great big sister.  :)

Amie likes to play on Anya's bunk bed...but knows that she can't do that without us.  We wanted to send Anya a picture telling her that her bed was getting used well while she was gone.

This is Anya's room at Grammie's house.  For those of you who don't know, this was Shelley's room growing up, so it's kinda cool for us that she gets to use it.

Anya was showing her cousins her room at Grammie's, and playing around in it.  Yan Yee and Moy Moy really enjoyed it.

This is one of Amie's pillows that she's using.  She loves it.  Have you seen Coraline though?

This is Amie tonight, as she was about to start round 3 of Chemotherapy at Mott.  This was totally spontaneous.  I can't help but think this is a lot like the internet meme picture that has been floating around a while...

I've been asked to let y'all know that anyone desiring wristbands, T-shirts, or to just have a grand old time should check out Belleville WinterFest this Saturday.  (click the link for details)  There's going to be a booth for those that are doing stuff to support us, of which we are infinitely humbled.  I'm going to do my best to come by and say hey at some point.  They're good peeps.

Medical details:  

Amelie's counts were good enough, and she was hydrated enough, for us to start round 3 tonight.  The word still isn't official on rounds 4 and 5, but most likely we'll stay with the same levels of doses from rounds 1-3, due to the insurance denial.  Dr. Yanik, the pediatric oncologist we're working with says this isn't a big deal, as the evidence that is going to be publish indicates that there's very little efficacy to doing both rescue rounds, even though we have enough to do about 5 infusions.  Such is life...

The first "post-chemo" MRI is coming up on December 12th.  This will tell us if/how much the cancer is coming back.  Hoping for a nice clean bill of health on that one.

More to come in the days ahead.  I'm staying there tomorrow night.

Time to work on Sub Plans for Wednesday!