Summa, summa, summatime....

Okay, well. I don't know when the first day of summer officially starts but who cares? It's summertime!!!

Today was the last day of school for our area and I am so excited! Maile has been out of VPK for a bit now but now that everyone else's school age kids are out, we won't be so bored!

It is already so hot around here, though. Today we went to the park for a birthday party and everyone practically melted. But Maile had a blast playing with all of her little friends so that's all that matters. And I got to hang out with some pretty amazing mamas so I guess everyone wins. Yay!



I put Kale in a baby swing for the first time at the park. He loved it just like I thought he would. He wasn't even the slightest bit frightened--just acted like it was something he did everyday! He was too cute. He didn't get to swing for too long, though because of the rodent sized bumble bees and wasps buzzing around my head--I decided it was time to stop swinging. Try, if you can, to ignore the moldy swing. It looks so much worse seeing it now! Jeez! Maybe I'll be taking my shopping cart cover with me next time...





There are so many things to do now that summer is here. Yesterday evening I took Maile down to Plaza de Luna for some sunset thingie they have going on every Thursday. Different characters visit each week--yesterday it was a very dirty Spongebob. Seriously. Have these people never heard of spot cleaning? Dry cleaning? Cleaning in general? I mean, I guess the kids were impressed but all I wanted was to break out the anti-bacterial hand sanitizer and throw it on poor Spongebob. Ick. Anyway, it was cool other than that. There was a live band playing, the breeze was blowing and the kids were playing in the water fountain. I can't wait to go again.

There are a few other things I want to check out like Bands on the Beach--I have never gone to that but really want to this year now that Maile is so much bigger and I really think she'd enjoy it. I took her to the beach a couple of weeks ago with a friend of mine and her twin daughters while my parents watched Kale for me--we had such a great time. As for Kale going to the beach, I'm not ready for him to go for a long period of time yet. The boy is white, has super sensitive skin and I'm so afraid of sand getting sand in his eyes or something. Just not something I want to deal with yet. He did get his first taste of a swimming pool this past Monday--but wasn't really digging it. It was too cold for him and he started to cry as soon as his feet touched the water! Poor little guy.

A couple of days ago my mother-in-law took the kids and I out for a day of shopping at the Foley outlet. The place has been renovated and now has a great little playground for the kids complete with a carousel--which Maile just had to ride.




Not really sure what else the summer has in store for us. Maile has been super busy drawing, coloring and painting a lot.
That is supposed to be me and Mike--so in love. See the hearts? That's how you know.




I love that she's so into that kind of stuff; I used to be the same way. Hopefully she'll stick with it, though.
I can't believe in just three months she'll be starting kindergarten! Hmmmm....maybe I should register her, huh? That would probably be a good idea.

Until then...I'm gonna do my best to make this an amazing summer. The last one before my baby officially becomes a big girl...

Okay. I'm gonna go cry myself to sleep now.

Surgery #2 scheduled

Yesterday we met with Kale's ocularists again and also with his doctor/surgeon, Dr. Scruggs. Elise, one of the ocularists, tried once again to see if anything would fit into Kale's left eye--the one where the conformer had fallen out--and it was just not happening. Everything has retracted in size and now his eyelid looks like it did before he had surgery. Elise's father, Dr. Cox, decided to go ahead and just leave his right conformer in (it's been in since he had surgery a month ago) since it doesn't seem to be giving him any problems and doesn't look like it's going to come out like the other one did. Our meeting with them was very short and sweet and so we went to see Dr. Scruggs.

She took a look at his eye and told us what we already knew: he needs surgery again. Only this time, instead of putting in the conformers like before, our only option right now is to try hydrogel expanders. They'll be sewn in and their purpose is to expand his eyelids in size. They'll expand by water, but I'm not really sure yet how the water comes into play. That's one of the things I didn't think to ask while we were there, but did think to ask as we were already on our way back home. Figures. Anyway, the expanders will stay in for a couple of months (assuming they don't come out, which is always a possibility) and then he'll have to have surgery again to take them out and replace them with bigger ones. And then again...not sure how many times it'll have to take place, just depends on how well they work I guess.
Not too excited about more surgeries...but again. Necessity. We knew he'd have to have surgery again, just not for this. If this wasn't something that had to be done--if it was all just about him "looking normal"--I don't think I'd put Kale through all of this. No, wait. I know I wouldn't.

So that's it for now. I'm sooooo glad that Kale didn't have a rough time like his last visit. He only got upset for a minute yesterday when Elise tried to mess with his left eye, but that's it. Whew!

His surgery has a tentative date of June 25th--so a little over a month to go until then. Woo.Hoo.

Please, week. Be over soon.

We had to take a trip to UAB today. Yesterday we went to see a local ocularist (Kale's ocularist referred us) who tried unsuccessfully to put Kale's conformer back in. He even made a smaller one for him and that wouldn't go in. So our only choice was to go see Kale's ocularist today. We left early this morning and made it back earlier this evening. Talk about tired.

Anyway, today's visit was pretty unsuccessful, too. Kale's ocularist tried around ten different conformers, all shapes and sizes and nothing would go in. Apparently the inside of his eye retracted in size. One tiny conformer went in, but wouldn't stay put because his upper eyelid isn't formed very well (he's supposed to have surgery to fix that). We were there about an hour and Kale screamed and screamed. And I cried and cried. By the fifth conformer I was just silently begging for them to give up already because Kale was so upset (and so was I).

After they finally decided to stop trying they called up Dr. Scruggs--Kale's surgeon--to see what she wanted to do next. She had come by earlier in between surgeries to see how his eye looked and to check on us. I really, really like her. She called me twice yesterday to check on things and see what we could do before making the trip up there. Anyway, she's going to call us in a week and let us know the next step. For now, Kale won't be wearing a conformer on that side, but we have to do everything we can to make sure his eyelids stay clean and open. It was mentioned that surgery might have to take place again on his left eye to get a conformer back in. We'll know more in a week I guess.

Okay. I'm gonna go attempt to study a little more for a final I have in the morning.

No title is worthy of the day I've had

I spent most of the morning trying to get stuff together for Maile and Kale so we could go to two birthday parties today. One was at one o'clock and the other was at two o'clock. We were going to leave the first one around two or so and then go the next one a little late. I dropped Kale off at my mom's house for the first party so he wouldn't be completely pooped out by the time we went to the second. We had only been at the party for ten minutes before my mom called to tell me that Kale's left eye conformer came out. Holy crap. He likes to rub his face on people's shoulders when they're holding him, maybe to scratch an itch or something. He also does it before he's about to fall asleep. My mom said he did it like he was tired and then he lifted his head up and "looked" at her and that's when she noticed the conformer wasn't there!

So she tried to put it back in herself before calling me, but Kale wasn't having it. So Maile and I got in the car and I rushed to get there as fast as I could. But not before a bird decided to fly into my windshield as I was talking to Mike on the phone telling him what was going on. So he got to hear me shout a loud "Eeeeeeek!" as the bird came flying towards the window and as feathers just kinda flew around. Awesome.

I finally got to my parents house and Kale was fast asleep on my mom. When he woke up I finally got to see what he looks like without the conformer. Kinda cool, I must say! It looks more natural than it ever has, that's for sure. Anyway, so after a little while my mom, my dad and I decided to try together to get the conformer back in.

It didn't work. At all. And Kale fought us the entire time. So I went into my parents' foyer by the stairwell to call and try to leave messages with Kale's ocularist to find out what to do. Next thing I know I'm being attacked by my mom's automatic Air Wick spray thing that's on the stairs. I had no clue what it was, so I had no idea that standing directly in front of it would land me in a situation where I felt as if I was getting maced. At least I smell good.

So now we're home. Mike called a bunch of other numbers we had here at the house and left messages with anyone and everyone we could think of at UAB and hopefully someone will call us back. We're just concerned his eye may get infected or it may close up. It's really red and swollen right now, but it doesn't seem to be bothering him so I guess that's good.

Anyway. It's been a long day and I'm pretty much ready for it to be over.