Early October

This month is flying by!  Our days are pretty much scheduled out for us with extra curricular activities, mid-day kindergarten drop-off, house cleaning, grocery shopping, homework, piano practice, daily treatments and medications, and some general play/sibling bonding-time.  The weather has been fantastic this fall and we have really enjoyed being outside as much as we can.  We have also been doing some needed fall clothing shopping, which Bree enjoys.  I am happy to have a shopping companion who doesn't complain or ask if we are almost done or can go home.  Bree always wants to know where we are going next, and "home" is her least favorite answer!

I needed to find winter coats for her and Finn, pants for me, and dress pants for Kai.  Instead I found Sofia tennis shoes and matching sun glasses!  She was thrilled! 

October 5th was another long day at Children's Hospital.  We had an ENT appointment early in the morning followed immediately by Finn's annual CF clinic visit.  That meant that in addition to seeing all of our normal people, he also had to have his annual labs drawn.  It was a 4 hour morning that wore us both out.  Finn loves to play a game I came up with that involves hopping from tile to tile on the floor.  He jumps in the direction that I tell him over the number of tiles that I tell him.  And we added different types of animal hops just to keep it interesting.  He was having a great time entertaining himself while we waited.  Overall the report came back pretty good.  His lungs are looking great other than a very small spot of inflammation and bronchiectasis (permanent lung damage).  Those spots are really small, though.  I looked at the CT with our pulmonologist and she couldn't even see it which means you have to be a radiologist to even notice it.  That's good news.  The only area of concern is his ongoing sinus issues.  The ENT feels that we have run out of home treatment options.  After discussion with the ENT and CF doctors we have decided to continue doing what we can at home and wait as long as possible before another sinus surgery.  He did have polyps that we were able to see during an office scope back in September, but an 11-day round of steroids has hopefully helped with that a bit.  And so we just continue to do sinus rinses and treat with antibiotics as needed until he seems so miserable that we feel it's time for surgery.  It's a wait and see kind of thing right now.  Other than that, his bloodwork has come back looking great.  His doctor did note that his liver levels are just slightly elevated.  That is not uncommon in kids with CF and so we will repeat those labs in January and see what they are doing at that time and then decide where to go from there. 

This is the view from Kai's piano teacher's house.  We have a great time playing outside while waiting for Kai.

Love our fall weather!

So glad that he likes to ride a bike these days!

Finn's morning meds.  The syringes are Allegra, Augmentin (antibiotic), and Ibuprofen.  The big one is water to flush his g-tube when we are all done.  And then the pills are his Prilosec and Creon (enzymes).

After having fantastic and successful parent-teacher conferences on the 14th we all went out to lunch.  Bree and Finn had been playing dress up and didn't want to change.  We got a lot of smiles and second looks whenever we walked by!  As for conferences, both boys seem to be doing well in their classes.  Kai tested at a 7th grade level.  I don't even know what to say about that except that I'm proud of him.  His biggest struggles continue to be socially and with transitions.  He is the only kid in his class that is pulled out for GE every day and he struggles with integrating back into the classroom after being out.  It's something he is working on with his fantastic teacher.  Finn on the other hand did not test well at the beginning of the year.  However, he is now way ahead of the excepted curve based on his initial test.  This either is a reflection of him just needing exposure to the idea (his teacher's thoughts), or a reflection of his personality at the beginning of the year and his complete lack of interest in reading (my thoughts).  Either way, he is beyond where they expected him to be at this point and he is an engaged and eager learner.  Awesome reports!