Weekly Wrap-Up - June 29

I'm in total denial that June is actually over! It doesn't seem possible . . .

With the end of June fast approaching, one thing we needed to deal with was the homeschool paperwork for the new school year. One of the (IMO, absurd) rules in our state is that the paper I type up that says we'll be homeschooling must be notarized . . . I'm not sure what the point of that is, but it is, what it is. Normally that's not a big deal, since there's a notary at Rodney's office, but with him off work, we had to actually figure out a time to go in and get it notarized. This past Tuesday worked, so after meeting friends for lunch, we stopped by the office. Needless to say people were glad to see him :)

The big news from this past week was Rodney's follow-up appointment with the surgeon on Wednesday. They took x-rays and confirmed that his sternum has healed. They lifted all restrictions except no lifting anything over 20 lbs. Though he still has pain with too much movement so is taking things slow. Additionally, they discontinued most of the meds that the hospital sent him home on, and lowered the dose of a med he was on pre-surgery (pain medication is still, as needed). The surgeon was happy with his progress overall. There was some "noise" on the EKG that the surgeon said is typical after heart surgery, but he still wanted to have an echocardiogram done just to be sure. When we told him that Rodney's cardiologist already has one scheduled for next week, he asked that we just have those results sent to him, as well. Assuming he doesn't see anything of concern on the echocardiogram, Rodney will not be seeing him again!

This week has also seemed to be a turning point for alot of other smaller "issues" with Rodney's recovery. His appetite is much better, his nausea and coughing are essentially gone, and his stamina continues to improve. Now he's just complaining that it's boring to walk in circles around our yard, hee hee.

The girls did awesome with our trip to the surgeon. Rodney had asked that I come back with him to hear what the surgeon said, ask any questions I had, etc. So we decided to bring Little Bit back with us, but leave the big girls in the waiting room. They brought along schoolwork, and did fine, though did say they thought we'd NEVER be done LOL. The receptionist even mentioned to us, as Rodney was "checking out" that they had been very well behaved :) I didn't expect anything different, but still nice to hear. Meanwhile Little Bit did quite well for sitting so long quietly in an exam room. The PA was great and even showed her Daddy's x-rays, which she thought was cool. In anticipation of that, I'd downloaded some Lego Duplo games onto my tablet (somehow, even though the iPad is "hers", she still thinks she needs to play games on MY tablet, sigh . . . the nice thing was, I could download the games ahead of time but have them "hidden" in the apps area where she didn't know to look for them (since the iPad doesn't have that option) and just every so often while we were back there, if she got antsy I'd "happen" to find her a "new" game LOL. Overall she was quiet and did well.

With a new school year starting this week, I did some tweaking of the schedule and we semi-started those changes this past week. As a part of that I made up a daily schedule that included a column for Little Bit with pictures drawn in next to her items so she knows what comes next. She LOVES it! And is quick to tell me that it's time for stories, art or whatever her next thing is! As is usually the case, some changing up of the chore chart has re-inspired the big girls to be abit more diligent about their chores as well.

The timing seems to be working well, for the big girls to be doing more independently while Little Bit is getting more into being an active part of "school" . . .

Sabbath's weather was GORGEOUS and Rodney wanted to walk somewhere other than our yard, so we headed to a playground near our old house, that Little Bit had been asking to go to for awhile now. The weather was great, the girls had the playground to themselves (they turned it into a "castle', or somesuch), and Rodney and I got to sit on the "porch swing" under the trees and just "chill" . . . a lovely, restful Sabbath!