"You are in so much trouble with her..."

You know, people look at Carina's adorable little face and say, "You are in so much trouble..." Implying of course, that we'll be fighting off the boys as she gets older, or that she is going to manipulating everyone with her charms. Well, they have no idea.

This girl is all about pushing her limits and seeing what her body can take. Or maybe she's just trying to keep up with Dante. I think she has a permanent bruise on her forehead from tripping and smacking her head so many times. She had the collarbone incident, of course. (Which has healed well, luckily.) The following week, while trying to climb up unassisted like her big brother, she took a header off of a hammock. The next week she tripped at the pool and had a big bump on her forehead. Now, we're visiting Gomma's house in CT, I turn around to open the blinds in the kitchen and I hear her slip...

Carina was trying to climb up into the kitchen chair, slipped halfway and smacked her face on the arm of the chair so hard that she split a hole in her lip. I yelled for Chris to get out of bed (I'm still not sure what the crash was that I heard when I scared him awake) as I tried to calm her and Dante down. We had a lovely trip to the local emergency center and Carina now has 2 stitches in her lip. The cut was pretty wide and wouldn't heal nicely without. She screamed the whole time but as soon as we let her go, she calmed down. I would've screamed too seeing that big ol' needle coming at my face. The doctor was very nice and caring and was particularly concerned about how the line of her lips would heal.

Now, what do you think she did when she got up from her nap today?... Tried climbing the same chair! AARRRGGHHH! She was definitely more mellow, and not feeling her best, but she will be fine, I'm sure. Not so sure about us though. After all that I then proceeded to smack my chin so hard on a cabinet, I almost split it, and then went to kill a bug in the car and smacked the metal LATCH hook instead, with the heel of my hand. I can still feel the pain up my arm hours later. Maybe I should be in bed now...

Let's catch up, shall we?

We spent a wonderfully, relaxing week at Alligator Point beach, thanks to Lyndall and Bolling, again. This year was not quite as relaxing as years past- chasing two toddlers around doesn't stop in a different location. But, just being somewhere where you didn't have all the things "you should be doing" staring you in the face is amazing. The kids had a great time and keep asking to go back.

We came home and spent the next week and a half taking care of doctor visits for everyone. Dante had an audiology appointment, where he tested out his acting skills faking it in the sound booth. Chris had his own audiology appointment, trying to determine some ear pain from all those years rocking out, but now he has no excuse for saying he can't hear me; his hearing was just about perfect. We did Carina's follow-up x-ray. We met the surgeon to have Dante's port removed. (We have scheduled that for the end of July. )

We spent a day at All Children's Hospital, getting a GFR study done to check Dante's kidneys and a speech evaluation. We start the morning with a port access and an IV (which after it is used, he doesn't want out. Go figure.) They inject him with something radioactive and send us on our way. We spend about 2 hours with Heather, testing Dante's speech and language skills, due to his hearing loss. He needs some help with "s" and "sh". She suggested therapy to get him on track. (Ready for this cost? They suggest twice a week. Insurance says, OK at $25 a session for 60 days. If he still needs more, the doctor has to appeal. Yikes.)

From that appointment, we return to Nuclear Medicine for our first of 3 blood draws. It actually ended up being an all-right day. I had packed a ton of activities and we didn't do any of them! We visited Sara, from Child Life. Dante ran up and gave her a hug. We had a great time catching up and Dante was belly laughing and being super silly. He obviously remembered being comfortable and happy with her. It was great to see her and still don't know how we would have been where we are today without her support!

Every hour for 3 hours, we return for blood draws, in between playing in the play room.

When it's time to remove his port, I realize that this might be the last time his port is used...and strangely enough, I feel sad about it. How weird. I think the sadness had more to do with emotion of all we've seen with it, the nervousness of having it removed and something else happening, but really, no longer having the super easy way to get his labs done!

We're looking forward to some other fun activities this summer, minus hospital visits, of course. Lots of swimming, playing and hanging out with friends. Along with potty training and pacifier weaning for Carina... Hopefully lots of yoga for mommy too!

Oh, and by the way, the GFR test came back normal. Woo Hoo!