Conversations in the car:

Avery says "Daddy, poppa is retired right". "Yes he is Avery"
"Oh, so that means he is tired of working". I think that sums it up perfectly!

In other news, the cast came off. Everything looks good so far. Brennyn was able to pick out the colour of her splint and picked purple without hesitation.

We are off to sick kids again tomorrow. The cast is being removed. Hopefully, the fingers look great under that bulky cast.
I think Brennyn may miss that cast, she's been showing everyone and anyone her cast. Doesn't matter if she actually knows that person, she goes right up to them and says "look, look at my cast". If for some reason, they dare to ignore her she says it louder and practically shoves the cast in their face.

She may also miss using her cast as a weapon, thank goodness she only figured that out today. She may have almost strangled her sister. Sometimes they get along, honestly.

Anyway, crossing my fingers that everything has healed up correctly.

Someone in this house is really catching up developmentally and with speech/thought patterns.

Here's a few fun examples:
Blair says "Brennyn please come upstairs right now"
Brennyn says "Daddy, you're bossy".
Mommy spits out her tea in laughter.

I look over into the living room and the Christmas tree lights are suddenly on. The only person sitting near the tree is Miss Brennyn.
I ask "did you just plug in the tree lights".
"Yes mommy, it was dark and I needed light". I should add that I was in the kitchen which is beside the living room. This girl works quickly and stealthily.

I also caught her munching on a big box of smarties. They were at the back of the counter, but somehow she managed to get ahold of them.

My girls keep me on my toes!

Blair took the ambulance to Brennyn's preschool a few weeks ago.
He asked the class what he was and Brennyn answered "MY DADDY". She answered every question after that, no other kids had a chance. It helps when it's her Dad who is the paramedic and has reviewed what a stethoscope was and what a paramedic does "Take sick people to hospital".
One little girl took a liking to Brennyn's daddy. Her mom told me yesterday that thsi little girl thinks Brennyn is so nice (because she brought her daddy to school with a real ambulance). She was following Blair around all morning that day, so cute.

Children are amazing

Brennyn is doing so well. You would never know she had surgery 5 days ago. She's been running around, trying to wrestle her sister, jumping off stairs (I think she's trying give her mother a heart attack).
I had to force her to watch Treehouse Sunday, just to get her to relax on the couch. Even then she said "no sleep on couch, it's not night-night time mommy".

The only sign that Brennyn is in any discomfort is her odd bout of crankiness. Oh, and she has been going to bed by 6:30 every night. Not by her choice, but she is asleep in seconds.

Her skin graft is starting to cause discomfort, but only because it is so itchy. Brennyn keeps telling me that she is so itchy. The surgical bandage comes off tonight and the surgical tape underneath will eventually fall off.

We go back to sick kids next week and the cast comes off. Blair and I decided to take Avery out of school that day so we can make it a family day. There is enough to do at Sick Kids that Avery will be entertained while we wait, and wait for the doctor to remove the cast.

I've mentioned this before, but I need to say it again, Sick Kids is an amazing hospital. It really is the best of the best, and I feel so comfortable and relieved that Brennyn is seeing a surgeon at that facility. Yes, unfortunately it takes so long to have surgeries done but at least you know they have so much experience working with children.

Brave little girl

Home again! First surgery done (first in Canada anyway).

I am so proud of Brennyn and am in awe. She was fantastic. I don't think an adult would have handled her situation better. Oh, and she won the nursing staff over in seconds! One of the nurses even ran out and got her a new doll!
My baby had her last bite of food at 6:30 Wednesday evening. Her surgery was booked for 2:00pm on Thursday, but was delayed until 5:00. She did not even ask me for food until after 3:00, and did not whine or cry once. She just said "mommy I'm hungry". Blair and I felt so bad for her and did not eat in solidarity (okay, we did have breakfast while she was still sleeping that morning).
She did exactly what the nurses and doctors said to do. Finally, when the surgical nurse came to get her, Brennyn just said "bye mommy and daddy". We watched her walk down the hall and she yelled "see you later alligator". Blair turned to me and said "are you crying". Of course, I said "umm, no, my eyes are just itchy" (I was bawling, but Brennyn didn't see).

Just over 21/2 hours later, we were called to recovery and the surgery was finished. Still, Brennyn did not complain. She looked at us, closed her eyes and went back to sleep (after the nurse gave her some morphine).
We went back to her room, read a story and Brennyn slept for the rest of the night. Blair and I squished ourselves onto the daybed and slept on and off.

By the time we got home, Brennyn was acting like her normal self. I had to make her watch tv (only way to keep her resting and not jumping around, damaging her hand).

She is very sleepy tonight, so I'm hoping her hand doesn't hurt her too much. She said it doesn't hurt, but I don't know how it could not hurt. She has a cast from her fingertips to her shoulder, that will come off Dec. 7th. She also had some skin taken from her leg for a skin graft.

So, surgery 1 is done, only 3 (or 4) more to go!

surgery

We're going down to sick kids tomorrow anyway. The anesthetist has the final say and there are no other surgeries booked. They said to come down and hopefully if her cold isn't too bad, they will go ahead.
I'm crossing my fingers and toes.
Poor Brennyn can't eat anything after midnight tonight but her surgery is not until 2:00pm.
We'll be staying overnight with her.
I'm so nervous for my little girl. We've tried to explain everything, but how much does a 3 year old really understand about surgery, and not getting to eat for a day, and pain.

bad timing

We finally got the call from Sick Kids today for Brennyn's hand surgery. Unfortunately, Brennyn has a runny nose so they may not be able to proceed until January.
They don't want to risk any kind of infection, which I totally understand. I'm just so disappointed about the timing. We've been waiting for this call for 8 months.

Stupid cold germs, ughhhhhhhhhh.