Dog Update

Just so I don’t leave you hanging about the dog…

Friday was a really bad day. I went to see him in the morning – he was still not doing well, getting worse. He looked horrible. I looked in his face and silently pleaded with him to hang on and get better. I talked to the vet over the phone in the afternoon and he suggested one last treatment before we gave up. All along we were treating his problems like they were ulcers – except the medication that should have worked simply wasn’t working. If it wasn’t ulcers – the other options it could be was cancer or inflammatory disease. He suggested giving him steroids to see if it helped.

A few hours later, I stopped in to see him. I brought the kids with me because I wasn’t sure if they were ever going to see him again, and I was getting ready to tell them to say goodbye to him. But when they brought him out, they put him on the floor, and he ran over to us, wagging his tail. Before he was shaking non-stop (most likely from pain), but he was hardly shaking at all – this was only hours after they started him on the new treatment. I couldn’t believe my eyes. We took him outside so he could pee, he did, then pulled towards the car like he wanted to go HOME. This is not the behavior of a dog that is giving up!

The next morning he looked even better. They told me if everything continued as is, he could come home that night. I couldn’t believe it! The dog had literally come back from the dead. That night I brought him (and about a dozen medications LOL!) home and he’s pretty much back to his old self now.

I’ve been told this is not a “cure” – his stomach is diseased. What this buys us is some more time with him. Whether it’s cancer or inflammatory disease, the steroids will eventually stop working. In the meantime, we are so glad to have him back with us for however long we can keep him. I still don’t know how I’m going to cope when the eventuality comes. He’s like my daemon / animal spirit. He’s always by my side and I don’t know how I’ll ever be able to say goodbye to him.

Climbing Camp

TMomentum offers. (They’re an “Indoor Rock Climbing Gym” here in Utah) If you live near by and are looking for a cool camp for your kids, definitely check them out. Rachel loved it. She did it last year too, and I can’t believe how quickly she scales those walls now! She’s like Spiderman. LOL! They run weekly and on the last day – they have a pizza party and a “reptile show”. When I went a little early to pick her up on Friday, I got to see one of the huge snakes they regularly bring to this show. HUGE. Amazing to look at… from a few feet away. 😉

As for an update on our dog: He’s still at the vet/hospital. Yesterday morning I thought he had given up – but we started a new treatment last night, and it’s given me a little hope. We’ll find out for sure tonight whether this will hold him for a while. He’s an old dog, so we’re on borrowed time – but I would really love to have a few more months with him.

The Dog

T

Ladyfingers and Popovers

Printable Mask Ear Hooks

Zachary has been fascinated with printable masks recently. He colors them in and then wants to wear them, of course. The problem I’ve run into though is making it so the mask will stay on his face. We’ve tried string, but it doesn’t take much to pull the string right off the mask – usually ripping the paper (and inducing much crying from Zachary). And the string is just a pain to work with in general.

Side story: A few months ago, I had taken Rachel in to get her eyes checked. (She had been complaining about vision issues) They put drops in her eyes and then gave her these “disposable sunglasses” to wear until the drops wore off. Basically it was just a flimsy shaded piece of plastic with these adjustable (and detachable) cardboard “ear hooks.” For some reason, the contraption fascinated me so I saved it. Those sunglasses were lying on my desk when yet another one of Zach’s printable masks ripped.

*Lightbulb moment* – what if I used those ear hooks as a template, and cut out new ones (so I’d be able to keep the original), and just taped the ear hooks on the paper mask so they’re in just the right place to fit over his ears. (You can cut little slits – just the size of the ear hook arm, and adjust the size then tape in place.)

It worked perfectly! I scanned the ear hooks in and recreated the outline using Illustrator. If you use them for your kid’s masks I would recommend printing them onto card stock. (Or printing them out and then using it as a template to cut out the shape from something sturdier than regular paper).

Here it is for your downloading pleasure

Here is Zachary proudly modeling his latest fun mask:

If you’d like to find some fun printable masks for your little one to use with the ear hooks here are a few:

Moshi Monsters – These are very cute little monsters. On that page, if you scroll down, you’ll see the color-in / printable masks. Zach is modeling Diavlo in the picture above. 😉

Activity Village – There’s a few cute animal masks on there – and the site has a bunch of other fun printable activities. Of course, this only helps feed Zach’s printing obsession. (Did I already mention He LOVES printing from the computer!!)

childcareandbeyond.com – There are a bunch of safari themed masks there. My favorite is the Tiger Mask – that one looks really cool.

Fantasy Jr. – Somewhat creepy – but right up Zach’s alley. (Also clicking around there, I found this Dragon Mask – on Animal Jr. (which had a few more cool animal masks) On that Dragon Mask page, it also showed a very cool looking Chinese New Year dragon craft! I know it’s not currently the Chinese New Year, but that dragon looks WAY COOL. We are SO making that very soon!!! – that last site is on Craft Jr., which, as you can imagine, has a bunch of fun kids crafts!)

Nick Jr. has a bunch children masks too, but they’re kind of spread out in different sections. Doing a search on their site though you can see a compiled list.

Making major life decisions via eeny meeny miney moe

Portland, OR? San Jose, CA? San Diego, CA? Denver, CO? and now Washington, D.C.? In any particular moment, any one of those places looks like a place we might end up. For someone that likes to have everything under control, this process of figuring out where we’re going to go next is killing me. It all depends on things completely out of my control. And even though, my first choice would probably be Portland, it’s not really up to me or my preferences at all. Where we will go next all depends on where Sam gets a job – and where the best places for what he wants to do will be. Thankfully, I think he’s figuring out a path for what he wants to do. It’s not exactly what he’s doing now, but it’s in the same general field, and I think with some studying, certification test taking, he can transfer his experience. But everything else is up for grabs at the moment. He’s determined to have us out of Utah this time next year – so that’s encouraging. But where we’ll be… I have no freaking clue.