A special weekend & busy week

Thankfully, we all slept in on Saturday (if 6:30 is sleeping in...it was 7:30 Orlando time so that helped us feel a bit better). On Saturday morning the kids went swimming with Daddy while I caught up on some email and finished up packing.

We went up to St. Cloud for the weekend to see Papa Ron and Nana Jane. We had a wonderful time visiting and seeing Dave, Rebecca, Sam and Will too. We told them all sorts of stories of our week. Grace showed off many of her new tricks and just how big she was getting. On Sunday morning we went to Panera Bread - a Sunday morning ritual. Several people got to see Grace and they were quite excited (as was she!). It was wonderful to meet some of the special people that have been praying for this little girl and watching her grow. We look forward to future visits to Panera to see more of her cheer team!

We rested a bit more on Sunday and soon we were on our way back to the Cities.

We checked in at the Ronald McDonald House (RMH) shortly before supper was being served - what timing! We grabbed a quick bite and got settled into our room. We got to bed fairly early. We're all still playing catch-up from our vacation! We must have commented a dozen times to each other this past week that we won't ever be able to take the kids on vacation again - they'll think that limos and first in line and ice cream at all hours is the norm. :-)

This morning we were up early - Grace had a cardiology appt. at 7:50 a.m. in St. Paul. We met her wonderful cardiologist. Grace is now 34" tall and weighs 28 pounds 2 ounces. She also had an EKG, which looked great. Our best news of the day was that Grace doesn't need to be seen again for 2 - 2 1/2 years!!! We were thrilled!!! Yeah, Grace! Grace was quite pleased to leave the clinic - even though an EKG is not painful, she was still scared and wasn't her idea of morning fun. Originally the dr. had ordered an echo. There was no way she would have sat for that. We remember this was such an awful age for tests for Carson - too young to watch movies or understand what was going on. Plain and simple - they are scared. Thankfully, the dr. opted to not do the echo - no medical need since there wasn't any concern.

We were off to Perkins for a big breakfast. Then to IKEA. Grace fell asleep along the way and slept for about a half an hour. Seeing the doors of IKEA got her quite excited - who wouldn't be excited for such a fun store?!? We picked up a bookcase/organizer for the basement for the kids' stuff. Once it is up, I'll post pics. We think it'll work well. Needless to say, the van is PACKED (or at least will be very packed once all our stuff gets in there).

Back to the RMH. We did some laundry and Grace took a two hour nap. Trav and Carson played in the house and enjoyed some computer time in the computer lab. Soon Carson came up and rested a bit too, while Trav ran a few errands.

We met up with Sherryse (former caregiver of Carson's and he'll be in her wedding next summer) and had a wonderful pasta supper tonight - it was so yummy and fun to catch up a bit. She came back to the RMH and we showed a few things from the trip. Carson was thrilled to see his girl!

Grace is finally asleep tonight - she had a restless time getting settled down. She is teething and having a tough time. Hopefully the Motrin will give her a restful sleep.

Tomorrow is busy - CT bright and early for Carson, two appts. for Grace in the morning and one for Carson in the afternoon. Wednesday morning Grace has an appt. and Carson has one early afternoon. Then HOME! We can't wait to sleep in our beds Wednesday night!!!