Summer Fun

We have managed to get a few fun, summery things in this year, even with all the extra hospital time. We took a short canoe trip down the street from the house. It was short because we got stuck between two beaver dams (oops!) but for a first trip for Saoirse, it went well. She wasn’t too sure about the life vest, it is pretty much the size of her, and makes it pretty uncomfortable to sit. I ended up having to hold her in my lap, but she liked that.

After we got out of the hospital from the mucositis, we went camping. We have been trying to go camping all summer, and it never seemed to work out, so we were very excited to go. We just went a few towns away, to Gloucester, and stayed at a really lovely campground. Saoirse loved playing in the dirt and running around. She wasn’t so sure about the tent at first, but when she figured out how to go in and out, she thought it was a fun game. For the most part we had a very smooth trip, but I’m not sure the other campers appreciated the 1am screaming at the top of her lungs. But other than the lack of sleep, things were great, and we can’t wait to take her again.

We have also been playing outside as much as possible when we are home. We have a few play structures in the yard (the neighbors were getting rid of them), and she loves climbing and sliding on the slides. She also has a swing in a tree that she loves. We have gone to the park a few times to meet the other babies, and that’s always fun, but I’m always leery of the germ thing on the play structures. The park has some animals though, and she loves watching the horses and the sheep. Saoirse loves playing outside, and usually gets her hat and brings me my shoes, before rushing to the back door in the morning. She even pulled me out in the rain one day and loved every minute!

The only thing that I feel we have been missing out on is swimming. Saoirse can’t be submerged because of her central line, and sadly she has a great affinity for the water. She gets quite upset when she is near water and can’t play in it. Even bath time is hard because she just wants to splash and play and we have to keep her from getting too wet. Normally we would have spent a lot of time at the quarry this summer, but we have only been a couple of times, because it’s hard to keep her out of the water. We made the mistake of going to the beach one day. I thought she would like playing in the sand and that it would distract her from the water, but she really wanted to go into the ocean, and wasn’t too interested in the sand. So total flop, but there’s next year. We’ll have to find an indoor pool somewhere once her line comes out so she can learn how to swim.

Even though we haven’t been able to have quite as many adventures this summer as we could have, Saoirse has still been able to experience a lot of what summer has to offer. I’m sure we’ll even add some more before the summer is over, and then comes the lovely fall – when it’s nicer to be outside because it isn’t so hot!