SD's Story: December 24-25, 2011

Saturday was a pretty normal Christmas Eve. We all did some last-minute shopping (horray for our local Cherry Republic - I can only imagine how much money they made this last week). SD started craving pizza, an obsession that would be continued through Christmas and beyond. SD has been sleeping a bit better, though he has multiple diapers per night and sometimes wants one of us in his room for a while to comfort him.

We kept debating whether to bring SD to church on Christmas. He was getting more pale this week, but got a lot of color back on Saturday. He was still weak, but his immune system at his last checkup was the strongest it's been yet. However, we decided to keep SD home just because of the personality-influencing side effects of his dexamethasone. He's just not himself; and we felt it would be better for him to go to church on New Year's, after he had been off that drug for several days (his last dose is Tuesday morning).

So, Christmas Eve was average. It didn't really feel like Christmas Eve. Christmas itself was a different story.

We are hoping this was the worst Christmas ever.

OK, it wasn't that bad, but it was bad enough. Among other activities, we tried to get some cute pictures of SD and his sister in their matching gingerbread outfits - you can see how well that went...

SD was also not interested in hearing the Christmas story. It took several attempts to get through it.

He did take a fleeting interest in two of Mandy's gifts: a musical Charlie Brown scene, and a set of ice cream bowls. Other than that brief time, he completely ignored all of the presents. After offering him several presents to open (and being loudly rejected), we decided to keep his presents until next weekend.

Our present-opening time was regularly interrupted by whining and screaming. Our visitors were not as used to that atmosphere as we were, so we felt bad for their Christmas morning. They were very understanding, though!

We are so thankful for Grandma Snell, who slaved most of the day making a wonderful Christmas dinner! We all enjoyed it except for SD, who only wanted pizza. We refused to give him pizza all day, which frustated him.

As usual, Emma provided a bright spot. She so enjoyed opening (some of) her presents! Everyone enjoyed being around her!