I guess green was the color of the day!

Cast #5 is on, and everything went great!  (And we all ended up in green somehow!)  However, before we get to Cast #5, as usual, let's review some of Savanna's awesome summer adventures...

We had a fun little playdate at our house to help celebrate Savanna's 2nd birthday.  (Yes, we celebrated her birthday for a couple of weeks!)

Savanna got to hang out with her buddy Jolene at a cookout.

She also got to hang out with her buddy Eden at Shindig on the Green.  Every time a song was done, Savanna cried for more.  By the way, her favorite words right now are Bluegrass and Reggae!  I guess we are doing something right!?? :-)

Hiking with Dada...

Trying on mama's shoes... great fit!

Bike Riding!

Hoopin' it up at River Music

Mountain Play Lodge

Book Club Olympics - yes, we are in our "tourist" costumes!  (Savanna was wanting to play some tennis too, I guess.)  We tied for second place at the Olympics!

Chilling at Biltmore

When we took her cast off on Aug. 19, it had been 9.5 weeks since she got the cast on!  That was a looooooong time to have it on (especially in the hot summer), but I'm happy to report that her skin looked really good with just some minor heat rash and really dry skin, like usual.  Thankfully, there was nothing worse.  Needless to say, we made the most of her 5 cast-free days!

First real bath in two months...  She loved it!

  That rib hump is looking really good too!

Hanging at the big kids pool!  She had so much fun playing in the pool for about 2 hours, that she fell asleep within 5 minutes of being in the car on the way home!

Hanging out at our home pool

On August 22, we had a new x-ray taken, but we did not get to know the results until August 25, the morning of Cast #5.  At beginning of casting in January, she was at approximately 52 degrees.  After 7 months and 4 casts, she measured around 40 degrees.  The left photo is from Aug. 22 out of cast, the middle is from January out of cast, and the right is from January in her first cast.

We had hoped for a lot more improvement, especially since she looks so much better to us!  However, the doctor reminded us that this is a slow process and could take about 2 years.  When he remembered that we were only 7 months in, he said, "Well, we are just at the beginning of this journey."  So, there's that.  It's not something we wanted to hear.  However, the good news I took away from this was the following:  He never said anything like, "I can't believe we haven't seen more improvement."  Also, he did say that this was still the best course of action to take regardless of her improvement.  Casting is what is the best and least invasive option for her at this time, so stay the course we will!

Cast Day #5 - We were first case, and we had to be there at 8:00am, which means we had to get up at 5:15am!  She did great and was in a good mood the whole time before surgery, until they put the mask on her in the OR.  I call that a success.

Waiting to go to the OR...

Playing with her new Minnie Mouse cards (Shriners always hooks her up!  We also got a cute blanket and a new outfit (a soccer jersey) for her Build-a-Bear.)

After the cast was on, and she came back to us from recovery, she was not very happy.  Thankfully, we had lots of grapes and cheddar bunnies to help cheer her up.  The hose in the photo is a dryer for her cast.

Here she is being turned into a flower (petalled) in the cast trimming room.

All done!  She choose green for this cast.  I guess she wanted to match her mom and dad!  We kept telling her she was our little turtle.

To learn more about Progressive Infantile Scoliosis, please check out this PSA...

Also, as you consider contributing to charities, please consider donating to Shriners Hospitals for Children and the Infantile Scoliosis Outreach Program (http://www.infantilescoliosis.org/).  We couldn't be working like we are to heal Savanna if it wasn't for these two entities!

Next casting date:  October 30, 2014, so we've got about 8 weeks!

Next adventure: Traveling to the coast to visit family.  Unfortunately, there won't be any beach time for this little one.

Thanks for reading and for keeping us in your thoughts!  Also, thanks to my awesome friends for helping keep us fed on casting days!!

My Beee-youuu Super Star

Cast #4 is on!  It's hard to believe we are already 5 months into this casting gig, but here we are!  Before we get into Cast #4, let's talk about some adventures Savanna had in Cast #3...

Savanna's First Festival
We all camped out at the Lake Eden Arts Festival for two nights in early May!  We had lots of fun dancing to the good music, and she was wiped out each night!  (She loved the pack and play in the tent we had too.)  The weekend would have been even better if it hadn't rained...

Other Fun Times
We also had many park, library-story-time, and hanging-out-with-her-buddies adventures...

Traveling Princess
We went to a friend's wedding out of town last weekend.  She looks super cute in the dress her dad bought her!  (Just don't pay attention to her shoes...  These are the only shoes she's into these days, so we roll with it!)  :-)

Cast #3 Removal
We removed Cast #3 on Sunday, June 8 (4 days before Cast #4 was scheduled.)  If you recall, we had a terrible time taking off Cast #2 (It took us 1.5 hours!!  Insane!!).  Well, this one took only 15 MINUTES!  How in the world did we have such a dramatic improvement?  We owe it to some good old-fashioned advice and some good old water!!  I basically snipped the coban and mole skin using some nose hair trimming scissors, then I wet the plaster with some water.  After a few seconds, the plaster layers started to disintegrate, and I used some medical bandage scissors to cut through it easily...  Voila!  It was off so fast!  So, there is good and some bad here.  I learned how to take off the cast more easily, but I also learned how fragile the cast can be if water gets on it!  I have been really careful so far about not getting her wet, and this just underscores it.

Her skin looked really good with only a bit of heat rash.

She could not wait to get in the tub!  She is trying to pull her diaper off here!

Overall, her curve is looking better, but I still see that pesky rib hump...  It just lets me know that there is still more work (casting, growing, etc.) that she needs to do before we're done.

Savanna's Birthday and Visit to the Pool
My little Sunshine is two!!  Her birthday was yesterday (June 11), and because her cast was off temporarily, we headed to the pool with some friends.  She had a blast splashing in the water, and playing with her little airplane.

The birthday girl...

We sang Happy Birthday to her, and tried to get her to dig into her strawberry muffin, but she's wasn't having it.  It was more fun to play with!

Casting Day #4
Unfortunately, her cast-free days came to an end, and it was time to head back to the hospital.  We woke up this morning at 4:45 to get the day started.  We arrived at the hospital before her 7:30 appointment.  Thankfully, she was much happier at the beginning of the day this time, although she still doesn't really like the nurses "messing with her" (a.k.a doing their jobs).  Mickey Mouse on Disney Jr. and the iPad were very helpful in keeping her happy before surgery.

 I was able to go back with her to the OR while they anesthetized her.  

After surgery, she was not feeling very happy, so we were trying everything... berries, cheddar bunnies, water, Mickey Mouse, her lovey Spunky, etc., and they were only working somewhat.  So, we don't have any pictures from right after surgery.  However, in the cast trimming room, we were able to get a couple.

Her current favorite color to say is blue (or how she says it... beee-youuu), so that's what color cast we went for!  It's teal with beee-youuu stars!  Plus, she's my little super star, or rock star!  (She wasn't a happy star though, unfortunately...)

What finally made her happy was when we were done and leaving the place... not only because the IV port was out of her hand, and she was somewhat fed and able to move around on her own again, but also because of the visitors we saw on the way out!  Pet therapy to the rescue!!

Her next cast is scheduled for August 25th, 11 weeks away!!  Wish us luck on keeping the cast on that long...  9 weeks has been our max. so far.

By the way, our friends rock!!  They've been helping to keep us fed while we have been going through this process, and we are so grateful!

Thanks to everyone for all the love and support!