A Walk in Manayunk

Today after we finished the enormous chore of cleaning our house, Michael and I decided to walk down to Main Street for lunch and some window shopping. We finally got to stop into this neat science shop called Spectrum Scientifics. It sells all kinds of toys (toys Michael loudly announced in the store are what our kids will play with some day): build your own robot kits, telescopes, grow a crystal garden, magnets, microscopes, etc. They even have a whole section dedicated to chemistry lab equipment. You can buy beakers, flasks, graduated cylinders--all the things that I tried so hard not to break in chem lab in college. I am tempted to buy a few flasks and use them as flower vases, although this would give me the definite nerd stamp for life. We did decide to support the neat store and bought a thermometer with barometer that sticks to the window and we got a slinky! I have already scared the dogs and cat with sending the slinky down the back staircase. I am going to have to hide my slinky next week when Dad comes, otherwise I know I will lose it. :-)

Emmy Update

Emmy does have a bladder stone--2cm x 2cm in size. The vet told us today that she has three options: surgery, lithotripsy (using sonar to break up the stone), or medical management. After much discussion, we have decided to start with the medical management, which includes continued antibiotics and a special diet. We will try her on this for one month to see if it dissolves the stone, and if it doesn't we will explore the other two options. We felt like surgery would be a "quick fix" but risky due to the anesthesia, open procedure, and possible surgical and post-surgical complications. She seems to be feeling okay today; she is playing a bit more and going outside a bit less. Hopefully, the special food will work and our Emmy will be stone free in a month!

Our sick little Emmy

Maybe its lame to dedicate a post to Emmy, but until I have human children, my pets are my stand-ins. Our little Emmy is sick with urinary tract stones and a urinary tract infection. When she was a puppy she got many UTIs, but has not had one in a while. This past weekend Emmy starting feeling poorly, so we took her into the vet. We found out on Tuesday that she has a UTI and she started an antibiotic. But our poor girl is still feeling badly and is urinating blood and passing clots, so back to the doctor she goes. We were told by the vet today that she has crystals in her urine which points to stones. Tomorrow morning we have an appointment with a new vet to explore this more. We are worried she will have to have surgery. I have no idea what they do for dogs with stones. I doubt they do lithotripsy or cystoscopic surgeries, and the thought of open surgery on a dog makes me nervous. We will keep praying that she makes improvements and that they can correct the stones and infection with medications. Poor Emmy Lou!

Ohio Trip

Trip to Ohio

To start our vacation month, we decided to drive to Ohio to surprise Mike's sister Julia for her 11th birthday. We spent the past weekend there and had such a great time. Julia was very surprised, so surprised that she hid when she heard the door opening thinking that a kidnapper was coming in the house. We were able to watch her volleyball game (she's an awesome player), go to her birthday dinner with the family, and spend Sunday hiking and picking apples. Also, we got to meet our new niece, Tabitha, Mike's sister Chrissy's new dog. She is Cavishon and super cute.

We really enjoyed the time we got to spend with everyone there. It makes us wish that we could see everyone more often. Our families are too far away from us. We will be going back to Ohio for Thanksgiving and we are excited to see everyone again. I will post some of the pictures from the weekend once I get them uploaded to my computer.

New to Blogging

Most people know that I have been very anti-blog from the myspace and facebook standpoint. Something about having all my personal data out there always made me a little nervous. But I have been swayed. I figure that since Michael and I are so busy lately and are only going to get busier with our internships starting in 9 months (yikes!), keeping a blog might be a good way to help keep family and friends current on our lives. I cannot promise timely posts, but I will do my best.