Update on Bo

I have had a couple people and neighbors ask how Bo has been doing.  Most of neighbors have been really sweet checking in on us, especially since they have seen Rob have to carry Bo home from a walk, or they were watching one of us coax him out to the front yard. 

He has been on Itraconozole for 17 days.  The first 10 days, he was on the true version that we filled locally at the Target pharmacy.  We were waiting for the compounded version of the drug from an Veternary Pharmacutical company in AZ to arrive.  The compounded version is slightly cheaper, not as much as she advertised!  I am price shopping currently, as it would be nice to get it for even less.  The true version of Itraconozole was $9/pill, and he needed two a day, just to give you a hint of how expensive Blastomycosis is to fight.  Compounded Itra is much more reasonable. 

Bo seems to be in a better mood this week.  The last 3-4 days he has eaten normally, he hears us fill his bowl and he comes trotting in.  For this I am so thankful, the week of force feeding him with prescription id mush shoved down his throat with a syringe was no fun.  He has lost about 15-20 lbs already, so I am ready to fatten him back up. 

His breathing is almost back to normal.  The Blasto is in his lungs.  One of the major symptoms is wheezing, coughing, and panting.  He did give me quite the scare Saturday/night with several nose bleeds. 

Now I need to address his sores.  The sores are broken skin where the yeast trys to escape.  The skin gets swollen, and then it breaks through.  It is not pretty!  Bo has about 15 sores.  The worst are on his left paw, this is what causes him to limp.  My next step is to track down some pastilite clay.  It is supposed to help with itching and draw the toxins out.  I think I need to help him stop licking them at best, it would help them heal. 

I am happy to report that Bo seems happier this week.  He was so excited for all the trick or treaters tonight.  He wags his tail.  He is picking up scrapes under Noelle's chair again.  He even trotted around the yard today, running to sniff the fence when people were walking by.  I hope we have turned the corner.  I am super cautious as the stats are still 50% on recovering from Blasto.  Many dogs and people are not strong enough to handle the harsh meds.  Itra is really hard on the liver and kidneys.  We are lucky Bo was super healthy and we caught it fairly early.  That was also luck as our vet has only diagnosised this once before.  It is not prevelent in Iowa. 


All this to say that I am really thankful that Rob has owned dogs before.  I had no idea how to make this decision.  Since we manage our money well enough, we have some funds to throw at this.  If Bo wants to fight it, we will help him.  But we'll have to be realistic if the time comes, and that will be a difficult day. 

Ames High Homecoming 2023

You can be in any group during the parade, so if you want to ride with the soccer team or the football team, the band directors don't mind as long as you participate somewhere. These two band nerds choose correctly!  

I asked these two to find each other and send me a picture of them both. I do see Dallas "lost" his tie by this time. So glad that they made this happen.

Dallas, Emily and Noelle at a "rustic barn" for pictures with Emily's group that went to the dance together.

Freshman march with the AHS band 2x/season. Homecoming was the first opportunity. Freshman band is a different class period, so the two bands only had one early morning practice to prepare. Dallas marched until halftime was over, then he put his football uniform on and went back to the sidelines.  

Dallas mostly wanted a picture with my van, that he gets to occasionally drive to school.

 

Kitchen table piles

 Last school photo and a weeks worth of college mail, both beautiful and bittersweet.

Sedona portion of Summer 2022 trip

Little ice cream spot in downtown Sedona (that was really a liqueur store with a bit of ice cream)

Early on, on the first hike, the first day. Note we are refreshed and happy.

Three brave souls on Devils Bridge. They do it for the gram.... They did it for me! This supposably1.8 mi round trip hike (so says the internet) at 6000 ft elevation to get to Devils Bridge for this death-defying photo opportunity turned out to be 5.6 mi in 95 F heat.  We made it to the car with one swig of water left.... Robert and I had white salt/sweat marks on our t-shirts!  It took hours, and my kids didn't want to hear the word hike the rest of the trip. 

We refueled this kid often, I do believe he was on some sort of growth spurt.

Day two, we pivoted and instead of doing a couple more hikes I had planned, we rented a Jeep to off road, climb rocks, get to said hikes and photo opportunities with a cooler full of gatorade in the back and air conditioning.  Totally worth the money. Robert loved driving. We did two trails, a moderate and adventure and skipped the beginner trails. 

Look, I still got the photos I wanted, we still saw all the red rocks and the holes, but with a fun Jeep! We covered so much ground. It was so fun!

Cow pie rocks in the back ground, kids were standing on the Merry-go-round rock.

The landscapes were breathtaking, God's creation is amazing. 

 We rented from Barlow Jeep Rental in Sedona. Dallas is posing with the truck Rutledge Wood used on an episode of Top Gear. He spotted it right away in the parking lot, it is one of his favorite episodes. Robert has actually met Rutledge so we had to get a picture. It turns out that Barlow Jeep did all the outfitting for that episode of Top Gear when they went off roading, the gal running the shop was quite impressed we had seen it.

We hit one more thing on my list of things to do in Sedona, Slide Rock State Park. It was originally an apple orchard. The homesteader used the water running through Oak Creek Canyon to irrigate apple trees and other crops. The canyon reminds me a lot of Ledges. There were natural "rock slides" that were smooth that you could sit and slide down. It was probably 7-10% decline. It was cool mountain water and refreshing. There was also a small "cliff" you could jump, and some deeper pool areas that were at least over 6ft. We did two of the longer slides, 80ft. It is smooth, worn down sandstone. It was fun. I wish there was less people, just like Ledges it was busy.

Phoenix part of our Summer 2022 trip

We started and ended our trip in Phoenix as we flew in to PDX. We landed by 8:30 am, Arizona is in mountain time zone, but does not observe DST (except for Navajo reservations), needless to say it was early for us, we left Ames in the dark and needed to feed the hollow teenage boy. Our connection in Denver did not allow for a food stop and United did not give him the little package of cookies he was expecting!

Big breakfast for all. I think Dallas ordered Lemon Poppy Seed pancakes that came topped with ice cream, plus sausage, plus and ice coffee he made Emily order but then drank most of it. 

After breakfast we found a theater to see the new Minons movie. It was Robert's goal to see this and the new Thor movie while on vacation. We succeeded! 

I am skipping to our last day of vaca, which landed us back in Phoenix. It was 115F when we drove into Robert's high school friends driveway. I had meet him 1-2x, but never met his wife or kids. They entertained us with this VR rig, made us dinner and we questioned how anyone can go outside in the summer. 

Stahmer and Kibbe family

We spent one night at a really nice DoubleTree resort hotel in Phoenix before flying home in the morning. We swam at 9pm and it was still 105F!

 

Spring Break 2021 - All Iowan's go to Florida

 We obviously escaped to Florida with the rest of the midwest. Florida, the land of DeSantis, free from many Covid restrictions, warm water and sunshine called to us. 

Robert was still flying a ton that year, so we used some points/miles and booked some decent $$ flights. This also meant that we needed to stop in Denver on the way to Orlando.... Our flight days ended up being 8-12 hour days, long on the way home. We found a great new terminal in Denver and Emily did homework while Robert worked, and the other kids and I watched movies and ate $10 candy.

Pictures are in reverse order of our trip. We ended our stay Bradenton Beach on the Gulf of Mexico. We had a little two bedroom place in a small resort with a pool and the beach across the street. We enjoyed the little tiki-hut by the pool. 

We met up with our good pals while in Florida for a day at their beach and then out to dinner. Seeing friends on vacation is extra fun!

Emily fills my phone with adorable pictures like this

Relaxing in the condo

I love the beach!

The reason we went to Disney, to see the Star Wars area in Hollywood Studios Park

Bradenton Beach is perfect, South of the more famous Anna Maria Island, but with all the awesomeness of being on the Gulf. Warm, clear water and tons of shells. Bonus is you don't have to pay to cross the bridge. 

Noelle posing with a display case full of gluten free pastries. 

Magic Kingdom at night. We did two days at Disney and stayed on property. One day at Hollywood Studios and the second day at Magic Kingdom. We road a gondola from the hotel to the parks which was fun and easy.

The Disney cast members really yelled at you when you pulled your mask down to take a photo. A year previously at Universal we were allowed to unmask for photos, not at Disney!

Although, at the Disney pool you can be unmasked!

I found this sign in a rural FL gas station. It cracked me up since it was not about Covid!

Waiting at the airport. Des Moines was packed with people ready to leave the cold.

February 2021

Normal life, slow days. Mostly at home. Mostly doing weird things!

Reading, on a destructed couch.

I am a sucker for holiday candy. I hope it is one of those things my kids remember about their childhood. 

Baseball in fresh snow. 

Art.

Heart shaped pizza, and the flowers I carried walking down the aisle. Robert has to go out of his way to find white tulips on Feb. 14. 

Uno

Our avocado. Watching it grow brought me a lot of joy during Covid and winter.