Friday, 30 September 2011

Ella's Story: Random fun at home

If you're a new reader of Ella's Story, you can see previous posts with more background information on her health problems here:




Or for a very long story short, here is a brief description of Ella's main chronic health struggles:
Ella was diagnosed with hemiplegic cerebral palsy in 2008 after suffering a stroke in-utero in 2007. She also suffers from epilepsy, thrombosis, dysphagia, developmental delay, speech processing disorder and Pseudohypoaldosteronism.

 After months of having a naso-gastric feeding tube, Ella finally had surgery for a gastrostomy on Wednesday the 7th of September.

After getting quite sick following the surgery, largely due to mismanagement of her conditions by the WCH, she improved a few days later, as you can see in the previous post. A few days after that, Sally and I visited the Jakases again.
Both Daniel and I hadn't gone to a motorsport event for a long time, due to family/work commitments and health problems respectively. With a drift practice session taking place at Mallala that Saturday night, we thought it would be a good idea for us to go, while Emily and Sally stayed home with Ella and Scarlett for a bit of a girl's night, eating lollies and watching chick flicks.

I headed over to their place at about 3 in the afternoon, while Sally was still finishing work for the day, and hung out for a little while talking and taking a few photos. 

Scarlett was wandering down the hallway when I came in.




I must have said something amusing at this point....


...which was clever and funny enough that Scarlett thought it deserved a hearty round of applause.


However, my witty banter couldn't compete with seeing her own reflection in the floor.



While Ella was busy watching Mary Poppins...


...Scarlett was feeling a bit peckish, and looking for something to munch on.



Ella's Jessie doll probably wasn't the tastiest choice, but it was the most convenient.




While Scarlett was busy gnawing off one of Jessie's feet, Sally turned up at the door. Ella excitedly yelled 'Hi Sally!', and jumped up from her little lounge to rush over and give her a hug.




In line with their girl's night theme, Sally had brought along a couple of tiaras and wands, so they could be princesses.



After helping her with the tiara, Ella was quite pleased with her new accessories, running around with her wand.




Sally had gone to talk to Emily in their room, but Ella wanted to play some more, so she went looking for her, and dragged Sally back into the family room.





By this point Scarlett wanted in on the fun too, so Sally gave her one of the wands.



After Scarlett had made several unsuccessful attempts trying to turn Sally's feet into some sort of snack food...


...Ella decided that the magic wand probably wasn't being used to its full potential, and confiscated it.


With baby magic not working, Scarlett made her way over to the kitchen, and started rifling through the drawers in search of a tasty treat.



After being placated with a couple of Jatz biscuits, Scarlett meandered back over to near the TV, where Ella was sitting back down again watching Mary Poppins. 



With Julie Andrews providing the entertainment, Emily gave Ella some water through her gastrostomy tube.






While Ella was quite happy watching the movie and munching on some potato chips...



...Scarlett was feeling thirsty and figured that the outside of Sally's glass might taste good, so she grabbed Sally's hand and gave the cup a good lick.


Disappointed with the lack of fluids, Scarlett made her way back to look at her shiny floor twin, who requested a different DVD.




After the movie had finished, Ella went back to running around a bit, going past a nice ray of golden sunlight streaming through the room.




After having some chicken and hot chips for dinner, Ella's cousin Max then came over with their family dog to play in the backyard.






They both had a bit of fun yelling orders at the dog, particularly Ella.




Sit.....


Now.....attack!




I never knew dogs could jump that high, how amusing...


1...2...3...again!


Scarlett came over to the sliding door to see what all the fuss was about.


With a few kids milling around the house, Sally was keeping watch out by the front door.


Ella had made her way around to the front at some point...


...briefly wandering onto the driveway until Emily collected Ella and took her inside.




With the girls settled in watching a movie, Daniel and I headed out in his Pintara wagon up to Mallala, stopping for petrol on the way.




After such a long break from seeing drifting for the both of us, it was really cool seeing and hearing the wide variety of cars flying sideways through the corners.


With so many cars on the track at once, there were some interesting moments at times, particularly in the novice group.


After being engrossed with the action for an hour or so, I messaged Sally to see how the girls were getting on.

She said they were enjoying a chick flick movie, (I can't remember which one) but after giving Ella her meds and water on top of a stomach full of chips, she had unfortunately thrown up all over Sally while sitting on her lap. So this necessitated a shower for Ella and change of clothes for Sally, who replaced her funky ruffled skirt with one of Emily's dresses. It all sounded rather unpleasant, but Sally didn't seem too phased by it.

Back to the drifting, a Nissan R31 Skyline or Pintara wagon similar to Daniel's car had blown a turbo, leaving a trail of smelly smoke clouds as it limped back into the pits.





After a couple of hours of sideways action, the session finished for the night, and all the cars headed back to their garages and car trailers.

We wandered through the pit area for a little while to have a closer look at some of the cars that had been out on the track.

















After snapping a few photos of the various participants being loaded up and driving off, we headed back to Daniel's car. 



I'd messaged Sally in the meantime, to see how they and Ella were doing. After the messy vomiting incident earlier in the night, she was apparently doing fine and sleeping peacefully. 

With our extremities chilled from the brisk night air, Daniel and I jumped back into his car and headed home.




If you're reading this as a parent of young children, Emily, along with another mum, runs a small boutique kids' clothing and accessories business called 'Original Mini Moo'. They hand-make their merchandise at home when they have a little bit of time to spare.


So if you're after some handmade clothes, toys, hats or rugs for your little ones, and want to support a couple of busy and hard-working mothers, you can browse a selection of items for sale on their Facebook page, just click on the Mini Moo logo or this link: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Mini-Moo/189892247687519

You can email them for further information at mini.moo.store@gmail.com



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