Tire woes....

Luckily, we hadn't planned on going anywhere this weekend because our tires keep going flat even though the dufuses (plural dufi?) at Tire Pro said they fixed them. We have to keep driving to the closest gas station 10 miles away twice a day to keep the tires filled until tomorrow when we can go back to the "pros" at Tire Pros. On the way, we had lunch at Mimi's Cafe.... since we didn't have anything else to do:)

A little change in plans..

Today we set out to do our usual Saturday routine.... work out at the gym, then drive to Chandler for swimming lessons and shopping at Whole Foods. it was pouring down rain (yeah-- we've only had .7 inches this year). When we came out of the gym, both right front and right rear tires were flat. By the time I got the car to the tire place and had the tires fixed, it was too late to go to swimming lessons. They had to take all four tires off and check them for leaks because they thought that someone tampered with them. Nothing surprises me in Casa Grande anymore. The tires didn't have any damage, just flat.

Since we couldn't go swimming, we went to the Golden Corral (yee ha!) for brunch, then to Blockbuster to pick out movies for our exciting weekend indoors.

Jazzy picking out movies.

Swimming and Dancing...

Jazzy has been having fun at swimming and dancing lessons. They only let us take pictures of the dancing lessons for 10 minutes once a month! and of course, my camera malfunctioned as it usually does... so the photos are not that great. She wasn't paying attention to the teacher... which is I guess why they don't want parents in the room. On the other hand... at the other place in Chandler where she takes gymnastics and swimming, the parents get to watch and after a few lessons, it is just fine.
She is making good progress in her swimming lessons. Her teacher puts her underwater for a good 5 seconds.... much longer than I did in the "Mommy and Me" classes. He also makes her swim under water and put her head in the water much more than I did.

We also went to downtown Phoenix to the Phoenix Children's Hospital for a doctors visit... just to get us established there. It was fine until the techs went to take her blood and kept poking and jabbing for about one minute. She was ok for about 20 seconds, then started crying. After about 45 seconds, I told them they had 10 more seconds to get the blood or they were going to have to take the needle out because she was screaming by that time. I counted to 10 and just said "needle out now"... and that was it. No blood work. What a bunch of yahoos.....

on the way to dance class
dancing
filling out their sticker books
in front of the dance school
swimming

Jazzy's ER visit.....

Jazzy has had a temp of 104 since last Thursday. She received every treatment I could think of.... including Tylenol and Ibuprofen which only had a very temporary effect. Her lungs were clear, but she has/had an extremely sore throat. When she became so lethargic yesterday that she couldn't even open her eyes.... I took her to the ER for a second opinion. Just as I thought, they said she was fine and just had a very severe sore throat which was causing the fever, but I wanted someone else to listen to her lungs. Then.... I thought of an old naturopathic treatment. Within an hour the fever was completely gone and has been normal for 24 hours. She is back to her bouncy ballerina self. She lost 3 # -- which was alot for her, but now she is back to eating again. Here she is today having her snack. All of this stemmed from the birthday cake, candy, ...etc, etc.. which she is not used to. Her immune and lymphatic system became overwhelmed and the fever is a normal response. I wonder what my ER bill is going to be:) just to get a "second opinion".

Jazzy is all signed up for her fall classes. Gymnastics on Monday AM and Saturdays, Singing and Art on Tuesday AM, Swimming in Chandler on Saturdays, her favorite ballet and tap on Thursdays.....

Jazzy having a snack today.

In Memory of our beautiful Spirit Dog.....10/17/03-- 8/14/09

Our beautiful Spirit Dog passed away suddenly and unexpectedly. Spirit was a Certified Therapy dog and worked with physically and mentally disabled kids. Most of the kids were blind and deaf and just totally relaxed when she sat next to them and they could pet her.

Without Spirit, I probably wouldn't have Jasmine because Spirit got me interested in kids in general. She was with me during the entire arduous adoption process. Spirit enjoyed many tea parties and other games with Jasmine... as well as the neighbor kids.

She loved everyone.... and I mean everyone. Once, a group of Mexican guys came to my house to work on the front yard. At first they wouldn't get out of their truck..... but after a few minutes, they were dancing to Mexican music around the yard with her. She could melt anyone with those big brown eyes. She did have a ferocious bark, though... when anyone came by our property. The UPS guy has always been terrified of her, and she would play jokes on him by doing a little lunge when he bent over to lay the package down. Poor guy! I would never tell anyone that she would just lick you to death if you came in the house.

Spirit's favorite pass-time was to sneak over to the neighbors house and terrorize the neighbors ferel cats. If she saw a cat, it was always fair game to chase and no matter how much or how loud I yelled, she was totally oblivious. Luckily, we live in an area where there are virtually no cars. She also wasn't what you would call "friendly" with other big dogs. More than once she pulled me over on the bike and impaled the handle bars into my abdomen. If you were a small dog..... you were a good friend. It was only with dogs her size that she would try to dominate.

She is SO missed already.

My favorite photo of Spirit
Spirit's 2nd birthday. She had several birthday parties. All the neighbor kids were invited.
Christmas a few years ago.

Jazzy's Hello Kitty Birthday Party....

Yesterday was Jazzy's 3rd Birthday Party at "The Little Gym" in Ahwatukee. In attendance were Grandma and Grandpa Blakeman, Roger Merritt, Dawn Campbell, and Mary Ann Beilin. We had lots of fun playing on all of the gym equipment, including a bouncy house. Jasmine received alot of nice presents..... more than she got at Christmas!!. Her favorite is a piano from Grandma and Grandpa Baker.... which she plays constantly... much to the stress of my ears. She received a really nice Hello Kitty pillow for her bed from Dawn, Dora books from Grandma and Grandpa Blakeman, a Dora mermaid doll from Mary Ann, a tricycle and lots of other stuff from Mommy, and a huge painting of her orphanage photo from Roger. Her Hello Kitty cake was store bought since Mommy is not talented in that arena... but it was really good.

Swimming and Gymnastics.....

Since the Casa Grande pool closed for the year, we have to drive to Chandler to continue swimming lessons. I'm not sure if it is worth it since it is only one day per week, compared to four days per week in the summer.. so she is not really learning anything new. To make it worthwhile, we added gymnastics after the swimming class. The Aspire Kids Club is where the ASU Men's gymnastic team trains. They have all kinds of competitions for older kids. For the pre-school kids, they have a little miniature version of everything from parallel bars, uneven bars, rings, trampolines, balance beams and mat space.
The swimming photo is taken thru a steamy glass wall, so isn't very clear.