Final Soccer Game of the Fall 2014 Season

Julia's last soccer game of the fall season was played today; it was supposed to be last week, but the snowy weather cancelled last weekend's soccer games.  Thankfully today's weather was much better.

Julia was really in her element today when playing defense.  She had a couple of good plays kicking the ball out of the box and helping the goalie.

 Since my knee surgery was just two days ago, I had to sit out this game as assistant coach.  But I cheered on my little Sunshine as loudly as I could from the sidelines.

Fourth Knee Surgery

Yesterday I went in for my fourth knee surgery in eight years.  When I had an MRI taken five weeks ago, the orthopedic doctor saw lots of jagged, flaky cartilage that needed to be cleaned up.  He also wanted to check on my OATS surgery from two and a half years ago.  In my previous three knee surgeries, my doctors have been surprised by unexpected damage.  I was prepared for this yesterday, and I wasn't all that surprised when I found out that the procedure wasn't as simple as originally planned.

 Yes, there was plenty of jagged cartilage to smooth out and clean up.  Yes, the cartilage plugs from my 2012 OATS transplant look pretty good (there's just cartilage around the transplanted plugs that is deteriorating, which isn't good).  But yesterday's surprise was . . . my jagged cartilage had been sawing my meniscus in half.  That explains why I had SO much pain on the outside of my knee the past week and why I had to walk stiff-legged - my meniscus was being severed every time I walked around.  Thank goodness I was scheduled for surgery yesterday, so my orthopedic could stitch the meniscus back together again.  In order for the meniscus to heal, I need to walk with a straight-legged brace for the next two weeks.  When I see my doctor in a week and a half for my follow-up appointment, I will find out more about what he saw with my missing cartilage . . . stay tuned!

Power Outage

We had a power outage this evening, which lasted for several hours.  In order to have light in the living room, we propped a flashlight on one of the couch pillows.  I guess Rosie thought the flashlight would put out heat, as she sat as close to the flashlight as possible . . . which also made for a really cool picture.

New Backyard Birds

I took a few pictures of "new" birds today.  Well, one bird (the junco) isn't completely new to us, but they only live here during the cold-weather months.  Since these little guys have shown up, it's very clear that we are done with warm weather.

 The other bird was new to us.  I had to look up this one - it's a white-throated sparrow.  I'm sure it's been in our yard before, I just never noticed the bright yellow eye shadow feathers.

Evelyn's Closet

We moved to Massachusetts about  17 months ago.  Ever since then, Evelyn's closet has been a catch-all for all sorts of stuff - things that belong to both her and Julia.  Piles of papers, dolls' clothing, memorabilia, etc. would create an avalanche when the closet doors were opened.  I finally remedied that situation.  I bought memory boxes at Michaels and the Container Store, and I organized all of the papers into the boxes.  I also sorted through the doll clothes, hanging up dresses, as well as putting hats and shoes in baskets.  Let's hope Evelyn is able to keep her closet looking somewhat organized!

Pajama Surprise

Emily and Kit had a couple of surprises for Julia and Evelyn when they got home from school...matching pajamas!  Both Julia and Evelyn were over-the-moon excited to get warm winter PJ's that match their dolls.  Originally, the matching pajamas were going to be Christmas gifts, but with the weather getting chilly, I decided to let them have their PJ's a little early.

First Snow

 Oh, the weather outside is frightful . . .

. . . but the fire is so delightful.

With this morning's snowy weather, it's no wonder Julia's soccer game was cancelled today.  But the snow didn't last long - it was mostly gone by about 3:00 this afternoon.