Marissa Batted!!

I had a special day today myself. I was taken out to lunch and shopping at Circle Centre Mall. We had so much fun!! The agenda was to purchase an outfit so Tom and I can go out on a date sometime soon. Can you believe it? I TOLD you they take care of the whole family here. Haha!! It was a fantastic "girlie" time. It's been such a long time since I've done anything like that. Thank you so much, Dr. Cox, for the field trip! And thank you, Beth and Maegan, for taking care of Bailey and Rissy while I was gone. You are very, very special people. Thank you so much!

Bailey did a fantastic job looking after Rissy this afternoon. They were both working on putting chart packets together when I got back -- one of the many jobs they have lined up for Bailey. Tomorrow, I hear she gets to learn about how to read echos with Dr. Farrell. That will be fun!

Dr. T came in with two other people this afternoon to look at the Berlin Heart - they were from a U.S. company that makes VADs. They talked for a little while with Bailey and how well she's doing on the Berlin Heart, etc. Well, with two other strangers in the room, I wasn't about to talk to Dr. T about anything remotely personal, so I didn't mention my field trip that I just returned from. So he left and, about an hour later, he charges back in the room with Beth, his nurse practitioner, and says, "So you had an 'Angie' day today and didn't tell us anything about it, or show us anything . . . ", and so on and so on and so on. I tried to defend myself by saying, "Well, you brought 2 people in here with you - I didn't think they'd be interested! Anyway, it's girlie stuff!" So I went to the shopping bags and started pulling things out. I pulled out this cute little floral sleeveless frilly-like girlie top [how's that for description? haha!] and he looks away and says, "I . . . I don't know what that is." And then he backpedals and says he didn't really want to see it, he was just giving me a hard time. I said, "I know! That's why I'm showing you!" Beth appreciated my purchases!

Bailey had a great poker night with Brian, one of the documentary guys. He brought pizza and Lynn with him (also from the Speedway). We had a great evening of conversation and poker. Bailey won! I don't know how hard Brian fought, though. He made a comment last poker night about how it just didn't feel right beating a Riley kid. Haha!! And Brian called up his buddy Patrick and Bailey got to talk to him again and his little girl. I was trying to listen in, but the sound wouldn't pass through Bailey's brain and out her other ear, so I was out of luck. It was good to see you again, Brian, and very nice to meet you, Lynn. Enjoy the race this weekend!

Josie's calling every night and having a great time in Florida with Tom's family. She's getting lots of sun time but says she's not sunburned, so that's definitely good. I miss her!

And, last but not least, I know you're all sitting on pins and needles waiting for the news . . . Marissa had a softball game tonight and . . . she BATTED!!!! I was so proud of her. I didn't get to go to the game, but she took daddy up there with here to home plate and she did it! I think what got her over the fear was that her desire to run the bases just kept growing and growing and gradually became so much greater than the fear of batting. She also realized that she only has 4 more games left and if she doesn't do it now, she'll run out of opportunities pretty quickly. Tom said she ran to first base and was so excited she couldn't contain herself and started squealing. She's a stinker, though. When he brought her back here to the hospital, I asked her right away if she had fun and then if she batted and she said, "I don't want to tell you yet, let's wait a minute." She made me wait! I'm so proud of her!

Hope everyone out there is doing well! Keep in touch!

Love, Angie