Last Day of Chemo!*

*Technically, the last chemo dose is tonight at 4am. Which is really tomorrow. But our plan is to sleep through that one...

After a pretty restful night, Sam slept until 10am this morning. He started out a little bit queasy, and so after getting dressed he got back into bed for a bit. When Karen arrived, he was ready to read her a book before building a small kit that she brought him.

How cute is the little frog that they built? (And Karen wore her Bears shirt in solidarity with Sam...oy.)

Sam isn't eating much, but he managed to work on his old standby, Ritz crackers with peanut butter accompanied by Sprite (well, Shasta, but he doesn't know that), and even chowed down an ice cream sandwich during a trip downstairs to the lobby to hang out with the grandparents (all of them!).

When we were downstairs, we saw a note about a Beach Party that was happening tonight in the Resource Center. When I mentioned it to Sam, he was very excited...so after a quick shower and a change into "beach clothes," we headed back downstairs.

Yes, that's a turtle on his head.

The "beach party" had a couple of beach-themed art projects and a visiting therapy dog.

Yes, that dog is wearing a bikini.

At first, Sam was largely unimpressed with the beach party. No sand. No water. But he eventually got into an art project that involved painting and gluing seashells onto picture frames, and we spent almost an hour and a half doing it! As we left, he said "That was a great beach party!" I couldn't argue with him!

I hoped for a dinner, but Sam wasn't interested in eating much after the chemo was over, even with the anti-nausea drugs in his system. The IV nutrition (TPN) will run all night, so I feel comfortable that he's getting what he needs. He even turned down popcorn for our movie-watching. (I gave up the Olympics tonight, but tomorrow night I know he will let me watch the women's gymnastics again....right!?) Thanks for all the movie suggestions - I now have a pretty good list! Tonight's selection is The Neverending Story. Sam's biggest question is "why does the story never end? And if the story never ends, how does the movie end?"

Sam has been so active and engaged, even while feeling sick to his stomach. I know that now that the chemo is done, his blood counts will start to drop and the next week will probably be very yucky.

For now, we are savoring the activity, the beach parties, the ice cream sandwiches and the laps around the floor...eight days down...a whole lot more to go.