Friday 6th April

Well its been a really good week! We went to church on Sunday, Harry has not been able to go for weeks. His energy levels are brilliant and he was pleased to see his friends at church too. Though Sunday did end with a trip to LGI as his NG tube came out, but at least a round trip of about 1 1/2 hours sorted that one out, a few tears, but soon forgotten!
On Monday we had to visit the dentist for Callum, his first visit. Yes, we did try and prepare him, via reading Peppa Pig's trip to the dentist over and over, however the power of Peppa this time did not over rule Callum's cantankerous nature! Yep, you guessed it, he would not open his mouth!!!!!! The cheeky monkey a day later when passing the dentist, said triumphantly 'I did not open my mouth for the dentist!' and upon saying this opened his mouth as wide as he could, so where was the dentist at this point!!!! There is the next time in 6 months!
So following the dentist we went to Harewood House and met friends up. The boys had a fab time playing, digging in the mud, playing in the play area and we even saw a Heron stealing the penguins' fish, just before leaving and the rain descending!
Tuesday was a busy day. Callum was in nursery, so after my physio appointment I took Harry on the train to Leeds and we checked out a dress that I had ordered as a potential ball dress, however, they always look so good on the models, but a dogs dinner on myself! However, Harry enjoyed the train ride! We then picked Callum up early and  went home to meet friends. Harry loved playing cars with Adam and Sophie and Callum played and watched the lovely Peppa Pig!!!
Harry had his playworker come Wednesday am and had fun with her, whilst I could catch up with washing etc.! Then we met a new playworker in the afternoon, whom is a volunteer play worker. I have been linked to her via education Leeds and the plan is that she can see Harry in and out of hospital, so fingers crossed it works, as the link in hospital will be inavaluable to keep Harry's and our sanity! We also popped into town briefly and I took Harry into The Shoe Room, whereby he decided that the shoes carefully put on their sides for display purposes should be upright and loudly declared that the display of bags on the floor looked 'a right mess!' Fortunately the shop assistant burst out laughing as I did! As you can imagine, we left sharply!
It was Grandad's birthday on Thursday and we went to McDonalds for lunch!!!!! Well Harry's appetite has been incredible variable and so it was not worth wasting money on going for a fancy meal and Callum is still variable on his attention span to sit still. Well Harry had a kids fish finger meal, he decided to swap his kids fries for my mum's go large fries and he ate the lot!! So we were all chuffed. He took an age to eat it and Callum got bored and having attempted to rearrange the furniture in McDonalds, yes a fine feat as most of the furniture is secured to the floor, but he found a rather tall bollard that he attempted to move around the entire restaurant, before I took him outside, where he was trampling on bushes trying to get to the window to bang on the window at Harry!!!!! The day was glorious with sunshine, a far cry from the snow storms of the previous day. There was still a slight chill in the air, so Granny said to Callum, 'put your coat on' to which Callum immediately replied, 'its not a coat, its a jacket!' which it was, a hooded sweater, however at 2 he is already  'splitting hairs', as daddy would say mummy does! The boys were then able to play out in the open space by my parents house, getting sticks, pretending to make camp fires and just being boys. It was lovely to see the boys play together and i think this made my dad's day, having seen Harry so poorly on Mother's day.
So, it's Friday again. We went to Wacky Warehouse this afternoon and Harry and Callum met up with their friend Charlie from nursery. Harry has not been able to play with Charlie since his party in January. They got on like a house on fire and had a brilliant time.
Harry is due back in hospital on Easter Day for chemotherapy to stimulate his stem cell production, followed by injections that I can administer at home for the following 10 days. These injections GCSF, are ones I have given him before, but this time it is a double dose. The side effects can be that his bones ache, so we will have to see how he manages next week.
However, we have really soaked up the time at home and not having to be in hospital for the last couple of weeks. The community nurse came Thursday to take about 9 vials of blood from Harry  for various tests, we have not heard back, so we assume all his blood counts are satisfactory. He is certainly on fine form and despite Harry looking like a cancer patient, we can nearly feel that things are normal!!!
Though acutely aware of the looming number of weeks that he will have to be in hospital. He has his operation 25th April and perhaps will get home for a week, prior to his spell of about 6 weeks in isolation, so that'll take us up to the end of June. Past Paul's 40th, Father's day etc. However, a plan it is and how I like a plan!!!