7 Ways We Have Learned to Deal

One of the things I think hits parents who adopt smack dab in the face is the medical life that comes with adopting kiddos with, well, medical needs. It is difficult to describe to someone who hasn't experienced it, and how it takes over every aspect of your lives - waking and sleeping. There is almost no such thing anymore as a "full night's sleep" or a "normal meal." Those every day parts of life you didn't realize you took so much comfort in is all swept away when you have a child with medical needs.

I was recently speaking with a mama who adopted a sweet little girl from China. This was not an inexperienced mom - she already had three children prior to the adoption. It isn't like she didn't understand what raising a child entailed. But what I heard was exhaustion and burn-out. Where was a single moment in which to rest? Days were spent juggling doctor appointments, therapy appointments, lab appointments, hospital stays and procedures, insurance phone calls, pharmacies, unique dietary needs, therapy needs, medicine schedules, oh! and the intense emotional trauma that came along with adopting a child who had been living in an orphanage for years. Head, explode.


It is easy to lose yourself in your baby's medical life. In fact, it seems impossible not to. You go into a special kind of survival mode. One slip up, and your baby is on the floor seizing.  The stakes are high. You have to be on your game all the time. There is no room for error. Life is hard enough when you aren't making mistakes.

How does a marriage survive? How do siblings survive? How do you survive?

I don't have the answers. I've only been at this for about 6 years, so in most ways I'm still quite the novice. I love meeting with parents with kids with special needs or medical needs that have been at this for 10, 15, 20 years. They are my heroes. So full of wisdom, peace, and joy. Seriously! Every one of them. How the heck do you get there?

From my short stint in this medical world, here are a few of the things I've learned. For those of you reading this who know so much more than me, please feel free to add a comment with your suggestions!

1. Always be honest with your kids.
Even with your biological child, trust between a parent who takes you to these painful, invasive appointments, and a child who doesn't understand why they are being tortured, is strained and even nonexistent. My one-year-old daughter had extreme anger with me after undergoing a horrible medical year and wanted nothing to do with me. Building a foundation of trust in the midst of all of this is a very difficult endeavor, especially when trying to bond with your adopted little one.

Never trick a child into getting into the car with you to go to a doctor's appointment. Never tell a child during a blood draw "almost finished" when it isn't. Never tell them something isn't going to hurt when it will. Be very open and honest with them, while providing comfort and love. Something along the lines of "Yes, this blood draw will hurt. If you are able to hold still, it will be over faster. But always remember that I will be right here with you the entire time either way. I will never leave you, and I love you always. We are in this together. Do you know what I do when I'm afraid? ..."

I have even had to correct well-meaning nurses and doctors on this one. They feel horrible when they are doing a procedure that causes fear and pain, and they tend to say things like, "It doesn't hurt! You're okay! We're almost finished! Don't cry!" I will then step in (usually at a yell because the child is screaming) and say, "No, baby. It is not almost finished. It has only just begun. It is going to be another few minutes. I've got you though. I'm right here. It's okay to cry. I know you're afraid and it hurts."

Build that trust and eventually your child will come to believe you when you tell them that this test won't hurt. They will come to accept you as their protector who loves them and wants to do what's best for them. It takes years, but in the long run this is so much healthier than the short-term easy lie.


2. Role play
Kids have to process, and a lot of times they don't have the verbal skills or the emotional maturity to be able to talk things out like we do. What they use for emotional processing is play. It's counterintuative - if the thing your kid fears most in the world is an EEG, why would I play EEG with them at home? It is seriously their way of processing things and is incredibly healthy to do. Of course you'll have to be sensitive to their emotional needs and not push them into anything. Ladybug was so fearful of EEGs at age 1 (and 2 and 3) that if you even tried to touch her head she'd melt-down.  However, it was interesting when I showed her how to do an EEG on her Pooh stuffed animal. Suddenly, she wanted to participate. It opened up a whole new world for her as she tried to work through what was going on and really helped take some of the power away from that fear. Here's some pictures of Panda's new favorite game - drawing everyone's blood.

It used to be shots when we began his injections last year - you never knew when he was going to sneak up on you with an object that resembled a syringe and stab it into your leg! I'm not going to lie, it was creepy. (But healthy.)

3. Schedule phone time within your day and train your kids
This one is hard. One thing a parent new to this medical world may underestimate is the time spent on the phone with insurance and billing departments. Both are constantly making mistakes. Or being stupid. Or both. And pharmacies. Hours a week will be spent on the phone with them. Just accept it now. I highly recommend planning a system for these phone calls. In our situation, we spent time training Ladybug to not run a muck and act out when Mom was on the phone for two hours fighting with people. So we had to role play it. I had to practice with her when it wasn't an important call and apply immediate consequences and rewards. As she got older we practiced doing quiet activities in a separate room. Sometimes I'll try to put on a movie I know she'll sit down and watch. Now that Panda is here the training is back on. I have to physically block out times on my schedule when I will make these phone calls and then prepare accordingly. My calendar looks something like this:

(Don't mock my scheduled art time. I am just not a creative person and if I don't schedule it, it won't happen!)

4. Take photos and videos when possible
This goes along with role playing in with its mental health aspect. For those of you who have heard of a social story, this is similar. Take pictures of your doctors (with permission of course! Don't be creepy.) If there is ever a happy moment during a check-up or a procedure or a hospital stay, capture it on camera! Letting the kids look through pictures and use them to help tell their story helps heal. Plus then I use them the next time around to remind them of an upcoming appointment social story style. It also helps them remember that there were times that they actually weren't screaming.

5. Schedule time for play everyday
It is so easy to get so wrapped up in running from appointment to appointment, keeping kids fed, making sure medicine is on schedule and refilled regularly, and completing their therapy at home that play seems to fall into the background as unessential. Or even a time for Mom to clean the kitchen.  But play is essential for brain development and bonding. As mentioned in #1, bonding with your medically heavy baby is crucial.  I highly recommend the book Play: How it Shapes the Brain, Opens the Imagination, and Invigorates the Soul by Christopher Vaughan. It completely changed my outlook on the essential nature of scheduling play time. There also is a book sitting on my shelf to be read called Fun Games and Physical Activities to Help Heal Children Who Hurt. Hopefully it will provide some practical advice. I'll let you know once I actually read it!
This can be something as simple as allowing your little one to dress up as a doctor and give their specialist an exam at their next appointment. This one makes me laugh every time. The doctors don't mind at all! They love to play along.
Or as extensive as finding a little grassy knoll outside the medical center to picnic between appointments and letting the kids run around for thirty minutes. Run with them! Laugh with them. Enjoy those little moments - they'll get you through the rest of the day. And them too!

Elmo always gets his blood drawn too.

6. Find another parent who understands 
It is like food for your soul to talk to another Mama or Dad who gets it. The ironic part about this is that these other medical parents also have incredibly demanding schedules and getting together almost seems impossible at times! Schedule far in advance, don't give up when you have to reschedule. Play dates, let's face it, are tough while we are all dealing with our children's unique needs. You need adult time. Time to be honest or broken or celebrate a win - just being yourself. Not on your mom-game.

A few suggestions if you don't know where to start - find a Facebook group unique to your child's medical need. Find a church nearby - it is becoming more common for churches to have parent support groups with special needs kiddos. Begin asking around - ask your child's therapists, ask other parents in waiting rooms at your appointments.  Once you actually find a support system of like-minded parents, you won't be sorry for the effort of the search.

7. Don't quit praying.
This is far trickier than I ever thought it would be. There's a fine balance between accepting your new situation and rocking it, and never ceasing to pray for healing and miracles. I'm still learning this one - it's a challenge. When you pray fervently and emotionally hour after hour, day after day, week after week, for months and years, you begin to think the Lord's answer was just a hard "no." But the bible commands us to pray and assures us that prayer matters, so just because Ladybug is still having seizures after 5 years doesn't mean He isn't hearing me or that His answer was no. It is my job to have faith and never stop praying in earnest, and the rest is out of my hands. Prayer is essentially our only weapon in a situation that we have absolutely no control over (no matter how much we may try). I recently read two parables Jesus shared about being persistent in prayer, which my weary soul needed so much.  This one was completely new to me:

And he told them a parable to the effect that they ought always to pray and not lose heart. He said, "In a certain city there was a judge who neither feared God nor respected man. And there was a widow in that city who kept coming to him and saying, 'Give me justice against my adversary.' For a while he refused, but afterward he said to himself, 'Though I neither fear God nor respect man, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will give her justice, so that she will not beat me down by her continual coming.'" And the Lord said, "Hear what the unrighteous judge says. And will not God give justice to his elect, who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long over them?" 
(Luke 18:1-7)


I don't think I am at the joy and peace level of those other parents I look up to, but I have noticed a trend that I'm much more that way than I was 5 years ago. Thank the Lord! So if you are brand new to this world, hang in there. It gets better. You adjust to your new normal in ways you never thought you could. You get stronger. The bible says the Lord provides the strength and wisdom to those who ask, and so I'm learning to ask.

Panda Update - 1 year and 4 months

Since we hit the year mark of Panda being home, I haven't been updating regularly - mostly at this point changes are coming slower and healing is more long-term and less obvious in the moment. BUT...here is the latest!

Eating: Our little guy is finally beginning to open up to trying new foods. This is huge when it comes to his health. He's even allowing me to make a green smoothie in the morning to go alongside his eggs, so as to make sure he's getting some leafy greens. I literally took a picture of his plate the other day at lunchtime because it was so beautiful to finally see a plethora of different food groups all on his plate being eaten! Proud Mama over here.

As a side benefit, it has really helped to make our daily lives a little bit easier. Between his fear of foods and yet a constant fear of hunger, Ladybug's medical diet, and my medical dietary needs (which differ a bit from hers) I was making 3 separate meals every time we sat down to eat!
It was definitely a full-time gig. It may be why Panda lovingly dubbed the kitchen "Mama's Kitchen."

 

Panda's first American hot dog. I felt it needed to be documented.

Drinking: Panda is finally drinking fluids throughout the day and even has begun to ask for water when he's thirsty! It makes me laugh to think of the random things we are so thankful for, like our littles finally drinking enough water to keep them hydrated.

Sleeping: He's back in our room in his little panda cove. He sometimes naps upstairs in his actual room in his "big boy bed." We just keep praying that he will eventually want to move there, but we don't want to make the mistake we made last year of pushing him before he's ready. He's healing so much where he is right now, and we don't want to disrupt that process. His nightmares are few and far between these days, and it is much more likely for him to wake us while laughing in his sleep than it is screaming. And if you've ever heard a Panda laugh, you know that it's hilarious!


The Great Outdoors: Whoa!! This is an area that is like night and day from April of last year. Last April being outdoors exhausted our Panda physically and mentally. The sensory input from the wind, the brightness of the sun, all of that strange grass and dirt, the unknown sounds of birds and airplanes - it was all just too much for the little guy. He'd go outside with us, terrified to be set down, and then after 20 minutes go inside and pass out for two hours as he tried to recover.
Today, he willingly walks outside, in the grass, barefoot, to feed the ducks when they come by our house each afternoon. What a transformation! I love that he is learning to appreciate the beauty of the world around us.

Speech/Language Acquisition: While Panda's vocabulary is expanding on a daily basis, his pronunciation improvement has come to a stand still. The doctors thought he needed tubes in his ears, but it turned out he didn't - he just has abnormally thick ear drums, which means they don't vibrate properly. Ladybug's speech therapist has been talking with me about him lately and it looks like it won't be long before he's in speech therapy. He struggles producing certain sounds and his speech has a nasal quality, which points to more serious issues. We shall see! But none of this has stopped our little chatterbox. Learning English has come easily to him, and he speaks constantly in full sentences. He pretty much has a running monologue from morning to bedtime. It definitely earns us quite a few looks every time we are out and about as people wonder why the one-year-old is speaking so well! ha! It makes for fun conversation.

Growth/Age: Our Panda has grown almost 5 inches since being home with us. He receives a growth treatment daily that we administer through injection. I have had to overcome my extreme discomfort with needles - you can literally do anything for your kids. And he's thriving! His endocrinologist is impressed with how well he's responding to the treatment and has high hopes that he has plenty of time to catch up. He still wears 12-18 month clothes, and is most likely (according to doctors) between the ages of 4-6 years old now. We will probably never know his actual age or birthday. That really bothered me at first, but over time I've come to terms with it. In all reality, what does it matter? He has a legal birth date, and we are just planning to stick with that. Not knowing one's age or birth date makes one no less precious or valuable as a human being. His Creator created him for a beautiful purpose and values our Panda beyond measure, and I pray that he takes comfort in these facts as he ages and begins to understand the confusion.

We celebrated his fourth birthday at the beginning of this year surrounded by family. Panda was in heaven! He wanted an airplane birthday as airplanes are totally his thing. His imagination is incredible and at any given time you can pretty much guarantee he is flying a toy airplane around the house, is an airplane himself, or "reading" a book about airplanes.

His love of airplanes comes in handy as we seem to be constantly on one.

He's just too cool.

Panda is rocking it at life. It hasn't by any means been an easy process and there are more challenges ahead, but every moment has been worth it to be able to finally hold my son and love him.

Educating our Children

Why discuss this? How does this relate to adoption? I think the number one thing we are learning throughout this process is to be incredibly flexible. Those of you who know me know that flexibility isn't my strong point! But when it comes to meeting your child's particular needs, that sometimes means going in a completely different direction than you ever thought you could.

I am a certified elementary school teacher and taught in public schools for five years before staying home with our Ladybug when she was born. And I loved it. I mean really loved it. I loved the kids, I loved the day-to-day life, I love just teaching. I still miss my babies I got the amazing privilege of teaching what now feels like a lifetime ago. I really hope to go back some day.This is probably why the decision of where to send our kids to school was so agonizing for me to work through throughout the past few years. I always imagined my kids attending the same school at which I taught, hanging out in my classroom after school doing their homework and playing while I wrapped up the day.

But life likes to throw curve balls at you, and I, being the least flexible human being on earth, have had to learn how to go with the flow.  My priority is to do what is best for my children, even if that doesn't align with what I originally planned.

Our Ladybug has a few diagnoses, but the two main issues we are dealing with is epilepsy and Pompe Disease.  We are very blessed that the Pompe now has a treatment - for this we are incredibly grateful. The bad news is it is a life-long treatment that basically changes everything.  She will have to take a full day out of every two weeks to do her blood infusion treatment indefinitely.  She will have to have a port surgically inserted into her chest to which the treatment will hook up, and as she grows she'll have to continue to have surgery to change out the port that apparently will need to grow with her. She will also have ongoing respiratory therapy, physical therapy, speech, and occupational therapy. Also, from what I understand, the days leading up to the biweekly treatments are a little rough as the patient can be excessively tired and  not feeling well as the body is in need of the next treatment.

All this to say, between the Pompe and her rough seizure days, the Duke and I, along with doctors and therapists, have decided full time school is not the best fit for our Ladybug. She would have an average of one absence a week, which when you are already developmentally behind and needing extra help, sounds like a disaster waiting to happen. We have spent the past three years going through our options, touring schools, and talking to experts. We have attended conferences and meetings, contacting other parents and learning what others have chosen to do. We have finally come to the conclusion that we need to explore a part-time school program.

Luckily for us, university-style schools are popping up all over the place in Texas. This is a full-week program where a student attends the school classroom for two or three days per week. The parents take over the education at home (aka the satellite classroom) the other days of the week following the school-provided curriculum. Considering we spend so much time doing school-like work at home already, this option seems to fit. We can pack up school to take to the hospital with us every two weeks, hopefully learning how to fit the treatments into our everyday lifestyle. We believe this to be the most emotionally healthy route to take for Ladybug, as well as the most educational route that will leave the least amount of holes.

What about Panda? Well, Panda is still four years old, and if I've learned anything, it is to keep our options open!  Right now, it appears a part-time school will also be best for him, at least in the beginning as he learns to be away from the family and from Mom. He is still dealing with his abandonment and healing from some pretty intense trauma. He is also catching up in a major way with his speech and language, so some extra one-on-one time definitely won't hurt. When it comes time, we will make a decision that we feel is in Panda's best interest, whatever that may look like.

On a personal note from Mom's point-of-view...

The original plan was  for me to go back to teaching when the kiddos got old enough to go to school. I'd be lying if I said there wasn't a part of me that was disappointed, although in a way I suppose I am still going to be teaching.  Considering everything that has happened in the past six years (I'm including my pregnancy in that time frame), I have had to put my personal desires on hold to tackle what life has thrown at us. As a mom, of course I do this with love and joy, as we all want what is best for our children! But that's not to say it hasn't been a sacrifice. Teaching was my thing. I loved it. Every single part. I miss my kids I used to teach more than I can express. I still pray for them often. They are constantly on my heart and my mind. I loved getting up in the mornings and going to work, and I was very much looking forward to returning to my job in the classroom.

All that being said, because I do love to teach so much and have such a longing desire for it, I can't help but to watch this transition in our lives with interest and excitement. What on earth does God have in mind for me and our family in the upcoming 14 years of school for our kids? I have a feeling that my continued desire to be in the classroom and teach is there for a reason. I enjoy teaching my littles very much, even if it isn't an entire classroom of kiddos. I love instructing Ladybug and Panda to read and write and think. My joy overflows and it spills out onto the kids. They beg me each day after breakfast to go into the "preschool room" and work. They are both little sponges and they soak up my enthusiasm for those teaching moments. 

Panda has finally learned to sit and listen and focus. (This took about a year to teach him.) Once that was learned, his learning has exploded! He's not only learned his alphabet, but his phonics, counting, shapes, puzzles, etc. I can't seem to teach him fast enough. He craves it all! And Ladybug finds words while reading her books and begs me to add them to her sight word repertoire. She squeals with glee when it's time to practice handwriting, as challenging as it can be for her. They are both little eager students.

Falling into a university style school seems pretty natural for us as a family as it is basically something we are already doing. It will just be strange now to be given a curriculum to follow. (I'm sure I can always add my own flair!) Say a little prayer for us as we try to choose a school that will not only meet the kids' health and emotional needs, but that will be willing to take on a different family with unique challenges.

Just a few pics of the kids being adorable and learning at home...

 Valentine art

Working on those scissor skills!

 Geometry 

 Pencil grasp for Panda and handwriting for Ladybug

Building her spacial reasoning skills like a boss

 Letter Recognition

Proud moment with a puppy photobomb 

Celebrating the number 80

Painting on a beautiful day!

We seriously have so much fun learning at home that I don't know what to do with all of our pictures and videos. One day I'll figure that out! In the meantime, we will just keep using that time for bonding and loving on each other in the best way we know how. 💓

Celebrating Panda's First Gotcha Day!

What What!! We had the honor to celebrate a full year with our handsome guy!! To think that he's only been with us for a year blows my mind.

I was going back through his pictures and videos from our trip to China last year and it feels like a lifetime ago.  He was a different kid, and we were different parents.  We've all changed so much in a year! Such a journey.

Gotcha Day - Dec. 2017

Day 2 with Mom and Dad

 Day 3 - Even got a smile!

We celebrated by procuring a cake and a free balloon from the cake lady, and presenting our little Panda with a gift.  I had created a photobook for him depicting our adoption process. I thought it would be cool for him to look at later in life when he starts to have questions. Well, I was mistaken. He was obsessed with it as soon as he realized what it was. He spent well over 30 minutes going through it again and again, sometimes making up his own story and sometimes asking us to tell it to him. Even now he regularly goes to take it off the shelf and browse through it.

I had gotten the idea from some friends who also adopted and created a similar book for their kiddos. It is one of their children's most priced possessions! It's a challenge for me to empathize, as my childhood all makes sense to me in my head, and always has. Considering Panda spent a good year or two with his birth mother and then another couple years in a Chinese orphanage, and then all of a sudden was picked up by two (awesome) people and brought to a brand new country, I can understand why he is grasping for anything to help explain the disjointed and jarring bits of his life. Plus add the lack of language skills to try to sort everything out and talk it through. I just wish we had more to give him from his early childhood - some sort of something from his time with his birth mother, or even more than two pictures of him in the orphanage. (We were not permitted to visit his orphanage, so even we have no idea what to tell him about his time there other than the basics.)

Speaking of language skills, the book has opened up a whole new subject and word for Panda that he didn't seem to understand before - "China." So get this. First of all, Panda's comprehension is so much higher than his expressive language. He is still learning English and communication skills, and he is surprisingly savvy navigating what words and concepts he knows in order to ask me questions or tell me something. So the other day, he crawled up into my lap and started singing "Jesus Loves Me," inserting the word "China" into the song and adding a question mark to his words, obviously trying to ask me something. Taking a stab at it, I answered two questions that I thought he might be asking. I told him yes, Jesus loved him always and will always love him, while he was in China and now that he's home. I also told him that Jesus loves everyone in China, just like he does here in the United States. It doesn't matter where you are, Jesus loves you. It seemed I satisfied his curiosity, so he smiled, nodded, and got back down to go play.

Um....talk about blowing my mind.

He now adds the word "China" into Jesus Loves Me every time he sings it. Wow.

Just a couple of pictures of our celebration.

11 Months - Panda's first American Autumn

What! Has it seriously been almost a year with this guy?? (Ya'll, that tux. I just can't get over it!)

I went back and reread my post from a year ago and how difficult it was stepping out on faith, traveling across the world and having no idea what we were getting ourselves into! Oh, if we had only known then what an incredible little boy was waiting for us on the other side of that ocean.

October with a Panda

Blindly following in his sister's excitement, Panda was enthusiastically ready for his first pumpkin patch. It was beyond hilarious watching him discover pumpkins for the first time. Most of them were bigger than he was!

 And then of course you have to paint them...

We also got the joy of Panda's first Halloween! He took right to trick-or-treating. He confidently walked up to doors and knocked. As soon as someone opened the door, he cocked his little head to the side and sang in his little panda voice, "Hellooooo!" He of course followed it up with a "trick-or-treat," but then after receiving candy, he wouldn't leave. He didn't understand why we weren't invited in to hang out. It kind of makes sense, really. He wasn't there for the candy...just the company!  :)
He had two costumes this year - one for our trunk-or-treat on the 30th and one for trick-or-treating on the actual 31st.

It's crazy that even after 11 months we are still having so many firsts with this little guy! Thanksgiving will be a blast. He is very into having lots of family around, although when everyone leaves he gets a little depressed. He has instantly understood the concept of family and the difference between family and friends, which is impressive to me. I've mentioned before how he loves so intensely, and he really does love our extended family with an all-out fierceness. 

Panda wants to discuss family constantly. Everything can be made into a family.  If we are shopping, the 5 rolls of wrapping paper in the cart are a family. There's a Mommy wrapping paper, a Daddy wrapping paper, a Panda, a Ladybug, and then, usually, a Grandma.  All stuffed animals must have a mommy stuffed animal. If we see a baby anywhere when out and about, he needs to know where his mommy is. He prefers for our family to always be in the same room and if possible, somehow wearing matching colors. Because. That's what families do.

I love how much he loves family. He never takes family for granted, and really neither does Ladybug. They both just crave time as a family. Their emphasis on family has continued to shape the way I view our time together and the way we live our lives.

Panda Awesomeness:

Eating and Drinking - He loves to eat and now drink! So exciting. He has begun to try some new foods and be a little less suspicious. He also tasted his first piece of pie this month. Needless to say, he was a fan!

Activity - He is always on the go! He is learning to climb, run, squat, dance, and jump.  Hips or no hips, he loves his freedom!

Sister - Gosh, the longer he is home, the closer they grow.  The first thing he asks for in the morning now is Ladybug, and when in a funk, she's usually the only one who can help him climb back out. They adore each other! In fact, they are so much on the same wave length that when one is being mischievous, the other is right there at their side.  There isn't a lot of sibling tattling going on...more just partners in crime!

The Great Outdoors - Panda has not only adjusted to the concept of being outside, he now embraces it! He still is hesitant for the first couple of minutes near grass, but it doesn't take long until he lets loose and joyfully runs (or rolls) through it! 

He is a mosquito magnet like nothing I've ever seen. The whole family will be sitting outside having a relaxing Saturday lunch with not a mosquito in sight. Except for the 5 swarming Panda's face.  Seriously, not a single one on any of the rest of us. If anyone has any recommendations for a better mosquito repellent cocktail for cute little people, please let me know! We've tried so many...

Panda Challenges:

I'm going to skim over this section this month as I feel like it would just be repetitive. Our challenges are still all in the same general arena as the past months: sleeping, fears of abandonment,  medical challenges, and some signs of trauma in different areas of life. All in all though, things are constantly heading in the right direction. Our Panda is learning and adjusting like a BOSS.

What's that you say? You need more pictures of a Panda in a tux? Happy to oblige...

I just want to eat him up!

A little over a month from now is Panda's Gotcha Day!!! We are excited to celebrate! From what I understand, Gotcha Day is maybe even a bigger deal than a birthday, especially since the birthday we have is a guess anyway. We will have cake, presents, and some good ol' fashioned family time, a Panda favorite. =)