Check out my new bike!

Christmas Time

Out and about

Have been spending time at the park and beach.

Trying my hardest to walk

We're having a lot of falls at the moment - trying our hardest to stand without holding on and trying to walk but still very wobbly.

Visiting Santa

Ben and I went to visit Santa today. We didn't get a good photo - I cried and Ben was too excited about Santa to concentrate on looking at the camera!

Pegs are pretty cool and the basket makes a nice hat too!

What have I been up to?

Well I'm now cruising around the furniture all the time. That's all I want to do. I found the corner cupboard in the kitchen is pretty good for leaning against and I don't have to hold on to anything.

I've started going to Mandarin playgroup which is great for me, but mum doesn't understand what they are saying.

My Great Nana

This is my great nana who is 94. I am her 11th great grandchild.

First visit to the beach

Big brother teaching me about Bob the Builder

And now we love the bath

Trampoline Time

And now we are home

Izzy will take another 2-3 weeks to fully recover. She also has to now become familiar with our house, although didn't have any trouble getting busy with some toys.

So close to home... but not yet

Izzy's first day in Australia, and first day of seven days in hospital with RSV bronchiolitis and pneumonia.

Leaving Shanghai

Our last hours in Shanghai, waiting in Qantas Club for our flight home.

Hospital - Day 7... and finally going home

We were told last night that depending on how Izzy did with her oxygen requirements overnight, we may come home today.

She must have known as she went the whole night without assisted oxygen and we came home at 2pm today.

Finally!

There were a few other photos which were supposed to go on my blog prior to hospital, so they are coming now so I can complete the journey.

Hospital - Day 5

Izzy is starting to respond to her antibiotics. We trialled her today without oxygen - she may go back on it overnight when she is asleep. Paed confirmed it will take about 2 weeks for her to get over RSV bronchiolitis, hopefully the pneumonia and other bug will go sooner.

He wouldn't give me a definite answer on whether we would be staying in hospital for the two weeks, he just said we don't want to send her home too early.

I've now been living in a one room hotel room or hospital room for four weeks. Makes our shoebox house seem like a mansion!

Hospital - Day 4

Last night the doctors ruled out Swine and at lunchtime today they ruled out TB.

Izzy is now on a high amount of oxygen, having steriods for her lungs and several different antibiotics. She has RSV (bronchiolitis) and pneumonia. They think she also has another bug somewhere. We are still in isolation as bronchiolitis is contageous, however at least the doctors and nurses no longer come in covered up like we have the plague.

The paed told us today we will definitely not be going home before the weekend.

Still in hospital

Izzy is still in hospital in isolation. Not a lot of improvement, she is now on oxygen. I doubt we will be home before the weekend. Still waiting on more test results, and now trying to get more info from China regarding her vaccinations.

Not the home coming we wanted

Izzy is still very sick. Our flight landed at 10.01am on Saturday morning and by noon she was admitted to Mona Vale Hospital. We are in isolation until all nasty diseases can be ruled out, however the paed has just visited and said it is bacterial pneumonia (unless she doesn't respond to the two different anti biotics they are giving her, in which case they will do more tests).

She is miserable and it isn't the welcome home we wanted to give her.

At this stage I'm staying with her at hospital for another 3 nights.

Last post from Shanghai

We are doing our final packing now.  Have done our final shopping and our bags leave in just over an hour.

Izzy is still quite sick – I’m so glad you’ve all seen photos of our smiling and laughing girl because she isn’t like that at the moment.  I think we’re in for a bad night on the plane.  There are 6 babies booked on our flight so we won’t get a bassinet as they are allocated to babies in age order.

Izzy probably won’t be back to her happy self for a few days.

SEE YOU IN SYDNEY!

 

Shanghai - Day 14

Second last day – the time has gone so fast but I am looking forward to coming home.  Shanghai has been absolutely wonderful and I could stay here for 2 or 3 weeks to see everything there is to see – I’d just spend too much money at the shops.

This morning we went on the Maglev train – fastest commercial train in the world.  Top speed was 431km/hr but you wouldn’t have known you were going that fast because it was such a smooth ride.

Then back to the tailors market to collect all our clothes we had made, and a final group dinner.  We have been to the tailor’s market twice and the “fakes” market twice and our guide had warned us about pick pockets but we got though okay.   Not so lucky for one of the others in our group who had her purse stolen from her handbag.

Izzy hasn ‘t been well today and we have just returned from hospital.  She has been very wheezy and we’ve come home with four different medicines for her and she is now knocked out on the bed.  Dr said her cough will develop into Asthma if not treated so we’ll keep going with the medicine we got from hospital and I’ve already got an appointment with our GP for her on Tuesday.

Interesting comparison – we rang our guide to ask her to take us to hospital and translate for us.  She told me to have lots of money ready and my credit card.  Didn’t matter what it would cost because we have travel insurance.

So it came time to pay for the doctor, I’ve got my wad of cash ready, the cost was equivalent to $3 (three) Australian dollars.

Four different medicines, the cost is equivalent to about $14 Australian dollars.

I’m sure it is a lot of money for the locals. 

We get taxis all over the place and it only ever costs equivalent to about $3 – even when you’ve sat in the cab for about 30 mins, still only around $3.

We started packing our bags this afternoon, we’re worried about the weight of all our stuff.  I think we might be lucky and just scrape though. 
We have enough room in the bags, but will be close on the weight allowance.

 

Nearly time to come home

Here I come!

 

Shopping

The shopping in Shanghai is fabulous.  We have gone overboard and I’m wondering whether we might need to post some things homes.

These are shoes I’ve bought for Izzy – around $10-$12 a pair for leather shoes.

 

Shanghai - Day 13

This is some of the view from the top of the World Financial Centre.

 

Shanghai - Day 13

We didn’t go on any of the organised sight seeing this morning, it was time to let Ben and Izzy have a rest.  We have been dragging them around every day, all day and night and they are both exhausted.  We just went and saw a few things at our own pace.

Tonight we went the World Financial Centre – it was the tallest building in the world until recently (I think the tallest is now in Dubai).  It is over 400m tall and I think 101 floors (can’t remember exactly).  It has a rectangle “hole” at the top and there is an observation deck with a glass floor.  The view of Shanghai at night was brilliant.  We then went on a cruise down the river in Shanghai.

This afternoon we also got Izzy’s passport back with her Australian Permanent Resident Visa.  We could have changed our flight to come home tonight – we are now basically free to bring her home.