As many already know, I took some time off for maternity leave, and I had a baby. My baby boy was born May 1st and we named him Callum Wolf. He came two weeks late……I hated waiting. But naturally I was thrilled to finally hold him in my arms.

I do now have some sad news to share about Callum, he was born with a rare condition, biliary atresia.

This conditon can take many different paths, but all eventually lead to the need for a liver transplant. We didn’t know what path he would take, until recently.

At five weeks old my son had a surgery that hopefully would buy him the time to grow and get bigger before a liver transplant. Some with this condition can go until adulthood until a transplant is needed. Unfortunately his surgery was determined a failure right away and now at 4 months old he list listed for a liver transplant.

As you can guess the last 4 months have been difficult.

This isn’t all bad news, that Callum needs the transplant so early. We don’t have to wait in suspense, when will he need the transplant? When will he get sick? We know he needs it now. We know he will get better after he gets it. Many born with this condition may not need a transplant for a while, they can live with complications and going in and out of hospital on a regular basis. We skip all that! and go straight to the end part.

We are lucky enough to live near a hospital, SickKids, that have no size limits on when they feel they can pull off a liver transplant on a baby. They know what they are doing.

I want everyone to know Callum’s prospects look really good. In fact for a sick baby he looks really good. He’s shaping up into a happy little boy, who charms the socks off most people. He’s super cute, some of you have already met him. I will share the pictures in person. Soo many pictures.

Currently he is at SickKids and I live with him there. This will be the case until about a month or more after he receives a liver. Hopefully it will happen this fall or early winter.

There are a few reasons why I am sharing this with you.

Classes are coming back this fall!! YAY

But I will need to add some rules.

Basically upon transplant my son will be on immune suppressant medication at a very high dose. That means regular colds could be deadly to him. He will be extremely immunocompromised. Before transplant, if he gets any colds and suddenly a liver is available they would have to pass on it and my son would have to wait some more time. The longer the wait the more risky the surgery becomes. If I catch a cold I would give it to Callum… well you see the problem.

His medication should reduce post transplant after six months. For that six months however he will basically be living at home in isolation. After that? He will be still immunocompromised, but to a much smaller extent that will only become smaller and smaller over time. Callum will be able to go out and even join me at work. Basically he can live normally and have a normal life, with a few minor differences, six months post transplant. Until then we must be very careful not to get sick.

So for the above reason, while I am teaching and going out in the public I will be masking up, washing my hands etc, like it’s 2020. I will be fallowing these rules until we are given the okay from Callum’s medical team.

What I will require from parents and students is basically some of the rules we all got used to with Covid. Hand cleaning!

Students will not have to wear a mask, unless they have been around somebody who has a cold. I ask that at any sign of being unwell that students stay home and not come to art class. This is very important!

I ask that parents have some understanding as there maybe some last minute cancellations of classes as there may be some medical events that I need to be there for, so that I can comfort my baby.

Yes Classes are back!!!

and I am looking forward to it!

I am working on all the details. Bare with me. The goal is for Tuesday September 19 as the first day the studio is open again.

There are some major schedule changes. I will no longer be teaching on Sundays. But I do have another Teacher, Alice. She has tons of experience teaching art as well, as well as having a professional practice as an illustrator. She’s created and published a webcomic and done some work for Universal Studios. She’s extremely well rounded in terms of her skill set. So I am very happy to be working with her!

She has my upmost confidence as a teacher or I wouldn’t be leaving my Sunday classes to her.

Saturday will be completely the same, as taught by myself, Katherine.

Weekdays, Tuesday, Wednesday Thursday will still be mostly the same, but for the last class at 7pm I will need to have a minimum of 4 students for me to leave the time open. I am also open to having to make some Friday times available if there is enough demand.

As usual I will continue to make updates to the website.