Here are the things that make her laugh...
- peek-a-boo
- pretend sneezing
- scaring her (BOO)
- Lee laughing
- Steve making her dance
- Liz and Spencer talking to her
- Shaking your head saying "no,no,no"
El's you are just way, WAY, way too cute!
Friday, April 30
Laughing...
Here are the things that make her laugh...
- peek-a-boo
- pretend sneezing
- scaring her (BOO)
- Lee laughing
- Steve making her dance
- Liz and Spencer talking to her
- Shaking your head saying "no,no,no"
El's you are just way, WAY, way too cute!
Friday, April 23
We're almost there... potty training!
I hope I'm not shooting myself in the foot, but Lee is almost potty trained! He is a really deep sleeper, so he probably won't be trained at night for a while, but during the day he's 100% trained. I'm SO proud of him! We started this task a year ago, because he was really interested right before his 2nd birthday. He wore underwear and loved it for about a month with hardly any accidents. Then independence set in and he wasn't interested anymore. So we gave up. Then over the last year about 7 times we would have "spells" where he would play around with the idea of going potty and underwear and then it would fade away... back to diapers.
I was telling my friend Stephanie B. about it and she printed this book for me about "throwing out all diapers" not having that option and then to teach Lee to recognize his body signs. He was pretty much trained after the first day. He definitely knew what he was doing.
He cried when we threw the diapers away... and he asked one time for them saying "mommy I want my diapers back". After I told him that they were all gone and that he was a big boy, he got a huge smile and said "oh yay". I'm just so proud of him!
He wears underwear to nap and nighttime. Naptime he's usually pretty good. He has very little accidents. Nighttime is going to be awhile. but I wake him up before I go to bed around 10-11ish. Steve them wakes him up to go at 4:30am. So he'll learn eventually.
One down... one to go in a few years :)
Monday, April 19
3 Months Old
My sweet baby girl. You are just so, so sweet. I love going to get you in the morning because you are all smiles. You smile all day long. You are quiet and watch everything to take in. You love your big brother. I can already see you following right behind him in all his mischief ;)
You're starting to teeth. I can feel your two bottom teeth right below your gums. They are RIGHT THERE. It's made you pretty crabby though. Not crabby all the time, but just more crabby when you get tired. Tylenol cures that pretty good though.
You are sleeping 12-13 hours every night now, straight through. You do amazing! Every 4th night you wake up in the middle of the night for a catch up feeding. You still have 3 naps a day, but your wake time is just about 2 hours now. You are also eating about 6 oz at every feeding too. Sometimes though you like to do 3 oz and confuse us, but mostly you're doing 5-6 oz every feed.
I'm still swaddling you and I'm wondering when you're going to give that up. You really do love it though... so probably not anytime soon.
I love you my little Elles Bells. Please don't grow up too fast. Ok? Thanks!
You're starting to teeth. I can feel your two bottom teeth right below your gums. They are RIGHT THERE. It's made you pretty crabby though. Not crabby all the time, but just more crabby when you get tired. Tylenol cures that pretty good though.
You are sleeping 12-13 hours every night now, straight through. You do amazing! Every 4th night you wake up in the middle of the night for a catch up feeding. You still have 3 naps a day, but your wake time is just about 2 hours now. You are also eating about 6 oz at every feeding too. Sometimes though you like to do 3 oz and confuse us, but mostly you're doing 5-6 oz every feed.
I'm still swaddling you and I'm wondering when you're going to give that up. You really do love it though... so probably not anytime soon.
I love you my little Elles Bells. Please don't grow up too fast. Ok? Thanks!
Monday, April 12
Something I don't want to forget...
Yesterday, the family (Me, Steve, Lee and El) all went to Morris to walk by the river. Something Steve had seen and wanted to show us. Plus, what 2 year old doesn't like throwing rocks into water? Or mud? Anyways, Steve thought that this particular area had a park. Lee perspective of a "park" is swings, slides and something to hang on.
So, we're all in the car and Lee has asked 34 times how much longer. Steve announced proudly that he did remember where the park was and that we were there. Lee then announces "sorry Daddy, there's no park here!" What 2 year old that had his hopes up for 30+ minutes just matter-of-factly explains that Steve was wrong? No crying, no fit. Just along for the ride.
To that Steve said... "yes, but there's rocks and tunnels that we can go and see". So the adventure began.
A few days ago I wanted to take a few pictures of Lee, because I don't have enough, and I asked if he would take a few. He said "no". So I said "how about if your playing something and you don't know I'm taking your picture". Lee said "How about a bath". Ugh, Ok, but that's more work for me though. Humph. At least he's clean, and I did get pictures of him. This was picture number 7 that I took. As you can see, when Lee agrees to pictures, that means 7.
He's still pretty cute though ;)
So, we're all in the car and Lee has asked 34 times how much longer. Steve announced proudly that he did remember where the park was and that we were there. Lee then announces "sorry Daddy, there's no park here!" What 2 year old that had his hopes up for 30+ minutes just matter-of-factly explains that Steve was wrong? No crying, no fit. Just along for the ride.
To that Steve said... "yes, but there's rocks and tunnels that we can go and see". So the adventure began.
A few days ago I wanted to take a few pictures of Lee, because I don't have enough, and I asked if he would take a few. He said "no". So I said "how about if your playing something and you don't know I'm taking your picture". Lee said "How about a bath". Ugh, Ok, but that's more work for me though. Humph. At least he's clean, and I did get pictures of him. This was picture number 7 that I took. As you can see, when Lee agrees to pictures, that means 7.
He's still pretty cute though ;)
Friday, March 26
2 Months Old
I can't believe you are 2 months old already. You are growing by leaps and bounds but I'm thankful that you're not growing as fast as your brother. You went to the Dr. on Monday and you weighed in at 11lb 8oz. You were 23" tall. You are the sweetest baby I have ever met. You love to be cuddled for a bit and then you love to lay down and look around. You also sleep and nap amazingly! You're still a bit fussy in the evenings, but nothing that's too bad. During the day you are all smiles and completely content.
Here's a few things that went on this month:
- Eating 4-5oz at almost every feeding.
- Sleeping 11 hours straight through the night.
- You still love to be swaddled.
- You love watching TV
- Mommy took you and Lee out by herself for the first time this month.
Lee loves you so much and is always looking out for you. He always runs in your room in the morning when you wake up. He will walk by and give you a kiss on the head. You and Lee were watching Snow White and Lee came over and told you "it's ok baby sister, it's not scary" when the evil witch was casting her spell. When you cry he will find you a bink and give it to you. He has tried jumping over you, but was stopped by Papa just in time. He still isn't really into holding you but at this moment, that's ok with Mommy.
Your schedule now (and it's been this way for over a month now) is:
8am - Wake up, drink bottle
9:30-10:30am - Nap
Noon - Wake up, bottle
1:30pm - Nap
4pm - Wake up, bottle
5:30pm - Nap
6:30pm - Wake up, bottle
8pm - bottle
9pm - Bedtime
*You fall asleep almost 1.5hours on the dot from when you woke up from nap.
Here's a few things that went on this month:
- Eating 4-5oz at almost every feeding.
- Sleeping 11 hours straight through the night.
- You still love to be swaddled.
- You love watching TV
- Mommy took you and Lee out by herself for the first time this month.
Lee loves you so much and is always looking out for you. He always runs in your room in the morning when you wake up. He will walk by and give you a kiss on the head. You and Lee were watching Snow White and Lee came over and told you "it's ok baby sister, it's not scary" when the evil witch was casting her spell. When you cry he will find you a bink and give it to you. He has tried jumping over you, but was stopped by Papa just in time. He still isn't really into holding you but at this moment, that's ok with Mommy.
Your schedule now (and it's been this way for over a month now) is:
8am - Wake up, drink bottle
9:30-10:30am - Nap
Noon - Wake up, bottle
1:30pm - Nap
4pm - Wake up, bottle
5:30pm - Nap
6:30pm - Wake up, bottle
8pm - bottle
9pm - Bedtime
*You fall asleep almost 1.5hours on the dot from when you woke up from nap.
Wednesday, March 3
Look what Lee can do!
Tonight Steve and I were talking about how Lee doesn't have an attention span. It's about 15 seconds. I was telling Steve that I bet Lee could sing his ABC's if he could focus long enough. If I sing the ABC's and stop at any point, Lee would tell me what letter came next. After that, Steve asked Lee to sing the ABC's and Lee did the whole thing from beginning to end. I then bribed him with 2 vitamins if he would do it again so we could tape it. So here's a good example of that 15 second attention span, as well as most of his ABC's. They are in bits and pieces but they are mostly there.
A Smile is Worth...
Everything!! You started smiling yesterday! I went to get you out of your crib and you gave Mommy this HUGE smile. I fed you your bottle and another smile. Than last night as I was getting you ready for bed... like 10 more smiles ;) I love it! My heart just melts everytime.
Sunday, February 21
Belly Button
You lost your belly button tonight while Mommy was changing your diaper. YEAH! Now you can officially have your first bath and not just a sponge bath.
Saturday, February 20
Two and a Half Years Old
Lately you have been SO much fun to be around. I have loved every stage for the most part, but I have to say that you have really impressed me with how big you are getting and understanding things. Here's a few things that have happened in the last few months.
You are a big brother now. You have been such a big helper with Elsie and you love her so much. You still won't hold her, but you ask me all the time where she is and if she's ok. In the mornings you will practically climb into her crib and tell her "it's ok, no crying" and then you tell me "It's ok, I took care of it". You have stopped referring to Elsie as "it" as well. The first couple weeks you would tell me, "Mommy, put it in here" or "Mommy, it wants a binky". Also, the first week Elsie was home, you would come downstairs and say "Who's that?"
Here's a few other updates from the past few months:
Today, you were telling me that you were flying to space and this was your rocket ship, etc. etc. I asked then, what a piece of your rocket ship did and you told me it was your horn. Then you told me it was to do "the horn-ie things".
You wanted to try Elsie's formula so I let you. At first you were like "yumm... good" then you really started to taste it and you started to gag. You then told me it was "disgusting".
You that same day also wanted to try dog food, so I let you. You gagged on that as well and spit it out in the garbage can. I had to then give you strong juice because you wouldn't stop gagging.
One morning after you woke up, you told me "Mommy, I need a cup of sugar in my milk". I had no clue where this came from. After awhile I was making your oatmeal, I turned around and there were eggs and peaches out on the counter. When I asked you what those were for, you told me "Oh, I want eggs and peaches in my oatmeal". Turns out Blue's Clues is to blame for this one. They did an episode about cooking and "seeing what's in the fridge". Another morning you wanted "a little bit of ketchup in my oatmeal". That didn't happen either, just so you know.
Speaking of Ketchup, when we were at the grocery store last weekend, you pointed to this massive big jug of ketchup and said "oh, there's the ketchup". It didn't look like the ketchup bottle at all, it was just the label you recognized.
You sing your ABC's like this: A,B,C,D,E,F,G, now I know my ABC's. However if I sing with you and stop anywhere in the alphabet, you know what letter comes next.
You can count all the way to 13 without mistakes if your not being silly.
You absolutely love, I mean, L.O.V.E. pow-pows. You turn everything and anything into a pow-pow. If we're playing with Legos, you build one... if we're playing with blocks, you use a gun to knock them down. You have even turned my Ziplock baggie wand into a pow-pow as well. This all started at Christmas when Grandma and Papa bought you your first Nerf gun.
You have turned into a little negotiator. I always give you warnings... "One more minute until bed". "Five more minutes until we leave". Etc. Now you will say to me "One more minute Mommy and we leave". Sometimes it's after I said we need to leave, other times it's randomly placed in our day when we're not leaving at all.
You also will put yourself in time-out which makes me second guess the whole "time-outs for punishment" thing. We use a little mat that Crystal gave us it's a tiger. If I see you sitting there, I will ask you "why are you in time-out" and you will tell me "oh, I touched Daddy games" or "I not listening to you". It's like you weigh the option before hand and decide it's worth the punishment.
Daddy has become obsessed with our furnace that clicks in the basement. So obsessed, that you now will tell people that their basement clicks too. I really appreciate this!!
You can draw a capital letter "E" all by yourself. It might have more than 3 lines coming out of it, but it's a start.
If someone asks you your name, you will tell them "Lee Schweigert". You told me the other day that the dogs name was "Teal'cers Lee Schweigert" and "Kota Lee Schweigert".
If someone asks you how old you are, you will say "2, but Mason's 5". You want to be just like Mason, it's so cute. Mason (and Spencer his brother) are the neighbor boys who are really good friends with Lee.
You have been requesting peanut and butter sandwiches for lunch more and more. Before this year started, you wouldn't touch peanut butter with a 10-ft pole.
You can do summer-salts all by yourself.
That's pretty much all I have for right now. If I think of anymore I'll try and note them all down.
You are a big brother now. You have been such a big helper with Elsie and you love her so much. You still won't hold her, but you ask me all the time where she is and if she's ok. In the mornings you will practically climb into her crib and tell her "it's ok, no crying" and then you tell me "It's ok, I took care of it". You have stopped referring to Elsie as "it" as well. The first couple weeks you would tell me, "Mommy, put it in here" or "Mommy, it wants a binky". Also, the first week Elsie was home, you would come downstairs and say "Who's that?"
Here's a few other updates from the past few months:
Today, you were telling me that you were flying to space and this was your rocket ship, etc. etc. I asked then, what a piece of your rocket ship did and you told me it was your horn. Then you told me it was to do "the horn-ie things".
You wanted to try Elsie's formula so I let you. At first you were like "yumm... good" then you really started to taste it and you started to gag. You then told me it was "disgusting".
You that same day also wanted to try dog food, so I let you. You gagged on that as well and spit it out in the garbage can. I had to then give you strong juice because you wouldn't stop gagging.
One morning after you woke up, you told me "Mommy, I need a cup of sugar in my milk". I had no clue where this came from. After awhile I was making your oatmeal, I turned around and there were eggs and peaches out on the counter. When I asked you what those were for, you told me "Oh, I want eggs and peaches in my oatmeal". Turns out Blue's Clues is to blame for this one. They did an episode about cooking and "seeing what's in the fridge". Another morning you wanted "a little bit of ketchup in my oatmeal". That didn't happen either, just so you know.
Speaking of Ketchup, when we were at the grocery store last weekend, you pointed to this massive big jug of ketchup and said "oh, there's the ketchup". It didn't look like the ketchup bottle at all, it was just the label you recognized.
You sing your ABC's like this: A,B,C,D,E,F,G, now I know my ABC's. However if I sing with you and stop anywhere in the alphabet, you know what letter comes next.
You can count all the way to 13 without mistakes if your not being silly.
You absolutely love, I mean, L.O.V.E. pow-pows. You turn everything and anything into a pow-pow. If we're playing with Legos, you build one... if we're playing with blocks, you use a gun to knock them down. You have even turned my Ziplock baggie wand into a pow-pow as well. This all started at Christmas when Grandma and Papa bought you your first Nerf gun.
You have turned into a little negotiator. I always give you warnings... "One more minute until bed". "Five more minutes until we leave". Etc. Now you will say to me "One more minute Mommy and we leave". Sometimes it's after I said we need to leave, other times it's randomly placed in our day when we're not leaving at all.
You also will put yourself in time-out which makes me second guess the whole "time-outs for punishment" thing. We use a little mat that Crystal gave us it's a tiger. If I see you sitting there, I will ask you "why are you in time-out" and you will tell me "oh, I touched Daddy games" or "I not listening to you". It's like you weigh the option before hand and decide it's worth the punishment.
Daddy has become obsessed with our furnace that clicks in the basement. So obsessed, that you now will tell people that their basement clicks too. I really appreciate this!!
You can draw a capital letter "E" all by yourself. It might have more than 3 lines coming out of it, but it's a start.
If someone asks you your name, you will tell them "Lee Schweigert". You told me the other day that the dogs name was "Teal'cers Lee Schweigert" and "Kota Lee Schweigert".
If someone asks you how old you are, you will say "2, but Mason's 5". You want to be just like Mason, it's so cute. Mason (and Spencer his brother) are the neighbor boys who are really good friends with Lee.
You have been requesting peanut and butter sandwiches for lunch more and more. Before this year started, you wouldn't touch peanut butter with a 10-ft pole.
You can do summer-salts all by yourself.
That's pretty much all I have for right now. If I think of anymore I'll try and note them all down.
Friday, February 19
One Month Old
You are one month old and I can't believe how fast time is going. I try to hold you as much as I can because I know tomorrow, you are one day bigger.
This month has been pretty good, although we are finally figuring out your pooping issues. I've called the Dr. 3 times because you just seem like you're in so much pain. But as of 4 days ago, I think we have it all figured out. Who knew that a little bit of syrup could make a baby poop so much.
At 3 weeks we went to the Dr. and you weighed in at 9 pounds, 8 ounces. You were 19 inches still.
You have figured out your days from your nights. (Yeah!!). Last night was the first night of sleeping 7 hours straight through the night. You were up for an hour to eat and look around, and then slept for another 4 hours. Yeah for sleep!!
Swaddling is so-so. You sometimes love it, other times scream until we have unswaddled you.
You love to sleep on your tummy, but it makes Mommy nervous, so it doesn't happen very often.
We've had so much fun having you in our family! I can't wait to see what you're like as a toddler. I can wait... don't get me wrong... I can wait. I'm just saying, I look forward to that period, far, far from now ;)
This month has been pretty good, although we are finally figuring out your pooping issues. I've called the Dr. 3 times because you just seem like you're in so much pain. But as of 4 days ago, I think we have it all figured out. Who knew that a little bit of syrup could make a baby poop so much.
At 3 weeks we went to the Dr. and you weighed in at 9 pounds, 8 ounces. You were 19 inches still.
You have figured out your days from your nights. (Yeah!!). Last night was the first night of sleeping 7 hours straight through the night. You were up for an hour to eat and look around, and then slept for another 4 hours. Yeah for sleep!!
Swaddling is so-so. You sometimes love it, other times scream until we have unswaddled you.
You love to sleep on your tummy, but it makes Mommy nervous, so it doesn't happen very often.
We've had so much fun having you in our family! I can't wait to see what you're like as a toddler. I can wait... don't get me wrong... I can wait. I'm just saying, I look forward to that period, far, far from now ;)
Tuesday, January 26
1 Week Old
You are one week old today and I'm not sure where the time went. Although you've only been home for 4 days now, it feels like one. Daddy took you to your first Dr. appointment today and you weighed in at 8 pounds, 13 ounces. You are back to your birth weight. We asked the Dr. about your sleeping so much and he didn't seem concerned at all. He said that if you were eating good, that you should be fine. YEAH! He was very happy with how much weight you have gained and how good you are doing.
Tomorrow we go and see the Cardiologist at St. Joseph to just get a check-up. Hopefully everything goes well and you get a clean bill of health. Right now you're sleeping in the pack-n-play in the living room and I'm just waiting till 11:30pm to wake you up to feed you before bed. I have to wake you up to feed you, that's how much you sleep.
Big brother Lee is still getting used to you. He'll occasionally ask who you are and kiss your head. Today he wanted to give you a hug, so he hugged the life out of you and you grunted. He thought that was funny. Other than that he pretty much keeps to himself and goes about his business.
We love you and hope you don't grow up too fast.
Love,
Mommy and Daddy
Thursday, January 21
My Baby Girl is HERE!
Elsie Rose
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
6:10am
8 pounds, 13 ounces
Monday we had a Dr. appointment to check her size and make sure everything was going good in the pregnancy since she was over due. Had a ultrasound and the fluid around her was pretty low. So the Dr. decided to induce labor. We arrived at the hospital around 5pm. Checked in and meet with our Dr. again. He said that he was going to give me a little pill for the first 12-hours that would start moving along my cervix because I still hadn't progressed at all. Then the pitocin would start at 6am to start the contractions.
At 6pm I received my first dose of Cervidol I believe is what it's called (not sure). About 15 minutes later I was having contractions about 3 minutes apart. At Midnight, I received my second dose and my contractions were a little more than a minute apart. At this point I was in a lot of pain and asked for meds. I was only dilated to 2cm so they couldn't do epidural yet. Gave me something in my IV that took the edge off for about an hour. At about 3:30am, got my epidural. 5:45am I was 10cm dilated and started pushing. 6:10am Elsie was born. Everything went way better than expected and we were alone and recovering an hour later! I never ended up getting the pitocin.
Wednesday morning we were getting ready to be discharged, both my Dr. and Elsie's Dr. had signed off on our release papers, we just had to wait for Elsie to get her last blood draw and they check her stats one last time. As they were checking her oxygen levels, they realized that she was only at an 82 where they like to see her as close to 100 as possible. So away to the nursery she went to get that checked out. In the nursery they do a oxygen check on her hands and feet and they were coming up 2 different numbers. Hands were in the mid-high 90's, where her feet were in the low 80's still.
At this point, Steve and I were waiting in our room, when the nurse comes in and tells us what's taking so long. She said that they just wanted to monitor her a little longer and that she would be back as soon as they heard anything. About an hour later, the nurse and a Neo-natal Dr. came in and explained that they wanted to do an ECCO to find out if there was a blockage anywhere in her arteries because of the two different oxygen level readings.
We were able to go see her for a minute before the test and she was happy and content. After the test results were back, they weren't 100% sure if there was a problem, but the Dr. at Rush in Chicago looked over the scans and wanted to transport her so they could have a better look. So we signed the papers to have her transported. However, here's where it gets tricky. Because they weren't sure if there was blockage, they wanted to put her on this medicine that keeps a vessel open that is only used while I was pregnant with her. This vessel within 24-hours of birth, twists and closes, because she doesn't need it any longer. So they wanted to put her on this medicine to keep that vessel open, so there wouldn't be any complications during transport. A side effect to this medicine is apnea however, so at the time, they wanted to sedate and tube her so if she were to stop breathing during transport, they would have ways to help her without having to pull over. Side note: they didn't end up having to do this because she did fine with the medicine on her own and they were able to monitor her long enough in the nursery.
They had a really hard time getting an IV hooked up to her, they tried her belly button, hands and then found a spot in her foot where they were able to put in a line.
Transport arrived around 6pm and she was taken to Rush in Chicago. We met with the Neonatal Cardiologist at Rush and she had run the same ECCO again and looked it over. Here we got great news that she looked over both scans, and although this connecting vessel was still open, she didn't see any blockage anywhere. However, they want to take Elsie off the medicine and run another ECCO and see after it closes. So that was great news! Hopefully after today, when they take her fully off the medicine they won't see anything again.
She did see however a valve in her 4th ventricle in her heart that was misshaped, but at this time nothing needs to be done. Just monitoring. So that was good news as well.
This morning they are going to take Elsie off the medicine and repeat the ECCO. We will have more information later this afternoon and we will try our best to keep everyone updated as to what is going on.
Thank you for all your prayers, thoughts and comments! They are greatly appreciated and mean so much to Steve and me!! It is so hard having a 8lb+ baby in a nursery full of babies that don't weigh more than 2lb. You look around and see all these teeny tiny hands and feet kicking and it really puts everything into perspective. It's so sad that they have to fight so hard for their lives. So if you can, say prayers for them as well. They are just so tiny and helpless. Thank you so much again for your prayers, we have the best friends and family in the world!!
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
6:10am
8 pounds, 13 ounces
Monday we had a Dr. appointment to check her size and make sure everything was going good in the pregnancy since she was over due. Had a ultrasound and the fluid around her was pretty low. So the Dr. decided to induce labor. We arrived at the hospital around 5pm. Checked in and meet with our Dr. again. He said that he was going to give me a little pill for the first 12-hours that would start moving along my cervix because I still hadn't progressed at all. Then the pitocin would start at 6am to start the contractions.
At 6pm I received my first dose of Cervidol I believe is what it's called (not sure). About 15 minutes later I was having contractions about 3 minutes apart. At Midnight, I received my second dose and my contractions were a little more than a minute apart. At this point I was in a lot of pain and asked for meds. I was only dilated to 2cm so they couldn't do epidural yet. Gave me something in my IV that took the edge off for about an hour. At about 3:30am, got my epidural. 5:45am I was 10cm dilated and started pushing. 6:10am Elsie was born. Everything went way better than expected and we were alone and recovering an hour later! I never ended up getting the pitocin.
Wednesday morning we were getting ready to be discharged, both my Dr. and Elsie's Dr. had signed off on our release papers, we just had to wait for Elsie to get her last blood draw and they check her stats one last time. As they were checking her oxygen levels, they realized that she was only at an 82 where they like to see her as close to 100 as possible. So away to the nursery she went to get that checked out. In the nursery they do a oxygen check on her hands and feet and they were coming up 2 different numbers. Hands were in the mid-high 90's, where her feet were in the low 80's still.
At this point, Steve and I were waiting in our room, when the nurse comes in and tells us what's taking so long. She said that they just wanted to monitor her a little longer and that she would be back as soon as they heard anything. About an hour later, the nurse and a Neo-natal Dr. came in and explained that they wanted to do an ECCO to find out if there was a blockage anywhere in her arteries because of the two different oxygen level readings.
We were able to go see her for a minute before the test and she was happy and content. After the test results were back, they weren't 100% sure if there was a problem, but the Dr. at Rush in Chicago looked over the scans and wanted to transport her so they could have a better look. So we signed the papers to have her transported. However, here's where it gets tricky. Because they weren't sure if there was blockage, they wanted to put her on this medicine that keeps a vessel open that is only used while I was pregnant with her. This vessel within 24-hours of birth, twists and closes, because she doesn't need it any longer. So they wanted to put her on this medicine to keep that vessel open, so there wouldn't be any complications during transport. A side effect to this medicine is apnea however, so at the time, they wanted to sedate and tube her so if she were to stop breathing during transport, they would have ways to help her without having to pull over. Side note: they didn't end up having to do this because she did fine with the medicine on her own and they were able to monitor her long enough in the nursery.
They had a really hard time getting an IV hooked up to her, they tried her belly button, hands and then found a spot in her foot where they were able to put in a line.
Transport arrived around 6pm and she was taken to Rush in Chicago. We met with the Neonatal Cardiologist at Rush and she had run the same ECCO again and looked it over. Here we got great news that she looked over both scans, and although this connecting vessel was still open, she didn't see any blockage anywhere. However, they want to take Elsie off the medicine and run another ECCO and see after it closes. So that was great news! Hopefully after today, when they take her fully off the medicine they won't see anything again.
She did see however a valve in her 4th ventricle in her heart that was misshaped, but at this time nothing needs to be done. Just monitoring. So that was good news as well.
This morning they are going to take Elsie off the medicine and repeat the ECCO. We will have more information later this afternoon and we will try our best to keep everyone updated as to what is going on.
Thank you for all your prayers, thoughts and comments! They are greatly appreciated and mean so much to Steve and me!! It is so hard having a 8lb+ baby in a nursery full of babies that don't weigh more than 2lb. You look around and see all these teeny tiny hands and feet kicking and it really puts everything into perspective. It's so sad that they have to fight so hard for their lives. So if you can, say prayers for them as well. They are just so tiny and helpless. Thank you so much again for your prayers, we have the best friends and family in the world!!
Sunday, January 10
3 Days Till Due Date...
Any day now, you can just come right on out! I won't mind one bit!! You're 39-week appointment went really well. You are doing great in Mommy's belly, infact so great that I have not progressed at all and will most likely be back at the Dr. for my 40-week appointment. We'll see what he says that day. Hopefully that I have progressed and that he can strip my membranes. I really would prefer to not be induced... but if it comes down to that, I'm not opposed too, too much.
Saturday, January 2
38 Week Update
My neighbor and friend Liz took some belly pictures for me and I absolutely LOVE THEM!! Here's a few ;)
38 weeks along and still nothing really to mention. I went to the Dr. last Wednesday and I still haven't progressed any. Lee was the same way. Hopefully this week Wednesday they "stretch" me like they did with Lee and move things along. I can't wait to meet Elsie and hold her!! Everything is going good though, we had a little bit of a scare this weekend. She stopped moving and no matter what I drank or ate, she still didn't move. So we had it checked out and everything is good. She's back to her normal self now, little tiny jabs and kicks. Mostly I feel hiccups 3 times a day. Her heart rate is right around 140BPM and she is definitely head down. However I have not started to dialate yet.
Time to come out baby girl!! We want to meet you!!
Friday, December 25
37 Week Update
I went to my 37 week appointment and everything looked good! I have lost 2lb which the Dr. wasn't too concerned about considering I have run out of room to put the food. Heart rate was 147BPM and Elsie was right on track as far as size. I think she's still running a little small, but we'll see. She doesn't feel that small... lol.
Internal exam again, and although my cervix is "very, very soft" I'm still not dilated at all, and no where near. So hopefully, Elsie follows in her brothers foot steps and I go into labor without actually dilating at all.
Internal exam again, and although my cervix is "very, very soft" I'm still not dilated at all, and no where near. So hopefully, Elsie follows in her brothers foot steps and I go into labor without actually dilating at all.
Merry Christmas
We ran out of Christmas cards this year to send everyone, so in case you did not receive yours in the mail, here is what they looked like. We would like to wish everyone a very, very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year in 2010!
Thursday, December 17
36 Week Update
I had my 36 week appointment yesterday and everything looked good! Heart rate was 149BPM. I was measuring a little small again, but nothing to be worried about. I also had my first internal exam. Those are fun!! (<-- sarcastic). It's not that bad, but you get crampy after wards and that's the part that I don't look forward to. Anyways, the Dr. said that my cervix was "very, very, VERY soft" but I was still have not progressed. He reviewed my chart from when I had Lee and he said that I should be able to cut my labor in half with Elsie (yahoo!!). He also said that I should progress a lot faster with Elsie because of how soft my cervix was. So that's good enough news for me!! Today I started feeling like she was dropping more. She was pretty high up until today and now I have more room to eat and more room to breath!! So that's good as well!!
I'll try to get Steve to take a picture tomorrow so I can post a belly picture. I feel like such a slacker because I had one for every couple weeks with Lee and poor Elsie only has 2.
I'll try to get Steve to take a picture tomorrow so I can post a belly picture. I feel like such a slacker because I had one for every couple weeks with Lee and poor Elsie only has 2.
Sunday, December 13
Christmas Card Rejects...
With all the pictures I took of Lee for our Christmas Card this year, I couldn't help but post the reject ones that didn't make the cut. As you remember last years fiasco with trying to get Lee to sit still and take a picture, this year went MUCH better ;)
I tried a session before lunch and Lee just wasn't into it and wanted to play. Here's an example of the pictures I got.
Card would of said: "Merry Frick'n Christmas"
So... I got Lee undressed, fed him lunch, we had our neighbors over at the time and played for awhile and after they left I thought I would try one more time to get a smiley - sortof picture for our card before naptime. Although I did get some cute ones, here's some that didn't make the cut.
Please note: Although I could get Lee to put his button down shirt on, I could not get him to put his jeans back on. So the following pictures were taken with Lee in a nice shirt and no pants!
Christmas Card: "You don't need pants to have a great Christmas"
Christmas Card: "Just peeking in to wish you a Merry Christmas"
Christmas Card: "Hamming it up for Christmas so my Mommy stops torturing me, I mean taking my picture"
There you go! I have mailed out the cards and if you haven't received yours, I apologize, I have run out, so I will post the card here in a few days so you can see it. I'm sorry again we couldn't mail them out to everyone, we do want to wish you the Merriest of Christmas' and Happiest of New Years in 2010!
I tried a session before lunch and Lee just wasn't into it and wanted to play. Here's an example of the pictures I got.
Card would of said: "Merry Frick'n Christmas"So... I got Lee undressed, fed him lunch, we had our neighbors over at the time and played for awhile and after they left I thought I would try one more time to get a smiley - sortof picture for our card before naptime. Although I did get some cute ones, here's some that didn't make the cut.
Please note: Although I could get Lee to put his button down shirt on, I could not get him to put his jeans back on. So the following pictures were taken with Lee in a nice shirt and no pants!
Christmas Card: "You don't need pants to have a great Christmas"
Christmas Card: "Just peeking in to wish you a Merry Christmas"
Christmas Card: "Hamming it up for Christmas so my Mommy stops torturing me, I mean taking my picture"There you go! I have mailed out the cards and if you haven't received yours, I apologize, I have run out, so I will post the card here in a few days so you can see it. I'm sorry again we couldn't mail them out to everyone, we do want to wish you the Merriest of Christmas' and Happiest of New Years in 2010!
Snowy
There's something about little boys and playing in the snow. The first morning we woke up to snow on the ground this is the conversation Lee and I had.
Me: Lee, look outside, there's snow on the ground.
Lee: Know?
Me: Yeah, look out the back window.
Lee: Oh KNOW! I need my glubs (gloves)
Me: Why do you need your gloves?
Lee: To play in the know (snow)
He was so good about wearing them and keeping them on too! I was very proud of Lee!! He had so much fun and when we came inside he told me that he was "so tired" and took a good 3 hour nap that day. I had so much fun watching him run around and stomp in the "know".
Decorating the Tree
I never would have imagined decorating the tree would have been this fun! For some reason I envisioned Lee not being too into it, or vice versa, being a little too into and breaking something. We have lots of ornaments that are either paper, wood or metal all of which are unbreakable, so we dove in and started decorating.Lee remembered that at the bottom of the tree went the "polar express" train. Papa and Grandma Shoes gave us a tree train last year that was put away almost immediately because we were afraid he would break it. This year is a different story. He was SO excited to get the train set up that it was up before any of the ornaments were on the tree. He just laid there and watched it go round and round. It was so neat to see him so excited.
It took about an hour for the train to wear off and then we started putting on ornaments. He was so excited for his "polar express" train, that I got out the official Polar Express bell and gave that to Lee to hang on the tree first. He kept shaking it by his ear to hear the bell. It was so sweet and such a great memory that I will cherish. He loves the movie and I'm so glad he has the train and the bell for the season.
Lastly, we put the angel on top, Lee again was a huge helper. He clung to Steve as if Steve would throw him up there and let go. We got it up and turned off the lights and Lee said "oh SO beautiful". As you can see, Lee put all... I mean A.L.L... of his ornaments in one teeny, tiny section of the tree. For the first week, he would take off a few and redecorate, but he always put them back in that one section!
Merry Christmas everyone. I hope you enjoyed decorating your tree as much as we did. It really makes me want Christmas to come that much sooner!!!
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