Ho! Ho! Ho!

Christmas Sunday

We started getting ready for church at 9:00. At 10:45, everyone was dressed and we still had 15 minutes to spare, so I thought we would take a QUICK picture. Ha! We were 10 minutes late to church, and this is the best we could do...






We are having family pictures taken tomorrow with my whole family...wish us luck!

Gratitude

"Gratitude, thankfulness, or appreciation is a positive emotion or attitude in acknowledgment of a benefit that one has received or will receive."
I feel like I am generally a pretty grateful person, but spending over a week in the hospital can really put life into perspective and the word gratitude has taken on a whole new meaning in my life. The first night that Blake was in the ICU was a sleepless night for me. I was so worried about my baby and was overwhelmed with emotion as I thought about how we ended up in the ICU and what might have happened had we not gone to Blake's doctor's appointment that day. At 4:00 in the morning, I sat in the rocking chair (aka my bed for the next 8 nights) and rocked my sweet baby boy. I was so scared and pleaded and prayed that my baby would get better. The walls in the ICU are paper thin and as I sat in the rocking chair, I could hear the doctors enter the room next to ours. I couldn't understand everything that was being said, but I did hear the doctors tell the parents in the next room that they had tried everything to heal their son, but the medications weren't working and the only thing keeping their son alive was the medications he was on and the medical equipment that was helping him breathe. I then heard his parents tell the doctors that they understood what was happening, but that they weren't quite ready and that they wanted a few more hours with their son to say goodbye. Tears filled my eyes and my heart ached for those parents. How do you say goodbye to your little boy? Why now? Why him? I held Blake a little tighter that night. The next day, we were moved to a different room and later that night, I passed by our old room and found the room next to ours empty. I couldn't even imagine what those parents were going through. I learned that night that no matter what I am going through, there is always someone going through something harder and that as difficult as my trials and challenges may be, I would never trade them for anyone elses. I am now more aware of many of the things that I have taken for granted in the past, like my own health and the health of my family. I am more grateful for my warm house that I get to live in and the many comforts that I am able to enjoy. I am more grateful for the county that we live in and the freedom that we have. My goal for the new year is to focus more on what I do have and not worry about what I don't have and that, to me, is the true meaning of gratitude.

Our little trooper

Blake was such a good baby in the hospital. He flirted with all the nurses and was smiling all the time even though they were poking at him 24/7. He was such a trooper...he was much braver than mom and dad!

Getting his first EKG

Smiling in his hospital bed

Anya was so nice to track down a swing so that Blake wouldn't be so bored. It turned out to be a little ghetto and even with new batteries, it barely moved. Thanks for trying Anya!

Look at his cute little hospital gown!

More good news!

Blake got to come home from the hospital yesterday! On Friday the doctors told us that he may be in the hospital for as long as a month, so you can imagine how excited we were when they told us that he could go home on Wednesday! He had a huge turnaround starting Sunday evening and continued to get better over the next couple days. I think he is as excited to be home as we are to have him home. He is doing great. He is on 3 different medications that he has to take twice a day. We have to listen to his heart 3 times per day to make sure it isn't beating too fast or too slow. We will be following up with cardiologists regularly until Blake is 1 and then they will try to wean him off of his medications. If he is able to maintain his heart rate on his own, he will not need to have an ablation, otherwise, they will do it when he weighs about 30 pounds, which at the rate he's growing, could be sooner that we think:) We feel so blessed to have had such great doctors and nurses and such supportive family and friends to help us through this. Once we realized that Blake was going to be okay, we took some pictures to document the whole ordeal, so I will post those later, but just wanted to let everyone know that he is home and doing well!

Update

The cardiologists just came in to see Blake and after a rough and emotional weekend where I felt like we weren't making any progress, I had to share some good news. Last night, Blake converted into a normal heart rhythm and stayed in one for 5 hours, which is the longest he has stayed in since we have been here. They were able to turn off the IV drip that has been running since Thursday and he is now taking all of his medications by mouth. He still converts back and forth between a normal rhythm and the tachycardia, but he seems to be staying in a normal rhythm more than he is out of one. He was able to get some good sleep last night and he was a very happy boy this morning. Our nurse today let me take off all of the leads and lines that he is hooked up to and I was able to give him a bath. They have the little pink buckets that they use to give newborns their first baths and we filled it up and stuck him in there and he looked at me like "mom, I don't fit in here!" It was pretty funny! They are going to do an echo of his heart today to make sure that his cardiac function hasn't declined from last week. If he is able to keep his heart rate down and stay in a normal rhythm most of the day today without the IV drip running, he may be able to transfer out of the ICU in the morning! They also placed a PICC line on Saturday so they are able to give meds and draw labs without having to poke him, which makes him and me very happy. He has been laying in his crib in only a diaper so they could monitor his heart and his color, etc all week and they let me put clothes on him last night. Now that he has clothes on and they have been able to remove some of his lines, he is looking more and more like my cuddly, healthy baby. Thank you everyone for your fasting, your faith and your prayers. I know we are not getting through this alone!

Blake update

We have had many friends and family calling wanting an update on Blake. For those of you that don't know, Blake was admitted to the ICU on Tuesday because his heart was beating about 240 beats per minute and a normal 2 month old should have a heart rate of 120-140. They did an EKG, chest Xray and an Echo of his heart and found that he is in what's called suprventricular tachycardia. The form of this that Blake has is pretty rare and it is called Persistent Junctional Reciprocating Tachycardia...I know it's confusing, but basically he has an extra electrical impulse in his heart that is stimulating his heart to contract continuously without relaxing or giving it time to fill up with enough blood. His heart is only putting out 30% of the blood volume that it should be. As you can imagine, he is very tired, it's like running a marathon day after day without giving your heart a rest. They have tried several times to do a cardioversion, which basically means that they use medications to stop his heart and then re-start it with the hope that when it restarts, it will be in a normal rhythm. So far, each time they have converted him, it only lasts a few seconds and then he is right back in SVT. They have him on several medications to slow his heart rate down and some that make his heart contract stronger to help put out more blood. His heart rate has been in the 180's and 190's for that past 2 days, which is an improvement, but still too high. If they are not able to convert his heart into a normal rhythm, they will have to do an ablation, which means that they basically freeze or burn the extra electrical impulse in his heart so that it does not stimulate the extra heart beats. He has to weight about 30 pounds to do the procedure, so they won't be able to do it until he is about 3 years old. They will treat him with medications until then to keep his heart rate down so that it does not cause permanent damage to his heart. The doctors seem very confident that they will be able to treat this either through medications or through the ablation. They keep telling us that the medications take a long time to work and to be patient. We know that he will be in the ICU until at least Tuesday. Once they are able to stabilize his heart rate, we will be able to take him home. We are trying to be patient and we know that he is in good hands. Thank you everyone for your phone calls, your thoughts and your prayers. We love you and will keep you updated.

Blake's Blessing

Happy Halloween!

My little Glow worm. He thought he should eat his costume:)



Aubrey, Jeana, Carli and I were 80's rockers (Thanks RockBand for the props!)

John was a basketball player...boring!

Popeye and Olive Oil aka Jason and Nikki

All Smiles

Okay, so he may not be smiles all the time, but he was this morning! Blake has colic and every night around 6:00, he starts to cry inconsolably until he finally wears himself out and falls asleep around 11:00. We have tried EVERYTHING: Mylicon, Gripe water, bouncing, singing, baths, running the vacuum, fans, swings and our doctors latest recommendation, acidophilis drops. The only thing that seems to work is a long ride in the car...and thank goodness for that! Despite this, we still love our Blake boy and we love that he is such a happy boy all day because it makes it a lot easier to endure the crying at night!

One Month Old!

This past month has just flown by. Blake is already growing out of his newborn clothes , he is staying awake longer during the day and he even watched Baby Einstein with John yesterday and he liked it! My newborn is getting big! I tell him every day to stop growing and I have a feeling that I am going to continue telling him this for the rest of his life! We love him more and more every day, if that is possible.
Here are a few of his newborn pictures. The little stinker wasn't going to miss a minute of his first photo shoot, so I don't have any sleeping newborn pictures...

Is Anyone Else Excited....

For Halloween!?!
I'm putting up all of my Halloween decorations and I am so excited!
Here is my newest favorite decoration:

My friends from paint class made this and I had to have it!
I absolutely love this time of the year. I love the fall weather (although I do miss summer already!), I love the fall leaves and I love that we dress up in crazy costumes and people give us candy for doing so! Maybe it's the kid in me, but I still get excited for Halloween!

Sailor's Blessing

My cute little niece Sailor was blessed on Sunday. My brother did a great job with her blessing and Sailor looked so cute in her blessing outfit!

My siblings (minus Bart, he had to work:(

My sisters with Blake and Sailor

Don't you love her skirt!?!

2 Weeks

I can't believe our little guy is two weeks old already! We went to the doctor on Monday and he now weighs 8 pounds and is 21 inches long. He is in the 50th percentile for his weight and the 75th percentile for his height. His daddy is hoping he will be tall!
Here's what we've been up to for the past couple of weeks:
After Blake's first bath at home. He cried at home as much as he did in the hospital! This kid hates to be cold!

Blake had jaundice and had to be on a bili blanket for the first week. I was so excited when he finally got to come off it so I could hold my baby like a normal newborn!
First doctors appointment. We had to go to the doctor everyday for the first week to have his Bilirubin level drawn. He hated having his heel poked, but hated being undressed to get weighed even more!

Our little Glow Worm. I had no idea how fitting it would be when I bought Blake his Glow Worm Halloween costume!


Sun Bathing


Blake already has some good friends.
The first is his cute cousin Sailor. They are only 3 weeks apart and I am so excited for them to grow up together!
Proud papa's




Destri thought that because Blake has so much hair, he needed a bow in it, so she took off Sailor's and put it on Blake! Look at his face...I don't think he liked it!

His other little buddy is my friend Heather's baby Ryker. He is also about 3 weeks older than Blake and we have all kinds of fun planned for the two of them!


And we can't forget his older, wiser buddy, Cayden. Cade loves to hold Baby Blake. It is so cute!

We had to start him young...John couldn't wait to take Blake to the golf course. Hopefully he loves to golf as much as his dad does!


I'm not sure what he thought of golf...he slept the entire time!

Blake is such a good baby and he is so dang cute (I'm his mom, I can say that!) I knew that I would love being a mom, but this is even better than I imagined! Most people take a chance when they get married that their husband will be a good father. I already knew that John was a good father, but watching him with his baby boy has been so much fun. He can't wait to hold him in the morning or when he gets home from work. He calls him his "Bitty Buddy" and I think it is so cute! We love our little Blake and feel so lucky to be his parents!