zoo trip 2011

So it has been a week since we went to the zoo and I am FINALLY putting the pictures up.  WARNING: Picture overload!

As soon as we got there Greyson had to get the map so he could tell us all where to go.

He was pretty happy to be sitting up watching everything going on around him in the wagon.

That's one happy baby.

I sure hope this doesn't mean he is going to like snakes, he sure won't fit in our family.  His mom, dad, and sister will be freaking out if he comes up carrying one of those.



Addison wasn't feeling great, but she was excited to tell everyone that the elephant was making nuggets.

Of course one of her favorites was the fish.  Later she asked me for her fishing pole.

This was right before the duck bit her finger.  She didn't think it was very funny.

Greyson liked watching the ducks...or maybe he was just happy that Aunt Sharon wanted to cart him around. 

I think she was starting to get hot and hungry but she did finally decide to look in the water at the sting rays.  She didn't want to touch one though.

Later she decided to stick her fingers close to the water.  I didn't realize how close one of the stingrays was.

This Chimp was busy playing with his poop, and apparently Addison was having none of it, she decided to just walk away.

Greyson didn't care if he played with his poop, he says you should see the stuff I make.  Huge messes I bet mommy feels like you do right now ;)

Like his hat?  He actually wore it for a while..until he realized it was on there.

She was watching the orangutang playing in a bucket, she thought it was pretty funny.  I think you can tell how she feels from this picture though.

We were getting close to the end of the day, and neither kid had a melt down.  I was pretty impressed with how well an 8 month old did, and how well Addison did considering she was NOT feeling well, but still insisted on going to see the animals.

She even took her turn at pulling brother.  What a big helper...until we got to the next animal and she just dropped the handle.

There was one monkey in this exhibit when we got there, he came over to look at Greyson, and then it was like he hollered to his buddies to come check him out.  Two more came out and were looking at him but acted like they were trying not too.  We had fun with the commentary on that one.

Addison thoguht she needed to pose with this snake for daddy and GJ to see.  I wss surprised she would sit this close to him but wouldn't stand on the wall by the hippo's.

Greyson had fun poseing with the crocidile in the background there.  He really was such a great little boy that day.

Addison thought this guy needed some help swimming so she is holding him up.

It was nice to go to STL for something other than a surgery, appointment, or hospital stay.  We are planning a trip back in September with daddy, I think both kids will have fun with that.

Health wise, Greyson does have the cold that Addison and daddy are now getting over and you can hear it in his lungs when he breathes, I am sure that is the reason for his low saturations.  We go back to Dr. Holly on Monday to have his sturations checked again, and see if they are closer to his normal range.  If they aren't I am going to request someone take a listen to him and make sure that his lungs sound clear before I get to worried about it.  If they don't then we will go back the week after when he is hopefully over the cold.  Dr. Rahimi suggested we might have to put him on a medicine to help dialte his Pulmonary Arteries if his sats stay low, and I believe it is a life long medicine.  There is another name for it that they use, but the one I remember, and everyone else will too, is...Viagra.  What you wanna put my baby on viagra?  AllI could picture was poor Greyson walking around...ughhum...innappropriately.  The nurse assured me that 99% of the time it doesn't have that effect on them.  

Saturation check

Today we took Greyson to the new tiger pediatrics office. It was awesome!!! He weighed in at 17 lbs 10 oz so he gained 8 oz in a month which isn't bad, although I really thought he was much bigger. His saturations however were, in true Greyson fashion, in the mid to low 70's!!! He should be and has been in the mid to low 80's and he should be pretty stable after his Glenn. I called cardiology and Dr. Rahimi is out until tomorrow but I spoke to a nurse who said it may be a fluke in the machine or how it was reading or his little cold. He hasn't been near as bad as sister but he does get mildly congested when be sleeps however he bad been awake hours before the check. She is going to talk to Dr. Rahimi tomorrow when he gets back and call and let me know but we will probably have his sats checked again next week to see if the cold is the culprit behind his low saturations. Hopefully they will be good then. He doesn't have any cyanotic spells and his cuticles stay pretty pink. I will admit I am a teeny tiny bit worried but I think I always will be a little worried with him. I am a worry wart when it comes to my kids.

Both Addison and Greyson LOVED the zoo and I will get pictures of that up soon. I am not loading all those pictures from my phone. Addison did have a lot of fun and Greyson loved the puffins and hippos a lot.

Look what I can do...

Look at what I can do now:

I can sit up all by myself!!!!

Playing with my turtle

Opps I fell down, but I am happy about it.

I LOVE this toy!!!

Greyson is doing awesome at sitting up by himself.  He will sit up for quiet some time without anyone around.  Today he was pushing up on his arms and I helped him get up on his knees too, he stayed up there for a few seconds. 

Upcoming news!!!

We are going to the zoo this friday, this is Greyson's first zoo trip even though he has been so close to it for 3 weeks for his short life ;)  Addison went last year and loved it, she is so excited to go this year.  She told me today her favorite animal is the yion!

I will put these pictures up soon.

A year ago today...

I dreaded this day coming, with Nate being on his bear hunt I really thought it would be a hard day to spend alone.  It was one year ago today that we were both excited to go find out if we were having another girl or a boy.  We would have been happy with a girl but both of us wanted a boy pretty bad and with Nate's family history we pretty much new we would be having a boy in October.  She put the ultra sound wand on my tummy and of course little baby no name, as we called "it", was dancing around like he always did on his ultra sounds.  We had made it clear that we wanted to know what we were having, i had even had the tech guess at the 12 week scan, so she was interested to see if her guess was correct.  Little baby no name was eager to tell us what he was, and showed his boy parts right away.  We were excited, texting people, posting on Facebook, and enjoying all the boy things that were in our future.  We weren't paying total attention to the ultra sound or what it was she was looking at because we were so scared with Addison's ultra sound because they would look at this or that a million times to get good pictures, and this baby boy never did what we wanted him to do.  We weren't surprised when she looked at the heart a bunch of times.  She did say I can't get a good picture of his heart they may want you to come back in a week or so to get some more pictures.  We left the ultra sound room to wait on our pictures before heading over to see the Dr as happy as could be, we were going to have one of each a boy and a girl!  Nate needed to go to work and I was just running over so they could weigh me and listen to his heart beat, which we had just heard, and we weren't seeing Dr. Jones since he was out that day so Nate went on ahead to work.  I waited for Christi to come out and give me my packet, she sure was taking FOREVER, then I went over to see the Dr.  I got in right away, which wasn't too odd considering I went in the morning and they weren't too busy anyway.  They didn't even weigh me just took me straight to a room.  Addison was playing behind the door and right as I was saying you better move because the Dr will hit you with the door, she came in and hit her with the door.  Addison is crying and the Dr tells me that there is something wrong with his heart.  She says the tech already called over and talked to Tara (My Dr's nurse) and they had set up a special ultra sound for me right away and I was to head over there.  She also said that this was a little more high tech and it could be that they didn't quiet get the pictures right.  Great I had a 15 month old and I sent my husband away.  I called my mom and told her there was something wrong with the baby's heart and I needed her to come watch Addison for me while we had another ultra sounds.  What does she say "Are you kidding?"  No this is not something I would kid about.  When we got in the parking lot to drive to the other ultra sound I called Nate and told him there was something wrong with the baby's heart and I had to have another ultra sounds.  What does he say?  "Are you kidding?"  I broke down in tears.  Telling Nate made it all real, there was something wrong with my baby and I didn't know if he would live or die, I was attached to this baby, I felt him kick me, I knew his routines of awake and asleep.  I couldn't lose him!  The next ultra sound was a blur, the Dr told us there was a problem with the walls between his heart chambers and a specialist from Cardinal Glennon would be down the next Wednesday to take a more detailed look and tell us exactly what was wrong.  I do remember him telling us that if we wanted to terminate the pregnancy he could arrange it.  His words "We don't do that here, but we know people who do"  WHAT?!?!  Is this some back alley thing, I was appalled at the way he said this to us.  I bawled like a baby, I couldn't ask questions, all I could think about was my little baby inside and I had no idea what his life, if he had one at all, was going to be like.  We went out to lunch to take our minds off of it, and once we got to the restaurant Nate broke down to.  In the short time between finding out we were having a boy and the time we found out about his heart, he too had made plans for his son, teaching him to play baseball, hunting, fishing, was he going to be able to do any of these things?  It was the longest memorial day weekend ever, both dreading and hopeing for good news on Wednesday.  I researched the hospital he would be born in and was VERY comfortable with their NICU and that I could stay with him and the Dr's there and felt a lot better about the situation.  Now I just needed to know my guy was going to be alright. 

Check Up

Greyson went to the Dr. today to have his weight and saturations checked.  He weighed in at 17 lbs 2 oz.  and his saturations were 85%!!!  This is awesome news.  He as usual had me a little worried before the appointment.  He has been acting fine but I always worry we will get some surprise we are not expecting but today we didn't.  He goes back in a month and we will see what they are then, I am sure they will be great but of course I will be a little worried before the appointment.  On a plus we will be going to the new office so that will be exciting. 

Next friday he has physical therapy and a meeting with First Steps to discuss what I want him to be doing in 6 months so I have to think about that.  I always try to aim a little high but I am never upset if he doesn't do something.  He will do things on his own time and I have come to learn that.  It feels like we haven't been to a cardiologist in FOREVER!  I guess that is a good thing too, we will see him again in July. 

As usual for Greyson here lateley he is doing excellent. 

New food

While on a trip to find Greyson a sippy cup he will actually drink from at toys r us this weekend we found plum organics baby food. Each pouch has a fruit and veggie in it and they are color coded so that he gets lots of different color foods. We got one of each kind and we are working on trying them all to see which he really likes. So far he has had apple, corn, & sweet potato and broccoli & apple. He LOVED both kinds. I love that they have both fruit and veggie in each meal and that there are so many different kinds of foods in them. Gerber doesn't make spinach or broccoli that I have seen. They also have puffs that are both fruit and veggie in one which is a better snack I think. I found them cheapest on diapers.com so I think we will order from there once we see what ones he likes. The only draw back is that they do not have meats so we will probably get those in the Gerber when the time comes, although Addison hated the pureed meats. she is a total carnivor now though. ;)

Otherwise Greyson is doing excellent. He rolls from both front to back and back to front. His PT is proud of him and has shown me some ways to help him strengthen his arms in preparation for crawling and work on sitting up in the future. She said she is happy with him not setting up until 8-9 months. He is progressing quiet well with it and I think he will be sitting up by then.

Some of you get my blog updates via email and it posts on Facebook so I will probably take a few names off of the email list Wednesday when I am at my actual computer. If you want to stay on just reply to the email and let me know you want to keep getting them by email.

Greyson 6 Month pictures

Greyson's 6 Month pictures:

He was not very happy and obviously got tired during the shoot so he napped and we took pictures.  He doesn't have near as many clothing changes as Addison did but we got some GREAT pictures!

The day of doctors...

So our first appointment was at 11 am for Addison to see the urologist. Apparently Boone didn't send the results up from her test in December so they were waiting on a report from them  I  didn't know that so it ended up I explained the test results before Boone got a report faxed up. Everything should heal itself and she will stay on antibiotics daily and retest in November or December, which is gonna be a pain now that she is potty trained. She won't pee in anything other than a potty. So they are really gonna have to fill her bladder to get her to go on the table. I fear she will be embarrassed if she potties on the table. 

On to Mr. Greyson. His nursery follow up went well. He is where he should be developmentally. He is SO close to rolling and they showed me how to help him work on that. He is also REALLY strong in his legs but needs to work more on his arm strength so that will be our goal over the next few days. He got a new toy that should help him work on pushing up with his arms. 

Cardiology...no news there. He is doing great. Sats were in the mid 70's which is alright. Dr. Rahimi would rather see them 80-85 but 70's are ok too. He has good flow through his Glenn. I could see it in his echo which was pretty neat. Addison and daddy fell asleep waiting for the echo and so did Greyson which was helpful for his echo. He slept through most of the echo but woke up when dr rahimi came in to mess with him. He was awake from about 10:15 this morning until about 3:30 when he got his echo cat nap. He was in an excellent mood though and it was nice to see him so awake since that's not something you would see before surgery. 

We were able to make our donation of leg warmers and hats to help make other kiddo's hospital stay more comfortable. Once Greyson outgrows his plastic cleanable toys we will donate some of them to the hospital as well. It will be nice to give back. We have gotten such great care from everyone at cardinal Glennon and it makes our situation so much easier. I used to worry that we wouldn't meet nice drs. That some of them might be sort of cocky or push their own opinions as dr grant did but all of the drs and facilities have been so great. (what does dr grant know anyway).  Anyway I'm glad to be able to give back. Oh and in case you were wondering how fat the little man has gotten...he was 15 lbs 1 oz!!!  He was 12 lb 10 oz when he left the hospital 5 weeks ago after his surgery. The boy is doing so much better. So well incactwe don't see cardiology for 3 MONTHS!!  We will have saturations checked monthly with his pediatrician but not seeing a dr weekly is both exciting and scary. I know dr rahimi really cares about Greyson and wouldn't do anything he disnt feel totally safe with so we are happy about that.  

Busy Tomorrow...

So tomorrow is our day full of Dr's appointments for both kids.  Addison has a urology appointment at 11, lunch at the lovely Glennon Cafe, which means mommy and daddy are getting the fruit and yogurt parfaits that we so love ;)  Greyson has his nursery follow up at 1 and cardiology at 2.  I am hopeful that the nursery follow up doesn't take too long but it sounds like a Dr will check him over and a PT and maybe OT.  Not really sure why when he sees a PT monthly already and I know my boy isn't behind.  He has already rolled from his belly to his back and is SO close to rolling from back to tummy.  I guess it would probably help if he actually liked to be on the floor.  He wants to sit up so bad and isn't far from it.  He laughs and smiles all the time.  His sister didn't do much until she was 8 or 9 months and then she did everything.  She sat up, crawled and pulled her self up on things within a week or two.  He will get there I have no doubts.  The poor boy has been through a lot in his short 6 months... Yes that is right I said 6 months.  Tomorrow Mr. Greyson is 6 months old.  My how time has flown and how we have had so much happen in such a short time. 

I found my feet!

My first movie!

Addison's First movie!!!

Shopping... Again?!?

Shopping Saturdays!

Rockin' my leg warmers!



Synagis and saturations

Greyson went in today for his synagis shot and saturation check. Addison started feeling yucky with a fever like she had the day before right when we got to the office. Yesterday we gave her Tylenol and it went away and she was fine this morning. She had a temperature of 103.7 at the dr today and it was 103 yesterday as well. I was holding her when she did G's saturations so I didn't get to look at the machine. I was surprised when she said they were 87-90!!! She even put it on his other hand just to be sure and it read 88 as well. He didn't cry much when he got his shots either and he weighed 14 lbs 7 oz today so he is growing pretty good.

Addison took some Tylenol while we were there and not so willingly let Dr. Meyer check her out. With her renal history and the fact that she missed a day or two of meds that worried us. She was saying that her legs hurt and having me and Nate kiss them, but there is no rash anywhere on her. She also told me today that her potty hurt which had me worried that it might be another UTI. We tried to get her to go potty there but we had just gone so she didn't go. We took the stuff home with us and finally at 5 she went. I took it in and they did a dipstick test on it which was negative. They are doing a culture on it to see if it grows anything. I have to call if any new symptoms come up or she still has a fever after 72 hrs. I don't know what it is but I'd be happy if it cleared itself up.

No News is good news

Greyson has been doing Awesome!!!  He gained a pound in a week and as of last Tuesday was up to 14 lbs.  He eats like a pig and has Rice & Apple cereal 2-3 oz in the morning and straight Rice cereal in the evening 2-3 more oz.  He has started playing in his jumper and LOVES it so much more than Addison did.  He is full of smiles and giggles and is such a different baby than he was before surgery.  I can't believe how little energy he had and we didn't realize it.  I am still nervous all the time but slowly getting over it.

He now loves bathes which he SCREAMED through before.  I think he is ready to go swimming and Addison is so ready to go so I feel like a trip to the ARC may be in our future. 

Here is a progression of his scar it is looking VERY good!!

6 Days After Surgery:

1 Week After Surgery

2 Weeks After Surgery

3 Weeks After Surgery

1 Month After Surgery