We're Done!!

Yesterday we had a full day of Dr. appointments down in the cities for Mr. Elliot. We had 2 ultrasounds plus met with his Hematologist and Urologist, and even had a surprise visit with his Nephrologist. We were originally supposed to see his Nephrologist but were called several weeks ago saying she would be out of the office and we had to reschedule for November. This was really disappointing since she makes the call on when Elliot is done with his sodium supplements. While waiting for his urology appointment we saw her walk by and long story short she and the urologist teamed up and saw him at the same time which was awesome!

The results of the tests:

  His kidneys are about the same as they were back in May. They are still dilated, but since they aren't worse and he hasn't had any further infections we can continue to watch and wait. We'll go down in 3 months for a follow up and just keep an eye on them. If he gets any more UTI/Kidney infections he goes back on his medicine and we talk surgery - praying we don't get to that point. The Dr. said in general boys who do out grow hydronephrosis will do so by around 2 or 2.5 years of age. His nephrologist was very pleased that things were stable and he was growing so well that pending the results of his lab draws we will be off his sodium supplements for a month trial period. If after a month his levels are still good we get to be off for good! That is huge, he hates the sodium and we hate giving it to him!!

  His other ultrasound on his blood clot also led to good news. His clot is continuing to get smaller. Because of this we get to be DONE WITH LOVENOX SHOTS!!! You have no idea how happy we are about this. I did a quick bit of calculating and we have stuck a needle in his chubby little legs almost 200 times! 200 little bruises on his legs. It sucks! But we are DONE!!!!!!

3 Years of Love

3 years ago today was such a wonderful day!

I got all dolled up and squeezed into my lace dress 

So I could go meet up with this crazy guy and takes lots of pictures

 And we started our life together, hand in hand,

and side by side.

With the support of our friends and family

We became husband and wife, and our lives will forever be changed, be better, and be filled with love.

Thank you love for 3 wonderful years. I love you more than I can express, can't wait for the next 3, 30, and 60 years with you!

Ding Dong...

Ding Dong The Wicked Witch is Dead....

Can you guess why that song has been stuck in my head today? 

(Please note that I am not calling my son the wicked witch, I just had to laugh when I walked back into E's room this morning and saw this)

 Apparently playing on top of the play mat is sooo yesterday!

In other Elliot News/Pictures

Bath time has become so much fun with him. Ever since he found out that splashing in his tub makes me laugh we play lots of games during bath time. 

Even though he isn't quite crawling he can sure get to where he wants to be. I put him down over by the teddy bear and came back a minute later and he had rolled himself over to the rock n play and was trying to tackle it. Crawling isn't far from our future, and I can't decide how I feel about that. He can get up on his hands and knees and will move either his hands or his legs but hasn't figured out how to do both at the same time!

The best news of the week is that we have finally had some success in Operation: Sleep in the Crib. He now only takes about 20-30 minutes to settle himself down for naps and will sleep for a little while. It is so great to see progress!

New things

I love watching Elliot learn new things. It seems these days there are new things to brag about every day! Some good, some bad. He's learning how to sit by himself, how to grow razor sharp teeth to bite with (ouch!!!) how to play on his stomach without getting mad at the world, how to pull himself over to the wall while I'm changing his diaper so he can scratch the wall and flake paint off in the process, to give bear hugs and kisses. What we've been working on this week is how to sleep in a crib (during naps, I've been entirely too selfish to give up my nights so far - bad mamma). Yikes, I knew it was going to be tough, but this week has just sucked. After so many hours of crying, snuggles, researching new techniques to sleep train, and hoping he isn't going to hate me later in life we've gotten only a few 20 minutes naps out of him. Translation: overly tired baby and stressed out mom. Yesterday was our best nap - a whole 30 minutes!- and I took a picture of him sleeping in his pack n play just so I could remember how peaceful he looked and to keep me moving forward in this frustrating process.

Another new thing he is learning this week is to use a sippy cup. He sort of gave up bottles again so I thought I would pick one up in the store and try it. He loves it! Still not super great at it, but it is really cute to watch him!

I can't wait to see what new things he learns next - like the fake cry he has going on right now... oh joy!

Lately....

I know I've been MIA in the blog world for quite a while. Sorry about that. But here is a quick recap of what life has been like lately.

We're still working on getting settled into the new house. I hadn't taken any pictures because I haven't gotten the house to a point where I like to show it off, but I don't think we'll get there for awhile. So here are a few "as-is" pictures from this morning.

What little boy doesn't need 4 beds in his room? We had him sleep in his rock in play (that's where he is in this picture) because of our nomad status for the first chunk of his life, but now he refuses to sleep laying flat in his crib or pack n play. Any advise on how to transition him to his crib? I'm at a loss. I've tried letting him play with toys until he falls asleep, crying himself to sleep, laying him down while he is asleep - but he wakes up instantly and freaks out. I need to figure something out soon because he is quickly outgrowing the rock n play.

This is what I'm greeted with in the mornings. Reason #5753367 why I love him - He sleeps from 9:30pm - 8:00am and then gives me the best "I missed you and am so excited to see you" smiles when I walk in.

In between getting settled in and working on the never ending to-do list we've enjoyed some good down time as a family

Elliot is enjoying his new big boy highchair and learning to eat rice cereal. He is also working on pushing his bottom two teeth out/leaving a trail of drool behind him.  Sigh he's getting way to big already.

So that's our life in a nutshell - enjoying having our own place, enjoying our summer (lake time this weekend - YEAH!!!!!) and most of all enjoying our little/growing too fast Elliot.

House Progress

It's been awhile since I updated with what we've been up to at the new house. We took a couple of weeks off with all Elliot's health issues, but we're getting back into the swing of things. 

We've gotten the bedrooms just about finished with paint. Now we're ready to start trim. I'm not sure if I've put this angle of the master bedroom up. This shows the living room, then we have our closet, a small linen closet and our bathroom.

Elliot's room. Two walls have the stripes and the other two are just the brown color.

Guest room. 

Before the craziness of life hit Bryce and his friend Dan got the floor in the main living area down. It looks great. While we were stuck in the hospital our carpets and appliances arrived. It was so much fun to come home to a house that felt so much more like a home! We were even able to take our shoes off inside the house for the first time! What a great feeling!!

Now that I have these shiny new appliances it makes me even more excited to get the cupboards whipped into shape. I can't decide if I want to go with dark cupboards to show off the stainless steel, or keep it light to match the woodwork. Thoughts?

A closer look at the floors

It's not going to be too much longer before we can start moving our things in, and we cannot wait!

We're Home!!!!!!!

Well I think the title says it all. We finally got discharged yesterday afternoon, and man were we ready. We had to sit around and wait for his blood thinner medicine do its thing and give us the magic numbers. And yesterday the Xa levels reached .5 which is the lowest number in the therapeutic range but hey its enough to let us get discharged. We found out at 1:00 pm and then had to wit around until 5:00 p.m. for all his medicine to get filled at the pharmacy and the discharge papers to get finished.

While at home we will give his antibiotic through his PICC once a day, sodium supplements twice a day (basically salt water we have to force him to swallow), and inject his Lovenox (blood thinners) twice a day. In addition we get to go to the lab twice a week for blood draws to monitor all his levels to make sure his kidneys are doing their job, So its a lot but if it makes E better it is worth it. We will also do a quick follow up in the cities in a month and then in three months do a full fledged follow up with ultrasounds and meet with the nephrologist and urologist too.

Thank you again for all your prayers and messages and support. It was such a scary and stressful time but we definitely saw God's hand of guidance and protection through it all!