West Coat Bound

We are headed west tomorrow to see some old friends we haven't seen in about 5 years! We'll be gone a week. Until next time..................................

Other Stuff

Hosea is healing nicely. He recently got a buzz cut, I'll post pictures later.

Shiloh has had a cough for about 2 weeks. I was doing all her allergy/asthma stuff I'm suppose to when that starts. But we headed to the Dr. this afternoon and she got some antibiotics. She'll be fine.

News Feed

Aggie had a gastric reflux scan today. I didn't know what this was going into it, perhaps i would have packed differently?? Thankfully I arranged to drop the children off at a friends house, I'm so thankful for sweet friends who love on my babies for me! So..... I knew Aggie would have to eat or drink something, since she could not eat 4 hours prior to the test. And she did, have to drink some radio-active formula. I was however not prepared to hear that she would be strapped to a table for an hour so a machine could take pictures of her radioactive formula going down her every 20 seconds. I immediately grew anxious upon the news. Deep breath, think scripture......... "Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." Phil 4:6-7 So I stared making my requests known...... "Lord please let her drink her radioactive drink, please fill her with peace, let her rest in your hands, allow her to fall asleep, please don't let her scream the whole time..........etc" I text friends to request prayer whom I knew would do so with me immediately. And praise the Lord who hears us!!! Aggie was Velcroed to the table and reinforced with several wraps of tape..... She looked up at me as this was happening and smiled cautiously.... I smiled back and told her what a sweet girl she was. About five min. into her confinement, she wasn't feeling so comfortable anymore and made herself known. I continued to pray, after about 5 minutes of fussiness, she stopped and just looked around, I sang to her and stroked her head, and then she dozed of for the remaining 40 minutes of the test. I was so thankful to God for hearing my prayer and answering it so faithfully. I am overwhelmed with gladness. She will have another scan, except "gastric emptying" Aug. 5th. I'm certain she will receive the same tie-down treatment, so I'm going to start praying now that it might go similarly.

Aggies One Year Photo Shoot

The House Date

I highly recommend this!! The last few weeks Mike and I have been taking the opportunity on Saturday nights to have a House date. We will put the kids down about 30 min. early, make something yummy, look presentable and eat delicious food with one another. Sometimes we light candles sometimes we don't, add a bottle of wine and .... ta...da.......... a house date. Steak is on the menu tonight, yumm! I LOVE it!

Da' Girls

I was blessed to be released from my normal duties to spend about 24hrs. away at a beach resort to celebrate a friends 30th birthday. It was a lovely time to celebrate a sweet woman, do some shopping, eat good food, and soak up some rays. I was eager to get back to the clan this afternoon, and thankful for my time of refreshment.

North Carolina

If you are from North Carolina, I want you to know that Shiloh misses you dearly and prays for your "protection" regularly.

Hosea's Surgery

You might be thinking... what Hosea had surgery. Since he was a newborn he's been seeing a urologist. We've known there might be a potential for some work to need to be done since then. We did a "wait and see" approach. Then we tried some cream, which kind-of worked. But it all ended in surgery this morning.

Surgery went well for Hosea. He had a little more work done than originally anticipate. There was the small part on the side originally planned, but upon further inspection the underneath side had some significant work that needed done. Also under the microscope they realized that he has meatual stenosis, causing the poor aim, and some other potential problems. So they also fixed that. We are home now, he is doing fine, just has some wobbly legs.

Cooperation

A morning snuggle picture.

Smile and look at the camera.

The best one!

Ugh, I forgot the flash.

Very funny Aggie, good trick. Thanks for looking guys.

A Flower

A flower by any other name would smell just as sweet.

News Feed

Aggie's PT went well. Her arms are still tight, she needs to reach up more. They commented on how much babbling she was doing. It is so funny, but this past week I had the thought that I'd been asking the Lord for healing and progression with her physical well-being, all the while neglecting to ask for communication skills. Since her brain injury may effect "gross motor skills and communication". After I noticed my negligence, and began praying, guess who has become a chatter box? It's such a sweet life the Lord has given me.

The ear Dr's have been at battle, almost ever since there was more than one. We see the ENT and Audiologist at clinic, then a completely different Audiologist for the hearing aid. These two practices have been feuding since we stepped through the hearing aid door. The hearing aid Dr. is concerned that the original ABR hearing test was done with fluid in Aggie's ear since she has always had fluid in her ear to her knowledge, legitimate concern. The ENT insists that he checked for fluid before the test, therefore the test is accurate. The Audiologist mentions he may have looked, but did he do a "bond conductivity test" which would be a more accurate way of telling. The obvious answer to this is.... of course... no, but no one will say this. Since Aggie will be getting tubes in her ears August 15 for all her fluid issues the audiologist would like another ABR done to confirm the level of hearing loss. ENT refuses. So I called our new pediatrician for council on the matter, he's in charge after all, an calls all the shots. I left a message on a nurse line and 30 min. later the Dr. is returning my call, amazing! He gave me the new plan, and said he would take care of it, fantastic! The new plan is, proceed with the tubes. Give the ears a few weeks to dry up, redo hearing test. This is very logical, the only bad part is Aggie will have to be sedated twice. But if that means we can better care for her hearing needs, than that is probably best. It is possible she may have better hearing than we think, since there may or may not have been fluid present for the original test.

O sweet conviction!

Hosea has a look about him.... kind of a sweet, but guilty look, don't you think? He actually is doing nothing wrong in this picture, at least I don't think so?

I have been so encouraged lately to see Hosea's conscience kicking in. Before, just like many of us sinful creatures, he had little to no remorse over right and wrong behavior, even with consequences. But lately he's been doing some confessing/telling on himself. He'll say something like "mommy I didn't make a bad choice". And I'll say "oh, what did you do?" And then he'll confess "I put my hand in the fish aquarium". I always thank him for telling the truth, in the later part of the conversation, and ask him not to repeat this behavior, and then we go over what a truthful confession might sound like from the git go.

We spend the first several years of our children's life doing obedience training, very repetitive, and often exhausting, but now we have the pleasure of shepherding a conscience. I love it! It's a new arena full of biblical principal. Lord my your spirit sow deep into the soul of this little man and fill him with the truth of your word!

More on that

Ok, so I read Kevin De Young's' blog posts on friendship and it was a little bit of a search to find them all, so I'll create links to each one for your reading pleasure. They are each only a couple paragraphs.

On a side note, I so enjoy a good friendship! It is a mere reflection of relational intimacy we are privileged to have with Christ. I pray that I may grow in it.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Enjoy!

Friendship

I've been enjoying thinking about what God has for us ladies in our friendships, this weekend I was checking the "Girl Talk" blog and their July 6th entry was on friendship. Girl Talk on Friendship I'm eagerly anticipating Kevin De Young's series on friendship to be completed, his link is the first one the blog entry recommends. The other entries were good also. Check it out.

Ice Equals Civilization

This always makes me laugh, but it's so true, just think about it.

It's a hard-knock life for us....

Our Shiloh Abigail is growing so quickly! She has become so articulate, and is often impressing the sunday school ladies with her vocabulary. I can't believe it, but as I write this I'm in process of getting our school room ready for kindergarten! Amazing! We are both excited!

This is Shiloh on our way home from watching fireworks. We bought them snow cones, she had blueberry. When the fireworks were over she stated, "We better hurry and get home before I get cab-it-tees (cavities)". She makes me laugh.

It's not everyday you get to snuggle with a princess, but in my case......it is!

The New Guy on the Block

Yesterday we saw our new pediatrician. Dr. Van Ostenbridge, they call him Dr. V.O. for short. It went well. He said it seems Aggie is being well cared for by all the other Dr.'s, he feels comfortable with all they are doing. The only thing he decided to go against, was the advice to stop nursing. How funny I thought! Since I was pumping and giving Aggie breast milk fortified in her bottles, and some straight fortified formula when I was out of milk, she is still benifiting from both worlds of nutrition. Mike and I have decided to keep doing what we are doing, we want to see what adding extra calories and rice cereal to her milk may or may not do for her. In theory, it should help, and if it does great! If it doesn't, as least me know we explored all the avenues presented to us to prevent surgery. The great thing is I can still nurse her if need be. I did last night at 10pm, and she was so thrilled that she just wanted to smile and coo at me every couple of sips, I highly doubt it added to her nutrition. I do think it did something for her emotional well being. :)

Menu Update Praise!

So...... Praise be to God who hears us! I have been trying for 3 weeks to get Aggie to take a bottle, as soon as I knew she would need to for her upper GI, and she just wouldn't. After our appointment yesterday with the surgeon, I was hopeful she would soon, especially if it could prevent surgery!! So I casually mentioned it to God, laziness on my part. I wish I could say I prayed and fasted and pleaded before Him, but I didn't. But you know what.... He still heard me, and He showered me with abundant kindness.

As soon as we got home from the Dr. yesterday it was feeding time, and I decided it was now or never. As I reported previously, she took 2oz. by bottle. The most she has taken in several months. I stuck with it last night (4oz.) and this morning(5oz.), offering the bottle first, letting her get her fill and then giving her the baby food. It is working!!! She hasn't nursed since yesterday at the Dr. appointment. I am pumping for relief, but that hasn't been as frequent as I thought it might be, but when i am pumping I've always gotten plenty, which puts my mind at ease when I think I might have been starving my baby by nursing her.

There are a couple of reasons the bottle is so important:

1. I can fortify(add calories) to my breast milk, or increase the calories/oz. in the formula, per the Dr.'s recommendation.

2. I can put rice cereal in the formula, to help prevent spit up.

3. It helps quantify all Aggies calories, intake, etc. so we can see what the actual problem might or might not be.

If Aggie was younger, I know this would be much more difficult, as I am pretty passionate about nursing my babies, but since we had the pleasure of bonding in this way for a whole year, I am thankful that modern medicine has the ability to help someone in our situation, and of course us.

New Menu Plan?????

We did see the Dr. today for the "surgery consult" about the tummy. It went well. We are not rushing into surgery yet. She suggested that we try using formula and adding calories to try and bulk aggie up, and perhaps some cereal to the formula, to keep it down her. I mentioned the possible milk allergy (she gets the same rash Shiloh did) and inability to eat from a bottle/cup, she suggested we let her get hungary and make it the only option. We also are suppose to see a speech therapist to help with feeding, and use soy products. It sounds so hard to me, but I did try it when we got home from the dr. and God had mercy on me..... she took 2 oz. from a bottle (the best she's done since early infancy), then I feed her some food as usual. It's not really enough formula for her to gain weight in theory, but it is a better start than I was anticipating since just a day ago all we could get her to take was about 1/2 oz. with much anguish. I've decided to go "cold turkey" with the breast-feeding to bottle thing and give it my best try if they think that will prevent surgery and help her, than that is what i want to do, though I have many mixed emotions and feelings about it. I'm looking forward to talking to her new pediatrician about it tomorrow at her appointment. The surgeon also wants us to do more testing on Aggie. They are with nuclear medicine. One will see how much reflux Aggie has, and the other will see how fast or slow her tummy is emptying. The results of these will determine to a greater extent the need for surgery. I asked about if she needed surgery the possibility of doing them at the same time as her ear tubes, though they said it is possible for that to happen, the surgeon will be out of town for the scheduled date of her tubes, and it doesn't sound like we will come to any conclusions as to whether or not she will need tummy surgery or not until a month or so after her tubes are in (August 15th). I think that is about all we learned today. I am glad we are not rushing in to surgery and exhausting all options prior to that, I pray one of them work! Over-all I am feeling peaceful about it, I'm not looking forward to the effects of a quick wean on my body, but it shall pass I am certain.

Pirates, Argh!

These little rascals have been running around gathering contraband, and digging up buried treasure. They are so funny and a joy!

Therapy

This is Aggies "therapy wall" that my parents made her for her birthday. It is a great invention for Aggie, since being on her tummy almost always invokes spitting up, not a good practice for weight gain. This way she is getting her upper-body work out against the wall, and gets to keep her lunch. It also encourages reaching up, which she needs, and has possibilities for many other exercises. The thought and attention to detail my parents put into it was very sweet and generous. Thanks Mom and Dad!

On another related note. How is physical therapy going? Aggie sees an actual PT twice a month. Our "early steps representative" meets us there. Then she comes to the house weekly to work with Aggie, and I do her exercises daily, through out the day. This keeps our PT appointments to a minimum, which is a blessing since we have so many medical appointments. Aggie continues to progress, though it is very slow. She is still not yet sitting up independently. It is a very meticulous process, as we have to use her body to teach her brain how to make her body work for every little thing. For example, as we work toward sitting up, we are strengthening her "core" muscles, abdominals, back, obliques. We will do exercises so that Aggie realizes she has abs, and then how to contract them for the purpose of sitting up. So presently her Abs and back are showing good strength, now we are working on her obliques, as falling over sideways can be a real problem. We are also trying to teach her to catch herself with her hand if she goes sideways. This is just one example of how the process works. She is remarkably close to sitting up, and can sustain it independently for a few minutes, but I would not trust to leave her unattended in this position, as she will certainly fall over. It is so amazing that ones brain and body can compensate in such a way after major damage has been done. We are hopeful for what the Lord may have for Aggie in her Physical well being and pray for healing daily. That she is continuing to progress, shows that the Lord is hearing our petitions and having mercy on our sweet little girl.

News Feed Addendum

I forgot to mention that Aggie does now have a pediatrician, as of Monday. The Dr. we applied for has accepted us after reviewing her charts. She will have her first apt. with him next Wednesday. Since all of the specialists she sees have to get "consent for treatment" from her pediatrician, this man/practice is taking on a lot of extra work with Aggie. We are grateful to have someone who is willing to oversee her care, and is able to grant consent for all her planned and up coming treatment.