A Homecoming on Henry's Birthday!

The day has finally arrived - Natalie gets to come home! I was convinced they were trying to hold my baby hostage, but they have finally given her discharge papers! As I mentioned before, it includes a bit of medical equipment, but at least she gets to leave!

Doesn't she look ready to blow this joint? She's rock solid with her oxygen saturation too - that monitor only goes up to 99. Of course, if it goes below 90, we get to hear the beep-beep-beep. Worth it! You can also see the smaller black & white cables on the left side - those go to her apnea monitor which will alarm if her heart rate goes too low or she stops breathing longer than 20 seconds. This baby will be well monitored! 

Henry wanted waffles and fried chicken for his birthday dinner! I may have subtlety led him to that decision, but it's a combination he loves. (Pretty much the only thing he orders at IHOP these days!) 

I clearly didn't have time for a super elaborate cake with all of the time spent at the hospital, but I did want to make Henry a PJ Mask cake like he requested. Unfortunately the cake mix I bought only made a single (but amazingly delicious) layer. I was all stressed out about it, but Matt assured me he probably wouldn't even notice.

First thing he said when he saw it? "Why is it so short?"

Sigh...

At least it tasted amazing. 

And he clearly is enjoying all of the birthday attention!

He told Nonni that his baby sister coming home today was the "best present!" Sometimes I don't know what I did to deserve this kid, but he is such an awesome part of my amazing family. I'm so glad to have all of them and for all of them to be home!

Happy Fourth Birthday Henry, I am so glad you are ours and can't imagine life without you! :)

Fourth Week in the NICU...

Yup, still here... But the end is in sight. She's doing better with her stats every day and we are close to getting her feeding schedule back to 30 minutes instead of the continuous feeds they had her on after the surgery. 

She had her BAER test last week and it took about 4 hours. Since it is based on a brain response, the babies have to be asleep to get accurate readings. So every time she woke up, we had to wait for her to fall asleep again. But it was worth the hassle - she passed with flying colors! Both of the cochlea are functioning and the right ear even has normal hearing! Looks like she might get a hearing aid on one side and the other won't need anything. Best news we've had in awhile! :)

To try and help deal with the reflux, the doctors ordered her a wedge for sleeping. It's a weird looking bed for sure, but she seems to love it. She sleeps quite well in general, but especially so all snuggled up in her wedge. I am a little jealous they don't make an adult sized one...

Oh and they had to get her a bigger bed to safely use the wedge. They borrowed this one from the pediatric unit and I loved the purple color. Apparently there aren't many purple beds because all of the nurses that came in to her room made comments about it. She's just stylish all around! :)

More soccer playing! Isn't he just adorable? And this time he has the correct socks on. :)

After she got her g-tube, we had to go to the surgeon's office to get our g-tube training. We got instructions on how to switch it out, but very clear instructions to bring her to the hospital if it came out before the 8 week mark. If it falls out before the stoma is fully healed they have to take x-rays to make sure everything is ok. 

Well when I went to change her diaper this morning, the g-tube was gone! Apparently the balloon had popped on it and out it came (it was hiding in her onesie). Luckily it happened while we were in the hospital, because I have to admit I may have freaked out a little bit (and possibly said a bad word). But the nurses were on it! They put in a temporary tube until the surgeons could come double check it and it was no big deal.

Stupid balloon...

We're getting so close to going home...! The medical supply company came by the other day to train us on all of the equipment they are sending us home with. It was a bit overwhelming. I am so glad we are getting to take her home and the equipment is making that possible, but look at that mess! 

Early Birthday Celebrations!

It looks like Natalie will *finally* be coming home on the 19th of this month, which is so terribly exciting, but it's also Henry's birthday. So we decided to do all of the celebrations early to make sure that he got his birthday fun in!

We went to Benihana's for my birthday and Henry loved it so much that he wanted to go there for his birthday too! 

The servers at Benihana are super great with kids. The soup they serve before the meal is pretty hot and they always bring out a bowl of ice to add to the soup to cool it down. And the boys both *love* the soup!

Henry wanted to be sure that the cook knew it was his birthday. He made sure to show off his "Birthday Boy" ribbon several times. :)

The boys favorite part is always the volcano and this time the guy made a volcano and a flower! I'm not sure who was more excited, the boys or the lady across the table. ;)

This kid makes a cute walrus, doesn't he?? 

Next on his list of birthday fun was the jump park. The boys love this place, so it was not at all surprising that he wanted to go there. Also, it is nearly impossible to get him to smile for a photo these days, he usually wants to do something weird instead (see above).

As always, they jumped and ran around all over the place. Then Matt and I had our fun throwing the boys into the foam block pits. It's going to be a sad day when I can't fling them in anymore. Which seems to be getting closer that it used to be...!

And last, but not least, we let Henry chose another dinner with just the four of us. Unsurprisingly, Henry picked Dairy Queen. He powered through his dinner and was ready for his ice cream cone. Apparently I failed at being a good parent and *didn't* get them dipped cones. Matt actually tried to send them back when the person brought them out and I was all embarrassed - "No, no, I ordered them that way..."

Matt may never forgive me for such a crime, but thankfully the boys didn't seem too upset with me. Happy Early Birthday, Henry - next time I'll get it dipped, I promise! :)

Third Week in the NICU...

So we're still here... I really didn't think there was any way we would be here this long, but to be fair I didn't think we would be here at all. One day the hospital social worker stopped by and was asking what we had known before she was born. After I gave her the run-down she said "So you expected to be in the NICU then?" And I had to answer that as crazy as it may sound in retrospect, I wasn't expecting it. 

Natalie continues to improve every day, but she is still experiences more "episodes" than the NICU doctors are comfortable with sending her home. She can't really manage her secretions (normal drainage in the nose & throat) with her swallowing issues, so it occasionally blocks her airway, makes her oxygen saturation drop and we have to suction her clear. And she is still dealing with reflux which sometimes leads to silent aspirations and causes her heart rate to drop (brady event or bradycardia).

So we're just hanging out waiting for her to get bigger and stronger so she can come home. 

Thankfully the NICU staff are very aware on how hard NICU stays can be on families. They do a ton of stuff and even make sure to include the siblings. Today was siblings day and we brought the boys up to participate. The first thing they did was make babies out of rice and stockings. Many of the babies are born premature and super tiny, so the thought was to make a baby that weighed the same as your sibling. But since she is now over 6 pounds, we decided they could each make one half her weight. I can only imagine 12 pounds of rice spilling on the carpet in the near future...

They even had extra blankets and hats for the babies. So many people crochet and knit things for the NICU babies. One of her nurses even left her an adorable pink hat. And a rose for me, then Nonni. And another red hat got dropped off on Heart Health Awareness Day. It's all so very thoughtful!

They also had a craft table with several valentine's themed crafts since that holiday is fast approaching. 

I think the ladybug mailbox was the favorite of both boys. Of course one had to meticulously follow the instructions to make it perfect and the other one went freeform with his design. What a surprise! ;)

Doing the two minute scrub-in to go back and see their baby sister. I figured they would complain about it, but they are both total champs at it. I've been having to slather myself in lotion non-stop since it can be a little drying, but I did get a bottle of the hospital approved lotion for our room finally. 

She was cleared for baths again once they took out the stitches holding her g-tube in place. She really seems to love bath time, huh...? I never got a photo of it, but the gauze pad they put over her stitches was cut down to make a heart. It was such a thoughtful gesture on the surgeon's part. Like I said - it's the little things... 

The before school program that Thomas goes to had a Valentine's Day breakfast for parents, so I changed up the usual routine that morning and went to go have heart shaped waffles with him. And bacon. And donuts. It was a pretty awesome breakfast spread! Plus you can't beat the company! :)

The boys and I picked out this pennant to make her room more festive and when I went to hang it on her door, I saw that one of the nurses had been decorating too. How sweet is that?!? Not going to say that she was their favorite, but I didn't see any valentine's on any other rooms for at least a few days. ;)

This girl has had lots of trouble with her IV's. They kept going bad within 12 hours and when they tried to do a more central line, even that one went bad fairly quickly. So no one was excited when she needed a new one. But the nurse that day made this contraption for her hand that basically turned it into a club and that IV lasted soooo long. I guess not being able to bend her hand saved it. 

Also that rabbit outfit was so adorable! I never brought any outfits in because I figured they would get mixed up with the hospitals, so it was always a fun surprise when she got an outfit change!

We took the boys out to Red Robin for dinner one night. Matt was trying to convince them to try the jalapeno, but they were not the least bit convinced. I think he even promised them a Lego set, but they were happy with their fries and corn dogs. 

But I thought it would be fun to share a dessert - which I honestly don't think we've ever done. The race to eat it was on after everyone got their first bite. It's hard to top chocolate cake and ice cream!

Second Week in the NICU

Once we realized she was going to have surgery, we knew we were definitely going to be racking up another week in the NICU. Thankfully we have pretty much settled into a routine that is keeping us all *mostly* sane. 

My biggest struggle is pumping. Supply isn't the issue, there is way more milk than she could possible need right now. But I just don't love pumping. I enjoyed nursing the boys and it bothers me that it isn't in the cards for her right now. Thankfully it's not my first rodeo with pumping because I would probably be much more frustrated right now if I didn't already have some experience with it... 

More x-rays! I honestly don't even remember what this set was for. She's gotten so many x-rays. They keep kicking me out of the room and letting my mom stay. Apparently being young and the potential for having more kids means you get kicked out. Rude. ;)

Another visit from the boys! They got a little antsy last time they were here, so I bought them a Paw Patrol coloring book to share in case they got bored. Well Thomas didn't want to color any of the pages, he wanted to draw his own scene and use the stickers. The only blank page was the back of the sticker page, but he made it work. And told me I needed to get him blank paper next time. Sooooo particular!

Henry colored for awhile, but you can see the boredom still set in a little bit. 

They did the standard newborn hearing test on her good ear and she (unsurprisingly) did not pass the screen. Based on the chat with the ENT, I'm not panicking until they do the BAER  (brainstem auditory evoked response) hearing test to see if her inner ear is functioning. If so, then she'll just get some hearing aids and it will be no big deal. 

When mom decided to fly up a few days early, my dad went out that night and bought me my favorite Texas donuts because she hadn't had a chance to get them yet. My emotions might be running a little high recently, but that definitely brought a tear to my eye when mom told me that. No matter how old we get, it's always nice to know our parents still want to baby us. :)

Also, food isn't allowed in the patient rooms in the NICU, so I had to store them in a locker in the parent room. Totally worth having to scrub back in to go eat a few donuts!

I know I mentioned it last week, but this little girl really loves her dad. She loves staring at him! Matt is getting the raw deal of the situation since he still has to go to work, but he goes up and spends most evenings / nights with her after we put the boys down for bed. She seems to picking up some of his night owl traits as she seems to be more awake with him than me. 

Speaking of hours, our usual routine is me getting up before everyone else and getting to the hospital pretty early. I'm there in time for rounds and mom comes in after helping get the boys ready for school. Mom and I take turns for lunch so Natalie gets super spoiled all day. Then most days, I go pick up the boys and Matt eats dinner with us when he gets home. Nonni usually can't tear herself away until after the boys are in bed and then Matt goes up there shortly after she comes home. 

The exception to this is the weekend. I stay home in the morning to have breakfast with the boys and Nonni goes in first thing. The boys seem to be coping pretty well with this arrangement so far. 

The day after her surgery brought a whole new level of ridiculousness to the number of IV's she has. One of the other nurses was teasing her about hogging all the IV pumps. ;)

This particular weekend, one of Thomas' friends was having a birthday party. Since his dad was also a coworker, I decided to take a break from the NICU for a few hours and go party with the boys. It was a nice break and the boys seemed to enjoy having both parents there. :) 

And these beautiful flowers came from my dad to Natalie and I. He sent them to the NICU, which means they only got to go as far as the parent's lounge (food isn't the only thing banned in NICU rooms). So I brought them home where I could enjoy them in the morning and evening. Thanks for the pick-me-up, Dad! :)

Surgery Day

Since we were stuck waiting for the ENT for so long, the NICU doctors called in the Speech Language Pathologist (SLP) last week to do an assessment on her to see if they could approve her for trying to feed normally. She did a great job on the suck & swallow while the SLP was holding her, but then had a reflux event that came out of her nose and dropped her vitals. So the SLP advised to wait for the ENT and that she would likely want a barium swallow study done - they let the baby swallow formula with barium so they can see where it goes via x-ray. 

Sure enough, that's exactly what the ENT ordered after looking down her throat with an endoscope. The study showed that she had an uncoordinated swallow and in addition to it coming out of her nose, she was also aspirating fluid into her lungs and not coughing it out - what's called a silent aspiration. The end result is that it's not safe for her to feed by mouth and she was going to need surgery for a g-tube. 

We knew this was a possibility because the SLP had walked us through all possible outcomes the other day. My favorite outcome is that this g-tube is temporary and some day she will be able to eat cake and waffles and all kinds of yummy things. But until then, this will keep her alive and I am incredibly grateful she was born at a time where issues like these are manageable. 

Before they can do the surgery, the surgeons wanted to check her upper GI tract to make sure there were no other issues and the x-rays showed she had an intestinal malrotation. I was 0% surprised by this given the heterotaxy and glad they caught it before it led to a blockage, which can be quite serious. Needless to say, she went from needing a laproscopic procedure to needing a full surgical intervention called the Ladd's procedure. 

While I was happy she was going to get the interventions she needed to thrive, I am still dealing with post-pregnancy hormones and not 100% rational. I suddenly had a strong compulsion to get photos of her belly before she has surgery. 

So I went home to get accessories and got permission from her nurse to temporarily remove her wires to have an in-room photo shoot of that unblemished little belly I already love kissing. She seemed to love getting her photos taken today, but we'll see how long that lasts!

I was nervous about leaving the leads off for too long, so I only took a few photos before putting them back on. And I brought so many accessories that I took a few extra photos of her just for fun. I am pretty sure she thinks this flowered hat is a bit ridiculous, but she is tolerating it for me. :)

Today is surgery day. As mentally prepared as you think you are, it is incredibly difficult to be calm when they wheel your 10 day old back for surgery. We are the parents that avoided getting tubes put in Thomas' ears over repeated infections because we were so worried about the tiny risks with surgery (and antibiotics always cleared it up).

As we were getting the risk run down from the anesthesiologist, I may have felt panic set in a little bit...

Thankfully the surgery was incredibly short and she was back in her room in less time than we had been told. And I am amazed at how fast she is recovering from it. Obviously she wasn't in great spirits as the anesthesia wore off, but she is now happily snoozing on her mom.

This kid is a tough one!

The slight downside is she is back to having sooooo many IV's again. We have to give her intestines a few days to recover before she can have milk again. But we're making progress into getting this girl ready to go home!

First Week in the NICU

When we had Natalie's 20 week ultrasound, we both wanted to know the gender (that's a first)! As soon as the ultrasound tech said "It's a girl!" I went into a bit of shock because I had been convinced it was a baby boy. Matt, on the other had, got so terribly excited. He punched his one hand into the other so hard he hurt his recently fixed collarbone. I don't even think he knew he wanted a girl that much!

Of course, with the good came a bit of bad. They wanted to refer us to the neonatal specialist for follow-up because she had choroid plexus cysts and a persistent right umbilical vein (PRUV). We went through the cyst scare when we had Henry and they just vanished at one point and it was no big deal beyond the massive stress it caused us in the meantime. So I wasn't the least bit concerned about them, but the PRUV was a new unknown.

Through a series of follow ups, they also identified that she had a midline liver and her gallbladder was in the wrong spot. Organs being moved around, but not perfectly reversed is known as heterotaxy or situs ambiguus. The biggest concern with that is the spleen can sometimes be missing or have multiple tiny spleens and both scenarios lead to a compromised immune system. And heart issues are also common - her heart may or may not have had a hole that was too big. At some point, they thought they could see a splenic artery, but there wasn't much more to do but wait and do ultrasounds on her when she was born. Trying to image tiny organs on a baby is challenging when they are inside of their momma. 

Given the concerns, the plan was for the NICU doctors to come see her immediately after delivery and make sure she was stable. Unless there was anything immediately concerning, the ultrasounds could wait a few hours. When she was born, they let me hold her for a minute and then took her over to the heated baby bed to check out her vitals. I overheard them say she was 5 lbs & 15 ounces and thought that sounded incredibly small for as big as I had been! And there was apparently an issue with her ears?

The NICU doctors said she was good to go and gave her back to me. I had a chance to take a good look at her and sure enough, one ear was missing and the other was a little misshapen. Whatever, she's still beautiful! :)

Probably an hour or so later (time is relative in the labor room), the nurses were concerned that she was breathing too hard and grunting, so the NICU doctors were called back. They decided to take her over to the NICU just to keep an eye on her for a bit and they said she would likely be back in my room upstairs before the nurses there finished my intake checks.

That's not exactly what happened. I showered, got all my vitals checked and she was still down there. So I went down there too. They had her on CPAP (continuous positive airway pressure) for several hours until she was breathing better on her own. Once she was on room air, she did pretty good, but her oxygen levels would drop and the nurses would have to suction out her nose to get them back up. Thankfully, her planned ultrasounds came back with positive confirmation of a spleen and her heart passed the checks on it. Whew!

We realized at this point that she might be in the NICU for a few days. So we decided to bring the boys up to the NICU to meet her. The NICU has a pretty awesome book to describe what the purposed is of all the tubes and cables they might see on their sibling. Then after the required 2 minute scrub, these little guys were ready to see their baby sister. Thomas was entranced by the amount of equipment on the walls and was asking what everything was. 

Henry only had eyes for his baby sister. This little guy was instantly smitten and told me "Mommy, I love her!"

We tried a few times, but she just couldn't or wouldn't nurse. Initially they had her on IV fluids, but once I started pumping milk for her they gave her a NG (nasogastric) tube to feed her. So Matt got to get in on the fun of holding up a syringe full of milk to feed her. :)

This little fighter really has a thing for her dad already. She would mostly just sleep when I was hanging out with her, but as soon as it was just her and Dad, she would stare very intently at him. He's clearly already her favorite. 

Since we were stuck for an indeterminate amount of days, Nonni changed her ticket to get up here a few days sooner. It was a huge relief - especially once I was discharged from the hospital. Matt and I were trying to keep life with the boys normal while also trying to spend every possible minute with our new baby. At least this way, we had three adults to help divide and conquer!

I was doing my best to remain positive about what seemed like unending bad news, but there were some days that were harder than others. Like the day I was discharged from the hospital, but my baby wasn't. Luckily this girl had grins for me as soon as I got to her room. She's such a calm and easy going baby that she usually soothes my frazzled nerves pretty quickly. 

With all of the airway difficulties and reflux she was having, the NICU doctors wanted her to get checked out by the ENT before they would try nursing or bottle feeding again. Unfortunately for us, there is one pediatric ENT and she was out of town. So we had to wait for her to get back.

Thankfully the NG tube worked really well and I could at least feed her milk even if it was a slightly different way than expected. And also, the NICU has the most comfortable recliners I've encountered in a hospital. This is how the two of us spent most of the week. High tech set-up on that syringe feeding, huh?

Aunt Heather finally got to meet her as well! The boys came back for another visit and were excited to see that she had moved to the slightly less intensive side of the NICU - mostly because they had a new room to check out. 

It felt like the week was crawling by and we were making no progress. But then one day I walked in and she had clothes on! Her umbilical cord had fallen off and the nurses had found some cute clothes for her to wear since she was no longer restricted to a diaper and blankets. It's the little things some days... :)

Happy Birthday Natalie!

Guess who made her grand arrival into the world today? I'm not exaggerating in the least either. I was scheduled for an induction that started yesterday and she waited until 12:31 this morning to arrive right as a 7.9 magnitude earthquake hit! Of course, no one in the delivery room even noticed the earthquake because a baby was flying through the air (slightly joking?). It was just when everyone's phones starting going off with tsunami alerts that we found out what chaos she caused on arrival. There was also a tsunami wave *in* the delivery room, but that's another story...

Right after she was born, I was cuddling with her while Matt was trying to get ahold of my sister to make sure the boys were ok. Everyone was worried because the phone alert was encouraging costal areas to seek higher ground, but given our house is at about 300' elevation, I wasn't worried at all. Just getting some newborn cuddles from a slightly ticked off baby.

I totally failed at getting many photos of her today. In my defense, I had been in labor for almost 16 hours and was pretty exhausted. And there was a bit of chaos after she was born that's for a future post. Needless to say, she is beautiful and we love her so much. If the rest of her life is like her entrance into this world, we are going to have our hands full with this one!

The Dome is Back!

A year after the dome collapsed, it is finally open again and soccer is no longer in the smaller, darker dome. Don't get me wrong - the proximity to home was great at the other dome, but photos were very challenging!

Please for the first time ever, these two get to play on the same team! Henry is turning 4 during the session and Thomas hasn't aged out quite yet, so they get to play together! I think Henry was more excited about this, but Thomas seemed ready to show his little brother the ropes. 

Randomly, we managed to get jerseys that had their ages on them. I thought this was cooler than anyone else. Plus if I had switched where they were standing it would have been my age! Darn for not thinking that before taking the photo...

Henry seemed a little apprehensive about playing big boy soccer, but I kept reassuring him that he would do great!

Of course, Henry is Henry - so there were lots of goofy faces and actions. Haha - I love this kid and his mannerisms! Also, I wasn't paying enough attention to the pre-session emails. They were giving everyone soccer balls this time, which is fine and all - we already have 3 at home. But they are no longer providing socks and I totally missed that. Poor guys had to play in their dinky socks they wore in... "/

Thomas' at least partially covered his shin guards. But then his shoe came untied. They were a mess with footwear and it was totally my fault. Sorry guys! :(

Since the dome *just* reopened, it's not actually fully completed. There is usually a tall net that runs around the perimeter of the fields and protects the people using the track from stray balls. But not today! After the first few runners had to dodge errant soccer balls, Matt took it upon himself to stop the balls from going on the track. Such a thoughtful guy!

The boys actually both did really good today! Henry managed to keep up with the pack and seemed to be having fun. He did catch on that the coach would throw in new balls when the old one went out or made it to the goal. I had to convince him that he shouldn't just stare at the coach waiting for the "new" ball and should actually go after the ball in play. But overall - awesome first day playing with the big kids! :) 

Small Sledding

These boys want to go outside in the winter generally a bit more than their momma does. I know I am the one who wanted to move to Alaska, but some days I am just feel more like hibernating than freezing. But there two have been asking to go play in the snow a lot lately and I finally compromised with them.

"We can go outside and play as long as you want if it's in the back yard."

They were totally fine with that. :)

We have a small hill on the side of the yard, so they decided that they wanted to try sledding down it. It's clearly not the most exciting of sledding hills, but it is super easy for them to climb alone and it's a few seconds of a fun ride.

Henry figured out pretty quick that it's much easier to belly flop on your sled if no adult is helping you get onto the sled. 

Thomas quickly followed the same idea, but had issues with getting the bulk of his body on the sled. Once I pointed out that his legs dragging in the snow was slowing his down, he did a much better job!

Eventually their dad got home from errand running and came over to make the sledding more exciting. There are a few boulders in the yard and these guys slid straight toward them the first time I tried to help push them down the hill - thus the reason they weren't getting any help from me. I was standing between them and the closest boulder. 

Once Matt was there, he was giving them crazy shoves toward the middle of the front yard - which is where the rest of the boulders are. So I stopped taking photos in order to catch my flying sons... ;)

So while it wasn't the most exiting sledding adventure, the boys had fun and that's what really counts, right? :)