Christmas Morning

Our first Christmas morning together as a family of three in our new home was wonderful! Jeff was a little unsure of when he would actually get to come home that morning due to the crazy night at work, but luckily he was able to come home at his normal time. Santa came right when he got home at 3:00 AM! After he got a few hours of sleep, he got up and joined Hayden and I.

1st Christmas Morning! Waiting on Daddy to wake up!




After Jeff and I "opened our stockings", I opened my present from Jeff. We said we weren't exchanging gifts, but I guess I should have known better! Jeff didn't get a present other than a few things in his stocking. Poor thing! I got a Keurig coffee maker (or we did...Jeff really drinks much more coffee than I do)! Jeff always gets me the best stocking stuffers. One exciting thing I got this year was a Mesquite newspaper. I always look forward to him bringing home the paper on Thursday nights because it has tons of coupons in it. My new favorite thing is to clip coupons! Ha!! I know you think I am crazy! But seriously, it is such a good deal! The Dallas Morning news is now $3.50 for a Sunday paper. A total rip off in my opinion!! But, the Mesquite paper is 50 cents! So, it is great for coupons! Ok, that was random, but I love coupons and saving money!!







Back to Christmas morning...Jeff's parents then came over to our house to watch Hayden discover what Santa brought him! They have a tradition of going to Jeff's brother Matt's house really early to watch their kids and eat breakfast. Then, they were able to come over and join us.









Hayden opened his first wrapped present for the morning. It was a gift from our friends Bo and Rhonda. He got this precious piggy bank! We absolutely LOVE it!! I love personalized gifts and I want to be better about giving gifts like this. Thank you so much Bo and Rhonda!!




{Notice Skooter is still wanting Hayden to play with him! For some reason, Skooter wasn't getting much attention that morning.}

Just curious...does Santa leave wrapped gifts at your house? He never did when I was growing up, so I guess he won't for Hayden either! :-)

Hayden would rather crawl on his Daddy than play with his new toys! :-)





What a great first Christmas morning! The rest of the day was great too! Another post coming soon!

Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve was a fun day for us. At least for Hayden and I. Poor Jeff had to work for 10 hours in the freezing cold, the crazy wind (wind chill of 18 or lower) , snow blowing in sideways, icy roads, walking up high bridges trying to get to people who wrecked out...pure craziness for him! But, Hayden and I enjoyed our afternoon together. We watched the snow fall and cooked a few things for our afternoon at our friend Cindy's house and prepared for Christmas Day. Jen's mom Cindy invited Hayden and I and my parents, Robin, and Granddaddy, over for Christmas Eve. Spending Christmas Eve together is a tradition that we have had for as long as I can remember. Typically we have it at my parents' house along with my Dad's side of the family. But, because of Mom's health, we didn't do that this year. We were so glad that despite Mom's health and the crazy weather, Mom was able to make it! As always, we had a great time together!



Landree, Jen's little girl, is so precious! She was genuinely so excited and so thankful before she even knew what her present from us was. After she opened it, she again, was so thankful and excited. What she didn't realize was that it was actually rooms for her doll house Santa was bringing the next day.


Hayden loved the books (paper) he got!


Landree was so sweet and played with Hayden and even wanted to read his new books to him! She is such a good reader {storyteller}!





Hayden was loving crawling {sliding} all over the floor! Cindy was helping him try to get some traction and practice his crawling skills!


Hudson, Jen's 4 month old, was there too! I guess I didn't get a picture of that baby doll! Sorry Hudson! We are so excited about what Christmas will be like next year with the boys!

"Momma, really, you have already kissed me over a thousand times today. Again?"


A few years in review...
This year

(I am thinking I look much more tired and "Blah" this year. Wonder why?)

Last year (I was about 5 months pregnant). We had just found out we were having a precious little BOY!


In 2006 (Landree's First Christmas)

1st Christmas Function!

Our first official "Christmas Function" was the Sunday before Christmas. We decided to meet our friends Matt, Amy, and Barrett to eat Mexican Food at Tamolly's. YUMMY! We were so excited to get to see our friends! We enjoyed adult conversation and after dinner, the boys exchanged gifts. It was so fun to watch Barrett. Hayden will be his Barrett's age at Christmas next year. Thank you for our gifts! We love ya'll! Can't wait until we meet again in January!

Mom Update 12-24-09

Christmas Eve Gift!

Anyone else use this as a greeting when you see someone in your family on Christmas Eve? This has been a tradition in my family since I can remember and probably even before I was around. When I was little, I remember always waiting for my Grandparents to get to our house so I could say "Christmas Eve Gift" to my Granddaddy. Whoever said it first was "supposed" to get an extra gift from that person. Well, I typically got an extra gift. Usually a wrapped can of spinach, green beans, or something. Just a fun thing we have always done!

So, we got a Christmas Eve Eve Gift! Mom got to come home yesterday. YEA!!!!

The nurse from Home Health came yesterday to show us how to use the IV and to get her set up for their services. She has two different IV antibiotics to take each day. One that is a 1 hour drip and one that is a 24 hour drip. So, she will be "hooked up" to an IV all day every day. Poor thing! She has a little back pack that it fits in to take with her wherever she goes. But, we are soooo happy to have her home! The Home Health Nurse will come every day to change out the 24 antibiotic. Dad or I will change out the other 1 hour antibiotic.

She is still taking quite a bit of Lasix to try and reduce her fluid retention. She had gained 10 lbs in two days in the hospital. So, she ended up having to stay an extra day.

Thank you so much for your thoughts and prayers.

Merry Christmas!

Mom Update 12-22-09

Mom has been in the hospital for almost a week now. Although she really had all the signs, they went back and forth on whether she actually had pneumonia or not. They said that what they were seeing on the x-ray could be scar tissue from when they did the surgery a few months ago to get a biopsy and remove the fluid around her lungs. But, they did know she had a serious infection. They have since figured out that she did have a staph infection.

A surgeon came in and removed her dialysis port and they sent it off to be tested for staph. Although the site didn’t look bad, sure enough, it came back positive. They have and continue to treat her with powerful IV antibiotics and her white blood count is coming down.

They went back and forth on really what to do for the fluid because of her kidney functions. They were afraid that what they would give her would raise her creatitine levels again, but decided that they had to do something. The fluid retention was getting BAD! You could just see the fluid sticking out her back and her legs and feet were just about to pop. I know that sounds yucky, but it was bad! They finally decided to give her Lasix (which she normally takes as a pill but doesn’t work quite as good) through IV to get some of the fluid off. Other than her having to get up and down repeatedly and slightly raising her creatitine levels, it has worked fairly well.

The doctors have talked about her possibly coming home today or tomorrow. I know she is ready and we definitely want her home before Christmas! My grandfather (my mom’s dad), who lives in Vegas, is flying in today as well. Last time Granddaddy was here, Mom had to go into the hospital as well. Not sure if you remember, but my grandmother (mom’s mom) passed away in March. So this will be our first Christsmas without her.

While this has all be going on lately, Mom and Dad have had construction going on at their house. They had their house repainted on this inside and new tile, countertops, and carpet. So, they have had to worry about all that while Mom has had numerous doctor appointments, been so sick, and been in the hospital too. Mom’s best friend Cindy (Jen’s mom) and I have been working to get things somewhat back into place and put some of her new things out. She had previously bought new bedding, bathroom décor, etc. The good thing, they will get to come home to a clean and like new house!

For now, when she comes home, they are talking about a home health nurse coming in to clean her “wound” where the dialysis port came out and continue to administer antibiotics for 2-4 weeks. After that is complete, they want to set up the surgery to have the heart valve replacement surgery. BLESS HER HEART! I just feel so bad for her! If it isn’t one thing, it is another! That surgery scares me because it is so major, especially for her. She is such an amazingly strong woman and I know God will take care of her!

Please continue to pray for Mom…for her health, for her emotional strength, for her physical strength, for her doctors, and for her family.

I know she would want me to wish all her friends and family a Merry Christmas! She loves you all!

Ready for Christmas!

Are ya'll ready for Christmas? We are!



I know Hayden won't really remember it, but it is still so special for us! We love our "Jolly Baby" so much and can't wait to spend our first Christmas together as a family!

Mom Update #2 12-17-09

Well, Dad took Mom to the ER this afternoon. Even with the oxygen, she was having a very hard time breathing. Ya'll, it was so hard to watch her literally gasping for air. Her lips, face, and fingertips were turning purple off and on. Her oxygen level was staying in the low 80's. She was so uncomfortable, weak, nauseous, and literally shaking uncontrollably from being so cold (running a fever). When they got to the hospital her oxygen was back closer to where it needed to be.

Turns out, they think she possibly has pneumonia. They know her white blood count is high and she has an infection, so they are treating her with IV antibiotics. As of right now, they haven't decided what to do with the fluid on her body. She should see her regular doctor tomorrow so hopefully they will do something to get some of the fluid off as well.

Mom Update 12-17-09

It has been a while since I posted about Mom, so I thought I would give you an update. She has good days and some not so good days. The good news is that the week of Thanksgiving was her last week to have taken dialysis treatments and her creatitine levels have stayed above normal, but lower than they had been. The bad news is that the fluid is building back up in her body. Her legs, her stomach, face, everything is full of fluid. She is taking some meds to help eliminate the fluid, but it isn’t doing too much good. Her weight goes up and down daily. This fluid build up is making it very hard for her to breathe. She also is running a fever off and on causing her to be extremely cold a lot of the time. She isn’t eating too much either. Nothing sounds good to her, so she isn’t real interested in eating. So, this makes her that much weaker.

On Tuesday, she had a heart catheterization. They wanted to take a closer look at her heart to see what was going on with it. What they determined (which they already somewhat knew) was that her right valve is not working properly. Basically what I understand is that the valve is not closing completely when the blood is flowing through it, allowing the fluid to come back out of the valve. This is what is causing her to have so much fluid build up and making her have such a hard time breathing.

So, what’s next? They put her on oxygen yesterday to see if that would help her breathe more easily. The heart doctor said he wanted to talk to her other doctors to see what they thought about a valve replacement surgery. This is a surgery that is not done often and is quite major. She saw her oncologist yesterday and he felt that she needed to have the surgery. He was going to talk to the heart doctor and other doctors as well and come up with a game plan. She sees the heart doctor on Monday.

Please keep praying for her!

8 Months

Another month has flown by! So, what’s going on with Hayden this month?



Loves, loves, loves bath time! We haven’t gotten brave enough to ditch the little tub.



Crawling? Not yet! He will spin in a circle, rock, and go backwards some, but hasn’t gone forward yet! He will also go from the sitting position to the crawling position. But, no forward movement when he gets there!





Loves to stand!! Would much rather be standing or holding your hands trying to walk than be in the crawling position or on his tummy.





Loves to climb on Jeff and I on the floor. He does really well going from a sitting position to turning around and climbing on us. He doesn’t quite pull up all the way on his own, but I don’t think it will be long!

Has started sitting in the front of the buggy when we go shopping. Usually these are just quick trips though. He doesn’t care to do it for long. He usually just ends up in my arms or in the Bjorn. I do have a cart cover, but I haven’t used it yet.





Within the past month, Skooter has become obsessed with Hayden. He is in his face wanting to play all the time! Skooter will get the bone and bump Hayden with it and Hayden tries to grab it. Hayden will get so tickled watching him. Can’t wait to see what happens when Hayden is on the move! Should be interesting!





Has started signing “all done” when he is finished eating. He just grins and thinks he is so big when he does it. He loves it when I sign “more” too. Not sure why he gets such a kick out of it, but he does.

Our biggest accomplishment…he has started going to sleep on his own without rocking or needing lots of reinforcement! YEA!! He has recently grown to love his paci again when he is going to sleep in his bed and on long rides in the car, so this has helped us significantly! He now loves his Fisher Price rain forest soother as well. Yes, we still have had times where it hasn’t worked and we have given in, but for the most part, he is doing very well!

Now, if we could get him to sleep through the night, we would be doing all the good! He is still waking about every 3-4 hours.

Still no teeth. I thought for sure we would have them this month. But, no such showing! I guess they will come out whenever they get good and ready! :-)

Weighs about 18 pounds. Wearing 6-9 month clothes. Wears a size 3 Pampers Baby Dry Diaper or size 4 Target diaper (we have grown to really like these...the price too!).

Ho, Ho, Ho!

We did it! We braved the craziness at North Park and took the kids to see Santa! When Jennifer's mom got there at 10:00 this morning, we were #122 for the day! And Santa didn't even start taking pictures until 11:30AM. And...this was a Monday morning! So they told us that we would get in between 2:30 and 5:30 PM. Well, we finally got to take our picture around 3:30. But, we made the most of our time there and had lots of fun!

Here are some pictures from our day!

When Jennifer and I got there with the boys, we met up with Jennifer's mom and Landree at story time with Santa.



The boys loved story time...can't you tell?


Mommy and Hayden




While we waited, we did a little shopping. What else are you going to do for 5 hours at North Park? Well, this is what Hayden did while I tried on some clothes...tried to turn around and stand up in the stroller!



Then, another favorite thing...to eat! We decided on P.F. Changs. YUMMY!!



We were so excited that my friend Stacey and her 5 week old, Cooper, were able to join us for lunch!



Then, what we were all waiting for...SANTA!






Hayden was exhausted after our long day waiting to visit Santa! He fell asleep in the truck before we got out of the parking lot.



We had a great day!