Isaac's sign

Isaac watched a show about signs. He decided he needed to make a sign for his door. Can you guess what this sign says? (or depicts?) *HINT* His mom is all for this!

I'm SO not seeing this :)! But I may single handedly turn these numbers around.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/04/070409115759.htm

Male Births: Decline In The US And Japan

"ScienceDaily (Apr. 10, 2007) — A study published in this week's online edition of Environmental Health Perspectives reports that during the past thirty years, the number of male births has decreased each year in the U.S. and Japan. In a review of all births in both countries, the University of Pittsburgh-led study found significantly fewer boys being born relative to girls in the U.S. and Japan, and that an increasing proportion of fetuses that die are male. They note that the decline in births is equivalent to 135,000 fewer white males in the U.S. and 127,000 fewer males in Japan over the past three decades and suggest that environmental factors are one explanation for these trends......."

Christmas Baby?

Apparently this baby thinks he's missing out this Christmas. He is trying his hardest to make an appearance before Christmas. Or maybe it isn't his fault, maybe it's just my wimpy uterus. Whatever the case is, I've started the Nifedipine early this pregnancy, which has reminded me why I don't like that silly drug. But it's pretty darn good at stopping contractions, and so is modified bedrest which is what the doctor ordered me to start today, along with Nifedipine every 6 hours. He said these next few weeks are crucial, and to keep the baby in at all costs. Don't anyone worry though, I'm a pro at this preterm labor thing, I'll keep this baby inside cooking, and he'll just have to wait until next Christmas. The good thing is that Dave has 2 weeks off of school, so he can really help me take it easy when the contractions come. Earlier in the day the contractions were coming every few minutes, and EVERY time I stood up. After the Nifedipine, and a few hours of laying down, the contractions had all but stopped, so this is a true blessing. I'm grateful for medical science!

Henry is officially back to walking. He removed his mental block, and is walking almost like he was before. We are so grateful for this wonderful Christmas present from him, the peace of mind in knowing that he is totally recovered from his nasty illness. It is a wonderful blessing, and we are grateful to our family and friends who have all been so concerned for him and us. Thanks!

Hooray!

Yes, this is Bubba standing up! Yesterday I saw him stand himself up in the middle of the room and walk to the couch. Since then he has been standing a lot more and taking more and more steps. He still crawls as his main form of transportation, but I think it will only be days before he has the balance to walk everywhere again. YAY! Thanks again for all your kind thoughts and prayers. I'm grateful to have a healthy baby now! (Although both our little ones have extremely snotty noses. Welcome to December I guess?)

For those of you who have only seen him through pictures, I'm sorry that you do not understand that this is the most beautiful baby in the whole world. **NO BIAS INVOLVED, I promise! :), It's purely narcissism because this is the first baby that looks like me!** It's such a shame his mother is such a terrible photographer, I seem to catch the worst shots of him, but I love looking at this baby with his cutest little nose, pouty lower lip, and huge blue eyes. I love to kiss and snuggle him too! Not that there ever really was a lapse in my gratitude for this kid, but I am more grateful than ever to have him after he was so sick.

For Family Home Evening we made this Gingerbread Train with a kit that some extremely nice people gave to us. It was so fun, the boys loved it!

Here's his smile!

Here is Bubba's smile after thoroughly enjoying the brownie batter spatula. This smile is what we see most of the time from Henry, but if he isn't beaming from head to toe he is either screaming for something he wants (He really needs to learn how to talk) or he has his head in his hands sobbing because his daddy left the room. He seems to be very dramatic these days, luckily it is generally on the happy side of drama!

Another long day at the hospital

We were scheduled only to go to one appointment with the Pediatric Rheumatologist, but ended up spending the whole day at Primary Children's Hospital. I must say, I LOVE that place, I wouldn't want my baby anywhere else! Henry was a doll, even with no nap the whole day, he flirted with every person he came in contact with, at least until he realized they were of the evil medical profession! I learned the meaning of SPECIALIST. These people truly are specialized, and I felt like we were in good hands. We met with some Neurologists as well as the Rheumatologists. By the end we had a whole team huddling together making sure they had left no diagnosis untouched.

In the end, the diagnosis that we were given was.... NONE! He actually took his first steps in the office (Proud moment to see your baby take his first steps.... again!), which he hasn't repeated since then. They said that his bloodwork shows that he was extremely sick! But his bloodwork has improved, as has his pain and movement. So they are just calling it a very strange reaction to a very bad illness. They feel very confident that he should recover fully in the next few weeks. As much as I wanted to have a diagnosis, a good prognosis like that made me feel just great! I am so pleased to hear that he will get better, and that they can find absolutely nothing wrong with him right now. Neurologically they thought he was fantastic, he has perfect reflexes, and of course developmentally he performed fantastically (well, he is extremely advanced if you ask me, not to brag! :). His joints are great which rules out any kind of arthritis (another sigh of relief) and his muscles appeared to be okay, although he is a little bit weak. So after all of his millions of tests, we find nothing wrong and just wait for him to get better!

I'm very thrilled to know there is no long term damage expected, and thank you all for your prayers! Hopefully he'll be walking again soon, although he is a lot easier, and a lot more snuggly when he's less mobile. I was feeling really excited that with his lack of walking, he had no bruises on his head, but his brother took care of that in a vaccuming accident. I guess that's what you get when you let your 2-year old vaccume. Oh well. I'll post a picture of his gorgeous, smiling face (even with the black-eye he is really cute) soon. It's so nice to see him smiling after the way he was last week!

Baby Bubba

So here is the update on my Bubba. He hadn't made any progress until last night. I was starting to get depressed. I admit I've had a lot of extreme thoughts including wheelchairs as I've wondered what the heck is wrong with this kid. We have made an appointment with a pediatric Rheumatologist at Primary Children's hospital. We are hoping that he/she gives us some clarity on things, but we'll see.

He doesn't appear to be in too much pain, but he still can't walk. I have tried holding his hands to walk him, and IF he will even let his feet touch the ground, which is a big IF, then he can't pick up his feet to walk. I put him behind a walker, and he took a few necessary, clumsy steps as he pushed it forward, but then figured out how to pull it back so he didn't have to step. The progress he made yesterday was standing alone. He actually let me stand him up, and he stood there by himself for a good minute! That made me feel good to see some progress, and to see that he had a little bit of balance.

The good news about Henry, and this was a proud moment in a mother's life, is that we learned yesterday that he has the "force." As the big boys were playing with their lightsabres, Henry stuck his hand out in the air and made a "chhhhh" noise as he forced them from my lap. Hopefully he'll be back on his feet using a lightsabre again soon!

I'll keep you posted after his appointment. Please keep praying for him! Thank you!

DISNEYLAND!

Disneyland was absolutely perfect! Isaac was the perfect age to soak up everything, and tall enough to go on all the rides. He loved every second of it. It was the perfect time of year to go as it wasn't hot, and there were hardly any lines to stand in. Only a few of the newer rides had long lines, but I don't think anything was over 25 minutes. My personal opinion is that if you go to Disneyland in off season, you don't need more than 2 days, we did everything we wanted to do... sometimes twice!

Our first ride was Space Mountain. Imagine taking your child on a dark rollercoaster! I freaked out, and clung to Isaac just to make sure he was still there. He wasn't scared at all, and I loosened up quite a bit after that! His favorite two rides were Star Tours and Autopia (The one where you drive the racecars.)

Here are Isaac and Matthew with their tickets

Isaac studying the map

The most important part of the trip. Isaac got chosen on the first try for Jedi Training, and he was in absolute awe. He did just great fighting Darth Vader. I think this is quite an amazing show.

Matthew preferred riding in a stroller, but Isaac was just happy walking with me. But Matthew did let Isaac ride with him once.


The kids meals are really cute there. The Mickey ears were little burgers, and the waffle fries were delish! We took the plate home with us. Gotta love free souvenirs!


No wait for the carousel! I wonder why?

The Monsters Inc. ride


In line for the Toy Story ride, which is REALLY cool!

The Toy Story Ride is a game, you shoot this cannon and see how many points you can get.


Looking at the Holiday Small World. It was so fun how they implemented holiday songs into the Small World song, and all the little people were dressed up for the holidays.


Isaac's favorite ride. He loved being able to drive!

He was a remarkably good driver. He hit the bumpers a lot less than the adults ahead of us. Only 12 more years to go, but I think I have a good driver to look forward to.


Eating a Dole Whip float while waiting for the Tiki Room. Does life get much better than this?


The only picture you'll se of me. I'm looking way too round for my own good. (Not just in the belly unfortunately!) And the humidity destroyed my hair!


We didn't see very many characters, but the main Disney Characters were around a bit.


The Buzz Lightyear ride. There was never a line, we loved it!


The castle was all covered in snow. Everything was decorated for Christmas, it was beautiful!


Brooke was nice enough to ride on the spinny rides with the boys. I didn't think my tummy could handle it.


I couldn't believe that Isaac wasn't scared of the Tower of Terror. He loved it.


I can't think of a better kid at a better time to take to Disneyland. Isaac enjoyed it so much, and we had fun going on all the rides together. It was so nice to not miss a thing since it was just us two. I was so grateful not to have any babies with me, although I saw my friend Ashley there and she seemed to be having a great time with her baby. We had a lot of fun going on a road trip with Brooke and Matthew, we just love them! It was the perfect trip, we loved it all, and thanks to the grandmas and Dave for watching the babies for us.

Thoughts on Christmas

We saw Santa Claus at Disneyland. Isaac said, "Mom, that Santa looks different than the last Santa I saw."

Santa came to our ward party last night. And after Isaac sat on his lap he ran back to me and said, "Santa forgot what I told him I wanted!" I don't think he even told Santa again what he wanted, he was just baffled that Santa wouldn't remember that he told him only 4 days ago that he wanted a Storm Trooper Helmet! Weird!

That kid is just too sharp, I don't know how long the Santa thing will last for him!

This year I bought my kids DVDs and video games. What mother buys strictly media for their children? But my kids have incredible imaginations, and are quite pleased with the toys they have, so I decided they didn't need any more toys, but we have very few movies, so that's what I bought.

It gets worse. I bought Isaac Narnia 2, which just came out. He wanted to rent it from Redbox, but I told him he had to wait until he got it for Christmas before he could see it. That makes it more exciting right? Last night I opened it up and watched it after he went to bed. How can I make him wait if I couldn't even wait? And what kind of person opens a gift and uses it before they give it? I hope he reads this someday and finds out what a terrible mother he has.

Those are my Christmas thoughts. Holding my breath that no more Santa curiosities arise, and excited to plant my kids in front of the DVD player with some new DVDs.

Sick Baby :(

I have been so busy since I got home from Disneyland I haven't even had any time to blog! On Sunday when Dave drove Henry home from Las Vegas and poor Henry had a terrible fever. When he dropped Henry off at my mom's house he told her to take him to the doctor the next day if he wasn't better. Well over the next five days Henry went to 2 pediatricians, Primary Children's hospital, and the Logan Regional Emergency Room. On Monday and Tuesday he wouldn't even move his neck, sit up, or walk or crawl. When my mom took him to Primary Children's the doctor was sure that he had meningitis! But luckily that wasn't the case.

So the poor kid had tons of blood drawn, a CT scan on his neck, a spinal tap, 2 ultrasounds, 2 sets of x-rays, and was spared a few other requested tests that I declined on. He had something nasty in his body, he had two tests that show signs of infection, the CRP is supposed to be under 1 and his was 14, and the SedRate is supposed to be less than 10 and his was 116! So he was definitely sick, but they couldn't figure out with what, and why he wouldn't walk or move his neck. The doctors were all pretty puzzled and in the end the best diagnosis they could give was called Toxic Tenosynovitis. Basically it means that he had a terrible viris that caused inflammation in his joints which caused extreme pain. I kept trying to tell people that this was the happiest baby ever, and for him to be crying and clinging to us was NOT normal and meant something was VERY wrong. The poor baby spent days just clinging to my Mom and then to us with his head on our shoulders and a rigid, tense body curled up in a ball.

He is doing a lot better now, which is the only reason I can take a minute to blog. He is a lot happier, and not in very much pain. He crawls around and plays. The only thing that is unfortunate is he is still unable to walk. He is starting to get bugged by it too, he tries to stand up, but just doesn't have the strength. This was a kid who didn't crawl at all anymore, so it's still pretty disturbing to me. My goal is to have him taking steps by Monday, hopefully he'll make it. If you have a minute, please say a little prayer for my Henry that he'll get better and be able to walk again soon.

And by the way. I want to give special recognition to my wonderful mother who took care of Henry in his extreme sickness. She was supposed to have the easy job of tending Henry who scarcely makes a peep, and instead she had a ridiculously sick baby that needed 24 hour care, and she spent her time up at the hospital. She used it as a bonding experience, and I'm sure it's something Henry won't soon forget. Thank you Mom for your help, we love you!