Deconstruction of a Magazine

When you have a ton of fun in the pool...

you need a LONG nap!

(Rachel and Jonas zonked out)

More Family Fun

This weekend we had some visitors. My Aunt B and her husband, Karl, stopped over for the night on Friday on their way to the beach. We had some beers and grilled out. It was a nice time. Since Rachel was asleep by the time they got in to town, they only got to see Rachel very briefly the next morning before they left. And, of course, I didn't think to take a picture.

Sunday, my dad, Grandpa C paid us a visit. Well, more like paid Rachel a visit. We all know who he was here to see. She took some time to warm up to him again (like all people) but by today she was all smiles. She really likes to be tickled, oddly enough.

We have a lot of things coming up that I'll be posting about. We'd like to take a trip to the local pool and attend a play date on Friday. She has a PT appointment with our favorite PT, Lisa. Lisa hasn't seen Rachel in about three or so weeks so I can't wait for her to see Rachel and all the progress she has made. We have the sleep study follow up on the 22nd where we will find out the results, a follow up with her surgeon on the 24th and also on that day, a follow up ultrasound and meeting with the Nephrologist. Then another play date at our house and her nine month check up on the 28th. Can I tell you how excited I am for all these appointments?? I can't wait to show all these doctors how well she is doing and I can't wait to see how big she has grown. This month is going by so quickly. I'm already thinking about Rachel's First Birthday Party and that just seems unreal. How can it be coming so fast. Didn't I just have her?

Fantastic!

She still hates getting her picture taken

For Rachel, this last week has been one of amazing accomplishments (at least in my eyes). It seems like she grew up a months' worth right in front of my eyes: she's half out of her 6 month clothes and half in her 9 month clothes, she can hold and drink from her bottle for a little bit, she is eating solids and loves peas, carrots, green beans, pears and sweat potatoes, she even tries to grab the spoon and feed herself, she blows raspberries like they are going out of style, she figured out how to turn on to her stomach in her crib, she is getting her pudgy knees under her belly and is fighting to crawl, she loves to "swim", and sit and stand. Every second of the day I'm watching her and going " I can't believe she just did that!" One of her PT's came today to do a small evaluation and she was really impressed with Rachel and how far she has come. The PT commented to me that Rachel is "motivated." Yes, yes she is. Rachel doesn't want to sit still. She wants to move, she wants to see and she wants to try everything she can get her chubby little hands on. Putting a diaper on her is a wrestling match. I'm surprised I can get it on straight half the time. This little girl is everything I ever wanted in a child. If I could sum her up in one word it would be - spirited. I know that will come back to bite me as she gets older, but right now I'm thrilled.

Her uncle Mike and aunt Mer gave Rachel this learning table as her Baptism gift back in February. Just a couple days ago she realized that if she hit the keys she would get music. But she doesn't just continually hit the keys, she will strike once and wait with her hand in mid-air until the song is done playing and only then will she'll hit it again.

Ever since we brought Rachel home she has been fascinated with our entertainment system and center. Now that she knows she can move, she likes to roll herself over to it and kick buttons with her feet and as in these pictures, use a toy to hit the buttons.

Never thought I would be so excited to see our baby hit our electronics.

Sleep Study and Thunderstorms

I can finally sit down and write about Rachel's sleep study!

First, we drove through a nasty thunder and lightening storm on our way to Winston-Salem. I swear there were bolts hitting left and right of us on the highway. The rain pounded down so loudly on the car roof and the streets in W-S were flooding. But, Rachel slept through it all. I guess she knew how little sleep we both would get so she was getting as much as she could in the car.

(at this time you are probably wondering where the pictures are)

Our appointment was at 8pm, which is well past Rachel's bedtime of 6pm. I had to go alone because they only had room for one parent. Rachel was still in an OK mood when we got there but as soon as the technician started messing with her head and putting sensors on it, she flipped. Oh man, I wish Stephen was there to take video or pictures or something because she was a sight. They use this putty stuff to attach the sensors to her head. It's almost like spackle. So picture her red in the face, screaming at the top of her lungs with tears in her eyes, snot coming out of her nose, failing backwards and rubbing this putty stuff all over both of us while I'm holding her as tight as I can so she doesn't fling herself out of my arms. Yes. That was fun.

(now you know why there are no pictures)

I think, all in all, she had eight sensors on her head, two on her chin, two on her chest and one on her back. They put a netted stocking on her head to keep the sensors in place. She also had a small nose tube that kept track of her breathing. Rachel looked like a beat up homeless person. And now, after all that, she was supposed to go to sleep. They set up two hospital beds side by side. I have never slept with Rachel before and I don't think I ever want to again. She is noisy and moves entirely too much (which is one of the reasons why we got the study done). My job, until 5am, was to make sure she didn't pull anything off her face. Nice. I think I got one hour of sleep. She likes to suck on her fingers to calm herself and every time she needed to do that she would rake down her face with her fingers and pull at the tube in her nose. Every. Time. And every time I had to stop her and hold her hands and keep the pacifier in her mouth instead. I was a glorified pacifier holder. At 5am the technician turns on the lights and politely tells us to get lost. We won't know the results of this test until the end of the month. A doctor has to review it. I"m not sure what they will find. It seemed like, to me, she never really got to sleep and so the test won't really show her issues. But who knows. If we ever have to do this again, it will be Stephen's turn to go with Rachel.

She Drinks Alone...

Besides being the cutest thing in shades, Rachel decided yesterday that she wanted to feed herself. I had an empty bottle on the coffee table and she was sitting on my lap facing it. All of a sudden, she reached out her arms towards it. So I brought it to her and she grabbed on and brought the nipple to her mouth! My jaw hit the floor. We've never practiced that before. So, I went and got a smaller bottle with some formula in it and got the video camera out. Here she is...our big girl!

Therapy Gadget

This is Rachel's new therapy gadget.....

she loves it because she can sit upright and bang things on the "tray."

Look at what a big girl she is!

This is her "I'm done!" face and skooch back.

Elton John Has Nothing On Her

More on Elton in a bit...but first, have your ever collected poop and put it in to a container? We've had to do just that. Our pediatrician ordered stool testing to be done on Rachel's poo because of the diarrhea she's had the last couple of weeks. We received three vials last week for her to fill. Yeah, we never realized how little Rachel actually poops until we had to fill up three vials. Of course, Rachel also likes to poo in the early morning hours so by the time we get to it, it's already mostly soaked in to the diaper. We got two vials full and turned in last week and the results came back ok. We turned in the last vial today. If all is well with that one, we will just chalk up the weird poo to her new formula and resume solids again (which I'm really excited to do, strangely). I'm thinking green beans...Rachel has really been in a wonderful mood this week. Going by that information, she must have been feeling pretty crappy for a couple of weeks in a row before she got really sick two weekends ago with her fever. She smiles and talks constantly. She moves like no ones business either. She will be sitting on my leg and all of a sudden take a dive forward like she can walk and fully expects to walk. She loves when we hold her belly down and swing her from side to side. This girl is a daredevil and is going to be TROUBLE when she figures our how to crawl or walk. And I'm going to say whatever comes first because I wouldn't put it past her to just walk and bypass crawling - it's soooo beneath her! Ha!

On to Elton John...

Yeah, these were the only sunglasses that I could find to fit her little head. They are a tad bit wide on her face but they fit and she really could care less about having them on. She never tried to yank them off. I figure she needs to get used to having something on her face because, let's be honest, her dad can't see without specs, her mom is basically blind and Rachel has Ds which throws everything in her favor for getting glasses in the future. I'm sorry Rachel, I swear we will get you glasses that look MUCH better than these! But still....you have to laugh at how cute she still is!

End of the Day Pictures

We had a follow-up with the GI in Greensboro today. He was oddly nicer to us (did he find out we were going to see someone else?) and agreed that putting her back on the Prevacid twice a day was fine if it was the only thing that worked. He also said that her diarrhea could be a result of the formula she is on. Because it is already partially digested, it could be just how her system is reacting to it. He didn't seem very concerned. I guess we'll just wait and see what the stool tests say and go from there.

Here are a couple pictures of Rachel before bedtime. She's a little sleepy head. :)

Poop, Reflux and Relatives

I'm really tired of both of them and I know Rachel is too. I think we are finally on a path to narrowing things down though as to what is causing her chronic diarrhea. We know it isn't Celiac. Her formula is gluten free. We stopped feeding her solids for the time being so we know it isn't those. (The diarrhea started the same time we started feeding her solids-three weeks ago). Her surgeon called us and told us the symptoms if her surgery was failing. He said before that if something was going to go wrong with her surgery it would be when we started solids. The symptoms he gave us do not sound like what is going on with her. So we can cross that off the list. We are going to give a stool sample to our pediatrician so they can test it for parasites and the what not. If that comes back clean (no pun intended) then we know that it's either food related (formula allergy issues) or something is going wrong inside her little tummy. I'm sure we'll start by changing formulas, again, for the hundredth time. UGH.

(got your glasses, mommy!)

We have an appointment with a new GI in July but that is such a long time away. I have to call this new doctor's office every day now to see if someone has canceled and if we can slide in. Please cross your fingers that we get in soon. Rachel's reflux is also barely under control. Today wasn't a very good day in that department. Lot's of arching and some crying. She's slowly eating less but who knows if it's because of the reflux or because she's just gotten through a growth spurt. The Prevacid and formula changes have really not done a whole lot, but then again, I would hate to see how she is without them! She is also still moaning at night. We've just turned off the monitor sound and have our door cracked so we can hear her if she really starts wailing. I don't like doing that but it's the only way we get any sleep. It's still amazing to me how, even though, she isn't feeling her best, she can still have the best little smile around.

(it looks like she wants to strangle me but it's still funny!)

Yesterday, my brother and his wife stopped by on their way back up to NYC from Charlotte. I don't get to see my brother very often and I'm really happy they stopped by. Rachel really liked seeing her Uncle Mike and Aunt Meredith too! We had a nice dinner outside with our friends. My brother marinated some steak and it was delicious! They took a ton of photos so I'll post them when I get them.

My favorite Rachel...

is a naked one! These were taken a day after she got over her latest sickness so she doesn't look her best. But, I still think she is the cutest "naked" baby ever!

Happy 8 Months My Sweet Pea!

14 pounds, 24 1/2 inches and a whole lot of attitude!

We love you!

You Down With ENT? Yeah, You Know Me!

Sorry, busting out my old rap skillz. Did I just give away my age? :)

Today was a big day at Brenner's. Rachel had her hearing tested and she did Ok. They explained that she is hearing high pitch levels fine but the mid-tones didn't seem as good. They said it could just be the wax in her ears and her tiny ear canals. The woman who gave Rachel the test also said that the most important sounds for her to hear are the high tones. She also tested to make sure Rachel's eardrums were moving and they were. So, for now, we don't worry and then go back in September for another check up. Hopefully, it's just wax and small ear canals for now and next time will be better.

(Rachel trying out the big girl chair)

We met with a new ENT as well. We took Rachel to an ENT in Greensboro a couple of months ago and he bascically told us she was fine. We sat on that for a couple months. I've always been concerned about her sleep. She is really restless and arches. Most recently she has been having short episodes where she stops breathing, coughs or snorts and then starts breathing again. She has always needed a ton of naps during the day to keep from being crabby and all this together has us thinking that her arching may not be from reflux like we thought. We think she sleeps that way because it's the best way for her to breath. So, we decided to get an appointment at Brenner Children's Hospital. (Man, do we love that place!) As we stood at the desk to sign in, an exam door opens and out comes Ben. He is a little boy with Down syndrome. At that moment I knew we had made a good decision. The new ENT, Dr. K, took all our concerns seriously. He did a quick scope of Rachel's nose and throat. He said everything looked normal. He then scheduled a sleep study to be done on Rachel. Thank you! I know we will learn some much needed information from this study. Either we find something wrong that we can help Rachel with or we find nothing and concentrate on the reflux. Can I tell you how happy this makes me? Finally a doctor who wants to help us and Rachel and not just blow us off as over paranoid first time parents.

(having fun with herself in the office mirror)

We then stopped by the NICU to say hello to some old friends. I am now kicking myself because I had my camera and I DID NOT GET A PHOTO OF THEM WITH HER! Argh! I guess we'll have to line something up next time. Maybe in September when she turns a year old. It was great seeing everyone and if you are reading this, I'm sorry she wasn't in a good mood. She had a long day and it was getting close to bed time. Jamie, I think Rachel remembered all the country music you made her listen to and that is why she cried when you talked to her. :)