Christmas # 4

Under Construction until Grandpa P. sends some pics.

Christmas # 3

Christmas #3 - my mom's.

Stockings 1st - a break in tradition

Anara quote of the day, "Bandaids!!! I got Bandaids."

He does this to himself Daddy unwrapping 1-armed with a little help
New jambos complete with wand
Anarabug
Not quite what I meant by, "Hold that up so I can take a picture."
Bryan's girlfriend, Melissa, and Edison
Sleepy faces
Grandma Janet

Christmas # 2

Here are some pictures from Christmas #2 - Christmas morning at the H. homestead.

Violet, Anara and Joy opening gifts.

Great Grandpa H. and Edison

Uncle Guy and Joy napping
Baby Joy
Big Smiles
LG and Joy

Christmas #1

Our first Christmas this year was my mom's side of the family on Christmas Eve.

Aerial View

Reading the "God Book"
Myla being a Mommy
Waiting for presents
Discerning by smell
Bryce, Anara, Violet, Edison and Myla
Santa's little helpers


Anara looking slightly more Asian
Big eyes
Uncle Bubby and Edison

"This juice is even better than Grandma Janet's."

That was the first thing Violet said after they brought her into the room from recovery. Her voice was hoarse and scratchy from being intubated. She was pretty out of it for a while and didn't smile right away. She had two root canals with crowns, two fillings, and four sealants. She has not had any soreness and returned to her normal self after a trip to McDonald's.

The kids and I came to our hometown yesterday. Nate is staying in home for his post-op followup and won't be up until Tuesday afternoon. He is doing better and having less pain. At his followup he will find out exactly how much movement he is permitted and what recovery/therapy will look like.

I am hoping to do some Christmas baking today and get a little shopping done (I went Christmas shopping for the 1st time yesterday in between nursing).

Quick Update

Violet is having a root canal and two large cavities filled tomorrow. The dentist is going to fix them while she is under anaesthesia at St. Vincent Carmel. He thought it would be too traumatic to fix them in three separate appts. The dentist was shocked at how quickly she developed 3 major cavities. He thinks it is related to her asthma medication making her saliva more acidic. He said her home care looked great so I let myself off the hook a little.

Nate is feeling a little better. He is not supposed to use his left arm and does a pretty good job restricting activity. He is still pretty sore. He will wear the sling for about 6 weeks.

We had some bad urology news yesterday. Anara has some giant stones in her bladder. Dr. Kaefer has to make a 2 inch incision and pull the stones out with his finger. She will have this surgery January 23rd and will have a short hospital stay. Unfortunately we will be getting the suprapubic tube back temporarily. I was pretty disappointed to hear this even though it's just a little procedure.

Edison is gaining weight and doing well. He is still a little fussy and seems uncomfortable. I think it might be gas. If not gas then the pediatrician thinks maybe reflux - who knows. He has stopped turning his head to the right and we are trying to work with him on this. He weighed 11 lbs on Monday.

Something died in our bathroom. Seriously, our bathroom smells awful and I cannot locate the source. We are pretty sure it's a dead mouse or bird but we can't find it so I guess we just wait for it to decompose past the stinky stage. It's pretty nasty.

I neglected to mention...

one tiny little detail.

Nate had shoulder surgery this morning. We weren't really sure what to expect and didn't think it was really going to be that big of deal. Turns out it might be a big deal. He injured his shoulder during high school football. He has always had pain in his shoulder when he moves it certain ways. We used to joke about his high school football injury. We decided in October that he should probably go have it checked out since he was experiencing increasing discomfort. He had a partial dislocation (labral tear). This morning the surgeon told me that the bone was in good shape but the 15 years of wear and tear has worn his cartilage almost completely away. He will most likely have arthritis in this joint and could always experience some level of discomfort.

The surgery was only about 30 minutes but the recovery will be much longer. Our first little bump in the road to recovery happened right after surgery. The catheter for the nerve block wasn't in the right place and didn't provide any pain relief after surgery. They repositioned this and the numbing agent is now working well. He had morphine to take the edge off the pain in the recovery room and this combined with the general anesthesia made him weak, tired, and nauseous. We spent 3 hours waiting for him to stabilize enough to drive home and even then he was sick in the car. He is still experiencing a little nausea tonight. Also, I don't think we realized how little movement he would have during the recovery. He is not supposed to move his left arm at all and doing so over the next 10 days could tear the surgeons repair work. His arm will be in a sling for about six weeks.

I am a little nervous about the next 10 days or so. For the most part, I can handle the kids. I have to plan ahead a little as far as taking Vi potty, cathing Anara, or feeding the girls since breastfeeding is so time consuming. Life is just easier with two sets of hands. The biggest hurdle might be next week with our 4 days of doctors appts. Monday Edison has a pediatric appointment, Vi has a dentist appointment, and hopefully a lactation consultant is coming for a second home visit. Tuesday Violet has a dentist appointment. Wednesday Anara has a renal ultrasound and a urology appointment, and Thursday Violet has an appointment with the pulmonologist at Riley. It's going to be a crazy week.

About Violet's dental appointments... Yesterday Anara and Violet had leftover Halloween suckers. Violet told me that she had some sucker stuck in her back tooth and it was really bothering her. I was in the middle of breastfeeding so I told her to go get her toothbrush and brush it out. She brushed for about a half hour and when I finished feeding Edison she asked me to try and get it out. I looked in her mouth and realized that she had lost a substantial part of her molar. I tried to call her pediatric dentist and was unable to contact anyone. We took her to see Dr. Mark and he smoothed and sealed her tooth temporarily. He found three cavities. We scheduled an appointment with her pediatric dentist next week to make the appropriate repairs. She has seen a dentist every 6 months since she turned 1 and I was disappointed to hear that she had three cavities - you would think he would have picked up on those. I had noticed the dark spots about a year ago and pointed them out to him but he said it was just staining. I know that it isn't all about home care but it's frustrating for a kid who breastfed, took vitamins, gets limited sugar, doesn't drink juice, and brushes regularly to have 3 cavities at age 3. What's really remarkable is that Anara had terrible nutrition the first year of life, never had her teeth brushed until we adopted her and her teeth are absolutely perfect. Guess it's just genetics.

Feed the Birds

Grandma H. had a great idea to keep the girls busy during Daddy's shoulder surgery. She brought supplies for the girls to make bird feeders. The girls covered the pine cones with peanut butter and then rolled them in birdseed (mrrr nhee). They also filled orange peels with bird seed and then they hung everything on our tree.

Working hard

Peanut buttering the pine cone

Helping Grandpa hang them

Filling the orange with birdseed

Birds came and cleaned everything off in a day

Anara's Christmas present - a more permanent solution

One Month - Thoughts and Pictures

Yesterday Edison was 1 month old - time has gone pretty fast. Here are some ways he has changed.
1. He has already outgrown some 3 month sleepers and several onesies barely fasten.
2. He is much more alert now and his eyes are even bigger.
3. He stopped rolling over from his front to back as soon as you put him on his tummy.
4. He will sometimes go 4 1/2 hours between feedings at night.
5. He can seem pretty crabby and uncomfortable which starts our minds wondering (reflux, food allergies, gas, colic, or normal newborn stuff?).
6. He is finally starting to ease back into sleep after nursing at night.

The grandma's are gone, Nate is back to work and we are officially on our own during the day. I am really appreciative of all the help I had after Edison was born. The biggest challenge now is meal preparation. Feeding Edison isn't terribly easy and feeding the girls is still quite an ordeal. It's hard to find time to fix something other than peanut butter and jelly (I started dinner preparations at 10:00am today). I spend about 7-8 hours in a 24hr period attached to the little piranha and it feels like as soon as I finish I start again. I didn't realize that nursing would be such a painful struggle the 2nd time. We have had a lactation consultant come to our house and the best she could do is offer that his tongue is too long. This isn't helping with soreness and I wish I could figure out some way to fix his latch. I am thankful that I haven't had the overwhelming emotions this time like I had with Violet but the whole nursing ordeal is still discouraging. I realized today that I can count the number of times I have left the house since his birth on one hand (without using all 5 fingers). I know that sounds pathetic but I just don't have the energy to put together an outing right now with three small children. And, breastfeeding is so awkward for me that I cannot do it discreetly outside the home.

Here is a list of things that would really come in handy right now.
- A live-in lactation consultant, wet nurse, or some prosthetic nipples.
- A sous-chef.
- A volume control/mute button for Violet and Anara (to use while Edison tries to nap.)
- A housekeeper to do things like clean the cobwebs on the light or the stain on the ceiling that I only notice when my hands are full and I am preoccupied.
- A behavioral coach to help Anara learn to poop in the potty.
- A third arm - preferably coming out of the right side of my body to be used as a 2nd dominant hand.
- A pair of eyes that I could detach from my body to follow the girls while I nurse.

I wish I could remember all the fun quotes from the last several weeks. The girls have said some pretty entertaining stuff regarding their new brother, and I can only remember a few.
-Just this morning Violet was looking at him and said, "He's pretty cool isn't he?"
-When Violet was still really interested in breastfeeding she wanted to know how God puts the milk in there and then asked, "What recipe did God use to make that milk?"
-Yesterday we were watching food network (as I often do to pass the time spent nursing) and Violet said, "Giada has some great ideas." Then Anara said, "I just love pasta."
-One night at dinner I asked Violet to take two more bites. After she finished she said, "Mommy, I did what you asked me to" and then she leaned over with her hand near her mouth and whispered, "Sometimes I don't."

1st Bottle

Failed Attempts at a Christmas Card