I finally started on some hats to take to the NICU when we go visit for Lucy's birthday. Here are the first 3, probably the WORST 3! I didn't finish the bottom of the 2 on the left. I think I like it better unfinished. You have to remember how small Lucy's head was--10 inches around. These 3 are about 12 inches.It's hard for me to hem them that little. I will make some bigger & longer as well. I've ordered some tags to iron on to them as well, and I'm going to make a card-stock card to attach to them with Lucy's newborn picture & also a picture we'll take next month & some uplifting words to the parents. All 3 of these were made from clothes Lucy wore. I also have some boyish prints and solids.

Mannix had an Angry Bird themed 4th birthday party. We made him this pillow from an adult t-shirt. ( The yellow words aren't actually on the pillow).

Sweet , sweet Lucy

We keep forgetting things we need to do here since we moved states. I finally got paperwork, made phone calls, played phone tag, and got in touch with First Steps ( KY's early intervention). We observed her at home, and completed paper work ( answered yes, sometimes, or not yet) to a series of questions about her communication, gross motor, fine motor, problem solving, & personal social skills. She has been progressing SO quickly in the past few days. She is sitting up for a few seconds, and has just yesterday put her hand down to rest on it for a few seconds! She also is doing an army crawl of some sort to get around EVERYWHERE. I thought this might ' up her scores' a little.

After talking to someone at First Steps, they explained that there are 3 categories that a child's skills fall under : Typical, monitor, and concerned. Lucy had no scores in typical. She had a couple fall under monitor ( I think some of her communication and personal/social). But she had her fine motor & problem solving towards the top of Concerned, and her gross motor were very low. Sitting without any hands, standing, crawling position--these are all in gross motor. So we will have an evaluation face to face at the house with a specialist, and we will discuss any concerns, her behaviors, and what steps are next. Every time I've been worried, she miraculously picks up that skill almost the very next day. Maybe she senses my worry! ;) She still wasn't kicking her feet at all, and hadn't found them at 6 months. I had her Dr. check things out ( I was worried about Cerebral palsy), and the next few days she was kicking ad grabbing her toes. Last week I was pretty upset about her not sitting at all still, and she started sitting for about 5 seconds! We will see how she does, and hopefully she will keep progressing . Her adjusted age is about 7 months and 2 weeks old. All of this is based on her being that age. I know there is no comparison between her and Landon, but he was crawling right at 7 months, walking right at 10 1/2 months, and eating all the same food we were eating by 10 months. He had his first grilled cheese on our Gatlinburg Trip in early October. Lucy is still with baby food. She can do the Mum Mums great & puffs too, but we've tried crackers and bread and have had to finger swipe them out. 

She is still  nursing. We were supposed to try to include 2 extra 4 ounce bottles, as well as extra baby food, to try to help with her weight gain. ( She only gained 5 ounces in 3 months). We have upped her baby food, and tried to add more formula or milk. In order for her to drink more, we have to hold her hands down and shove a bottle in her mouth. I'm not forcing nursing because she has 2 teeth now, and NO THANKS on getting bitten!  She probably has only taken about 3 extra bottles since we have been here in almost 4 weeks.She has seemed to actually be nursing longer though, AND SHE HAS GAINED ABOUT 1 1/2 pounds in the past 3 weeks! She is around 12 pounds now.

I'm planning her birthday week & weekend. We will make this a big celebration! We are planning on visiting her nurses and doctors in the NICU & dropping off the gifts for the babies, probably a little celebration with anyone in Nashville who wants to, and then her 1st party here in Louisville. It will ALL be cupcake themed, of course!

projects & more projects

I have SO many things I need to get started on! The house is pretty much unpacked as much as we plan on unpacking it. I just need to set up my sewing maching in the basement. I haven't gone down there TOO much beause we don't have a washer/dryer yet :( We are waiting until the Home Depot Black Friday sale starts the 2nd week in November (YAY). Once I'm down there every day to do laundry, then I'll start on some projects while I'm waiting on the washer.

http://www.prudentbaby.com

Project #1-- My friend, Leslie, and I had been planning on making baby hats to drop off at the NICUs in Nashville. Well, I moved. So, for now, I am planning on make a big batch of hats to drop off when we visit for Lucy's 1st birthday. I am planning on taking them about 4 times a year. Receiving the gifts from previous NICU parents was a wonderful, unexpected gift. We really loved getting them & decided we would do the same. I am going to use used t-shirts and used baby gowns. IF you happen to have any used t-shirts or baby clothes/gowns/onesies feel free to send or bring them to me.

Project #2 -- Dresses for Lucy, made from my old sweaters. The idea is from http://www.make-loveit.com

Project #3-- Lucy's birthday shirt and tutu (of course!) I'm not showing a picture of those though. I don't want mine to look so bad that it doesn't look ANYTHING like the picture, and I also want to keep it a little surprise until I make it!

Sweetest boy ever!

Lately, everything to Landon has been the biggest_________EvEr!. He also has not mastered all of his blends( blends,right? I never taught those in 3rd). His st sounded like a d, his br sounded like an f, and his w & r just always sounds like a y. He says funny things like 'let's go to Yalmart or  let's yun as fast we can. But he also loves sticks.So the point of all of this is that he really likes to yell out when he has the biggest stick ever! Remember that his st sounds like a d.

He finally got the st this week :) Now that I think of it, he couldn't do sp until the other day. He wanted to rent "Spooky Buddies", but kept calling it fooky buddies. One of my favorite words he says is girl. He use to say  durl, and now it's more of gil. After I tell him at bed that he's the sweetest boy ever, he grabs me for a hug ,& tells me ,You're the sweetest gil EVER!

Light

How did I JUST read that  St. Lucy's Day is on the 13th December, in Scandinavia it marks the beginning of the Christmas season. Lucy's birthday is on St. Lucy's day . =) St. Lucy was a Christian martyr, very little is known of her actual life, but various legends have sprung up about her, mainly based upon the meaning of her name. The meaning of the name Lucy is light. I'll have to look up some of the legends, but for now here are some pictures of our little ray of sunshine! These are her 9 month pictures, they were taken by her Auntie Amanda .

sweet miracle



    

absolutley in love with her

 



wonderful blessing



We're here. We got everything out of the house and on the road to Louisville around 7pm last Thursday. We were able to get our lease signed & start moving things in on Friday.....drizzle and 57 degrees. We had some friends help us Saturday too, and returned the truck Sunday morning. The house is much bigger than I had thought when we looked at it a week before. There is much more space, a beautiful deck, & a great hill to walk or run. I will take pictures later next week of the house.

I never put pictures up from Lucy's NICU birthday party reunion. It was in August and we had a great time.


This is Leslie. Luke had posted on FB about me having the baby, and she told him she worked in the Baptist NICU & would maybe have Lucy. They had mutual friends in high school/church. It was very calming to me to know that someone Luke knew was watching over Lucy before I got a chance to even go see my baby. Thanks, Leslie! We spent many nights in the intensive section talking to Leslie about our other boys,houses,medical stuff, and her pregnancy ( she was on bedrest and having BP issues throughout Lucy's stay).



Meggie & Erica. They both had Lucy, or were around her, a lot once she got to the step down unit. We didn't really get to know the day nurses as well because we usually got to the NICU at 8pm and stayed until after her 11 pm feeding. So we saw them a lot at night too like Leslie.

Nurse April. Lucy spent her 1st New Years Eve with her on the last night in the intensive section. She is actually a close friend of our friend--after meeting in the NICU as well. I'm glad she was working nights at that time,since we didn't get to know too many of the day nurses.



This picture was taken by the photographer at the party.

 There were a few other nurses we did not get to see. We are able to keep up with some of them on facebook or on their nicu facebook page. We are planning on going to visit on her birthday, and I am also working on a project for gifts for the babies soon.

And this is Dr. Rojas. Lucy had 4 different NICU doctors besides nurses, cardiologist, & respiratory therapists. When Dr. Wingo, the L&D nurses, and I decided we could not wait ANY longer because of my liver-- there was a lady having twins that the NICU was waiting on& said we had to wait for also. They ignored what the NICU said, and took me in for my c-section. Dr. Rojas was in the delivery room because Dr Haynes was waiting on the twins.( sorry for the mess and busyness) He also walked into the L&D room right after Dr wingo had told Luke I'd have brain damage and we wouldn't know how severe until after they did a scan. Because of THAT meeting, he says he won't ever forget Luke. ;) Luke told him, not so nicely, to get out of the room, that he couldn't handle any more bad news, and we'd see him later. He told us Lucy was doing great, and he'd see us the next day. The next day when I woke up with him at the end of my bed, he reassured me how well Lucy was doing, and then said I looked much better than the day before ;)

I mentioned a few weeks ago about some friends who would be having a baby with a heart defect & would need surgeries. Baby Caleb went to heaven on September 14th.Mommy ( Krista) was about 32 weeks along & delivered him that afternoon.Please  pray for Mommy and Daddy ( Brian) and the rest of both families. They also have 2 other kiddos, so keep all 3 of them in your prayers!

MoViNg

It’s official, & can be made public now. We are moving! There are so many mixed emotions. We have such good family, friends, friends who are like family, church family, & doctors here. I hate, really hate, leaving the kids’ doctors. I hate leaving the Dr. that brought both my kids into the world in emergency c-sections. I especially hate leaving all the people that helped us with Lucy, it’s a different type of attachment. I feel like Landon will be so sad without Jack,Trey, Owen, and Lyla--his bffs. I hate packing-ugh. This is move # 4 for us since we have been married, but thankfully we’ve been in our house for about 5 years ( I think?). But at least I have a while before we have to go. That was sarcasm. Luke has actually been told that he will need to be at his new store  on September 19th. So I will send the next two week packing boxes, but today it feels so great to sit in sweats, listen to the rain, and NOT pack. So many questions. Where will we live? Where will we go to church? What doctor will we go to? What doctor will the kids go to? What about my neurology appointment I have in 2 weeks? What about Lucy’s Early Intervention? What about Lucy’s secondary insurance? What about her next hearing test & following preemie tests?The plus side to all of this is that Luke’s position is in New Albany, Indiana, and we will be moving to Louisville. We have both been praying for this new position for a long long time. He’s been working for this for 6 years, & finally made his way up to store manager. We both have always hoped for a move to a coast, walking on the beach, laying out, playing with the kids in the water on weekends. But we both know this is just a 2 year commitment, and we could very well be moving again in the next few years. And he will continue to try to move up in the company in the next several years. A district manager is the next step up & could require a move also. We have looked at a few houses over the weekend in Louisville, one that I love. I love. Luke really really likes it too, he just isn’t for sure it’s for us right now because he is leery of a few things and the inspection.It has everything on my list: brick,fireplace, 3+ bedrooms, 2+ baths, large dining room, pantry, & it is also right by the park & Southern Parkway. It also has a full finished basement with a full bath and extra bedroom & living areas. <3 It just went on the market like this weekend, so it very well could still be available in a few months.We’re still looking at houses with the help of some people, but at this point are possibly leaning towards renting at first. We will find a house at the right time. ( I hope the right time is in the next few weeks!)We are planning on keeping our house here & renting it. So we will be busy busy this week and next. I'm sad to leave the house that both the kids came home to, but excited about new opportunities with our family!