Snow snow snow

Just a quick update, Quinn's surgery has been put off until the 5th of January.

Here he is, the young man himself.

A little post Christmas gathering.

Quinn loved Grandmas boots.

Too cute.

Quinn finally go to hold his brother.

I hadn't really thought to have him hold Wesley until my sister said something. Thanks Sarah, he's asked two more times since this picture was taken yesterday.

So for Wesley news. We went to the doctors today. The boy has gained a pound and 2ozs since he was born! He eats all the time. His cord fell off on Monday and he's been smiling in his sleep since day three or four. It's really cute to see his dimples come out like that, he has a great smile. I'll try to get it at some point. He hasn't smiled fully awake yet, but he smiles as he's falling asleep. OK, like I said, quick post. We will definitely be posting more over the next couple weeks.

Merry Christmas

Twas the night before Christmas and Quinn suggested leaving a snack for Santa to have on his ride round the world and back. To the fridge we both went to decide what to leave and what did my child choose oh you wouldn't believe. For Santa he left an apple and orange, beans and carrots with ranch dressing of course, a roll and chocolate milk would make up the course.
OK, I'm out, that's my cleverness for the day. How many children would leave such wonderful healthy food for Santa. Heehee, several people have mentioned not wanting to be his Santa, but I love it.

Here it is in all its glory.

Quinn's letter to Santa and a nice picture he drew.

No explanation needed.

Santa brought a ton or superheros this year.

And grandpa provided a bat cave for them. Grandma got Bakugans and I got a couple more dragons. Luckily all of these guys can play together!

While Santa brought this for Christmas, its really for our stay in Boston. A mom that we met when were up for Quinn's cath procedure got one for her son who was also having an open heart procedure. Dan and I thought is was a great idea. What do you do to entertain a 4 year old who has to be still for several days. It's like an oxymoron, a still 4 year old. Well, we will see how it goes.

We are going to try to get this one on the go Quinn go website. I thought it would be kind of perfect. Quinn cheering himself on.

Pillow pet from Auntie Kristin and Uncle Joe, "I've always wanted a pillow pet! Do you remember when we went to the Ferris Wheel and you told me I could have one? Well this is great, now I have one." Nice job auntie and uncle, he really loves it.

This is what Wesley did for Christmas.

Finally, I leave you with this pic. I thought the crossed eyes would leave you with a warm fuzzy feeling.

Dec 21st a very special day

So unfortunately, we finally had to evict the newest addition to our family. Thursday the 16th at my last doctors appointment the doctor checked me and told me that at the moment I was not making any progress toward have this child. She then asked me if we wanted to schedule an induction for the following week. I told her definitely not, I wanted this baby to come on his own. She told me that was fine and as long as everything looked good with the placenta and fluid levels, they would actually let me go as far as two weeks over. I thought that was awesome, until I looked at the calender. Wesley had been breach for a while and had luckily turned head down, but then he was posterior with his back to my back even up until the day he was born. Apparently this increases your change of needing a Csection by a lot. So once I looked at the calender I realized that I couldn't let Wesley wait too long or I might not make it to Quinn's preop day on the 30th if I did need a Csection or any kind of repair. I called the doctor back and they said it would have to be Tuesday the 21st due to the holiday schedule (earlier than I would have liked, but what can you do). Well, Sunday into Monday I started getting crampy and thought that perhaps I might get to have Wesley without the assistance of the dreaded hated pitocin. The doctor had me come in at the end of the day and at that point I was making progress so again I thought, yes, this might happen on its own. But then nothing, Monday night was a more comfortable nights sleep than Sunday into Monday. Sigh, so 5:30 in the morning, I got up, did a little cleaning, eat some breakfast, got Quinn's stuff ready for school so my dad didn't have to do anything, and took some pictures. Here are Dan and Quinn at 6:30 the morning Wesley was born.

Here are my last belly pics.

Definitely smaller than with Quinn. I gained 68lbs with Quinn vs. the 47 (+ 3lb of water weigh I gained the day before) I gained with Wesley. Quite a difference. I guess all that extra fluid did make a difference.

We got to the hospital at 7:30am Dec 21st (the first day of winter, with the first dusting of snow we had had in a long time, the day of a lunar eclipse, and the day my second son was born. Pretty special day in my book).

They started pitocin at 9a, I finally asked for pain management at 1:20, it came around 1:40 it wore off around 3:40, we tried another round around 4p, which didn't work accept to numb my legs, very annoying when you are delivering. Luckily Wesley was born at 5:05 so it really wasn't too bad!!! I had about a half hour of "wholly crap this hurts!!!" and then I got to start pushing. Half hour later the boy was born, healthy and breathing and has now become the youngest baby I have ever held!!!!!! :) and taken home from the hospital. The night he was born, Dan said, how do we know if he's ok during the middle of the night, there are no monitors telling us he's breathing and his heart is beating. Well, yes, welcome to the wonderful unnerving real world. Thank you thank you thank you!!

For your viewing pleasure ...... Wesley and his amazing muscles!

Quinn came to visit for a little each day thanks to Grandpa Dan who watched him while we were in the hospital.

Grandma came too. I don't have a picture, but Nohno, uncle Tony, his girlfriend Heather, cousin Maki, and Marshall also came.

Look ma I can already throw adorable posses.

Master Wesley himself.

I have no idea who he looks like, the boy has golden brown hair (although Dan insists it's blond, so I guess his hair color is a matter of opinion) and dimples?? Where did those come from.

Getting ready to go home. Born on Tuesday when home on Thursday, really??

I couldn't resist the bear outfit my mom got us.

And we are out of here.

Yes still still pregnant

Here are the latest belly pics. I am due tomorrow.

I don't know, but I don't think I'm as big with this one as I was with Quinn.

But still huge.

That being said, I've gained 46 lbs with this little boy verses the 68lbs I gained with Quinn.

Speaking of, here is the boy himself using daddy as a jungle gym.

Back in Boston

This past Monday we brought Quinn up to Childrens for a cardiac cath. At the beginning of September during a routine check up with the cardiologist it was discovered that the pressures on the left side of Quinn's heart were getting high and there seemed to be some thickening of the heart walls indicating an obstruction was starting to build on the left side of his heart. Since his birth and subsequent heart repair we have been working on the right side of his heart widening the pulmonary artery which sends blood to the lungs. Now apparently we are dealing with something new and unrelated to Quinn's initial heart condition. He has developed a buildup of dense tissue just below the aortic valve that is actually starting to impact the valve in the aorta (the vessel that sends blood to the body). Of course you would never know any of this by looking at him, Quinn never stops moving. Quinn's cardiologist actually looked at us and said that they don't really know why this condition occurs and it's actually pretty rare for someone with Quinn's condition to develop the obstruction in the left side of the heart we are facing now. Sigh, of course it is. So long story short, the open heart surgery I thought we had avoided when Europe developed (and the FDA approved) a way to break up his stents and place a valve via a catheter procedure is now coming our way January 3rd. Please keep us in your thoughts and prayers.

Here we are on Friday for his preprocedure check up.
Quinn waiting for his evaluative echo.

The nurse putting on his id bracelet

Monday morning, arriving for his cath. This contraption is the most awesome thing. I think at some point anyone who enters this hospital stands and watches this thing for a while.

Waiting in the waiting room before the procedure.

Getting ready.

After being given the sleepy medicine.

Right after the procedure.

Getting ready to go.

Quinn actually opted to ride in the chair rather than on daddy's shoulder!!! Daddy liked that.

A couple of Quinnisms from this trip.
Nurse referring to the blood pressure cuff: is this bothering you?
Quinn half awake: Actually, its driving me crazy.

Quinn: Daddy, why do you have 2 heads.
Daddy: I don't
Quinn: Yes you do (pointing and counting) 1, 2.

Too cute.

Baby Shower

Yay, I was so worried I ran out of time to do this. Kristin and Karra surprised me this past weekend with a lunch to celebrate the little boy we have coming.
It was perfect and they will never know how grateful I am. I worry so much about short changing this little boy between school and everything going on with Quinn. And I absolutely don't want to do that. For a while I was thinking I was already doing a poor job at being a mommy to a second child. But this weekend, I finished shampooing the carpets and setting up the room. And then this!!! We celebrated my new little boy. Thank you thank you thank you everyone.

Little man who we have yet to name, you are very loved already and we definitely want you here.

Oh yes, and we came home to find this!!! Ah my boys.

Quinn's Birthday

Sadly, I did not get a ton of pictures from Quinn's birthday. It's kind of tough when you are the hostess.

We had a how to train your dragon birthday theme (if you don't remember, that was the very first movie he ever saw in a theater, and he still loves it). I loved it too.

Uncle Marshall made the most amazing cake with a huge Toothless (the dragon) on top.

Yummy and oh so exciting. Quinn loved it. Thanks Marshall.

So we had a whole bunch of stuff. Food of course, then we turned the kids into dragon trainers by putting tattoos on their arms. The first thing they had to learn was how to knock dragons out of the sky (balloons tapped to the ceiling). We tried to do this with little Frisbees, but that didn't work so well so we grabbed some Nerf swords and let the kids go at it. Then they had to tame their dragon by stomping on its tail. Each child had a balloon on a string attached to their waist and their trainer had to pop the balloon to subdue them. Who knew those balloons would be so hard to pop.

We had a pinata, the cake, and then all the kids wanted to go outside and play soccer. We didn't even get a chance to open the presents!!! Seems like everyone had a good time. I wonder how next year will go.