I have nothing to wear... and other news...

So if you know a little about me... You will know I LOVE CLOTHES... and better yet... I LOVE SHOES!!! I think that my girls are quite lucky that I love clothes this much...

I spent this entire weekend cleaning out, organizing and re-organizing the girls clothes. I took down the boxes of Emma's clothes from when she was younger, to pass to Lillie, put up some of the clothes too small for Emma (to hopefully save for Lillie) and put away clothes that were recently given to us by friends. Both girls got some great clothes!!!

Just take a look at Lillie and Emma's closets....

Emma's closet.. FULL!!!


Lillie's closet... FULL! (and nicely organized- YEA!)

I have an obsession with dressing the girls alike. I don't know why, but I think they look pretty darn cute when they match... And while I can, I still try to do it.. (I know in a few short years, or maybe months, Emma will think it is NOT cool anymore to dress like her baby sister.) When I go shopping for clothes, I first browse both sizes then try to remember if there are any clothes that are similar then go grab the matching ones when I can. This weekend we went to Gymboree (IN THE POURING RAIN) and I scored some cute clothes! I got Emma a heart skirt and Lillie the matching dress. (so they are not exactly the same, but pretty close) Oh and they were wearing matching clothes when we went (out in the rain) to go shopping. :)

This was Easter morning. NOTE- matching!!! I bought these dresses at Strasburg last year and had them put away until now. They looked adorable!

In other news...

Lillie is now BINKY FREE!!! We got rid of her binky on Friday. We just decided it was time to do it, took them all out of her bed, and put her to bed. It was so easy! We could not believe it. This once again proves that Lillie is such an easy going kid and does not let anything really phase her. She just put herself right to sleep, did not even cry. It's almost like she totally forgot to get mad about it. We went the entire weekend without it, and really she was happier this weekend than she had been in a while! I think before she would throw a fit so she could have her binky! :)

So here are some random photos of the past few weeks.. Enjoy!
Emma and her daddy dying Easter eggs. Lillie did not help this year. She was already in bed!

Easter Morning. (if you look closely, you will see that the girls pajamas match! LOL)


BIG Emma! She loved hunting for eggs!


Lillie LOVED looking for eggs! She was running all around the yard! We did have to tell Emma to leave some out for Lillie!


Checking out the loot!!!


This was at a party that one of Emma's friends had. It was so much fun! Easter egg hunting party! :)


Emma helping her GaGa get the measurements all ready for the patio!


Dig that hole Emma!!! The boys actually put her in there to get the dirt down 2 feet so they did not have to keep bending over. She (of course) loved to help!


Lillie wanted to make sure she was in the hole to help too! She was at least a little taller than the hole!



In other, other news...
I am back in the gym.. Trying to get the rest of this 'baby weight' off. (you know the weight I gained when I was pregnant with Lillie? Well, now that she is 18 months old, I can't blame it all on her anymore). So I went ahead and got a personal trainer! I had one the last time I worked out, and I loved it! They really push you to your limits and teach so much! I have 30 min sessions about 2 times per week. The other days I go, I try to work on cardio, kickboxing classes and do some of the workouts the trainer teaches me. I will hope to be back at my 'goal weight' by the end of summer. I am also doing weight watchers with a friend of mine. It is great to have a partner to talk with about foods!!!
Wish me luck!!!

Emma- shows off her skills

Here are some videos of Emma. I keep meaning to take them to show how well she is doing on her 'school ready' skills. She has one more year before Kindergarten.


Emma doing math and spelling.



Emma speaking Spanish- ok really "Spanglish!"


She is quite an amazing little girl! We are so impressed with her!!

Where have we been?

WOW, I can't believe it has been this long since I posted something.. SORRY!

We have been here, there and everywhere!

I will not go back too far, but will talk about our Spring Break.
We took a little road trip on our way to San Antonio. We drove up to Brenham and saw the bluebonnets. I loved just letting the girls out and letting them run free. I did not try to get the 'posed' pictures that I usually want, because I wanted them to just be themselves and have fun. I think I captured some of their best moments.

Nothing Better than sister love. WOW...


SWEET Lillie!


My BIG girl Emma!


AWWWWWW. Love her!


"Don't forget to get Blue Baby in the picture!"

(for those of you who knew me as a small child, do you remember this baby doll? this is blue baby. I had one EXACTLY like this as a kid. I bought one for Emma when she was 1 month old. It is her MOST favorite baby doll. Take a look at this picture.. Blue baby in the bluebonnets)

I think of all the kids, blue baby was the easiest to photograph. She sat so still!

The girls had matching 'bo-bo's' on their chins. Hey, they are kids.. It's ok. :)

After leaving Brenham we made our way up 290 to 21 through Bastrop and into New Braunfels. We then headed to my Aunt Lari's house for dinner with our extended family. It was nice to have my grandparents there with all of their 7 Great Grandchildren!


From Left- Joah, Carys, Tyler, (up) Jadon, Ashlyn, Lillie, Emma
Joah, Carys and Jadon are my cousin, Linsey's kids. Then the rest are my 2 and my brother's 2.


The next morning we went to Sea World. (Lillie stayed in New Braunfels with her grandparents! That was a nice gift!) Ashlyn, Emma and Tyler LOVED Sea World. And thanks to our travel guide, Guncle (my brother) we lucked out on things all day! He called and found out you could actually come in at 9:00 am instead of 10 (like the website says). We fed dolphins, sea lions and saw every show! We were quite lucky! The kids got to ride the Shamu Express Roller Coaster. I guess for a 4 year old, that was the equivalent to the Texas Cyclone at Astroworld. Emma is still talking about how BRAVE she was and how she held her hands up in the air the WHOLE TIME! It was priceless when they were re-playing the event to KK (my mom) when we got home!
We all loved the Shamu show. It is so cool watching that HUGE whale jump so high out of the water and splash! The kids were all so GOOD that day, we are looking forward to going back this summer. (we bought the season passes so we can go back a few more times!)

Sea Lions


Dolphins


Shamu Express Roller Coaster. Can you spot Emma?


BFF *Best Friends FOREVER!!!


GO SHAMU!!!


On the play ship!



Other than that, we have just been busy, living life. Life with 2 kids is crazy busy, but so rewarding!

Lillie's health is great! We think the medication worked and she is finally having 'normal' days! We will go back to TCH 2 times this summer for checkups with the GI doctor and her yearly checkup with the eye doctor. We are so grateful for this hospital and the experts there!
Lillie will be 18 months on April 18. She is still wearing 6-9 month and 9-12 month clothes. I can't wait to see if she has gained any weight since the medication worked! We will go back to the doctor soon. I forgot, until recently, that the terrible 2's started around 18 months.. YEP, they do. We are working through this with Miss Lillie. Having an older sister that can do things for herself, makes Miss Lillie want to do things for HERSELF! And on HER TIME! :) But she is still such a sweet baby!

Emma is WONDERFUL! She amazes us every day. She has really taken an interest in math lately. She wants to add numbers constantly. She has learned addition and wants to practice often! We did get confirmation that she got into Lillie's school for next year. She will be in a program that will prep her for kindergarten. She is so ready for school already. She can spell quite a few words orally and write them. Math- VERY strong in math. Reading- she is reading simple books I have found at stores, and her school. This summer I am going to put her in a drama class and take her out of gymnastics for a little. She can't wait! She wants to 'perform on stage'. That is her newest thing... I WANT TO BE ON STAGE. So, we will take things one day at a time, and see where this takes her. She loves to be the center of attention and does not have one shy bone in her body, so we think she will do well!

We have an answer!!!

http://www.medicinenet.com/clostridium_difficile_colitis/article.htm

This is an article to read about the bacteria that was found in Lillie's samples. It is called c-difficile for short. We are going on an antibiotic for 10 days and this will hopefully kill the bacteria, or jump start the body to kill it on it's own. It could take these 10 days, or take 3 months to a year for the body to kill it. She said it is something she has seen a lot, so it's not a huge deal.
She did say she is not mal-absorbing any of her foods, so that is a good thing. She is getting what she needs out of the foods she is eating.

Her blood tests revealed she had an elevated glucose number.. I think this was from the marshmallows she ate in the waiting room at TCH. HAHA The doctor seems to think that was the issue as well. (oops... lay off the marshmallows!)

We are also to give her a pro-biotic daily until we go back in May. She gave us samples to give her, so we will just go purchase more until we go back. (it is an over the counter medication)

We feel like we are on the road to an answer!!! WOW, who knew it would take this long, and this many questions to find a bacteria.. That nasty thing created so many people to worry so much!!!

We will keep everyone updated on this as we have more answers!

We have an appointment!!!

We have an appointment scheduled with the GI clinic at TCH!!!

And the best news... It is THIS WEEK! Friday at 12:45. When the nurse called she indicated they had just had a cancellation, so wecould come Friday!!!!!

So here we go... On the road to answers!!!

Updates to come!

Allergy Update and What has been going on?

Hello All. I an not sure if we have fully let everyone know what all is going on with Lillie's allergies.

We have been working through a milk allergy for a while now. Lillie has been on a soy milk diet eliminating all milk and milk products from her diet. We have been noticing strange thing with her and so we decided to check with an allergist. I have been playing dr. mom and have researched many options on what it could be but we thought a professional should be the one to make the diagnosis...

So here is our results from today's visit:
Eggs... Her skin prick came back positive for eggs so we are to go on a egg free diet for the next month. We will take her back and discuss the results with him in 1 month..

We are being tested (through a blood test) for celiac disease. (this is a gluten/wheat allergy). I hope to take her to the lab tomorrow for this test. We requested this test and he agreed it was needed as well. Since she is under weight (5th percentile) and her BM are so strange, it was worth the test to see if this could be the issue. The treatment for this is a wheat free/ gluten free diet. If this blood test comes back positive, then we see a GI specialist at Texas Childrens for a intestine biopsy. I have learned so much about celiac this week reading about it online. It is quite interesting. You should google it!

Once we complete the 1 month study of her egg free diet, we will see about re-introducing milk into her system. He seems to think she is lactose in-tolerant. Since we are on the soy for now, she is fine. But the skin prick did not show a milk reaction so the next steps is a lactose free milk.

We are glad to know that at least we are getting answers after ruling out so many things so far. We have run a few other lab tests that I will not go into detail about.. I promise, you would be totally disgusted! Let's just leave it at that.

I have created a form that we write all of her foods, and diapers on so we can track what foods are causing the most issues with her and to see when things change. He was quite impressed with my chart! I told him, as a special education teacher, I know how to make charts and will follow through!

So, now we just wait.


In other news...
The girls are so sweet. We just love them more and more each day!
At school, Emma is now in the program called Extended Day. This is where the naps are shorter and they get more 1 on 1 time with the teacher to work on more academic things. She is doing word bingo, and learning simple addition using manipulatives. I have shown her how to use her fingers for addition problems with 5 or less and 5 or less in them. She loves to do math!!! Her teacher has even said she is getting her to teach other students how to do the math work. We are so happy when good notes and work come home! She is now beginning to see that she is going to out smart us. She is always thinking of what she can say next and then anticipates what we will say in response... then she always has a come back. It is so funny to watch her little mind work. A few days ago when I went to wake her up this is how the conversation went:

Emma- "Mommy, I do not want to go to school."

Me- "Emma you have to go to school. You need to learn new things to get ready for Kindergarten."

Emma- "but mommy, I already know everything they teach at my school. Why should I go back."

Me- "Because Emma, you need to see if there are any new things to learn today."

Emma- "well, I don't think we will learn new things. I already do all of the work in my classroom."

Ok remember this is at 6:30 in the morning as she is still in bed... My next response goes something like this:

"Emma it's time to get up. Your breakfast is on the table, and you need to get up now. I am sorry you don't want to go to school, but you have to because I have to go to work and Mickey *our dog* can't babysit you at home today." Then I walk out of her room before she has any time to respond. And she usually gets up.

Now for Lillie..
She is one of the sweetest easy tempered children I know. She just does not let anything get to her or bother her. She just takes things one step at a time. She is always pleasant, babbles all the time and LOVES attention! She is getting to the independent point where she does want to do things on her own and will let us know when these times are. She loves to draw on paper, paint with water colors, and feed herself with a fork. Lillie has much better hand - eye coordination than Emma ever did at this age. She is so good with her hands. She loves clothes and shoes. Last week my dad went to college station for a meeting and brough back the girls new aggie shirts. (he goes about 2x per year and brings them shirts each time he goes). He was showing Lillie her shirt and she leaned into it to tell him to put it on her. SO we did, over the top of her valentine's dress. My mom would not let her go out to eat with a maroon shirt OVER her red and pink dress. :) She will find her shoes laying around the house and bring them to you, sit down and hold up her feet. The other night she had her shoes on OVER her footy pajamas! HA..
She is still only 19 pounds and in the 5th percentile for weight. She is wearing 6 - 9 month clothes and she is 16 months old. I keep thinking one of these days she will get to wear 9 - 12 month things.. Maybe by the summer! Emma's baby clothes for this winter may fit her next winter. (At 12 months Emma wore 18 month clothes so by next winter Lillie will be 2 and I bet the 18 months will actually fit!)

Well, that's all for now. Pictures to come later. I need to get to bed. We were at the allergist for 2 hours... I am pooped!!!
Good night!

1 year ago today- January 14

1 year ago... our life changes forever
1 year ago... we witnessed miracles
1 year ago... we were surrounded by our friends and family
1 year ago... Lillie introduced us to prayer, and to pray for miracles

Can you believe it has been 1 year since this journey started? I keep thinking that it really did not happen, but we all know it did.

Let me recap you on the events of January 14, 2008..

It was an ordinary day... I was getting ready to head back to work, so we were crunched with last minute dentist appointments for Emma, and a mommy-daughter lunch. This lunch was interrupted with a phone call from Lillie's new day care to come pick her up, something was not quite right. She had a fever. It was 103. I rushed her to the doctor and within minutes we were rushed to the hospital by ambulance. Within about 1 hour upon arrival, we were told Lillie had meningitis, and possibly a very contagious or deadly strand, so we were locked into our room in the emergency department, waiting on results. James arrived during this time, as I was alone with Lillie until now. The night was rough. People coming in and out, having to put on full protection- gown, gloves, face mask, but needing to be in there to check her levels, administer medication, etc.

The night went from bad to worse as Lillie was getting worse, not better. We were then transported via Kangaroo Crew ambulance to Texas Children's Hospital directly into the PICU (Pediatric Intensive Care Unit). Lillie was stable the rest of this day, eating and sleeping. I left her at 10:30 to get some sleep (in the Ronald McDonald House). I had not slept longer than 30 minutes the night before. At 1:30 am- Jan. 15th- I got a phone call to return to Lillie's room, she had stopped breathing and needed to be intubated and placed on a ventilator. I was scared and alone. I walked into the room just as they gave Lillie medicine to relax her to place the tube. She was so lifeless, I was so scared and alone. I was then asked to wait in the waiting room until she was stable again. I crawled in a chair (and covered up with a blanket by the waiting room lady- so nice!!) and was able to fall asleep again... Within 1 hour, they woke me up to tell me she was stable and had moved to another room, to be closely monitored.

Fast forward... We spent 5 days in the PICU and Lillie improved more and more each passing minute and hour. Saturday she was moved to the 10th floor where we would stay for 10 more days. By Monday- the 21st you could see a total difference in our little Lillie. She was eating, and wanting to play. We were visited by many friends and family during our stay and were given gifts by many Lillie's angels. You know who you were!

Fast forward...
Lillie has met ALL milestones on time (or even early) At one time in the hospital it was unknown if Lillie would ever have a typical life. We knew better! She is walking, babbling, eating everything in sight, and best of all- sleeping!!!!!

We took a small family vacation to Galveston and watched Lillie experience sand and swimming and candy! Never too early to introduce sugar!

We survived, unharmed, Hurricane IKE. Our house was fine and we all were safe.

We celebrated Lillie's birthday on October 18th with a "Leap Frog Lily" party. She enjoyed the whole party and loved playing in the cake! We were blessed to have our special friends and family join us at the party. We also were blessed to have Nurse Jennifer- the nurse who took care of Lillie for 4 days in the PICU. She will always be a part of our family!

We celebrated Emma's 4th birthday with a special "Pinkalicious Tea Party" with her closest friends. Lillie was joining in with the girls! She was ready to be a big girl!

We celebrated Thanksgiving and had so much to be thankful for this year! We were thankful for doctors, medicine and most importantly God's Grace and blessing us with a MIRACLE!

We celebrated Christmas and the birth of our Savior grateful for the lessons we learned this year.

We have also learned many medical terms, symptoms, etc. We are working through news that Lillie has a milk allergy and any foods that even contain milk, are not good for her. Just ask Emma, she will look at the nutrition label for you to show you where to look for milk! :) What a good big sister.

Lillie is a TINY miracle (weighing only 18 pounds at her 1 year appt- putting her in the 15th percentile for weight for her age), but we like her this tiny!!!

On a side note, God works in mysterious ways. I entered Lillie's pediatrician office in January to get copies of payment info, and saw one of the Infectious Disease Doctors that took care of Lillie at TCH, she is now a full time pediatrician at our office! I was so happy to see her, and the best part, she remembered Lillie!!! She asked about her and was so happy to hear things were good! (we have already been to see her this week- to see if she needed stitches on her little head, but we got lucky no stitches!!!) So now we have another doctor who has been on this journey with us, to see us through Lillie's care.

Thank you for joining us on this journey. We could not have done this without all of you..