Baby in a basket...

Today was a good day to take pictures... here are just a few of my favorites.

"Bree-ito"

My little "Bree-ito". Isn't she precious?

(I have always loved to wrap my babies up like little burrito's- the name seemed appropriate)

Thanks Katie for the SUPER cute hair bows. We love them!

Great news day!

Today we met with a cardiologist at Primary Children's hospital. They wanted to get a more in depth look at little Aubrey's heart to make sure we didn't miss anything. 3 hours- 2 xrays- a lot of poking and prodding and an ultrasound later, we came out with this bit of news...

(To think we thought she had a lot of cords weighing her down in the NICU)

 First of all, we learned that Aubrey's heart looks pretty much perfect. Pretty much we just confirmed what we already knew. She does have the small whole in her heart but the doctor said it is small enough that even if it doesn't close up on it's own, he probably wouldn't do anything about it. She also does still have a little mummer which should also go away on it's own, probably within the next six months. So we will be going back for another check up in 6 months but neither of these things have him too concerned.

The best part of the whole day though,

We got to get rid of the oxygen!

That so made the 3 hours we spent at the hospital worth it. 

The only downside to losing the oxygen is the horrible rash from having those tabs stuck to her head for the last 3 weeks. That's going to take a while to go away. Poor thing.

The happy side of bedtime...

To make bedtime a little bit more exciting..

We bought the girls some new summer time pajama's.

 I think they did the trick...

Bedtime didn't take nearly as long tonight.

She didn't even make it to her bed...



Attitude...

Take a look at this attitude...

 So I know that anytime you have a new baby in the house it is to be expected that a good nights sleep is a thing of the past... but I didn't really expect it to be the big sisters we would have so much trouble with. Brooklyn has never been a great sleeper, as many of you already know, but she has always been so good at going to bed at night. It was just keeping her asleep that we had problems with... or sleeping in past 6:30 in the morning...

The week before the baby was born Brooklyn decided she was done sleeping in the crib. She did awesome at transitioning to a big bed and would go to sleep pretty fast. But since we came home with the new baby, getting her to go to bed has been quite the challenge.

The first week all she would do was cry for fear I was going to leave her again...

Finally she got over that fear and decided it was a lot more fun to stay up and play as long as she wanted after we put her to bed. We have started packing all the toys away in the closet at bedtime so there isn't anything to distract her. The problem though is that her biggest distraction is her big sister.

Those two are the biggest trouble makers.

Last night it was about an hour and a half before they finally fell asleep...

Tonight the clock is still ticking away...
Although it is really cute to hear them talking to each other and having fun together, I wish I had a better way of getting them to bed at night.
Any ideas?

Strong Willed...

One thing I learned early in life (as in from the moment each of my children was born) is that my girls are very stubborn and strong willed.

Very. Strong. Willed.

...

A few examples from the last 24 hours.

Example one: Refusing to go to bed... or at least going to bed on their own terms.

 Example two: Refusing to let their sister sleep in peace... or refusing to stop climbing INSIDE the playpen with the baby.

 Example three: Refusing to leave that darn oxygen cord alone... or constantly pulling it out of her nose (and it is not just Aubrey that has a problem with this one)

 Example four: Refusing to eat... or at least not without a big fight. (This one has been done by all three little tykes- Aubrey just wants to sleep, Brooklyn throws her food on the floor and Madison makes herself gag everytime she eats.)

This one has been the biggest struggle for me. I know these last few weeks have been hard on everyone and I know that choosing to eat (or not to eat) is one of the only things in their life that they have controll over so it really is no surprise this is how they choose to deal with the stress. I just wish it wasn't the case. They are all so skinny as it is...

Although I sometimes get frustrated with how strong willed these girls really can be, it is also one of my favorite traits of theirs. Especially when they are so passionate about doing something they know is right.

It is moments like this that I truly love.

Reading the children's Book of Mormon before bed- per Maddie's request.

I love you my little stinkers!

Right now...

Aaaaah... the moment is sweet.

All 3 children are sleeping...

... The only problem: it is dinner time and certainly not bedtime.

I'm afraid I might be in for a long night.

Good thing they are cute.

Jail Break...

Our experience at the NICU:

I think my friend Tannie said it best when she said "are we making a jail break? Are they going to come take him back?" about finally getting released from the hospital with her little baby boy.  As much as I loved sitting in this room hour after hour... day after day... I sure am not going to miss it.

I seriously never thought the day would come.

But it finally did!

We broke free from the chains and guards (or rather all the wires and nurses- whom we actually really enjoyed... the nurses not the wires)

Yesterday we were actually able to take our sweet Aubrey home from the hospital. It felt so unreal to actually have her in my car with me.

Since I wasn't able to have my husband there with me, our sweet nurse Babette let me take all the traditional "leaving the hospital" pictures with her. 

Although we really did not enjoy having to be at the hospital, we really did have some wonderful nurses taking care of our daughter. And really, putting up with me was probably harder than taking care of our baby. I can't tell you the number of times I sat and cried while these nurses just sat and listened. I think it takes an amazing person to work in the NICU. I know none of you will ever see this but THANK YOU for taking such good care of us while we were there. You really did make it so much more bearable for me.

(these were just a few of the women who helped take care of us during our stay)

I think it was quite hard for the girls to believe that we were actually home too. Brooklyn kept watching me just to make sure I wasn't going to be leaving her again any time soon.

But more than anything, I think they were just so excited that they were FINALLY able to hold their little sister.

Welcome home Baby Aubrey, we are so glad you are here!!!

Today...

Today has been a hard day. I started out the day with the hope that we could bring our Little Aubrey home. The doctor was really optimistic about everything and had said as long as her blood work came back looking good this morning, that we would get to go home today. So we spent the day yesterday doing all of the routine check out requirements so we would be prepared to go home this morning if all went as planned.

...

But we all know life never goes as planned.

We had to learn about car seat safety (which you would hope I already know considering I have 2 other children) We had to watch a movie about giving CPR.

We had to do a car seat test (where they put her in her car seat and watch all of her stats for 90 minutes to see how she responds to being in the car seat). We had to do a hearing test.

And just as you should expect... Aubrey decided to be a little stinker.

While doing her car seat test...

Her oxygen levels dropped.

(We already knew we were going to have to take the Oxygen home with us but now we knew we were going to have to turn the amount of oxygen she needs up while in her chair)

 While doing her hearing test...

She decided to have her left ear not pass.

(This was just the first test they use to see if there is a reason to be concerned. It is the test where they bounce sound waves around the ear and can tell by how it bounces back. The second test they had to do, she passed. This is the test where they can actually tell how much you can hear by how the brain reacts. It took them over an hour to finish all of these tests because they would get right up to the end of the test and she would pull the probes out of her ears and they would have to start all over again.)

When I got to the hospital this morning the nurse informed me that her blood test showed that her numbers had gone up... when they were supposed to go down. Which means, who knows what really. All I know is that this means we can not go home now until at least Thursday morning. That was SO not the news I wanted to hear. This news also shocked the doctor because the numbers that went up were the numbers that had been perfectly normal from the beginning and the numbers that were ridiculously high are working their way back down where they are supposed to be.

Once again, puzzling.

 The doctor didn't actually get in to see us until this afternoon. The news he brought with him this time was probably the hardest to hear yet it was almost a relief to finally have an answer.

The test results found that Aubrey does have Down's Syndrome. I think the news shocked even our doctor because she doesn't have the typical characteristics of Down's.  

 It's hard to know  what sort of challenges we have ahead of us but a few things that are encouraging is that we already know she doesn't have the normal heart problems that are associated with Down's Syndrome. We did find that she does have a small hole in her heart but this is a normal thing to have as a baby and it usually closes up on it's own over time. Her hole is a little larger than normal but all this means is that we will have to meet with a cardiologist regularly to watch it and if it doesn't close up on it's own they just have to put a little patch on her heart. Nothing serious at all. What a blessing.

Now that we realize the "what" we now know where to go next. Knowing this also changes some of our expectations as to what little Aubrey should be doing. The doctor also believes that this could be a big part of why her oxygen levels are going up and down so frequently. We already knew we were going home with Oxygen but we may be on it a little longer than we had originally thought while her little body works so hard to get stronger. 

Sometimes our lives don't always go the direction we originally saw it going but that doesn't mean the road we end up taking won't be just as fulfilling and satisfying as we had first planned. I know that life is going to be quite different for our little family but we wouldn't change it for anything. We are so grateful to have sweet little Aubrey and can't wait for the day we can all be back in our own home together.

Thank You!

This morning when I walked into Aubrey's room, I found this cute little basket sitting on a chair. It was filled with little goodies, notebooks, pens, books and tissues and a note from a dear friend who also recently had a baby in the NICU. She said she knows how hard it is to have a baby in the NICU and wanted to give us a few things to help make things easier.

All I can say is

THANK YOU!!!

You will never know how much this gesture meant to me. This was just what I needed to find this morning.

...

Quick update on Aubrey: She is still doing really great. She goes back and forth between being on oxygen and being on room air as she is still trying to get stronger. Her jaundice is going down- which means we shouldn't have to put her under lights. We will be in the hospital until at least Wednesday because she has to finish the antibiotics before we can go but should be able to leave as soon as we are through with all that. Anyway, Thank you again for all your kind words and prayers in our behalf. Your faith and prayers are giving us the strength we need at this time.

Finally, a little update and some pictures

I know so many of you have been waiting to hear more about our little Aubrey and want to see more pictures but everytime I sit down to write, something else comes up...

So here's to trying once again.

Wednesday my mom and dad brought the girls up to visit their new sister. Just before they arrived the nurses took her to the nursery to do the normal routine. While there, Aubrey's oxygen levels dropped a little too low for anyone's liking. So she was quickly wisked away to the NICU unit downstairs.

 They said she would only be down there for a few hours- which quickly turned into overnight. So the little girls were not going to be able to meet their little sister just quite yet. They did get a quick peak through the window just before they headed home for the night. They were so cute! Brookie kept yelling "BABY, BABY" as she tried to get us to hand her the baby through the window.

 Little Miss Maddie picked these beautiful flowers for me. Don't you just LoVe her vase! (it's a sprinkles jar if you can't tell) Sweetest thing ever.

 Thursday morning when we went down to visit, our pediatrician had all sorts of news for us. He told us that Aubrey did have an infection and that he was going to put her on an antibiotic. This guarantees us at least a 7 day stay in the NICU. He also told us that there was a slight clicking noise in her heart that concerned him and so he wanted to do an ultrasound of her heart just to check things out. The cardiologist said he thought everything looked pretty normal but they are sending the ultrasound down to Primary Children's for further evaluation just in case.

The doctor also pointed out an extra flap of skin on her neck that had him concerned that Little Aubrey may have Down Syndrome or Turner's syndrome and ordered a karyotype blood test to be done to help determine if there was anything to be concerned about. The test was done that afternoon and was also sent off for further evaluation.

The girls got to come back up on Thursday night to stay with us for the rest of the weekend. They got to see their sister once again through the window but this time it was a window that they could actually see through without being up on someones shoulders. Once again, they were thrilled.

 This morning things started really looking up for little Bree. She made a lot of progress including finally starting to eat. Because the antibiotics make her so tired all she has wanted to do is sleep. We would try and try to feed her but she was just not interested. Since they had a sugar water IV hooked up to her, we were not trying to push it too hard but decided today was the day we really started to ween her from the sugar water.

 The bad news this morning was that because she wasn't eating, she wasn't flushing the biliruben out of her body and so she started to get a little bit of Jaundice. Not enough that the doctor put her under lights but enough that we are hoping her good eating habits from today will continue.

Our biggest news of the day was that because she was doing so well with the little amount of oxygen she was being given, we were finally able to let her try breathing completely on her own. She did so good all day. By bedtime though she was so worn out from her big day that we decided to put her back on the oxygen for a while to give her a break.

 We were also able to completely ween her from the IV tonight. Hooray! This really is exciting because that means the only cords needed now are the ones that monitor her oxygen levels and resperatory levels. Today really was a big day for her!

.....

 This picture here shows what makes the doctor a little concerned about little Bree. It's kind of hard to see in the picture but there is a bunch of extra skin on her neck that looks like rolls of fat.This is one obvious sign that a baby may have Down syndrome or Turners syndrome. Our doctor told us today that he doesn't look at her and think she looks like a child who has Downs but there are a few things that have him concerned enough that he wanted to have her tested. Unfortunately we will not have the results of these tests for at least a week or so...

Although we are all praying for the best possible results, I feel so much comfort and peace at this time. I know with out a doubt that this beautiful little girl is supposed to be with our family and we already love her so much. She has such a strong spirit and is a wonderful addition to our family. We love you so much little Aubrey! Please get better soon so we can bring you home so your sisters can finally give you the hugs and kisses they are dying to give you.

Thank you once again to everyone for all of your kind words and prayers in our behalf. We love you all!