Wordless Wednesday - Partners in Crime

For more Wordless Wednesday participants, go here.

Fight for Preemies - Bloggers Unite

As I have posted before, Davis was born at 31 weeks, weighing 3 lbs 9 oz. He spent 7 weeks in the NICU. You can read the story of his birth and the first few weeks here. I have posted numerous pictures about Davis and how amazing he is but today we fight for all Preemies.

In An Average Week in the United States*:

10,440 babies are born preterm

1,664 babies are born very preterm

6,769 babies are born low birthweight

1,217 babies are born very low birthweight

In 2006, there were 542,893 preterm births in the United States, representing 12.8% of live births.

Between 1996 and 2006, the rate of infants born preterm in the United States increased more than 16%.

During 2004-2006 (average) in the United States, preterm birth rates were highest for women ages 40 and older (16.8%), followed by women under age 20(14.7%), ages 30-39 (12.7%) and ages 20-29 (12.1%).

During 2004-2006 (average) in the United States, preterm birth rates were highest for black infants (18.3%), followed by Native Americans (14.1%), Hispanics (12.1%), whites (11.6%) and Asians (10.7%).

In 2005, the annual societal economic cost (medical, educational, and lost productivity) associated with preterm birth in the United States was at least $26.2 billion.

November is Prematurity Awareness Month and today bloggers unite to fight.  Please take a few minutes to visit the March of Dimes to learn how you can help.

Happy Halloween

Even though I am majorly behind on posts/pictures, I thought I'd share the Halloween pictures from today.  Davis was Bum.blebee from Trans.formers for Halloween but went to a wizard/Hog.warts party earlier today.  Samuel was a dragon.  He LOVED his costume.  Both Chris and I chased him around for at least 20 minutes once we put on his costume and neither of us was able to get a decent picture because he was too busy running around.  The ones here are the best that I got.  I hope you enjoy.

At the Hog.warts party:

Look at the cake my friend made.  It was amazing.

Bumb.lebee:

On our way to the neighborhood party.  It was Samuel's first time in the wagon and he really liked it.

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The dragon:

These are very typical of the shots we got.

 

 

The Dumbest I've Read in a Long Time

I just read this article on MSN about parents hosting swine flu parties so that their children can be exposed to people with the flu.  All I have to say about that is WTF are they thinking.  Crazy.  I can't understand the reasoning behind purposefully exposing your child to any illness, let alone one that has so many unknowns at this time. 

Kreativ Blogger Award!

I got an award!! Thanks to BB for the nomination!

Here are the rules:
1-Thank the person who nominated you for this award.
2-Copy the logo and place it on your blog.
3-Link to the person who nominated you for this award.
4-Name 7 things about yourself that people may not know.
5-Nominate 7 Kreativ Bloggers.
6-Post links to the 7 blogs you nominate.
7-Leave a comment on each of the blogs letting them know they’ve been nominated.

7 things you may not know about me:

1. Chris and I were set up on a blind date (although he says we met before that date I do not remember) in 1990 and were engaged 6 months later.
2.  My mom died in 2004 from Leukemia and now I raise money yearly for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society and I hope to one day train for a half marathon with Team in Training.
3.  I am a lawyer but have never set foot in a courtroom other than for jury duty.  I do corporate/contracts and would die if I ever had to go to court for any reason.
4.  I actually did really well in law school and served as Editor in Chief of our law review.  Although sometimes I lack common sense, I have a lot of "book sense".
5. The only sport I was ever half way decent at as a kid was swimming.  I "played" basketball and softball but was not good at all.
6.  Before visiting Chris' grandparents' house in rural Mississippi after we got married, I had never been on a farm or out of a city. 
7.  I am horrible with directions.  If it weren't for goo.glemaps, I'd be lost a lot.  I really want a GPS but am too cheap to buy one.

7 Kreativ bloggers I would like to nominate are:

Jessica
Shamae
Debbie
Kathleen
Tracey
Elaine
Merlot

Happy Children's Day

Today (October 1) is Dia de los Ninos in Guatemala. A friend of mine who is a missionary in Guatemala mentioned it on Face.book so I did some minimal research on the holdiay (Thanks Wiki.pedia!). I am thinkig that as Samuel gets older, celebrating this day might be a good way to celebrate his Guatemalan heritage. I need to research some more to find out how this day is celebrated (if any reader knows, let me know) but celebrating kids sounds like a wonderful idea.

Just curious, for those of you with children of different race or heritage, do you do anything special (or do you plan to do anything) to celebrate the differences or celebrate any holidays specific to your child's race/heritage?

So Busy!

Sorry, it's been forever since I have posted. I don't even know if I have any readers left but thought I'd add a quick post to update what's going on. Samuel turned one on August 24. That is also the day that he started full-on walking. Now he does not stop. The boy is BUSY! I do not have time to post when I am at home because I am constantly having to chase Samuel around to keep him from pulling stuff on his head (he LOVES to pull stuff off of our kitchen table and counters) or from climbing on our ottoman and hearth (he thinks walking on the ottoman is fun, fun, fun). By the time I finally get both the boys to bed, I am exhausted and ready for bed too. I'll try to at least post some of the pictures from all of the birthday parties we had in August.

Somebody is Six Years Old Today!!!

This should have posted on August 7 not August 6. Today, the 7th is his birthday.

I cannot believe that Davis turns 6 today. It seems like just yesterday when we were rushing to the hospital so scared that he was coming too early. I am so in love with my oldest boy and grow more proud of him daily.

From this 3 lb. 9 oz fragile baby:






To this big boy:




HAPPY BIRTHDAY SWEETHEART!

One Year Ago

One year ago today we got the call that changed our lives. Today is the anniversary of our match for Samuel. We were starting to get really anxious and beginning to wonder if we would ever get a match. God knew exactly what he was doing. Samuel was meant for us from the beginning. Its been quite a year and I wouldn't change a thing. He is truly a gift from God. I continue to pray that R has found peace with her decision.

August is a very busy month for us. Davis turns 6 on the 7th and Samuel turns 1 on the 24th. Two parties to plan. And getting ready for kindergarten. Fun times ahead!

Reading My OB/GYN Records

I recently got a copy of my records from my OB/GYN since he is semi-retiring and I am finding a new GYN to do my annual exams. In reading through the records I can't help but be so grateful that Davis is healthy. God was really watching us that day almost 6 years ago. Reading about Davis' delivery and also about our two losses has brought back a flood of memories. A few things of note in the delivery records are below.

From the typed operative report under Postoperative Dianosis:
1. A 31-32 week gestation with ruptured membranes
2. Breech presentation
3. Fetal distress suggestive of cord compression
4. Cord prolapse
5. Bicornuate uterus (turns out it is actually unicornuate with a rudimentary horn but what a way to get diagnosed with a uterine anomoly)

From the operative report under Indications:

The patient was being observed in labor and delivery with a diagnosis of premature, preterm rupture of membranes and had begun demonstrating bradycardiac episodes suggesting cord compression. At 1800, while I was at the bedside, the baby had an acute bradycardiac episode which was nonresponsive to position changes. Cervical exam was perform and she was 4 cm dilted with a foot present in va.gin.a. There was no cord palpable, but with the pregression of dilation and presence of the feet, the assumption was that she had either an occult or partial cord prolapse causing the bradycardiac episode. . . . decision was made to proceed with the rapid sequence induction and cesarean section.

From Findings section: A vigorous male infant from the breech presentation with the umbilical cord prolapse to the level of the feet.

I remember the nurses in the NICU commenting about how lucky we were since he was the baby with the prolapsed cord. I didn't understand at the time what that meant and was mostly in a daze for the first few weeks of his life.

For the 5 years after his birth as we tried to have number two I was always concerned about the risk of premature delivery again. The chances are great that with my uterus I would never be able to carry a baby to term. God really knew what he was doing when he led us to adoption and brought our precious Samuel into our family. Our family in now complete and I wouldn't change a thing.

9 Months

It's very hard to believe, but Samuel is already 9 1/2 months old. He is growing so fast and changing so much. I do not have much time to post lately since he is a VERY busy baby and is into everything. It seems that every dangerous thing in the house calls to him and he must get to the item as quickly as possibly so he can beat mommy or daddy there.

At his 9 month appointment on May 27, he weighed in at 21.7 lbs (75%) and was 29 inches long (75%). His head circumference was in the 25%. According to the pediatrician he is doing great developmentally.

A few things that he is doing or that happened recently:

- He got his first haircut on May 23. We went to an old fashioned barber shop in town and his stylist said he was the best baby she'd ever cut. He did so well. Check out these picture from his haircut:





- He's been "crawling" for over a month now. He mostly scoots around on his tummy but is really quick and gets anywhere that he wants. He will occasionally crawl on his hands and knees but after a few motions he goes to his tummy. Here is a very short video of the crawling (please ignore my voice - I sound like an idiot). Seems like every time I try to get it on video, he stops crawling.




- He is taking four 6 oz bottles per day although he rarely finishes all of his bottles in a day (he'll typically leave 1 - 2 oz of his morning and afternoon bottles). His total formula intake is 20 - 24 oz. per day.

- He is eating three solid meals a day although we are sticking purely with purees and yogurt as he seems to have real issues with any textures. He typically gets cereal and a fruit for breakfast, yogurt and a veggie for lunch and a meat and a veggie at dinner. He will choke and puke on anything besides baby food. Pediatrician said to try to introduce new food textures every week or so to see how he does and that some kids just take a little longer to get used to textures and gumming their food. We've tried puffs and he can do them ok but he occasionally forgets to gum them thoroughly and ends up choking and puking them up so we really limit them to just once or twice a week and only a few at a time.

- He has seven teeth already (three on bottom and four on top). So cute!!!!

- He just starting pulling himself up to stand. He will try it on anything (including toys are are not very stable) so I fear he is going to injure himself if we do not watch him like a hawk. He can also sit down from standing.

- He generally sleeps through the night (from 7:30ish to 7:00ish). He generally takes a 1 1/2 to 2 hour nap in the morning and a much shorter nap (45 minutes) in the afternoon although there are many days where he boycotts his morning nap.

- He comfortably wears size 12 mo. clothes.

- He cannot yet sit up from laying down although he is getting close to doing this.

- He LOVES his big brother. He lights up whenever Davis walks in the room and Davis can make him smile and laugh even when he is being grumpy. He wants to be in whatever room Davis is in so he is often found crawling towards the playroom to play with his big brother.

- He says "ma ma" and "da da".

- Being his mother is such a dream come true and an answer to so many prayers. God really knew what he was doing in matching us with this little angel.

Here are some of the pictures from his formal 9 month portraits:

Poor Davis

If you follow me on FaceBook, you have undoubtedly seen all of my posts about Davis' teeth issues but I thought I'd document them here as well. We had a few friends over on Memorial Day so we heated up the pool for the first swim of the year. Everyone was having such a good time that we let Davis stay up much later than normal. Davis was walking along the bench in the pool but because it was dark (we had the pool light on but it does not put out a ton of light), Davis did not see when the bench ended and he hit his mouth on the side of the pool. Chris and I heard Davis crying (actually screaming) and saw our friend pulling him out of the pool. I rushed to him and there was blood everywhere. We thought he had just busted his lip so we headed inside to get some ice. Once we were inside, I saw the damage. His top front two teeth were extremely lose as was the tooth next to it. The canine tooth on the top looked chipped. Poor kid didn't want any tylenol or anything for pain (but was able to eat a cookie to make himself feel better).

The next morning, we went to school and I left a message for our dentist. Our regular denstist office was closed for continuing education so the pediatric dentist that was covering called and told us to come in to make sure there was no danger. I picked Davis up from school early and we headed to the dentist. She thought we'd have to pull at least two teeth and maybe up to four but wanted us to follow up with our regular dentist in a few days once the swelling went down. We did that on Friday and the final verdict is that they think he might have broken his jaw but it is settling back in place. It was pretty clear that his front two teeth would need to come out. We were hoping to save the other two. The X-ray showed that the tooth next to the front teeth was split (the tooth split from the roots) so it would have to come out too. The canine tooth is actually not chipped but was pushed up into his bone. We are just hoping that it did not get too close to the tooth bed of the permanent tooth. If it did get too close, it might stop development of the permanent tooth. We are going to leave the canine in and monitor it. They hope that over time that it will start to drop back down.

We tried to go ahead with the extraction on Friday while we were in the office. Davis was doing great until the dentist gave him the first novocaine shot. After that, he started screaming and crying so we put an end to the work. We didn't want his first real dental experience to be traumatic so we rescheduled for June 10 when we'll do the extractions under conscious sedation. I am nervous about him taking the drug but they tell me that it is really mild and kids typically come out of it pretty quickly. He will still be awake but the drug makes them loopy and also has the effect of making them not remember what is happening.

Poor kid will be without his front two teeth for 6 - 8 months (the permanent teeth are there but not too close) and without the tooth next to that for about 2 years (kids usually don't lose that baby tooth until they are 8 - 9). Since the canine is pushed up into the bone and you can only see a small part of it now, he will look like he is missing all 4 teeth. He thinks it will be cool (and is excited that the tooth fairy brings extra money when kids have to get teeth pulled at the dentist) but we are just hoping that he does not get teased when he starts kindergarten next year.

I took some pictures of his beat up mouth and will post them along with pictures of the missing teeth after the procedure next week. Please pray that the procedure goes smoothly and that he does not have any sort of reaction to the drugs.

Pictures!

Since my last post was such a downer and I have not posted pictures of the boys in ages, I thought I'd post a few recent pictures (and one video). Samuel is 8 1/2 months already. I can't believe how much he has changed. I'll do a formal update post when he turns 9 months but until then, I leave you with these:












Samuel dancing (please ignore my stupid laugh at the end):

(Un)happy Mother's Day

For all of the years we were trying to have a baby, Mother's Day was a painful reminder of what we did not have. When I finally became a mom, I was looking forward to finally being able to celebrate Mother's Day. Unfortunately things didn't work out that way. My mom (who was the best mom on the planet and my best friend) was diagnosed with acute leukemia the week Davis got released from the NICU. After a seven week stay in the NICU, the son we had waited so long for was finally coming home. What should have been one of the happiest times of my life was also one of the saddest.

My mom fought hard to beat her cancer, but unfortunately she lost her battle. She died on Mother's Day (May 9) in 2004. Every since then, Mother's Day has left me sad. I am so sad that my mom died, sad that I cannot celebrate her as a mom, sad that she only got to see Davis a few times (she was not allowed to be near children under two due to a compromised immune system), sad that she will never get to meet Samuel, sad that my boys will not know her. On a day that I should be so happy with the way things have turned out for us, I continue to feel sadness about my loss. I hope and pray that as time goes by that I will be able to enjoy the day more and celebrate being a mom to the best sons on the planet. I am truly blessed and need to remember that when I start to feel blue.

My Two Sons

I have had this post knocking around in my head for awhile and decided I would take a stab at writing something substantive on this blog for once.

I used to work with a guy (he was a much older partner at my former law firm) that had three children. He had two biological sons and an adopted daughter. I remember that he would always mention that his daughter was adopted when talking about her. She had some emotional issues and it was like he was embarrassed by her behavior so he would qualify stuff with "she's adopted." I am not sure why I am thinking about this as its been since 2000 that I even worked with this guy and that is way before adoption was even a thought for us but for some reason that has stuck with me. I wonder if part of his daughter's issues were caused by being labeled adopted rather than just his daughter?

I can't imagine talking about Samuel like that regardless of what issues we might face in the future. I do not have one biological son and one adopted son, I have two sons - plain and simple. I am very proud of the way Samuel joined our family but do not think it is something that will come up that often when talking to people outside of our family. It will obviously be something we discuss in our house and with him but I never want him to feel like he is any less our son because of the way he joined our family.

Book Giveaway!

Betty Rubble is the big winner. Best of luck to everyone.


I have two books on preventing miscarriage that I would like to give away. If you are interested in the books, How to Prevent Miscarriage and Other Crises of Pregnancy and Preventing Miscarriage: The Good News (mine is the older edition but still has some good information), please leave a comment and include a way for me to reach you. I'll randomly select a winner after 5:00 pm on Wednesday, March 18.

Forever Family

We are officially and legally a forever family now! The hearing went really well and you could tell that the judge really liked this part of her job. The whole thing in front of the judge took about 5 minutes. She even gave Samuel a stuffed toy boat, which he loves. Our attorney gave us Samuel's original birth certificate and he sent off yesterday to Georgia to get his new birth certificate. We should have it in a month or two. We got out of the courthouse a lot sooner than we thought so we went out for brunch. All in all, it was a great day.

Here a a few shots from the day.


Waiting to go into the court room. A lady that was there for her finalization took these pictures for us.


Getting sworn in by the judge.


First picture as a forever family!

Tomorrow is Our Big Day

Samuel's finalization hearing is tomorrow at 8:00 am. We are going to have to get the boys up really early to get there on time. I just hope they are not too grumpy in the morning and things go smoothly driving to downtown Dallas for the hearing. We'll probably be at the court house for 2 - 3 hours (we have to wait for the certified copy of the adoption certificate). We decided to take Davis out of school so he could attend. We want him to be a part of this big day for our family. He knows that it is an important day and after tomorrow Samuel will be his brother forever. I'll try to post some pictures tomorrow if the judge lets us take them.

Losing His First Tooth

Davis has lost his first tooth! On Sunday evening, we were putting a puzzle together and I thought he had something stuck on this tooth and when I looked closer, noticed there was no tooth. Thankfully, the tooth wasn’t lost, though for a little while, we thought it might be. It had fallen out during dinner, and was still in the dinette, sitting on Davis’s chair. We cleaned it up, and helped him ready it for the Tooth Fairy that evening.

6 Month Portraits

We took Samuel to J.C. P_enne_y's for his formal 6 month portraits. Little stinker was not very smiley but we got some cute pictures anyway. Here are some of my favorites. I hope you enjoy them.

6 Months

Its hard to believe, but Samuel is 6 months old today. Time has gone so fast and he has changed so much. He has an amazing personality - always smiling and talking. He lights up when he sees me and it makes my heart melt. He is also so in love with his big brother and big brother is so in love with him. Whenever Samuel sees Davis, he starts laughing because he knows that Davis will play with him. Davis cannot go to sleep without giving Samuel a kiss good night. Davis adjusted to having a new person in the family so much better than I thought he would and I pray that they continue to get along so well and become great friends.

Samuel doesn't go in for his 6 month appointment until next Monday so I'll update then with his exact weight and height but according to my scale, he is 18lbs as of this morning. I am putting together a letter to send to R. It is the last update that she asked for when she signed her papers. We are going to leave the door open for her in case she wants additional contact at a later date.

Now for a few things that Samuel is doing:

- He easily rolls from his back to his tummy. He still hates it on his tummy and usually starts crying pretty quickly. He is starting to realize that he can just roll back over and make it better.

- He is working really hard on sitting up from a laying position. Whenever he is on his back, he is lifting his head and shoulders up. I know that one morning pretty soon I am going to go to get him out of his crib and he'll be sitting up. We are already talking about lowering his mattress.

- He loves to stand while holding onto our hands and definitely puts weight on his legs. He has actually taken a few "steps" while I was holding his hands.

- He has two teeth. They popped overnight without too much fanfare.

- He started solids. He usually gobbles up his cereal and his stage one food (a whole container of it) when he gets it in the evening. He has done rice cereal, squash, carrots and sweet potatoes. The next food on our doctor's list is bananas and we'll be trying that soon.

- He loves to babble. He says da da da all of the time and we are trying to teach him when to use it. It is so cute when he "talks".

- When I started writing this I wrote that he is generally sleeping all night. For 6 nights in a row, he went down around 7:45 and did not wake up until 7ish. The last two nights he has started waking again (and last night he woke up twice). I am hoping the night wakings are a fluke and we go back to the 11 hour stretches.

Now for some pictures:

March of Dimes March for Babies

Every year since 2004, I have walked in the March of Dimes March for Babies to raise money for the March of Dimes and I will be walking again this year. As many of you know, our son Davis was born 9 weeks premature and spent 7 weeks in the NICU (neonatal intensive care unit) at Medical City Dallas Hospital, therefor the work of the March of Dimes is very important to me personally. I am oficially kicking off my fundraising for 2009's March of Dimes March for Babies and ask anyone who is so inclined, to please consider donating to this worthy cause. Please follow this link (http://www.marchforbabies.org/KLTTX) to donate online or you can send checks and/or cash to me directly. Please let me know if you have any questions. Thank you.

We Have a Date!!!

Our finalization hearing is scheduled for first thing in the morning on Friday, March 6. I am so excited about becoming an official forever family (even though we've been a forever family since the moment I set eyes on Samuel). Samuel turns 6 months next week and I'll post an update about things then but everything is going great. He is an awesome baby and we are so blessed to have him in our family.

Puppet Show

Davis threw an impromptu puppet show from Samuel, and as you can see from the latter’s reaction, the show got rave reviews. Enjoy!


Puppet Show from Chris Turner on Vimeo.

Milestones

I am posting this quickly so I don't forget the date (since I am not good about remembering or otherwise documenting these kind of things). Samuel rolled over from his back to his tummy today for the first time. He was playing on his mat while I was doing something in the kitchen. When I turned to check on him he was on his tummy. It must have just happened before I looked since he hates his tummy and had not started to fuss yet. On January 1 he rolled from his tummy to his back two times but has not done it since.

He is sleeping pretty well even though he is sick right now. He is going 8 - 9 hours at night. I am so grateful for the rest.

ETA: He actually rolled over from back to tummy 3 - 4 more times tonight and from tummy to back once.

Davis' First Sleep Over

Tonight is Davis' first sleep over at a friends house. Even though it is just down the street, I am a little sad about it. I was trying to figure out why it was bothering me so much and the only thing I have been able to come up with is the NICU. The only other time Davis has slept out of our house when we were here was during his 7 week NICU stay. Even though in many ways it seems like that was forever ago, in other ways, it seems so recent. Sometimes I still see him as the fragile preemie and I just want to wrap my arms around him and protect him. I hope that over time the NICU time will become less memorable and I'll be able to let him grow up without being one of those hovering parents.

Samuel is not feeling well

I have been home alone all week while Chris is at Macworld San Francisco with some friends. This has confirmed that I am definitely not organized enough to be a stay at home mom. It looks like a tornado has been in my kitchen and living room. I usually don't mind that since I am working and I have that as an excuse but not so much this week. Its driving me crazy but I can't seem to find the time to do anything about it.

Samuel has had a minor cough for a while. I mentioned it in passing to his doctor at his four month appointment on Dec. 29th and we both agreed that it was probably just him adjusting to extra secretions from his teething. She listened to his lungs and they sounded fine. On Wednesday of this week, I noticed that the cough was sounding a little more "chesty" so I made an appointment with a nurse practicioner on Thursday morning. His oxygen level was down to 95% so they gave him a breathing treatment in the office to see if it helped. After the treatment his sat level was still low so they prescribed breathing treatments at home. Poor boo is still laughing and playing as much as he can but he tires easily and coughs a bit. He does not particularly like his breathing treatments (he wants to pull on the cord and put his hands in his mouth during the treatments and when I stop him he starts screaming). I am waking him once each night to give a treatment. We go back to the doctor next Thursday. Hopefully by then, he'll be all better.

Worse news is that they think the virus causing the problems is RSV and infants who get RSV have a 30% increase risk of development asthma.

Here is the picture I took with my camera phone of his treatment in the doctor's office.