Recently.

Recently we've been busy. Thus no posts.  

Additionally, my laptop doesn't connect to the internet, which also hinders the posts.  

But here's what we've been up to: 

As previously stated, we went to Ruidoso

Then Brad had to go to Spain

So Noah and I went to Florida (which was a blast!)

Noah had his tubes placed May 2nd. He did great!

Noah now signs for please, thank you, more, and sometimes eat

He says Mama, Dada, Yummy (me-oh but it's purposeful), Roar, Uh-Oh Moo, Ball, and once this week he said Car and he tries for up (but usually comes out uh-oh please)

We're still in the apartment...someone in this family is being taught patience (and let me tell you...it is a long process.)

We found a new park...it's awesome. Noah loves it. So do I.

Noah and I have turned over a new leaf on our days...we're really working on getting out and having fun so we don't go stir crazy.  We have a better system now and it's working well.

I don't sleep. Ever. It's kinda frustrating. I had a minor breakdown the other night..where I was close to the ugly cry while telling Brad it's so unfair I can't sleep.  

Don't think I'm unaware of that being a little irrational...it's just true. 

Brad taught me about an ap on our phone last night called Sound Hound...you can sing and it tries to identify the song.  It's a fun game for the car. 

Noah's new thing is climbing on everything. His favorite place to sit is in our little rocker chair, he likes to sit there (by himself of course)

 It sure feels like we've been busier than what this looks like...but I'm drawing a bit of a blank. So instead: pictures. 

Here he is in "his" chair. 

Alright.  That's it for now. 

Ruidoso.

Let's talk for a minute about friends. We've been blessed...BIG TIME...with some absolutely amazing friends in this life we're walking through. Friends from growing up, friends from college, and now friends from our time in Austin. Good gracious are we thankful.  So when the opportunity presented itself to go on a vacation with some friends kids free back in April..we were P-U-M-P-E-D!!   So after much planning...on the Bean's part (thank you for that sweet Bean family!)..ix couples decided to go on an awesome little vaca to Ruidoso, NM.  And can I just say it was soothing to my soul. That is not an exaggeration. Soothing. To. My. Soul.

 I, being a talker, feel like I should have so many more words to explain this...but I don't. But we LOVE the people the Lord has put in our life. They ROCK. 

We spent 5 fulls days of uninterrupted time (two days were spent on 10 hour car rides but still) with friends, no kids, just talking and spending time together. It was a-stinking-mazing. Don't get me wrong..we missed our sweet boy...like CRAZY..but there's something to be said about some quality adult time. 

 These faces..we girls made them a lot on this trip. Our husbands our just troublemakers. 

 We ladies got pedicures and massages, we sat out on the porch and read, we watched a movie-IN THE MIDDLE OF THE DAY- I mean seriously. The guys played golf, we stayed up late, slept in (not me but unfortunately that's just how I am lately), ate meals and didn't have to share our food. It was great.

And boy did we come back refreshed.  Good thing because life kinda hit hard after that for everyone, back in full force.  

More pictures..from our night of Just Dance. 

The sweet Peterson's! Rockin it out. 

 We group danced. We're not ashamed. We're not too old. 

Hahahaha.  

Have a great day!

14 Months!

So Noah turned 14 months old...a solid 2 weeks ago..but who's counting.  I've found that finding time to blog at night is becoming increasingly more difficult, and during the day is nearly impossible, so here I am 2 weeks late.  

However..our sweet man is now 14 1/2 months old- and OH MY GOODNESS he rocks our world.

He has had quite the busy past few months after turning one. A few of his most recent skills:

Walking like a champ...a little off balance but very fast!

He runs now. Adorable.

Climbing up and down on the ottoman.  He had been eyeing our furniture for awhile now, seeing what he could climb up on.  Then when we arrived home from vacation, BAM, he's up and down on the ottoman for our rocker. It's quite cute. He gets up there looks at me and laughs, and then falls back down. Then he goes again.

We buy 2 gallon water jugs because our water at the apartment isn't very tasty. He loves to carry the empty jugs around like they're his briefcase. So stinking sweet.

He is quite the little lover. He loves to snuggle those he loves, he gives "kisses" (he leans his forehead to you so you can kiss him), he loves to high five, even squeezes for hugs. There is absolutely nothing like it.

Started sleeping in until at least 7:15-7:30 on a daily basis, 8-8:30 if I'm lucky. (Rarely) After months of 5-6am wake up calls, this is AMAZING. It's such a change to wake up on my own instead of in state of confusion because sweet little man is awake.

Loves the park, loves to go down the slide.

Loves to drink from straws

Still working on milk from a sippy cup- unfortunately this means still a bottle at night time so I feel a bit guilty, but the dude needs his milk.

Anywhere from 12-24 month clothes.

Understands more and more of my instructions. That is so exciting to me.

Still very few words. Mama, Dada, Go (rarely). We're hoping now that he has his ear tubes this will begin to change.

Speaking of the tubes..had his first surgery yesterday. He was a champ! In and out of the OR in 15 minutes. And super playful the last two days.  He seems to be hearing better, but time will tell on that. His doctor actually asked me if I was sure that he passed his newborn screening.  So we're hoping that his hearing was only that bad due to the constant infections and fluid in his ears.  We'll see.  Either way..super excited that at least the infections will be improved now!

Waves at everyone.

LOVES his friends. His big kid friends he stands and stares at while giggling at every little thing they do, then his tiny friends (especially Kat and Dave's little one) he has to sit right next to him and continuously hug and kiss him.  Gotta watch him though..he's kinda a brute.

Had his first days without us this past weekend while Brad and I were on our vacation with friends. He did great, but oh my goodness we missed him!

Throws balls all day. Basketballs, little balls, footballs.  It doesn't matter what kind it is..he will throw it. He actually has a great arm, he currently uses both hands but we both think he's favoring his left side.

 First haircut. 

I feel like there is so much more...but I'm his mama. So we'll leave it at that! 

Hope you have a great week! 

Praise the Lord!!

So we don't have any "official" answers (as in we haven't heard from the doctor)...but since Sunday morning Noah has been breathing in the 40's.

YAY!!!!!!

The speech therapist said he does have a little delay in his swallowing which she says is often associated with reflux, so she's having us thicken his liquids for a couple of months. But that's nothing! It would seem that maybe the prilosec has kicked in and started working, and if that's the case! Again I say:

YAY!!!!!!

How awesome would that be if all this time that's all it was. I don't know why it flared up with RSV, or why it just wouldn't go away. But truthfully, I don't care.

I hope that's the case.

We'll wait to hear. But for now we are thankful little man appears to be healing!

Yay!

That's all I have tonight!

Who needs sleep.

Not this girl. Apparently.

Noah's barium swallow study is in the morning (not a scope we found out- so glad!) and I can't sleep. I'm not really nervous, it's much less invasive now that I know it's not a scope. But I think I'mostly nervous that it won't show anything. I would really just like some answers.

Or even more than that, I would LOVE to take him to the doctor and have him say "he's normal" for once. :)

But yesterday when Dr. Caldwell and I had our morning chat (seriously who talks to the pediatrician every morning when their kiddo seems as healthy as ours), but while were chatting I asked if there was anyway this is just how little man breathes and maybe this is all his normal. The doctor kindly informed me we have to stay focused because this is not normal and we need to figure it out. Bummer.

So if you think of it be praying for our little guy tomorrow. Please pray that it will all just be reflux and nothing more serious. Or that I'd this doesn't show answers that the Lord will guide these doctors to a diagnosis quickly if there is something going on. (I would totally be cool with hearing- "we don't know why but he's just a fast breather, nothing to be worried about!") It seems so silly to do all these tests when he seems to be fine on a day to day basis, but if two different doctors are concerned I'm going to trust them, and we're going to do whatever they ask. :)

Thanks yall! Have a great night!

Last Week

We just got back home from a week away in Indiana. Brad's sweet grandmother, Grandma Jean, passed away and we were able to go home for her funeral, and to spend time with our families. While we were so sad to say goodbye to Grandma Jean, it was a neat time of celebration of her life, and to spend time with family from across the country. We are so blessed to have families that are just A-MAZING. We're thankful!


We were able to sneak a visit in to see Uncle Luke while we were home. Noah LOVED that!

We also were able to head down to Indy area to celebrate sweet Nora turning 1! It was so great getting to spend time with some great friends from home! We were even able to see El and Austin, and Jackie and Alex which was awesome! I think these kind of reunions should happen more often! :)







Back home in Austin we, of course, headed right on out to the Big T when we landed! Missed those sweet peeps out there in the big T!

Today, Noah spent another 2 hours at Dr. Caldwell's. The lab tech offered to pitch us a tent so we could just move in. Sad truth that we are there that often. That they know us by name. Noah just walks around like he owns the place. He was out exploring when Dr. Caldwell came out of a room and little man got the biggest smile on his face. Even Noah knows that guy is fantastic. This time our dude scored a visit with an ENT for possible tubes in his ear (THANK GOODNESS) so hopefully in April we'll have a plan for that. Dr. Caldwell really feels this is all reflux so we are praying that the scope/swallow study will show this to be true.

On another note, it's funny how even after almost 5 years here in Texas, two different places can feel like home. On Monday, when we landed, it was like a *sigh* "Home!" We had a wonderful week and we were so sad leaving....but then we landed in Austin, and again *sigh* "Home!" (I'm not sure how to type out what I mean by those-hope it makes sense) We went out to Taylor, made nachos with our community group, put the kids to bed, and sat around on the ground eating from the same tray talking and laughing. And I thought...holy cow. How cool, and yet so strange, to feel so at home in two completely different places. Weird. But very cool, and super thankful for friends and family across the country that we love.

That's it. Probably time to unpack. :) Hope you have a great week!

Can I just share with you...

Can I just share with you the way my brain works?

Just for a sec. Please don't judge the crazy...apparently when it's my child...I am able to get to crazy town very easily.

So the meds didn't make a difference for Noah this weekend - which I gotta say...is a tad discouraging.

Now..he's not any worse..at all. He just rides right at the same speed...breathing like a crazy man. At least 60 breaths/minute. Try that for a few minutes...you'll be dizzy.

So anyways...our little trooper continues to truck along with no change..and Mama and Daddy don't dig it.

Our pediatrician called on Monday to ask if there were any changes, and when I told him no, he told me to call the pulmonologist and let him know because we should have noticed significant differences.

So I did...and then my brain went crazy while I was waiting on them to call back.

Before I spoke to the doctor..I had almost convinced myself that Noah had diabetes. Diabetes...trust me..that's not a respiratory issue. :)

Let me just show you how I got there:
Noah has been breathing fast for weeks...but the last couple of days had gotten faster again.
He had been started on a steroid..which elevates blood sugar
Then Noah started leaking through is diapers overnight (like DUMPING urine-or so it seemed to me)
One of the symptoms of diabetes is frequent urination...so I thought that was what was happening
So I thought maybe because Noah was diabetic...and we were giving him steroids...we were sending him into DKA so he was working super hard to compensate using his respiratory system. (that goes a little deeper medically than you probably care about..but I was sure.)

I then called Brad and shared my fears. You can imagine that was well received. Hahaha.

Thankfully one of our dear friends is a doctor that I work with at the hospital..so I called him..and he talked me out of the crazy. A little medical reasoning from someone much smarter than myself and I was back to rational.

And thank goodness for that because when the nurse called back from the pulmonologist she definitely didn't need to have to deal with my crazy.

So anyways..we're kinda back to square one...little man had a chest xray yesterday which thankfully didn't show anything concerning...the downside to that is..no answers. So Noah will now have to have an upper GI endoscopy, and a swallow study to evaluate for reflux. This was ordered by the pulmonologist; however, Dr. Caldwell had also mentioned reflux yesterday when we spoke (don't you worry- that awesome dude has called Friday, Monday, and today to check on our little man) and today when we spoke he felt this was a good plan. So now we are just waiting for it to be scheduled.

Interestingly, Dr. Caldwell told me about 60% of people with asthma also have reflux...so maybe that's where we're headed. I can totally handle those...they are treatable.

So we are praying for answers..and we are thanking the Lord daily that while Noah isn't exactly as healthy as a horse as we would prefer..he's safe and happy and we're working towards answers. Plus..whatever this is totally doesn't affect his day...he is a playful crazy little man - so active and fun. I'm so thankful for that!

Anyways..that's it for tonight. Just wanted to share how my silly mind works. We're super excited because tomorrow we're having a play day with some friends and taking the kiddos to the zoo. So much fun! Have a great week!