New look!

'Tis that time of year again! I can't hardly believe that Thanksgiving is already gone & Christmas is under a month away! Where does the time go?! It seems like just yesterday that we were bringing Gabby home from the hospital, scared out of my mind at the prospect of parenting such a tiny, helpless baby. If I had only known then what I know now, I think I would have told myself to just relax & enjoy the little moments with Gabby:0)

Even though I'm changing my layout to Christmas, I don't have any pictures of snow to share... yet;0) I'm anticipating it, though! Crazy I know, but if its going to be cold at least I have the pretty white stuff to look at!

As we were putting the Christmas tree up this evening, I had a funny thought. No tubes. It was funny looking back to last year when we decorated the house. I had to dance around 50 ft. of oxygen tubing, but not this year! No tubes of any kind are found in this house. Vaeh & Gabby were too funny with the whole experience. Gabby was so antsy to get her hands on an ornament to put on the tree. I though I was going to have to tie her up at one point (LoL)! Vaeh didn't really seem all that excited to put the ornaments on the tree, but she was all to willing to help put the boxes & such away! Now the fun will begin keeping Vaeh away from the ornaments, etc., that I have out... her & the little guy that I babysit for now (he's 2). Should keep me on my toes!

Hope everyone had a wonderful holiday this past week. I know we had a good day on Thursday. We revived an old tradition from my childhood - making paper chains. All of the kids in the family when I was younger used to work on making these paper chains with strips of construction paper that my Mom had cut for us. We used to have a ball! At my Grandparents' house, the living room was nearly 30 feet long. So we used to have a competition to see who could make the longest chain. Then we'd end up combining them all & having a chain that was well over 60 feet long! The kids on Thursday were able to compete with some of our best work from back in the day! It was fun to see the kids enjoying something that I have fond memories of from my childhood. Being the bad blogging-Momma that I am, I forgot to take the camera & get any pics of it:0/ I'll try to do better next time! Maybe a re-enactment is in order?!

A note of thanks from us... my Uncle's Mom is holding her own. They were able to do a biopsy over a week ago, & all of the test results have come back negative at this point. Which is good & bad. She is still having some difficulties & they haven't come up with a diagnosis. So, thanks for the prayers!

A belated Happy Thanksgiving to you all! Know that we have many blessings & we count each of our blogging friends as some of those many blessings!

Catching up...

Okay, first off I'm sooooo mad at either 1.) my computer, or 2.) blogger. It (not sure which one) won't let me upload any photos or videos... UGH!!!!!!!!!! It all seemed to start around the time that we got our new laptop. I can't figure it out & its starting to make me very upset. I've wanted to show you all Miss Vaeh's orthotics & she does this new thing that I was wanting to show... Oh well, maybe I'll figure it out here soon!

This past Monday, we had our now quarterly (every 3 months) date with Dr. Butto. I had to laugh at Vaeh on Monday morning. She asked where we were going, & when I told her to see Dr. Butto... she jumped, laughed & said "yay!" Not sure if anyone remembers (or if I ever told...) but back in the beginning, Vaeh would SCREAM through her appointments with him! It became quite a production just getting an EKG. Especially if doc walking in the room, she would turn it into high gear! So at this appointment when Dr. Butto walked in & Miss V smiled... lets just say Dr. Butto got quite a kick out of that! I think he may have to come up with a new nickname for her. "Little troublemaker" isn't very fitting anymore!

Vaeh just keeps growing! She was 36.5 inches tall & weighs a whopping 31lbs!! Hard to believe she's gained a quarter inch & a pound in a little over a week! (gotta love the difference in scales & person measuring;0) Her sats were perfect - 100% & her blood pressure was super! I was really suprised to see how high her blood pressure was -something like 101/68. I say "hi" because since we had increased her to the correct dose of revatio, she's been running in the 80's/50's! She sat almost perfectly still for her EKG, & of course had to "help" with her echo - they always tell us that they've never seen anyone who likes to play with the gel like her!

Overall Vaeh is doing really well! The only thing that was the slightest glitch in the appointment was that her RV pressures didn't change. It doesn't mean anything bad, but it means we still have to give her the revatio. But it also means things are stable. Meaning no "interventions" any time soon. Translation = we're going to make it an entire year without any surgical procedures!!! YAY!!!!!! Its amazing to think that we've made it that long! The longest she'd ever gone prior to this was between 6 & 8 months, but a WHOLE YEAR?!?!?!?!!!!! I have to admit, though, I'm getting kinda bored - LoL!! (just kidding;0)

A quick thank you for all the prayers for my Aunt & Uncle's family. His mom continues to hold her own. She had a biopsy last week, & they haven't gotten the results yet. Again, thanks for the prayers.

Well, its time I get moving! Lots to do to get ready for Thanksgiving! Its the beginning of my favorite time of year! Can't wait for all the smells in the kitchen tomorrow. Oh, & there's some changes I need to make on here.... Happy Thanksgiving, Everyone!!

Saving Little Hearts 2010 Calendar

They've finally come out with the SLH calendar for 2010. If you remember, I posted about it a while back, here. I had sent one of Miss Vaeh's photos from the Littlest Heroes Project shoot that we had for her. I finally saw a draft of the finished product. Vaeh was placed in January. If I read correctly, they had more than enough photos to complete the calendar. So many, in fact, that they made it a 15 month calendar! Here's a look at January's page...

If you look closely, you'll see Miss V in the bottom row, 4th in from the right! Isn't she just beautiful?! (yes, that was a VERY biased statement;0) You can go to the Saving Little Hearts site to order your calendar! I think there may even be a place to find where you can submit photos for next year's calendar.

I'm so sorry that I've been dormant here lately. I've been kinda upset with blogger, or my computer (not exactly sure which one). I haven't been able to upload any photos... ugh! But for some reason, something told me to try this morning & it worked! WooHoo! So, to back track a bit, someone asked about pics of Miss V's orthotics. Blogger still isn't letting me upload some photos & I'm not sure why. I'll keep trying to get it to cooperate with me!

In other news, Vaeh had a check up last week & here's her newest stats: she weighs in at a whopping 30.5lbs & is 36.25 inches tall!! I never thought that my little peanut would break the 30lb. mark, but yet again she has amazed me! She's doing really well in school & is making great progress with her orthotics. The therapist did tell me that they may be evaluating her for OT again, as she seems to be lacking in some (very) fine motor skills (ie: threading small beads onto a string). I say if it will help her, bring it on! She's still having trouble with drawing circles, copying things that someone else has drawn, but is still doing well & loving school!

One last little note for this post. If you all would remember my Aunt & Uncle, & their family in your prayers. My Aunt's Mother-in-law was taken to the hospital a couple of weeks ago & is still in the hospital. She's now at a larger facility where they're still trying to decide if she has a tumor or fungal infection in her brain. Its been very stressful on the family & they could use your prayers... & I know there's some great prayer warriors floating around blogger-land! Hope everyone else is doing well!