"Maybe it's just a cold?"

In the continuing quest to try and figure out why Evie is coughing up so much phloem, mucus and her formula, Evie saw one of the cardiologists from Hope Children's Hospital's Heart Institute (where she had her surgery). An x-ray and echo cardiogram showed that she did not have pneumonia or any other type of infection or other problems common with infants who are intubated for extended periods of time.

Unfortunately, the doctor could not conclusively state what might be causing all of her coughing and mucus. It's nice to know that she doesn't have these more serious illnesses, but we still don't know why, how long it will last, or what to do about it. With serious illnesses checked off the list, the best explanation we have so far is from her pediatrician and her home health care nurse, who both theorized it may just be a bad cold. This has been going on for almost 10 days now, but thankfully she has slept well the last two nights, at least. (I think I've typed "mucus" so many times in the last few days that this blog will probably be the #1 Google hit).

This past Sunday, Grandpa and Nana Cermak came over and spent a good long day with the twins. We had some beautiful weather over the weekend and Gavin got to take a nice stroller ride with Grandpa, but Evie was tied up to her feeding tube all day, she read lots of stories with Nana on the couch.



Gavin checks his iPod play list before hitting the road.



As mentioned yesterday, the twins are learning their body parts from the books the Florys gave us. Gavin learned a lot of them while Evie was in the hospital, and in the photo below shows Evie where his "ear" is.



Evie has found Daddy's ear!