Early Morning Evie

Evie has eaten well all weekend and is interested in walking (assisted) again. We had a very busy weekend and took a lot of pictures. Stay tuned for them, but for now here is Evie at 6:30 am as she gradually becomes more awake:

Friday Cuteness

Today is Francis and I's 10 year wedding anniversary! Today is a beautiful spring day, just like it was on May 29, 1999. I spent the afternoon with the twins at Naperville's Riverwalk and later, Francis and I enjoyed a wonderful anniversary dinner at Maggianos.

Here are Francis and Gavin changing the batteries in the musical turtle...



...and Evie gets to learn as well!


Evie browses through a shoe ad:


Evie woke up from a nap with bed-head:

She usually wakes up with bed-head in the morning, too!

Gavin and Grandma read a story before nap-time:

Our silly boy:

Evie Gets A Break

We took Evie to see her cardiologist, Dr, Gulecyuz, this morning. Good news - he and the team at Hope Children's Hospital have decided to leave her alone for awhile! They do not recommend any surgery at this time; instead, they want her to gain weight and heal completely. This is what we were hoping to hear.

We discussed many things with Dr. G, including the findings of her angiogram last week. Her left lung used to not have enough blood flow, and now it has too much, which has resulted in high pressure in that lung. Also in this lung there is a group of blood vessels (which the angiogram doc called a hemangioma) that are "angry" looking (Dr. G's word) and probably do not provide a good oxygen exchange. None of this existed before her February surgery, when a new conduit was attached to her heart connecting to her left lung. It is hard to say if this would have happened anyway, or if the conduit had anything to do with it.

Luckily, her lower right lung is doing very well and her cardiac functions are strong. She does not have the degree of diastolic dysfunction that Dr. G. thought she had. As usual, we were told that overall she is doing well! We will just slowly get her to eat more, be more active, and hopefully wean from the oxygen.

Here we are at Dr. G's office. Evie loves sitting at this table and pulling crayons out of the caddy (she's not very interested in coloring with them)!

Lucky Evie - more crayons in the exam room!

Evie's nurse showed me how to attach her blood pressure cuff, and let me check her pulse-ox (you can't really see it here but Evie has the sensor on her toe):

Nurse Julie thought Evie's scar was healing well - Evie agrees!

Evie wanted to hand me every little scrap of crayon wrappers from the container:

All done and ready to leave - just a quick look out the window with Daddy!

Evie leaned on the glass, but stood up fairly confidently! Also, she walked (assisted) this morning with Francis and again with me at the end of the day!

Memorial Day, Part 2

So after naps on Monday, we headed over to Uncle Kevin and Auntie Di's house for a cookout. The kids were not as shy as they were at Dan's party, since most of the crowd here was immediate family. Gavin was very interested in the cats:

Evie was very interested in this pink gift card holder:

She let me put her on the floor, but wanted me to stay within eyesight.

Evie also tried potato chips and liked them! (Her nurse keeps telling us to "get her fat!")

Sitting with Grandma:

At dinner, Evie wanted a taste of my hot dog ( we didn't give it to her):

"Mom, I want a hot dog!"

Gavin was happy to eat strawberries:

Back at home, Francis decided it was time to introduce Gavin to the Nintendo DS:

It was a fun day to end a fun weekend! Gavin has been babbling a LOT, just lots of cute syllables strung together. Whenever he does it, Francis and I look at each other and say, "aww...!" Evie contines to eat a little more each day. We will see her cardiologist tomorrow to talk about last week's angiogram and whatever will come next.

Memorial Day, Part 1

On Monday morning we took a walk to the park. Francis pretended to "catch" the kids mid-swing, which they loved!

We got Gavin on the slide a few times, and he even went down by himself twice, but he was actually more interested in the stairs.

Francis showed Gavin how to use the digging toy:

Not quite big enough to do it by himself yet!

Evie enjoyed sitting on the springy horse:

So did Gavin!

Then it was back home for lunch and naps. Stay tuned for the rest of the day's adventures!

Dan's Going-Away Party

Evie update: she had a good weekend, gaining 2 ounces from Saturday to Monday with minimal spit-ups. She still has a slight cough from being intubated. She has crawled a little more each day!

On Sunday we went to a going-away party for our good friend Dan, who is moving out of state. We got to catch up with lots of friends and introduce the twins to the ones who had not met them yet.

Here is Evie, ready to go in her party dress:


When we arrived, both kids were a little overwhelmed by all the people there. Gavin wouldn't leave Francis' arms for a while, and when he finally did, he hung out with our god-daughter, Annie, age 6:

Evie never left my arms at all (not that I minded!):

A rare shot of the kids happily "sharing me," which usually results in tears from the twin who was in my lap first:

Francis and Dan:

Here we are with Dan's girlfriend, Keila:

Keila is a pediatric cardiologist, so she was very happy to meet Evie!

Here are more friends at the party!

Evie is Home!

Evie did well overnight on 2 liters of oxygen. We already have a machine at home (called a concentrator) that can deliver 2 liters, so the doctors OK'ed her to come home. She was tired today, but kept some formula down. When we got home, she was not interested in her toys - she was very clingy with me!

Even though she was calm, Evie had a frown on her face most of the morning. In the photo below, we were almost ready to leave, but she didn't smile until I said "let's get your shoes on!" Whenever I say "shoe" or she sees her shoes, she gets very excited. I would like to think this is an early indicator of loving all kinds of shoes like me, but I think that's premature, because Gavin has the same reaction! I really think the twins associate shoes with going somewhere, which is always exciting to them.