Happy Birthday Abbie!!!

Birthday Girl loved the balloons!

Yesterday Abbie got to celebrate her first birthday with lots of cake, balloons, presents, and family! We had pizza for dinner, cause what's a party without pizza? Abbie loves pizza crusts, so it worked out great. Next, we opened presents and she loved every one of them. It took awhile, but you can't expect a one year old to open a new toy and then just move on to the next present without playing with it first. She got some cute new dresses and outfits for Spring, new books, some stuffed animals, a beautiful toy chest (made by Grandpa J), some cool new toys, and a play tent. After presents came the cake. She took a couple of swipes at the frosting and decided she didn't like getting messy. Oh well! More undamaged cake for the rest of us to eat! Here's a little video of Abbie going at the cake.

While we were eating cake, we watched a couple of slideshows with pictures from Abbie's first year. The kids were kind of bored so Abbie and her cousins went to play with her tent. I was sitting there, watching the slideshow when I noticed that it had gotten kind of quiet and both of Abbie's cousins were sitting there watching too. I asked Haley where Abbie was and she said, "I think she's trying to climb the stairs." Yikes! We all got up and ran to the stairs. Lance's brother Ren was the closest but we were all just a little too late. We don't really know what happened, but I think she fell from the 2nd or 3rd step up and bonked her head pretty good. She had a big goose-egg and was crying pretty hard for a few minutes. We knew she was okay though, because after the initial scare, she wanted to get down to play with her new toys. Poor girl! What a birthday present!

Can you see the red bump on her forehead?

Anyway, thank you to all of our family for making Abbie's birthday special. This year has been a challenging one for us, but we are so happy to have this sweet little angel as part of our family. She makes us smile and reminds us that life is precious. Happy Birthday Abbie! We love you!

Loving the party hats!

Playing in her tent

Long Day, but Good News

Getting checked in. Not a happy camper!

Abbie's heart cath was yesterday and boy was it a long day. We arrived at the hospital at 9:30a.m. only to be told that somebody had told us the wrong check-in time. We weren't supposed to be there till 11a.m. and Abbie's procedure wasn't scheduled to start until 12:30p.m.! That left 3 hours for us to try to keep Abbie entertained and somewhat happy. We managed, with lots of help from the toys at the hospital and a little nap. So 12:30 rolls around and we still haven't heard anything. We asked the nurses in the waiting room to call the cath lab to see what was going on and found out that they were going to be delayed. We ended up waiting almost 5 hours before Abbie was finally called at 2p.m.. The procedure itself took 3 hours, and then we had to stay at the hospital for 5 more hours to make sure Abbie was ok. We ended up leaving the hospital at 10:15p.m. Yikes!

Making lunch for mom and dad while we wait

Abbie taking a nap in a wagon

Anyway, that was our long day, now on to the good news. The pressures were a lot lower than before and it doesn't look like there are any other big problems. Abbie's heart is definitely unique and it's just going to have to be monitored to make sure it is growing and working properly as Abbie grows. So, bottom line is nothing is changed from the original plan and Abbie is doing well. Here are some cool x-rays of Abbie's heart. I just thought it was neat to see the pacemaker and the lead wires that are attatched to her heart. You can also see how her sternum was wired shut after her open heart surgery.

Abbie's procedure

We have an appointment set for February 16th to get Abbie's heart cath done. The procedure itself is supposed to take about 3 hours and afterwards, Abbie has to stay flat on her back for 6 hours!! Hopefully she'll be somewhat sedated or else that is going to be a torturous experience for all of us! Anyway, just wanted to let you all know. Any thoughts or prayers on that day would definitely be welcome!

Groundhog's Day

Yesterday was Abbie's first Groundhog's day! I know that sounds funny because nobody really celebrates Groundhog's day. Well, we do. Since we've been married we have a little tradition. We make special Groundhog cupcakes that are chocolate cake with green frosting and half a twix sticking up in the middle to represent the groundhog. We build a fort and pretend to be "underground" like a groundhog, and of course, watch Groundhog's Day. We didn't have time to watch the movie this year, but we did the other stuff and Abbie loved the fort! She crawled right in and started playing peekaboo. Anyway, just a random little tradition.

Mom and Abbie in the fort

Abbie playing peekaboo with Dad

Cardiology Appointment

A few days ago, we took Abbie to Primary Children's for her cardiology check up. It's kind of sad when your baby starts crying before anybody even touches her because she knows exactly what's coming. I hate having to hold her still while some stranger is jabbing a needle into her arm. I made Lance do it this time, but she just kept looking up at me with those sad little eyes saying, "Mom, how could you let them do this to me?" Anyway, she was sedated and then they did an echocardiogram and a pacemaker check. As of right now, her pacemaker battery should last another 5 1/2 years which is awesome. We thought it would have to be replaced in the next few years, but now she won't have to have that surgery until she's over 6 years old. Her echo looked good but when her cardiologist talked to us afterwards, he was just a little bit concerned about the pressures they measured. They couldn't tell from the echo where the high pressure was coming from. If it's coming from the left atria, everything is just fine, but if it's coming from the right atria then that's a problem. Dr. Puchalski told us that his gut is telling him that everything is just fine, but he wants to make sure. So, in the next few weeks Abbie will be getting a heart catheterization. This is where they insert a long, flexible tube called a catheter into a vein in the leg and thread it up to the heart. With this procedure, they can measure heart pressures a lot more accurately than with an echo. We haven't scheduled it yet but we'll let you know what happens.

Back to Reality

We've been back from our vacation for over a week now and as much fun as we had, I'm so glad to be home! I missed my baby and being away from her for over a week made me realize how much I love being a mom. Anyway, the cruise was awesome. We had a week full of great food, fun activities, lots of time together, and no responsibilities. Lance finally got to go scuba-diving and he loved it! We saw some cool ruins in Belize, went ziplining through the jungle in Honduras, and went snorkeling with the stingrays in Grand Cayman. Abbie had lots of fun and was such a good girl for both of her Grandmas. She almost didn't want to come home with us! Anyway, here are a few pics of our trip.

Getting ready for his first dive

Exploring the ruins

Lance ziplining through the trees

Kissing the stingray for 7 years good luck

The dining room where we stuffed ourselves every night