Chicago and almost 7 months!

Older pic I know...just hate boring picture free posts, LOL!
Thank you as always for all of your kind words. I feel the need to say thank you a lot these days, but I'm feeling like a pretty lucky girl to have both a good online and IRL support system. Sorry for the boring picture free posts. Our laptop is on the fritz and all of my recent photos are on our portable hard drive AKA hard to post recent pictures. Brynn is doing okay - she'll be 7 months at the end of this week and is 11 lbs 12 oz. I'm so proud of our little girl. She continues to vomit up most formula but does great on breastmilk so I pump or feed round the clock and it's really helping her weight gain - she's up quite a bit this month I do love my sleep - but it's a small price to pay for a growing girl. Brynn looked at me the other day and said "mama." I thought it was just a joke....but she said it 3 more times that day for my mom and dad and the hubby. Melts my heart. Her big ole grin and kicking of the legs along with the excited phrase "mama." How did I get so lucky? Just praying she is okay in my thoughts and prayers.

Food and work. My main two focuses these days. Work is going so well. I spend most of my days either up in labor and delivery doing epidurals for the moms or down in the open heart room. Guess you could say I'm an anesthetist who loves pregnant bellies and open hearts, LOL! But yesterday we did a neuro case on a gentleman with a glioblastoma brain tumor - he did really well and was both moving everything and talking after surgery and it was so rewarding. I'm keeping him in my prayers for an OK recovery. Such a nice man - father of two little girls both 2 amd 4. Food- Brynn. She is loving solid foods these days. I've made her carrots, sweet potatoes, pears, apples, bananas, pears and prunes. She loves them all and I think I have about a months supply in the freezer. I'm still pumping and then feeding her 2 - 3 meals a day of food. Not sure where the kiddo packs it away to. While feeding her I still get the blueness around her lips and hands occasionally. Doesn't give me warm fuzzies - but I'm trying to stay Zen about the whole thing. I know that the central core circumoral hypoxia of the lips is worse than the extremities...but on most days she has both. So, we'll deal with it as it comes. I have a follow up echo shortly with her cardiologist so we'll see how things look at that time.

Basically if she has any increase in symptoms they're talking surgery. If things stay status quo we'll monitor for now (EKG, chest X ray, extra - monitoring for pulminary hypertension, etc.) I just wake up every morning and hope it's a good day for the little girl. She's so happy and care free - she has no idea that her heart isn't quite right. I just smile at her and flash her my best mommy grin so she has no worries. I'll leave the worrying to me and the carefree baby play to her, you know?

We're still planning a few day get away in Chicago at the end of this week. We rented a loft downtown on the Mile and are taking our nanny with us so we can have a few relaxing mom and dad dinners away. I think it's good for the marriage and both of our sanity. During the days we'll do family time with all of us and Brynn and my friend's little sister has some friends and family nearby she's going to visit. Hopefully it'll work out well. I hope everyone is having a great week and thanks again for all of your kinds words and prayers.... I'm just taking it one day at a time. That's all we can do right?