Zachary's Birthday (Part One)

I know it's been a week since Zac's birthday, but at least I'm finally getting around to putting some pictures on here! =)

Zachary wanted a basketball cake for his birthday. Why? We have NO idea! He has never played basketball that we know of, but it appealed to him all the same!  It was carrot cake with orange cream cheese frosting. And, believe it or not, Drew even had a couple of pieces (but left most of the frosting on the plate!). =)

I wasn't thinking when I nicely spaced seven candles around the outside edge of the cake. It took Zac two tries and then Justin helped finish blowing the candles out on the third try. Next year I will have to remember to put them closer together!

Zachary got a new Lego set from his brothers. It is a set that makes three different race cars. He has had lots of fun building different cars with it.

Due to outgrowing his old helmet, Zac's gift from Mommy and Daddy was a new bike helmet. It is more adjustable than his old helmet and has more air vents so (hopefully) he won't get as sweaty this summer.

Thanks Uncle Scott, Aunt Aimee, Tyler, Riley and Peyton for the Imaginext Batman set. All of the boys have enjoyed playing with it, and Zachary especially has had fun playing. The kids have combined their Imaginext knights and Batman for some very bizarre encounters! =)

 

Zachary absolutely loves getting dressed up for church and was thrilled with a new shirt and tie from Grampy and Grammy. He also got a boxed set of Cul-de-sac Kids mysteries from Grampy and Grammy.  Thank you!!

Overall, Zachary had a great birthday. I think by far, the family favorite gift is a Where's Waldo? book from Mommy and Daddy. We have spent several hours looking for Waldo, Wenda, Woof, Odlaw (Od-waw according to Aaron) and the assortment of items that they have lost. It has been lots of fun!

Although Zachary doesn't realize it yet, Part Two of his birthday is still to come! He will have his birthday with Papa and Nana in a week and a half when we go to visit them. He's going to be so excited!! :)

Nancy

Happy Birthday, Zachary!

Zachary at one week old.

At a year old, you were already the boss! :)

You have always loved everything outdoors, even at two!!

Our happy, helpful, smiling three year old.

The star (and only!) four-year-old on the t-ball team. At times, we wondered if the batting helmet would run away with you!

After almost a year of preschool, you were a very confident, outgoing five year old.

As always, you have a love of sports. You are sporting your Georgia Tech football uniform on your sixth birthday.

Seven years....wow!  It seems so impossible that seven years ago today we first looked at a squirming little bundle of sweetness and fell completely in love with you.  Happy Birthday, Zachary! Daddy and Mommy are so proud of you!!!! We love you bunches and bunches!

Quick Update!

I just wanted to update and let you know (if you don't have it already) that we have started a new blog just for Rebekah and information about her Truncus Arteriosus.  You can read about her cardiology appointment at her blog www.rebekahgraceellis.blogspot.com.  As of about 6:30 this morning, we already had almost 1500 hits on the blog, and we have only given out the address for two days! This little girl has prayer support from all over the country! :)

Nancy

This 'N That

So this post is a little all over the place, but I had some cute pictures to post.......

Two Saturdays ago we went to the park for a picnic lunch.  This was Caleb's first park visit that he was really old enough to do anything more than sleep in the stroller! :)  He is addicted to slides, and we found that he really loves the swings, too.  Big surprise there.....all of his brothers love to swing, too! :)

Don't you just love that cheeky little grin??? (Caleb's, not Daddy's! :)

Justin completed his first school report about two weeks ago.  His teacher assigned each of them a different animal to research.  Justin had to answer questions about the cheetah - what it eats, where it lives, how it moves, what it looks like, and what sound(s) it makes.  He then colored some of the cheetah pictures and cut all of them out and glued them on the paper.  He was SO proud of his project!!

As you can imagine, we have no lack of bicycles around this house, and there is a bike for every size!  Aaron was getting a little big to be riding the Big Wheel plastic "bike," so Drew recommended that he try the little "big boy" bike.  He loved it!!!! He can pedal all over the cul-de-sac all on his own power. He is so proud to be riding a "real" bike like his brothers!! Of course, Zachary and Justin had to show off their bike skills, too....complete with gunbelts and six-shooters!  :)

Two very fast-pedalin' little hot shots!!

And our happy boy....little Caleb.  He loves to play (especially when his brothers leave him alone long enough to play with his toys!).  He is officially walking now - meaning he walks more than he crawls! Talk about proud of himself....his grin stretches from ear to ear.  Drew even found him "running" from one end of his crib to the other tonight after we put him in bed!! No lack of energy and activity at this house! :)

Miss Rebekah has some activity of her own this week.  Tomorrow morning at 9:15 we will meet with her cardiologist for a level 2 ultrasound (mainly of her heart) so the cardiologist can view it for himself and give us his opinion of what is going on.  We will be sure to update you all with any news he gives us.  For now, she is content to continue gymnastics practice with her flips and wiggles.  :)

Nancy

Bekah's Room Phase 1!!

First came the taping and prep work.......

Then the trimming (and trimming and trimming and........).

Then the rolling - strictly Drew's job.  I just tape and trim.  :)

And the finished walls! :)  If you look closely, especially toward the bottom of the picture, you can see the difference in color in the two walls.  The wall with the window is a shade darker than the wall on the left.

I am LOVING little girl dresses hanging in the closet!!!!!!

After several hours of work (more on Drew's part than mine!!), Rebekah's walls are all painted! We have a little bit of touch-up work to do, and then I want to paint the baseboards and door casings just to freshen it up.  But the biggest part of the job is done. The boys all thoroughly approve, and we like it too! :)  Now, we  just wait to see if Bekah likes it.

Nancy

Drew's Perspective

Drew and I have discussed many times in the past few days how blessed we are to be given such a special little girl to take care of.  Yesterday, Drew pretty much summed up our feelings in this post on his Facebook page, and I asked him if I could also put it on the blog (with a few....ahem....minor grammatical corrections).  :-)

"I want to thank all of the church family and our friends for the encouraging words and phone calls this week as we found out that we are embarking on a new adventure. Something that struck me as I read many of your posts on Nancy's page is that many of you expressed that you are sorry about Rebekah's heart defect. I understand that everyone is expressing their feelings and support, and I appreciate that.  Your support and encouragement will continue to mean even more in the days ahead. But, we are choosing to see things in a different way.  Rebekah's heart defect is not something to be sorry about; it is the Lord's will.  Whatever His reason, He has been preparing us for this and would not have allowed it to happen if we were not able to meet the challenge.

The Lord has been very gracious and has been preparing Nancy and myself with various challenges in the past few months to draw us closer together and cause us to rely more on Him. He has taken a lot of "securities" away to bring us to a better place of totally trusting in Him for everything in our lives. I know without a doubt that He has my little girl, who He gave to us, in His hands, and He can heal her if that is His will. It may be a long road, but we will be okay with the Lord leading and guiding in our lives.  There will be many trials and needs, but I pray that we will faithfully rely on the Lord to meet each of those needs. One of our biggest goals in this trial is to touch someone else's life along the way. Rebekah's heart defect is very rare, and we would like to be a testimony and encouragement to anyone else who walks this road behind us.  I am very grateful for all the kind words and encouragement.  I felt that we should share how we are looking at this new challenge and intending to walk forward - with the Lord leading us and your prayers and support behind us."

Drew

Rebekah

Here she is!! Introducing Rebekah Grace.....in pictures! :-)  I had a Level 2 ultrasound today at my high risk OB, and they can put the pictures on CD, so here we go!

During the ultrasound, the technician seemed to have some trouble finding the two vessels leading out of the heart - one that loops blood through the lungs and back to the heart (to oxygenate the blood), and the other that supplies blood to the body.  A little while later, another tech came in to see if she could get a clear picture of the vessels, and she couldn't see them clearly either.  So, Dr. Greig came in to look and concluded that Rebekah has a heart defect called Truncus Arteriosus.  Basically, when her heart formed, the two vessels did not separate, leaving her one large vessel.  So, while Bekah is in utero, everything is fine because her blood supply and oxygen are coming through the placenta.  Once she is born, she will be facing open heart surgery within the first 8 weeks of her life.

She almost had her thumb in her mouth here!!  We will be meeting with a Pediatric Cardiologist sometime in the next two to three weeks for him to look at an ultrasound of Rebekah's heart and determine how severe he thinks her defect is.  Most likely, a final determination of her heart defect will not come until after birth when the doctors can determine how critical or stable she is on her own.

So, for right now, the tentative plan is for her to grow, grow, grow!!  Based on what Dr. Greig suspects the cardiologists will recommend, we were told to prepare for a delivery in Charleston, SC, where the Pediatric Cardiology unit is and where Rebekah will ultimately have her surgery.  We will be meeting with the NICU doctors, the PCICU (pediatric cardiology intensive care unit) doctors and nurses, the pediatric cardiologist, the pediatric cardiothoracic surgical team and the high-risk OB doctors in Charleston sometime in the next 2 or 3 months to meet them and familiarize ourselves with where things are and how things are going to progress once Rebekah is born.

Dr. Greig's biggest concern is for Rebekah to grow as much as possible in utero, and based on my past history of NOT going into labor on my own, he said they will wait until 38 or possibly 39 weeks to schedule my induction at MUSC in Charleston.  Once Rebekah is born, we will be looking at one of three scenarios:

1) Rebekah is very critical at birth and will have surgery within hours or a day or two of birth to repair the vessels.

2) Rebekah is somewhat stable at birth or can be stabilized with medication and/or medical equipment in order to allow her to stay in the PCICU for a week or two to grow before surgery.

3) Rebekah is much more stable at birth than the doctors are suspecting and she is allowed to come home for a few weeks to grow prior to her surgery.

Because each person is different and reacts differently, the doctors will not be entirely certain of which scenario we will be facing until Rebekah is born.  The one thing we know for sure is that she will need at least one open heart surgery to correct the vessels, and possibly two or three more as she grows depending on the extent of the birth defect and how it is repaired during the first surgery.  She will visit a cardiologist at least once a year for the rest of her life in order to monitor her heart and stay ahead of any potential problems.  However, the long-term prognosis is very good.  Rebekah should have no restrictions or limitations due to her heart defect.  She should be able to grow, develop and play like any other baby.  She should even be able to participate in sports programs if she wants at some point.  And, some really encouraging news is that there should be no reason that she can't have children of her own some day, although it will require a little more monitoring of her heart than an otherwise healthy pregnant mom would have.

I'm sure I'm forgetting something or not answering everyone's questions! If you have a question, leave me a post, and I will try to answer it (or find the answer!!).  The links below should also provide more information:

http://www.lpch.org/DiseaseHealthInfo/HealthLibrary/cardiac/truncus.html

http://www.pted.org/?id=truncusarteriosus1

We would certainly appreciate all of your prayers as we approach Rebekah's delivery in July and the surgeries that follow.

Nancy

It's SNOW!!!!!

You know that it doesn't snow here much (if at all!) when the Sunday evening entertainment was lining up by the door and watching the snow fall....and fall....and fall!  In all, we got between 3 and 4 inches, which by the boys' standards, was enough for a blizzard!! :-)  They especially enjoyed the ride home from church in the snow.

We were all dressed up to go outside!  We had to get hats, scarves, gloves, mittens and the whole nine yards.  We so rarely get to use all of this stuff that the kids wanted it ALL!!

I just LOVE the little footprints in the snow........

Aaron had so much fun "shoveling" snow and pushing it around in his wheelbarrow. 

Justin's biggest thrill was throwing snowballs at us....very sneakily, I might add!!

Aaron was just so excited to be out in the snow.  I think this is really the first time he remembers snow, and definitely snow of any measurable significance.

Zachary's biggest dream was to have enough snow to make a snow angel.  It was really kind of crusty, so the angel didn't come out great, but he was thrilled to be able to do it!!

Daddy showed the boys how to make a snowman.  They have never had enough snow to make a snowman before, so they had a lot of fun.  Justin named ours "Mr. Snow Manny."  I know - how original! :-)  He was about two feet tall, he had black jelly bean eyes, a baby carrot nose, some icicle hair spikes and a blue scarf.  The kids considered him the coolest snowman ever!

And after fun was had by all, Mommy made a warm bubble bath in the big bathtub for us all to play in.  Caleb was napping through all of the outdoor activities, but he did join the boys for a bath.  Unfortunately, Drew didn't get a really good picture of all four boys in the tub, but this one of the older three was pretty cute!

Lest we leave Caleb out completely, I'll put in this picture I took last week.  The older boys were outside playing, but Caleb was just about to lay down for a nap, so I didn't take him out.  He stood at the window for ten minutes or more just watching his brothers play.  :)

Justin doesn't know yet, but school is cancelled again for tomorrow.  He will be thrilled, but it's back to the books for Zachary!  One snow day is enough for any homeschooler!!! :-)

Nancy