Scarlett's First Christmas in Pictures

Scarlett in her "bumbo seat" Christmas Eve, she is waiting so patiently for Christmas morning!

Our little Christmas Tree on Christmas morning before present time!

Of course I'm Santa's Favorite!

Scarlett with all her presents pre-opening

Post opening, look at all that good stuff!!!

Scarlett and Mommy in our matching aprons that Grandma made for us!

Scarlett helping Mommy make Christmas dinner, her little apron is too cute!  Thanks Grandma!

Scarlett's First Christmas!!!

    Sorry it has taken so long, but here is how our Christmas went...

    We had a great first Christmas with Scarlett.  We of course started the morning out by opening all of Scarlett's presents!  She of course didn't care too much about the actual opening of the presents, but she did get excited once each toy was revealed to her from behind the wrapping paper.  After opening the presents Scarlett and I headed off to the kitchen to start making our Christmas dinner.  We had a roasted chicken with carrots and mashed potatoes!  While the chicken cooked we took a family Christmas nap.  Everyone was worn out from all the excitement of opening presents!!!  After we woke up I finished preparing the meal and we sat down to eat.  The rest of the day was spent relaxing/ taking another nap, and just spending a good day together as a family!  We are so blessed to have our precious Scarlett with us this year!  It was definitely our best Christmas yet!

We hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas!!!

(Pictures to follow, right now the website will not let me add them!!!)

Christmas Eve 2011

What a year, what a week, what a day. Our family is one little Scarlett Rose sweeter this year! This is Mommy and Daddy's most special Christmas yet. Love you Star!!!!!!

Dec. 5 - Dec. 11, 2011

     This week was a good week.  Scarlett is doing very well eating and had gained 6 ounces in 7 days!  She is now just above 11 pounds.  The doctors are very happy with her progress. Since they are so happy we get to have a little break.  We don't have any  appointments this week, which will be the first whole week we have not seen a doctor or home nurse. Other than that we are also looking forward to this week because Grammi and Grampi are coming into town to visit.  Scarlett can't wait to spend some good snuggle time with them!  

Getting back in the groove!

 Scarlett has started to roll to try and get her toys! 
It's very cute, she's pretty persistent about it!

Clean Baby!  Oh how we LOVE bath time!

                                                  

Scarlett in her church dress!  It's very festive!

                                              

Scarlett helping Mommy bake some cookies.  She was very curious about the mixer, but such a great sous chef!

  

    Other then what you see in the pictures above, this week was spent getting back to normal.  Scarlett had been off schedule since her hospital stay, she had gotten used to being woken up every couple hours to get vitals checked and what-not.  Anyway, since we have been home we have seen both the cardiologist and the pediatrician.  Everyone says she is looking good.  The cardiologist had an echo done this past week to make sure that there wasn't any fluid around her heart from the surgery.  All looked well and she said the function looked really good too!  The only concern both doctors have is about her weight, so pray that our little munchkin starts packing on the pounds!  Too bad she can't help eat those cookies!  :o)     

Happy Thanksgiving!!!! One more picture. :)

Happy Thanksgiving!!!!

Well, I updated the ride home post with some pictures.  ALSO, some really cute videos can be found on Mommy's Facebook page if you are interested.  To put it simply, we are so grateful for what we have this year.  We've been through more than we ever dreamed we could handle, but we're making it.  For now, we are just so happy to spend this day at home with Scarlett.  She's happy, healthy, and babbling away at us!  We love you sweetheart.

Scarlett looks great today...and she's babbling!

Again, sorry, no pictures. Will try to post a nice full update tomorrow (Thanksgiving day). We won't be joining anyone for dinner because Scarlett is still in the early stages of recovery. Thus we should have time to write a full blog entry. Thanks so much to everyone who is thinking of /supporting us. We love you too! And we love you precious Scarlett!

A ride home to remember.

Post update:  The only things really worth remembering about the ride home are : it was long (stop-and-go traffic on I-95), rainy, frustrating, we had a cranky baby, drivers were terrible, we were all exhausted, etc.  It was pretty much not too fun.  WE MADE IT, however, and that's what matters!

We made it, and all of us are physically OK. Will update blog with details, pics, etc sometime tomorrow I hope. Until then, goodnight. And we love you Scarlett.

Homeward Bound....

Is a really great movie about a cat named Sassy, a dog named Chance, and another dog named Shadow. Oh wait, this blog isn't about that. It's about our sweet little angel. See attached for the face of a little girl that is ready to be back in her natural environment. Mommy and Daddy's faces weren't available for photographing, but they're elated too!

Scarlett's echo update.

The attending Dr. explained to us very well what is going on. The flow across Scarlett's aortic valve looks good, the same as it did pre-op. The valve is still "mildly stenotic," which means fatter than it should be, but since the flow is good there is no concern. What sounded way more concerning to Mom and Dad was that the main part of the surgery, the connection from Superior Vena Cava to the Pulmonary Artery, was "narrowed." The Dr. explained that this can happen because it's a surgical connection, not a natural connection, etc. She said that given Scarlett's recovery and stats, this is not a cause for concern and likely will never be. After all, she says, Scarlett is the boss of us and will tell us when we need to get concerned! Daddy loved that comment. Here's a picture of her from a minute ago. We love you Scarlett!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Scarlett got her echo, and a short visit from her attending.

Daddy occupied little baby Scarlett during the echo, mostly with her Seahorse gloworm and Dolly. She did great, and it wasn't too difficult at all! Mommy actually slept through it, which is saying a lot. Her attending Dr. just stopped by to look at her and reiterated that Oxygen weaning is really the key to getting to go home. They'd like to see her eat more, but even if she picks up a little we may still get released under the presumption that she will do much better when she's comfy at home, which Mommy and Daddy believe she will.

Scarlett looking/feeling better.

The doctors just rounded on Scarlett this morning. Everyone agrees that she looks much better than yesterday. She picked up her eating a bit last night, and got some sleep too. She's definitely more happy today and has already smiled at Mom and Dad several times. She'll get her echo today, and the doctors say she's "very close" to going home. If everything continues to look good, she may get to go home Tuesday or Wednesday. The biggest thing remaining is weaning her off the Oxygen, because they don't like to send her home on O2 if they don't have to. Both Mom and Dad are feeling good ab0ut Scarlett's status today.

Rough afternoon/evening.

This afternoon Scarlett was really irritable, cranky, and inconsolable for no apparent reason. The nurse and doctors weren't entirely sure what was going on. They tried changing up her pain meds a bit and increasing the potency of them, which did seem to help a little. Most importantly, Scarlett has lost an ounce or two of weight and isn't eating well. She almost came off her Oxygen, however, but didn't do quite well enough without it. Please pray for peace, rest, and lots of ba-ba for our baby girl! I'm too tired to post pictures, I'll add some in the morning.

Scarlett doing OK.

This morning the Drs rounded on Scarlett and said the fluid in her chest near her lungs had decreased which is great. They also said that she looks really good and the nurse can start weaning her off her Oxygen! She gets more blood tests and an echo tomorrow, which we are hoping is the next step toward sending her home!! The doctors did mention the possibility of Scarlett having to go home with Oxygen, but hopefully that will not be the case. Our nurse Carly has been fantastic. She says that Scarlett is definitely teething, but hopefully the tylenol she's getting will help with that. Right now Mommy and Scarlett are sleeping in the room while Daddy is up in the Connelly Resource Center working on laundry.

Scarlett had a rough patch this afternoon.

Scarlett was a little extra fussy in spurts this afternoon, which was really hard to endure because she gets so blue when she screams and gets upset. Her tummy and head were hurting. The nurse was able to give her more oxycodone and tylenol which helped. She also got some meds to keep things moving through her system. Our sweet little baby had to have her foot IV removed...it was replaced with an IV in her right hand, which was NOT fun for her. At least the IV specialist got it in on try number 1!! Mom and Scarlett are doing their best to rest up tonight. It seems like we have a minimum of 3 days left in the hospital...what a week this has been. Mom and Dad love you so much Scarlett!

Scarlett looking good, going to step down unit...and we get our own room!

Scarlett looks so much better today. She got her bandage removed, her pulse-ox is in the high 80s (still with oxygen), and she doesn't seem to be in pain at all. The doctors noted a little fluid on one side of her lungs, but that should go away with medication and we may get to go home in a couple days. Thanks again so much to everyone who's been supporting us via thought, prayer, hugs, taking care of things for us back home, ensuring we have a place to crash, scarlett's medical expenses fund, and otherwise!!!! It truly has been overwhelming and we are SO grateful for the kindness and generosity we've been shown.