2+2

Today Cohen says to me: "Mom, you know what 2 + 2 is?"

Me: "What it it?"

Cohen (beaming with pride at his smartness): "A couple!"

Haha!

Esophagogastroduodenoscopy

Esophagealgastroduodenoscopy: (a.k.a. EGD) a scoping procedure that directly visualizes the interior of the esophagus, stomach and duodenum.

Howz that for a long word?!

Today was a big day for Layla. We've been waiting for 3 weeks for this appointment and we came a little nervous for Layla, but anxious to get going on more investigation as to why she has her issues.

Thr day started with getting all ready for the procedure.. I think she is the cutest little thing in her hospital clothes.

After she was prepped we were taken to the pre-op waiting room. Here she is, waiting with daddy.

Her GI doctor, Dr Pohl, and the anesthesiologist had us give her a kiss, then they took her back into the surgery unit to sedate her and perform the scope, while cody and I went to the waiting room.
After about 45 min Dr Pohl came out to talk to us about what he saw. He said her anatomy looked normal and he didn't see any abnormalities or ulcers. However, he could see how much her saliva pools in her throat. He said they had to suction her several times and that there was crazy amounts of saliva backed up in her esophagus. This really confirmed to him that she has dysphasia (doesn't swallow), and he really seems to be taking her a lot more seriously now. He said he is starting to think it may be a neurological issue :( and wants to call the neurologist she is scheduled to meet with in July and explain her case to him. He was also saying he wants to get the neurologist, the ENT specialist, himself, and us, all together to meet and put their minds together and come up with a plan for her.
In his words, her case is complicated.

So basically, we still don't really know anything yet :(

After the scope, Dr Pohl placed a ph probe down her nose into her upper stomach. This probe tracks levels and other things for 24 hours, afterwhich it will be taken out and he will analyze the results. This is to test for acid reflux, which he is pretty convinced she doesn't have. She can't have her feeding tube in while the probe is in so she is staying in the hospital until the test is finished tomorrow at noon.

Coming out of anesthesia was no fun for Layla.. She was confused and didn't feel good. They allow one parent in the post op area so I went to be with her. She was so sad and crying about as hard as I've ever heard her, which isn't super loud, but it was super sad. After about 20 min she finally started to calm down and get over the anesthesia more. After that they got Cody and walked us all down to the Rapid Treatment Unit, where we will be until tomorrow.
While the probe is in her feeding tube has to be out. So she won't be able to get food until tomorrow after noon. She is hooked up to an iv that is giving her some sugar water to keep her hydrated and hold her over until tomorrow. She'll go about 30 hours w/o milk.

Surprisingly, she is handling is so well.. Being a total trooper. The nurses have been marveling and how happy she has been. They said babies and kids usually fuss and cry most the time the probe is in, and rip it out and have to keep getting it replaced. Since coming out of anesthesia, Layla really hasn't cried much and has been really pleasant. I'm so relieved because I was really worried about her going without milk that long. I guess we'll see how she does tomorrow morning.

You can see in these pictures she is still a bit groggy. The tube coming out her nose, taped to her face is the ph probe. The other wires are vital signs monitors. She also has an oxygen monitor on one foot, and the IV in her other ankle.

She fell asleep with my hand on her belly :) Sweet little thing..

This is the box her probe tube is hooked to. The probe has sensors all down it, that send data to this box. Cody and I have to also record external data on the box- we push the 1,2, or 3 button when she either gags/coughs, throws up, or cries. And we push a button to record whether she is upright or laying down.

Oh by the way, little chica is getting FOUR teeth right now.. Her two bottom and her two top canines! So random. Her left canine and bottom have both just barely poked through and the right ones are close. She's been my earliest teether of my early teething kids so far. It'll be kind of funny when she has only her canines on top.. She'll be our vampire baby ;) Hopefully the other top teeth come soon. Until then she's gonna have a little awkward looking phase, haha ;)


Here's my bright eyed girl, feeling much better after a good long nap.

We decided to pass some time this evening by pulling her around the hospital in this wagon. Cody pulled it and I followed with the IV poll.
She loved the ride :)

Now she is asleep for the night and Cody and I are smooshed on the little one-person couch/bed, haha :)
If she coughs/gags/throws up/cries tonight we'll be pushing the buttons on the box.. Doing our little task ;)

I'll update again tomorrow when we get to go home.

Night, night.

Super Boy

Cohen has been wearing Ava's princess cape around, using as his "super hero" cape. So last night I made
him his own cape, so he wouldn't have to be running around in his sister's purple cape anymore :)

He hasn't taken it off all morning and has been "flying" all around the house!

3 months..

Layla is 3 1/2 months now and is just my little angel baby. She laughed for the first time a week ago, and has laughed a few times since. It's the cutest thing and makes me so happy. She has also begun reaching for toys these last few weeks. I love seeing her learn these new milestones.. She is so cute! Layla has been discovering her hands and has begun reaching for things. Once she gets a hold of a toy she isn't quite sure what to do with it yet, but she is starting to pull things into her mouth. She is a happy, happy little girl. Super mellow, easy-going and patient. I love her tender spirit. She really likes to see what's going on and is very alert and so super smiley.
She is doing really good with her feeding tube, happy and growing. It doesn't seem to bother her at all. Her tube did get pulled out a few weeks ago (my fault), and we had to take her to the hospital to get it put back in. On saturday she pulled it partially out which was scary for a bit, but luckily we avoided another trip to the hospital. A couple Saturday's ago we had a scare where she threw up dark green bile and had to take her to the ER.. It was a sign of a bowel obstruction which typically requires immediate surgery. But after a long day of X-rays and waiting everything checked out ok and whatever was causing her to throw up corrected itself. This last week was great.. Not one trip to the hospital or doctor, which was a record for us since she got her NJ tube!
So far we haven't found any answers as to why she can't swallow or why she aspirates. Some bigger things have been ruled out, like brain problems and palsy. In a couple weeks she will stay in the hospital for a night and they are going to sedate her and do a scope to look at her throat and airways. Then they will do a ph probe test where a tube is put down her nose into her esophagus and stays there for 24 hrs measuring acid levels. So she'll be hospitalized for that because her feeding tube will have to be out for the test and she'll be fed with an iv instead. We are hoping some answers come out of all that.. I guess we'll see :) If they don't find anything, it may just be something she will hopefully grow out of someday.. Until then we have gotten pretty used to it all now, found a new normal and are just so grateful she is happy and growing and healthy. We tell ourselves all the time that things could be worse, and we are grateful that it isn't. We feel that she has been really blessed. I'll keep more updates coming.. I got a blogging app on my phone so I think I'll get around to posting a lot more often!

Hello

Hey handsome boy...

little randoms of today..

Today at preschool, Ava's class had a Thanksgiving 'feast', where they all brought some fruit for the meal, dressed up as Indians and pilgrims in costumes they'd made, and had a little feast together. She came home from school today more chatty and excited than she has all year.. she LOVED it. How cute is the little Indian headdress and shirt-thing they made??

Later on today, I told the kids we needed to go to Macey's for a few groceries. Macey's is one of Cohen's favorite stores to go to because they have 'race-car' shopping carts.. He's obsessed. Anyway, I mentioned we would be going to the store in a little bit, and the kids ran upstairs to "get ready". They came down a few minutes later dressed so random, but so excited about their choices I didn't have the heart to make any changes. So Ava went to the store in her fluffy skirt, dress-up high heels, too-small shirt, and self-done hair style. And Cohen felt the need to switch into shorts on this chilly day, then add some Dora sunglasses and Spider Man boots to accessorize. He originally had dress-up high-heels on as well, but he decided they weren't comfy, so luckily he made the last minute switch to the boots..

These two are becoming quite the best of friends :)

Follow the Prophet

Cohen's been in a singing mood lately. He'll get singing in the car, and it is entertaining to listen to because most of the songs he sings are made up and don't make any sense. And he likes to sing loud.

Cody and I just got called to be primary teachers at church, and this Sunday was our first day teaching. It was also the annual Primary program, where the primary kids put on a singing program for sacrament meeting. Cody and I had to sit up on the stands with our class, so even though Cohen is not in Primary yet, he got to come sit up with us. One of the songs of the program was 'Follow the Prophet'. The primary kids always sing that song the loudest and with the most enthusiasm, and Cohen surprised me by joining right in on the chorus! I was unaware that he new that song, haha :) And he sang with just as much enthusiasm as the rest of the kids. There is one line that says "Don't go a stray," but his version was "Don't go straight!", and he'd look right at me like and sing it like he was demanding me to not go straight. The rest of the day he had this song in his head, and would randomly break out in his version of the chorus. He likes to sing it 'loud and crazy'. Anyway, it was pretty cute, so I thought I'd try to get him on tape. He isn't as cooperative for the video camera, but it's still cute to see him attempting to sing :)

Happy Halloween!

Prepare your self for picture OVERLOAD.

A Halloween post has to be filled with lots of pictures :)

Every year our friends get together for our annual Halloween party. Now that the Taylor's are in New Mexico :(, Devin and Jessica have become the new hosts and of course they put on a GREAT party. It's always a blast to all get together and everyone's costumes seem to get more creative each year.

I don't have many pictures from the night, but here's a partial group shot.. missing Jessica, Mel and I (Jess was taking a more official group photo with a timer camera, but i don't have that pic yet).

Costume prize this year when to the Chickens!

Awesome costumes, Meagan and Ty!

We played some fun games, including this design-a-costume-in-5-min-with-limited-supplies contest. Our group won, with with Ty's kind cooperation to be transformed into hula babe!

Woody and Jessie, from Toy Story 2.

One of the best surprises of the night were when Mike and Jaime showed up unannounced!! They drove late the night before all the way from NM, just to be here for Halloween. Yay, we love the Taylors!

Moving on to Halloween Day:

Meet Toy Story 2 + Cinderella

Buzz Lightyear

Cinderella

Aren't they so CUTE?!

The kids were both SO excited to dress up this year. They'd been talking about their costumes all month. I made Ava's dress, and she had fun watching in all come together, which made her extra excited for when she could finally wear her dress to all her parties and trick-or-treating.

Sadly, it was pretty cold and rainy right during trick-or-treat hours, but the kids were too excited about trick-or-treating for us not to go.

So we braved the weather, took our umbrellas, and went for it.

It was pretty miserable at first.. it was so windy which made it FREEZING.

After shivering through a whole entire 3 houses, it was time to improvise. We took the carseats out of the Jetta so the kids could easily hop in and out of the back seat between every few houses to warm back up. The new plan worked out fabulous and the kids had the best time trick-or-treating. The rain eventually turned into a sprinkle and the wind died down too, so the last bit of the night was much better. Cohen had a blast.. He "flew" from house to house yelling, "To infinity and beyond!". And at 'scary' houses, he would shoot the decorations with the 'laser' on his costume. After each house he'd ask, "Can we go to another house?!?", not wanting the experience to end. Kids are so much fun :)

After trick-or-treating with the kids, we headed over to Grandma and Grandpa's house for our family Halloween party!

Bubba = scary, tall guy

He and his friends did a haunted porch again at my parents' house. They had six guys dressed up like this, all wearing stilts, creeping around the front yard. And they carved tons of pumpkins, had black lights, mist, and all sorts of other spooky stuff.

The Andersons = Cop & Robber

Todd was a hilarious looking cop! He reminded me of some dorky police man off Reno 911 or something :)

The Larsens = Oompa Loompas

Vanessa went all out sewing and creating these awesome costumes! They definitely took the cake for costume prize i think.

Mom & Dad = 50's

They win cutest costume prize :)
Ava was in total princess mode at the party. She was acting the part all night, all proper with gentle manners and pretty smiles. She was Vanessa's lovely assistant throughout all the games and activities :)

The activity of the party was playing Minute to Win It. Boozie and Devin modeled the game exactly after the TV game show, with actual clips of the show and everything.

Here's Todd attempting to knock down a standing pencil 15 ft away with rolling marbles. (The only one to accomplish this was Dad).

Cohen took a turn going for the pencil with the marbles, it was pretty cute :)

Here's a less than flattering shot of me trying to hook 3 keys in a minute.

(Todd was the only one to accomplish this task)

This challenge was funny.. Put an oreo on your forehead and keeping the rest of your body completely still, move the oreo to your mouth with only your face, not letting it fall. Cody had no problem with this one! (I had a picture uploaded of him here but I accidentally deleted it while typing and I'm not about to reload it and then bring it from the top of the post down to the bottom.. Anyone have any good advice on rearranging pictures in blogger, with a laptop? I struggle) Ava also tried out this challenge and actually just about got the cookie into her mouth!

Family Halloween Photo (Catudals your were very much missed!)

And that was our Happy Halloween :)