Happy Halloween!

Love, Our Little Pumpkin

Yesterday Mia and I went back to LA to have a consultation with another helmet specialist. This one was recommended by the doctor at LA Children's Hospital. We wanted her to look at Mia's helmet and see if it was doing the best job it could be doing because we want to avoid another surgery at all cost. Well, she wasn't pleased with the helmet for several reasons and in the end she thought Mia needed a new helmet...so she got a cast done of her head (it was extremely unpleasant for her) and we'll be going back next week to get her new helmet. Please pray that insurance would pay for it because it is a second helmet that can be a bit controversial.

Here is a picture of Mia in her Elmo towel she got for her birthday! Enjoy!!

Heart Surgery

So we finally got to LA today to see Mia's heart surgeon. We were supposed to see him at 11 and so we left fairly early because we hate being late and never know about traffic, yet we arrived at 10 with plenty of time...that was ok though because we needed to stop by medical records and get some of Mia's stuff so we thought our timing was perfect. But at 10 they called us and said he was in a procedure and wouldn't be able to see us until 2pm. Now you can imagine how I felt...I was like, no, what are we going to do for 4 more hours! So we went to medical records and Mia got a bottle and then we decided to grab some lunch and go to a park for awhile. It was actually a really really really nice afternoon, us just enjoying ourselves and being with the baby. She was content to play with Daddy, the weather was perfect, and we were just relaxing at a nice park near UCLA.

So at 2 we arrived back at the hospital and let them know we were here, at 2:30 a nurse came to talk to us and do a mini evaluation of Mia and then Mia's heart surgeon came in to talk to us. No matter how many times someone tries to explain what they are going to do to Mia's heart, I just can't picture it and really don't understand, it is almost frustrating...but Brad told me it's because they are using a 2 dimensional drawing to explain a 3 dimensional project...anyway, we went through alot of our concerns with the surgery and got some reassuring answers. If the job is done right, this will be the only time she'll need heart surgery, so we continue to pray for that. She'll be in the hospital about a week recovering and the tentative surgery date (I say tentative because until it is actually there anything can happen...like getting sick, etc.) is Tuesday, November 25th...the Tuesday before Thanksgiving. Brad said, do you really want to spend Thanksgiving down here, but realistically that is a good time for him because he gets Thursday and Friday off and he won't have to take as many personal days, so we feel like that is a good decision. In a way it is overwhelming to think that in a little less than a month she'll be undergoing another difficult operation, but we continue to rest in God's peace knowing that He is in control. So please be praying for this surgery. Pray that it would go well with no complications and pray that she wouldn't have to have another heart surgery again.

On a different note, Mia's left arm/hand is doing so well. She used to keep it fisted when she was clapping, but now she'll open it more and more...and we've noticed she's transfering alot more from her right hand to her left, which she hardly did before. Thank you God! And she knows Patta Cake (However do you spell it?) We start saying it and she starts clapping her hands...we got it on video and I'll try to put it on the blog in the next day or so...we continue to be so encouraged by these little things.

I also got good advice today from a nutritionist regarding Mia's caloric intake and we have some new things to try there, which made me very hopeful that she'll start putting on a bit more weight and even catching up a bit. So lots happening...lots of good things happening.

We saw a lady at UCLA wearing a t-shirt that said, "God is Good, All the Time". And it's so true, we are continually reminded of that.

Feeling Better

Mia is finally feeling better and we are grateful! Hope y'all are enjoying your weekend as we are ours.

We were supposed to go to LA today to visit with the heart surgeon, but he had another surgery come up and so now we are going to see him on Monday...at least that's what we think, at this point we're not sure we'll ever see him! He's a busy guy.

Mia is feeling better and so far this morning it doesn't appear that she has a fever, but I'll be monitoring her closely. I sure hope that it's all done with...this has not been a fun week for her. She didn't eat too well yesterday, so pray that she gets her appetite back today (as small of an appetite as it is!)

Ok, so I spoke too soon. Last night around 5ish Mia started running a low temperature, so we gave her some tylenol and hoped that would be the end of it...we ended up being up with her for most of the night...alternating between tylenol and motrim. This morning she was still running a temperature and at one point it was fairly high, but the motrim seems to have kicked in and is helping with that. Overall she's just not a happy camper...normally she doesn't like to just sit in my lap, but we watched all of sesame street together today...her just sitting in my lap. So pray that she'll be feeling better by tomorrow. I'm sure it is from the shot...so far it doesn't appear that she's had any seizures, which we are very thankful for. Pray that the fever goes away and she doesn't have any seizures. I will let you know how she's feeling tomorrow.

I took Mia in for an immunization today. She got her hepatitis A shot and seems to be tolerating it just fine, which is great...she hasn't had any fever and she's doing great. The nurse gave her the shot and she cried for about a minute and then was fine. And then we went home, it was pretty painless overall. For me and the baby. :)

So we were supposed to go down to LA today to see the surgeon who will be doing Mia's heart surgery, however he ended up starting a surgery late and so they asked us to reschedule for Friday. So we'll be going down on Friday to see him and hopefully have more information then. We continue to trust God's timing for surgery, so pray that we would be patient as we wait on Him.

Pray also for Mia tomorrow, I am going to bring her back to the pediatrician's office for her immunization, this will be the first one since her stroke and I get a bit nervous hoping that she won't react to it.

We had physical therapy this morning and she continues to do really well, we are now working on getting her to crawl. It's so neat to see her progressing and getting stronger, we are grateful.

On a different note, they told us awhile back that she had one central front tooth and she just started getting teeth on top, so we were curious what that would look like, well, she's definitely got two front teeth and they are very nice looking! So we don't know if that means they were mistaken (quite possibly...) or if when she gets her permanent teeth they will be different...but right now we just want to say thank you God!

Pictures

Here are some more pictures of beautiful baby Mia!! (and Aunt Goose)






I know this one is a little out of focus, but check out Mia's moose socks!!! They have moose on them and on the bottom are little plastic pads for traction in the shape of moose tracks. Too Cute!


Have you heard the one about the three turtles???

Today Mia has been feeling better, thank you so much for praying for her! We like having our happy baby around...we don't like it when she's upset. We'll probably go next week sometime for her shot, I'll let you know when. She also got weighed today and she's now 15 pounds 6 ounces. When I was at the pediatrician's office they told me she was almost 29 inches, I knew that couldn't be accurate, so I remeasured her at home...well she is now 28 inches...that's our long string bean. Today her teacher came to visit and was reevaluating how she's doing compared to when they first met her 4 months ago, I couldn't believe it has only been 4 months, but she's doing so well, we kept marking things off of her list and that made us very happy, we are so pleased with Mia's progress, we know that it's a God thing and so again, we say thank you.

Tagged

So apparently I've been tagged, I was supposed to go to My Pictures and pick the fourth picture in the fourth file...of course we have so many folders and subfolders that I had to pick the fourth of the fourth of the fourth, but this picture is of Brad and I and Brad's mother prior to our wedding, we were at the sight where we were going to be married and I believe we were just checking it out and discussing the possibilities...yup, that's when Brad and I were "fresh"! HA! Now I get to pick others to do this, so I pick Eliza, Nancy, Jaime, and Angela because I think y'all will actually do it.

So we were supposed to get an immunization today because Mia is now a year old and we had an appointment with her pediatrician, but we decided to put it off until next week because she just wasn't herself last night and this morning. She's been a bit irritable and she was a little warm yesterday. Last night she woke up at 10, 12, and 2 and wouldn't go to sleep on her own, she only wanted someone to hold her, which is very unusual, so I decided that I would wait until she was feeling "normal" before I give her an immunization. We've already decided to slow down the process because of her past seizures and so I've scheduled a slower pace for her. Yet this morning I kept thinking why does it have to be done today, it can wait a week or so and I think that was a good choice, so pray that she'll be feeling better, were not really sure what is bugging her. :( And pray for her head growth, the pediatrician is really concerned because it hasn't grown and she's calling her neurologist today to discuss it with him. Otherwise she's growing on her own slow curve and doing well.

Happy 1st Birthday Mia!

Sweet Baby Girl,

Mommy and Daddy love you so much. You are 1 today...we can't believe it has been a whole year. You've had quite a year sweetheart and we want you to know how much we love you and how we are so proud of you. You've been through quite a lot and so we wanted to reflect back on your year for you.

1 year ago you came into this world at 1:03pm. We didn't know if you were going to be a boy or a girl, but when the doctor said, it's a girl...Mommy and Daddy looked at each other and were so happy. Mia, we said, her name is Mia. We already knew you had a blocked intestine, but in a little bit we were going to find out some more things that weren't quite right.

They weighed you and took your measurements. You weighed 5 pounds 4 ounces and you were 16 3/4 inches long. Today you are now 15 pounds 4 ounces and 27 inches long. Sometimes we call you our long string bean because you are skinny and long. Considering how much you were in the hospital this last year, we think gaining 10 pounds is quite an accomplishment.

When they were looking you over they found out you didn't have an anal opening and then they did some more checking and realized your heart didn't finish closing off the four chambers, so all your blood was mixing a bit, and you had a blocked nostril. You looked beautiful to us, it was hard to believe that we made you...well, we know God truly made you, but he used your Mommy and your Daddy to help. Daddy always tells Mommy, you baked a beautiful baby...and it's true...you are beautiful.

Of the 366 days in the past year (it was a leap year!), you've spent 97 in the hospital. Mommy did the math and that is 27% of your first year. It was not a fun way to spend 1/4 of the first year, but you were such a trooper and such a good baby that all the nurses wanted to take care of you. Mommy didn't want to figure out all the days we made trips to LA and other places for doctor visits, but she figures we do alot of the doctor/therapy/hospital stuff. Our prayer is to do alot less of that this coming year! You also went through 4 surgeries this past year. The first one was to fix your blocked intestine, which happened when you were 1 day old. The second one was to keep your heart from going into heart failure with a PA Band, that one happened when you were 13 days old. The third one was to fix your blocked nostril and the fourth one was because your skull had fused early. That was the hardest one because you had a stroke during the surgery, but God has been faithful and He continues to heal you inspite of the bleak outlook the doctors gave us, and we want to give Him all the glory for that.

You've been quite a testimony of God's healing power and grace for alot of people sweet pea. You've impacted so many people all over the world, it's amazing to see how God has used your little life in such a big way, but the Bible says, when we are weak, He is strong, and that is so true. Over the past year, God has helped you to learn how to sit, roll over, and bang on drums (maybe you'll be a drummer someday). He's helped you to gain ability with your left hand and that keeps improving each day. He's given you the ability to speak...you've got quite a bit of baby babble happening already. He's allowed you to see and know who your Mommy and Daddy are even when the doctors told us that wouldn't happen. God is so good baby girl and He continues to take care of you, we are grateful.

Why Mia Danielle? Well, when Mommy and Daddy found out we were going to have a baby, we didn't want to know until you were born if you were going to be a boy or a girl. But we immediately settled on Mia if you were a girl because we both loved that name so much. It was a real easy decision. We had alot harder time thinking of a boy name for you, so we were real glad when you were a girl! Danielle was chosen after your Grandpa Dan who passed away 6 years before you were born, in fact, your birthday is on the day that he went to heaven to be with God. We think that is pretty special, we didn't plan it, but God knew. He knew long before you were born that you would be born on that day. And He knew you would be born with all these complications and He is using it for His glory.

We couldn't have imagined a sweeter, more precious, baby girl. We love making you laugh and watching you grow up. We don't expect this coming year to be easy either, but we know that if we put God first, He'll help us through everything.

We love you all of it baby girl,
Mommy and Daddy

.999

Today on Daddy's homepage it said Mia's age: .999 We thought that was pretty close to 1 and decided to celebrate your birthday. It was a whole lot of fun. Because you are 1 now we decided to let you invite 1 friend to your party. And you chose your boyfriend Jacob. Of course his older brother and mom got to come along too, so we might have to discuss those rules a bit more next year when you are 2. But you had a great time. You had an elmo cake and you opened presents and you got lots of love pokes because your Aunt Goose was here! Your Aunt Rachel and Uncle Tim were also here via Skype from Italy. They saw your whole birthday party! Lots of others were here also, like your Uncle Paul and your Nana and Grampa and of course Mommy and Daddy and we can't forget Aunt Goose's boyfriend Jared. Here are some of the pictures from your fun day.

Slowly but surely Mia keeps getting bigger. She's now 15 pounds 4 ounces, which is great. Her birthday is coming up real soon and it's funny because the law in California says for a child to face forward in a booster seat they have to be 1 year AND 20 pounds. I remember picking out her car seat a year ago thinking, oh no...what if our baby gets to 20 pounds before the year is out...not unrealistic since Brad and I were both decent sized babies. Now sometimes I think, what if she is in this car seat until she is 2...probably very unlikely, but I wonder when she'll finally get to face forward. All in God's timing. :)

Right now she has all these toys on the floor in the office by her and what is she playing with...my empty boxes. Figures. :)

Enjoy your weekend!

Mia Pictures

Mia has this drum that she loves to play with...it's the perfect size for her to practice sitting with, which she's getting really good at, she just can't get herself into sitting yet. We're still working on that.

We now have an appointment to see the surgeon who will perform Mia's heart surgery. Our appointment is on the 20th of this month. After we speak with him then they'll schedule her surgery. Please pray for wisdom and scheduling. Pray that Mia would stay healthy also.

Peace

Mia has been doing really well. I've been battling a cold recently, that's why there haven't been many blog posts...I've been sleeping when Mia takes her naps to try to keep up with the baby when she is awake. We still don't know more about her heart surgery yet, but hopefully we'll get some more information on Monday or Tuesday.

Today some dear friends brought a rose over for Mia. It's the Peace Rose. It is too remind us of God's peace that He gives to his believers, which Brad and I can attest to having felt firsthand over the last year. We've attached a picture of what the rose will eventually look like. Thank you for always remembering our little girl in your prayers, we continue to be so grateful.

So we don't have an official date of heart surgery, but it looks like that will be the next step for Mia. We are waiting to hear from her heart surgeon, we'll schedule an appointment with him and then discuss it and go from there. So sometime in the near future it may be happening, we'll see what he has to say regarding this.