Ella's Nine Month Professional Photos

Our sweet little girl is growing up way too fast!

Photos by Heather Purdin of Click Photography

Tuesdays With Courtney

Every Tuesday this summer, one of my favorite former students comes over in the morning to help me with the kids. It is heaven! She is such a sweet girl and does whatever she can to make the day easier for me. She gives Ella her bath and feeds her breakfast and plays with her, she plays with Nicholas, and helps me to get the kids out of the house. Today we went for a walk around the neighborhood and Nicholas got to try out his new EASyS Stroller and he absolutely LOVED it! He was talking and smiling during the whole walk and was super comfortable. Both Nicholas and Ella just adore her and are always happy to see her when she arrives. I am pretty sure Nicholas thinks she is one of the most beautiful girls he has ever seen. Thank you for spending Tuesdays with us, Courtney! You are the best!!!!

Equipment Delivery

Today, our awesome vendor from ATG Rehab, brought over two new pieces of medical equipment for Nicholas. The top photo shows his EASyS stroller which we were able to purchase because of donations from our awesome family & friends. Nicholas sat in it for a little while before nap today and we will break it in with our walk around the neighborhood this afternoon. A huge thank you to everyone who made this stroller purchase possible for us!

The second photo is Nicholas's new Rifton potty chair. It can fit over our toilet or be used alone with a removable basin. It has all kinds of nifty features to make sitting upright and going potty much more comfortable than a regular toilet. I hope Nicholas is ready to potty train!

Backyard Pool Day

The high schoolers who attended the weekend retreat that I volunteered for. It was fun getting to know these teens!

When I got home from the retreat this afternoon, I filled the wading pool with water and took advantage of the beautiful 85 degree day. Nicholas spent the whole afternoon in the pool with me and Ella joined us when she woke up from her nap. We sang songs, splashed and giggled a lot. I can't think of a better way to spend a Sunday afternoon!

Lazy Days of Summer

Around here lately, most days have been pajama days because, frankly, we have not had much of anything going on. We have been watching movies, sleeping in, and chasing Ella around the house. It's quite nice to have such an easy schedule and I, for one, am not complaining. Most of our time has been spent indoors as we have experienced a lot of summer rain in the last week. Jeff and I have been working on sprucing up our patio in the hopes that mother nature will give us some sunshine so we can spend time out there. We bought some stepping stones and placed them around the edge of the concrete slab, potted some herbs & plants, and are looking at purchasing new patio furniture as soon as the prices drop a little. It seems summer in Washington never truly arrives until August anyway, so it is nice to get some of those yard projects done before the heat wave hits. Tonight & tomorrow I am going to help lead a high school summer retreat in Lewis River. It should be a fun weekend with campfires, swimming, and awesome witness talks.

Have a wonderful weekend!

Ella is Ten Months Old

Our sweet girl is ten months-old today! She has changed and grown so much since her arrival last September. She is now crawling everywhere and she is super fast. She has become my little shadow following me all over the house. There have been many times that I almost trip over her or times when she startles me because she all of a sudden appears from around the corner. Also anytime I open a drawer, cabinet door, or the dishwasher, she beelines it over to me to see what is inside. She is happiest when she is on the go, but does love to snuggle when she's sleepy.

She loves to eat and will try anything. We have introduced more table foods in the last month and she really likes bananas, green beans, graham crackers, and cheese. She is silly and playful and loves to be tickled...she laughs so hard. She also loves to stand on the sofa and look out our big picture window. We have taken her outside to our back yard several times and she loves the grass, she picks huge handfuls and tries to shove it in her mouth. She loves to explore the plants, bugs, and trees back there so we always keep a watchful eye on her. She absolutely adores her brother and tries to be gentle with him. Nicholas loves when she plays with him and calls, "Babe!" which is his nickname for her. Nothing makes me happier than seeing our two children playing happily together.

Happy ten months, Ella Roo! xoxo

Thanks Are in Order

Today we placed the order for Nicholas's new EASyS Stroller! We are so beyond grateful to our friends and family who so generously donated in the past few weeks. We were able to purchase the stroller so quickly because of all of you! We are so humbled and so amazed that within one month of asking for donations, we received what we needed. We even had perfect strangers hear about Nicholas and his need for his medical stroller, whose hearts were touched in such a way that they made donations to our sweet boy. Please know how immensely grateful we are, and we will think of each and every one of you every time Nicholas uses his stroller. A few of you told me that you still wanted to donate or have recently sent donations by mail, so please know that we plan to use your money to buy Nicholas a Hayden's Comfy Cushie to make traveling in his stroller super comfortable. Shelly Calafiore is a grandmother to a sweet little girl named Hayden, who also has SMA. Shelly creates custom made cushies for SMA kids who use the EASyS Stroller. She does absolutely beautiful work and we are excited to see what she will create for Nicholas!

Thank you so very, very much!

Ella's First Tooth

Can you see it?

Close... Closer...

Closest!
She cut her upper left front tooth first! I think most kids cut their bottom middle teeth first (I know Nicholas did) but Ella apparently likes to do things a bit differently. Maybe her thumb sucking helped that top tooth peek through first? At any rate, at 9.5 months old, it's about time we see a tooth in our baby girl's mouth!

Pool Party

This afternoon we went over to our wonderful friends' house for their kiddos combined birthday pool party. We had a great time and both the kids enjoyed themselves. Ella loved being in the water, while Nicholas enjoyed watching the other kids jump off the diving board and make big splashes. This is Harrison...he was one of the kids who birthdays we celebrated today. Harrison is the sweetest to Nicholas. He came over to Nicholas during the party and said, "Nicholas, thank you for coming to my birthday party." He said it on his own with no prompting. He does sweet things like this all the time and it always chokes me with emotion. I just love him!
This is the half the face of the hostess with the most-est and her adorable niece, Lucy.Nicholas has never been a fan of swimming or being in the water so he was content to lounge and watch the kids swim. We asked him several times if he wanted to go in and he always said, "No!" with a big grin on his face. Jeff and Ella are like fishes...they both love the water!Ella loved playing with her little friend, AnnabellaHarry and Mason floating aroundThere's the birthday girl...the sweet and adorable Grace.The DeShazer backyardNicholas really loved watching daddy's high dives and back flips off the diving boardI can't think of a better way to spend this hot afternoon! Much love to the birthday kids-Grace & Harry!

Independence Holiday Weekend

Our weekend plans changed quite a bit because on Friday as we were all in the car ready to go to a birthday party, Nicholas vomited. We took him inside and suctioned him and tried to calm him down, but his heart rate was super high and his oxygen levels kept dropping so we called the paramedics. They came to our home and administered oxygen and monitored him for about twenty minutes. He was doing great when they left so we opted not to go to the hospital. Later that night after he had been asleep for about an hour, he woke up feeling distressed again. His oxygen levels were in the mid 80's for a few minutes and his heart rate was unusually high again so we called 911 for the second time and just asked that they transport him to OHSU. We knew something was wrong and because OHSU is a twenty minute drive from our home, we didn't want to waste any time. I quickly packed a bag of things for both Nicholas and myself and rode with him in the ambulance. He did just fine on the ride there but vomited again when we arrived at the emergency room. It was a very long night, with neither of us getting much sleep, but luckily all the tests they ran came back negative for aspiration or any kind of infection. We assume that since I increased the milliliters per hour on his feed that day that his tummy got too full and his system was backed up which caused him to vomit and became so distressed. The doctors prescribed antibiotics just in case he was fighting off something, but sent him home Saturday evening. He has been feeling great since Saturday and we are so, so happy that we did not have to spend the holiday weekend at the hospital!!!

We stayed home and relaxed Saturday and Sunday,but decided to venture out on Monday afternoon to my folks' house. Several of my parents friends and our friends joined us for volleyball, a BBQ, swimming in the wading pool, s'mores around the campfire, and fireworks. It was a fun day, apparently I was having so much fun that I neglected to take photos. That and the fact that neither of the kids would nap made me a very busy mommy.

Miss Ella in her patriotic outfit and swimming in the wading pool
Sweet Nicholas enjoying the sunshine and all the familiar faces
Ella with her buddy, Bella, snuggling in to watch the fireworks
I found the firework setting on my camera, but it wasn't very good. This is the best photo I got...not very impressive.Happy Independence Day, America!