Elizabeth is tri-lingual! She speaks English and American Sign Language, and apparently she's decided to add German to the list. Uncle Ralf and Auntie Julia, we'd welcome your help with pronunciation. This is a little rhyme that her Grandpa Harms loves to say to her...it involves bouncing her on his knee and then a pretend fall at some point...She loves it. I didn't realize she'd managed to memorize it too!
Thursday, July 17, 2008
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
Peterson Family Reunion
We're having a fantastic time at Granna & Papa's house. We've enjoyed swimming, eating, laughing, playing, and relaxing with family. Here are only a few of the hundreds of photos we've taken.
Monday, July 14, 2008
Sunday, July 6, 2008
Saturday, July 5, 2008
Safe and Sound in the Golden State
We're here! We've arrived for the first leg of our California Journey. Elizabeth and Ruby travelled beautifully and we said a prayer of thanks as we touched ground at the airport. We're having a blast already and it would only be improved if Auntie Julia and Uncle Ralf were camping out on the balcony. Here are a few pics of the fun:
Uncle Matt with Grayson
Uncle Matt with Grayson
"So you see Grayson, the Babinski sign is normal for a baby of your age."
Partying Hard
Foster City Fireworks
Grandma & Ruby
"Okay, who want's to entertain me??"
Saturday, June 28, 2008
What I wouldn't give for an otoscope
Good News! Last night around midnight, Elizabeth was discharged from the hospital with a raging ear infection. Amazingly we managed to make it through a visit to our pediatrician, and the ER without anyone looking in the poor girl's ears! I'd even called our Pediatrician's office yesterday to see if we could bring her in for a look, but the schedule was full and our Dr. thought he'd already checked them out. Oops. So we're home, and after a shot of antibiotics in the hospital, and a couple of doses of Tylenol, E is still sleeping soundly and-we hope-on the mend. We're not sure how this is going to go over with our insurance, but I'd choose an ear infection over heart failure any day.
Thanks for sticking with us,
~Sara
Friday, June 27, 2008
Elizabeth Update...
Just one week shy of our planned trip to California, Elizabeth is being admitted to Children's Hospital tonight. She's had some bizarre symptoms over the past week that culminated in a trip to the ER yesterday. After going home for the night some lab tests today showed in increased level of ammonia in her blood and she's begun spiking pretty high fevers. That combined with her symptoms means they want to keep a close eye on her and give her some IV fluids.
Praise God that:
~ALL the tests to rule out really nasty causes for her symptoms (heart failure, a GI bleed, a problem with her spleen, a blood infection or reaccumulation of fluid in her abdomen) have come back clear, so while we don't know the cause of her fevers, her high ammonia level or her other symptoms, we have an idea of what it's not.
~Elizabeth is in good spirits today, after quite a few miserable days, so that at least is an encouraging sign. she was singing, "Who built the arc? Noah! Noah!" and "God is watching over us" as Matt buckled her into her car seat to leave tonight. It about broke my heart.
~Tomorrow is Saturday, so despite being slammed at work, Matt has a bit more flexibility than he would have on a weekday.
~Ruby has been a rock-star throughout the whole thing and has been super easy to shuffle around.
~God has given us good friends here! Some friends are loaning us their car for the weekend, since the one I drive has died suddenly & another friend brought us dinner tonight.
~Our babysitter, has been available for a few hours on short notice, which has made these past two days of running back and forth to the hospital more doable
We would appreciate your prayers for:
~Complete healing
~Wisdom for the doctors treating Elizabeth tonight and this weekend
~Grace, peace, and encouragement for all of us
~Sleep for Matt and Elizabeth in the Hospital and Ruby and Me at home tonight
~Our trip to California...we really want to go this time!!
I posted the words from this hymn as a comment on a friend's site this afternoon. Her 7 week-old son is in the PICU tonight with a serious infection and I was hoping to encourage her. I guess I encouraged myself as well.
"Fear not, I am with thee, O be not dismayed,
For I am thy God and will still give thee aid;
I'll strengthen and help thee, and cause thee to stand
Upheld by My righteous, omnipotent hand"
Goodnight,
Sara
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
7 Months
We have a 7 month old! Crazy. She's 20 1/2 lbs and doing all sorts of fun things...jabbering, sitting, watching every move Elizabeth makes, playing a bit of peek-a-boo and taking baths in the tub and sleeping through the night....FINALLY! She's not much of a fan of food with flavor yet...so we're sticking to rice cereal and oatmeal...though today she managed to mash an avocado down and seemed to enjoy it. We're having fun!
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
Cousin Camp Round Two
We are so blessed to have family who is willing to come all the way to St. Louis to see us. We've been showered with attention all spring and couldn't be happier. Last week, my brother, Micah, his wife Tawni and their daughter Rachel came to visit for 6 days and we had a ball. Not only did they spoil us by cooking fabulous meals and helping with the girls, we also loved all the great conversation and hang out time. Rachel and Elizabeth were two peas in a pod (they're 8 weeks apart) and by the time Rachel left, Elizabeth was a full-flegged Rachel impersonator...including when it came to eating! Elizabeth learned to feed herself with a fork, eat more table foods than she's ever tried, and had so much fun being a "big girl" with her cousin. Here are some pictures of our week together followed by a post linking to a few videos of "feeding therapy with cousin Rachel".
Wednesday, June 11, 2008
Table Food
For the first time ever, one night last week Elizabeth ate exactly what we did for dinner. I made red beans and rice from scratch and decided that the flavors might be right up her alley. She's a savory girl like her Mama. Well, She loved it! She ate all 10 ounces (her regular volume for meals) and though she ended up throwing it all up after the last bite, she was willing to eat the same meal again the next day and the experience has inspired me to offer her more table food ground up in our trusty food mill. Unfortunately, the food we regularly eat is no where near as calorically dense as Elizabeth needs it (she'd have to eat more than US in order to get the 300 calories she needs at each of her 4 meals!) so I'm adding butter, sour cream and milk to everything these days.
Our Dinner
Her Dinner
Elizabeth enjoying a snack of sour cream. I had some on my plate with lunch and she came over, scooped some up on my fork and ate it...and then said, "YUM"! I immediately scooped her some and she at ete it up! Here she's leaining over admiring herself in the mirror....yeah, she's a cutie pie.
Our Dinner
Her Dinner
Elizabeth enjoying a snack of sour cream. I had some on my plate with lunch and she came over, scooped some up on my fork and ate it...and then said, "YUM"! I immediately scooped her some and she at ete it up! Here she's leaining over admiring herself in the mirror....yeah, she's a cutie pie.
Sunday, June 1, 2008
"Eating" Defined
Many of you have emailed with questions about Elizabeth's eating. I thought I'd try to answer some of the most common ones.
Amazingly, Elizabeth's eating doesn't appear to be influenced at ALL by Ruby's recent move to solids. At least not yet. Elizabeth started eating again a week or two before Ruby started on rice cereal, and in the few times that I've managed to feed them at the same time, She's less interested in copying ruby and more interested in encouraging ME to feed Ruby more, saying, "Ruby's turn." I'm hopeful that we'll see more "corporate enjoyment", but we're taking it one day at a time.
I still feed her all of her food...she really dislikes feeding herself, though we can usually get her to give herself 2 or 3 bites during the course of a meal...with a limp spoon in a limp hand, food dribbling down her chin because she's not really trying to get it into her mouth. She's willing to try some finger foods though...pieces of cheese, egg, chicken, graham cracker, and she and I had a blissful time over a salad 2 nights ago. She ate a piece of cheese and tomato and enjoyed it!
As a result of her increased oral intake, Elizabeth's now vomits 2-3 times a day. All of it is in response to food. (still this is better than a volume related--or worse, unexplained--vomit) She's come so far in regards to her tolerance of textures, but sometimes it's just too much stimulation in her mouth and she can't stop from gagging and vomiting. We know this is just par for the course though...and as much as it frustrates and saddens us to watch her throw up all her food at some meals, she is amazingly resilliant and her willingness to keep eating is a real blessing.
We're regularly feeding her over 50% of her diet by mouth now...and usually can manage to feed her at least 1 meal a day entirely through her mouth. I'd appreciate your prayers for energy and encouragement for the task of feeding. It can still be quite a struggle some days. I feel awkward even typing this, because we've prayed so hard for her to EAT, but there is so much energy and work required to teach her and help her and cajole her to eat, our 4 meals a day are still my most dreaded task. For more insight, you can hop over to my friend's blog for her recent post on this same subject. McCarthy Micro Preemie Blog: Continuing the Vomit plea post
All in all, we DO see that God is slowly healing Elizabeth. She is really thriving. Her language expands every day and she says the funniest things. She's decided to start learning to dress herself & tie her shoes, ("make a loop, pull it through....") and often helps me around the house with dusting, folding laundry and emptying the dishwasher. The other day, we did some cleaning in the morning, then had a rather hard afternoon. She needed lots of my attention and was whining quite a bit. At the end of the day though, while she played on her rug, she repeated to herself something I'd said hours earlier, "Elizabeth, you are a BLESSING!" I couldn't agree more.
Amazingly, Elizabeth's eating doesn't appear to be influenced at ALL by Ruby's recent move to solids. At least not yet. Elizabeth started eating again a week or two before Ruby started on rice cereal, and in the few times that I've managed to feed them at the same time, She's less interested in copying ruby and more interested in encouraging ME to feed Ruby more, saying, "Ruby's turn." I'm hopeful that we'll see more "corporate enjoyment", but we're taking it one day at a time.
I still feed her all of her food...she really dislikes feeding herself, though we can usually get her to give herself 2 or 3 bites during the course of a meal...with a limp spoon in a limp hand, food dribbling down her chin because she's not really trying to get it into her mouth. She's willing to try some finger foods though...pieces of cheese, egg, chicken, graham cracker, and she and I had a blissful time over a salad 2 nights ago. She ate a piece of cheese and tomato and enjoyed it!
As a result of her increased oral intake, Elizabeth's now vomits 2-3 times a day. All of it is in response to food. (still this is better than a volume related--or worse, unexplained--vomit) She's come so far in regards to her tolerance of textures, but sometimes it's just too much stimulation in her mouth and she can't stop from gagging and vomiting. We know this is just par for the course though...and as much as it frustrates and saddens us to watch her throw up all her food at some meals, she is amazingly resilliant and her willingness to keep eating is a real blessing.
We're regularly feeding her over 50% of her diet by mouth now...and usually can manage to feed her at least 1 meal a day entirely through her mouth. I'd appreciate your prayers for energy and encouragement for the task of feeding. It can still be quite a struggle some days. I feel awkward even typing this, because we've prayed so hard for her to EAT, but there is so much energy and work required to teach her and help her and cajole her to eat, our 4 meals a day are still my most dreaded task. For more insight, you can hop over to my friend's blog for her recent post on this same subject. McCarthy Micro Preemie Blog: Continuing the Vomit plea post
All in all, we DO see that God is slowly healing Elizabeth. She is really thriving. Her language expands every day and she says the funniest things. She's decided to start learning to dress herself & tie her shoes, ("make a loop, pull it through....") and often helps me around the house with dusting, folding laundry and emptying the dishwasher. The other day, we did some cleaning in the morning, then had a rather hard afternoon. She needed lots of my attention and was whining quite a bit. At the end of the day though, while she played on her rug, she repeated to herself something I'd said hours earlier, "Elizabeth, you are a BLESSING!" I couldn't agree more.
Friday, May 30, 2008
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
The Colorado Harms came to town
We were thrilled to host Matt's youngest brother and his wife this weekend. We had a great time showing them around town, despite the crazy thunder storms including tons of lightning and hail. We are SO thankful that they came to visit and can't wait to see them again soon. Phil and Darbi, we miss you already!
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
Good, Good Days
Sister Snuggle Time
Elizabeth helps Ruby with her "Tummy Time"
Row, Row, Row your boat
She's an Eating Machine!
Ruby loves the backyard swing
And like He did so long ago in Jericho
God just made the wall fall down
That is the perfect summation of how we feel: The wall fell down this week. Elizabeth is eating. Really eating. Eating purees, tolerating textures that have given her trouble in the past, allowing me to feed her a variety of foods and is mostly okay with it! Talk about miracles...It feels like this is the one we've been praying for.
I had a dream last Tuesday. In it, Elizabeth took a bite from a sandwich and ate it. I was amazed and kept waiting for her to throw up or gag at least. Instead, she opened her mouth and showed me how she could move her tongue to push the food from side to side, chew and swallow....amazing. I woke up feeling so good. I didn't realize it was a shadow of things to come. Tuesday afternoon, our Occupational Therapist, Mary, pushed Elizabeth a bit during lunch, and got her to explore some textures, which she handled better than she had last week. This gave me encouragement to try a few new things with her later in the week. Then Thursday at a particularly stressful ENT appointment, Elizabeth's G-Tube came out...completely out of her belly. It's a long story, but I actually had the fleeting thought, (before I replaced it with a new one) "well, maybe she just needs to learn how to eat!" It's about time.
In the last two days, she's eaten 4 out of 6 meals ENTIRELY by mouth...pureed bananas, carrots, applesauce, sweet potatoes, oatmeal, yogurt, avocado...I keep waiting to wake up! Thank you to those of you who have been praying faithfully that she would learn to eat. We'll be on to chewing before long!
As a result of the good news from Elizabeth's endoscopy, we'll be heading out to California in July. We'll spend some much needed time with family, get a little rest, visit our beloved church, ALCF, and hopefully see many of you! We're still in the planning stages, but hope to have a day &/or evening when we can be in one spot so folks can drop by for a visit. If you're in town, we'll keep you posted!
In other news, Ruby's growing like a weed. She'll be 6 months old on Sunday! She weighs close to 19lbs, has two teeth and is LOVING solid foods. The girls are interacting more & more. Elizabeth is a great big sister and a super helper around the house.
While Matt's parents were here two weekends ago, we were teaching Ruby one of our favorite songs, "Running over". As a result, Elizabeth has been singing it at the top of her lungs for days now. It's such a good reminder.
Our cups are full and running over indeed.
Elizabeth helps Ruby with her "Tummy Time"
Row, Row, Row your boat
She's an Eating Machine!
Ruby loves the backyard swing
And like He did so long ago in Jericho
God just made the wall fall down
That is the perfect summation of how we feel: The wall fell down this week. Elizabeth is eating. Really eating. Eating purees, tolerating textures that have given her trouble in the past, allowing me to feed her a variety of foods and is mostly okay with it! Talk about miracles...It feels like this is the one we've been praying for.
I had a dream last Tuesday. In it, Elizabeth took a bite from a sandwich and ate it. I was amazed and kept waiting for her to throw up or gag at least. Instead, she opened her mouth and showed me how she could move her tongue to push the food from side to side, chew and swallow....amazing. I woke up feeling so good. I didn't realize it was a shadow of things to come. Tuesday afternoon, our Occupational Therapist, Mary, pushed Elizabeth a bit during lunch, and got her to explore some textures, which she handled better than she had last week. This gave me encouragement to try a few new things with her later in the week. Then Thursday at a particularly stressful ENT appointment, Elizabeth's G-Tube came out...completely out of her belly. It's a long story, but I actually had the fleeting thought, (before I replaced it with a new one) "well, maybe she just needs to learn how to eat!" It's about time.
In the last two days, she's eaten 4 out of 6 meals ENTIRELY by mouth...pureed bananas, carrots, applesauce, sweet potatoes, oatmeal, yogurt, avocado...I keep waiting to wake up! Thank you to those of you who have been praying faithfully that she would learn to eat. We'll be on to chewing before long!
As a result of the good news from Elizabeth's endoscopy, we'll be heading out to California in July. We'll spend some much needed time with family, get a little rest, visit our beloved church, ALCF, and hopefully see many of you! We're still in the planning stages, but hope to have a day &/or evening when we can be in one spot so folks can drop by for a visit. If you're in town, we'll keep you posted!
In other news, Ruby's growing like a weed. She'll be 6 months old on Sunday! She weighs close to 19lbs, has two teeth and is LOVING solid foods. The girls are interacting more & more. Elizabeth is a great big sister and a super helper around the house.
While Matt's parents were here two weekends ago, we were teaching Ruby one of our favorite songs, "Running over". As a result, Elizabeth has been singing it at the top of her lungs for days now. It's such a good reminder.
Our cups are full and running over indeed.
Sunday, May 18, 2008
First Foods
Clearly Ruby likes eating.
When I slowed down, she tried to eat her bib, the chair and finally decided to try to feed herself!
When I slowed down, she tried to eat her bib, the chair and finally decided to try to feed herself!
Saturday, May 17, 2008
Sunday, May 11, 2008
Grandma & Grandpa came for a visit!
Grandma & Grandpa Harms are here to visit for Mother's Day and we're having a grand time. Yesterday, a trip to the Missouri Botanical Gardens provided more fun and more photo ops. The matching sweaters were lovingly knit by Mary Hughey, the sweet Aunt of our honorary "Auntie Abby." Thanks Aunt Mary!
Friday, May 2, 2008
Cousin Camp
This week, we've been thrilled to host our nieces Eiley & Taliah for "Cousin Camp." My sister, Svea came along too :) ...and it's been quite a ride! Here are some pics from the first 5 days. I'll keep adding photos to this album for the rest of the week. We'll be so sad to see them go on Sunday. It's been a little slice of heaven.
Welcome Grayson Paul Harms!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
