I'm about to write that things have been relatively calm around here, a completely crazy thing to actually put in writing  but I know that things are about to get a little crazy with Audrey's birthday approaching and the end of the school year so I'm already jinxed!  I apologize for being such a blog slacker; once you stop for bit though it's hard to jump back in.  Especially for me and my inability to leave details out, my story-telling skills are minimal at best and when I have SO many to share, the task seems daunting to say the least!  I think I'll just ramble through what's been going on and if I wander off on a tangent, so be it!

I've had lots of new visitors lately as a few new friends have linked to me.  My hits tripled the day that Jenny mentioned me.  I know I've mentioned scotthousehold in here before  as Jenny's story played a few roles in ours--Stacy and I followed Jenny's site in starting in July 2004 and have been following ever since.  Jenny's strength and grace inspired me before I had a sick kiddo but of course really  hit home when I found out we did; in fact I emailed Jenny shortly after I started this blog to say thanks for sharing her story as it had given me such inspiration.  It was her too who brought Sugar Photography into our world.  Anyway, we met back in March and I immediately felt like I'd met an old friend.  We had another fabulous girls night out last week too.  Tracey, Amy, Debbie, Jen,  and of course Stacy, thanks for the fun!  I'm generally a subscriber to my husbands "org chart" theory--a quick summary is that you only have a finite number of spaces on your personal org chart for friends and that if you add someone than someone else falls off--but meeting these women makes me think that my org chart could actually expand!  I know y'all have missed Nate's quirky blog entries, he's totally been holding out too (he's written several but not published).  Hopefully he'll jump back in soon. Speaking of husbands, another new friend I met through Jen W, has the ultimate superstar husband EVER---read this!  I met Janet on our photo shoot but had been reading her blog for sometime and again felt like I had met an old friend; I love that. 

All that said, along with the increased hits, I've also seen several archive hits.  I'm not sure if that's the new folks checking the past out or if it's some of y'all going back to remember how far we've come.  I've been doing a little of that myself and must say going through Audrey's birth and first week was tough.  I was brought right back there and one of the overwhelming feelings I had was how glad I am that I didn't quite know all the medical stuff as well then.  I knew big picture but didn't know the machines, the drugs, or the terms like I do now.  I think if I did, I wouldn't have been so hopeful.  She was a sick, sick baby and that leads me to the beyond overwhelming gratitude I have for her medical team.  That first night Dr. R asked us 3 times (even asked us separately) if we were ready to stop because it just wasn't getting better.  Each time she would hesitate though as she'd think of something else to try and finally after recalculating a med dose we started to see hope.  The next days/nights were similar but I don't remember feeling completely unsure again until the night before surgery.   It also struck me  that so many details weren't on the blog due to time constraints and such but moreso the comments and updates in the comment section that I had never read were SO heartwarming, what a community y'all were.  Seriously, I can never express how much your support means to me.  I haven't been able to reread everything yet, I've only gotten through the 7th; I'm sure next week will find me a blubbering fool reminiscing about this past year!  I'm realizing too that I'm still really sad that Audrey never had a "newborn" stage.  That's a whole other thing though and I'm going to move on for now...

I still haven't shared Ethan's big 6th birthday.  We had our regular gang over for what was supposed to be a heated pool party (the weather didn't cooperate--30 degrees that morning!) so instead we hung inside and played guitar hero--I didn't try it until the next night,  I rock!  That night his best buddy and his favorite cousin spent the night.  Our first official sleep over!  I was more than hesitant about it (it was Nate's idea) but I was pleasantly surprised how fun it actually was--movie, dance party, light saber duals, pancakes in the morning--good fun!  I was exhausted the next day but it went smoothly and when your kiddo says "that was the best birthday ever" it was worth it! 

The radio ad--Audrey's laugh made it on the radio ad after all, for those of you in Dallas it will start running on Monday April 30 on the following stations:  KLTY, KLUV, KRLD, KSCS, KVIL, WBAP  I have it and would love to share it but haven't figured out how to post a MP3 file here (which means I haven't asked Nate yet).  It turned out well but trying to get Audrey to laugh on command was enough to put us in tears!  For those of you who haven't seen her, she has the funniest, most unconventional laugh ever--think woody woodpecker, not your sweet cherubic baby giggle--and the ad people thought it would make a memorable audio.  In true AJ form, she all but refused to laugh.  We tried everything and if you would have just seen her face, you would have totally thought she was cracking up; inside the booth, however, no sound just a laughing, huge smile!  I thought the ad exec who pitched it was going to strangle her!  We got enough that the magical audio guy was able to string it together but it's not her full-on real laugh.  Nate and I left there wondering why in the heck anyone would ever make their kiddos be actors/models, what a whippin!  I think we'd need a promise of a cure for CDH before we'd ever do such  things again.  It was a fun little adventure though and hopefully an avenue for CDH awareness.  Speaking of, superstar Lauren was on the front page of her hometown newspaper with a great article and stunning pics of her and sweet Avery.  She's doing presentations about CDH at high schools too---she's so amazing!  Let me know if you hear the radio ad, I'd love to hear reactions.

Goodness this has turned into a book so I'm going to close now but not without some shout outs....Happy Birthday to Landon Drake our new nephew who arrived safely and healthy on 4/24, we can't wait to meet you buddy!  Congratulations to Jana and family on the arrival of sweet Carson!  I can't even express how happy I am for them.  To my WAY preggo bizarro friend Suzi ,(aka Gunther) hang in there, RC will come on Tues, I have a good feeling the 1rst is his day (she's 40 weeks and SO ready)!!!  Finally, send some Audrey some super healthy thoughts, she has yet another cold/ear infection that has us on minimal breathing treatments, ear drops, etc.  It really isn't a big deal and she's doing great with it, but I would love for her to be in perfect shape for her big party next week! 

Talk soon!

Mary!!!!!!!!!!  How I left Miss Mary Hawkins off my original post is beyond me, she is the cutest, toughest 4 year-old I know--she is one of the elite few who can actually tell Jason what to do and he listens!! 

 

and of course, Baby Sofia!!!!  One year old!  You and your mommy are two tough, sweet cookies and I'm proud to know you, hope your day was happy! 

 

I have LOTS to update about E's big party and fun pictures too but it will have to wait; suffice to say fun was had by all despite the weather ruining the swimming part and Ethan had "the best birthday EVER"! 

I also finally have Easter pics to post.  If I'm still awake after Lost, I'll get back on but I wanted to quickly get birthday greetings out to the girls before the day was over--it's been a long one!!

 

 

Monday was Penny's.  We miss her SO much.  She was always the best person to share our super crazy times with as she would always say something like, "well, we wouldn't want it too boring, would we?" (this summer we'd always laugh when I said I would rather boring right now and she'd agree!) or, my favorite in regards to Jason or Ethan being punks, "you want them to have their own personality".  I just want to talk to her again; Happy Birthday Penny!

 

Tuesday was Miss Caroline's, our youngest neice--Happy 2nd Sweet Girl, we can't wait to see you this weekend.  Sunday will be Ethan's and Nicole's (Nate's sister); big party here on Saturday!  I can't believe my baby will be SIX, craziness!!! 

Two new ones will be added soon too--a new nephew, Landon, should arrive late next week and my buddy Gunther should have Bubba soon there after (Suz, if you don't name that kiddo soon, I swear I will call him Bubba his whole life!).  One of Ethan's first friend's ever, Tyler turns 6 the day after E (16th), Birthday wishes to him!  Audrey's buddy, Sofia will turn one next week--yay Sofie!!!!  Also, I'm not 100%, but I think my old buddy Krista's birthday was the 8th--Happy Birthday Krista and THANK YOU for helping my causes, your donations mean SO much to me!  I even updated my Autism page, please consider donating, just $5 will make a difference!!!

 

OK, so I still haven't shared any of the goods teased last time and it's nearly midnight, yikes!  I'll answer the questions I keep getting--Ethan went to Acute Kids for a chin laceration he got from falling off his bike--he's totally fine, just "got glued" as he says (derma-bond, no stitches) but a ER visit nonetheless and Audrey had an upper GI with small bowel follow through yesterday as her GI doc was starting think she may have a minor partial bowel obstruction.  She doesn't, still just VERY poor motility (food moves slowly through her small intestine)--think yucky bloated feeling and imagine feeling that a lot--it's no wonder she doesn't eat!  We've always known she has poor motility but it seems to be more exaggerated when she's sick--cold, virus, teething (yep she has 4 coming at once, 3 have popped through!!) We're going to try Reglan again but hopefully when she's feeling better she'll get back to tolerating feeds and maybe even oral stuff again too; it's so sad to see how quickly she can lose weight, and her oral desire.  A WONDERFUL moment happened while there though--the doc was interested by Audrey's history and so moved the camera to her chest before we started and her lungs looked SO much better than they did the last time I saw an X-ray (Dec) that it moved me to tears and word loss--imagine that??!  The doc was so sweet  that she started to tear up too.  I can't wait until the day when I can look at an x-ray and not be able tell anything was ever wrong, those will be some serious tears!!! 

 

Alrighty, I'm zonked.  One last thing...my dear super photographer friend, Jennifer, whom y'all have raved about for Audrey's pics, is up for a blog award that's based on votes.  You have to register, but I'd so appreciate your effort in doing this; she's done SO much for us!  Go to her site for the link and consider voting for the HFC blog (an organization I LOVE) and one of my favorite transplant Texan's blog too.  (Y'all are going to kill me for getting you addicted to new blogs, but you'll see you won't be able to stay away!!)

 

Talk soon!