Wednesday Weekly Recap

Things are much better around here. Jordan is not coughing anymore and is pretty much back to his normal self. Kylie isn't sick anymore and is being the cutest girl ever. Scott is as busy as ever and I'm trying to fill my days as well.

In 2014, I made goals every month in certain areas to accomplish. I did these goals throughout the whole year and it was amazing for me. It helped me think about things that needed to get done and also helped me focus time and energy on my family. 2014 was a great year with a lot of fun activities and I know that making goals helped. I didn't do any goals last year as pregnancy just wears me down. The years I'm pregnant, I can expect not much to happen as I just get too exhausted and overwhelmed. Since I am not pregnant this year, I am happily starting my goals back up again! I am so excited to be doing these again and it has gone well so far. Some of the areas are the same as last year (house project, date night, monthly friend get together, updating baby book), but there are some new ones that I'm implementing as well. The other ones are more habits that I want to form and once I feel comfortable with them, then I'll add a new one. Right now, I'm working on doing the dishes, making Scott's lunch, writing out the menu for the next day and picking up the living room before bed. I've been horrible at dishes and I want to make more of an effort to keep the kitchen clean often. I won't worry much about dishes during the day, but I will make sure they are done each night. So far, I've been at it for 2 1/2 weeks! It's really making me feel better knowing that things are cleaned up before bed.

I think the next habit I'll work on is laundry. I'm horrible at folding and putting the laundry away. I want to be more proficient at folding and putting away more quickly. I am getting a little tired of seeing laundry all over the floor and not finding things to wear because I haven't put them away. I'll update soon on how that is going.

I'm also trying to dedicate more time to doing activities with Kylie. I will do a new art/craft, a play date and an activity out of the house at least once a week. I haven't done many activities out of the house since Jordan got sick. I'll start those up in February. Anyway, I'm just really excited to be doing these goals again.

Scott is going to be super busy here now. He started up clinicals on Monday and so the only day of the week he'll have off will be Sunday. It's going to be a little tricky for him to figure out how to handle clinicals, work, school, family and church callings (he's in the primary). I pray that he can figure it all out.

 I can't believe that February is coming up! I need to get working on my goals for next month. Here are some pictures of Kylie helping me vacuum one day (another goal is to have Kylie do some "chores", like help switch laundry, help vacuum, help with the dishwasher, etc.) and of grandma Becky and Jordan.

Testing out Jordan's swing. She's also starting to sit in his bumbo.

Jordan's 3-months!

Jordan turned 3-months on January 2nd. It was so sad that he ended up in the hospital that day. This kid is growing up too fast! Soon, he'll start crawling, then walking, then talking...oh man, I can't even think about that right now. I'm already missing him being a brand new baby, but I think the smiles and coos make up for it.

Some things about Jordan:

• He loves to talk. He lost his voice from RSV, but now that he's getting it back, we're hearing him talk again. I just love having conversations with him.
• He gives the biggest smiles and I can't be mad at him for being up in the middle of the night when he gives me those.
• He loves having his hands by his face and likes to chew on them as well. It is really hard to swaddle him because his hands come straight out. 
• He's starting to grab onto things and hold on. It surprises me when he grabs onto my finger and won't let go.
• He's starting to sleep through the night now. Of course, he won't go to bed until midnight, but that's beside the point. He wake up once or twice by coughing, but I think once this cough is done, we can stick him in his crib!
• Scott and I have heard him giggle once. We keep trying to get him to do it again, but have not had any luck. It was the cutest giggle though.
• Since we had to go to the doctor for a follow-up from the hospital, I have some stats. Height: 24.6 inches 58%. Weight: 13 lbs 39%.

Jordan's First Hospital Stay

On Friday night, we noticed Jordan breathing hard, coughing a lot and having a higher temperature. We debated taking him in and even had my mom come over to watch Kylie. Once my mom showed up we ended up not taking him in, thinking that he was doing okay. I stayed up all night with him and got about 1 hour of sleep. I handed Jordan off to Scott at 7:30am and got about 5 hours of sleep. After breakfast, we decided that we should take him in, especially after having such a restless night. My mom came over again to watch Kylie and we headed to the instacare, since the doctor isn't open on Saturday (January 2nd). While there, Jordan had a fever of 102 degrees and his oxygen was in the low 80's. The doctor there was very concerned for his oxygen levels and fever, so she called for an ambulance, even though we asked to drive ourselves. I rode with Jordan up to Primary Children's Hospital while Scott went home to tell my mom and pack a bag. It was very strange riding in an ambulance for the first time with my 3-month old son. I never want to repeat that experience again. While waiting for the doctor at the hospital, Dean and Lane showed up to give Jordan a blessing and during the blessing, I got this feeling of peace that everything was going to be okay and that Heavenly Father was watching out for him. After the doctor saw him, we waited a bit to be transferred to a room for the night. Jordan got put on a high flow of oxygen to help support him breathing. Poor guy hadn't eaten in a while (I fed him while waiting for the doctor, but I didn't have much and couldn't breastfeed him while there) and once he got put on the high flow of oxygen, he couldn't eat at all! Scott asked every question he could to see when he could eat again and it looked like Jordan wouldn't be able to eat all night. He would cry often because he was hungry and then cough, which led to poor breathing. We just felt so bad for him. Kyle and Brianna (who came into town for his blessing, which of course was canceled) stopped by with some food, which was very nice. That night was just about the same as the night before and I was just grateful that I had gotten some sleep that morning.

It was so bumpy during the ambulance ride.

With grandpa Fletcher

Don't worry, daddy's here.

Jordan was diagnosed with RSV, coronavirus, and bronchialitis. His chest would concave pretty deep when he was breathing when we first arrived to the hospital. Since he didn't improve through the night, we transferred to the pediatric ICU around 7am. The ICU doesn't have individual rooms and just curtains between patients. I'm glad that we spent the time before in a more comfortable room. They had to give him some extra support to help him breathe while there. Luckily, they allowed him to have a feeding tube (after much prodding from Scott) and Jordan was so much happier with food, that he was able to get some good rest. We could also see how much better he was breathing since being in the PICU. Since we hadn't seen Kylie since Saturday afternoon, I wanted to head to my grandma's and see how she was doing. I texted Becky (she also came into town for the blessing) and asked her to come to the hospital to help keep Scott company while I was away. I headed back home to take a shower and I was supposed to take a nap, but I wanted to spend as much time with Kylie as possible before heading back to the hospital. I packed a few other things and headed over. I ate some dinner with everyone and it was nice to see Kylie and have a break from the hospital, although I did feel a little guilty for not being with Jordan. While away, Scott was telling me the good news about Jordan. His level of high flow was a 10 and we couldn't leave the hospital until it was down to .5. We also couldn't leave the PICU until his flow got to a 6. Once he got moved down to an 8, he had to be on that for at least 8 hours before looking to be moved down again. Well, he was doing so well that they moved him down to a 6 early! So, we got the good news that we were done with the ICU and leaving to another floor that night. The extra support really helped him as well as being able to eat. He was able to sleep pretty much all day.

In the PICU

Making popcorn with grandma!

After dinner, I headed out with Kylie to the hospital. We sent Kylie with Becky to Brita's house to stay the night. Scott also had a wonderful co-worker come and bring him some dinner. We moved to another room a few hours later and had a much better night. Jordan was still having coughing fits, but they were shorter than before. He was still on the feeding tube and just getting some good sleep. If you looked at his chest, you would hardly be able to tell that he was having trouble breathing. It's said that day 5 of RSV is the worst and then it just gets better. It's more of a bell curve than a roller coaster. It's nice to know that there's a low chance of Jordan getting RSV again.

On Monday, the 4th, we worked on getting Jordan to eat well without a feeding tube and breathe okay without help. The oxygen level lessened quite a bit throughout the day. By the end of the day, he was at .12. There were times that he would rub the tube out of his nose and we would leave it out to see how he did without it. Sometimes he would need it back in pretty quickly, so he wasn't quite ready to be without it. Jordan didn't eat the best with a bottle, so we ended up putting most of it back into the feeding tube. The poor guy was just so exhausted. Jordan was still having plenty of coughing fits, which he'll probably have for a week or two after. Scott left that evening to go see Kylie and my mom came by with some dinner. It was nice to have some company. I discovered the movie channels on the TV, which provided some nice entertainment as spending all day in a hospital room can get a little boring.

Coming up from the PICU.

Tuesday, the 5th, was a better day. I had a hard time waking up that morning so Scott was great and let me go back to sleep after trying to feed Jordan. He wasn't interested and I kept falling back asleep while holding him. When I woke up later, Scott had talked to the doctors already. They mentioned that we would most likely be leaving later in the day. Jordan was off oxygen altogether and was unhooked of his IV and feeding tube. It became so much easier to pick him up without worry of tangling cords. It also meant that he was doing so good that they didn't need to monitor as closely. It was so exciting to hear that we would be leaving and I was really looking forward to it. I tried to breastfeed Jordan and he only latched for about 5 minutes, but it was great that he even latched! After that, we tried a bottle, but he was not interested and kept spitting it out. He also had a really long coughing fit. It got frustrating as we just wanted him to eat and feel better. Every time we tried to get him to eat, he could care less. It made it to where by 4pm, he had only eaten what he got when he breastfed twice for 5 minutes. The doctor came back and said that they wanted to be sure that his urine output was okay, so there was no risk of dehydration. It made sense as we didn't want to come back to the hospital, but it also meant that we would be spending one more night. I was disappointed as I was so ready to leave, but then I couldn't. Scott left around 5 to go get Kylie and head back home to spend the night with her. Before he left, an old mission companion stopped by, which was really sweet. It was someone Scott hadn't seen for a while and he was just really appreciative of the gesture. While he was gone, I was able to get Jordan to eat 1 ounce from a bottle. After I grabbed some dinner, I breastfed him for 5 minutes and got him to drink almost another ounce. It was a little strange to be by myself in the hospital, but it was nice to not have to share the tiny "bed" in the room.

Yay, he's eating!

Cuddle time.

Things are so much better without all those tubes.

Wednesday, the 6th, we were told that we were leaving for sure. Scott arrived at the hospital around 10:30-11:00am while his mom watched Kylie. We waited a couple hours for discharge papers, but once we got them, we were out of there. We arrived home to cookies and a happy Kylie. Scott went out grocery shopping with his mom and we spent the rest of the day relaxing.

Ready to leave!

Cookies of love.

We've been recharging ever since. It's been almost two weeks and I think we're all finally on the mend (Scott got a pretty bad cold while in the hospital and I got a small sniffle and cough). I'm so glad that things are going back to normal. This was definitely an interesting way to start out the new year and one I don't want to have happen again. We're also saying that if we have any more babies, that they will not be born in the winter time. We don't want any more risk of a baby ending up in the hospital again. We are thankful for all the thoughts and prayers from everyone. We are especially grateful for our family and their help with Kylie during this time. Even though we weren't able to bless Jordan, it was a blessing that family was in town to help out. I am grateful that Scott and I were able to lean on each other during this stressful, scary and hard time. In the end, all that matters is that Jordan is and will be okay.

Christmas

Christmas was fun this year. Kylie is starting to understand what Christmas is and all that it entails. She still doesn't fully understand the excitement of gifts, but she loved unwrapping them. Kylie and Jordan got so many fun things from family. I surprised Scott and made a calendar with pictures of us. Scott wanted to get me a photo book of my blog, but he couldn't really put it together himself and so we're making it a Christmas/birthday gift. I already have one book done, from 2011 and I can't wait to start working on the next year. I love the idea of having these photo books for Kylie and others to look at pictures. Pictures are very digital now, but I think it is still good to have pictures printed and photo books are a great way to do so.

We did find that it was a little difficult to try to share Christmas with both families in the same state now. You have to figure out if one side gets Christmas Eve or Christmas day or you can decide to share the days with both families. We decided to do Christmas Eve with my family and Christmas day with Scott's. It feels like it might work better that way, but who knows, we could always change our mind next year.

We had a yummy dinner at my grandma's and then we did a small program of reading the scriptures and playing Christmas songs with bells. Since we weren't seeing my mom on Christmas day, we opened presents from her. Kylie got this fun rocking cow that she loved. We had dessert, played games and then headed home.

 

Christmas morning started later, around 9:00. We had a cherry roll for breakfast, thanks to my mom. After that we opened our stockings and presents. Like I said, Kylie sure enjoyed unwrapping the gifts, but she had a hard time giving her full attention to each gift. She would enjoy some more than others or once she saw one gift, she didn't care to open any more. After opening gifts, we headed to Scott's parents house. Steve was there with his kids and then Brita and her family showed up later in the afternoon. We all just hung out and played games the whole day. Even though it can be tricky making sure that the holidays are split fairly, we sure enjoy living by so much family.

I couldn't get the pictures of us to not be blurry.

Wearing her apron!

The apron I made Kylie.