12/25 - Merry Christmas!

Well. We are in FL safely. It was a long drive (16 hrs) but it went pretty smoothly. We severely underestimated how much Aiden would sleep so we are going to have to re-think our drive home strategy. Aiden slept for only about 6 hrs total (we drove from 2:30pm to 6am). The picture above was taken the day the day before we left. We sat Eli in Aiden's chair to pose for some pictures. Eli is actually staring at the tv though.

I like the picture above. I've got some cute ones of Brad and Aiden wrestling but I need to rotate them on my computer and then post them.

After we got to FL, we unpacked the van and took the kids and my mom over to my dad's house. My mom and dad watched the boys for a few hours while Brad and I slept!! That was great. After Aiden woke up from his nap, we took him to the Firestation that my dad works at. Aiden had fun with all the trucks.

Yesterday afternoon, we walked down the park in my mom's condos and let Aiden burn some energy. He had fun but wasn't used to the higher temperature. His little cheeks turned red.

Last night we went to my Aunt Becky's house and waited for Santa to come. We dressed the boys up for church so they were looking pretty spiffy. Aiden wasn't as scared of Santa last night like he was a few weeks ago.

Aiden got to see everyone go up to Santa as he called their names so he didn't mind going to get his present either. As you can see from the picture below, he was pretty excited about his gift.

Aiden got a Hess car which this year, is a race car!! He LOVES it. It has another race car inside the hood of the big one. The big ones has button that makes lights flash and noise go off. It's like his Hess truck which he loves so much. He wouldn't let anyone play with his new cars and the only way he would take a picture with Santa is with his cars.

We got up today and Aiden saw his cars from last night and wanted to play with them. We went to the park for a few minutes this morning but didn't stay too long because everything was wet from raining this morning. By 11am, we were at my dad's house and stayed there all day to celebrate Christmas with other family.

The picture below is Aiden opening his stocking. He loves the matchbox cars that were in there.

Aiden definitely got the hang of opening presents and liked it. Next year should be even more fun than this year although this year was so fun to watch him open something and become so obsessed with it. Eli was held a lot which was good because otherwise he cries. I can't wait until he stops being so needy. The picture below was a miracle. Below are my sister and I and our boys along with Billi, our neice.

Overall, today was a great day and it's been so good to see family for Aiden to play with his grandma and papa (who he hasn't seen in a year). It's makes me so excited to move back to Fl. He also got to see his cousins for a little bit which was fun. We are hoping to see them again later. Tomorrow I will be seeing some old gymnastics friends for the first time in about 10-12 years. Eli has a really bad rash/yeast infection from me eating a few cookies that had butter in them. Apparently he really is lactose intolerant!! Won't try that again. Merry Christmas to all.

12/20 - Snow storm '09

So we've had a bad snow storm over the weekend and have been stuck inside. We got released from the hospital late Friday night and Eli and I drove home in the snow that had just started. By the time we got his prescriptions and came home, it was snowing pretty good. We missed Eli's 12 week picture last week so we took at 13 week picture this week. Below is Aiden with the white card and Eli with the yellow index card (yes Eli is fatter but it's also a closer picture).

Eli is doing pretty good. He gets breathing treatments a couple times a day and in the picture below, you can see Aiden is trying to help. What a good big brother.
Eli likes his breathing treatments and sometimes tries to eat the tube. Babies don't do well with masks when the treatment takes 10 min so they give him an adult dose and just let him breathe it in. It works pretty well and his oxygen saturation goes up very fast with them.

Since we were snowed in on Saturday, Aiden decided to dress up in his Superman costume. He put a bunch of Halloween stickers on his outfit and Brad put his mittens on him. In the picture below, he was giving me a high five!
We got bored so we let Aiden open a Christmas present from his Godparents (Arin and Mike). They got him a cool Elmo Jack-in-box. He likes it but hasn't figured out he has to keep turning the handle until the music is done for Elmo to pop out!
Here are some pictures of the snow. The picture below is of our porch which Aiden loves to play on. As you can see, his picnic table is covered and his dumptruck is barely noticable.
This is our house without the couple of inches we got at night.
Aiden wasn't sure what to think of the snow. He doesn't match because he doesn't have snow pants so I just layered clothes on him. The snow was up to past his kness and to his thighs!
We went for a walk and like hearing the snow crunch under his shoes.
Below is a video Aiden trying to tear off icicles and give them to me. He had fun and we'll probably go out in it again tomorrow.

We took some cute pictures today but I'll post them tomorrow night. Both of the boys go to the doctor tomorrow so we'll see how they are doing. I need to finish grading my on-line assignments so I can submit grades before we leave on Tuesday afternoon.

wrong video

Just a new video, the veggie one I was supposed to load last time.

Amy is in the hospital with Eli and I miss her

So this whole week Amy and I are finding out what it is like to be single parents. Unfortunately, we each have a child and are trying to manage as best we can. I have taken two videos of Aiden that I wanted to share with Amy of how cute Aiden has been. Sorry for the short post, but I want her to see these. The first one is from Aiden the other night at dinner since Amy didn't believe that Aiden actually ate real live vegetables and not the puree stuff he normally eats. Very cute. The second one is of tonight when we opened the package from Grandma and Grandpa Hoyt with some presents for the kids and him figuring out where they go. I love you sweetie and enjoy!

12/17 - Still in hospital

We are still in the hospital but I want to talk about something other than Eli still be here right now so I'm gonna talk about cute little Aiden. The picture below is from the Christmas party at Brad's work that we went to. As you can see, Aiden is crying his eyes out on Santa's lap....there is always next year. When he figures that Santa brings him a present, he'll like him eventually. He LOVED the present this Santa gave him (Thomas the train bath toys).

Last week, before Aiden got really sick, I met my friend Cindy at Chick-fil-a and we had lunch. This was the first time I let Aiden go in the play area. He had fun even though there was just this circle thing that he could climb in and out of.
The picture below shows how miserable my little man was as I took him to the doctor office last Wednesday. He could barely breathe (hence the open mouth) and was so tired. He is feeling much better now!
I got to take Aiden home the other night while Brad stayed with Eli for a few hours. The Hunters gave Aiden and Eli a Christmas present and below is Aiden trying to take his present. He was so cute and excited. He wanted to open it so bad. I think Christmas will be fun this year ... even if we wrapped up the toys he already has! haha
Aiden has been shipped around to various places this week but we are so grateful for our church friends who have helped us out during this difficult period. We really thought Eli was going home yesterday but ... we are still here at the hospital. He hasn't been eating and his oxygen was dropping quite a bit at night. His coughing and sneezing are SO much better and he is not wheezing anymore (that much). He still gets breathing treatments every 4 hours and they brought us a nebulizer yesterday that we will use once we leave here. I'm pretty confident we are going to be able to go home today.
The above picture was when they had a "no-no" on Eli's hand to protect his IV. They don't make them small enough so that didn't work out. They eventually just but Coban on it so he can't bend it and ruin the IV. Brad took the picture below while I was with Aiden the other day. He's actually being alert now and looks like he's feeling so much better.
His sleeping is all messed up now and he thinks 2am-10am is his night time right now. I'm not enjoying that right now and that will have to change soon. He's sleeping as I type this. I'm gonna have to wake him up so he doesn't keep us up all night. Eli has lost some weight being here but he's a chunky monkey so I'm not worried about it.

The picture above is Eli being fascinated with the O2 and heart rate machine that constantly goes off because he starting crying and his heart rate goes off the charts or he stops breathing for a few seconds and that makes the machine go off. Thankfully I know where the 'silence' button is at!!

Hopefully the next post will be from home with pictures from our real camera and not my camera phone. Christmas cards will be very late this year ... they are sitting on the table and most of them are actually done!

12/14 - Eli in hospital again

I'm just writing this quick blog to say Eli is in the hospital again. Aiden started getting sick last week and I took him to the doctor on Wednesday. They said he had a viral infection and a bacterial ear infection. Eli started getting sick on Friday with the sniffles. We didn't think much of it but then he started to cough and it didn't seem like a normal cold. By Saturday, everyone was sick!! Sunday morning Brad went to church with Aiden so he could work in the nursery (it was our week but Eli was way to sick to take and I was feeling pretty yucky too). I have the World's Best Husband. Anyway, I talked with Eli's doctor on Sunday morning and by late morning he had a fever that was pretty high.

When we finally got called back to get his vitals taken (a 45 min wait), he had a temp of 102.9. They rushed him back and he was seen almost immediately. They ordered a bunch of lab tests and the first test they did came back positive...RSV. He has a pretty bad cough. They have also diagnosed him with some type of bronchitis type thing. He gets breathing treatments every 4 hours and tylenol for his fever. He's also not eating so after 12 (yes, TWELVE) pricks, they finally got an IV in. He had one but they took it out when they were going to discharge him late yesterday but then the doctor changed his mind but the nurse already took it out. He was so dehydrated after a few hours that it was even harder to get an IV because all his veins were tiny. He's such a little trouper.

I'm hoping they will let us go tomorrow (Tuesday). It will be completely dependent, as of right now, on whether he will eat when the IV stops. We can do the breathing treatments at home and the coughing stinks but his oxygen levels are still pretty good. Please pray for him and the whole family. Brad is having to take care of Aiden and Brad is getting sicker everyday. I'm already pretty sick and not getting any sleep with people coming in every hour or so for vitals, breathing treatments, etc.

12/3 - Family Photos

Let's a do a little comparison to begin. The picture with the white index card is Aiden. The yellow is Eli. It's hard to compare since Eli is such a chunky monkey. I still cannot believe that child eats with such long bouts in between and is that huge. He was in premie for a month, newborn for a month, and has been in 0-3 months for two weeks and is almost grown out of those clothes!! We just bought a case of Size 1/2 diapers and I hope we can use them all. It looks like he needs size 2. Aiden was in the in-between size for almost a month!

Not much has happened in the past few days. We let Aiden have a Christmas present early that Aunt Pat sent him. We couldn't hide in the garage anymore! He was surprised by it and wasn't sure what to think of it. The video below is him seeing it for the first time.
Aiden had his 18 month check up today. He's doing great. He weighed 26. 2 lbs (50th percentile) and was 33.75in (>75th percentile). The picture below is Aiden in his new family pictures and Christmas church outfit. Doesn't he look handsome?
After we took at Target, we used some free time and Aiden decided to mop the floors. Can't wait till he does this for real!
We went to a Hail and Farewell tonight and I snapped a few pictures of my own before we got the boys undressed. I think they turned out cute. Aiden won't put his hands around Eli yet but he'll let him sit on his lap now. We are making progress.

We got our Christmas tree yesterday and will decorate it tomorrow. We are also going to a squadron Christmas party tomorrow and then we'll be having fun watching the UF vs. Alabama game.