Judah's Arrival

A few days ago my sister, Kristin and her husband welcomed Judah Robert. He was 7 lbs 14oz and 20 inches long. My sister was in labor for 6 hours and 2 of those hours were spent at the hospital. She went from 5 to 10cm in 20 minutes and in 2 pushes he was here. He came so fast that she did it without an epidural.
Our family is especially excited because Judah and Ethan are 14 months apart. We can just imagine what it will be like in a year or two when the boys can play together.

Easter Fun

This year for Easter we headed up to Ken's parents house for dinner. Since Ethan's the only grandchild and he's still so little we didn't have an Easter Egg hunt this year. Maybe next year when he's walking and can hold his own basket.
Here's Ethan with his football Easter basket:

Ethan with his Uncle Tim:




We had a wonderful ham dinner. Ethan had fun trying to get into everything. He barked at the dogs and ate some dessert. He loves ice cream!
Earlier in the week my mom gave him the cutest stuffed bunnies for Easter. I don't have a picture but Ethan just loves to play with them.
We had a great Easter! We look forward to next year when we can watch Ethan hunt for eggs with his 4 cousins.

A trip to the Hagan Park

A few days ago Ken decided that he wanted to take Ethan to Hagan Park to feed the ducks and geese. He went last summer when he was about 6 months old. We had been saving heels of bread for the ducks since then.


Getting ready

I love this picture of the two of them.

Ethan with his bread. Thankfully he didn't try to eat it. He also didn't try to feed any ducks or geese which was a good thing since geese are mean.
We had a nice afternoon feeding them and looking at farm animals through a gate. We saw a donkey, sheep, goat, chickens, geese, and roosters. Ethan looked like he enjoyed it.
It was a very nice family outing and if it hadn't gotten cold I think we would have walked around longer. I know Ken wanted to stay longer.

Clinic Update

On April 6th, Ethan and I headed to our clinic appointment with Ken's mom, Grammy, as well. Ethan weighed 22 lbs 7oz, which was less than he had weighed at his 1 year appointment 6 weeks earlier. He was at 23 lbs 4 oz then. He had been sick for the last week, but a pound is a lot. In the pulmonology department they don't like him to go below the 50th percentile for ratio of weight to height. He fell just below because of the weight loss.
He had sputum test and everything came out normal. It even showed that something that he had been growing in his lungs had completely gone away. Must have been the antibiotics over Christmastime that did it.
We met with Ethan's dietician and she told us to start trying to fatten him up again. We were given a list of things to add to his food. For example, butter, jello, Nutella, mayonaise, etc. He has to gain back an entire pound and we're hoping he does it before the beginning of May when he has a weight check.
His pulmonologist put him on an antibiotic for 10 days because of his wet cough. His lungs were clear, his ears were clear, and there were no other problems.
We are set to go back into clinic in June maybe July if his weight goes up and he doesn't have any other problems.
Right now, we are in week 3 of sickness. He has had the same wet cough since March 31st. We are all ready to be done with the nebulizers that we're doing 3x a day, plus his vest and an albuterol puffer 3x a day as well. Ken and I try to just do what has to be done, but it's hard when it goes on and on. We know that eventually this will be an all the time reality. Most likely Ethan will be on more meds and nebulizers as he grows which will take up more time. I'm mad that we have to do them in the first place. Please just let the poor guy catch a break and we well again.
Throughout all of this we've been dealing with pink eye. Ethan got it on March 31st and a week later I caught it. He was treated and while on his antibiotic for his wet cough it went away. As soon as the antibiotics were done on Saturday it came back. So now he's on a much stronger eye drop. I'm ready for April to be over. Bring on May!

Sickness go away!

Ethan's sick with his 3rd cold for the season. We have been lucky that it's only been 3x since October. We always worry that a cold could turn into something worse, but also try to remain hopeful that it won't.

Right now, he has a wet cough, congestion and a runny nose. He's not drinking as much as he should and his eating is okay, but not great. I am more concerned than I was yesterday, but still trying to take it a day at a time. I need to make a call tomorrow to the pediatric pulmonary nurse to give her an update on him.

In the meantime, we have been told to do Hypersal 2x a day and Pulmozyme 1x a day through his nebulizer. We also are being told to do his vest 3-4x a day. It makes it difficult to do anything but just stay home, but we probably shouldn't go anywhere anyways. Ethan is grouchy and cries to held. Not typical of Ethan at all. He's usually fairly happy most of the time (unless you tell him no or take something away).

It's so sad to listen to him on the baby monitor coughing away and wincing right after. His throat must be hurting him. His voice is raspy.

Please God, let him get better.