St. Patrick's Day

Here are a few pictures of Hailey in her St. Patrick's Day dress. Thanks for buying her the dress, Zelda.

She is doing wonderful. She has slept through the night for the past two weeks. We put her to bed around 7 or 7:30 and she sleeps until 5:15, when we wake her up. I know, we are very very lucky. She just got over her first cold and she was a trooper.

Also, she got weighed today and she is now 14 lbs 9 oz. Growing, Growing, Growing...

Hailey's 2 month check up

I have been a little slack updating the blog. My plan is to update the blog once a week with pictures and/or information.

So, Hailey had her 2 month check up last Thursday. Paul and I took her to the appt. When we got there, they weighed her and she was 13 lbs 14 ounces. Whew, do we have a big baby. The nurse and the doctor said not to worry but if you know me, you know I worry. Dr. Erwin came in and checked Hailey out. She gave her a clean bill of health. Then the nurse came in to give Hailey her first round of shots. She had to get three shots. It was heart wrenching, knowing that my little girl was going to be in pain. Paul had to leave the room because he does not do well with needles. I asked the nurse if there was anything that I could do and she said just be ready to pick her up. So I was.... The nurse gave her the first shot and she instantly started screaming, she gave her the other one in the same leg and then switched to the other leg for the last one. As soon as it was over, I grabbed her and held her until she calmed down, a little. I wanted to cry myself but I held it together.

She has to go back again for a 4 month check up, at which time she will get another round of shots.

Heart Doctor

Well yesterday was a long and busy day. We had an appt at East Carolina Heart Institute for Hailey. The appt was at 1:45 and they tell you to arrive 20 minutes early but of course I was 30 minutes early. So we got there at about 1:15 and did not walk out the door until 3:45. When we got there we were in the waiting room with so many other children, since it was the pediatric department. You couldn't help but feel bad for so many of them knowing that they had heart problems. We sat and waited to be called. When we were finally called back, the nice nurse ran an EKG on Hailey, well a few EKG's on Hailey. Who knew it was so hard to run one on an infant. She had little sticky pads all over her, one on each of her arms and legs and then five on her chest. Every time she moved around a little, the stickers would come off. Paul, the nurse and I tried to keep her as occupied as possible so she would stay somewhat still. She did great. After the EKG, she had to go for a sonogram. She did fairly well during that test but got a little fussy at the end because she was tired and needed a nap.

So after the tests, the doctor came in to see us with the news. The news was both good and bad. The bad news is that Hailey has a small hole (about 1mm) between her right ventricle and left ventricle. The good news is that the hole is in the muscle and should close as the muscle grows. If it doesn't ever close, that is ok because there is really no risks associated. She could do everything in life that she wanted to do and most people would never know that she has the small hole. The doctor said the only time someone would have to know was when she had a "dirty procedure" (doctors terms not mine) like having a baby. She would then have to be given some antibiotics so that no bacteria got inside the hole. The doctor informed us that she would like to see Hailey every year to monitor the hole and see if it is closing.

Thank you all for keeping Hailey in your thoughts. Tomorrow (Thursday. March 5th) she has her 8 week check up where she will receive her 2 month shots. Stay tuned for that post....

On another note, along with bringing Hailey to the heart doctor yesterday....we sold our house. So we are closing on this house April 16th (45 days). We do not exactly know where we are going to be. We made an offer on a short sale house this afternoon, so we are waiting to hear back. For those of you not familiar with a short sale, it is a house that is for sale but getting ready to go to foreclosure. So it may take a little longer to hear back from them. Stay tuned for more information on that as well.

Back to work....

Well Monday is the BIG day...I have to go back to work. Yes, it has been 8 weeks. It is going to be a VERY hard day but I know that she will be in good hands. The day care that she is going to is only about a 1/2 mile from my office and the women who work there have been there for years. Also Paul is going to drop her off (to make it easier on me) and I am going to pick her up.

The crazy part is that they are calling for snow here Sunday into Monday, so I might not be at work after all. If the daycare is closed, I will be working at home. The good thing is that I have my lap top at home and all I will be doing for the next two months is checking emails anyway. (LOL) Who knows how many I have after being out of the office for 8 weeks.

Next week is also a BIG week for Hailey. She starts day care on Monday, goes to the heart doctor on Tuesday and her 8 week check up on Thursday. Stay tuned for updated on both doctors appointments.

FIRST ECU event...Go Pirates

Hailey attended her first ECU event. Jamie and Brian came to visit Valentine's Day weekend and Brian wanted to go see ECU play basketball while he was here. They had a game on Valentine's Day at 7pm, so we dressed Hailey in her ECU outfit and headed to the game. She did great. She was awake the whole first half, in her carrier that Paul had strapped on him. Below is a picture so that you can picture Paul walking around with this on.



At half time, I took her out of the carrier and she fell asleep, so I held her the whole second half (plus overtime) while she slept. I could not believe that she slept the whole time because naturally it is loud at a basketball game but it was extra loud because we went into overtime. ECU basketball is not that great so the fact that we were tied, went into overtime and then won the game was very exciting.

Below is a picture of all of us at the game and a picture of Hailey in her ECU outfit.

Hailey and Sydney

Our friends, Kim and Tim had a beautiful little girl, Sydney, on December 10th, 2008. They live about 2.5 hours from us, so this past weekend was the first time we have gotten together since having our new additions. We wanted to get the girls side-by-side to see how close in size they were. As you can imagine, it was nearly impossible to have the girls "stretched out" at the same time, so this was the best that we could do.



We were guessing that they look pretty close in size and we were right. Sydney and Hailey both had their check ups yesterday and the weigh about the same. Hailey weighs 11 lbs 15 ounces and Sydney weighs 11 lbs 14 ounces. The only thing is Hailey is 4 weeks younger than Sydney. As you can see from the pictures below, Sydney's size is not hurting her because she is beating up on her new friend, Hailey. It was too cute.

I decided that I was going to buy the girls matching dresses so that we could have a little photo shoot. You can definitely tell the girls apart, Hailey has dark hair and Sydney has blonde hair. Here are a few of the pictures.

4 week check up

Hailey had her 4 week check up with Dr. Phillips on Wednesday, February 11, 2009. She is definitely healthy ....she weighed 11 lbs 15 ounces. Remember, she was 9 lbs when she was born only 4 weeks and 6 days ago. Dr. Phillips said that she was in the 87 percentile, which means that out of 100 newborns she weighs more than 87 of them. There is really nothing to worry about as far as her weight is concerned, she is just a great eater. He said that as long as she is not excessively spitting up then she needs to eat that much. To be honest, she doesn't really spit up at all.

She was so good while we were there. When he started to check her out she was sleeping on the table. He thought that he heard a heart murmur but then she woke up and he had a hard time hearing it. He informed me that most heart murmurs are innocent but to be on the safe side, he was going to refer her to a cardiologist. Ofcourse, when I got home I started to read up on heart murmurs, so for those of you not sure what it is, here is a little information:

Heart Murmur Causes
Most heart murmurs are innocent: They are caused by blood flowing through healthy valves in a healthy heart and do not require treatment. However, heart murmurs can be caused by blood flowing through a damaged or overworked heart valve. Heart valve defects may be present at birth or heart valve disease may result from other illnesses, such as rheumatic fever, heart disease, heart attacks, or infective endocarditis.

She has an appt on March 3rd at 1:45 pm with the cardiologist. Lets hope that if she actually has a heart murmur that it is the innocent kind and that nothing is wrong. Keep Hailey in your thoughts...

Other than the possible heart murmur, Hailey got a clean bill of health. She has to go back for her 8 week appt, at which time she will get her shots. That appt is scheduled for March 5th.