I Love You More...

At bedtime right before I leave Isabelle's room she blows me a kiss and says she loves me and I do the same back and close the door.

The other night when leaving her room I blew her a kiss and said, "I love you more than words!" She responded without hesitating, "I love you more than breakfast!"

So cute!

Making Faces....

Tonight we brought a blanket out in our backyard and enjoyed the nice weather, Calista enjoyed laying outside and looking around and Isabelle provided the entertainment. She is so expressive and uses her hands and facial expressions to tell us stories. She totally cracks us up, so I couldn't pass up the opportunity to capture these faces on film. I am glad I did, because I never want to forget some of these silly faces....

In the next two pictures she was saying "I was like oh my gosh!"

I am not sure where she heard that but we were dying when she said it,

I was laughing so hard these two came out a bit blurry...

Another phrase she says a lot is "Dad, you smell really bad!"

this is the face that goes with that phrase.

Calista is 7 Weeks Old!

Calista is 7 weeks old today!

Great news, last Friday Calista was tested and her numbers are slowly going up and looking good. She keeps passing her stress tests and doesn't need to be seen for 2 1/2 weeks!! That is progress!! Praise God for answered prayers!

This week, Calista got to meet her Auntie Sarah and her fiance Gabe for the first time along with a visit from Grandma and Grandpa G!! She also got to see Nana and Pops and Great Grammy and Gramps this week. Lots of spoiling this week!

Calista has been giving us a few smiles each day which we love! She loves her kick and crawl gym and is starting to warm up to the swing a little. Her kick and crawl gym has a ball at one end that she can kick (involuntary of course) when she does kick it she stops wiggling and looks around wondering what just happened, it's pretty fun to watch her in it!

Here are a few snapshots from the past week!

In her Kick and Crawl GymHanging out with Gramps...

Meeting Auntie Sarah.... (Today is Sarah's Birthday!! Happy Birthday Auntie Sarah!!)

Here is one of Freddie and Issy showing their pearly whites, don't they look great!!

(Tomorrow is Auntie Christine's birthday, Happy Birthday Christine!)

Calista is 6 Weeks Old!

Calista is 6 Weeks Old Today!

On Monday Calista gave us her first "real" smile, both Isabelle and I were smiling at her and she gave us the biggest smile, I was so excited, I scared her, thankfully that hasn't stopped her, she has smiled a ton since. When Freddie came home that evening she gave him a smile too. I tried to capture it on film, and got the tale end of a smile. I just love the way her entire face lights up when she smiles.

Calista got her first cold this week, Isabelle and I got it too. It isn't terrible just sore throats and runny noses.

My friend Vangie sent Calista the cutest gifts, a bath towel and hooded bath robe with her name on them. I thought it was so cool that her name was on it! You can tell Calista loves it too by the big smile on her face.


Calista has started to show small improvements in her blood work so we only need to test weekly now!

Dancing With Cinderella

Isabelle loves to dance and recently she has started asking Freddie to dance with her. She loves to be twirled and to pretend that she is a princess. Freddie never hesitates to dance with her when asked. I love that about him and I LOVE to watch them dance together.

When watching them dance together in the backyard the other night, I remembered the song by Steven Curtis Chapman called Cinderella, it is so adorable and reminds me of Freddie and Isabelle. I have attached the video below, grab a Kleenex before playing it!

and here are a few pics I grabbed of the two of them dancing the other night in the backyard....

Cinderella by Steven Curtis Chapman

Baby Pictures

Here are some pictures we found of both Freddie and I as babies and toddlers... I scanned them in so they aren't the greatest copies but you get the idea. I thought it might be fun to see what we looked like as kids, everyone is always asking us who we think Isabelle and Calista look like... You be the judge...

Freddie - Newborn

DeAnna - Newborn

Freddie - 6 Months Old

DeAnna (On the left) and my twin brother Garrett

Freddie - 4 years old

DeAnna - 4 years old

Pictures of the girls to compare....

Isabelle - 3 years old

Calista - 5 weeks old

Calista is 5 weeks Old!

Calista is 8 1/2 lbs, she weighs what Isabelle weighed at 2 weeks old. But Isabelle started off a bit bigger than Calista did.

Calista is a strong girl, she holds her head up real well! When on her tummy she lifts her head up and turns it from side to side, she prefers to be held upright against your chest and she holds her head up for long periods of time.

Calista's lab work has continued to stay about the same, stable. Other than that there really isn't anything to report about it. We continue to go in every few days for lab tests. We will keep you posted if anything changes.

Calista loves bath time, something Isabelle never really enjoyed till she was older. She can be super fussy and we start the bath water and she calms down.

This weekend we went on our first road trip as a family to Reno, for my Gramps 80th Birthday and my Grandparents 60th Wedding Anniversary. Calista met lots of family, and we had a great time at the party!!

Gramps and Calista

Grammy and Calista

This picture of my brother cracks me up, I wanted a picture of him with the girls, but he was scared to hold Calista... Isabelle is making this silly face she has started doing every now and then and she made Calista cry by squeezing her foot and my brother was freaked out by all of it!!

Isabelle & Calista

Calista 1 Month Old

Isabelle at 1 Month Old
Here is a cute video of the girls from tonight...

(Today is Nana's Birthday, Happy Birthday Nana!!)

Calista is 4 Weeks Old!!

Calista is 4 weeks old!! With the crazy day we had yesterday I forgot to post Calista's weekly update...

This week she began cooing, which Freddie and I both enjoy a lot! She still sleeps a ton, but when she is awake she loves to look around, especially at faces! Over the weekend we finally had time to replace her crib and her room is finally complete.

It is so interesting to me how different my girls are... Isabelle loved to be swaddled all the time and she loved her bobo (pacifier) she also loved the swing and bouncer. Calista, doesn't like to be swaddled until she is asleep and then she doesn't like her feet tucked into the swaddling blanket... She hates the swing and is just warming up to the bouncer and it took 3 different brands of bobos before we found one she liked and she only wants it when she is full. Calista also insists on being held 24/7 and hates being put down and will cry the second she notices she isn't being held.

Today at Calista's follow up appointment from yesterday's ER visit, we meet with our regular doctor and the Hematologist. Her lab tests improved again by 0.1 not much but still an improvement. They were very patient with me while I asked a ton of questions. We discussed the new plan of action and some concerns they have for her. This issue is going to be with her for a while, but I feel a little better today after talking to our regular doctor and getting a better understanding what they are doing and learning a little more about what is going on in her body. We still have a long road ahead of us, so please keep praying for Calista. We don't have to test everyday, just every few days as long as she is stable and improving, so I will plan to update you each week when I write the Calista update unless something major changes.

Again thanks so much for all the prayers and support!!

Here are some snapshots from this week....

Home

We were sent home just a short while ago. Yesterdays lab results were the lowest they had ever been, and they told us to make sure she eats every 3 hours to keep her hydrated. They also gave me a list of things to watch for. It wasn't our regular doctor we saw yesterday, he was just filling in for our doctor and thought even though the number dropped to where our regular doctor wanted to transfuse that we could wait another day.

Last night I had a hard time waking her up or keeping her awake to feed, which isn't normal for her and this morning I woke her up for her feeding and she wasn't real interested, I didn't worry and tried again an hour later, she ate then, but projectile vomited the entire feeding, I waited a bit and tried to feed her again and she ate, but then vomited the entire feeding again followed by a lot of shaking and each time she just lay there after she vomited and shook which worried me. I immediately called the advice nurse and they told us that she may be in distress and to go to the ER immediately. While I was on the phone she vomited 2 more times.

As soon as we got there they started triaging Calista and testing her. She got poked 4 times while we were there, had chest Xrays and was hooked up to 4 monitors. She ate again and then vomited while we were in the ER. Her Xray came back clear, and her labs came back with a slight improvement from yesterday. They don't wont to transfuse her if she is making an improvement even if the number is low. Since all the tests came back clear that she wasn't in any major distress we were sent home and we begin going back daily for tests and appointments.

I am a little stressed because we now have had several different doctors with so many different opinions working with us that it is so confusing. The frustrating part for us is that if the transfusion is going to help her why are we putting her body through all these ups and downs. I know they want to see if her body can heal on its own without a transfusion and I don't really want her to have one if she doesn't need it, but It breaks my heart to keep putting her through all of this too. It was very scary to see Calista the way she was this morning. Please continue to pray for Calista.

Pray

Calista was vomiting and shaking this morning so we were told to take her into the emergency room. So we are at the emergency room waiting to get some tests done and see what the results of the tests are. Please pray for us, as these symptoms were signs that we had to watch for with her low red blood cell count.

Goodbye Summer

It's Labor Day and it hit me today, Summer has come and gone. Although I am sad to see the summer go, I am excited for the fall, the changing of the leaves, pumpkins and even the return of some of our favorite TV shows....

Today we spent the morning at the California State Fair. It was the perfect weather for going to the fair, cool and breezy and believe it or not, it wasn't crowded until about when we are getting ready to leave. We went with our friends, and the kids had a blast! We ate junk food, rode some rides and visited the petting zoo. Calista did great, just relaxing in the stroller! It was a great end of the summer outing!

Here are some snapshots from the fair....

Jack and Isabelle are in the third car back, they laughed the entire time!

Issy an Abby