Overwhelmed

When we were pregnant with Ellie I was overwhelmed.  Overwhelmed with fear of the unknown.

Now I often find myself overwhelmed for lots of other reasons.

Overwhelmed by how cute Ellie is. It's fun to just stare at her when she smiles because she usually gets the vibe your putting off and goes in for the hug.

Overwhelmed when I see Julia take the lead with Ellie at bedtime and remove her glasses, sing her songs, read her a book and give out hugs and kisses.

Overwhelmed with gratitude that we've been given four beautiful, terrific children that fill our lives with great meaning.

Glasses

Ellie has a new look!  Our girl has glasses!  The final of the three medical issues this summer was one of the most challenging ones.  It took time and will require some follow up in a couple months but so far - it's going great!!!!

For about a month or so, we noticed one of her eyes was crossing.  This is a very common issue among kids, typical children and children with Down syndrome.  It's easily corrected (most of the time) with lenses or patching the "good" eye.  Rarely is surgery needed.

So after seeing the one eye doctor in town that sees kids and learning he does not treat this issue, we had to wait a bit for an appointment in Atlanta.  But we were on the way out of town anyway the day an appointment came open so it worked out great!  We had practiced dropping water in the kids eyes all week - all four were cooperative and excited to receive the warm water in their eyes :). And if you can believe this, Xavier woke up the morning of the appointment with a matted eye - some kind of infection!  So the office worked him in and he got examined first which probably put Ellie at great ease!  She did great and we left with a prescription for glasses. Two weeks later we had her free pair, thanks to her great insurance through the state of Georgia.

After a long day, we finally arrived at our destination out of state.  There was a church sign on one of the roads that said "Fixing your Gaze".  God is fixing Ellie's gaze as we fix our gaze on Him!!!!!!!

And we thought she couldn't get any cuter!

She's just catching up on what the NFL season will have in store.

What a dream come true - Daddy's work caters in lunch from our favorite restaurant and we are the lucky recipients of the leftover chips!  Ellie in position for the best 3:00 snack ever!!!

Speaking of Daddy working - this is the scene of Jeff coming home after his first day!  Everyone found him, even Ellie brought her iPad for entertainment!  This doesn't even look like a king-sized bed! 

End of Summer

This summer was "The Year of the Table"!  A beautiful table and chairs made its way to us from family in Kentucky.  It needed some TLC but after a few weeks outside (notice the box fans!), we have an almost brand new table in our kitchen - much bigger than we had before!

Another trip to the grandparent's house!  Here is Julia helping Ellie in an indoor playground!

Ellie joined in the card-playing fun!

Celebrating 4th of July in front of the t.v.!

Medical update

As I mentioned back in May we had three concerns this summer with Ellie's medical issues. 

The first issue was ruling out sleep apnea.  Well, after 3 attempts at home due to faulty equipment and then a tenacious Ellie pulling the tube out of her nose - we got the results we'd hoped for!  Ellie is a healthy night breather!  All good!  Here she is getting ready for bed.  The fact she made it through all 3 nights with only minor complaining is a testimony to how great of a sleeper she is!  Although - for memory sake...I don't want to forget Jeff and I climbing in her bed after she was asleep at 9:30 to try to get the nasal canula in her nose.  That was the one thing she would not let us do before sleep. So, one of us straddled her and one of us shone a flashlight in her face.  We'd abruptly freeze and hide the light whenever she moved. We came out sweating each night - we traded jobs back and forth from one night to the next.  I believe Jeff was the final victor on the last night when it worked!  

All zipped up so she can't mess with any of it!

We made it as fun as we could!

Then we were off to the hospital for annual bloodwork.  I went to a different hospital this time that normally doesn't see pediatrics - but I'm always trying to think "outside the box".  And lucky for me - there was a phlebotomist there that used to work at Egleston in their lab!!!!!  God is good!  So we chatted in the lobby (without Ellie there) and I pre-registered and by the time I brought Ellie in the next day - there were three people there in the lab to greet us!  It went SUPER well - she started to cry just a little but the nurse distracted her, I held her in my lap and sang songs and the phlebotomist got the job done!  And good results there too - all normal.

Here I am filing out comment cards on everyone that helped us!  My handy clipboard that a nurse gave to me one day in 2012 during our first admission when I had papers scattered everywhere in the hospital room.  A loving gesture - I treasure my clipboard.

Braves

Our family went to an Atlanta Braves game!  

Here we are squeezed into a crowded shuttle!

I must say, this was the last of Ellie's smiles for the day.  Once she got in the stadium and heard the loud, echoey music and saw the large, fast and busy crowd...even from the stroller with her iPad - it was all too much.  We had crying.  And some screaming when I wasn't moving fast enough!  I was trying to get us to this room I had arranged to have access to weeks beforehand.  It's generally for nursing moms but I had obtained a pass for us to have access to anything "special" we needed thanks to a program the Braves have for "Exceptional Fans".  

So here's Ellie happy in the quiet (very) quiet, air conditioned (very) air conditioned room that we stayed in for 3 hours watching the game on a big screen television. I had some lovely chats with some moms.  Even with a wife of a player from the other team! 

In a tender Mommy and Daddy moment, Jeff went out of his way to come to the door and knock and bring us something to eat.  I had texted him that I tried to get us a snack but was failing miserably due to her inability to tolerate the noise while we waited in line.  The girl outside the nursing room gave a knowing smile when I teared up receiving this giant back of popcorn  love from Jeff. 

That kept her busy for a while!

And here we are on the field afterwards!  A wonderful escort took us right down so we could "run the bases". The tunnel through which we traveled was lined with players headed to the locker room.  We tried not to stare. 

Ellie did a great job running all around the field!