I have peas! My cute little garden has sprouted some peas, I ate a few even though they aren't done growing yet. I planted them way late this year but had I planted them on time they would have gotten frost bitten with all of the prompt people's peas. See, it pays to be late (I learn from my husband...)

The babies went over to grandma LouAnn's yesterday while I went to Costco. (Seriously people when the carts full, you just can't stop in front of me, I need to use the momentum... that and isn't it amazing how your turning radius grows throughout the Costco visit?) We don't need girl clothes but I bought a few anyway, we realized that dresses really make the feeding tube access easier throughout the day. After that I went to the hospital to get my volunteer badge so we can get that going. It's really a neat program, you go to the NICU whenever you want and just look for parents. There aren't rules and time clocks they just want you to make friends.

Needless to say, the twins had a great time, there were 10 cousins there to love them up and play with them. Dylan was so smiley and giggly all night. It's so fabulous to see her smiley again. She's still sore in her back and not liking the diaper changes and being shifted quickly, but that too gets better every day.

I fed Dylan peaches and oatmeal last night and she actually did quite well, not like her brother... but he's a Hoover so we can't ask for too much. She did so well in fact that I will probably have to start feeding her solids right along with Duncan.
Duncan's first taste of Pepsi from dad... and it begins..

Babies, babies and more babies!

We have (not so) cute little baby birds in one of the trees in the backyard. I saw the mom building the nest a few weeks ago and Matthew hoisted me up to see inside and there wasn't any eggs then. I guess a lot happens in a few weeks (when you have been spending your days and nights at the hospital). I went out to check on the garden today and I saw the mom flying around and then heard a bunch of little chirps. The nest is only like 6 feet high, I suppose I could pet them if I wanted to break all of the rules...

Back to juggling babies!

What an uneventful weekend! Hooray!! We are all together again thank goodness. I think Dylan is the most rested of us all, she's happy now while the rest of us are trying to get back on schedule.

We went to the Neurosurgeon today and that was nothing really. He just looked at her back and said 'see ya on the 10th!' He's not concerned about her feet and legs because she's been moving them quite a bit more now and she was really kicking at him because she was so mad. Mad because he was looking at her bum, tickling her feet and well... wearing those green scrubs. I think she's learned a valuable lesson through all this, someone leaning over you wearing scrubs can't be a good thing! He figures that she was guarding her back by not moving and each day she will move a little more as she tests herself and determines what hurts and what doesn't.

Dylan has this thing she does with her hands that we call 'evil hands.' She kind of rubs them together like she's plotting her next attack. This PICC is right in the crook of her arm and wrapped up so she can't bend her arm, and I am sure it's a bit heavier, so she can't do it like she used to. However, she put her hands together breifly this morning, both arms straight up so her hands touched. That's her comfort thing and she's stuck not being able to bend that arm for a couple weeks so hopefully she will figure it out.

We went swimming at Kristen's again yesterday and Duncan loooved it. He is so funny! We got a floaty thing and he just leaned back in it and kicked his legs. I took more pictures, but left my camera there, boo!

She's home! ...Again!!

Yesterday the home health nurse came to teach me how to use the IV pump for her antibiotics and we got everything ready so at 8PM we could run the pump. The first step is to flush the line with saline so the nurse had me hook her up and push the syringe to flush. When I tried it was really hard and Dylan seemed uncomfortable. Not only that, but it seemed to leak a little where it comes out of her skin. So the nurse took off all the dressing, cleaned it up and tried again... no go. She called another nurse and then the Infectious Disease doctor's that prescribed the antibiotics. They gave a heads up to the emergency room and sent us right back up there.

Lucky for us, Kristen happened to be dropping off milk last night when the nurse was here, she stayed a little while and then ended up taking Duncan for a sleep over so we could get Dylan to the hospital.

That's right, seven hours at home and we were back on our way. They tried to run another PICC in the ER but couldn't get it so they ended up admitting her so they could do it by flouroscopy today. Turns out that worked. They not only got the line in but they got it all the way to her heart, the other was just to her chest. (The ER nurse suspected the PICC that she had in the NICU made it hard to get the first one in. Because something is competing with blood flow the body creates other ways for it to go... so it's getting there, but not through a big vein... fascinating.)

I didn't get to bed until 4:30 this morning so Matthew took one for the team and went up to the hospital with Dylan this morning and has been there all day. I got to sleep in. I actually got 8 hours of sleep... although the sun was up for most of it. I am waiting for Duncan to wake from a nap to go get him from Kristen's and then who knows, we might have a night as a family for the first time in a couple of weeks!

Here's a couple of pictures of Duncan since he was feeling a little left out (I am sure...). I love these because you can see his long eyelashes, even though Dylie's still have him beat! We will have to pull the cameras back out when they are both in one place again!

She's home!

Hooray! I dropped Duncan off at Kristen's today and Matthew called me to tell me to hurry because they were going to kick Dylan out. They pulled the drain this morning and scheduled all of her follow up appointments and that was it.

She was so smiley at home it was so cute. It's so good to have her here that's for sure... I think she's pretty happy about it too! She doesn't stand as much as she did and her feet don't move whole lot. That could be because of her tethered cord but we just don't know. It could just be that she's sore too, or that I am just reading into things. We have an appointment with the Neurosurgeon and the Pediatrician on Monday so we will mention it then. There's a nurse coming by this evening to teach me how to use the IV pump and we will be off and running for a couple of weeks. The follow-up MRI is on the 8th of July to see how everything looks, then the Surgeon's appointment is on the 10th to schedule surgery. Crazy!

Our friend Sara came by this evening to give Dylan a little snuggle, she just couldn't resist and car troubles kept her away from the hospital so she was just dying to see her. It was fun to see Sara's growing belly, either lots of donuts or there's a little guy/gal in there!

I also am terrible and forgot to mention that Shannon, Tracy and Charlotte came to see Dylan last week. Charlotte is so cute and tiny! I think Duncan weighs more than her and she's just zipping around everywhere and even trying to put her finger in the outlets! Two! There will be two of those in the Anderson house! Lots and lots of baby proofing!

Here's a picture of Dylan smiling at Shane and then just another cute one from the hospital.

Apparently Shane is Charming

Our little one had a really good day today. She seemed like things are getting back to normal. When she was in the NICU a nurse pointed out that she didn't like to be messed with, which is normal if the only people messing with you are poking and prodding. She got much better but I think that's back a little now. She just doesn't want to be moved, even when she's in your lap and you adjust. Oh well, we fixed that once and we can again.

A few days ago she was losing her lunch every time we fed her but today we worked back up to full feeds and she seemed to do okay with everything. They just want to make sure that she isn't getting any fluids from the IV so she can come home. Piece of cake. Aunt Melissa came up and said she looks twice a good as yesterday and a hundred times as good as the day before. She is pretty darn cute with a little purple bow in her duck fluff hair.

Shane and Traci came up to see her this afternoon and Dylan couldn't get enough of Shane! It was crazy! She was doing huge bug catching grins and wrinkling her nose at him I couldn't believe it. Traci and I were chopped liver, Shane was where it's at. I took several pictures but left the camera at the hospital so maybe I will get them here tomorrow and post a couple. It was a fun little visit with lots of little Dylan snuggles.

Duncan went with Aunt Ami today and had a big day swimming with all of the cousins. That boy sure loves the water. Good thing he has great skin, I think we will have to spend a lot of time at the pool this summer! He is such a good boy, he is just eating up being tossed around from family to family. It's all fun and games until mom shows up and then he just wants to sleep it all off.

Better, muuuch better...

I spent all afternoon with my little pickle and she is doing much better today. I didn't believe her dad when he said she smiled and talked to him this morning until she busted out with some for me this afternoon. There are glimpses of the old Dylie in there and that's very exciting for sure! We can't wait to have our smiley little girl back.

Not a lot for today, they put her on another antibiotics and removed one of the first ones, they just bumped her to one that would be the most effective toward these bugs. The drain is still leaking although it's definately slower which is good.

There was some talk about sending her home which is very interesting. We had a talk with nurses in the NICU when she was there and they said that if they are worried about parents that they will keep the baby longer until they prove themselves. So basically... our competency is shooting us in the foot here. They know if they let her go we will bring her back for her drain and all that good stuff but we want them to keep her a bit longer. Let's have a few more good days. Heaven knows we would want her sick up there rather then home you know? No sense in revisiting this mess in a week! It's Matthew's fault really... he's like a doctor up there with her, I am sure he would complete the nurses log too if they would let him!

I think I will bring a camera up tomorrow and take a picture of the drain and stuff, so she can see what she had to endure. It's nasty looking but still very interesting.

One week and counting...

Okay, here's the story... We went for the MRI on the 9th and they tried 6 times to get the IV in for sedation and couldn't get it. She's a "tough stick" as they say. Add that to the three pokes in the ER from Sunday and she's a poked out kid. They ended up doing the MRI without sedation, the poor thing just laid there still because she was so tired after them making her cry. After it was done they said to go home and follow up with the doctor that ordered it. Not good wnough for us, we said that we didn't want to leave and that the ER ordered it. So she said she would ask the Radiologist if he saw anything of note, she ran off and then came back and said he wanted to talk to us, bad news right? Yup!

He said she has a mass at the base of her spine and called the ultrasound guy to come in and take a peek. From what he saw it looked like a solid mass or tumor but they needed another MRI with contrast (die in her blood) to see for sure. They sent us right to the ER from there, it's now about 5:30 at night. In the ER they checked us out and finally admitted her at 1 AM. The doctors had no idea what this thing was... and it's still somewhat a mystery after a weeks time, but we do know a lot more which is good.

After three more pokes and finally an IV, they have run several follow up tests and found out that normal spinal cords end at L1 or L2 and hers ends at L5 and her sacrum, which we already know is kind of funny. They confirmed it is tethered but it's hidden in this mass. The mass goes from her spinal cord around her sacrum and into her bowel area. It's is full of fluid and is very very inflamed. They placed a drain in her back on Thursday and pulled out nearly 4 tablespoons of nasty infectedness. The surgeon and Neurosurgeon will need to team up to operate to remove the mass, but not until the inflammation and infection are gone.

What now? They are culturing the goo to see what antibiotics they can use to take the bacteria out. So far they found normal gut bugs, two types of ecoli and strep, but they think there's more that they haven't found. They started her on a broad range of antibiotics through a pic line, which is like a deeper IV that isn't quite as painful. (She got the Pic when she got the drain on Thurs.)

She is doing a little better but still terrible. Her blood tests still show a massive infection and she's on Oxycodone when she really needs it. She will come home when the drains pulled, they have an antibiotic plan (likely we will do 4-6 weeks of IV antibiotics...) and when she's feeling better, probably sometime next week.

People have been fighting over who can watch Duncan which is nice not to have to worry about. He's so easy going, everyone adores him, thank goodness. Kristen had him all last week, we joked that he was in Disneyland. But a weeks a lot of baby so everyone else is going to trade off from here My mom came here to watch him today and she cleaned, cooked and did all of the laundry... that's my kind of sitter! Everyone has been so great watching him and helping out I can't even believe it.

My mom, Jill, Aunt Melissa and Jessica have all been up to the hospital to visit our sick little Lamborghini. Jessica brought us dinner tonight too, and she's a wicked good cook so, as expected it was yummy. She said she will be the one to take Dylan to get Mani/Pedi's and that Dylan can go to her for all the good skin products, starting tonight with a nice gift of lotions for Dylie's dry skin.

That's the goods for now, I will try to make notes here everyday so everyone can get the news as it happens (which would have been bad up to today but now things get better everyday. In fact Matthew just called and said he actually got a smile which is good... we haven't seem one of those in 2 weeks! More later!

Poor little baby

So our little Dylan hasn't been herself for a couple of weeks. We went to the doctor last Monday and he said we probably had Coxsachie (we meaning Dylie and myself, lucky us). When I got better it didn't seem like Dylan did, she had a fever and her lower back was sensitive so we went to the doctor again last night. He tried a few things and sent us over to the lab at IMC. At 10:45 PM he called here and said she obviously was fighting and infection, but he didn't know what it was, so he said to take her to Primary Children's first thing in the morning.

Matt got up early and took her up there, after several pokes, prods, IVs, and xrays, they still don't know what the problem is. They did check her blood again, which again confirmed some kind of an infection but they are quite puzzled as to where it might be. So the next step is to check for a bone infection via and MRI. The good news is that they can do the MRI of her brain, and upper and lower back at the same time they check for this infection. Which moves that up a few weeks. She was released back to us and we have her MRI tomorrow at 2PM.

It would have been nice to find out today what's bothering her, since she has been pretty grumpy lately but the test did confirm that she isn't just naturally grumpy like her mother. Something is really hurting her. Hopefully I will have more news tomorrow.

First Post Ever

Hi all - Instead of keeping everyone updated by e-mail I thought I would create a blog. I know... some of you will say 'what's a blog?' and the other's will say 'finally! Sheeesh!'. Hopefully this will give you all the info you need and more. I don't expect too much excitement but it's a nice way to show off cute pictures of the babies and keep everyone updated on all of the appointments and things that we have with little Dylie. So, here we go!

Wait? What's that? A little one stirring? Well then, this is all you get for now, more later!