Jace the Magnificent!

So to catch you all up... Jace is now just over 11 lbs and is starting to turn into a bit of a chunk thanks to us switching him to soy formula! :-D He is eating like nobody's business and growing so fast! He is 5 months old now and is starting to fit into his 0-3 month clothes nicely now! He has rolled over a few times and is practicing at improving and is just now purposely reaching for things (sometimes). He LOVES dancing with his mommy (especially to Christmas and Salsa music!) and walking to the local park. He also just had his first successful cereal feed with a spoon last Sunday and was all smiles about it! He is still very demanding and high energy which drives his mommy a wee bit (or a lot bit) loco. He is only sleeping 2-3 hours at a time throughout the night, which makes it really hard for me to get much of any sleep and we are also dealing with the teething pains. I'm really hoping that once he starts eating solids, he'll start to sleep longer at night and my goal is to get him out of my room and into his crib by the new year! Bryce is very busy with work, the paramedic program, and the fire station, so he is only home long enough to eat, sleep, and get ready the next morning. But his hard work was recognized at his Wheatland Fire Award Dinner, where he was awarded a gorgeous plaque for Fire Fighter Intern of the Year! Woo Hoo! Bryce turned 23 on the 19th, but had to work, so we just had a late cake celebration at his parents on his way home. I am very busy taking care of Jace with his many appointments, but they seem to be getting less and less, thank goodness! I am also trying to get our house ready to open my preschool, but the progress is slow. Hope all is well with all of you also! :) Happy Holidays!

Yay! I finally got a chance to do a photo shoot with Jace and I really like most of the pictures I got. He's such a camera ham!

It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown!

So I've been looking forward to Jace's first Halloween since before he was even born. I got his cute pumpkin costume before I had him! Unfortunately Bryce had to work until 7pm and I had to go to a class until 4pm, so Jace got to hang out with his Grandma Carolyn until I got back. I dressed him up and we took him to take a few pictures with the cousins and then Carolyn, Jace, and I met my stepmom Catherine for a lovely Thai dinner. Bryce met up with us later and then Bryce and I took Jace to visit some more family and some of Bryce's friends. I tried taking a picture of Jace inside a pumpkin but he wouldn't have it so I got mostly very angry pictures, but I got one ok one. Overall it was a very busy, but enjoyable Halloween! Enjoy the pictures!

Jace has discovered his mouth and hands!

So recently Jace has been really exploring with his mouth and hands. He likes to lick everything and mouth his hands, it cracks me up, because he'll follow objects around with his tongue sticking out to try to lick them, so I've included a video of this.

Jace's Baby Blessing

I forgot to write about Jace's baby blessing, so here it is... Jace was blessed on Sunday, October 11, 2009 in the Lincoln 1st Ward. Bryce has a very hard time with public speaking, so Jace's great grandpa Roger Hall said the blessing. It was a lovely blessing and Jace didn't make a sound! We were so proud of him, I was just sure that he would scream through the whole thing, because he woke up right before, but he was so good! Hooray! He looked so cute in his little man suit!

Jace's Smiles

Well, Jace is now over 3 months old and we are enjoying being entertained by our goofy son. We are still facing many challenges with Jace's health, mostly weight gain, but we continue to push forward. There was talk of hospitalization or the placement of a feeding tube by Jace's primary physician, but after meeting with a gastrointestinal specialist, we found out that Jace's current weight gain, although is slow, is appropriate and due to genetics he will most likely remain on the lowest part of the growth charts his whole life. Poor Jace, we've doomed him to be a little shrimp of a man! Hopefully he'll at least be as tall as his parents. Anyways, Jace has developed quite a little personality and I'm sure he'll keep me quite busy in the future. He cracks Bryce and me up all the time with his facial expressions. He raises his eyebrows, scrunches up his face, throws almost convincing fits, and gives the biggest, goofiest smiles. I thought I'd share some of his happy pics with you.

Bath, Sleeping and Swing Time For Jace!

Here's some documentation of some cute Jace moments at home! Enjoy!

We're Home!!!

Yes the day finally arrived! We got to bring Jace home on Friday night, August 28th after a wee bit of persuading the doctor. We've been home now for 2 weeks and are enjoying settling in as a family. Jace and I are starting to get the hang of the whole sleeping and eating thing and I'm now only having to wake up 3 times throughout the night to feed Jace. Bryce is working a lot and has to sleep in the other room so that he can get enough sleep to make it through 12+ hour days at work. Jace has definitely developed quite a little personality and we have discovered that he is a little bit of a high maintanence baby. He wants to be held and fed all day long and does not approve of us putting him down or paying any attention to anything else, but we are finding some ways to negotiate with him. He loves snuggling, going for walks outside, and is beginning to smile quite a bit with adorable little dimples on either corner of his mouth. Jace is keeping me quite busy with several doctors appointments each week. This week we have his 2 month appointment and he'll be getting his first shots (poor baby!). We also have an extensive audiology appointment to determine the status of his hearing, he has yet to pass a hearing test which is somewhat of a concern; however, we have seen him startle to some sounds, so I'm convinced that he can hear to some degree, but Thursday's appointment should tell us exactly to what degree and what can be done to fix any problems if they should exist. Regardless, we are so happy to have our precious little guy home and happy.

3rd Successful Surgery

Well, Jace had his coanal atresia surgery yesterday afternoon to open up his blocked nasal passage and it went quite well. He is able to breath out of both nostrils now and we are hoping that this will drastically help him to be able to eat better, so far so good! I couldn't believe how great he looked after surgery! No bruises, no swelling, no packing or tubes hanging out his nose, it just looked like he had a little bit of a bloody nose. He's feeling a lot better now. Yay!

Jace Fest!

Here's some more pics of Jace and family, including a 5 generation picture.

Jace William De Witt 7/20/09, 6 lbs 11oz, 19 in

Jace William De Witt was born on Monday, July 20, 2009 at 4:57pm at the UC Davis Medical Center by an emergency c-section. The doctors tried turning him to be in the head-down position; however, his heart rate dropped and we were rushed off to get him out quickly. It was probably the scariest moment of my life. During the delivery, they measured 4 liters of fluid and I became a legend at UC Davis for having the most fluid anyone had ever seen. When they got him out he wasn't breathing, so he was rushed out of the room before I could even see him. It felt like an eternity lying in the OR while the doctors finished stitching me up and I waited to hear a cry or something and finally I heard him and they brought him back in for me to look at him for a minute before they took him up to the NICU. I was in a lot of pain and on a lot of drugs, so I couldn't go see my baby until the next morning when I forced Bryce to push me in a wheelchair so I could hold my son for the first time and it was magical! He was so beautiful! It was determined that Jace did indeed have esophogeal atresia, which had to be surgically fixed ASAP. He had his surgery on Thurs. July 23, 2009, which went amazingly well, which was a huge relief. The time after the surgery was very difficult for us, because Jace had to be on so much medication and the hospital staff failed time after time to get a pic-line in (which is like a do-it-all IV), so our poor little boy became a human pin cushion, we counted over 50 needle pokes in just his arms! :( So the doctors decided to put one in surgically in his neck called a broviac line so he wouldn't have to be poked any more. Jace is now doing pretty well and is actually getting to eat! However, since he didn't get to eat until he was already a few weeks old the learning process is very difficult and slow for him. Also, the doctors discovered that in addition to the esophogeal atresia, he also has a coanal atresia on his right nostril, so he will undergo yet another surgery next week to open up his nasal passage. However, this surgery will be a lot less intense as the last one and the recovery time is very short, also this will help in his efforts to eat, because he'll be able to breath much better. Jace is such a sweet little boy whom we absolutely adore! He is very strong and definitely has his own little personality already. He hates having dirty pants, so we're hoping that he's going to be the easiest potty trainer ever! He also loves being held and cuddled, which I'm sure that he'll never run out of. I am pretty much fully healed now and I have lost about 35 of the 50 lbs I gained with the pregnancy in the past 3 weeks and I'm hoping to continue to lose the rest in the next little while. Bryce and I are staying at the Ronald McDonald House close to the hospital so we can be close to Jace, but we are hoping that we will all get to go home in a couple more weeks. :) Thank you all so much for your loving thoughts and prayers, they have been truly appreciated!

39 Weeks Pregnant! AAAAHHH!

Here I am 2 days before Jace was born, beware, it is not for the faint of heart! Ha ha!

Jungle Fever!

So I recently finished painting baby Jace's room to match his bedding and I had a lot of fun although it was physically akward at times due to my enlarged stomach region. So, I thought I'd share my fun with you all! Oh and by the way, I used enviornment friendly wall paint that has pretty much no fumes (how cool is that?!) and I only did a little bit at a time, so I remained healthy. :)

Do you ever think that God must have a twisted sense of humor?

So I am now 37 weeks and 5 days pregnant, a destination that none of the doctors thought that I would ever reach! I have been in so much pain for the last month that we begged the doctors to induce me earlier than the original date of July 15th, so we got an amniocentesis (they stuck a needle into my uterus and drew out some amniotic fluid to test) done to check if the baby's lungs were mature enough so that they could end my suffering. I was really scared to get the amnio, because of all of the risks involved, although at that point it really wasn't such a big risk to the baby, because he is considered full-term now. So if the test results came out positive then they would induce me the next day; however, they came out negative, so I am stuck with my original induction date, unless my baby decides to make his grand entrance earlier. That was quite a blow to Bryce and I, because we were really hoping that we'd have our baby by now. :( Then today we went to our weekly appointment and the doctors decided to push back my induction date from the 15th to the 19th of July which completely screws up all of our plans, because Bryce went out on paternity leave from work and can't go back, because his shifts are already covered and I could pop at any moment, but he can't submit the official Paid Family Leave paperwork until this kid actually comes, so now we are out half a month's income. :( But things always work out, so I will keep faith that it will this time also. My tummy measured 49 cm which is ridiculous considering a full term belly measurement is around 40 cm, so that's like what a 2 months overdue measurement. Oh yeah and another fun little piece of info, just a few weeks ago our baby was head down like a good little boy and he is now in the breech position, he's a trouble maker before birth! So now we just wait...and wait...and wait... ;)

Holy Macerole, it's been a while!

Hey everyone! So I am still alive and I'm sorry that it's taken me so long to update my blog. A lot has happened over the past few months and life has been a wee bit insane. I have several new ultrasound pics, a couple of prego pics and an angry tummy pic which I will attach. Ok, so let's play catch up...I am now going on 35 weeks pregnant and completely miserable and about the size of a planet! We found out about 2 months ago that our baby has an issue with the connection of his esophagus to his stomach called esophogeal atresia, so he is unable to eat via his mouth, which means that he is unable to swallow the amniotic fliud and will need sugery following birth. And because he is unable to swallow the fluid I just continue to build up more and more until now I have twice the amount of fluid that I should and my tummy measures over 4 weeks over-due even though I'm still over a month away from his due date. My stomach is so full with baby and fluid that I feel like I could pop at any moment and my stomach looks and feels as though I'm smuggling a good sized watermellon! Our baby weighed approx. 4 lbs, 10 oz as of 6/11/09 and is still happy, active and healthy in all other areas. We had to switch doctors and hospitals in order to deal with his problem so now I will be delivering at UC Davis and if all goes well with our baby after birth, he should only be in the NICU for 2-4 weeks. The doctors have scheduled me for inducing on July 15, but they may push it up which I would completely encourage. Everywhere I go people assume that I'm having multiples or that I'm going to pop at any moment and it's getting a little old being reminded of how far away my due date really is. I'm in a lot of pain and am finding it very difficult to sleep much any more and I can't really drive or be driven very much any more, but I am not on bed rest, so I'm grateful for that and I'm finding that Bryce and I are being blessed in so many different ways. We finally were able to buy our house and we are loving our new home and neighborhood. Bryce just got a job as Wheatland Fire's first ever Fire Fighter Intern, which is extremely exciting and we are blessed to be able to have most of our family available to come and visit us after the baby is born. :) So That about sums up all of the crazyness for now. I love you all and hope that all is going well for you also!

It's a Boy!!!

Hi all!

We had our 20 week ultrasound today and it is definitely a boy. The image of our son's gender was our first view of him during the ultrasound, it was as if he was saying, "Hello world, here I am!" It was so special for Bryce and I to be able to watch him. The pictures I've posted are from top-down: 1) His gender parts, 2) His foot, 3) His head and body, and 4) a 3-d image of his face, it's kind of hard to see it, but his head is the oval shaped light colored thing in the middle of the picture and if you look hard you can kind of make out his little facial features, his body is beneath him and he has his arm raised next to his head. He was so sweet! We saw him hiccup several times and he was moving all over the place, he's a little athlete already! He has all of his parts and everything looks good so far, but his tummy wasn't full, so they were unable to get a good picture of his stomach, so I'll be going back on Monday for a followup to try to get a clearer image of his stomach. My due date has also been pushed back once again from July 25 to July 30 now, so I get to look forward to a nice hot summer! :)

-Crystal