Let's see if we can get this started.....

Well it's now been at least over a month since I've been meaning to get this started. I swear I don't know where the time goes anymore. Kalli keeps us running most the time. Between her, work and nice weather keeping us outside whenever we can.....I struggle to get the extras done. Kalli is just over 4 months old now and we've been home from the hospital just over 2 months. She's really doing great, still eating good and growing really well. At her 4 mo. doctor's appointment she weighed 10 lb. 4 oz. So we are climbing the curve, but still show that she's below the percentiles. The doctor said it would take her probably 18 months to 2 years to catch up. But she's climbing and that's what we are looking for. She seems to be doing all the things that a normal 4 month old baby should be doing. So we are very happy about that. She smiles and coos and goos and tells us lots of stories. No really good giggles yet, but almost. She's starting to like her toys and always wants to be seen. She's just got to where if you leave the room she knows and she wants to see someone or be with someone or else she'll let you know.

A quick little run of events since Kalli decided to surprise us and come 6 weeks early. My water broke on Jan. 3, out of the blue. We just finished tomato soup and grilled cheese and I was trying to work on the bulletin board for primary.....next thing we know Leland is wading through my water in the kitchen trying to find shoes and get me out in the car. I was a little distraught to say the least. Kalli decided to be welcomed here at 5:44 pm the next day, Jan. 4. 20 hours of labor, but since I didn't even start really feeling the contractions until about 3 the next morning it really wasn't as bad as it might sound. And anyone who wants can call me a wimp, but my epidural worked fabulous and I would totally recommend it!

She did great! We were a little distraught about having to keep her in the NICU in Idaho Falls for awhile, but little did we know we had an even bigger adventure coming. The neonatologist came to our hospital room just after we turned out the lights and thought we might get a little sleep. Kalli was born with a tracheoesophageal fistula....meaning her stomach and her esophagus didn't meet together. The esophagus ended in a little pouch and up from the stomach the tube was connected to her lung. Leland flew with her the next morning on a life flight plane from SLC to Primary Children's medical Center. With all of the tests they were doing that day they also found out that she had a perforated bowel. So she went to surgery that night and ended up with a little stoma for her ostomy. They decided she needed a few days recovery, and waited until Friday to do her fistula repair. It ended up being fixable. Yeah! It was a snug repair, but they were able to sew it together and 5 days later she passed her esophagram with no leaks at the repair site. Kalli turned out to be a great eater. The only problem was she kept dropping her heart rate when she ate and sometimes even when she wasn't eating. That kept us in the hospital longer than expected and we ended up still being there when it was time to do the take down of her ostomy. She had kind of a rough recovery from that surgery, but once she turned the right way and started eating her goal feeds soon after getting her ventilator tube out. It seemed an answer to lots of prayers because once she started eating again her heart rate stopped dropping as dramatically and after our 7 day count down of no bradycardias and then a few more to show that she was gaining weight good we were on our way home, March 6th.

I suppose that's not the shortest version of Kalli's beginnings, but relatively it's a shorter one. Now we're home and she doesn't have to have her milk thickened anymore. She's small but almost a regular healthy baby. At four months she's almost outgrowing her newborn clothes. She gets to be with me for 4 days and then with her daddy for 4 days.....but I'm pretty close to declaring we're going to eat rice and beans every night if that's what it takes for me to go part-time.

Well we just finished her first rice cereal and I'm hoping bed time is coming soon. Hopefully I'll keep this updated at least semi regularly once i get it all figured out. :)