Tag archive for "healthy babies"

The Fab Five

Five Healthy Babies and The Fab Five’s First Park Trip…oh yeah!!

5 Comments 29 October 2009

Here’s a quick update on the Fab Five from their nine month visit to the pedi last week…

– Brooklyn Faith:  16 pounds, 4 ounces, 30%; 27 inches, 75%
– Britton Grace:  13 pounds, 8 ounces, 3%; 24 inches, 3%…I told you she was tiny!!
– Jack William:  19 pounds, 8 ounces, 45%; 27 inches, 25%, and oh yeah, 90th percentile for head circumference…he still has some balancing out to do!
– Lila Addison:  16 pounds, 8 ounces, 45%; 26 inches, 25%
– Ryan Elizabeth:  16 pounds, 9 ounces, 45%; 26.5 inches, 50%

All of the babies are as healthy as can be and are developing as well as most full term, 9-month-olds.  The only developmental skill they were lacking was in the ability to pick things up with their fingers, every other milestone was checked off the list!  Thank you all for your prayers that helped to make this a reality!!!

The picture above is a sneak peek of the photos we got from our photo session yesterday at Mayfield Park, close to downtown Austin.  The babies had a great time at the park while completely ignoring the utter chaos swirling around them as we tried to get the perfect picture of the less than blissful moment!  Between me, Casey, Eliot, the photographer and a friend of hers, and our go-to helper, Tricia, I think we managed to make it happen.  Everyone was completely wiped out after an hour and a half of whooping, squeaking, jumping jacks, songs, smiles, and any other trick we could think of to get five 9 month-olds to look at the nice lady with the camera, but it was FUN, and you guessed it, CRAZY!!!

God Bless,
Ethan
www.JonesLife.net

The Fab Five

Six Month Doc Visit and Ryan’s Wounded Army Crawl Video

6 Comments 26 July 2009

Updates, updates! I have updates! We took the amazingly unintelligent decision to take the babies to the doctor last week…all five at the same time!! It was chaotic, stressful, crazy, but totally fun and something we’ll remember forever…though we probably won’t be pulling that stunt again any time soon! Imagine five babies and five adults in a room about the size of a master closet…for two hours, complete with two shots for each baby…aaaaggggggghhhh!!!! Imagine five little wigglers all wearing nothing but their diapers on an examination table at the same time, then imagine Ryan trying to crawl over the other four to get to who knows where while Jack keeps rolling to his tummy, steam-rolling Britton in the process! Then imagine giving them all two shots!!! At one point, they all decided it was time to eat so we had two nurses plus Dr. Ma each feeding a baby while Casey and I handled the other two…too funny! Though it was relatively normal for Casey and I, I think it was a bit stressful for the doctor and her staff. As we were leaving, she said, “I think I liked it better when you brought them three and two.” I think we’ll take that as a not-so-subtle hint as to how she would like the next visit to be structured… :)
The babies are all doing very, very well and are mostly ahead of where they should be developmentally. They are officially six months and a few days old, but their adjusted age (based on their actual due date) puts them around three months developmentally. Here are the new stats (% based on adjusted age):
– Brooklyn Faith – 24″ tall (50%), 12 pounds, 7 ounces (25%), 41 cm head circ. (50%)
– Britton Grace – 22″ tall (8%), 10 pounds, 0 ounces (3%), 41 cm head circ. (50%)
– Jack William – 24″ tall (50%), 15 pounds, 5 ounces (55%), 43-1/2 cmm head circ. (90%)
– Lila Addison – 23″ tall (25%), 11 pounds, 12 ounces (20%), 41 cm head circ. (50%)
– Ryan Elizabeth – 24″ tall (50%), 12 pounds, o ounces (25%), 39 cm head circ. (10%)
They are definitely hybrid babies – doing some of the things six monthers do (crawling, for example) and doing some of the things three monthers do (like not sleeping through the night!!!). Ryan is the most striking example of this mix as she is fully mobile now…just put a toy a few feet in front of her and watch her go! This is definitely not something most three monthers are doing by this age! Here is the link to the video of her making her way across the three activity gyms to get to some toys:
None of the babies made a peep on the drive to and from the doctor’s office so I guess they enjoyed it – it was the first time The Fab Five was all together in the car at once. And since we dropped Eliot off at school on the way, it was also the first time all eight of us together in the car. And let me tell you, we were CRAMPED!! Thank goodness none of them fussed because there would have been no getting to them!
Our next venture out as a family is on the schedule for August 16th. We are very excited for this day as it is the day we dedicate the babies to the church at Riverbend. We’ll be on stage (yes, all of us!) for both the 9:45 and 11:15 services to introduce the clan to the congregation that has been so supportive of our family since before the babies were born. What a day that will be!
I want to take a quick moment to thank Jan (one of Grandma Stevie’s good friends) for making her third trip from the Dallas area to our home for the weekend to help take care of the babies. She has been so awesome to help out and really works hard to give us a break when she comes! Because of her and Grandma Stevie taking care of the Six Pack last night, Casey and I actually got to go out on a date!! Thank you, thank you, thank you!!
Thank you also to all of the volunteers for their continued support and to everyone out there praying for our family! Life continues to be in a constant state of change and mostly entrenched in chaos, but you all have helped to make it a very rewarding time for our family!!
God Bless,
Ethan

Good Times

A Great Day for The Jones 8!

4 Comments 25 January 2009

The Jones family – all eight of us (nine if you count the newest resident at our home, Casey’s mom) – had a great day today! Casey is doing better, the babies are continuing to bore the nurses (not really, but they don’t have many issues they have to deal with – that’s a really good thing!), Eliot had all kinds of new adventures, Grandma got to visit with friends and spent more time with the babies, I got to hold three of the five, and we all got to see several of our Marriage Builders friends who came up to see the babies…good times for all!!

Casey had it really rough all day yesterday. She spent a lot of time in the NICU holding babies, but for some reason, she was really nauseous and worn down all day long and into the night. Our guess is that she’s probably pushing herself a bit too hard, but poor girl is being torn in two different directions! She has doctor’s orders to stay completely off her feet for all but one or two hours a day from Dr. Reich, but she also has doctor’s orders from the neonatologists to be in the NICU as much as possible. I bet you can guess which order she is complying with…

Today, she woke up feeling much better and didn’t have any of the same issues as she did on Saturday. She held Britton for about an hour and held Lila for nearly two hours. Right now, she’s getting some good Eliot time, cuddling on the couch while Eliot “paints” whiskers on her mama’s face… :)

Eliot got to spend lots of time in the NICU, then got a surprise trip to Chuck-E-Cheese…yeah another trip for Eliot to C-E-C’s without daddy!! One of our good friends, Ryan Jones (or Uncle Jonesy to Eliot) came up to see the babies and took Eliot off our hands for awhile. She had a blast, of course, then came back to the NICU and helped Nurse Stacy give Brooklyn a sponge bath. That was really cool to watch – she was totally into it! Hopefully that is a sign of things to come when the babies come home!

For my part, I got to spend most of the day in the NICU to make up for not being able to come at all yesterday. I spent Saturday playing catch up from the last 2+ weeks away from home and work. Today, I held Ryan, Brooklyn, and finally my boy, Jack! That’s Jack in the picture above.
The babies are all doing very, very well! Seriously, the nurses have very little to report to us anymore when we come up. The only issues worth noting are Ryan and Lila’s heart problems, but we also have good news on that. Whoops – I just realized I haven’t posted info on Ryan’s heart problem as it just showed up yesterday. She has one of the same issues that Lila has – a hole in her heart that is allowing too much blood to get to her lungs. Both girls have responded well to the medication they’ve been on and the large holes they both have (the PDA’s) appear to be closing up. There is still a decent possibility that the holes will open back up however, so it appears that this problem will be on our minds for a while. Lila’s little hole is not something that is helped by the medication so they will continue to monitor that as well.

We couldn’t be more excited with how well the babies are doing…these little squirts are proving to be a plucky bunch! It appears that Britton has won the Diva award for now as she continues to make her demands known to all within earshot of a squeaky little 2 pounder. Ryan has quieted down over the last couple of days so she is out of the completition for now. Brooklyn and Jack are still competing for the most chill while Lila is just hanging out and taking it all in. They are all taking feedings pretty well and their little infections have all cleared up. As the doctor said yesterday, they are all at various stages of EXCELLENT!!!!

God Bless,
Ethan

The Fab Five

“Various Stages of Excellent”

3 Comments 23 January 2009

Whew!! What a wild day this turned out to be! It started with the kickoff to the diaper drive at HEB, rolled through three TV interviews, nearly six hours in the NICU, a few momentous occasions, and is finally coming to a close with this blog post. Casey and I are pretty exhausted (and so is Eliot!) and we’re hoping we can catch up on a lot of busy work and rest this weekend…that’s the plan, anyway. We haven’t had much success sticking to the daily plan lately so I guess we’ll just have to wait and see what tomorrow brings!

So here are the highlights:

– As you see below, HEB kicked off a week long diaper drive for us at the four points store (click the HEB logo for details)…very exciting! The folks at HEB were incredible!!

– I got to hold one of the babies for the first time this morning!! I held Britton for about an hour while Casey held Brooklyn for the first time. It was also the first time that we got to see all of the babies without their beanies and eye shades…their little faces are so perfect! It seemed like the world stood still for a while as we held each baby, slowly rocking them and telling them about the new world they are now a part of…so peaceful!

– The KVUE interview was really neat because we got to hold a couple of the babies (Brooklyn and Britton) up for the cameras and introduce them to Austin! That was the first time that I had really “handled” any of them and believe me, I was nervous! I know just about all men have an irrational fear of holding babies because they are so fragile and we feel like we’re going to break them, but with these little guys, that’s a real concern! They are so frail in your hands it feels like if you sneezed you’d probably break a few ribs!

– When we were taking a break from our first time in the NICU, KEYE called and asked to come up for another interview. We met up with them 30 minutes later, talked with them for about 20 minutes, then ran upstairs for a second round with the babies.

– In the afternoon, I got to hold Lila while Casey held Ryan, again for about an hour. Lila was the second smallest so I held the two pip squeaks of the bunch today.

All in all, the babies continue to do very well, however we still need prayers for Lila’s heart problem. They performed an echo cardiogram on her today to determine what exactly was the cause of her heart murmur. The news wasn’t unexpected, but it wasn’t welcome, either. She has two holes in her heart, one big and one small.

The big one is called a patent ductus arteriosus (PDA) and is relatively common in premies. There is a vessel that is supposed to be open during pregnancy to allow more blood flow to get to the lungs which is supposed to close upon birth. In premies it oftentimes does not close. They started her on medication tonight to get the vessel to close up. If that doesn’t work, she will likely end up being operated on, though the doctors do not expect we will get to that point.

The small hole is between two of the hearts chambers and it is called a ventricular suptal defect (VSD). I think these are also somewhat common in premies, but I’m not certain. This hole can not be treated with medication, but is not a big enough problem yet to require surgery. It will hopefully close on its own or never cause any complications that we should be concerned with, but no one can say for sure what it will do. The doctors will monitor the VSD closely, possibly beyond her stay in the NICU. Both of the holes in her heart, if they become problematic, will cause difficulty breathing and eating and will stunt her growth.

Despite this news about Lila, one of the doctors described the babies’ conditions as being in “various stages of excellent” and we couldn’t agree more!! Thank you to everyone for continuing to lift our babies up in your prayers and please continue to do so!

Pictures of all of the day’s events will be uploaded to the website soon!

God Bless,
Ethan

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