Yet another surgery for Summer

Summer has surgery tomorrow at 5:00 PM to get her intestines reconnected. Usually surgery is 6-8 weeks after the initial one, but since she has such a small amount left, they feel she would be much better off doing it sooner...the first one she had was July 30th, almost 5 weeks ago. Once she is reconnected, the extra fluid she had been losing will be able to be absorbed and processed by her colon. She will still have to be hooked up to TPN 24/7 for about the first 2 months until the GI team can figure out how to balance her nutrition needs based on how well her intestines recover. She has still been taking in Ellocare, which is a partially digested formula with only 15 calories (breast milk has 20). The lower fat content makes it much easier on her system for both absorption and processing. I am hoping once she is reconnected they can try her on breast milk again. I have filled up half of an upright freezer with breast milk from pumping since the twins were born. Maybe I will have to donate it to a breast milk bank that's in California.....sigh. We will hope for the best though, that is all we can do! Summer is also ready to be moved to a regular hospital room. She no longer needs the extra ICU care...so she will recover in the NICU and then get moved shortly after. This is great news for our family...in the NICU no one under 12 can visit unless a sibling, and the room is not very kid friendly anyway. In a regular room we can have our kids entertained by a TV on a couch with our own private bathroom. OOOOH, living the high life! When Summer was still at Evergreen she had a room like that and it was really nice :)

Summer's foot is finally a little longer than my pinkySTREEETCHCheck out the shoulders, getting chubbier all the timeSummer prefers her binky on her nose...not listening to you, mom!Maybe if she covers her eyes, I will stop flashing her...I doubt it :)

So, we are taking another deeeeep breath and going forward. We are just that much closer to bringing her home!

First day of school...Tom 4th grade, Andrew 1st

Well, summer has once again come to an end. It seemed very quick...okay, that could have alot to do with me only having about 2 weeks of it! We wanted to to the local water park yesterday for one last fling, but it seemed like we had at least 10 things going against our grand plan. Morgan woke up Sunday night screaming frantically. After about 20 minutes of being unable to console her, Tom woke up and picked her up. She calmed down a little only to start throwing up on him. :) Ok, it is kind of funny (only to me of course) that she picked him! She had a fever the next morning and I started feeling a little crummy too. To seal the deal, the temperature dropped to the low 60's with a chance of rain. Seattle is beautiful and green, but all good things come with a price! WE ended up staying home all day, most of it in our PJ's. I finally had a small bit of motivation that moved me to take a shower and take the boys to my friends' house for a BBQ. We ended up staying out too late so the boys went to bed at 10:00 PM...the kids were definitely NOT ready to get up this morning....neither was I.

After we convinced the boys that they WOULD go to school, Tom and I drove them. My parents came over to watch after Morgan, who slept until after 11:00 AM, but woke up fever free :) Since Tom was going to be late for work, we drove into Seattle, then I continued on to see Summer. The boys had a good day...Morgan and I picked them up at the school and we all stayed to play on the playground. While I was talking with some moms, Andrew came up to me and stated (in a way only Andrew can do....Deep thoughts by Andrew) "I really liked her mom! " then ran back to play. He had protested that morning about school until I told him Justin's brother had Ms. Drury the year before and loved her....his attitude took a complete turn around...again only the way Andrew can. Tom has Ms. Aulava, who was his Kindergarten teacher too, so was really looking forward to class this year...no arguments from him :)

Little Tom with Ms. Aulava at the Kindergarten field trip 6-2005

Tom and Andrew in front of the school

Andrew lined up to go in

Tom in Ms. Aulava's class this year

Andrew and his buddy, Jaeger in Ms. Drury's class

Andrew made himself right at home

Tom and his friend, Tyler (behind him)

I only had to explain how many kids I have/Brooke's passing 2 times and made it through without crying, this time. I have been dreading having to see parents and teachers that might not be aware of how things have turned out, but thanks to some good friends who hang out at the school a lot, the principal, PTA board, and teachers were told. I guess there is no way around talking about it anyway....sigh

Now that the school year has begun, it will be easier to go see Summer too :) We have to be thankful for those little perks!

A trip to the Fair

In the midst of our crazy busy last week of Summer, we managed to squeeze in a trip to the Evergreen state fair with my sister, Debbie, followed by the rain gutter regatta. Phew, I was a little tired at the end of the day!

At the fair we looked at all the animals, watched a lumber jack show, and ate some really yummy corn on the cob. I have been craving corn on the cob all summer. Especially while I was stuck eating hospital food for so many weeks! It was worth the $2.50 per cob :P!

Morgan was impressed with the "tows"

Andrew's the cow...

...and Tom is the silo.

Farmer Tom and his cow, Connor

Morgan and Micaela check out the sheep

Andrew and Morgan liked petting this sheep that looks like Morgan's stuffed animal, "Nye"

Pile o' pigs...10 babies born at once!

Connor and Morgan pet the piglet...notice the delicious corn Tom is munching on in the background...yum

Morgan likes the "piggies" and frequently asks to go see them whenever we get in the car

Punk Rockers Connor and Tom

Andrew is the "King" complete with hairy chest

Lovely lady Micaela

Mini tractor ride...woohooMorgan looks like a naturalTom gives Morgan a pushBelieve it or not, one thing the kids really enjoyed was grinding wheat! We were on our way out and we stopped to check out all the old fashioned kitchen appliances...they were covered in flour by the time we were through!I need to put these kids to work on my food storage!

The rain gutter regatta is a cub scout race with pine wood boats created by them and raced by blowing their sails with a straw. Tom's boat sums up our busy/hectic life at the moment....naked and sail tacked down with a push pin. Tom was happy with it that way, so who am I to complain! He did make some engineering changes between races and got the Creative Engineer award. Here's a few highlight pictures...

Color guard presents the flag for the Pledge of Alliegence

Hot air is essential for this race!

Tom and Joshua race

Caleb and Andrew, little brothers, race each other

Tom and Derek

Caleb and Andrew race Joshua

More cute pics and updates

Little Tom, Summer, and mom

I have been taking lots of pictures, of course :) Poor Summer opens her eyes long enough to look around and I flash her with the flash. She is getting big fast. When I visited with her last Sunday, I was told she weighed 3 lbs. 9 oz. By Wed. she had gained a pound and was 4 lbs. 9 oz. As of today she is 4 lbs. 13 oz! She is looking more and more like a "real" baby and getting cuter all the time. Of course, I am a little partial! The surgeons have decided to schedule her surgery to hook her intestines back up next Thurs, Sept. 4th. They are tying new things with her all the time. Yesterday they took her off her oxygen for a while, but she needed it again after 20 minutes. Today they tried to move her to a regular crib, but after a couple of hours she was no longer maintaining her temperature so had to move her back in the incubator. Though she failed both these tests, that is okay...at least they feel she is getting to the point to be ready and will be soon :)

I have to admit I like the bow

Summer looks cute wrapped in this blankie. This is a receiving blanket that belongs to the hospital...it is the one Brooke used on her bed while she was there. We used it to wrap her up on the day she passed away. For some reson it keeps popping up in Summer's room. At first I was kind of sad to see it. Now it seems only appropriate the girls share it...like Brooke is looking after Summer.


Baby tongues are always worth photographing :P

Big Brother, Andrew (with his handsome new hair cut) loves holding Summer...this pic wasn't even posed. How cute!


Summer seems to like Andrew too

Little Tom is great with his little sisters

Sweet big brother

Aunt DebbieGrandma and Grandpa Cameron visit on Sundays

Grandpa Cameron holds Summer for the first time

Grandma Norris gets a little baby fix too

Cozy baby wrapped up in this beautiful afghan knitted for Summer by my friend, Mindy. She had also made a blanket for Brooke...she decided to take it apart and make some special things for Summer out of it. She made two hats, booties, and a teddy bear.

Summer was warm and cozy in the blanket :)

She still likes to kick her feet free...Summer has been doing this ever since she was born.


This week has been packed with more Summer time cramming. We went to the Evergreen State Fair with my sister, Debbie, had 2 sleepovers, and finally got to our favorite beach park today, Friday. The weather has been very Seattle-like with overcast skies and rain...the beach has not been possible until now. Little Tom is spending the night with Connor tonight after going back to the fair today to ride rides, so it was just Andrew and Morgan with Andrew's friend Justin in tow. They had a great time! Morgan asks every time we get in the car to go see Aunt Debbie, go see piggies, go see hm hms (horses), mingos, etc....I guess she has been having a good time!

Morgan loves playing in the pool on our deck...when it isn't raining, of course....oh, wait, when it rains too, she doesn't care!
Morgan and Sadie at the park on a windy day My friend, Angie's, daughter Sadie Morgan popped her head up for a second as the wind blows behind her, causing her wild curly hair to look very poofy, like an 80's doo!Mckenzie came to play at the park too

Cavin is another of Angie's cuties...this was taken at the beach...he hung out with us on the blanket

The boys worked hard building water traps

Andrew and Justin

Andrew is triumphant...Justin successfully buried...except for his wiggly toes!

Andrew and Justin have a lot of fun together

Owen, Sadie, Andrew, and Morgan

Sadie and "Moygan" (Sadie's pronunciation) get along great...Sadie teaches Morgan how to be a girly girl with dress ups, shoes, purses and more. By the way, do you like the IKEA product placement? Ha ha...they label all their free kid stuff for a reason you know :)

Sadie and Morgan spotted a duck..."Look mommy, a guck!"...

..."oh, hi guck", Morgan said. Off they went, the duck went too...

Morgan's cute top half...the scabby upper lip was from falling on the playground.

Morgan's even cute on the bottom half too :)

This is a new way to drink from a fountain...try to capture the water and stuff it in your mouth

This new strategy doesn't seem to be working so well, but hey, what's a little more water when you are already wet?

Morgan had so much fun at the "Beet", she has been begging to go back. Maybe we'll go when the boys are back in school. It never fails, the weather is always really hot the first week of school