Keeping busy

Watching TV at the doctor's office

Eating dinner

These glasses just get in the way!

I actually ate some too.

Fighting over toys

Bad photo, but you can see her fuzzy mohawk

Stylish hat

Notice the super hero sticker on her chest. derek found a good spot for it.


It’s been a while since my last post. Last week our whole family was sick. For a family who has tried hard all winter, to stay away from crowds, wash our hands and generally avoid sickness, we sure have seen a lot of it. This last round of a stomach-flu hit pretty hard but luckily it only lasted about 24 hours. With the staggered effect of passing the sickness on to each other, it remained our family for much longer than 24 hours. The boys got sick and threw up in many interesting places, so I did a lot of cleaning during this period. We all seem to be better now and I hope we are close to reaching the end of RSV season so we can come out of seclusion soon. While the babies have been sick several times, we have been lucky and avoided RSV or anything that would come close to re-hospitalization.

Speaking of going back to the hospital, we are quickly approaching Brandon’s surgery. The surgeon has assured us that a hernia repair is so much simpler than his past operations but we are still very nervous. We hope to have him home within 24 hours but we are well aware of all of the complications that can arise from surgery. Brandon’s current surgery is scheduled for the 16th. Please keep him in your prayers.

As I have mentioned previously, Brandon has been diagnosed with hemiperisis. This means that his left side seems to be less responsive and it is developing slower. While it is certainly is apparent and very real, he has made really great progress. He has good moments and bad ones. We were encouraged with the therapist came over and couldn’t tell which hand was the problem hand. Brandon recently had a splint made that helps keep his thumb outstretched rather than always curled in. We keep it on him for two hours at a time throughout the day.

One of our big concerns is that they are still growing very slowly. They are almost 9 months old. Katelyn is 10lbs 10 oz. and Brandon is 11lbs. 7oz. One of the things we are doing to help them grow is feeding them solids 3 times a day. Despite her smaller size, Katelyn eats a lot. She is very messy but she loves to eat. She is also very active and one of the therapists was pretty sure that her high level of activity was burning a lot of calories.

Katelyn is pretty effective at moving around the living room and finding things to play with. She loves Brandon’s glasses, TV remotes and power cords. Brandon and Katelyn often get a hold of the same toy and engage in a tug-of-war.

The other day a funny thing happened with Katelyn. She has not been taking a bottle for months. When we first brought her home from the hospital we worked hard to get her to take a bottle but she resisted. We spent a lot of time with the occupational therapist trying many different tactics but our strong-willed girl resisted. The other day Brandon finished his bottle but still seemed hungry. Amy put a little more milk in his bottle and while carrying Katelyn walked the bottle back to Brandon and me. During the walk back, Katelyn grabbed the bottle with both hands and started drinking. Within a very short period of time she had downed the whole thing. I guess we can give bottles another shot :)

A section of our fence recently blew over in a storm. Yesterday I was outside trying to figure out how to fix it. The handle on the gate also was damaged. I had the latch in my hand when the boys convinced me we needed to race across the yard. I was feeling confident and I told them that I could beat them even if I was running backwards. It turns out I was wrong. They got ahead of me. I turned on the speed and really began to move my legs and arms. Blake figured out that the shortest path to the finish line was to run in my path. The metal latch, which was still in my hand, connected solidly with Blake’s head. As a result, we spent some time in the doctor’s office getting staples in his head. Not only did I feel horrible for seriously injuring my son, after repeatedly lecturing Blake about running with objects in his hand, but I also had to explain what happened to the doctor and nurses. He was very brave and upon returning home he asked if we could go back some time. I’m sure this desire was influenced by the pile of Batman and Star Wars stickers that both Derek and Blake got from the nurse. However, I would have much preferred to skip the experience.