Eleven Months

I hope your Christmas was as joyous, busy and fun filled as ours was (more information to be posted soon).

I can't believe Noah is eleven months already. This year seems to have just flown by. 2009 has been a year filled with joy, comfort, tragedy, peace, patience, family, friends, and most of all love.

Earlier this week, we visited our most favorite pediatrician. What we initially thought was pneumonia, turned out to be a bacterial infection in Noah's trach. The very same bacterial infection that we just finished a month of antibiotics to get rid of. Apparently, that was not enough to encourage the little buggers to leave. The Dr. thinks they might be colonizing, so we're back on antibiotics hoping this will finally be it.

Noah's current stats are:

Weight: 26 pounds (90th percentile)
Length: 30 inches (80th percentile)
Kc got this adorable bear coat for Noah from his Secret Santa at work. We couldn't resist taking a picture of him in it.After several minutes of photos, this is the expression you get from Mr. Man. Grrrr!

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas

Love Kc, Rebecca and Noah
{Sierra and Kitty, too}

Wrapping Paper

What do you get when you add one little boy, a jumper hanging from the doorway, inexpensive butcher paper and paint? Well...wrapping paper, of course.

This year, as I was getting set to wrap all my gifts, I wanted to do something a little different, a bit more special, and definitely a whole lot cheaper. I decided that a bit of child labor was in order and found some butcher paper and pulled out some old paint from my craft drawer. I put Noah in his jumper, painted his little feet, and watched him jump all over the paper. It was glorious fun for him and the results were awesome, even if it was a bit of a pain to clean up afterward.Look at those adorable thighs. Makes you just want to nibble on them!Here's what the finished product looked like. So fantastic!

Deck the Halls

Last week, The Jackson family (boy how I love the way that sounds) decorated their Christmas tree. It's always so exciting to open up the boxes of ornaments and think about the special times/places/people that surround each individual ornament.The last ornament we placed on the tree was a very special gift to Noah from Ken and Cathy. It is an adorable "Baby's First Christmas" ornament with a spot in the middle for a picture. We used the picture of Noah is his red and white stripped stocking cap...too adorable.Thank you so much for the wonderful ornament. It will be a treasured reminder of this first Christmas year after year.

Bye-Bye

Noah has recently learned how to wave bye-bye. He doesn't quite know what it means, but he loves to wave at people he know.

Noah's first Christmas present

Several weeks ago, I received a large bill from Noah's home health company that provides us with all of our trach and g-tube supplies as well as the durable medical equipment (two suction machines, feeding pump and apnea monitor). Thankfully in the past, my insurance has paid for all of the supplies, so I was quite shocked by the bill. After a quick call to the company, they informed me that the insurance company is no longer paying the rental for Noah's apnea monitor. What?!? That monitor is essential! There is no way we would know if Noah's trach came out while he was sleeping or out of our line of vision...Noah can't just cry and let us know something is wrong.

I quickly called my insurance company and was prepared for quite a battle. After a very short conversation with a lovely representative, I was informed that most durable medical equipment is rent-to-own. The insurance company had paid, in rental fees, the price of the apnea monitor and so now it was ours. Wow! Noah's very own apnea monitor! How very special! Just in time for Christmas!

A short phone call to the home health company, later that afternoon, confirmed what the insurance company had said. The bill was an error and we were told to rip it up.

So, Noah received his first Christmas present from our insurance company. And what a gift it was.

Notice the hands in mouth...EVERYTHING must go into Noah's mouth these days.

Big Boy Crib

Well...I finally feel as though I am able to take a bit of time and blog. These past three weeks have been a whirlwind for the Jackson family both at home and at work. I am now off for two weeks and get to focus on being a Mama. Yeah!

Several weeks ago, Kc and I gave in to the fact that as long as Mr. Man has his trach, he will be rooming with his parents. Right now, we are getting up several times throughout the night to suction Noah. We are both able to sleep quite well, me perhaps better than Kc, and wake quickly when Noah becomes rattly. The thought of having to walk down the hall into Noah's nursery several times in the middle of the night just does not appeal to me. Once we embraced our new roomie, we quickly realized that his pack-and-play was just too small. So, one Saturday, Kc took apart the crib he put together in Noah's nursery and moved it into our room. It's amazing how much easier and faster it was to put together the second time.
Noah just LOVES his crib. He takes full advantage of the room he has to roll around in.
Just before Noah rolls onto his tummy and falls asleep, he will peek over the side of the bumper pad and try to see if we're still there watching...we usually are. It is just too cute!

Busy...

Well...Mama and Daddy-O have been terribly busy this past week. They keep talking about getting ready for Christmas, shopping, wrapping, pictures, getting the cards out, parties, get-togethers, family, and work. Sounds like a lot to me. I will try to remind them to blog soon.

In the meantime, here's a cute Christmas picture of me.

Dynamic Kids

Noah has been receiving physical therapy twice a week for the past three months. Last Wednesday, he has his three-month evaluation where his progress is checked and new goals are set. When Noah first started PT, he was performing most tasks that a two or three month old child would do. As of Wednesday, all of his goals were met (sitting unassisted, picking up an object from the floor while sitting, and transferring an object from one hand to the other) and he has successfully completed all tasks that a 5 1/2 month old child would do as well as some tasks in the six and seven month range! It's been a lot of hard work, but Mr. Man is doing great! We've got a long way to go, but with the help of Mrs. Sandy at Dynamic Kids and Mrs. Jennifer at CitiKids, I know or little Stink Pot will make tremendous progress.
Noah's new goals for this next three months are to pull himself up from a sitting position to a standing position, cruise along furniture, and sit up from a lying position. Mrs. Sandy has also put crawling on the list, but she is less optimistic. Our little guy just HATES to be on his knees and pretty much refuses to try crawling. If it were up to Noah, he would skip the crawling thing all together and go right into walking. We'll see if Mrs. Sandy and Mrs. Jennifer let him.