Christmas 2010

Oh Christmas. I surprised myself this year by getting all my shopping done by December 5th. I know, it was seriously some kind of miracle. So other than the stress of getting everything mailed to family on time, our December was pretty low key. We got to enjoy a quiet Christmas at home this year. I am honestly thinking that this is the only way to go. While I missed the mass of family that we have always seen on or around Christmas, there is something to be said for being at home with no where we "had" to be.

We started with our Christmas Eve tradition of opening one gift. My parents let us do this growing up and I loved it. My girls do too! lol

Rory was super excited to have her "own" barbie. It was her very first one. She slept with it that night. Cadence took off to play with her Rapunzel doll in the Barbie castle she got last Christmas which is why I don't have other pictures of her on Christmas Eve. It was tough to get the kids to go to bed that night. Even though we don't really make a big deal out of Santa they were still super excited for Christmas to come. After three stories they finally chilled out enough to let us tuck them in.

I then stuffed stockings and put out everything else for the next morning. Here is what our living room looked like Christmas Eve...

Grandma Suzi sent these adorable angel ornaments for the girls. Cadence wanted to keep her's "safe" and wouldn't put it on the tree till the next day.

Christmas morning "dawned" nice and cloudy. And by cloudy, I mean at 9 am it was still pretty dark in the house! The girls were up at 8am like normal and the opening chaos began. Here are a few pictures of them making a paper mess...

What the floor looked like at the half way mark. We had to stop and clean up paper and then opening could resume! lol

It was an awesome morning. The girls got so many wonderful gifts! They were super spoiled despite being miles from our family this year. We had waffles and took our time getting ready for the day. We spent the evening at the Bowen's house, where we had an amazing Turkey and Ham dinner. The kids played with some friends and their new toys, watched movies, and Brady and I got to chat, laugh and play one amazingly long, and super hilarious game of Uno with friends. It will definitely go down as one of the best Christmas' I have ever had!

Brady had most of the week off after Christmas and so we had a lazy week. Monday was a rough day for me pregnancy wise. Lots of pressure and discomfort all day. I was prepared to go to the hospital for them to check me when it finally started to go away after dinner. I had a Drs appointment on Wednesday, where they checked me to make sure everything was alright. I was dilated to a one, but still "thick" (or not effacing). All this is perfectly normal considering this is my third baby and I am now entering the home stretch. I have been having braxton hicks often, but everything else has been pretty normal since then.

Our best news is to do with Rory. At my appointment on Wednesday I popped her up on the scale when I was done just to see if any of the dietary changes we have made are working. She was 25.6 pounds!!!! Keep in mind that she gained only 2 pounds between her 1st and 2nd birthdays. On November 12, when she had her scope, she weighed 22.4 pounds. Putting on 3 pounds in almost two months is AMAZING!! I was so excited to see that number on the scale! The changes we have made for Rory have been simple, but a little complicated. She gets a benefiber supplement twice a day. We have switched her to a high fiber/low sugar diet. We are avoiding as many "fake" sugars as possible and sticking with those sugars found in nature. We have seen a pretty big difference in her stools in the last month. Her diarrhea has gone from daily to every few days with solid stools being a much more common occurrence.

We have also taken her off of soy products completely. We noticed after lunch one day that Rory had a rash on her face from the ranch she had with her chicken. I took a look at the ingredients and Soy bean oil was the very first ingredient. She had the reaction a few more times after that and so I decided to take soy out of the equation. This has been pretty difficult. Soy is in SO many things. I have resorted to making almost everything from scratch. It takes much more time, but Rory's stools got even better and she has cut WAY back on how much she eats. At first I was worried about that, but after seeing the change on the scale I feel that we have found our culprit in Rory's health/weight issues.

That is pretty much all that has been happening for us as 2010 comes to an end! We hope that you all had a wonderful holiday season and a Happy and safe New Year!

The baby naming game...

It's funny, but I can't tell you how many people seem to think that Brady and I would have no trouble naming this little girl. It's our third girl after all. We must just be ROLLING in extra girl names at this point right?

Naming Cadence was easy. It had been my favorite name for many years. I got lucky and Brady liked it from day one and so we were set when we found out she was a girl.

Naming Rory was insanity! We went round and round and round with no names we both liked. I was going crazy, Cadence was calling her Violet, and Brady kept coming up with names that I felt were just awful. FINALLY a whole MONTH before Rory made her grand entrance into the world we agreed on her name. Cutting it a bit close, but we did finally get her named. Thankfully she came out looking like a Rory, or we would have been in trouble.

Now we are on girl number three. Honestly, had this baby been a boy we would have had just as much work to do. We had some ideas for a boy, but Brady and I haven't ever been in agreement on those either. With a girl though, we were starting completely from scratch. We had nothing. No ideas, and for the first few weeks after we found out she was a she we both just let it sit. Finally I pulled out the 100,000 plus baby name book and started with "A." I went through EVERY SINGLE NAME. Seriously. Took me over a week. I wrote down any name that I liked with no other considerations. When I was done I had a list of a little over 50 names. I handed that list over to Brady and told him to just go through and cross of anything he didn't like. When he was done we still had 25 names! Oy.

So we let it sit. After a week or so Brady decided we should get rid of all the R and C names to cut the list down (since we already have kids with C and R names). That cut it down a bit but not by much since there actually weren't any R names on the list. Next was anything that rhymed or was to "matchy" with the girls names. Nice. We still had 15 or so names...

Again we let it sit. I got back in gear after another week and put our last name with everything on the list. Should have done that sooner! lol The list went down by half once we got rid of the ones that just plain sounded wrong all together. At that point I felt we were down to a manageable list (eight names). We liked all of them and they went well with our last name. However I kept coming back to one name over and over. Oddly enough it wasn't my "favorite." Heck it wasn't even in my top four, but I kept coming back to it over and over. I would peek at the list and my eyes would just be drawn to it. It was actually starting to irritate me. I decided to give it more time and see if Brady came up with any he liked best.

Then Brady came home from work one day last week and told me that he had looked over the names again and that he liked a certain one best over the others. Can you guess what name it was?? Yep. The one I had been drawn too for no apparent reason at all. I laughed when he told me.

I can't describe the feeling really. The name just...fits. Almost like it was her name already and we were just now figuring it out, and to make the whole thing weirder whenever I say it out loud she kicks me.

So...long story all to tell everyone that our third little girl has a name!! And almost a whole THREE MONTHS before she is due. I mentioned it to my mom and the first thing she said was, "Wow. Thats early!" :o) I was surprised too Mom.

Lantz girl number three will be named...

We realize that we know a few Rebecca/Rebekah's. I can only think of one that actually goes by Becca. Oddly enough it doesn't bother me. You Rebecca/Rebekah's that we do know are awesome enough to think it was cool! :o) Added bonus is Cady loves it, and it sounds SOOOO stinking cute when Rory says it in her sweet little 2 year old voice.

We do have a back up name, just in case. I'm keeping that one under wraps because I am 100% sure that when we have this girl in our arms she will be Beckah. Still, it never hurts to be prepared!

We hope everyone is having an awesome Holiday season!

What things are like around here...

Yeah...that about sums it up!

Thanksgiving and other things...

We had a great Thanksgiving here in Nebraska. Just our little family and it was more fun than I thought it would be. I missed the noise and bustle of the family get together, but I did find that I was very nice to have a weekend with no demands, no where to go, and to just enjoy our little family. On Friday we went and saw Tangled. It was very fun and really funny! Saturday Brady tried to put some Christmas lights up on the house. He neglected to check them first so half of them didn't work. We also found out that the outlets on the outside of our house do not work. Going have to get that fixed soon. I picked up some new lights and we will try again this weekend weather permitting. Brady gave a talk in church on sunday. It was wonderful and I am so glad that I decided to go since I hadn't been feeling well.

On other news, I had a Drs appointment today. Everything is going very well on the pregnancy front. Baby girl is very active and her heartbeat is strong and steady. I had the joy of having my glucose screen today as well. I'm not sure they could make that drink worse if they tried. I got lucky for the blood draw and the gal got a vein the first time, but she snagged some tissue before she got in the vein, so I have a really pretty lump and bruise. I was really glad that it was just one poke though. Normally it takes three or four in several different places. This woman was an angel and took me at my word that my hand was her best bet (considering that the last 17 or so times I have had to have either an IV or blood taken my right hand is the only place that has worked). The results came back just fine and I can now look forward to having my Rhogam shot in the next two days. :o) Oh the delights of being Rh negative with a Rh positive husband. This will be my 5th Rhogam shot and if this little girl tests for a positive blood type I will get number six after she is born. It's a pain, but I truly grateful for modern medicine. Without these shots I would have run the great risk of rejecting any babies born after Cadence. I so glad that isn't something I have to worry about.

Cadence's rash is officially gone. She is finishing up her antibiotics and thankfully it seems the rest of us have escaped whatever it is that she had. Her strep culture came back negative, but the Drs told us that it still could have been Scarlet Fever. I'm just glad it is gone!

I hope that everyone had an awesome Thanksgiving and that you are all looking forward to Christmas! Happy Holidays!

Cady's turn...

Seems like we can't go more than a week without someone being sick or something weird happening.

On Friday night, Cadence told us she didn't feel well. Her throat hurt, she didn't want to eat and was very lethargic. By bed time she had a 103.4 fever and was pretty miserable. We give her some tylenol and sent her to bed hoping it would be better in the morning.

Saturday morning she had a 101 fever and was feeling more like her old self. By mid morning she was acting like herself again. So we thought crisis over.

Sunday morning, I woke up and got ready for church. The girls came in about 7:30am and Cadence said that she was itching really bad. So I had her take off her PJs and found she was covered head to toe in spots. A low grade fever was back and she said that her throat hurt again. So we called the TriCare Emergency PCM number and explained her symptoms (the clinic is closed on Sundays). The nurses we talked to were concerned that it could be strep (possibly trying to turn into scarlet fever) based on symptoms. So they okayed us a trip to the quick care option here in our area.

The Dr took cultures and they ruled out a couple of things and said that he really thought it was strep. The lab on the strep wouldn't be back until Monday or Tuesday, but he prescribed us some meds anyway since he wanted her on the mend as soon as possible (you know, since Thanksgiving is like four days from now).

So we started the meds and we are hoping that she will be feeling better soon since she is pretty miserable right now. Here are some pictures of her spots. She has them ALL over. Including the bottoms of her feet, her palms, and inside her ears. So far none on her tongue or in her mouth. It was funny cause the Dr told us to keep the girls apart. Hey, I'll try, but really it's next to impossible.

And here is crazy little Rory. She has been doing pretty good since we started her on the extra fiber. Her stools have firmed up a bit and sometimes they have been completely NORMAL! Woot! lol. We haven't had normal from her in a very long time so this is great. Now if we can just get her gaining weight...

I really hope that everyone is having a great November and that you are looking forward to an awesome Thanksgiving!

Rory's results...

We got Rory's biopsie results today. They were very good and nothing is wrong! I was relieved to hear it and frustrated at the same time. The Dr asked us to put her on a high fiber, low sugar diet (we were already doing the low sugar part anyway) and we will be adding a Benefiber supplement daily to see if that makes a difference in her stools. He also wants us to have her allergy tested (which was the next step anyway). We will go back and see the Dr in January with allergy results and with any luck have something pegged down. At this point though I am ready for them to tell me that there isn't anything wrong and this is just how she is, and that maybe she will grow out of it.

In the end, Rory is happy. She IS grown even if her weight is on the low side, and she is meeting or exceeding all her milestones. I have much to be thankful for in her case and I am already praying that adding extra fiber will help us get over this hill for her.

Thank you so much for all the prayers and best wishes! We feel so blessed to have so many friends and family who love and care about us!

Rory's Upper Endoscopy and Partial Lower...

Rory had her scope today!

Our morning started early (4:30am early) and we hit the road by 5:30am. We needed to be at the BoysTown Research Hospital by 6:15 to check in and get all the paperwork started (there wasn't much but everyone needed bracelets). They took us back to Rory's room and she got some HUGE but sweet Bugs Bunny PJs and the nurse explained everything and had us sign some stuff saying we understood everything.

Then they gave Rory some meds to help her relax and possibly sleep before they actually put her under. They told us that she might be loopy and act odd, but that it was normal. I am still trying to get videos off my phone, but Rory sure was acting silly!! They say it takes 40 mintues for full effect, but she was out after about 20. The nurse brought play dough, coloring supplies and a few games to keep us occupied (other than PBS on the TV) while we waited. They had a sweet play room, but we opted to stay in our room since Rory got loopy pretty fast.

The childs rights lady came in and Rory got to pick what flavor of gas/mask she wanted (she picked bubble gum) and the color of the sticky tape for her IV. They they explained one more time what the scope would be like and that it would be pretty fast. Then anesthesiologist came in (really nice woman) an let us know that Rory would be put out with a gas first, then get her IV (which was good cause since the last time she was "poked" for blood she has had a thing about needles), and that she would be staying with her the whole time until she woke up. Rory was totally out already at this point and a few minutes later (8:15 right on schedule) the anesthesiologist came back and carried her back.

The wonderful nurse brought us all muffins (Rory couldn't eat this morning and so none of us did so she wouldn't get upset). And we waited.

About 17 minutes later Rory's GI Specialist came in and gave us a print out of the pictures of her insides!! lol. They scoped her throat, stomach, small intestines, and then part of her large intestines as well. He told us that visually everything looked really good, but the biopsies would give us a better "picture" as it were. He said if there is any inflammation in the tissue the biopsy would tell. They also took some samples to find out if she had any enzyme issues, especially since she was testing a bit malnourished. The Dr told us that everything went very well and that he would call with results in a week.

15 minutes later they brought me a grumpy and groggy girl. She had acquired a new stuffed puppy and once she was back in my lap she promptly went to sleep again. lol. She woke up pretty quickly at the mention of juice and drank almost the entire cup. The nurse was impressed, especially since she kept it all down, and brought in the discharge papers very shortly after that.

Rory and Mommy took a 3 hour nap as soon as we got home. :o)

We are super glad that it all went well. We are super proud of Rory for being such a trooper (I don't think she cried once the whole morning). We feel so very blessed to have had some of the best, and most caring Drs and nurses during this whole ordeal. We are super grateful to all our family and friends and their prayers on Rory's behalf. We are truly blessed to have all of you on our side. Most of all we want to thank our Heavenly Father for giving us peace of mind and the right people at the right time to help our daughter. Life is so much easier with the Lord's peace and help.

Thanks everyone! I will update with more normal things in a few days and of course when we get her results. If nothing obvious turns up the Dr did say that we should be heading to an allergist next.