Peanut’s liver numbers are remaining slightly elevated and under normal conditions they’d be doing a liver biopsy to check things out. However, her platelets are remaining low so they don’t dare do the procedure because of the extra risk of bleeding complications. So we just continue to monitor her and increase her immune suppressant drug.

Still no answers as to what’s causing the reoccurring internal bleeding problems. We’re going to hope that (if it happens again) they’ll be able to do the red blood cell tag early enough to see where the bleeding’s coming from  and/or that there wont be an air pocket so that they’ll be able to do a colonoscopy and go in and check things out. So if/when it happens again we’re supposed to rush right in and get an x-ray and if there’s no pneumatosis then they’ll scope her. We’re also tentatively planning on an upper and lower scope in the next few months if she doesn’t have a bleeding episode before then.

They did a CT scan last Thursday to check her vessels and also to check for lymph nodes since her EBV is still showing its ugly head. They also put her back on acyclovir to see if they can get that back in check again. We have yet to hear about any results from the scan though. I’ll probably be calling to bug them if they don’t call tomorrow.

On top of all this, the doctor felt it necessary to inform me that its not uncommon for transplant kids with these problems to end up needing another transplant. If it did come to that she doesn’t feel like it’d be any time in the near future. But still, I so did not to hear this right now! I’ve been feeling the effects of all the worrying I’ve been doing as is!

On a happy note…

To celebrate our mom’s 2 year death anniversary on the 13th my sister’s judge signed the bifurcation (or whatever its called) and she’s officially a single woman!

Also, the weather decided to be kind to us and clear up for Peanut to have her birthday party outside on Saturday. Peanut had a blast and we’re so thankful for all her (and our) friends that helped make it special! You can check out pictures from the event here.

Then to finish out the crazy week, Luke and I ditched the kids and went to cheer on the BYU rugby team in the national championship game. Sad they lost (we blame it on the refs) but we enjoyed ourselves and they still played a great game! And my brother-in-law scored a try (or whatever it’s called) which was the best part! Photo’s from the Rugby game here.

1 1/2 lbs chicken – cooked and shredded

Combine:

1/2 c. honey

1/4 c. lime juice

1 T. Chili powder

1/2 t. garlic powder

Marinate chicken in above mixture for 1 hour.

When done, mix suace:

2 (10 oz) cans green chili enchilada sauce

1 c. half and half

Put about 3/4 c. of sauce in bottom of 9×13 pan.

Then I used the tortillas that you cook yourself (about 10) but you can use other kinds.

Put some chicken, spoonful of sauce, and some cheese in tortilla roll up and place side by side in pan.

Poor remainder of sauce over the top and sprinkle with cheese.

Cook uncovered at 350 for 25 minutes.

SOOO scrumptious!

This is her right before we took her down to surgery.

Probably feeling extremely awful but still had smiles!

This is her in the PICU after surgery

SO many tubes and wires and things in such a tiny girl!

Breaks my heart every time I look at these pictures.

This was the first time I got to hold her afterwards.

Very tender moment for me!

I’m so grateful that I was able to be there and wasn’t in a hospital bed myself!

And here she is now! Three years later and super crazy and energetic.

So grateful that TR has such an amazing older sister!

Can’t imagine life without her!

This is her trying to play peek-a-boo. She tries so hard but only covers maybe one eye 50% of the time! It’s quite cute. She is still our little tornado. Luke was taking care of her while I was in the hospital with Peanut and was filling me in on what he was doing at home. He explained it pretty well when he was complaining that while he was in the kitchen cleaning the fridge she was destroying the living room. Then while he was in the living room picking up her destruction she was in the kitchen pulling all the towels, spatulas, spoons, etc. out of the cupboards/drawers. And around and round it goes! That’s the story of our lives! But she’s just too cute and fun to complain about! :) Her smile and jibber jabber continues to melt my heart! She’s also started scaring me half to death by climbing on everything and anything she can get on/in. So nows she’s turning into our little monkey too! And I’m continuing to realize how low-key of a child Peanut was when it comes to all that!

Couple of weeks ago Peanut and I got to go spend a night and day with this super smiley, super cute, little girl. She just keeps getting bigger and cuter by the minute! It was a lot of fun to go hang out with my sistas! And very much needed I might add! Love them so much and am so grateful to have them in my life!

Had to do one more of her cause she’s just too cute not to share!

Update on the Pea… She hasn’t had any more super worrisome bloody poops! We’ve had two scares but they, thankfully, didn’t amount to anything. At her doctor appt 2 weeks ago the doctor said that if she were to have another air pocket then they’d have to keep her in the hospital NPO (nothing my mouth) for a week! So ever since then I’ve been praying extra extra hard that it wouldn’t come to that cause I’m just not sure I could handle it right now. I feel like I’m not as strong as I used to be when it comes to spending time with Peanut at the hospital. I still continue to try and live by our last blogs title ‘Count Your Many Blessings’ because sometimes that’s the only thing that keeps me going! And I cease to be amazed by how much our Heavenly Father has really blessed us with (and continues to do so!) and I’m so grateful for the gospel and it’s teachings that give my heart the peace and comfort it needs. I of course can only write this now that I’m past my ‘I just can’t do this anymore!’ phase! ;)

She wasn’t very happy to get her picture taken though.

These are the things that make hospital life bearable!

Update on her status: We are back home with still no answers. They are going to run a blood test for possible food allergies that could be causing it but they don’t seem real hopeful that they will find anything. They have a few hypothesis as to what is causing it back they really don’t know for sure and really don’t know what to do about it. So we just wait and see if it happens again :(

Tonight while Luke was tucking her in bed and saying goodnight here was the conversation…

Peanut: I don’t want to see Santa tonight.
Luke: You won’t, he’ll come while you’re sleeping.
Peanut: So I don’t have to see Santa?
Luke: No, no you don’t.
Peanut: Okay

A few things about her at One Year…

-She’s already a picky eater just like her mom and sister, however, she does like tomatoes which none of the rest of us like. And she LOVES fruit! I’m so glad too because Peanut hardly likes any fruit.

-She already has a huge bad habit which I think will be one of my resolutions in the new year to break…she has to go to bed with a bottle (I’m ashamed to admit that it has become her ‘comfort object.’) It’s a tuff one though cause I’m glad she’s not addicted to the binky like her sister was.

-Her favorite things to do include: banging on the window (blinds if she can reach them), removing all the books from the bookshelves, putting the bath toys (or whatever she has with her) in the toliet, clearing the cupboard of sippy cups (which have recently been moved to a higher location, emptying the dish towel and bib drawers, waking Peanut up if she’s awake and Pea isn’t, tearing pages out of books and magazines, playing with her sister (when she’ll let her) and last the best of all…giving loves!

-She’s the hardest little stinker to get to laugh! A few things that are usually no fails are tickling (grabbing) her sides when changing her diaper and playing peek-a-boo and hide and seek. She also has the cutest little evil laugh – it’s may absolute favorite!

-She loves bath time!

-She loves when Daddy comes home! She’ll run to meet him at the door and then follow him where ever he goes. Peanut’s latest thing to do when daddy gets home is to hide from him under the desk in our kitchen and now TR does it too.

Is EVERYWHERE! She even started walking. Of course she wont do it for the camera, the little stinker! But here’s the best we got…

IMGP0007

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=332062&id=639874391&l=908b762ffa

Peanut was super excited for Halloween this year. After switching from wanting to be a cat (like Dora) to Batgirl (I have no idea where that idea came from!) to a ninja turtle (Leonardo to be exact – her favorite) to Gohan (Dragonball Z) to a witch (like Garndma) and back to a cat again. She finally settle on being a cat but a ‘Cinderella’ cat however. (I guess she thought her costume looked like a princess dress.) It worked out that my sister-in-law had a dog costume that would fit Baby A so we went as cats and dogs! Too bad it was pouring rain so we didn’t do much trick-or-treating.

You can see more of her cuteness here.

This is the only other picture I got of the fun weekend with family. Aren’t these the cutest girls ever! And no I’m sure I’m not bias! :)

With that in mind you’d think I’d learned my lesson and should always go prepared to stay overnight when I take Peanut in for a procedure. Nope. Sad thing this time was that somehow deep down inside I knew we’d end up staying overnight but didn’t want to except it so I went thinking we’d go in, she’d get her endoscopy, she’d recover, we’d go home. Nope.

Explanation for those who care, don’t know what’s going on, or need some refreshers (a.k.a. my journal post)…

Peanut has had portal hypertension (good ol’ wikipedia!) ever since her portal vein clotted after her liver transplant. As a result they/we’ve been watching for signs of varices. Peanut hadn’t been showing any signs (bloody/tar like stools or throwing up blood), however her doctor wanted to do an endoscopy just to make sure since it had been so long since the last time she’d had in endoscopy (which was pre-transplant I think) and since she’s still showing signs of portal hypertension (enlarged spleen mostly). With no signs of any varices, I thought it’d be like last time. They’d go in see some but nothing too bad, do nothing, Peanut would stay in recovery for a few hours, and we’d be home! However, there was one vein that was pretty enlarged and looked like it could rupture at anytime so they ‘banded‘ it. Which resulted in a night stay in the hospital (nothing really compared to how much we were in the hospital within the first year of her life. And I did say annual overnight hospital stay cause it’s been almost a year since our last one which I feel really lucky about!

Peanut was really funny with this one. The first day all she wanted to do was come home. By morning time she didn’t want to leave. I think she enjoyed the one-on-one time with mommy, the non-stop TV watching, and the being waited on hand and foot!

I made these 25 jars of baby food for about $8.66. That equals 34 cents a jar.

Now, I get coupons for Beechnut quite frequently. My lastest purchase was 20 jars at 44 cents each minus $2 off coupon which made each jar 34 cents.

So was it worth all the time I spent in the kitchen? NO! Sure I saved the earth of some extra glass jars. And I’m so called feeding my baby healthier, fresher food. But it took me WAY too long! And by the time I pay the electricity bill for cooking the stuff it probably ended up costing more!

Don’t worry all you environmental/organic/healthy freaks out there… I’ve started milling/grinding/smashing the food we eat and feed it to her fresh but I don’t think I’ll go out of my way to make baby food again. Unless someone can convince me that it really is worth it.

+

This Movie

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Major Dangerous Potential

Good thing the handmade gate to match our wonderful handmade railing is on its way. Thanks a million Grandpa Dave!

P.S. Update for those who care:

Baby A saw the urologist who rated her reflux on a scale from 1-5 as a 2.5. Basically, she has a 60-70% chance of growing out of it by 5-6 years of age. The Doc gave us three options. #1 Prophylactic antibiotics to prevent future UTI’s and then retest in a year. #2 Endoscopic surgery where they inject a substance to try and ‘stop’ the reflux. And 3# Surgery to ‘cure’ the reflux. We chose option #1. So now every member of the family besides Daddy is on some kind of prescribed medication – we gotta keep those drug manufacturers in business!! Baby A is a champ at taking her medicine! Could be due to the fact that it’s known as one of the better tasting ones but I’m still impressed after the fights that took place to try and get her to take her multivitamins and the other med she was on for her UTI. So keep those prayers comin’ for the next year in hopes that she’ll grow out of it so that another one of my children doesn’t have to undergo general anesthesia in their early years of life!

On another ‘happy’ note: Mommy may have to undergo general anesthesia for the first time in her life for knee surgery! Back in May I thought I hurt my knee doing squats and lunges while working out with Wii Active. After having the pain come and go so often and experiencing extreme pain for two days after giving Peanut a horseback ride I finally got it looked at. I’m currently attempting a non-surgical treatment approach. Wish me luck cause it’s not looking to promising! Oh, for those of you who want to know what’s wrong: refer here.

Now on to Peanut . . . She’s potty trained . . . almost. She’s done great with everything but poop. She WILL NOT go poop in the potty. And I’ve gotten SO frustrated. I’m not really sure what started it. If she was indeed constipated beforehand because of the new medicine she started or if she was just holding it cause she didn’t want to go. All I know is that now she for sure is just holding it and refuses to poop in the potty. So we practically spend all day in the bathroom or on the couch with her moaning, crying, or complaining that her tummy’s not feeling good. We took her to the doc last Saturday when she hadn’t pooped at all since Wednesday and she pooped (a tiny bit) while there so all they said was to give her apple juice or prune juice. Tried that and talked to a few people who had similar problems with their kid(s) and tried a bunch of other things. Nothing’s working. My latest strategy, this suggestion, came from my good neighbor. Just pray that it works because I’ve already run completely out of patience.

She had her three month check-up with her liver doc. Her EBV levels were coming down and we’re hoping to see greater improvement since we were finally able to get the new medicine for it. Her spleen is still enlarged which means her portal vein still isn’t functioning and her body hasn’t completely compensated for it. So she’s schedule for an endoscopy this fall to check for varices again. She hasn’t shown any signs of having problems with them but since they haven’t been looked at in over a year they want to make sure. Everything else looked great!

Later Peanut’s talking on her princess phone that she usually uses to call Snow While, Cinderella, etc. to invite them to her house to play and says, “Hello Alice!” Pause “Where you falling from?” Pause “Did it hurt?”