Update on Eli

Eli is not coming home tonight. the Dr. was willing to send him home but the nurse mentioned to Amy that he was borderline. After discussing it further with the Dr. Amy decided it was in Eli's best interest to stay the night and have the opportunity of meeting with a Speech Therapist tomorrow morning.

He seems to be doing well. The goal is to get him to the point where they only have to suction the snot out of his nose every 12-hours. Apparently there are places where you can take your kid and have them suctioned that do not require a hospital stay. That seems to make things both quicker and cheaper.

Eli back in the hospital

The last few days Eli has had a harder time than normal breathing because his nose has been so clogged with snot. It really is hard to look at your little baby and see them struggling to breath. Friday he started desatting–oxygen concentration dips below 90% and the alarm starts going off–very quickly and couldn't bring himself back to normal very quickly. Amy turned his oxygen up to 1/16 from 1/32 and he seemed to calm down. Saturday morning she took him right into the Dr. to have him checked.

The Dr. did several checks and couldn't find anything but the breathing and quick desat times convinced him that he needed to be checked out at a better facility. Amy then ran home, put together a daypack and left for Primary Children's hospital. She returned around 10:00 PM that night.

Eli is still in the hospital but we are hoping he will be able to come home tonight or tomorrow. Amy would like him to come home tomorrow because that will allow him to be checked by the speech therapist regarding his swallowing.

I told Amy that I am running out of ideas for the kid's meals. I have already cooked that Dad standby–Mac 'n' Cheese–, have taken them to McDonald's for happy meals, given them left over pizza, and fixed them sandwiches. The only other thing I have up my sleeve before I start venturing into new territory is instant oatmeal–which I am going to give them for dinner.

Update on Eli

Amy was able to take Eli for his one-week-out-of-the-hospital checkup on Monday and to our surprise our little baby had gained a pound in a week which is really really good. So good, that Amy asked the Doctor if we were feeding him too much.

His oxygen was lowered and we may be able to start taking him completely off of oxygen for tests starting next week. So he's growing like a weed and getting strong day-by-day.

Rock Climbing with three boys???

We went rock climbing last week. I thought my kids were good at climbing at home. Avery scaled several walls that were 40 feet high on his first attempt. He climbed up and up and up. Black was able to get about 15 feet up several walls and Colin reached the 5 foot mark. They had an absolute blast!!! Of course they all want to do it again.

Scare

Yesterday we had a scare. The warning on Eli's oxygen monitor started going off again. Happens pretty regularly but much less frequently than the first day. Amy came into the bedroom (where we have the oxygen tanks and Eli setup) to check it. The alarm kept going off so I ventured into the bedroom to see what was going on. Amy was starting to become worried because he wasn't coming out of the desat. Then, by accident, she noticed bubbles coming from Eli's mouth and what appeared to be water dribbling down his face.

Amy quickly turned him over and pulled out the tubes in his nose. To our surprise, water came streaming out of his nose and mouth and even more from the tube. The tube was actually shooting water. Eli literally almost drowned. We called the oxygen company only to be told to remove the water, connect him to the smaller tank, and blow out the tube. All of this we had already started doing except for the blowing out of the tube.

The Home Health Care rep. apologized. We called our doctor and everything is OK but what a scare. I am sure glad that Amy noticed the problem and we didn't have baby Eli drowning as we held him.

Eggs and Gum

I've asked around and apparently my experience earlier today is unique... The only response I got from Amy was laughter.

I took the three older kids to the store today for food and other small items. We got to the counter to checkout and all of the boys started putting items on the counter so the cashier could scan them. I picked up the carton of eggs which was lying on its side and immediately got an uneasy feeling. I asked all of the boys, "who touched the eggs?" No one claimed responsibility. I opened the carton and checked the eggs. None were broken but one was missing. I started searching the cart for the missing egg and expected any second to hear a "clean up on isle 4" type of announcement on the speaker but none was announced.

I gave up and continued loading other items onto the counter when Avery brought to my attention that Blake was putting a pack of gum in his pocket. For those who don't know Blake, he gets into everything. Everything goes into his pockets. He is our little klepto. I took the gum away from him telling him something about not stealing. I then proceeded to check his pockets and to my amazement found it wet. Upon further inspection I discovered pieces of egg shell and a yellow runny mess inside the pocket.

What do you do at a time like that? Well, I put him in the little seat in the front of the cart and took his coat off so that the egg remains would not make it onto anything else. Blake of course was mad and took off his shoes. Needless to say, the nice lady behind me in line was laughing pretty hard. She "empathized" with me. I am glad to say that not everyone was looking at my little crew because of the calm manner in which I handled the situation. Of course that would be wrong because Blake started to scream and cry and wine and... Fun, fun, fun.

Blake's coat without egg

1+4 Adventures

 I love my kids.  I remember when one kid was hard.  Today I took Avery (6), Blake (4), Colin (3), and Drew (10 months) to Barnes and Nobles bookstore to buy a book about the iPad for Grandma Bodily.  When her iPad arrived without an instruction book it really made her nervous.  She became even more uncomfortable when she learned that the kids can navigate Dad's iPad pretty well without any help.

The kids were very excited to go.  I felt good that I could do what would have been unthinkable a few years ago.  We no sooner walked into the bookstore when Blake announced that he had to go to the potty while holding himself in the middle of the store.  We went to the bathroom and found out that Avery and Colin also needed to go pee.  All three older boys were soon crowded around the toilet happily peeing away.

We washed up and found the isle where the iPad books were located.  I squatted down to pick one off the shelf and Drew spit up all over me and himself.  Luckily no books were harmed.  Cool dad handled the mess like a pro and we soon had purchased the book and were headed to the car.

By the time we arrived at Grandma's house all four kids were asleep.  It's the journey that counts, right?

The fun thing is that this is not an unusual trip.  When I have the kids, this is what happens.  When Amy has the kids it seems-to me at least-that everything always goes so well.  She tells me that it is just as hard.  I guess when you are really good at things you make them look easy.  2+4 is a lot easier.  We'll see if 2+5 is easier than 1+4.

Baby Eli is coming home!!!

Rusty went to the hospital this morning to feed Eli and was surprised when the nurse mentioned that if we are OK with Eli still being on Oxygen, he could come home tomorrow. Amy subsequently visited Eli at 11AM today and helped him pass the "car-seat" test. Amy is at the hospital tonight learning all about Oxygen and how to help Eli.

We are all very excited to have all 7 of us home tomorrow!!! We are so grateful to all of those who have called us expressing support and kept Eli in their prayers.