Lakey Lou, almost ONE update

I never shared about our Monday’s cardio appointment on her Facebook page, so I thought I might as well sit down and write a quick post about her progress and our life right now. I have been so busy that I started this post and wasn’t finding the time to finish it… so I am today (two weeks later)! Our cardiologist helped fill me in on my confusion regarding Lake’s “third surgery.” All along I was under the impression that Lake’s third surgery would be this summer. Well, that isn’t really the case. She will be having her heart cath on MAY 7!!!!  Once they see how her heart is functioning and how the pressures are, we will get a more formal plan in place. Lake could have a surgery this summer, if there are results in her cath that need to be fixed. She may not need a surgery until next summer… or later. It’s kind of a relief, but I also think about getting everything behind us… though ultimately the BIGGER Lake is for surgery, the better. Right now that little stinker is not even 16 L – Bs. She is finally fitting into 9m stuff, even though her birthday is 9 days away!

Lake is doing so well even though she is a tiny tot. She is eating food like a champ and gagging less and less on her foods. She loves peas, bananas, garbanzo beans, egg yolks, avocado, carrots, puffer treats, yogurt melts and mum mums! She FINALLY got her first tooth on the bottom of that wide flat crinkled nose smile! It’s adorable and only took 11m to poke through. 🙂 Lake finally stopped getting lovenox shots, after three weeks of getting coumadin levels tested. She is currently on 2.5mg of coumadin/night that I administer through her g-button. I had to have her g-button replaced 3.5 weeks ago and it was NOT fun to watch. That poor baby endured a few seconds of pain to get it swapped out, but was fine once I was able to scoop her up and love on her. She is sitting up like a champ and learning to go from sitting to leaning to tummy! We finally are off the ECI Physical Therapy waiting list and will start that next week. Let’s get this baby crawling! 🙂 Her standing is becoming much better and she seems to keep her feet flat most of the time (I was worried she had sensory issues from her stroke). Her progression every month is inspiring and exciting. I am hopeful that her brain is rewiring itself nicely. Lake is also babbling and this weekend she mimicked the word “puppy” after she was loving on our sweet neighbor dog “Rosie.” She is so in love with her siblings that the moment she sees them her grin spreads across her face and she starts kicking her legs. What a wonderful blessing! She can clap like a champ and we are working on teaching her “more” in sign language, rather than screaming when her food runs out. Lake is really an easy baby and has a lovely personality… perfect for a fourth baby (and for this tired mama). She loves seeing her Daddy too and points her little hands at him when he comes home from work. She loves to splash in sink baths and needs them quite often after smashing food anywhere and everywhere you can imagine.

Our April is FILLED to the brim with some major plans!  Lake’s first birthday is this coming weekend… the weekend after that is my BFFFFF wedding, which I am a bridesmaid in and I am half-shooting. Then the BIG NEWS… is the following weekend (the last of April) will be our final days in our home… we will have to pass along the keys to our wonderful home.  The home we renovated as newlyweds and moved into just a week before having our first daughter – Parker. This is the home I home-birthed our second daughter, Eden, in. The home where we have made great friends with some wonderful and cherished neighbors. Paul and I have learned how to grill together in this house, how to be good parents, how to love one another more and be more selfless as spouses. This is our cozy spot in 76107 where my son has found his best buddies, a place he has a blast riding his bike up and down the street and where we used to walk him to school. The spot where we all walk to CVS to snag milk or Curly’s Custard to chow down some ice cream! This home started out with us as a family of three… and we will leave as a family of six after just four short years! Parker and Eden have become BFF in this home. Edie may never remember this home, which makes me sad. Lake will never know the home where my kids were cared for by all of the amazing volunteers and friends who took care of them so I could go sit with my baby in the NICU every single day for 10 weeks last year. This is the home we brought our 70 day old fresh out of the hospital heart baby and wheeled around her feeding machine, we checked her sats here, had nervous heart-parent moments here, did therapies on the floor, the place where we worked so hard to get her to take a bottle and get her to place her feet on the ground to put weight on her legs. The sliding backdoor where Lake would take a bottle if I had her facing outside, with a gentle rock and singing her beloved “This Little LAKE of mine” song. Our home is where Lake made so much progress in such a short amount of time that she had me in more awe of her warrior spirit! Now it may sound like I am bitter or you may question why are we moving – since I am sounding so devastated about leaving our precious and gorgeous home. The truth is I LOVE LOVE LOVE where we live. It’s one of the best places in Fort Worth, but reality sunk in after having our fourth babe. We have 1800 FULL sq. ft and three bedrooms for six people. We talked about adding on a huge addition, but didn’t want to overbuild. Our ‘hood has beautiful BIG homes that would fit us… but they aren’t within our budget! We are going to build a home that will fit our large family – that will give us space and new awesome neighbors! The building process is exciting and it’s what Paul “does.” We both LOVE home building so this is a truly fun experience for us.  The craziest part for us is that currently we aren’t sure WHERE we are going on May 1… we are looking into several options of how and where to live as we build our new home.

April is turning out to be a wild ride and I LOVE it… why would we want it any other way? I am not really stressed about it because I know that God will open and close the right doors to ensure we stay on the path HE  has  so perfectly designed for our family. I trust we will be just fine on this new and temporary journey. 🙂 We look forward to making fun memories – wherever we settle in. Thanks for reading friends… I am exhausted even thinking about the next three weeks as a “Jenkins.” 🙂

.love.