Since we’ve moved the table into the playroom, Jackson has decided its his table and stands on it peering at the pesky squirrels in his yard all day long.

Oh, and we’ve been to the doctor three times this week.

Poor Ryder has been miserable. On Tuesday she screamed, without stopping, from 2-11:45pm. It was such a hard day for everyone.

I got in with the doctor I’ve been trying to see for quite a while yesterday, and he listened to me and is sending her to a GI specialist at Medical City Children’s Hospital- the same place she had heart surgery.

Also, some of you may have already noticed (especially in above pictures) but Rory is having some eye issues. We think her muscle isn’t tight enough so her eye can’t focus right and so it goes in. We are taking her to a pediatric eye specialist soon and going to see if she needs a procedure to tighten that muscle.

Man. This year has been such a rollercoaster. Just when I think things have finally settled down something comes up.

But everyone has struggles in their life and they come in all shapes and forms. Our struggle for now is our kids.

Of course, I wouldn’t trade a single day or single struggle with these precious girls for anything in the world.

Bring on 2012! We’re ready for a new year, for new experiences, and for new fun with our girls!

The things that will remain the same in 2012- God’s unfailing love for us, God’s strength that carries us through every struggle, God’s mercy when we have such joyous times amongst are hardest days, and God’s grace that wipes away the sins of the days when we forget that He’s carrying us through and act like we haven’t received any love or help from Him. Oh, thank You for Your grace…. its the one thing I need every single day.

Happy New Year, y’all!

Without further adieu, the winner is….

Jaime Tyson!

I will mail it to you tomorrow!

And let me just say, Jaime has been such a great friend this year. We live so far away (her in FL and me in TX) but she has been here for me through everything. She sent care packages while I was in the hospital and prayed for Ryder so diligently. Thank you for everything!

Hope y’all have a great weekend!

Well, people, its a good one.

Ryder has all of a sudden decided that the bottle is her friend and not the enemy. For the first time in her life, she has consistently eaten 4 oz bottles every 2-3 hours for an entire week.

This is huge, y’all. The child is 5 1/2 months old. I think it was time to start eating like a normal child, for crying out loud!

So here are some pictures of the little chubster being all fat and happy.

Ryder is officially in love with playing on her play mat. Again, FINALLY.

And she also finally loves to play in the excersaucer some too!

I had to get some nudy pictures so that you could see her rolls! I mean, the kid has some serious chubs going on there! HALLELUJAH!

I also got a little practice shot of Ryder in front of the Christmas tree. I’m hoping (yeah right) to get some pictures of the girls together in front of the Christmas tree this week. Pray for me and my inability to stop torturing myself.

I mean, honestly y’all, this kid is CUTE.

—

How about a Stinker Update as well?

Well Stinker/Rory turned 22 months yesterday. I tried to get a picture but we don’t want to talk about how it went. Let’s just say bad is an understatement.

So I was going to blog yesterday about the giveaway I’m doing as a thanks to my readers….

but when I got to the computer something was missing. Can you tell what the missing items are??? Hint: I can not blog or do anything on the computer without them.

That’s right, folks, Rory had taken off with the keyboard AND mouse. They were later found hidden in her room. My little hoarder.

She also ate an ornament yesterday.

But that’s a story for another day.

]]> http://theharrislife.com/fat-and-happy/feed/ 7 http://theharrislife.com/whats-been-going-on/ http://theharrislife.com/whats-been-going-on/#comments Mon, 14 Nov 2011 21:04:12 +0000 Tiffany http://theharrislife.com/?p=4148 Continue reading →]]> Y’all, I am in a blogging rut. Or maybe a life rut? I’m just so tired all the time. Maybe because both children get up constantly through the night? Maybe because Rory is so much fun but I’m exhausted by the end of the day? Probably both.

I even forgot Rory’s 21 month post and have yet to take pictures of her. I tried today and it DID NOT go so well. I never even took a picture because she kept running off. So, Happy 21 months Rory! I love you even if you are a little butt. (Again, I say this with all the love in my heart.)

Apparently, she is way too cool to take pictures these days.

Its hard to believe that this time last year I found out I was pregnant with Ryder. Where is the time going? Rory needs to SLOW DOWN on the growing up thing.

I promise to get some cute pictures at some point this week of the two stinkers.

Update on Ryder: For now (I say this with much caution), Ryder is eating wonderfully. The soy formula seems to have worked magic on our lives. She has been downing her bottles without all the screaming for two days. Praise the Lord!!!!

(I guess when I had a stern talk with her about her behavior problems she listened. It probably has nothing to do with the soy milk.)

She seems to be chubbier to me too! What do you think?

Okay! Off to enjoy the few seconds of silence before the girls wake up from their naps!

I will tell you the story of my Thursday afternoon and you can understand. And this was just icing on the cake.

I picked Rory up from school and came home. Just the normal. When I got home I put my  car key (it fell off the key chain and I hadn’t put it back on like an idiot) in my pocket and got out of the car. I shut the door and then went to open Ryder’s door and it was locked. And then I realized I just locked the kids in the car. Now, any normal person would freak out. Me? I laughed. I couldn’t help it. I just laughed. Because sometimes thats what you have to do.

So I called the sheriff’s department and they called the fire department. Within about ten minutes we had two firetrucks in front of our house. And then they couldn’t get the car open with their tools so the police came. And the police had the same tools. So they called a wrecker. So in front of my house was two firetrucks, two police cars and a wrecker. LOVELY. They got into the car and my kids were only a little traumatized, so that was a success.

And my main question for myself the ENTIRE time was this- WHY OH WHY did I not turn Elmo on when I picked her up from school?! It would have made things much more pleasant.

So since this week was a bit dramatic and my kids were bipolar at best (still, I do love them so much), I thought we’d lighten it up and I’d go along with Kelly’s Korner Show Us Your Life topic this week- Show us your Pets!

Meet Jackson.

Jackson is a Jack Russel Terrier. We got Jackson our first year of marriage and he was our baby for so long. He has been such a great dog.

Now that we have kids, he likes to make us feel really guilty by shooting looks like this at us all the time:

(All I have to say is, if you didn’t wake up my babies so much you’d probably get more attention! ha!)

He loves to chase squirrels. In fact, that’s his sole mission in life. He eats, sleeps, and breathes to chase squirrels. Unfortunately, this means he sometimes kills the squirrels.

Jackson also loves water. He loves any form of water. He will run through sprinklers, jump off diving boards into pools, and chase waves at the ocean.

And then there’s Jersey.

Normally Jersey looks like this:

Jersey is a long haired Jack Russel Terrier. We got her nappy hair cut and she was completely traumatized for about a month. She is the polar opposite of fun loving Jackson. She is weird. She is scared of her own shadow. She is convinced the world is out to get her.

And somehow we love her.

We also had a fish….

And we all know what happened with  “the bish”. Poor, poor bish. Well when we got back from being in the hospital for Ryder’s surgery the fish was dead. May his blessed little traumatized, chewed up soul rest in peace.

I really want to get something else for Rory, but I am scared. As I should be.

Hope you have a great weekend!

We had the girls’ pictures taken yesterday.

Let me rephrase that. We TRIED to have their pictures taken yesterday.

It was a nightmare. They both cried the whole time. Rory was mad at the world. Ryder HATES to be naked, HATES to be on her stomach, HATES to do anything other than being held tight by her momma.

Basically, we were there for 2++ hours and got three shots.

But dang aren’t these three shots gorgeous?!

Thank you Jennifer for being so amazing and patient. And thank you for being such a great friend. If anything it was nice to know someone has been in my shoes and that it gets better.

And thanks for being brave enough to try again next week! ha!

This week has been the first real week that the girls have some what interacted with eachother. Ryder has been cooing and smiling at Rory and Ryder thinks that is the best thing that has ever happened to her.

Yesterday, we were all three outside and I just thought about how I couldn’t wait until they really really start playing together. I know they will be best friends (and sometimes worst enemies) and have so much fun together.

But I will enjoy today for now.

Let me just turn this on for you sister…

Now I can smile!

Oh sister- aren’t I funny?!

What? I’m not about to do anything…

nope, nothing at all!

Rory just shared her naked Mrs Potato Head with Ryder. Can you tell by her face that she’s so proud?!

While my parents were here, my dad fixed a table for Rory. The top is from a pie cabinet (is that right, mom?) that was my grandparents. She absolutely loves the table and sits to read, snack, and do puzzles constantly.

Jersey likes to hide underneath.

She rarely comes out to play…

because THIS face never comes after doing anything to scare her….

not this face either…

At least she and Jackson are friends.

Oh how I love days with my girls!

And today I want to talk about the miracles that have happened because of YOUR prayers.

Weight gain: When we were admitted into the hospital 10 days ago, our goal was to gain as much as possible to make her strong for surgery. Her starting weight was 9 lbs even, and today she weighs just over 10 lbs. AMAZING! We did not expect this sort of weight gain so fast – even the doctors have been impressed. And I say, of course its impressive- God orchestrated this weight gain!

Recovery: It is just crazy how fast Ryder is recovering. Because she was completely healthy other than her heart, she has bounced back SO quickly. Just four days ago she was undergoing open heart surgery, and tomorrow we will be released from the hospital! How insane is that?! Nothing short of a miracle because of YOUR prayers!

Biggest miracle of all- EATING: As some of you recall me saying, it would take Ryder around 2 hours to eat just 2 ounces of milk. It was exhausting, heartbreaking, and such a burden on our own hearts. She was burning more calories eating than she could take in- even with the higher calorie formula. Well, my friends, I have some wonderful news to tell you! Ryder is drinking 3 ounces in 10-15 MINUTES!!! How GREAT is our GOD?! We were told it could take a couple of weeks for her to be strong enough to eat “normally” and literally the first bottle she could have after surgery she sucked down in five minutes. Since then she has done so great every time.

So, once again, I am humbly saying THANK YOU to all of you who prayed. Its because of YOUR prayers and our awesome God she is literally a different baby over night. It gives me chills just thinking about everyone pleading for prayers and asking God to heal our little girl.

Of course, we still have a road of recovery to come with lots of doctors appointments and special instructions (no picking up under the armpits, no leaving her in the nursery for at least 6 wks, avoiding large crowds except from the occasional outing, pulling Rory from MDO so she doesn’t bring anything home, etc) but the worst of this is over and we are just so blessed.

Enjoy some pictures from the past couple of days and see for yourself how much better our baby looks and feels!

Ryder was taken back around 6:30 this morning and the surgery was over around 11. They repaired 3 holes and her valve. Everything went so smoothly and we are beyond relieved. She was taken to the Cardiac ICU and is getting excellent care. She is hooked up to so many monitors and has wires and tubes coming out from everywhere. It is by far the hardest thing I’ve ever had to see and go through.

Once she got into the Cardiac ICU they had a difficult time managing her pain, and that was so hard to see. Touching her makes it worse and of course we can’t hold her yet… so basically it is just torture.

She is stable and doing very well. They have gotten the pain under control. We are so thankful for God’s healing on her and can’t wait to see her thrive.

The hardest day is finally over. We will wake up to a new day and from here on out it will get better and better.

And once again, I can’t stop saying it!- thank you, thank you, thank you for praying for us. Andy and I both had a wonderful peace today as we waited. You are all so special to us and so appreciated.

More of her surgery story to come…

I have been so overwhelmed with all the people telling us they are praying for Ryder. It has blessed me so much and I can feel each prayer as we take this each day. Its keeping me positive and honestly I have never felt so loved and cared for in my life.

So I was sitting here thinking (which is what you do when you have endless alone time in the hospital!) and decided to create a prayer map for Ryder. I want to be able to print it out when this is over and hang it in her room. I want her to always know that even though she won’t remember this time, she will know and remember that she was loved and prayed for.

Click here to go to the map and then follow the instructions on the left side of the map. Thank you for helping us show Ryder the wonderful part of this struggle- PRAYER. Please feel free to pass our story and the link along.

(P.S. If you can’t figure out the map just leave a comment here, text me, email me, or post the info on facebook and I will enter the information for you.)