Blessed

We had a very blessed Christmas, spent with our amazing family and great friends. We started Thursday with Baker Metal and Recycling's Christmas party at Neil's parent's house. Neil's dad is an AMAZING cook and he served us king crab legs, prime rib and mashed potatoes. After we ate, we did a yankee gift swap, which is always a ton of fun. I ended up with some awesome LED Christmas lights, Neil got a gas gift card and Kynlie got a little rocking pony that she loves!





 Christmas Eve we took Kynlie out to my parents around noon, then rode snowmobiles in the ditches around town for a while. We went out to my parents and opened presents out there, then went to my grandparent's house and ate soup and hung out there. Most of my mom's family was there, we were just short her brother and his family and my sister and her family. We came back to our house to play Neil's new Playstation Move game and wait for midnight mass to begin. I put Kynlie in the Moby wrap while she was sleeping to go to church, but there was too much up and down that she kept waking up screaming so we spent most of mass standing in the back of the church.



 Kynlie got two new rides over Christmas, Neil got a remote control snowmobile that they sat her on and her little paint pony she got from the Baker Metal Christmas party. She bounces up and down on the pony to get it to rock. 

Riding her new pony



 

Riding daddy's new snowmobile!





 Christmas morning, Neil and I made french toast, bacon, sausage and a quiche and his mom, dad and sister came over, we had a very relaxing morning, eating and opening more gifts. We got a great gift from Neil's parents- a weekend in Big Sky with the whole family, snowmobiling, skiing and just being together. Neil spoiled me with a new laptop- which was WAY over our spending limit on each other but he has never been one to follow the rules!


 

 

Cousins Kacee, Kynlie, Shelby and Madison

Around 2pm on Christmas day, we went out to Neil's brother's house to spend the rest of the day with them. They gave Kynlie the biggest teddy bear I have ever seen. It is at least 5 foot tall and soft as could be. She loves it and spent a lot of the day crawling all over it.  

Kynlie's teddy bear buckled in the back seat for the ride home!

Sunday evening, we had our great friends over for supper and to play Neil's PS3 Move. This is how the daddy's were playing- each with their baby!

Playing video games with Dad!

I have been thinking about where we were at last year and how blessed we are to be at home with our healthy, happy baby this year. I thought it would be funny to see what Kynlie wore at Christmas last year and this year together. There is a little size difference! Last Christmas we spent at the Holiday Inn in Dickinson because they closed the interstate when we were trying to get back to Bismarck to be with Kynlie. It was great to not have to go ANYWHERE this year!



Kynlie's Christmas pajamas- last year Preemie, this year, 12 month.







Kynlie's diapers- Size 1-2 on the left, Preemie XS on the right!

She must've been good!

Kynlie's shirt today may have said "Naughty is the new nice" but she must've been a very good girl this year because she got a visit from someone very special tonight. We were getting her ready after bath time when we heard "HO HO HO" at the door. Luckily, she already had on her Santa jammies! Kynlie got to see Santa in her own home! Sadly, she wasn't very excited about it- I'm kind of worried she is getting sick because she has been very crabby and clingy all day.

Just relaxin- under the tree!

"I can't believe Santa came to see me!"

With presents and all!

He brought me and Kirsten ornaments

She's done with Santa for the night.



Maybe I'll give him a high five!



And a great kiss!





Thanks for coming to see me Santa

Kynlie's ornament says
"Faith
Create Miracles"

 

Kirsten's ornament says

"Hope
Is the place from which happiness grows"



Thanks for coming to see Kynlie, Santa. Thanks for the awesome ornaments you gave her and Kirsten. We'll leave you some cookies on Christmas Eve and hopefully we will see you again next year!

Funny Faces

I have been neglecting the blog a little lately. I didn't take many pictures when we were in Las Vegas because most of the time, Kynlie was in the Moby wrap on the front of me. We got a lot of funny looks and even had a man come up to me and ask if Kynlie's name was Carlos and if we found her in a closet.  That will only be funny to you if you have watched the movie "The Hangover." Linda got some so I am hoping to get her camera, then I will post some of her pics.

We had a great time in Las Vegas. Thursday night we went to Fremont Street and watched the light show, Friday we walked around some of the casinos that were close to the Mirage, wandered around the shops and tried to go to a show, but Kynlie couldn't get into most of them. She could get into the Cirque du Soleil- Mystere, but it wasn't playing on Friday. We decided that we would to to Terry Fator because he was playing in the Mirage, but you have to be 5 to go to it. Saturday, we went to the Bodies exhibit at the Luxor, then wandered around and made our way down to the birthday party. The party was for Neil's mom's cousin, who will be 80. This was the first time Neil or I had met any of these relatives so we were excited to meet some new family. The party was great, June is an 80 year old little spitfire. After the party, we ate supper at Paris, watched the fountains at the Bellagio, ate a crepe and went to bed.

Kynlie was a great traveler, the plane did not bother her at all, she had a hard time getting to sleep at night, but she also had no schedule down there. She decided when we were there that she was giving up baby food so she lived on bread and bananas. She is back to baby food now though, thank goodness. She had a little meltdown when we were eating supper at Paris and we had to go outside, but she was SO exhausted. I got her to sleep and she was good to go again. She was happy, smiley and goofy the whole trip.

She is such a ham lately and is doing so many new things every day. She tries to pull herself up onto the couch, but she just isn't big enough so she walks around it instead. She gives great open mouth kisses, give "high five," waves bye bye. She likes to drop her sippy cup off the side of her high chair, and before it hits the ground, she makes an "uh-oh" face and gasps. When I am done feeding her, I get a washcloth to wash her hands and she always puts her right hand up for me to watch, her left hand up, then takes the rag and washes them herself.

Kynlie likes to make this face when she is being goofy, she scrunches up her nose, makes her lips crooked and breathes in and out really loudly.

Tickle Tickle!

Cheese!!

Helping mom with the laundry.

We finally got her cute giggle on video.

We have a very busy few days planned for Christmas. Thursday is Baker Metal and Recycling's Christmas party at Neil's parent's house. I don't have Pyper Thursday afternoon so I am taking Kynlie to my mom & dad's and I am going to Marmarth to get a much needed haircut. Christmas Eve, we are going to see if we can drop Kynlie off at mom and dad's again- I haven't asked them yet- so we can cruise around on our snowmobiles for a bit, then we will go to mom & dad's and open presents with them and my brother and sister-in-law. After that, we will go to my grandma's house and eat with my mom's family.

Christmas Day, we are having Neil's mom, dad and sister over for brunch and will open presents with them, then we will go to Neil's brother's house for supper.

I am very much looking forward to celebrating Kynlie's first Christmas AT HOME with her. I have a feeling she is going to get very spoiled.

A couple of posts ago, I asked for prayers for a dear friend who was facing a very difficult time and I wanted to update everyone with the sad news that Princess Ella peacefully went to be with God last Tuesday. I didn't hear about it until we got home from Vegas and I am very sad that I missed her service. Please pray that Jen, Raymond, Blake and Joe feel God's comfort  with their loss. Ella will always be missed and she will always hold a very special place in my heart.

We want to wish everyone a Merry Christmas. Have safe travels wherever you are going and remember the reason for the season.

And the GOOD news is

Kynlie's appointment went great today, besides the fact that she still weighs the same as she did at her last appointment! Neither of her ears are infected anymore, but the doctor said that there is quite a bit of fluid in the right one. She said it should be no problem flying with her this weekend. I asked her about seeing an ENT specialist about getting tubes put in and she thought it would probably be a good idea. We have an appointment set up in Dickinson on January 21 in the morning, then we will go to Bismarck for her follow up appointment with Dr. Ocejo concerning her weight gain- or lack there of!

Our little stair master has gotten VERY good at going up the stairs, she'll book it up one flight, then turn the corner and go right up the next flight. She's usually pretty good about not trying to come down, but tonight, she decided she was going to give it a try. She was probably four or five steps up when I was cooking supper and decided to try and come down. It didn't go very well for her. I heard a thud and there she was at the bottom of the stairs. She cried for about 1.5 seconds and was good to go again. Whenever she goes up, I usually stand at the bottom and watch her, then when she decided she's ready to come down, I pull her down one stair at a time on her belly to show her how she should come down- she likes to come down head first! I guess she has to learn somehow and she likes to learn the hard way.

Happy Birthday to me!!

We had a triple birthday celebration on Friday. The 10th is Neil's mom and sister-in-law's birthdays, then mine is on the 11th. We had a party for the three of us at Neil's brother's house. We ordered pizza and Bruce made two cheesecakes that were amazing. I got very spoiled, getting some awesome presents. Kynlie and I spent yesterday hanging out at home, Neil was working. Last night we went out and ate with some friends, then had a few drinks. It was a blast, I have the best friends in the world. Kynlie went over to Neil's aunt's with his parents for supper, then they brought her back home and hung out until we got home.

Miss Kynlie is going back to see the doctor tomorrow for her ears, it's the follow up appointment I made after her last ear infection, but I'm glad I already had it made because she is still really tugging and digging at her ears and I think they are probably still infected. I'm interested to see what the doctor says about seeing a specialist about putting tubes in.

Tonight we went over to Neil's parents for supper, then to our niece's Christmas program at the church. It was a very cute program and all three of the girls had pretty big parts in the play.

Kynlie loves candy canes!

Our little monkey

 The outfit Kynlie is wearing in the picture above is quite the composite of sizes. 6-9 month vest, 12 month onesie, 3-6 month pants and newborn socks! She's not built very proportional. I tried an outfit on her the other day that someone got her that is a size 2T. The shirt fits her perfectly, might almost be too short and the skirt is WAY too big. I'm going to do a little tailoring on the skirt so she will be able to wear the outfit together because it is adorable.



Kynlie loves this toy that I got back out for Pyper to play with.

 We have a busy week ahead of us, doctor appointment, DEAP (Development Education Assistance Program)  is coming for their monthly visit, we need to get packing for Vegas, then headed down to Sin City the end of the week. I can't believe that Christmas is NEXT WEEK! I don't know where the year has went, but if it's going to keep flying by, why can't it just be the end of February so I could be in Hawaii?

Prayers Needed

I read something this morning that is killing me today. A good friend, that's babies were in the NICU with Kynlie is facing some very hard times right now. Please pray for Jen, Raymond, Blake, Joe and Ella, especially Ella. You can read Jen's blog at talesofthebrunsonkids.blogspot.com . This family has been through so much the past 14 months and Jen is such an amazing person and mom. No one should have to make the decisions they are having to make or see their baby be so sick. Please include them in your prayers.

Once again, we had a very busy week and a productive weekend. I started my Christmas baking, which didn't get off to a good start. Instead of the almond extract I usually put in my sugar cookies, I grabbed the cinnamon flavoring out of the cupboard. I also like a little extra almond flavoring in my cookies so I added a lot of the cinnamon. I didn't notice my mistake until I was licking the batter off the spatula and it just did not taste right. I added a lot of almond and it overpowered the cinnamon and the cookies don't taste bad at all. Neil and I did a lot of baking today, then we decorated the sugar cookies.

I took Kynlie in to the doctor on Thursday afternoon because she had been crabby and clingy all morning. I knew her ears had been bothering her, but I think I can feel another tooth poking through, so I thought maybe that was what the problem was. I was wrong. She has another ear infection, this time in both ears. I am very glad I made her an appointment so we can get this taken care of because we fly out for Las Vegas on the 16th and it could've been a disaster flying with her if her ears were infected. We have another appointment scheduled for the 13th to make sure her ears are clear and if they aren't at least we can get 48 hours of antibiotics in before we would fly. When we go back, I am going to ask the doctor about seeing a specialist for her ears. I had problems with my ears when I was little and had to get tubes put in, I hope she doesn't need them, but if they would help it would be better than her fighting all these infections.

This week is already looking busy. I am going to attempt to take Kynlie and Pyper to my great-aunt's funeral tomorrow. My parents will be there to help so we should do fine. Wednesday is the Christmas Stroll and Parade of Lights, Friday is Neil's mom and sister-in-law's birthdays, Saturday is my birthday, I'm sure Neil has something really special planned for me!! Yeah right!

I am SO in heaven having my good camera back. I am back to obsessively taking pictures of EVERYTHING now.

They are so sweet when they are sleeping

I love her big toothy grin!

She had to feed herself prunes for lunch today.

After a change of clothes, she ate a frosted cookie- then needed a bath!

Mmmm, that cookie was great

Sterling and Kynlie play a lot of tug-of-war.

Stair Master

Our little miss is learning so many  new things every day. I had to expand our fence that went around the stairs going down to block off the stairs going up too because Kynlie became obsessed with going up the stairs. We were wrapping Christmas presents last night and I spent most of the time below her on the stairs because when she decides she's ready to come down, she just tries crawling down, face first. At least it took her mind off trying to eat the dog food!

 She was over playing by the fence yesterday and I looked over and saw this. She was walking around her fence, checking out the situation, trying to figure out how she could get around it to get to those stairs!

 When I was getting some of our Christmas decorations out, I found these. When we finally got back to Bismarck after Christmas, after being snowed in in Dickinson Christmas day, these ornaments and a little card with her hand print were waiting by Kynlie's isolette. I could never thank Kynlie's nurses enough for everything they did for us. All the pictures they took, the photo sessions they did, dressing Kynlie up for Halloween, letting Santa come see her, making her a beautiful cake when she got discharged. They all treat the babies like their own and even call themselves "aunties." They definitely became family to us and will always hold a very special place in our hearts.

I finally got my camera back after its tragic boating accident this summer. I may be obsessively taking pictures now, just to see what I can do! I am excited for Kynlie to wake up to get some pictures of her and Pyper together, hopefully both looking at the camera, smiling! I may be setting my hopes too high though.

We got our house lit up on Friday, if you are in the area, come check it out. When I say area, you might be able to see the glow from any high point in the tri-state area! Kidding, come check it out, my hubby does a pretty amazing job decorating. He loves it, Kynlie loves the lights and we get a kick out of watching people drive by- really slow, checking it out.

Happy Thanksgiving

We had a great Thanksgiving Day. We went out to my parent's house for lunch, which was amazing, then came home and finished decorating for Christmas. Kynlie loves all the lights and the tree, which she has surprisingly left a lone. She feels the branches with her forehead and will feel them with her hands a little but so far she has been pretty good.

As I was enjoying time with my family today, I couldn't help but be thankful that I was home, with Kynlie and Neil this year. Last year, our Thanksgiving was spent in Bismarck, with some family. My parents, sister, brother and nephew came over for the day and we had Thanksgiving at my dad's cousin's house. Neil and his mom, brother and sister-in-law were in Denver at the football game. It was a very special day as that was the first time my parents had got to see Kynlie since she was born on October 9. Right after she was born the NICU  was restricted to parent's only due to the H1N1 flu, they couldn't even get on the birth center floor to look through the window. The Tuesday before Thanksgiving, they opened it up so grandparents could get in too.

I want to just post a tiny bit about what I am thankful for this year.

• for a happy, healthy baby
• for a wonderful husband that works his butt off every day so I can stay home with my baby and loves me unconditionally
• for both of our families, who are so supportive of us
• for our friends, who are always here for us
• for our warm house with food on the table
• for modern medicine, that has helped some very important people in our lives
• for Kynlie's doctor, nurses (aunts & uncle) and everyone that took care of her and I in Bismarck
• for the Ronald McDonald house, my home for 4 months

Those are all I can think of, which makes me feel bad because I know there is so much more that I am thankful. I definetly did realize that I took so much for granted before though and now that it's the little things in life that matter.

The rest of my previous post

Here are the rest of the pictures that I forgot to upload in the last post!



Our living room looking from the stairs

  

Our living room looking from the couch, notice my little stair climber!





We had Kynlie's pictures taken with Santa on
Saturday and they turned out great!



A lot of randomness

There has been a lot going on around here lately. We went to Billings last weekend and got all our Christmas shopping done, I had to get a little done on line because I knew some of what  I wanted wouldn't be in stores. Kynlie is getting a couple swimsuits for Christmas (don't tell her). We are going to Hawaii the end of February for a great friend's wedding, and I knew her swimsuit from the summer wouldn't fit her then. Of course, she had to try them on to see if we should keep them or send them back!

Trying on her new swimsuit for Hawaii!!

 Remember THIS post? Well I picked up the last of the stuff we were waiting on for our dining room to be complete, so now I can post that our project we started in March is complete!

New table and hutch

New table and piano

Pub table in old dining room

I see now that I forgot to put the pictures of the living room on here and for some reason Blogger won't let me upload more pictures when I have selected and added them once. I'll do another post with them on here I guess!

Kynlie is doing new things every day. Last week, she showed me how she can climb up a stair, today, it was a lot of stairs, really fast! She is pulling to stand on everything in sight. She is obsessed with the dog's food and I know it's disgusting, but has got a few kibbles in her mouth. We put a little Christmas tree in her room and she wouldn't go to sleep last night because she was checking out the pretty lights. She has been eating like a champ lately and there still isn't anything she won't eat.

We are sticking around town for Thanksgiving, which I am very thankful for. My mom's birthday is Friday so we are going to have supper for her , then my sister is going to have my nephew's birthday party on Saturday. We will do a little Black Friday shopping around town here and I'm hoping to finish decorating the inside of the house for Christmas by time the weekend is done.

I hope everyone has a very Happy Thanksgiving, safe travels, great food  and good company.

Everything's Fine

 Kynlie had appointments in Bismarck yesterday afternoon, we saw Dr. Ocejo's nurse so Kynlie could get three of her follow up immunizations. She weighed 15 lb 9 oz so I'd say she's gaining weight good now! That's 1 pound in a little over a month. She had to get some blood drawn too, they did a CBC which is a complete blood count, checked her iron, and maybe a few others. All of her blood work came back normal.

Kynlie with all of her owies, there is another band aid on her arm with the blue wrap!

After her shots, she had an eye appointment. Her eye doctor said that structurally, everything in her eye looks perfect and that he is very optimistic about how good her eyes will be in the future. He said that a lot of times when they have to laser the eye as much as they did to her that she would lose a lot of the peripheral vision, but she doesn't look like she has lost any. He said that is probably on account of the Avastin injection she got. I was relieved when he didn't have to pry her eyes open to look inside of them. He said they are usually curious enough about what's going on at her age that they will keep their eyes open for him. I asked him about her eyes crossing so bad when she's tired, but her eyes were already dilated when he saw her so he couldn't tell if it was a problem or if her muscles just get weak when she's tired. He did some basic tests where he covered one eye and moved the light around, then the other and both of her eyes followed equally so she is not favoring one or the other. He said it could also be exaggerated by her young looking face, he said her eyes are wide set and the bridge of her nose is wide and flat and that can make her eyes look more crossed than they really are. She has to go back in six months to see Dr. L again and we will see Dr. S, who is a pediatric optamologist that will check her vision to see if she needs glasses.