catch up october- mid december

Steve took Conner with him on the deer hunt this year. He had a lot of fun. Conner called me on the phone and told me that his dad shot a boy deer with antlers. "He shot him right in his armpit. Then we cut his belly open and got all the guts out."

We took a mini family trip the last weekend in October. We went down to Cedar City where they were having a Livestock and Heritage Festival. It was really fun and something we would definitely do again. Steve's sister Lisa came with us and we stayed at the Holiday Inn Express overnight. In the morning before checkout we went swimming. Then we headed over to the parade.

On our bed right before checkout.

The herd a thousand sheep down the road.

My sister-in-law, Lisa made a funny comment when this sheep ran by, she said, "There's one in every family."

Old, old tractor during the parade.

It was such a different kind of parade. Full of all kinds of tractors and livestock. Really fun for the kids.

After the parade we drove over to the horse and tractor pull. I have never watched one before and was amazed at the horse's strength. Look how huge they are compared to the big guys walking behind them.

This year for Halloween it was Shannon's turn to wear the chicken suit. Halloween was a little tough with Shannon. It was hard when people were so adamant that she make the sound of a chicken in order to get her candy. I just kept it to myself that she is deaf and I didn't feel bad when she would just grab the candy from the people when they were holding it in front of her waiting for her to respond.

Conner was a dang cute horse.

SUCH a happy girl.

One of Shannon's favorite things is to have her toenails painted. She is constantly doing her sign for nails painted and then points at the bathroom.

Movie night. Steve was working late so the kids and I made caramel popcorn and had a movie night.

Shannon signs to Devin, and she signs to her dolls. My absolute favorite is to watch Shannon try to finger spell. She only finger spells for the things that we finger spell, like Conner's name and certain foods. She grabs Devin's hands and makes him sign as well. She also makes her dolls sign and she has full on conversations with her dolls. Cracks me up.

Wow a lot to catch up on.

Shannon Update Surgery

Today is mine and Steve's eight year anniversary and we were given an incredible gift. A surgery date for Shannon's cochlear implant! We met with the surgeon yesterday and were told we would receive a call today with an exact surgery date since they had to match up a couple different schedules to make it happen. The doctor's nurse is named, Sherry and when she called Primary Children's to find a date they didn't have anything open that matched Dr. Gurgel's schedule. We were looking at sometime next year for her surgery. Sherry said to the people at Primary's what date can you give me? The lady said the only time that was left this year was December 28th she told the lady that she would take it and then talk to the doctor because he would be on vacation that day. When Sherry spoke with Dr. Gurgel and said the only time left this year was the 28th he said, "Let's do it." His nurse said I understand if it was cancer and you needed to remove a tumor but it's just for a cochlear and you are on vacation. The doctor said, "Sherry, this little girl is almost two, I don't want her to wait any longer." How amazing is he?! She will have to stay for 24 hours after her surgery and then it will be about three weeks until they activate the cochlear to give her time to heal. The surgery itself takes about 2 1/2 hours. Hopefully in about 5 months are so Shannon will say her first words! It hasn't hit me yet that this is really going to happen. Is Shannon really going to learn to talk, is she really going to hear me? I can't wait! I have a lot that I want to update but I was so excited for this news I had to hurry and post this.

Delivery

Got to the hospital on Monday, October 15, at 3:45 pm thinking I am about to be induced for my third delivery. After being hooked up to the monitors I found out I was already in labor. Six hours after getting to the hospital I was ready to push. Only had to push about 3 times and he was here. I felt so accomplished having the baby without being induced because I hadn't experienced that.

First kisses. I was finally able to see and hold my baby right after a delivery. It was so neat to be able to have him set on my belly after he came out.

Eskimo kisses.

First family photo. Only took about 4 tries to get all of us looking at the camera.

It took Conner a few days but Steve helped him to feel comfortable enough to hold Devin.

Shannon's completed room.

Shannon goes back in for surgery on November, 8th for more tubes. On the 19th of November we meet with the implant surgeon and should then be able to schedule the day of her implant surgery. So excited, except her insurance will only pay for one cochlear but we are SO grateful to even have that. The surgery to place one cochlear is between $60,000 and $80,000. Can't wait to hear Shannon speak!

Busy, Busy

I have made it to 36 weeks, well tomorrow, but close enough. I am having to do another 24 hour urine test and they are testing my platelets again as well. They will get the results back tomorrow and depending on the results there is a chance I will be induced. At my appointment yesterday I was almost a 4 and a little over 90% effaced. This is for sure the most painful pregnancy I have endured. I am very grateful for all the help and offers I have received from everyone.
Today, Shannon and I went up to PCMC. The appointment was a little overwhelming at first because there were four doctors in the exam room with us. An ENT doctor, Dr. Park, a geneticist, Dr. Carey, a pediatrician but I don't remember her name but she is from Italy and an audiologist. There were a few times that Dr. Carey, the geneticist, forgot that I am just a regular Joe and would talk to me with all this medical jargon and then ask if I agreed. Anyway after an hour of us all being together it came down to Shannon needing to get tested for Pendred Syndrome. Hopefully we will have the results of that test back in time for her next appointment which is with the implant team on November 1st. The implant team is going to see if Shannon is a candidate for cochlear implants.
We received such a tender mercy from Heavenly Father this week. Nursery hasn't been easy for Shannon and this week a new nursery leader was called. She is amazing, she was just released from being Relief Society President and the kicker is, she knows sign language. No one knew when she was called that she knew sign. She came over this week and asked if she could put Shannon and Conner in the same nursery, I thought that would be great. In our ward they have a younger nursery and an older nursery. Shannon and Conner will be in the older nursery together. She also asked if she could come Wednesday and take Conner and Shannon to the park so she could start to build a relationship with Shannon. Our family is so looked after.

My Pregnancy

Steve and I went on a date Friday night. While we were sitting at the movies I felt like something was wrong with my pregnancy. I wasn't in a lot of pain but felt if I didn't go to the hospital that it would be irresponsible. So I called the doctor on call and he told me to head over. They hooked me up on monitors and found I was dilated to a 2.5 maybe 3 and that I was having contractions every 4 to 5 minutes. They gave me a steroid shot to help the baby's lungs just in case and then gave me a shot to try and stop my contractions. The shot raised my heart rate to over 150 bpm so they weren't able to give me the second dose. They gave me an alternate drug to try and stop the contractions. Then they drew my blood to check my platelets since that is what caused me to be induced with Shannon at 36 weeks. My platelets came back at 101, if your platelets go below 100 many anesthesiologists will not give you an epidural and you have to have your baby natural. If your platelets are too low than your blood will not clot and getting an epidural could cause you to bleed internally and they wouldn't know and I wouldn't clot. Anyway, 5 hours later we were allowed to leave, it was 2 in the morning. The doctor sent me home with a Rx to take every 6 hours to stop my contractions. On Monday I was in a lot of pain. It felt like I was having a very heavy period with major cramps and pain. I went in to see the doctor and Allen had told the doctor that if I had progressed to a 3 to send me straight over to labor and delivery. Dr. Young checked me and said I was at a 3 but what concerned him more was that my cervix was ready. Sounded like I'll my body needed to do was dilate some more and the baby was ready to come. I headed over to labor and delivery and got hooked up on monitors again. They gave me a heavy dosage of meds to stop the contracting but they were still happening every 8 minutes. I was going nuts. I just wanted to be home and to take care of my kids. I asked Dr. Allen, can I just go home? He said he wanted me to stay 24 hours and then would check me the next day but he would see where my contractions were going. After 6 hours in the hospital my contractions had slowed down enough that he said I could go home but on strict bed rest. So, as of tomorrow I am 33 weeks pregnant. I am to lay in bed for the next 3 weeks only getting up to go to the bathroom and then lay back down. I am on a double dosage of medicine to stop my contractions for the next 3 weeks as well. Once I turn 36 weeks he will take me off my medicine and bed rest and the baby can then come.

One step forward

After just two months of physical therapy Shannon started walking. I believe it was July 15th that she took her first few steps. It is wonderful having her to be able to walk. Now I have to be extra careful about always keeping her in my site because if she wanders off, I can't call to her to get her attention.  She has been sleeping in her own room in the twin bed now for about 4 weeks and she is doing great. It is the same bed I used in high school. I also finished the vinyl in her room which I am happy with.

Last Friday, August 31st, Steve and I took Shannon up to Primary Children's and she had her MRI as well as another ABR done. She fought pretty hard again going under, luckily Steve was there to hold her. This was his first time being there when she was sedated and was very surprised at her strength. The ABR showed the same result in her left ear, which is not responding with this type of testing. The right ear gave us a response this time. I can't remember if it is called wave 4 or 5 but it showed up this time during testing. It is showing severe to profound hearing loss. The scale for hearing loss is this, mild, moderate, severe, profound. So in her right ear she is deaf, really can't hear anything. We still don't know what she can hear with her left. The audiologist, Adrienne, said they are just baffled by Shannon. She said that things like this do happen but it is so rare that they aren't sure what is going on. On Wednesday, I went up to Primary's again to receive the MRI results. Our ENT, Dr. Grimmer, said that overall everything looked normal except for her inner ear on both sides. It is slightly enlarged which can cause hearing loss, but in Shannon's case he didn't feel it was affecting her hearing. So he said to keep going along with our audiologists plan of sound room tests every 3 weeks and that we don't have an answer to what is causing her loss. He also ordered an EKG for Shannon and sent us to make an appointment with a pediatric opthamologist because there can be problems related to her heart and blindness when it comes to her baffling hearing loss. We will get the EKG results soon but couldn't get in to the opthamologist until November 1st. Our regular audiologist, Ranae, wasn't in when we went to see Dr. Grimmer but she called me the next day to check up. I told her what Dr. Grimmer had said about it not affecting Shannon's hearing and she said that she and Adrienne, the other audiologist had been talking and researching trying to figure out what could be going on with Shannon. She asked if we could come back up to Primary's the next day because she wanted to reprogram Shannon's hearing aids and discuss her MRI. So this morning I headed up there with Conner and Shannon. Ranae said she and Adrienne have been talking to another ENT named Dr. Park to get a second opinion on Shannon's MRI. He runs a hearing loss clinic at Primary's and agrees with the Ranae and Adrienne that her enlarged inner ear could be affecting her hearing, he said he wanted to see Shannon. I called and his next opening isn't until December 4th but I am excited for him to see Shannon. Besides Ranae reprogramming Shannon's hearing aids today she also took new molds because her's are getting too small. Her hearing aids are now programmed for severe to profound on both sides since that is what the ABR is showing on the right ear. After programming them we went into the sound booth for another testing. Oh my goodness I should have brought ear plugs for sure. Even though her hearing aids are programmed at a very high level of severe to profound she only responded about 3 or 4 times to the sound. And believe me the sound that was coming through those speakers was LOUD, but it didn't bother Shannon. After Ranae saw how Shannon responded with the newly programmed aids and insanely loud noise she said she didn't think hearing aids would work for Shannon, she will most likely need cochlear implants on both sides. So for now we go back in 2 weeks for another sound test, and then again every 3 weeks, then the next month I will have my baby, then in November we take her to see the opthamologist and in December she gets to see the new ENT.

We are all doing great, as long as I remind myself I don't have to have all the answers. Right now all I am going to concentrate on is getting Shannon to wear her hearing aids all day without ripping them out. Then I will worry about being more consistent with disciplining my children, then I will try to keep up on my house......one step at a time. Shannon will eventually pick up on sign, she will eventually learn to speak, she will learn her name, she will hear our voices. First and foremost she is our happy, happy Shannon.

Two steps back

Apparently Shannon is not a regular case when it comes to hearing loss. I took her to PCMC on Tuesday for another sedated ABR because our new audiologist as well as our new ENT felt the other ABR's weren't conclusive. Well it is a really good thing that they did the ABR, but the test did not start off well. They had 5 nurses holding Shannon down while they tried to put in her IV. I just sat in the corner with my hands clasped and was tearing up as I listened to her scream longer and harder than any other time. I looked over and saw quite a bit of blood on tissues then saw two of the girls switch places and someone else tried to place the IV. Once they were finished they had me hold Shannon to try and calm her down. She was pretty tuckered out and she just let me hold her. Shannon is not a cuddler so it was a nice moment to just rock her in the chair. She went under pretty quickly after that, only took about 5 minutes for the medicine to do it's job. A little over an hour later they finished the hearing test and began the process of waking her up. After she had woken up and had eaten we went up to meet with the audiologist and go over the results. She started off by telling me that the ABR results they had received today were significantly different than the results obtained by UVRMC. I just said, "in a good way, or a bad way?" She said that Shannon has a nerve problem somewhere in her brain. Her inner ear is not connecting with her brain so that she can hear the sound with this type of test. But that does not mean that she can't hear......weird. So the audiologist said she was going to speak with Shannon's ENT and tell him that she would recommend Shannon get an MRI to try and find where the problem is in her brain. So for now the only way Shannon's hearing can get tested is for Shannon to tell us what she can and can't hear. The audiologist was so confused by the fact that her ABR results were so different from each other. She was going to contact UVRMC to try and figure that out. So for now we are returning Shannon's current hearing aids and they are loaning us hearing aids until we know what Shannon needs. Since Shannon is 17 months old and can't speak or hear having her tell us what she can and can't hear is going to be quite the process. We have to do sound booth tests every 3 weeks for about 6 months and then compile those results to hopefully see a trend and then they can program her hearing aids. So many environmental factors come into play with sound booth tests. Is she responding to the lights or the sound? Is she responding to vibrations from the noise or the actual noise? Did she just by chance look the same way that the sound is coming? But then there is another problem, that only lets us know at what volume she can hear we still won't know if language is distinguishable for her because she can't tell us. If language still isn't distinguishable then she will need a cochlear implant. The FDA requires that a patient use hearing aids for 6 months before they will allow for a cochlear implant. So for regular people an ABR test is done, that tells them what can and can't, then hearing aids or cochlear implants are given and the people are good to go. Shannon is an anomaly. She meets with her ENT on August 29th and then the MRI will be scheduled. She has to be sedated for the MRI so they are going to also do another ABR test at that time since the results were so different just in case. Here are some pictures of Shannon riding in the wagon, trying to stay awake after coming out of being sedated. Starts with a yawn and then her giving up and falling back asleep.

Help, I need feedback

I would like to start my own online vinyl business but I am having a hard time coming up with a name. Here are some of the ideas, please leave a comment telling me what you like.

Design it in vinyl
Design it with vinyl

Display it in vinyl

Say it in vinyl
Say it with vinyl

Your Walls, Your Way (Steve's contribution)

Any more suggestions? This is tough.

Pushing My Cricut

I told my nephew a year ago that I would make him a Batman themed room, well I finally did it. Thanks to an old friend, Krystal Taylor, who let met borrow her Batman Cartridge.

Batman and Robin are each about 30 inches tall.

I used two different cityscapes to make the background. It is about 35 inches tall and about 11 feet long. 

I love how the brick turned out. I want to do something similar in Conner's room.

I did all of this with my Cricut Expression and three different cartridges. It isn't easy doing it with a Cricut, a lot of piecing. Hopefully one day I will have a big vinyl cutting machine. I have to use my Design Studio and Sure Cuts A Lot as well.

Here is Shannon's room....so far. It isn't finished. 

Besides cleaning up my vinyl mess I have quite a bit more that I want to do. Love my little model. Now you can see how big it is compared to a 3 year old.

I am adding more birds, a quote on the left side of the tree, her name over her bed and we'll see what else.

A few months ago I made these pillows for Shannon's room. I cut a whole bunch of petals out of fleece then sewed everything together and added some stuffing.

As soon as her room is complete I will post final pictures. Then I will move on to Conner's room.