Maryam's first trip to the movies!

We took Maryam to see Monsters v. Aliens in IMAX 3D and she LOVED it! Here are Daddy and Maryam posing for a picture in front of the marque.
Here is Maryam trying to walk in holding her super HUGE glasses on her face. How lame is it that they didn't have children size glasses for a 3D cartoon? LAME.
Here is Maryam walking inside with her glasses on, but she didn't like how dark it was, so she pushed them up for a bit.

Here is Maryam sitting on Mommy's lap. She wasn't heavy enough to keep the seat down, so she sat on my lap. I think she preferred that anyway because when she got a little frightened she just turned around and gave Mommy a big hug.

Here are Maryam and Anna chatting. The sound broke about an hour into the movie so we sat around listening to the remaining crowd play Mystery Science Theater 3000. After the theater announced that they couldn't repair it and that they'd give us our money back, Maryam and Daddy ran through the theater. Maryam LOVED it! She just kept running up and down the stairs saying "go, go, go, go Maryam, go, go, go. go, go, go Daddy, go, go, go." It was hysterical.

St. Patrick's Day Pictures

Baby BFF's in their matching St. Patrick's Day dresses. Anna + Maryam = BFFs!

Ian and Anna hinys! HA! I just HAD to put this picture on there because its hysterical! They give a whole new meaning to the word, "CHEEEEESE!" Ha!

Our little girl all dressed up but still not feeling well. Can't you tell? So sad. We really thought that Anna could make Maryam feel better, but not this time.

No Fear

Here is Maryam climbing the ladder thing. Of course she might not have tried it if Anna hadn't been on there before her saying "c'mon Maryam." So, of course, up goes Maryam. When she got towards the top I couldn't watch. I thought for sure that she was going through. But Christi was brave and stood there waiting to catch her. When Maryam got about 2 steps away from the top I ran up there and just grabbed her. I couldn't take it anymore.

Anna however is a climbing genius. She starts up and makes it without any of us having a heart attack.

Here is Maryam coming through a tunnel...

With Ian shortly behind her. I love running into friends at the park. Maryam had such a great time playing with her BFF. And the mommas had a great time picturing our future. "C'mon Maryam, you won't get in trouble." We can already hear Anna saying those dreaded words to Maryam. It will be just like when Christi and I were in High School. Uh oh world, watch out.

Flying a kite

Here is Daddy handing the kite to Maryam. With her weak little hands, he had to help her hold onto it or the kite would have taken off!

Maryam ran over to wear Daddy was with the kite yelling kite, kite, kite. I had no idea she even knew what a kite was! She's never seen one before, that I'm aware of. Maybe on TV?

Here is her Elmo kite that her Auntie Brande and Uncle JJ got her for her birthday. Yesterday was the first time she used it. And she LOVED it.

Two more things!

1. Maryam requested, chewed and swallowed upwards of 20 Cheerios tonight!!!!!! AND managed to drink half of a Honey Bear Cup in less than 3 hours. I'd say that is some GREAT progress. I kept telling her to swallow the Cheerios and then she rubbed her neck, swallowed, opened her mouth and said "aaaaa". I actually think she's starting to understand. (Knock on some good strong wood.....Or as one of Maryam's Neonatologists once said, "there isn't enough wood in all of San Diego County to cover what you just said!" But that was only in reference to me saying...."She's fine, what else could go wrong?" HA!)
2. The new blog layout is brought to you, yet again, by Christi and the help of The Cutest Blog on the Block. Thanks Christi! Can you believe she even remembered that I wanted it to be pink and green? How RAD is she?

New Blog

The new blog design was brought to you today by Christi29. My SUPER talented BFF from WAY back. However, IF you see ANY design flaws, which you won't, DO NOT TELL HER! She has severe OCD, requires medication and might end up totally losing it.
Thanks again Christi! I very much appreciate your dedication to keeping Maryam's blog current with the season/holiday. You're the best!

Friendship

Today Shawn Carnes graduated from federal law enforcement training at 29 Palms MCAGCC! Hooray for Shawn! Shawn is married to one of my best friends in the whole wide world, Christi Marie. She and Mayda Marie have been two of my "railroad track" friends for most of my life. (We're the 3 Maries!) Christi pretty much forced me to get pregnant when she found out she was pregnant with Anna. She was very persuasive, even from Kansas! She even posted a blog entry directed at Brett! And thank God she was persistent because look what we got!

Here is Maryam on day two of her glasses. Today she took her glasses off twice. Both times were in the car. She's still rear facing, which I'm sure is super boring for her, but way safer so she has to suffer through boring car trips because I'm overly cautious. And I think because she was bored she decided to play with her newest accessory. She handed them to me when I opened the door to take her out. She had them folded up and was handling them very carefully. I was a bit surprised by how delicately she handled them. We took her to the local optometrist, Dr. Rochford today, and he adjusted the glasses so they set better on her face. And he confirmed that the plastic frames were indeed too small for her face. Brian said he'd order her a different pair in a larger size and all will be well with the world of optics again.
In some SUPER wonderful eating news, Maryam swallowed at least 5 bites of saltine crackers tonight at dinner! HOORAY! w00t! Yippee! SWEET! RAD! (insert your own exclamation here!) AND she swallowed at least 2 bites of a french fry dipped in ranch. It was so cool. She'd take a bite of cracker and then take a swig of water to help her wash it down! It was like she was an old pro. I tried to act like it was no big deal, but the HUGE grin on my face could not be erased. I even got all teary eyed. NO I'm not pregnant, it was just a super big deal!
Tomorrow is my last day babysitting Anna. I'm so sad about that. She's such a doll and she has helped Maryam in so many ways. The bond Maryam and Anna have created is priceless. Anna has taught Maryam so much, just by being around her. Today at the ceremony when they saw each other, they both lit up! It was so cute. I'm going to miss that little grumpis and so will Maryam.

Thank you for all the comments from yesterday's post.

Big Bear Weekend

We spent the weekend in Big Bear with the Carnes Family. (Anna's family) We had a GREAT time. We went up Friday night and came home last night. Saturday we spent the day at Oktoberfest. Brett and Kelly won a log sawing contest and get to go back for the semi finals at the end of the month. Christ and Kelly won the girls log sawing contest and get to go back too! I didn't dare compete, my back still hurts a lot and I'm very weak (even when my back is fine, I'm still a weakling!). I would have helped my team lose!
Maryam had to be on oxygen the whole time we were there. We think because of the altitude. On the way up the mountain we had to pull over and hook her up because she started coughing really bad. When going to Big Bear it takes about 15 minutes to climb 4000 ft. I'm almost certain it was from the altitude, (We live at 2500 ft. Big Bear is almost 7000 ft.) but she's at the doctor now to make sure its not something else. The first night we kept her at 1/4 liter per minute and by the end of the weekend she was down to 1/8 liter per minute.
She still coughed at night, even when we turned up the O2. And since we've been home she's still needed the oxygen and is still coughing. That's another reason why we took her in today. Just to be on the safe side.
I'll update when Brett gets home from taking her in.
Oh, in good news, Maryam gets her glasses tomorrow! My cousin Brian did us a favor and sold the glasses to us at his cost. And my Grams said she'd cover the cost for us. So tomorrow Maryam will get both pairs of glasses. Hopefully she'll wear them. If anyone has any tips on how to keep glasses on a 19 month old, SHARE please!

Thanks Christi!

Christi Carnes, the digital scrapbooker extraordinaire, has mastered the use of html code to make Maryam's blog super fantastic! Kudos Mrs. Carnes, Kudos. My favorite part is what she said, "it was nothing, it only took 30 minutes!" Gotta love her. To see what she did with her own blog check out Christi's Blog.
Maryam still isn't feeling too hot. She was up for 3 hours last night mostly due to discomfort from the diaper rash. I think I've finally got that under control. Now, if only I could stop the diarrhea. My new game plan is to give her Pedialite until there is no more diarrhea between feedings. If 4 hours passes without her having more diarrhea, I'll try to put her back on the Pediasure. Wish us luck!
Maryam had PT today and I think it went well. My little sensory kid strikes again. We think the toe walking might be from not liking the tile floors. We don't have any carpet, we have tile in the living spaces and hardwood in the bedrooms. When she's on carpet she tends to walk normally ie, at PT. So, my new plan for the toe walking is to keep her in shoes for a few days and see if she stops toe walking. If that works then I guess she'll have to wear shoes at home or at the very least slip around in socks.

Dancing in the rain

Here are Ian, me, Maryam, Anna and Brett dancing in the rain. We were walking Christi out to the car when it just started raining! So, we thought hey, let's go dance in the rain. The kids LOVED it. And Christi's super cool camera even picked up the rain drops.

At the park tonight

Maryam and Anna on the slide together. After a few trips down the slide they wouldn't go down it without each other.

Christi trying to make them hold hands for the photo...we're such posers.

Here is Maryam and Mommy after our 3.5 mile walk. SUPER fun!

Monkey see, monkey do?

Here are the 3 kids laying in bed watching a Baby Animals DVD.....I wonder where they got that from? Hmmm? Could it be from watching their daddies play Play Station 3 for 5 hours? Hmmm? I dunno...what do you think? Isn't it Bromantic? (If you sing that, its WAY funnier!)

Here is Maryam after her bath. For some reason tonight she just wasn't feeling it. From the minute I put her in the bath tub it was like she was in sensory over load. It was really weird. What is normally very relaxing for her was the complete opposite for her tonight. She started crying and trying to climb up my arms to get out. I couldn't tell if she just wanted out of the bath tub or out of her own skin, IT WAS BAD. Then when I did get her to calm down (I did brushing using the washcloth instead of her actual brush) she was fine! She played with all of her toys and didn't want to climb out of her own skin or the tub anymore. But as soon as it was time to get out, she went into sensory over load again! This time I used the towel to brush her down and when I got her to her changing table I was able to do the joint compressions and she totally mellowed out again.
After the joint compressions I rocked her to sleep feeding her. It took barely 10 minutes for her to fall asleep. And even after all the crying from the sensory over load, she's respirating fine! When I sat down to write this blog entry she was sating at 94%! How awesome is that?

I TOTALLY forgot to mention the great eating and drinking news for today...DUH! Maryam drank some capri sun today! She took Anna's from her (sorry Anna) and just started walking around the house drinking! How cool is that? Then I gave Anna hers back and got a new one for Maryam and she continued to drink it even though it was a different flavor!!!! Hooray! AND, AND, AND Ian says he saw her swallow Jell-o! Ian is very intuitive of Maryam's eating problems, especially for only being 4. Everyday he asks me, did Maryam swallow anything today? And every time he eats something in front of her he wants her to watch because he's "going to teach her to swallow today." But even if she didn't swallow the Jell-o (I really think she did!) she did swallow some watermelon! She didn't swallow the whole big piece that she stuck into her mouth, but she definitely swallowed most of it! She just sucked on it until there wasn't much left. I did the stroke her neck trick that Amanda taught me, and the blow in her face trick that Amanda taught me and it worked! Christi, Ian, Anna and I all started blowing in her face while I stroked her neck and eventually the teeniest tiniest piece of watermelon came out and that was it! The rest went down her throat! HOORAY!

We're on day 4 of really bad teething issues. Hopefully she'll get some sleep tonight. Last night was better than Monday night and Tuesday night where we got a whole 4 hours of sleep between the two of us. It looks like the molar on the bottom left MIGHT finally come through sooner than later. The gums look more yellow and white tonight than they have all day. Wish us luck!

Feeling old!!!!!!!!

Mayda and Tyler.

Mayda and Austin.
OK, so Mayda's eldest son, Tyler, promoted today from jr. high school to high school. Normally this sort of event doesn't bother me AT ALL. But today I was the emotional equivalent of a pre-teen girl who's parents just said she couldn't date the boy of her choice. It was CRAZY! Just being in our old Jr. High gym made me emotional. I kept thinking about how Maryam is going to grow up one day. DUH! Of course she's going to grow up, she's a baby, she has no where else to go!
Of course it didn't help that Mayda was all emotional either. I was there the day Tyler was born, it seems insane that he could possibly be old enough to be starting high school in the fall. And to top it off, later in the day her youngest son, Austin, promoted from elementary school to jr. high school. For starters, I didn't even know that this particular event was celebrated, but it really got me thinking. Tyler will be graduating from high school in 4 years, just as Maryam will be starting elementary school! And Austin will be in the high school graduating class of 2014, 20 years after Mayda and I graduated...Chrissy too! Ladies, we're getting old!!!! Mayda and Maryam....the outfit is from Auntie Mayda.
Emotional tangent over.
Maryam's oxygen saturation isn't doing as well as it was a week ago. Today she's been sating around 95-96%. Not ideal, she has to stay over 95%, but we'd like her well over 95%. We gave her a dose of Lasix, as we were told to do, but it hasn't seemed to help. (I think that's a good thing, because that means there is no fluid build up!) She has an appointment with her pediatrician tomorrow, I'll see if she has any suggestions that might help us.
Brett and I noticed today that Maryam has started losing weight. We cut back 100 calories/day (which is practically unheard of in the preemie world) to see if it encourages Maryam to eat more food and drink more liquids orally. I think it has helped her want to put more into her mouth, she even dripped some pediasure into her mouth from her bottle today! But I wonder if the sudden weight loss could have affected her lungs. Her pants are getting too big for her! Today she was cruising and crawling around and her pants kept sliding off of her hiny.
I also wonder if the low oxygenation could be due to exhaustion. Maryam decided that sleep wasn't important last night and exchanged 4 precious hours of sleep for PLAY TIME! Seriously at 3:48am she was standing in her crib laughing and saying, "mama, mama, mama.....dada, dada, dada." She didn't go back to sleep until 6:30! Thankfully she slept in until 11am, so Brett got to make up some of his lost sleep. So far today she's only had a 25 minute nap. Raise your glasses folks...here's to hoping Maryam sleeps tonight, clink, clink, clink!

Maryam's Baptism, more photos

The Grandparents, parents and Maryam.

The GREAT Grandparents, parents and Maryam.

Nurse Jennifer made Maryam's BEAUTIFUL gown from the shawl of my wedding dress. She did a wonderful job. It fit Maryam perfectly. She was comfortable and gorgeous. Thank you Jennifer.