A few funny/cute stories worthy of note

With the arrival of Jadon, my parents are in town to watch the girls while we are at the hospital getting acclimated to our newest family member. There have been a few little moments that have happened over the past few days (some at the hospital, and some at home) that we were talking about recently and I thought, "I'd better write these down before we forget." So that's why I created this post. In no particular order, there are 5 things that Abby and I thought were pretty cute that the girls did over the weekend.

• While the girls were visiting the hospital and Jadon was in his crib sleeping, Alexis climbed up into the rocking chair next to the crib to get a peek at him. Fortunately Abby had the camera with her so she was able to snap a quick photo...

• We posed the girls on the rocking chair and I held Jadon over the girls so we could get a picture of the 3 of our children. When I initially held Jadon over the middle of Alexis and Alana, his arm was hanging over Alana's leg. She picked it up and tossed it off of her leg, as if to say, "Who do you think you are, touching my leg like that?" Below are the before and after pictures...

• My mom was holding Jadon on the couch in our hospital room while the girls were sitting next to her just watching curiously. My mom offered Jadon to them and asked, "Can you give Jadon a kiss?" Alexis gave kisses every time she was asked. Alana likes to offer her cheek and kiss the air (see 1st picture below). I was able to get a picture of Alexis kissing Jadon (2nd picture below), but I was having trouble getting one of Alana kissing him with her lips. My mom asked Alana to kiss him again and Alana extended her arm, pushed his head away, and said, "All done."

• I don't have pictures to go with this or the next one, but I think they're worth sharing. When it comes to discipline, we mostly prefer time-outs with our girls. They seem to be pretty effective. While the girls were at our house with just my parents, one of them (my parents couldn't remember which one) started to take a toy from the other. My dad said (in a stern voice), "No" and the one who was doing the taking immediately stopped. She then proceeded to hang her head (presumably in shame) and walk herself right into her time-out spot. The funny thing is, since she listened to the initial "No" she wasn't even deserving of, nor would she have received a time-out. Pretty cute.

• Finally, since Jadon was born and the girls have come to visit him, they can't get enough of his picture. They love looking at pictures of Jadon (if they can't look at the real thing). My mom says they constantly ask her to see pictures of him, so every time they ask she pulls out her phone and they look at pictures of Jadon. That in and of itself is adorable, but she called last night to tell me that once while looking at the pictures they decided to kiss the pictures. Priceless!

In other news: today is go-home day! Also, Jadon's bilirubin levels (related to jaundice, high is bad) have been somewhat elevated the whole time we've been here but he was tested this morning and they're coming down! Also, he's gained weight after previously losing. Most babies lose weight after birth and don't start gaining by the time the family is discharged from the hospital. Our little rockstar feeder isn't most babies! Yay Jadon!

A new arrival!

I'm terrible with blogs. It's been almost a year since I last posted. In the time since my last post here, Alana has also learned to walk. Also, Abby got pregnant. We bought a minivan in anticipation of the new baby. On our anniversary (March 11th) we found out that the new baby was a boy. We decided to name him Jadon Daniel Barton. Jadon was introduced to the world yesterday at 10:31am. He is 21.4" long and weighed 7 lbs 9 oz. I've posted a few of our favorite pictures.

My parents are here taking care of the girls while I'm at the hospital taking care of Abby, and Abby in turn is taking care of Jadon. Some nice things about this pregnancy/delivery experience that we missed out on the first one...

• There was much less stress leading up to the due date (ie: "will he make it or won't he?")
• I was able to be there in the delivery room with Abby holding her hand while he was born
• While he did go to NICU, it was less than a 4 hour stay (vs. 4 months with the girls)
• He was in Abby's room within 4 hours of birth and he is a "rockstar eater" according to a lactation consultant (Abby never got to breast feed the girls)

We praise God for his safe passage from utero to the life that we all know outside of the womb. The girls went through so much and as a result so did we. It's such a blessing to see what it's like to go through a "normal" delivery.

So far Jadon has been such a pleasant child (just like his big sisters). Seriously. He fusses every once in a while when he is hungry, or maybe even when he just wants to be held. :) All in all he is pretty laid back though. I am hoping that this continues. While we'll love him no matter what, it sure would be nice if he continues to need to be woken up in the middle of the night for feedings.

No promises, but I will try to update this a little more than once a year :) With 3 kids at home I'm not sure how possible that will be, but I've seen parents of more than 3 do much more than I have so I think I could manage. Time will tell. Thanks for reading.

We welcomed a new family member, and ALEXIS CAN WALK!!!

My sister was married on Saturday to Joshua Alan Myers. He's a great guy and they're down in Acapulco, Mexico for the week.

We're still in Georgia even though both of us were supposed to work today. The thing is, our check engine light came on while we were driving from the church for rehearsal to the restaurant for the dinner. Turns out our transmission is going out. It still drove fine, but we didn't feel comfortable taking it the 500+ miles back home. It's still in the shop. We're staying with my parents until it's fixed, and then we're going straight to Tennessee for another wedding (that of Abby's cousin).

Now for the most exciting news of the day... Alexis took her first steps. If you're on facebook you can see videos of her walking there. She was so proud of herself. It was awesome! The most I've seen her walk was about 20 steps and she was up for over 10 seconds on her own. I've even seen her pull herself up using an end table and then turn and take a few steps away from it. It's so awesome to finally have her walking on her own. Here come the bumps, scrapes, and bruises.

Getting back into this (for now)

I've let way too much time pass between my last post and now... but here's the gist of our lives since then.

Our girls had the helmets for almost 3 months and their heads are much more round now.

Alexis got RSV around the time of the Super Bowl and spent 3 days in the hospital.

We've taken several trips with the girls (including visits to GA, FL, and NY).

Abby was pregnant in April but miscarried fairly early on in the pregnancy.

My (Jason's) sister is getting married in a couple weeks and our girls will be flower girls in the wedding while Abby and I will be in the wedding party as well (we get to walk together).

That's our life in a few sentences over the last several months.

The latest that is going on with our girls....

Alexis - She is a super fast crawler, and she is able to pull herself up to anything now. She is cruising (walking along objects while leaning onto them) and will be walking soon. She has recently been making funny noises with her tongue and voice together. It's quite cute, but no first words yet. She says da da da da, and ma ma ma ma but it's obvious she isn't calling for mom or dad.

Alana - She is also crawling and able to pull herself up to most things. She is starting to cruise but only using baby steps. Her latest quirk is holding her hands in the air and making all kinds of gestures with them while screaming. It's not a mad or sad scream, just a "listen to me I have something to say" scream. Also very cute.

Both - We had a visit with a developmental pediatrician a couple months ago and he said that if the girls weren't walking within three months (the end of August) that he would like an MRI done on their brains. He is somewhat concerned with the possible shortage of "white matter" which controls motor skills (ie: they may have cerebral palsy). If they do have this it would be a very minor form. Both are EXPECTED to be able to walk and be normal cognitively. We hope for no CP, but if it is ever diagnosed we're not worried as our girls have already come so far. It's amazing to look back at the pictures of when they were first born and then see them now!

It's been a while....

...since my last post so I figured it might be a good idea to write another. A lot has happened since the last time I posted. The biggest development is that the girls' developmental pediatrician has decided that it's time to put the girls in helmets. They look like the one pictured here...



That's a little sad for us, but the alternative is a crooked head because the girls lay on their right side all the time which has created a flat spot on the right side of their heads. They'll have to wear the helmets 23 hours a day until the problem goes away. This is all of course IF our insurance or Medicaid will cover the helmets. They're 1700 bucks each so if not then the girls are just going to have to live with crooked heads :)

We have taken a few vacations since my last post. First we took a weekend trip up to Michigan. May parents joined us up there and we also introduced the girls to many people on my mom's side of the family. After that we took them to Florida for a week. We drove both times because even though flying would be cheaper for us (with my benefits) we didn't want to subject our girls to the germs and varying pressures they'd experience in airplanes. We drove through the night down to Georgia and stayed a day with my parents before driving through the night to get to Florida (where we stayed with Abby's family). It was a great trip and I can't wait until we go back for Christmas. We really miss Florida. Abby has taken TONS of pictures since the last time I've posted. I will give you a few of them here...


Us at my parents' house

The girls with all of their cousins

Alana and Alexis

Alexis (top) and Alana (bottom)


Also, here is a quick video of Alana talking away...

No real issues

So sorry it's taken me so long to get back on here. It's been a busy week. We checked into the hospital for 24 hours of monitoring and the girls didn't really act up at all. They were like a finicky car that acts up until you take it to the shop. :) We ended up getting discharged before the full 24 hours was up and we did go to Michigan. Pictures coming later. The girls still are only eating about 15-20 oz. a day. They used to eat 24 oz. at their peak. We think they're teathing. They show all the symptoms of teathing except fever and swollen gums (we don't think they're swollen anyway). It does seem early for three month (adjusted age) babies to be teething, but it is possible from what we've read. It would explain the loss of appetite. We're also not using Avent bottles as of right now. We spent a lot of money on them, so we're hanging on to them. The girls don't seem to eat as well with them as they did with the hospital provided bottles. We are still on for our trip to FL next week.

Minor setback

Our girls haven't been eating as much as normal for the last few days. We finally called the pediatrician about it yesterday and she set up an appointment for this afternoon. We showed for the appointment and she looked over the girls. Our original plan was to go to the appointment and then head straight from there to Ft. Wayne to stay the night with Abby's great uncle on our way up to Michigan for the weekend. Funny how quickly plans can change. Our doctor watched the girls eat their bottles and said, "I hope you guys aren't in a hurry to go anywhere." Haha, Really? At the end of our time there she said, "I'm going to admit them to Community North (the hospital where they were born) for 24 hours of observation." So, here we are in Indianapolis tonight. We are at home and our girls are in the pediatric unit at Community North.

The first 2 feedings the girls had in the hospital were typical for them for the past few days. They didn't eat much for either one. For the 3rd feeding they hooked up oxygen sensors to see how much oxygen was in their blood while feeding. They gave Alana oxygen with her feeding and she did great. So we though, "Hmmm, maybe they need oxygen while eating." Alexis killed that theory when they decided to see how her saturation would be during feeding WITHOUT oxygen and she ate a bunch and her o2 levels were good. So then the doctor at the hospital says, "Well guys, I honestly don't know what's going on." I don't know if that's good or bad. I think it's good, as I hope that maybe the last few days have just been a fluke. What we know now... in the past week they've each gained 2 oz. (8 oz. would be normal) and they had chest x-rays that showed some minor improvement from the last ones. No one is too concerned and we should have them back with us tomorrow. Keep them in your prayers and hopefully soon this will be just another memory.