Fun "4" Nick's Birthday!

Yesterday we celebrated Nick's 4th birthday! It was a lot of fun. The whole day he told EVERYONE we saw that it was his birthday and he is 4 now, and then after his "party" and at bed time he came whimpering to me and Josh that he just wanted to be 3 again. LOL Maybe so he could have another birthday party?

Anyway, it was a nice day. We had a house full of family, and some friends who might as well be family! Nick couldn't have been happier.
Thanks to everyone for coming out and making this occasion so special!

A time to relax... we hope

After a few weeks of some large amounts of anxiety, I think we will be able to relax a little-- at least mentally. It would be nice to be able to catch up on some ZZZZZ's like the 2 little ones are doing in the picture above, but not too likely. :)

I had a good conversation with Dr. Cowley tonight. He called to give us the latest test results on Nick. He said that back in November when they did the holter test Nick was having about 26,000 beats in a day and April's test showed him having about 9,500! That is a MUCH BETTER number. So, we think the medicine is doing a good job. Optimally we would like to see it a even a little lower, but when we were trying different dosages at the hospital, both higher and lower doses gave nick more beats, so we'll stay at this current dose for a while.
Dr. Cowley is going to try to schedule us to go back down at the end of June to do another heart cath and get some pictures of the coronary arteries and the left and right ventricles (and something else I think, but I wasn't writing fast enough) and he may also have a CT scan done as well since Nick will already be under general anesthesia. As usual, if anything happens with Nick in the meantime, or something changes then our plans are subject to change. :) But for now, we might get a little break from the next scheduled chaos. LOL

Earlier tonight when we got the mail there was a birthday package for Nick from the Richardson's. He was SO excited and didn't want to wait until Wednesday to open it so I let him have at it. They had sent him this cool M&M tee shirt, a dollar, a pink piggy, and a pop-up b-day card with 4 candles on it. Nick was SO happy. I took some pictures. You can see how in the 3rd one he's trying to look the same as the face on his shirt, LOL.






While we were admiring his gift and talking about his birthday and people who love him, I mentioned to him that I was expecting a call from Dr. Cowley tonight. Nick said "Dr. Cowley is my cardiologist." I said, "I know." Then Nick said "Yeah, and Dr. Cowley is my BEST friend!" I said "Really? He is your BEST friend?" Nick replied "Yep. He loves me."
Pretty nice, I think, that he loves Dr. Cowley so much and knows that Dr. Cowley loves him too. We are so thankful for this wonderful man and the time, knowledge, effort, and love that he gives to Nick!

One for good measure

I was just looking at the blog and realized that I should put another picture or two of Andrew up... He's growing so fast these days...


Riding his bike


Having the too-often-had but love-it-anyway PB&J sandwich with Nick

You can see how they are about the same size! Sometimes I think Drew is even bigger!

Josh and Paul's newest toys!

I can't believe I haven't mentioned the two biggest boys newest toys! Josh found a steal of a deal on a '92 Ford Truck that met my criteria for him getting a truck (which was: it had to fit all of the family and it had to be automatic because I don't want to drive a stick...and [sheepishly] I don't know how to drive a stick). Anyway, he found this truck in really good condition for SUPER cheap. Other than the fact it's a Ford, Josh is pretty pleased with the whole thing. He's missed having a truck the last few years.





And Paul finally bought himself (with some help from Josh) his own guitar! He's been saving up for over a year and has been really diligent about it. After the tooth fairy came by last time with the whopping $5 bucks for the 4 teeth he had pulled, it put him at over $53! [Remember, my kids don't get allowance or anything yet, so it was really hard to save that much!] Anyway, his determination for saving was beginning to fade and so we decided it was time to go guitar shopping. We chose to purchase a quality guitar since we intend on really using it, so we went to Mike's Music (where Josh is a frequent customer) and Mike gave us the "good guy discount" and a super deal on this beautiful instrument. He even threw in a soft case and a handful of picks for the aspiring musician! The guitar has mother of pearl on the front and is in such good condition that I think Josh is the teensiest bit jealous! LOL





So, now Paul takes lessons every Sunday afternoon from Josh, and has to play with the guitar EVERY day. He's so excited. He already has it in his mind that the next thing he'll save for is a set of drums to help him build his own band. Yeah right. Mommy doesn't think so, Bud. LOL At least not until we have a sound-proof room for you to practice! :D

Tricycling in the house...

Nick finally got his holter pack in the mail. They sent one several days ago, but it was faulty, so we had to send it back and have them send us another one. Anyway, we put it on yesterday after lunch and so now we're counting down 'till he can take it off. He really REALLY hates having the stickers (leads) on. They shouldn't hurt him at all,but he insists that they do and he becomes a completely different child. His voice goes up an octave and he talks all squeaky and soft, his body tenses and he clenches nearly every muscle, he wont play or do ANYTHING like he normally does. He continually cries that it hurts. He wont walk, sit, stand, lay, go potty, or even eat without help. I really think this is a mind issue, partly because I can distract him a tiny bit once in a while. Today, I even moved all the furniture around in the front room so that he could ride Andrew's tricycle around in the house.(It snowed last night, so outside isn't a good option). Here's a shot of that. You can see how he forgot momentarily that he "can't" do anything.





We'll send the pack back this afternoon and then he'll be back to his normal wild-man self. It does worry me a little bit that he wont play the way he usually does, because they want to see what his heart is doing under normal conditions, and him sitting around not doing anything is NOT normal. Oh, well. We don't really know what else to do! Lil' Turkey.