Pictures!

Well I know it's been a few weeks since we posted any pictures so here's a bunch - enjoy! With pictures like these of such a healthy looking boy, it makes it all the more harder to know we've just got a few days left until we have to give him back to the hospital for his 2nd heart surgery. We go for pre-op tomorrow morning, I'll post more details in the afternoon after the appointment. Please continue to keep us in your prayers over the next couple of weeks for the surgery and a speedy recovery. Thanks!

Ethan in one of his talkative moods!

Ethan sitting up by himself on the couch!

Mid-afternoon nap time

Bright-eyed and bushy tailed!

Ethan trying sweet potatoes for the first time!

Classic baby picture - sucking thumb and holding blankie!

In a good mood!

Another happy moment!

Ethan and his first stuffed animal - his hospital buddy that we
gave him to keep him company when we were not with him.

Funny Face!

Messy baby

So yesterday, I sat down to read the latest on baby Julianne (see link on right). Her current blog entry mentioned how they had a messy day with Julianne at their cardiologist office. Without getting too detailed, lets just say she had stuff coming out both ends and it got all over Julianne and her mom! Unfortunately, that has been the "norm" for them recently. Well we sort of had our own similar experience yesterday and today.

Poor Ethan, he just can't decide how hungry he is sometimes! We've been feeding him 6 bottles in a 24 hour period. These bottles have been only 4 oz. because they are still high-cal (26 cal/oz. as opposed to a normal formula bottle that is 20 cal/oz.) and still thickened with rice cereal to give even more calories per bottle. Well yesterday I experimented with his new bigger 9oz. bottle that I just bought. Basically I've done the math and a 4oz. 26 cal/oz. bottle is about the same as a 5 oz. bottle of 20 cal/oz. I tried giving him a normal 20 cal/oz. bottle without the rice cereal and he seemed to do ok for the first 3 oz. but then threw it all up. That was mess #1.

So I changed Ethan into his onesie that says "Automatic Sprinkler" - I bet you can guess what mess #2 was! Dan has prided himself in the fact that he hasn't been "automatically sprinkled" while changing Ethan's diaper so far. Well Ethan decided to change that record! Fortunately the leak was contained on the waterproof changing pad underneath him!

And shortly after the "sprinkler" accident, Dan fed Ethan his evening bottle - a regular 4 oz. high-cal/thickened bottle. All went fine with the feeding, but a few minutes later, Dan passed Ethan off to me to hold him for a bit. Ethan started sucking his fingers (he prefers them over his thumb) and gagged himself which made him throw up all over me for the 2nd time!

So then we decided it was bath time. He enjoys his baths, especially since I've started adding bubbles. He kicks and kicks in his baby bathtub over the sink, splashing soapy water all over the countertops - mess #4(not so bad!).

Then we jump forward to today - Ethan did great all day today, even for the few hours that his Mimi babysat him. But for his dinner, he took all 4oz. of his high-cal/thickened bottle and wanted more so we made him another 1oz. bottle. He seemed to do fine with that and STILL seemed hungry. So I let him sit in his bouncy seat for a little while to let his food digest and he started getting sleepy so I went ahead and gave him his nightly medicine and then he decided to throw up again. So I gave him a sponge bath, changed him into his jammies and he quickly drifted off to sleep so I took him upstairs to his crib for the night.

What an eventful 2 days! Well I hope you're able to get a little laugh out of this like we have! Oh, by the way, his cold is getting better and so is mine. I don't think the throwing up has anything to do with his stuffy nose. We're still on track for going to UNC next Friday, 1/18, for pre-op. If his cold is worse then we'll likely postpone the surgery, but I talked to his cardiologist office today and they said that he doesn't seem sick enough right now to postpone. That's good news because I just want to get this surgery over with and be back home once again.

We're sick :-(

Yes, it's true. Despite all our efforts to try to stay home and away from germs, somehow Ethan and I (Julie) are sick. Ethan's got a stuffy nose andI've got a bad cough. Last night Dan started to feel like he was getting a sore throat (something I never had with my cough) so we're praying he's taken enough Vitamin C to fight it off. Ethan and I have been sick since Thursday and with his surgery a little over 2 weeks away, we're at the critical point of trying to determine whether to hope he gets better and go ahead with surgery, or to postpone it a little bit longer. When we were at the hospital last month for his heart cath, Ethan's cardiologist said he needed to be healthy for at least 2 weeks - not even as much as a stuffy nose - prior to surgery so that the nasal congestion wouldn't complicate his breathing while on the ventilator for surgery. I really don't want to have to put off the surgery any longer, since I'm not looking forward to it in the first place, but we need to do what's best for Ethan.

So PLEASE pray for us to get well soon so we can go ahead and get this surgery over, if that's God's will for us at this time. Praise God that we have this flexibility to schedule it whenever we're not sick, instead of being in a critical state with his heart condition!

Solid Food

Ethan has found a new food - applesauce! Yes, that's right, last Thursday, 12/27 we started introducing solid foods and he seems to like the applesauce. To get him used to it and to make sure he's not allergic, we're only introducing one new solid food a week. This week, we'll try out bananas. We're so pleased that he likes to eat and that he's gaining weight steadily. He's currently 15 lb. 4 oz. (6.92 kg). We're hoping that the introduction of solid foods before his surgery will help him out with any eating issues post-surgery. It's hard to believe we're under 3 weeks now! Please keep us in your prayers as time gets close.

Pray for good health and for us to not go insane (especially me - Julie - since I don't have the "daily outing" of going to work like Dan does) as we do our best to keep Ethan quarantined at home so that he can stay healthy for surgery. Even as much as a stuffy nose could postpone the surgery and we just want to get it over with as soon as possible so we can have our little boy back home with us again.

Christmas pictures!

As mentioned in our last update, we do have some Christmas pictures and some pictures from our trip to Tennessee last weekend.

Our trip to Opryland Hotel in Nashville, the whole inside was decorated like this, with a riverboat ride in the middle of the exhibit below these lights.

A view below all those lights, some smaller ponds and greenery near the river.

An outdoor nativity exhibit - imagine that, a biblical display in a public place!

Ethan taking it all in!

Daddy (Ethan's Pop-Pop) and his girls (Ethan's mom and Aunt Jessica & Aunt Jenny) in front of a huge Christmas tree made entirely of Poinsettas!

Ethan with his Mommy, his Pop-Pop, and Aunt Jessica.

Four Generations: Frances Wrinkle (Mam-ma), Frances' firstborn- Rhonda (Mimi), Rhonda's firstborn - Julie, and Julie's firstborn - Ethan!

Well that sums up the highlights of our trip to Nashville to see the Garretts (Julie's dad's family) and then to Knoxville to see the Wrinkles (Julie's mom's family). I think we also have some pictures from Christmas day to come later. We just got a new digital camera for Christmas so we're still experimenting with it. Hopefully we will have some good Christmas day pictures to share.

Thanks for continuing to think and pray for us. We are so blessed to have Ethan in our lives and can't imagine life without him. Thank You Jesus for making Christmas special for us this year by giving us the gift of a son, just like you were a gift to Mary & Joseph so many Christmas' ago!

More family updates

What a blur this last week has been! First, my grandpa's health rapidly declined since my post last week. In fact, just 4 days after I requested prayer, he went to be with the Lord. On Monday, 12/17, he slipped into a coma and then by the following night, he breathed his last breath. My dad and his 3 siblings were all able to be there with him to say goodbye in his final moments, including my aunt Jo who had been in Korea with her husband for the past week on business. She managed to get to my grandpa's side, for his final 3 hours. So...Tuesday night mom called us and told us to get packed and ready to leave the following morning for a 12 hour drive to Nashville, TN for the visitation and funeral. Ethan was my Papa Joe's only biological great-grandchild and I wish they could've met, but Papa Joe at least got to see lots of pictures when my sister Jessica and her husband Brandon went to visit him last week. Papa Joe loved children and Jessica said that despite how sick Papa Joe was, just seeing the cute pictures of Ethan brought a big smile to his face!

Ethan did well with the car ride, he slept most of the way there and most of the way back today as well. Despite the unfortunate circumstances, it was nice to be able to get doctor's approval to travel with Ethan and let all the extended family meet him! Everyone seemed to be healthy, which is good because he got passed around to everyone! And on the way back home, we made a stop about 2 hours into our journey in Knoxville, TN to see my mom's side of the family - her 2 brothers and mom. Ethan is my grandma's only biological great-grandchild as well, so he's now got one more "claim to fame" to making him a special little boy!

Oh, and most important update of all...as we were loaded down with bags in hand, about to get in the car to start our journey on Wednesday morning, UNC Hospital called with Ethan's surgery date. We are scheduled for his 2nd heart surgery on Tuesday morning, January 22nd, with a pre-op outpatient appointment on Friday, January 18th. So please keep us in your prayers that Ethan (and we) can stay healthy until surgery time. This will mean we will need to really crack down on keeping him and us isolated as much as possible. We usually "cheat" and go out to eat or go shopping at least once or twice a week. Being around people we know is hard enough, because everyone knows his situation and wants to see how he's doing, but now we're also facing strangers in public who can't resist this cute little kid. We stopped at Cracker Barrel twice on our trip - once going there and once coming back. Both visits, we had complete strangers come up and touch his face and hands - which, of course, made us cringe as we watched Ethan start sucking his fingers and rubbing his face before we could get out a wipe to sanitize him!

Well it's late and we've had a long couple of days so we're off to bed. Thanks for reading our lengthy update and continuing to lift us up in your prayers. To summarize, here's our current requests:

- Pray for our family, as we continue to grieve the loss of Papa Joe Garrett over the Christmas season
- Pray for health over the next month for Ethan and me and Dan
- Pray for wisdom for Ethan's doctors and surgeons as they prepare for the 2nd surgery

Merry Christmas to everyone! We will post more pictures during the week of Christmas!

Family updates

To begin, thanks for your continued prayers for our family. Dan's foot seems to be doing a little better, thanks to the pain med and him staying off of his foot as much as possible. His doctor has credited his foot troubles to an "accessory navicular" - basically a fancy way of saying he's got an extra bone. It will continue to act up unless he wears his supportive athletic shoes (which isn't possible at work most of the time) or else he goes for surgery. But surgery is not something he's really interested in doing!

As for my grandpa (Papa Joe), he is constantly keeping us on our toes, one day he's looking like he's going to be healed then he gets bad the next day. His staph infection and pneumonia seem to be getting better but he's still on oxygen. He got moved to the ICU yesterday and his doctor last night didn't think he'd make it much longer, but today's doctor is a lot more optimistic and thinks he will be just fine and probably be moved out of the ICU tonight or tomorrow. He's still not out of the woods yet though, he's only slightly conscious at this time and could really use a good night's rest. Hopefully, when he moves out of the ICU, he will be moved to a private room so he can not be so disturbed by the other patients that he had to be with when he was in isolation for the staph infection. Please continue to pray for him. I did get clearance from Ethan's doctor that it's OK to make the 10 hour drive to Nashville, TN to see Papa Joe if we think he's getting close to death.

As for Ethan, he continues to do amazingly well. Even though he was awfully fussy and clingy on Tuesday and Wednesday, recovering from his 4-month shots, hehas managed to keep us entertained with his giggles as we try to cheer him up! Here are a few recent photos of him for your entertainment as well!

Ethan laughing at Daddy!

Sportin' a mohawk!

Watch out mom, you just think I'm cute now...

Praisin' Jesus in my sleep!

Not another bath!

Cross-eyed cutie!