Recent Happenings

March marks a year since Susannah's DS. She's had several checkups lately, and everything checks out good! Her pacemaker is functioning properly, her mitral valve leaks moderately (down from severely), and she's down to only two medications, as of last week. We get 4 months off from seeing the cardiologist! This will be the longest we have ever gone without seeing one of her heart doctors. She's learning and growing and getting bigger and stronger every day!

Timothy got to experience Myositis a few weeks ago. He had run a fever for two days without any other symptoms, and then about 2 days after he couldn't walk. His calf muscles hurt too much. Apparently this can cause bad enzymes to be released in the blood and can cause kidney damage. We got to go to the emergency room twice, per Dr.'s orders, to have his blood drawn. Our pediatrician was very surprised they didn't admit him the first night. The treatment is just rest and IV fluids. So we pushed fluids for several days at home. His blood work came back all normal last week! Yay!

Grandpa Riffel came down a couple weeks ago to put together the kids playset. He worked on it for four solid days and finished all but the crow's nest!! The kids have been out every single day since playing and swinging on it! So thankful he was able to come and do that!

Leigh is repairing/replacing/updating the master bathroom shower. He has been hard at work at that. He has two-ish walls torn up, replaced the drain/pipe going to the drain, and laid cement. It's slow going.

The kids and I went to Dothan for the weekend. My sisters came over Sat. morning and stayed through to Sunday. We went to Spring Farm day at Landmark park. It's a small farm with several historical buildings they've moved there. They open the buildings and do several demonstrations and stuff in the spring and fall. It was so much fun and took me back to my childhood!! :) Josiah's souvenirs include, a corncob, a nail from the blacksmith, wool from the sheep shearing, and a circle of a tree that he and Luke sawed off.
Mom and Dad are on a trip, so we weren't able to see them.

The kids are working hard at school. Looking forward to being done for the summer!!

Caleb is 16 months old and says many more words than any of the other kids did at his age! He is a busy, busy little guy that makes many, many messes every single day! He is a lot of work! But he's so cute and happy!!

Catch up

Thought I would update my blog since I'm about 2 years behind. I keep thinking I'll do a blog post every month, and then before I know it, the month is gone!

The last post was from Feb. 2015 when they did a heart cath on Susannah to figure out what her exact pressures were. After that, she had surgery on April 7th to tighten her PA band. This surgery went extremely well and she recovered quickly. She was only in the hospital for 3 days!
The talk at this time was that she should be ready for her double switch 3-6 months after the tightening. Well, in June, we went to a surgical consult expecting a surgery date, and coming away with waiting a few more months. They were saying Sept./Oct. We were hoping these dates would work out, because we found out baby Caleb was coming and would be due in Nov.
They decided she wasn't quite ready in Sept. and we continued to wait. However, In September, we ended up going to Kansas for a quick trip to see Leigh's Grandpa Riffel before he passed away.
My Dad was in Texas having radiation treatment, so Melissa kept the kids when Caleb was born in November.  Deborah came down the week after to help out. She decorated the house for Christmas!
Rachel, Mark and Deborah came to help us celebrate Christmas. (That finishes up 2015 :) )


Susannah's DS surgery ended up being on March 23, 2016. Caleb was 4 months old at the time of Susannah's surgery, and I was bound and determined that he would not be bottlefed, so he went to the hospital with us, had to have special permission to hang out in the close waiting room  (because it was flu season and he was not allowed in the PICU, and because the floors play room was off of that waiting room where sick kids went to play), and I went back and forth between him and Susannah. Both my parents were there and my sisters came on different weeks. Our church provided food and  gift cards and visits, which was a tremendous blessing. Melissa (and Pastor) had our other kids at the house, trying to keep things as "normal" for them as possible. I say "normal" because Misselissa is SO MUCH FUN!!!! :) :) The hospital stay for the DS was 10 days. After this surgery, she ended up with a narrowed baffle and fluid backup, and we went back to the hospital overnight in May for a ballooning via cath, which didn't work, and allowed us to go back a week later due to the increase in fluid and get a chest tube and a stent. She was also diagnosed with chylothorax and we got to stay for two weeks in the hospital. She also had to be on a fat free diet for 6 weeks after she got out of the hospital. For this hospital stay, Grandpa and Grandma Cannavan were able to come and stay at home with the kids. Grandpa Riffel and Grandma Connie came for Memorial Day weekend and helped give my parents a break. I went back and forth at night with Caleb, so we could get better sleep at home. Thankfully, he was allowed in her room with us since we were in the intermediate PICU and it wasn't flu season.
Not doing details since it's behind, and most of it's on Facebook on her page.

She turned THREE in July, just a few weeks after she got home. We got to go to Sanibel with my sisters in August. We went to Pensacola for Christmas. That finishes 2016!