Sadie's Surgery

After another 4 hours at Primary Children's Hospital and another CT scan, Sadie's Dr confirmed she has Hydrocephalus and will need to have a shunt put in her head to drain the extra fluid.
They had us tentativly on their schedule tomorrow. We could have rescheduled but this has drawn on long enough and since her 1st birthday is on Tuesday we decided to get it over with so she could start her 2nd year of life off much better!
The surgery is only and hour so she should be done about 9am. But they will keep her overnight.
The Dr explained recovery as an exagerated bump on the head. In a few days she should be great.
We are glad they "unkown" period is over and are excited to have the next two days over with as well.
Other than that, Spencer's neck surgery went well. His three week check up was on Monday and the Dr said he is the fastest healing person he knows and gave him the go ahead to go hunting next week!
The other little person we are awaiting is doing great. Im roughly 6 months pregnant. Its been breeze so far! Which has been a blessing since Spencer and Sadie are keeping things exciting around here, we forget sometimes that I am even pregant...other than the fact that my stomach is getting big!
Thanks for all the love and support!
More to come from the exciting lives of the Stevens fam!

Update

Time is flying by. It seems like just yesterday Sadie got fitted for her helmet. And I would like to say she is done but unfortunatly we might not be quite done, though Im slacking drastically in making her wear it. Call me a bad mom, but sheesh you would too if you saw her sweating! Next week we have a follow up appointment with a different plastic surgeon (since hers moved to Arizona) per her pediatrician's request. He is concerned that her head is so big... well sorry but her Mom has a big one too! She is still ranging in the over 100 percential for her head size. If there is a problem he thinks it just fluid which is easily drained and not a serious problem. So promptly I scheduled the appt with the Dr.

Adding to my Dr appointments, Spencer thought he would join the fun but getting bucked off a mustang 3 times. The third time was the charm! He has always had a small problem with his neck if he twisted it just right but the third buck landed him some more problems. Just a torn disc and a herniated disc! So after meeting with nuerosurgeon last week who says surgery to fix the torn disc is the only was to go. And sooner the better since the two discs are smashing a nerve that runs down his left arm causing it to loose strength. No good since he is left handed. So next week I will be scheduling a few more Dr appts for him to get some second opinions!

Oh and I cant leave myself out of the fun! For those who dont know, Im PREGNANT! This no joke! Im currently 18 weeks along and expecting a girl! Yahoo! She is due December 10th making her and Sadie 14 short months apart! We are excited. But I am not longer teasing Spencer about being cursed with all girls since 2 out of 2 are now girls!! But he is excited and even came home one day with a name for this one and a girl name for our 3rd girl! But I can definetly say the 3rd one wont come as quickly as far as I have anything to do with it.

pictures include Sadie's first swim in her little pool, clapping hands, our first family picture since Sadie was born, the March of Dimes walk and Sadie's first chocolate chip cookie.

Sadies New Head Gear

On Friday, Sadie received her helmet! Once its on, she hardly notices it. Now, getting it on is another story! So just be lucky you aren't the bad guy!!! But I have hope we will get it down to an art before the few months is up. We will see the plastic surgeon in 6 weeks and in only 2 weeks we will go back to the helmet place so they can make any changes to the helmet that may be needed. So I guess they are expecting quick results. Sadie also had her first trip out to meet Dutch... and also had a friend over, Aslyn (Christa & Trevor Jensen's little girl)

Sadie's first Trip Outside!

Spring is Coming!!! Or atleast Mother Nature is tricking us with a few Spring days! Oh well, I'll take 'em! Yesterday Sadie and I ventured outside for a few minutes. Of course the only hat that fit her is one a bought in preparation for when she is 12-18 months!!! She also has moved up in the world to a high chair for eating her delious rice cereal! YUM!

She is doing great! She had a follow up with the Plastic Surgeon last week and he said she will need to wear a helmet for about 2 months. We went in for her first measurements. They just measured her head, took a few pics and now we wait for insurance approval. Then we will go back for them to make a cast mold of her head (that should be interesting!). Then it will be a week until its made. So some more fun pics to follow!!!

Operation Day...Came and Went

Well, we have made it! We cant believe this week has come and gone so quickly. The operation was on Tuesday, we got to Primary's about 6am. After meeting all the doctors and nurses they took her back just before 8am. The actually proceedure didn't begin until about 9am and finished just before 1pm. It was a long 5 hours! We saw her after they got her settled in the PICU. She was still waking up and incredibly drugged up! So needless to say, she was out of it! After getting some dinner we went back and she was awake enough to feed her. We werent able to stay that night with her because of being in the PICU so we stayed at Nate and Nicole's house which was much closer than ours, (THANK YOU SO VERY MUCH!!!). On Wednesday morning when we got there Sadie was awake and literally kicking! She was happy. Her face was still a bit swollen so her smiles werent huge but we knew she was happy. She slept most they day Wednesday once they got her settled in her own regular room where I could stay with her. Thursday was even better! She was awake more, sitting up and smiling. You would have never guessed she had just had surgery! We even got a few laughs! Friday afternoon they released us with a clean bill of health. She will have follow ups with the plastic surgeon and if it does't shape how it should they she may have to wear a helmet for a few weeks. The change wasn't as drastic as we thought but thats ok. After talking to the surgeon and even seeing a few grafic pictures, we were informed that there was more pressure on her head then we realized. So much that her brain started to make holes in her skull.

We are truly grateful to the doctors and nurses who assisted her and us while we were there. We are so grateful to our Heavenly Father for blessing us with such a great daughter. She brings such a sweet spirit to our home and we are truly grateful for her. Thank you for all the love, support and prayers, we truly felt the power of those things this past week.

Since at home, Sadie is doing great. Its alittle scary to pick her up or lay her down but she is a good sport, and incredibly tough!

(Pictures: Top to bottom: Night before surgery, Tuesday after surgery (the tube was draining fluid from between the skull and skin) and Friday. There is still quite a bit of swelling which will take 3-4 weeks to completly go down.

Live and Learn... The Shed Fire

About 10:15pm last night as Spencer climbed into bed, I heard a strange noise, Spencer said it was just Buddy who was sleeping in the kitchen. But I kept thinking, no, it wasn't Buddy. Then another noise, this time I said "Its not the dog!". So we jumped out of bed and as Spencer walked down the hallway where he could see out our south facing window he yelled "THE SHED IS ON FIRE!!!" Before I could hit send on my cell phone the fire truck had already unloaded. Thank goodness to good neighbors who saw the flames! I didn't get the camera fast enough because I had to give information to the police officer. So enjoy the morning after pictures. We aren't sure how it started, but we know it started from the wood burning stove. Spence had a fire last night but left the shed around 7pm so anything that was still burning should have been completely out... apparently not though. Something lasted long enough to cause this damage. We are all well.. Sadie slept through the whole thing! And, so did Buddy....some guard dog! Poor dutch who likes to stand by the shed was found as far away as the corral would allow her to! A little shaken up, but she is fine. The lesson learned... put the fire completly out and make sure you have an inventory of EVERYTHING you have... that will be my Friday project! Of course once I inventory everything in my house nothing will happen but better to be safe than sorry!

Saide's Big Day

Just an update, Sadie's operation date is scheduled for January 13th! She will start recieving weekly shots 3 weeks prior that that will help increase her red blood cells. The operation will last about 5 hours. After spending a night in the NICU she will be in a regular room for another few days. No helmet required since the plastic surgeon will be shaping her skull for her. We are anxious for it all to be over, but know that all will turn out just fine.

Other than that, Sadie is growing fast, definetly out growing her cousins! She now weighs over 11lbs and is 23 inches tall.

She is smiling and working on the laughing. Just tonight Spencer got her to laugh multiple times. Afterwards he said he hadn't smiled so hard and so much since forever!
A few weeks ago, Spencer was finaly able to put the new shed in place. He transported it from a house that was going to just take it down. Needless to say, it was free if he could figure out how to move it. So after two nights of working on it, Spence and Matt were able to jack it onto a trailer and bring it to its new home. After weeks of sitting on the trailer.... and of course, me backing into it once, it made its way to the final resting spot. Now all it needs is a paint job to match the rest of the house. That will be a great spring project for me!

I've started working from home. Its great! I just need to get Sadie on a longer nap schedule.. but if that means her not sleeping through the night, I'll deal with it. I take all night sleeping over anything! Enjoy the new pics! From top to bottom: Thanksgiving day, after a delious meal, Dad and Baby Sadie fell sound asleep! Sadie with Grandma Helen (Spencer's Grandma from Texas). Spence about to give Sadie a bath, the time he got her to laugh real hard! The next pic is a bit blurry because I was trying to get a pic of her smiling but she knew and would stop when i would bring out the camera, so this is the best so far! The next two are the new shed and process of getting the shed into place. And the last one is Sadie with Jessica, my midwife who delivered her.