Will it ever end.....

OK so we went back to the doctor on Wednesday bc it had been a week since they put her on antibiotics and Raylee was not showing any improvement. They wanted to check her ears to see if they had gotten any better. So I loaded her up to find that she had not gotten any better, in fact, she was worse. Both ears were still infected and her congestion was getting worse. So they changed her medicine for her ears and bc she is so young there is no medicine that can be prescribed for the congestion. They told me that i could squirt saline up her nose and suction it out......words can not describe how much she HATES this and how bad it PISSES her off every time we do it. So things should be getting better right???? Well they aren't!

Last night had to be the worst night she has had in her whole 6 weeks of life. She felt SO bad! She was so congested and could barely breathe. She wouldn't eat much bc she was having to breathe out of her mouth and couldn't do that and suck at the same time. Poor Billy. She threw up all over him and I mean ALL over him. It was the grossest thing I have ever seen. We were hoping that after she did that she would feel better and go back to sleep, this was around 1:30 a.m., however we were sadly mistaken. Finally around 4:30 a.m. she fell asleep cuddled up with me in the bed. All that to say I called the dr back today and we had to go back to the doctor AGAIN! Still no change. Ears still infected and still badly congested. They did test for RSV, which thank God was negative. Please pray that the new meds help her. She is miserable!

The last couple of days I have not felt real good. I thought it was just the lack of sleep. Today my throat started hurting and I'm beginning to get congested. Billy just told me that his throat is starting to hurt. I guess we are all gonna just pass it around. Is this what we have to look forward to....her getting sick and giving it to us??? I don't understand. We were so careful in taking her out in public. I hope this doesn't mean that she is going to stay sick all the time! If this child doesn't hurry up and get well I will be going back to Whitfield as a patient instead of a employee...

As for the hurricane threat.....I will be packing my stuff and going to my parents on Monday, even though they only live 2 miles up the road. If the wind blows halfway hard our electricity goes off. We live so far out it was 2 wks before my parents got power restored when Katrina came through. Although I don't think we have much to worry about, I don't want to take any chances and I refuse to be in the dark with a screaming, sick baby. They have several generators and I would feel safer. Hopefully by this point we will all be feeling better. If not they may send us packing.....

Back to the Dr we go.....

So I had to call the doctor back today because Raylee does not seem to be getting any better. In fact, she has been doing worse. She has been REALLY, REALLY fussy. She wont eat much or sleep. Her congestion has gotten worse and she has been sneezing her little head off. I am about to loose my mind. It has been a week since we found out that she was sick and began meds. I would have thought we would have seen some improvement by now. We go back to the doctor tomorrow morning, hopefully we will get some relief soon......I don't know how much more of this I can take.

Another concern I have is hurricane Gustav. Natalie and I were talking Sunday night about Fay. I was telling her how lucky we were that it was just a tropical depression and not another Katrina. We were talking about how horrible Katrina was and how we couldn't imagine living through another one with a baby. Looks like we may not have a choice......

Pictures from the week.......

We didn't have a very good week. Raylee is still having trouble with her ears and has since come down with a cold of some sorts. Due to her being younger than 6wks they are unable to give her any meds for it. On the bright side of things, despite being sick she has been sleeping really good at night. She slept 6 straight hours Friday night. It was really nice. Saturday night she had an OK night, we didn't. She woke up at 2a.m. to eat. While Billy was feeding her we heard this faint knocking sound but we couldn't tell where it was coming from. We sat there and listening and we would hear it every couple of minutes. After 30 minutes it stopped and we never heard it again. I was scared to death. All I could think was...here we are out here in BFE and could be murdered and it would be days before anyone found us. It's amazing the paranoid thoughts you can come up with when your scared. We have about decided that what we thought was "someone knocking on the window" was the wind blowing some scraps of vinyl siding that was on the back porch. When we woke up this morning it was all blown out in the yard. At least that is what I hope it was. With the combination of being scared to death and Raylee being sick and making all kinds of noises while she was sleeping I didn't go back to sleep until 6:30 this morning. I think I will be going to bed early tonight. Here are some of the pics we took this week.

Hanging out after bath time

swinging the day away
I'm starting to tolerate tummy time a little better
Our sick little girl.....she felt horrible
Check out her hair....ha!
This weekend is the first weekend since we have been home from the hospital that we have not had any visitors. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy family & friends coming over but It was really nice to be able to sit back and relax and not have to worry about if the house is clean enough or worrying about someone coming up while I'm in the middle of pumping. We took advantage of the rainy, yucky weather and stayed inside in our p.j's and watched t.v., it was really nice! We will have to make time to do this more often..ha! Hope everyone has a good week. Pray that Raylee gets better. She is supposed to get her shots a week from this Wednesday but if she is still sick they wont give them to her. That means that we will be stuck inside for another week and me returning to work and her starting daycare will be delayed.

Back on house arrest........

We had to take Raylee to the doctor today. She didn't have a very good night last night or a good day today. Since last Friday she has not been acting herself. She has been fussy and not wanting to eat very much. However she has gained weight and now weighs 9lbs 14oz. I figured that because I am not producing enough breast milk and she has been getting more formula than usual that the formula wasn't agreeing with her and it needed to be changed. The formula was not the only problem. Both of her ears are infected. I was shocked! Up until last weekend we have been so careful about taking her out. I guess this means that we are back on house arrest until she gets her shots September 3rd.

He ended up changing her formula to Enfamil Gentle Ease. She has only had one feeding so far with the new formula so we are not sure if it is helping or not. I feel so bad for her. She is so little and cant tell us what is wrong. All I want to do is hold her but I don't want to spoil her anymore than she already is.

Busy, Busy Weekend

Raylee had her 1st big busy weekend. Friday we spent the day making Louis's cake for his 3rd Birthday party. Saturday she had her 1st shopping trip with me and my mom. She slept through it but don't worry, there will be MANY, MANY more to come! Saturday night she went out to eat and went to Louis's birthday party at pump it up. She loved it! She just looked around the whole time. I guess she liked all the bright colors and lights. Saturday night she slept for 5 straight hours for the first time!!! I was shocked! Sunday she went to church for the 1st time, went grocery shopping and had a visit from Billy's parents. Sunday night she sleep for 5 straight hours again. We thought Saturday night was a one time thing bc she had such a busy day but maybe not? Hopefully this will become a pattern! We will have to wait and see.

Raylee & Daddy hanging out Friday night....She was a little fussy

Asleep at last!
Me, my mom & Raylee before our shopping trip
All set and ready to go!
She slept through another outing at the Mexican restaurant

Raylee at Louis's birthday party at pump it up

Louis's personal cake that I made him for his party

He was more interested in dumping the cake out than eating it

the big cake I made for everyone else
Louis blowing out his candles
Daddy & Raylee before church

The first time we went to church as a family
Momma & Raylee before church
Hanging out on Sunday afternoon

I am sure this is not last time that she will look at me like I have lost my mind!

A Year Ago Today.....

My how time flys! A year ago today we closed on our house that we live in now. For those of you that don't know when Billy & I got married 4 years ago we built a house in Sunchase right outside of Brandon. We loved that house and everything thing about it. The only thing that we wished for was for it to be on a couple of acres of land and in a smaller neighborhood where the houses weren't so close together. We had been looking at land from time to time but never could find any that we could afford and still stay in our house or we would find some that we could afford and someone would buy it before we could get pre-approved and put a contract on it. Have y'all seen how much they want for land these days???? Its crazy! It's like paying another mortgage. Anyway we had almost given up hope.
One Monday morning our friend who is a realtor called me at work and said look....I found this house that just came out on the market today and it is the deal of the century. It is 2400 sq ft with 10 acres of land out in Johns/Puckett. It is a foreclosure and wont last long. She asked me if i could meet her out there after work. With the luck we have had I told her heck no, I was leaving work now and me and my dad would meet her out there! So I left work, called Billy and told him what was going on and raced over there. I figured with it being a foreclosure the house would be some little house that we would end up bulldozing down one day and build another house on but I was wrong. Now don't get me wrong, the house needed lots of work and there are still things to do but it was in much better shape than I imagined and it is 2 miles from my parents house! So the realtor gets there and she goes to unlock the door and we realize that the front door knob is missing so we end up coming on in. We walk in and look to the right where the formal dining room is and the walls are painted red. At this point I knew this was MY house. Those of you that know me know that I have an obsession with my dining room being red and when we built our last house the builder was not real happy with me bc it took 6 coats of paint to paint our dining room and kitchen. On the way over to the house I was telling my dad that if we got the house he better get ready bc the dining room would be red. Anyway, so we walk around the house and notice that ALL of the door knobs are missing, inside and out! All of the appliances were missing, stove, microwave, dishwasher, oven etc. The knobs to the tub and sinks in the master bedroom were gone. In the hall by the laundry room, what looked like a bear had eaten/scratched the sheet rock and there was a hole in the wall big enough for Delilah to crawl up in and take a nap. The house smelt like there were 1,000 goats that lived in there. There were toys and crap EVERYWHERE in the yard. The grass was uncut and came up to my waist. Even though the house was a total disaster I knew that with a little work and imagination we could make it nice. So I ended up putting a contract on it right away, keep in mind that at this point Billy has not even seen the house and I have put a contract on it...ha! Yeah, to say the least he was a little nervous for the rest of the day. From this day on life has been a whirlwind. We found a house, put a contract on it and closed in 17 days plus we were preparing for our Italy trip in two weeks. We were a little stressed.

With all the excitement of finding the house there was one small detail that we had not thought about. Finding this house was a complete surprise. We were not looking to move, therefore, our house was a complete DISASTER! It looked like a bomb went off in it and was no where close to being ready to put on the market. The next problem that we thought about was we have two houses which means two house notes and houses in our neighborhood were not selling real fast....what were we thinking. The lord must have been looking out for us because we ended up selling our old house in a month. In the end after selling our old house we swapped our old house and for 15-20,000 more we have a much bigger house with 10 acres of land in the country. Just what we were looking for! As our realtor kept telling us, if it was meant to be it will happen. And it did! Little did we know that a year from then we would have a one month old baby. The plan was to start trying about this time this year but instead God had a different plan for us. Funny how things work out.

Here are some pics that were taken the day we put a contract on the house. Hopefully this week I can take some "after" pics with all the updates that we have done.

Master Bath Tub

Kitchen looking from the living room
Close up of the front of the house
Master bedroom

Garage....notice the garage door motors are gone! They took them too!
Another view of the kitchen
Upstairs bonus room/office
dining room
front of the house

front door minus the door knob
back yard
back of the house..perfect place for a pool...hint hint...Billy!
Master bathroom

Lesson learned......

Yesterday I went to town to run some errands. While I was out I went over to my aunts house to visit her and grandmother and met Natalie for lunch. We went to the Mexican restaurant! I was so excited bc it had been more than 5 weeks since I had Mexican. BTW.....it was SO good! Anyway, this was Raylee's first time in a restaurant and I was nervous on how she would act. She did great. In fact, she never woke up! I think Natalie was disappointed because she looked like she really wanted to hold her but knew better than to wake her up.

After we got through eating I needed to run some errands to get the stuff to make Louis's birthday cake. I went to wal-mart Sunday and I'm not sure what they were doing but their Toy department was totally disassembled. I was looking for little toy dump trucks to decorate the cake with and of course they only had one and didn't have much of anything else. So I decided that I could just run in Fred's, big lots & the party line to get the little things that I needed and wouldn't have to go to Wal-mart. BIG MISTAKE! I should have just bitten the bullet and ran in wal-mart bc after all it is the one stop shop...right???

Lesson learned: when you have a baby there is no...running in a store right quick! It's amazing how the little stops that I made pre-baby of running in several stores in less than 30 mins turned into 2 hours. By the time I got home I was exhausted. I cant even imagine how hard it is going to be when she is old enough to want everything she sees and try to pull stuff off of the shelf.

Firsts.......

Over the past week Raylee has experienced several "Firsts".....

I left her for the first time. She stayed with Gamma & Mamaw Riser.

Her first visit with her great uncle Doug (on the right)

The first time she took a nap/slept in her bed

Cousin Madison got to feed her for the first time

The first time she wore blue jeans & the first time Aunt Lindsey & Uncle Michael watched her. I was not brave enough to tackel wal-mart alone with her yet....ha!
Her first tummy time.....which she is NOT a fan of!

This is just a snap shot of what we have been up to the past week. Tomorrow we are going to get her newborn pictures taken and if she is in a good mood hopefully we can take a family portrait. This weekend she will have her first big outing. Her cousin Louis is turning 3 and we are going to go to his birthday party at Pump It Up on Saturday. We are SO excited and can not wait! I have made his cake for his past two birthday parties and they have turned out pretty good. I am nervous about this years cake bc with the other two I have had a pan/mold to guide me. This year the theme is dump trucks and we could not find a mold. Wish me luck!

Baby Steps.....

So today I did it. I left Raylee for the first time, not once but twice. This morning I left her with my mom while I went to the post office and dollar general in Puckett. Yeah, I know....I was only gone maybe 2o mins but it was a start.

This afternoon/evening Natalie & I went to Olive Garden and then out to Dogwood while Billy kept her. I am so proud of him. I was gone longer than I had planned but he did great with her. He didn't even seem nervous. I think he was actually excited about having alone time with her. Although it was nice to get out without her and take a break I kind of felt lost at times. I felt like something was missing. I always enjoy the Saturdays that I spend going out to the mall shopping with my mom and I cant wait until a couple of weeks when she will be able to tag along with us. I just hope that she will be a good baby that likes to shop....ha!

Although I didn't cry today when I left her something tells me that will not be the case on her first day of daycare. My goal is to be able to go to work and to my morning meeting on my first day back at work without a red swollen face from crying the whole way to work. Everyone pray that I will be able achieve this goal. It is going to be hard but I think I will be able to do it!

What we have been up to lately....

Going to 1st Valentines party at school

Madison & Raylee
These are the Valentines that I made for Raylee's classmates. You know me, I like to be different and creative.

The front of the card

Her 1st Valentines day. Mommy and Daddy gave her a huge, soft lady bug and a monkey balloon.

This is her reaction. She loved her lady bug and gave it many sugars!

This is an old pic of when she was just starting to sit up on her own

Our little Princess

Saturday me, mom and Raylee ventured out to Sam's to pick up a few things. We let Raylee ride in the seat of the buggy for the first time. she thought she was SO big. She loved it! She just looked around like she was in a whole new world and she hung on to the buggy for dear life. It was so funny!

We walked by this older man and she got her feelings so hurt bc he looked at her and didn't say anything to her or pay her any attention. She thinks that everyone that passes by her should say something to her...ha!

Daddy built her a swing this weekend so we sat outside and watched him. She loves to be outside!

Even the pollen is getting to Delilah....her eyes are all swollen from walking around sniffing the spring air

So pretty in red. Mrs. Frances, who owns her daycare, says that red is her color. I think she's right!

She looks so grown up here. Check out her keds...too cute!

She has so much fun in the bath tub

This is a cake that I made for a baby shower at work. It didn't turn out the way I had hope. It is supposed to be a shadow of a pregnant person...hopefully it will taste better than it looks!

Gosh, so much has happened with her and she has started so many new things since the last time I posted. She is sitting up all by herself now, and has been for a while. She has said her first word which was mama. at the time we didn't think that she knew what she was saying but last night Billy was holding her in the recliner and I was in the kitchen cooking and she looked up at me and said...mama and then later I had her in the recliner while Billy was in the kitchen and she said dada. Tonight when Billy got home from work and she looked up and saw him she said...dada so we are thinking that she really associates us with those names and is not just rambling.

She is up on her hands and knees but has not actually crawled yet. she is a very lazy child. she is holding her bottle sometimes, most of the time when you want her to she wont. She is drinking out of a sippie cup but really likes the bottle better. We have had to lower her mattress because in the morning we would go in there and she was looking over the crib rail at us. She hates to sit down and wants to be standing all the time now.

She is eating from the table some. She has started meats and still eats fruits and veggies. Saturday night we were printing signs and my dad was eating some Vienna sausages...gag....and she wanted a bite so bad but they were they spicy kind so she couldn't. He made me stop working and go up to the house and get her some regular kind so that he wouldn't have to eat in front of her and not give her any. When I brought them back my mom took them and he said...."I want to be the one to give her her 1st Vienna sausage" we thought that was so funny! She ate a whole on and probably would have eaten more but we wouldn't let her. She doesn't not have any teeth but that doesn't stop her from wanting you you have. Her teacher told me that they can no longer hold her while they eat bc she took her grilled cheese one day and started eating it....ha!

We cant believe how big she has gotten and how time has flown. It doesn't seem like she is a baby anymore.