George & Lauren’s Weblog

Keeping up with the Lantzs…

Big Girl Bed September 29, 2008

Filed under: 1 — georgelauren @ 4:59 pm

My daughters are growing up before my eyes!  Here’s an update:

Hannah-She currently weighs 2 lbs. 9.5 oz.  She has gained over a pound now since birth!  Yeah,  Hannah!  She is starting to fill out in her cheeks and arms.  She is still having multiple Bradys a day.  So if you are looking for something specific to pray for, pray for her to be taken off oxygen and for her to stop having Bradys.  The nurses lovingly call her the attention seeking twin.  I got to kangaroo with her yesterday and she was fidgety for most of the time, but did settle down once I got a pacifier stuck in her mouth.  I love kangarooing with them because when I come home, I can still smell them.  So sweet!

Kate-Oh, my……..so much to tell and show!  Kate has graduated into a big girl “bed” (bassinet or crib).  She is now 4 lbs.  Because of her added weight, she is able to maintain her own temperature now through the body fat she’s put on.  She gets to wear her own clothes and be wrapped in her own blankets.  We don’t have to reach into the isolette to hold her, change her diaper, or pick her up.  She is also taking bottles at every other feeding now, 4 times a day.  So I’ve adjusted my schedule around her feedings.  I now go up to the hospital at 8:30 a.m., 2:30 p.m., and 8:30 p.m. (both me and George).  I think the Lord is trying to get me used to waking up early and keeping busy (not that I wasn’t already busy enough, but I had more down time in the morning).  She has successfully taken all of the bottles she’s been given since she started this new routine!  She has not had any Bradys for a week now.  Yeah, Kate!  Many of you are probably wondering when she’ll get to come home.  I haven’t been brave enough to ask because I don’t want to be disappointed by their answer, but I think it will probably be within the next 3 weeks! 

I hope it’s obvious that Mom and Dad are both VERY proud of their daughters’ leaps and bounds.  The Lord is just sustaining and blessing them.  We are thrilled and cannot wait for them to come home!  Here are some more pictures!  They are all of Kate, but I will get some new ones of Hannah tonight.  Love you guys!  Enjoy!

 

More Firsts September 28, 2008

Filed under: 1 — georgelauren @ 12:58 pm

Kate has reached some exciting milestones in her life!  On Saturday, she successfully drank her first whole bottle!  Yeah!  She went to town on it and downed it in about 15 minutes!  That’s awesome because one of the requirements to her leaving the NICU is that she succesfully takes a bottle at every meal.  She’s also been doing very well with breastfeeding.  She’s catching on to the sucking, breathing, and swallowing thing as well as can be expected for her corrected age.  (By the way, when I refer to corrected age, I am referring to her gestational age.  For example, her corrected age is 32 weeks 3 days, but her chronological age is almost 4 weeks.  Just thought I’d throw that in there for those of you who had no clue like I did the first time I heard that.)  She also got to wear her first big girl clothes from home.  We have a friend who works in Tampa General’s NICU and she gave us some things that are suited for preemies and the NICU.  I put a picture of her wearing the clothes, but I’m not sure how well you can see them.  She was adorable!  Yesterday, she weighed 3 lbs. 13 oz.  So she has already gained a pound since birth and only has 3 more ounces to go before she’s at 4lbs.!  She has been taken off of her caffeine because she has not had any Brady’s since 9/22.  She has to go 7 straight days without one before she can go home.  Obviously, those 7 days have to be right before she goes home.

Hannah is doing good!  She weighs 2 lbs. 5 oz. and is truckin’ right along!  She is still consistently having Brady’s (2 while I was there yesterday-not cool to see your daughter’s heart rate plummet even though I know that it’s easily fixed).  We are able to hold her now once a day so that it is very precious time with her.  It’s much easier to bond with her when you can actually hold her in your arms.  I’ve always struggled with seeing the resemblance between Hannah and Kate, but I totally saw it the other day.  I was holding Hannah and she was all bundled up, right down to the hat on her head.  She was smiling and I immediately saw Kate’s face.  When she makes certain facial expressions, I see a skinnier Kate.  It was so precious to me to be able to have that little “Aha” moment.  It also sort of helped me realize that Hannah will get bigger and she won’t always look so scrawny.  I can see the weight she has put on though. 

That’s it for now………..I’ll continue to keep you updated!

 

Our First Family Picture September 25, 2008

Filed under: 1 — georgelauren @ 11:50 am

So Hannah finally reached over 1000 grams yesterday so we were able to hold both of them at the same time.  We took our first family picture.  It was so sweet to finally get a “picture” of what it will be like at home for each of us to be holding a baby.  Hannah and Kate also got to see each other again after the womb.  I’m actually not sure if they have ever “officially” met.  George has the bad habit of not keeping his eyes open during pictures, so they aren’t the best pictures, but we’ll retake.  Hannah and Kate are both doing wonderful.  As of Wednesday, Hannah weighed 2lbs. 3 oz. and Kate was 3 lbs. 10.3 oz.  They are healthy babies that just need time to grow!

 

Once again, the Lord provides.  I got a notice for our new monthly electric bill and to my shock it was $229.00.  Whoa!  So I did some investigating and noticed that due to our “excellent payment history” we received our initial deposit back and were credited $376.00.  So the $229.00 is actually money that they “owe” us.  That means we don’t have to pay our electric bill for the next couple of months!  Praise God!

 

The Better Thing September 23, 2008

Filed under: 1 — georgelauren @ 1:10 pm

I have a lot of things to share that do not necessarily relate to one another so if you are one of those people that gets easily confused by switching topics quickly, just be prepared.

1) I sat down to do my quiet time this morning and I was tired (what’s new, right?) and I was thinking about all of the things I wanted to get accomplished today, mainly cleaning and organizing.  The Holy Spirit then brought to mind exactly what I needed to hear in order to help me to value my time spent with the Lord this morning.  When Jesus visited Mary and Martha in their home for a dinner, Martha was running around like a crazy woman trying to prepare her home and dinner for Jesus.  Mary was sitting at Jesus’s feet and listening to Him.  Martha got upset with Mary because she wasn’t helping and Jesus gently reminded Martha that Mary chose the better thing, spending time with the Lord.  He reminded me this morning that while my home may look chaotic, I needed to choose the better thing and simply let go of everything else in life and listen to Him.  Isn’t it sweet when the Lord speaks personally to us and you know that there is no denying it was Him?

2) Yesterday, George and I sat down to talk about how we were going to make me staying at home work out financially.  We went over some numbers and were both overwhelmed at how difficult it would be.  The Lord has blessed us with enough money to be okay for many months, but it is just scary to not have that extra paycheck and added expenses.  Two neat things came out of this.  I checked my work e-mail and I was notified that I had qualified for the student performance bonus (MAP) from last year!  Praise God!  I ran into our family room and woke up my sleeping husband by my excitement.  He thought I was crazy.  This bonus amounts to just over $2200.  What a blessing from the Lord!  The other neat thing that came was in my quiet time this morning.  It was about not building up treasures for yourself on earth where moths and rust will destroy it.  It will be a challenege for us to sacrifice some of the things that we were easily able to enjoy before without checking our bank accounts.  I need to hold onto our possessions with an open hand and be willing to let go of them for the good of our family.

3) Kate-She started taking a bottle for the first time on Sunday afternoon.  She did pretty well with it.  She is allowed to take it twice a day.  She is learning to suck, swallow, and breathe at the same time.  She has conquered burping very well!  The nurse said she could hear her from across the room.  I was also able to breastfeed her for the first time last night.  It was a first for both her and me.  I think that George was more excited than I was.  It was very precious, but she pooped out after about 10 minutes.  The goal is for them not too spend more calories eating than they take in, which is easy for them to do since they are so small.  She is up to 3 lbs. 8 oz.  and it’s easy to see the weight gain. 

4) Hannah-She is currently weighing in at a whopping 2 lbs. 2 oz.  I got to hold her for about 15 minutes yesterday because her isolette was being changed and the nurse “just happened” to do it while I was there.  As soon as she gets to 1000 grams, which should be soon, we can start holding her for 5-10 minutes.  Her PICC line is out, which is one less source of infection.  She’s climbing the ladder in terms of how much breastmilk she eats. 

All good news to report!  Thank you for your continued prayers and encouragement.  We are so blessed by them!  Love you all.

 

The Correct Path September 21, 2008

Filed under: 1 — georgelauren @ 12:43 pm

One of my best friends (Summer) gave me a devotional by Joni Eareckson Tada for my shower gift and I just started reading it.  Yesterday’s devotional was entitled “The Correct Path” and the verse she focused on was

Direct me in the path of your commands, for there I find delight.  (Psalm 119:35)

She goes on to tell a story where there is a 3 year old little boy who stops breathing and when the paramedics come to get him, they tell the parents to follow them to the cemetary.  The whole car ride the parents are wondering why they are taking him to the cemetary.  When they get there they realize that it’s the only place in their small town that is flat and open enough to accomodate the life-flight helicopter so they can transport him to a hospital.  Sometimes we feel like God is leading us down the wrong path to the wrong place at the wrong time.  The path doesn’t feel right so we falter in our confidence of God, instead of delighting in the path of His commands. 

While we love every precious moment we get to spend with our girls, it’s not the same as having them home and being able to pick them up and cuddle with them, comfort them, feed them, shower them with kisses, etc.  Sometimes it feels like a chore to go to the hospital because we are tired or overwhelmed by all that needs to be done.  It feels like the wrong path because it’s not “normal” for most new families.  The Lord gently reminded me yesterday that this is the right path because it’s His path and we need to have an unfaltering confidence in Him.  This confidence will allow us to delight in His plan for our family right now.  Every time I look into my girls’ eyes or their beautiful faces, I see the hand of God in their beauty and weakness and I know that He is with them.  Even though it’s hard right now, every step of our journey to have children has been worth it.  It’s not easy to finally be at peace with infertility and the loss of a child.  While for such a long time we felt overwhelmed with sorrow and grief, he is now overwhelming us with blessing.  If you are wondering how you can pray for George and me specifically, please pray that we will delight in His path for us right now.

Health Updates

Hannah-She is in the 2 lb. club!!!!!!!!!!!  She is up to 2 lbs. 0 ounces.  Praise God!  She is being weaned off of her oxygen and hopefully will be done with the nasal cannulas soon.  She likes to pull them out of her nose and put them in her mouth.  She is also done with her lipids and almost with her other vitamins, which means her PICC IV should come out very soon.  She is up to 12 ml of breastmilk.  They add fortified human milk to put some extra calories in her.  I’ve also changed two poopy diapers and they were normal poop for a breastfed baby!

Kate-She is 3 lbs. 6 oz. and doing wonderful!  She is completely off all oxygen monitoring devices so she has one less wire hanging off of her.  She loves to pull out her feeding tube, all the way from her stomach through her nose.  She loves to eat though.  Both girls are wide awake at their schedule feeding time.  They know it’s time to eat and they are not afraid to let their hunger be known.  We get to hold her twice a day and we’ve been giving her a pacifier during her feedings so she learns to relate a full stomach with sucking.  She does really well with sucking on the pacifier until she falls asleep. 

Here are some pictures from the last week!  Enjoy! 

 

9/17/08 Update September 17, 2008

Filed under: 1 — georgelauren @ 9:20 pm

Nothing extremely exciting to report on here, but perhaps that’s a good thing.  Sometimes excitement is too much for preemies. 

Hannah is settled in nicely at Brandon.  She had tiny complications from all of the stress of being transferred again, but most of those complications have already corrected themselves.  She’s up to 5 ML of breastmilk every 3 hours and we’re hoping that she starts packing on the pounds like her little sister.

Kate is “boring” (no complaints there).  She is up to 3 lbs. 4 oz. and drinking 30 ML of breastmilk.  She’s excited that her sister has come back to be with her.

I went in for my 2 week post operative checkup.  Everything looks good and there are no major concerns.  Our doctor, the same one that delivered the girls, is so awesome.  He walked into the room and his face was obviously saddened and shocked by something.  He asked me, “What happened?”  I had no idea what he was talking about, but I told him that the babies were doing good.  The nurse had written that there was fetal demise.  No clue how she came to that conclusion other than they weren’t with me.  Anyway, I tell you that with the intent of encouraging anyone who lives in the area and is looking for an OBGYN to check out this practice.  He went on to say that his heart had dropped when he read that because the last time he saw them they were doing just fine.  It’s so comforting to have an OB who cares about the babies and has been so encouraging throughout our entire pregnancy.  It has truly been a blessing to have Dr. Den Haese working with us! 

Thanks so much again for all of your prayers.  I was sorting through some of our pictures over the last two weeks and I was so amazed at how much they have already grown.  I feel like they are getting so “big” and I’m missing it.  They are so precious and we love them so much.  I’m still in awe that God allowed us the privilege of being parents to these two beautiful girls.

 

She’s Coming “Home” September 15, 2008

Filed under: 1 — georgelauren @ 7:22 pm

The neonatologist from St. Joe’s called me today and said that Hannah is doing great.  She’s pooping on her own and tolerating the breastmilk she’s getting.  Then……he said that he talked to Dr. Landfish, the neonatologist from Brandon, and decided to transfer her back TOMORROW!!  Thank you, Lord.  We are so excited!  We kept hearing comments from the NICU at St. Joe’s that she’d probably go back to Brandon, but not for a long time.  So to hear that news today was a huge blessing from the Lord.  I got to “cuddle” (kangaroo) with her today for an hour and it was so precious.  She was sound asleep. 

Thank you for praying.  God intended to answer our prayers much more quickly than we thought!

 

Kangaroo Pictures September 15, 2008

Filed under: 1 — georgelauren @ 1:12 pm

We have finally gotten to hold both of our baby girls and it is such a precious feeling.  What makes it even better is that they both tolerated it so well and were so content.  Hannah fell into a very sweet sleep and Kate was also out.  That’s good because it meant that they liked being held by mommy and daddy.  They were both light as a feather and it was almost hard to feel them, but every now and then they would lift a hand or foot and then put it back down.  Hannah also would kinda scratch my chest.  When we kangarooed with Kate, she completely spread her legs out across our stomachs like she was giving us a big bear hug.  Enjoy those pictures!  The ones of us and Kate were taken by the hospital polaroid so that’s why it looks like they were taken a decade ago.  The one time we left our camera at home…

Health Updates:

Hannah-She is now up to 6 ML of breastmilk every 4 hours!  Yea!  She is tolerating it well and is continuing to poop.  She has also gained weight and as of yesterday was up to 1 lb. 14 oz.  We’re hoping to add her to the 2 lb. club very soon.  She takes a little pacifier very well.  Her chest x-rays continue to remain promising, showing very little air in her bowels.  Keep praying for her health to improve.  We are also praying that she comes back to Brandon as soon as is healthy for her.  It would take away so much stress to have her closer to us.

Kate-She is now up to 3 lb. 2 oz.  She is filling out quite nicely.  My mom and dad were at the hospital the other night and noticed she had pulled her feeding tube completely out of her nose.  The nurse struggled with her all night to get her to keep it in.  Both of my girls have been referred to as fiesty countless times by the nurses.  The nurses have fallen in love with them though.  She’s up to 26 ML of breastmilk.  The nurse explained to us yesterday that at 32 weeks they will begin to bottle feed her once a shift.  As she learns to suck, swallow, and breathe all at the same time, they will slowly increase how often they give her a bottle and also allow me to start breastfeeding.  It will probably be at least another 5-6 weeks before she comes home.  She is continuing to have Bradys so we are praying that those will stop happening.

Mom & Dad-We were totally worn down this weekend.  If I’m being honest with you, it’s really hard to go to the hospital and be so worn out.  I’m feeling a lot of guilt right now about being at the hospital but also not feeling the true joy of being there because I am so tired.  We are just going so fast in so many directions and it’s tiring.  I think that makes it harder to bond with them, too.  We love seeing them and it’s worth it.  It just makes me feel like a bad mom for not being “all there” when we do visit them.  I know that that is a lie that Satan is trying to convince me of, but it’s a feeling that I’m trying to surrender to God.  That’s why we are hoping that Hannah will make it back to Brandon soon.  Yesterday, Hannah was all cozied into her little “sleeping bag” and looked so sound asleep and comfortable and we just wanted to climb into her isolette and sleep with her.  With that said, I wanted to say a huge THANK YOU to our bible fellowship class for providing meals for us.  While we don’t have babies at home so it would be easier to make meals, it is a huge blessing to not have to worry about preparing a meal.  THANK YOU!!!  We love you guys.  We are so grateful for your friendship and prayers for our family (that applies to our church family at large).  We have received so much support from our pastoral staff and from the entire church.

Enjoy the pictures!

 

9/13/08-Update September 13, 2008

Filed under: 1 — georgelauren @ 6:39 pm

Hannah is doing better and holding her own quite well.  She has had some chest x-rays and the doctor says that she doesn’t have much gas in her intestines, which is good.  It’s normal for them to have some, but she doesn’t have any concentrated in one area.  She also has been pooping on her own and with the help of some suppositories.  She tolerated the 3 ML of breastmilk yesterday so they are slowly increasing her intake of that.  The nurse last night told us that we would probably be able to kangaroo (holding her with skin-to-skin contact) her tonight during her feeding.  We are thrilled about that!  The Lord is sustaining her everyday and providing her with her “daily bread.”

Kate is also doing really well.  She is in the 3 lb. club!  YEA!  George is looking forward to holding her for the first time tonight.  I’ve been holding her, changing her diaper, and taking her temperature.  They also took her off the nasal cannulas today to see if she can handle that.  There’s not much to say about her other than that she is doing wonderful!

Mom and Dad are hanging in there.  We have very late nights because we see Hannah after 8:00 and that’s the farthest drive.  We usually don’t get home until after 10.  It’s hard, but so worth it.  We love our girls and would do anything for them.

Just a quick note…I was thinking the other day, “What would’ve happened if I had not been on the heart monitors when Hannah’s heart rate dropped low and they didn’t know to deliver her?”  The Lord gently reminded me that His timing was perfect and He was there to make sure that I was put on the fetal heart monitors at the right time.  I don’t know why I questioned his perfect timing.  He was and still is in control.  I think that in all of the business right now, I haven’t been taking enough time to be still and know that He is God.  Hopefully, I’ll have some more pictures tomorrow of us holding both of them!  God Bless…

 

Psalm 100 September 12, 2008

Filed under: 1 — georgelauren @ 1:02 pm

I’ve been reading through Psalms during my quiet time and came to Psalm 100 this morning.  The little subtitle is “A Psalm.  For giving thanks.”  I thought it so appropriate given the circumstances and just wanted to publicly make our thankfulness known.

“Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth.  Worship the Lord with gladness; come before him with joyful songs.  Know that the Lord is God.  It is he who made us, and we are his; we are his people, the sheep of his pasture.  Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise; give thanks to him and praise his name.  For the Lord is good and his love endures forever; his faithfulness continues through all generations.”

I can’t wait to share His faithfulness with our next generation (Hannah & Kate).  No update yet today to give.  I’ll post if anything is new!  Love you guys…