A Great Day for The Jones 8!

The Jones family - all eight of us (nine if you count the newest resident at our home, Casey's mom) - had a great day today! Casey is doing better, the babies are continuing to bore the nurses (not really, but they don't have many issues they have to deal with - that's a really good thing!), Eliot had all kinds of new adventures, Grandma got to visit with friends and spent more time with the babies, I got to hold three of the five, and we all got to see several of our Marriage Builders friends who came up to see the babies...good times for all!!

Casey had it really rough all day yesterday. She spent a lot of time in the NICU holding babies, but for some reason, she was really nauseous and worn down all day long and into the night. Our guess is that she's probably pushing herself a bit too hard, but poor girl is being torn in two different directions! She has doctor's orders to stay completely off her feet for all but one or two hours a day from Dr. Reich, but she also has doctor's orders from the neonatologists to be in the NICU as much as possible. I bet you can guess which order she is complying with...

Today, she woke up feeling much better and didn't have any of the same issues as she did on Saturday. She held Britton for about an hour and held Lila for nearly two hours. Right now, she's getting some good Eliot time, cuddling on the couch while Eliot "paints" whiskers on her mama's face... :)

Eliot got to spend lots of time in the NICU, then got a surprise trip to Chuck-E-Cheese...yeah another trip for Eliot to C-E-C's without daddy!! One of our good friends, Ryan Jones (or Uncle Jonesy to Eliot) came up to see the babies and took Eliot off our hands for awhile. She had a blast, of course, then came back to the NICU and helped Nurse Stacy give Brooklyn a sponge bath. That was really cool to watch - she was totally into it! Hopefully that is a sign of things to come when the babies come home!

For my part, I got to spend most of the day in the NICU to make up for not being able to come at all yesterday. I spent Saturday playing catch up from the last 2+ weeks away from home and work. Today, I held Ryan, Brooklyn, and finally my boy, Jack! That's Jack in the picture above.

The babies are all doing very, very well! Seriously, the nurses have very little to report to us anymore when we come up. The only issues worth noting are Ryan and Lila's heart problems, but we also have good news on that. Whoops - I just realized I haven't posted info on Ryan's heart problem as it just showed up yesterday. She has one of the same issues that Lila has - a hole in her heart that is allowing too much blood to get to her lungs. Both girls have responded well to the medication they've been on and the large holes they both have (the PDA's) appear to be closing up. There is still a decent possibility that the holes will open back up however, so it appears that this problem will be on our minds for a while. Lila's little hole is not something that is helped by the medication so they will continue to monitor that as well.

We couldn't be more excited with how well the babies are doing...these little squirts are proving to be a plucky bunch! It appears that Britton has won the Diva award for now as she continues to make her demands known to all within earshot of a squeaky little 2 pounder. Ryan has quieted down over the last couple of days so she is out of the completition for now. Brooklyn and Jack are still competing for the most chill while Lila is just hanging out and taking it all in. They are all taking feedings pretty well and their little infections have all cleared up. As the doctor said yesterday, they are all at various stages of EXCELLENT!!!!

God Bless,

Ethan

http://www.joneslife.net/