Blake's Hospital Adventure

Well, today Blake woke up with a fever, so we had to go to the clinic. He complained of having a sore throat, so they did a throat culture along with his blood work. His ANC was only 480, which is WAY lower than we are used to. His ANC has been in the high 1900s to the mid 2000s lately. I was concerned, but the oncologist assured us that it was probably a combination of him having a higher dose of chemo last night and his body trying to fix whatever was causing his fever.

So, usually they admit the cancer patients at Children's when their ANC is lower than 500, but because he was so close to 500 and because he seemed so active and was only slightly raspy they decided to let him go home.

Needless to say, he is not going to school until his ANC goes up. Hopefully we will have good news about his counts tomorrow or Monday!!! Luckily we did not have the kids scheduled to go to school Mon, Tues or Weds next week, so he has lots of time to recover!!!

They also had us stop chemo until his counts come back up and his fever is gone. Just a little while ago his fever was down to 99.0 with no medicine, so hopefully it continues to go down! We got back in for more antibiotics tomorrow morning, just in case it is an infection, but the doctors and nurses don't seem to think that it is an infection, so we are pretty optimistic about that!!! We still feel lucky that Blake has been sick only 3 times this winter. A lot of the kids in the Hem/Onc clinic have been through much worse.

Thanks again for all of the prayers, we will try to keep this updated!

February

Pretty Bow!

Love this outfit! Great Grandma Donna (Wilson) got it for Blake when he was a baby and it looks cute on Alexia too!

Our future Hawkeye

Love!

She loves her purses! She carries both of them around constantly!

Yum yum!
Alexia is still a little dream! She is so much fun to be around and every phase has been enjoyable with her! She loves her purses and carries them around constantly! She is funny, she holds her arm straight in the air, so her purses will not fall off! It is really funny to watch her run around with both arms in the air!

Alexia got to see Papa and Mama Bare! They came in from Joplin for mommy's birthday and spent two wonderful days with the family!

Blake and Alexia get along really well for the most part and are so much fun to be around! We are looking forward to spring when we can take them both to the park by our house!!!!

Pictures

Daddy's Little Girl

Showing her friend how to play with her toy train

Yummy fingers

She does not like to share her mommy with other baby girls

Look at our big girl!

Just like Daddy

Alexia is a super sweet little girl! She is a blast to have around and is definitely made of sugar and spice and everything nice!

We recently found out that she really does not like to share mommy's attention with other little girls. Her friend came over for a few hours and, while she loves playing with her friend, she did not like it when mommy held her or paid attention to her. She is such a funny little girl! As shown a few pictures up, her pouty face could melt even the coldest of hearts!

Alexia's 12 Month Check-Up

Alexia

She was sad because Mama Corinne was on the other side of the counter

Finding out how much she weighs

Rolling around with Mommy and Brother
Alexia's 12 Month check up went really well! We posted all the information on an earlier post, but thought we should include some pictures!

She did really well and it was really nice that all four of us (and Mama Corinne of course, which makes 5) could be there!

Jan/Feb Blake Update

Blake had a great time playing in the ball pit!

Showing his tap out skills!

Enjoying Alexia's birthday party!
Blake has remained fairly healthy all winter! He had a 3 day bout with RSV right after Christmas, which was treated quickly and caused no issues. The only other health issue he had this winter was an ear infection, which was also treated very quickly and hasn't caused any additional problems!

We are very blessed because many of the kids with Blake's condition and other forms of cancer have gotten very sick this winter and many of them have been hospitalized at least once this winter. We thank God and everyone who prays for Blake that he has not had to spend any time in the hospital as an inpatient so far this winter!

It is so nice to have such an amazing medical team. They are very reassuring and remind us that we are doing a great job with Blake! If you had told us a year ago that we would be at this point now we might not have believed it.

Blake is thriving. He really enjoys sports and plans to start soccer and t-ball with other kids his age! Sometimes it is hard to believe he is only three years old. He seems so insightful for his age.

We sure love him and really appreciate all of the prayers and the hard work of the medical staff at Children's!

Alexia's First Birthday Party

Alexia's Friends and Family came to celebrate her first birthday!

Alexia and some of her friends

Pretty girl!

Getting ready to eat cake for the first time!

She was not the biggest fan of the frosting

Uncle Rodney and his girlfriend!

Alexia and her friend Kenneth!

Big Brother helps open presents!

She LOVES her new tea set!

And her talking tea pot!

She is a big fan of books!

Alexia invited lots of family and friends to celebrate her first birthday at Mahoney State Park! We were very pleasantly surprised at how many people were able to make it! We missed those who couldn't make it, but understand work schedules, sickness and travel issues!

All of the kids seemed to have a blast! Alexia enjoyed her cupcake, but wasn't too thrilled about the frosting. She really loved all of the gifts she got!

One Year Old!!!!!

Well, we are having some Internet issues, so we will have pictures up later!

Alexia is just an amazing little girl! She is far beyond the typical development for a one year old, physically and mentally!

At her one year check up she weighed 24.5 lbs and was 31 1/2 inches tall!!! She got her vaccinations and had a routine CBC to make sure all of her levels were normal. She didn't even cry when they drew blood from her little arm. She is such a brave little trooper!

Alexia loves to pick up books or toys, then walks up to us turns around and backs to our laps and sits down! It is so cute when she does it, we hope to catch it on camera, so we can post the video! She also has a little bit of a mean streak in her, if she finds out something she does bothers her big brother she will do it over and over again and laugh. Such a naughty little thing! :)

Alexia idolizes her brother and her daddy! She loves to chase them around the living room and enjoys wrestling them as well! She is very much mommies girl too though, she loves to cuddle mommy and read books. We found out the other day that she does not like it when mommy holds other baby girls. She really wanted her mommy to hold only her! Perhaps it is a good thing that we are not planning on having any more babies because we don't know how Alexia would take it! Luckily Blake was not jealous at all, although he still does love his one on one time with Mommy and Daddy when Alexia is taking a nap or visiting Grandma!

The past year with this amazing little girl has been more of a blessing than we are able to express. The joy of her birth helped us through the hardest time in all of our lives and she has been nothing but the best in every way! She brings exactly the element that we need in our family! We feel so complete as a family of four, each of us brings something different to the mix and it is such an amazing dynamic! We cannot wait to see what this beautiful little girl has in store for us through the next year!!!!

Hopefully we will be able to post the pictures from her birthday and her one year check up!!!!!

God Bless you all!