No Strings Attached!!!

March 22nd (Day 1): We find out I am Group B Strep Positive, but didn’t have the antibiotics (which you get by IV 4 hours before birth…we arrived 30 minutes before birth). There is a high risk Kory will have the infection.

March 23rd (Day 2): Kory has a hard time maintaining temp & has a couple additional warning signs for infection. Cultures are coming back negative (meaning he doesn’t have infection), but a few more are still be to done to know for sure if he has GBS.  He goes into Special Care nursery as a precaution and to start antibiotics in case (infants who have the infection stay in the hospital for 7-10 days at best). Us in our little spot in Special Care. They have tons of rules to keep things sanitary and safe there (for which I’m grateful). Austin’s hand were pretty raw though from all the washing!You can only have a couple people visit and no toddlers (sorry big brother!)

March 24th (Day 3):  Kory’s cultures remain negative. His temp is more stable BUT we find out that over the previous night Kory was borderline brada cardia (out of range heart rate the signals baby is in distress). Doctor orders and EKG & Echo Cardiogram.  Amy gets discharged and we wait in the hospital to find out if Kory comes home. At about 11 p.m. we finally hear that his tests look good but the cardiologist recommends he stays in until 4 days old. We go home to get some sleep, instead of stay in our bordering room across the hospital in pediatrics (that was quite a walk every 3 hrs to nurse!)(Hanging out in our Ped boarding room, Cade waits for Melanie to pick him up – he’s excited to see Peyton)

 March 25th (Day 4): Kory passed his car seat test (stress test they do while they’re in the car seat before they can be sent home). We find out the cardiologist also recommended Kory get sent home with a heart monitor as a precaution until he is one month old. We board in the hospital and plan to be DC’d and on our way home on Day 5 (unfortunately because he was born in the middle of the night).

(Kory’s monitor makes him look buff!! Whoo-hoo! It’s an ABC – Apnea/Brada Cardia monitor, which goes off if he doesn’t breathe for 20 secs, or his heart rate goes too low or too high).

(Outfitting a baby with an ABC monitor is trickier than we realized! No zip-up sleepers for awhile!)

March 26th (Day 5): We waited forever to see the Pediatrician it seemed like! We were so anxious to take Kory home.  The boarding in went well with no alarms. The nurse did our DC teaching. He passed his hearing test and then we waited…and waited. Finally Dr. Anderson came in to talk with us. We found out that on Kory’s EKG they noticed his PDA was still open (an extra bloodline from the heart to the lungs while still in the womb which closes just before birth). It’s not abnormal to still be open, but since they noticed it they wanted to follow up (of course…another precaution).

(Austin does his dad tradition and dresses Kory to go home – after two kids you can call it a tradition)

(Kory’s all snug in his car seat, with his “tail” hanging out)

March 27th – April 14th: Kory is doing really well. He gains about a pound a week (well over what is average gain). He is a happy, contented baby and a great eater! He doesn’t go many places or even see much of the house because of his little “tail”. The monitor has not gone off at all, even for a false alarm.

April 15th: We see the cardiologist to follow up about the PDA. It has closed nicely, but as has been the pattern, as they find one potential problem resolve, another pops up. Kory’s electric circuit appears to go from left to right, instead of from right to left. This didn’t show up on the first EKG, so she said one of them is wrong and we will do another EKG in two more months to check (I’m laughing at this point!). She also recommends that the heart monitor can come off but to contact our ped to get the official word.

April 16th: I call the ped office, excited to get it off, only to find out our Dr. is out of town for the remainder of the week. Dr. Anderson (filling in for Neilson) says he recommends we keep it on and check with Dr. Neilson when he gets back.

April 18th: Dr. Neilson’s nurse (who happens to be in our ward) calls us and says she’ll order the download. If we don’t hear back by Friday to call in.

Friday, April 22nd – Happy one month old – still with a monitor. I didn’t bother calling because I knew it was hopeless to get it off by Easter :(

April 25th – April 30th: Did a lot of bugging the Dr. and the monitor company. Our Dr.’s nurse was very helpful. Apparently, they not only took forever to switch out the monitors (which happened Thursday, right?) but then took until TUESDAY to download. No hope of being cord free by Austin’s birthday!

May 2nd: Call the ped office to bug them again. Just after close they tell me that he has to have it on for another month, as recommended by the cardiologist. I was so frustrated!!! I couldn’t understand why because he was doing so well (but it’s already 2 weeks past him being a month old anyway – which is when he was supposed to get it off). They call back 15 minutes later and say that he was confused because he has another patient with close bday, same situation who has to keep it on. KORY GETS HIS MONITOR OFF! YAY!!! Just in time to go to church for the first time on Mother’s Day (we’ve been sick) with no monitors and all healthy!! I was so thrilled! You can see his little mark from the monitor always being on. I celebrated by giving him a full, real bath! Now we have one more hurdle – the 3rd EKG on June 9th. Hopefully all goes well and we end this saga with some giggles and gratitude at how all of the careful and precautionary measures ended up being nothing. To be continued…

Austin Turns 27

On Friday, the 29th, we went over to Kory & Shay’s house for dinner. The Thompson’s came too and gave Austin a LDS Church History Trivia Game which was a lot of fun to play! Of course Cadence has a great time playing with Evan too (lately all he can talk about is Evan).

(This is Evan pretending that the golf club covers are boxing gloves)

It was a fun, small little birthday celebration (we had cookie sandwiches instead of cake and ice cream), but we were glad we did it because…

 

…the next day we were all so sick! We ended up being sick for the whole next week and we didn’t get to really celebrate his birthday until a week later. Austin had already received his presents (raspberry bushes, grape vines, The Messiah Series by Bruce R. McConkie, & The Men of the MOTAB CD), so it didn’t feel a whole like like typical birthday. He has so much to look forward to him this year, including going back to school for his MBA in the fall. We are so proud of him and happy to have him as the father in our family!  

Easter

Easter didn't include our usual traditions due to illness and a new baby. However, we did get around to dyeing eggs (I was excited to see how Cadence would respond). Cadence loves to color anything and it turns out, he was pretty excited about this festive craft project, but not so excited about the meal.

Cade's Cabin Fever

This is what happens when you have a toddler cooped up because we're all sick (and mommy just had a baby). The result of some serious cabin fever!

Smith Family Visits

When Kory surprised us all by coming two weeks ahead of his “due date” (though we don’t believe in due dates around here anyway), we realized we weren’t going to have help from family for a little while. When we announced his birth to Austin’s mom, she offered to come out early to be with us. She ended up bringing all of the kids and staying here until Amy’s mom came, and in Utah through Jaylyn’s baby (Cael Hatch) being born (which ended up being two weeks later). She was such a big help! Cadence had such a good time with his Uncle Shane too (though they did get a little tired of each other after almost a week). Enjoy these Smith Family pictures :)

Grandpa Smith with Kory

 

Grandma (with Cael) and Grandpa (with Kory)

(Aunt Jaylyn holding Kory)

 

(Cael Hatch and Kory Smith – newest Smith cousins)

Grandma and Kory @ 5 days old)

(Uncle Keaton Smith)

(Aunt Kelsey Smith – she crocheted Kory a cute green blanket)

 

(Uncle Conner Smith)

 

(Aunt Michaela, who got to use my ticket to the BYU Alumni Ball with Austin)

 

(Uncle Kellin Smith)

(Uncle Shane and Cadence’s duet)

(Shane meets the chickens – in their ugly “teenager” stage)

(Austin his sister Jaylyn with their kids from left: Cadence Smith, Cael Hatch, Kory Smith, Sadi Hatch)

Smith Homestead: Chickens

We have chickens (again)! We bought our two White Leghorns from IFA in Provo. We wanted them because they are so consistent at laying eggs. We named them Sunny (sunny side-up) and Benedictine (Eggs Benedict).

Of course Cadence wanted to hold them. He loves having chickens for pets!

But our brood felt incomplete. We decided to buy an Americana, which lays different colored eggs. We named her Caddy (for an Easter, Cadbury Bunny), since she’ll lay our “Easter Eggs” all year long! We had to go up to the IFA in American Fork to get her. She’s only about a week older than our little Kory.

Caddy was a fun addition, but we worried about how they’d get along. She was about two weeks younger than the Leghorns and Leghorns are typically unfriendly. After they fought a little (while Austin carefully supervised and chided them to get along), they ended up being good buddies. Here is our little “backwards Oreo” brood.

Pretty soon they were learning to fly. With three chickens in the kitchen, things were a mess! They started loosing their baby fuzz and I couldn’t see to sweep enough. Fuzz was everywhere!

They are now outside, roaming every Saturday while Austin works in the yard. Austin started to draw plans for a new shed/greenhouse/chicken coop. His amazing design may not come to life this year, but he sure enjoyed doing it! We are hoping to get something for them though that at least gives them a bit more room.

It’s really amazing how fast they grow – children and chickens :)