11 months, March Madness and a mother who's turning 30!

Yes, I'm turning 30. For some reason, I REALLY don't want to be 30...but, I have two weeks to embrace it. I know its just an age and really doesn't matter, but the big 30 does feel big to me!

11 months! Wow! She's still sooooo small! 3 weeks ago she was 6.5kg's, and 67cm long...what a small little sweetie. She's doing much better now that she's shaken all her viruses and had a few healthy weeks. Does make me see how her development and strength is affected when she is sick for a while. She's still sleeping soooo badly at night - I'm getting up between 5 and 10 times a night and days starting between 4:30 and 5:30 pretty much which is a killer! And her day sleeps are 30-40min with a real fight to get her down! But I'm trusting that it'll just come right at some stage. I'll save her other updates for her 1 year birthday post!

We've got a busy month ahead of us, friends out from overseas, family wedding in Plettenberg Bay, two family birthdays (including the big 1 year!), 21sts etc! But we're looking forward to it!

God has been good to us and we continue to trust him for his provision and grace as we venture into another unknown month work wise.

getting ready for wedding day

Me and my friend Eva

Hanging with my young friend Georgia

My mom trying to stop me from rolling onto and hugging Georgia!

Today's encouragement

"But the eyes of the Lord are upon those who fear Him, on those whose hope is in His unfailing love, to deliver them from death and keep them alive from famine.

We wait in hope for the Lord;he is our help and our shield. In him our hearts rejoice, for we trust in his holy name. May your unfailing love rest upon us,O Lord, even as we put our hope in you." Psalm 33:18-22
Sent via my BlackBerry from Vodacom - let your email find you!

Things change and life goes on

So we had the heart news - thats a whole separate post in itself - I'll get onto that when I have a moment. Bottom line...we're waiting for at least another 6 months.

So, life goes on. And I suspect the days will roll into weeks and months - in a good way. I've accepted the delay, and know that Gods timing is perfect. But for now, its how we move on, how we choose to spend our time, our energies and everything else.

For now, I'm taking it a day at a time. We had a wonderful weekend, just hanging around with Katelyn just enjoying where we at with her, talking about her next milestones and (me) thinking about what I really need to work on with her, how we're going to get there etc.
She's almost 11 months - and we NEED to get to:
- Sitting
- Exploring objects, putting them in her mouth etc (this only happens by default now)
- Eating technique - needs to be worked on!
I'm happy to just stick to and focus on these now. I feel like she's so close, yet so far sometimes.
The exploring objects and eating thing is probably the one that makes me a little more concerned, I'm going to possibly have to touch base with some people and find out any tips / help that they've had or things they've done that really worked. She's suddenly become very anti anything in her mouth, so I've never really been worried, but all of a sudden, I've noticed she doesnt want anything put into her mouth unless she's eating. So - thats my big project for now I think (together with the eating). Its so important for communication and speech that I really need to learn more about it. The sitting, well, even if delayed and below average - it'll come.

So here's to a week of trusting God for interesting avenues/people/research for me to find out more!

Back to the waiting game

We're back to waiting. Waiting for cardio comic to get back to us about when we can schedule Katelyn's open heart surgery. We had a good checkup with him on Tuesday - where he was really happy with her general development and thinks she looks fantastic, and said that whether we did it now or in 6 months time it really doesnt make any difference.

He did an echo again ( think this was the most detailed one he's done), which showed that the band is doing a great job, that the VSD side of the AVSD (bottom hole) is REALLY big and will require a really significant correction. He's mentioned how BIG it is every single time he's had a look - doesnt make you feel fantastic! However, the not so nice bit, was that he spoke about a piece of tissue, that he has mentioned before but not in so much detail, and how he doesnt know how it may impact the operation.Basically, the piece of tissue seems to be close to the aorta, and should it be placed badly (become too close / cause a blockage to the opening of aorta etc), then basically celebrity surgeon on the day would not do the correction at all and that it cannot be repaired. Those were his words. Whether there are other things that you can do, we have absolutely no idea - he spoke and explained it to us a bit, but the he said, we'll cross that bridge if we come to it. So thats really just put a huge uncertainly on the whole thing, and even more reason for us praying that its sooner rather than later, as we wont know the impact / result until she comes out of surgery. The older she gets the more life threatening her condition becomes (ok, only really talking after she's 2) - as her lungs will eventually become flooded and not cope anymore. But I am daily trying not to think about that, and am so unbelievably grateful that we have one of the top surgeons in the world operating on our little K!

Anyway, its friday, praying we'll know by the end of today when this surgery is going to be, but hey, life doesn't always work out the way you think is best. I know Gods timing will be right.