Prayer Request

On Sunday, 9/30, my brother-in-law Lenier suffered from cardiac arrest before going into the pulpit as a guest pastor at a church in Rockingham, NC. I received a phone call from my sister, Denise, while I was sitting in church service at our church here in Wilmington.  When I stepped out to take the call, all I could understand was her screaming "Dani, he's not breathing, he has no pulse, he's blue" over and over again and "Stop the church service, stop them, everybody needs to pray right now" over and over.  It was the worst phone call I've ever gotten in my life. 

Although Lenier is technically my brother in law, he is more like a Dad to me.  I have known him since I was 16 years old.  He was the pastor of the church that I began attending after my dad committed suicide, the pastor that helped me cope with that terrible loss and the anger that I had towards God for "allowing" that to happen.  This man holds a huge part of my heart.  Not to mention he's the best husband to my sister and a wonderful father to his 3 grown children and my beautiful nephew, Jackson. This man is special to a lot of people, and we weren't ready to let him go. 

Over the past week, God has shown up, and he has given us our miracle.  As of this morning, Lenier is doing great!  He is talking and eating on his own.  He's ready to come home.  He wants to see Jackson (I brought Jackson home with me and he's been staying with us since 10/1).  They are running more tests and will likely do surgery the end of this week or the first of the next; we are still waiting to hear what that surgery will include (pacemaker and/or defibrillator). 

Please continue to keep him in your prayers as the Dr's determine their course of action.  Please continue to pray for my sister, as she is staying up there with him, away from her beloved baby (whom she has never before been away from).  Pray for strength for the entire family as there are some who have still not been able to get home (Lenier's oldest son, Justin, was serving our country in Afghanistan when this happened, they are trying to get him home, hopefully by tomorrow, 10/5).  And pray that God continues to bless Lenier with great test results and the strength to come home. 

A collage that one of the youth in our church made for Lenier's hospital room :)

I'm Really Pitiful at This

There really is no denying it, there is NO WAY that I could be one of those really serious, blog-every-day type people.  I mean, seriously, it's been over 8 months since I updated this thing! HA!

So, let's just do the run down.  Jensen is 20 months 2 weeks old.  Less than 4 full months before he's 2!!! OMG, time is seriously flying away!  He pretty much runs all the time, walking isn't fast enough for this one.  He is my rowdy one...always on the go, always loud, always the highest end of the spectrum, if that makes any sense. haha.  I love it, but he wears me out.  I can honestly say I don't know how someone stays home all day with their kids...KUDOS TO YOU!  Jensen has a mouth full of teeth and he still will eat most anything you put in front of him, and then he'll move on to what's in front of you. HA!  The last time we had him at the doctor, I think he was 27 lbs and I can't remember how long.  He's still somewhat small for his age, but only like the 25th percentile, so not too small.  His little body doesn't have a chance at gaining wait with the way he is constantly on the go.  I'm just destined to have wiry boys, I guess. 

Ryan is 8 years old!  I really can't believe that!  He's in the third grade now, still at the same school as 2nd grade.  Our first year (last year) was great at that school, and I hope that continues on with 3rd grade.  We'll have to see if he is going to end up requiring any special circumstances for testing since this will be his first year of end of grade testing and timed testing (Ryan has been clinically diagnosed with ADHD but seems to be getting a handle on it, sometimes).  I'm planning to talk with his teacher about that soon.  I am still struggling with understanding and coping with ADHD; I've always been one of those that thought it was an easy out for parents and I know there are others with that same frame of mind (some in my family, still), but I have learned that there really are some that do need help in controlling themselves, and my child is one of those.  I love him dearly, and we are doing the minimal amounts on medications so that he doesn't end up that "zombie-like" kid, but I feel like the medication played a huge role in success in 2nd grade.  We'll see how 3rd grade goes! :)

A few pics of my sweet boys to top it off :)

Why do they always sleep so much better when they are in my bed?

A little driving around the huntin' camp :)

He is very serious about his plant watering :)

I mean, seriously, can he look any older in this?!?

He was trying to stomp out the bumps :)

Real Quick

www.mythirtyone.com/131617


Just wanted to throw it out there that I'm now a consultant for ThirtyOne Gifts! :)

Jensen is One!!

We can't believe it has already been a year!  Little man turned one on 1/18 and we had his party today, 1/21.  Unfortunately, he got shots at his doctors appointment on Thursday and they seem to have caused his cold to go CRAZY, so he has been a bit of a grump the past few days.  We've been fighting a fever since late Thursday night, as well as his croupy cough and snotty nose.  So, needless to say, we haven't been sleeping much at all and none of us were in such a great "partying" mood today, but "the show must go on", right?

All in all, it turned out great.  I stayed up until 11 o'clock last night working on these...

We had a really great time, Jensen enjoyed the icing off the top of his monkey face smash cake and got lots of great gifts.  Most importantly, we got to spend lots of time with some really great friends and family. 

A quick shot in my "First Birthday" shirt with my decorations

My sweet new ride from Aunt Denise, Uncle Lenier & Jackson

Why are ya'll singing so loud?

Thanks so much to everyone who came out and made Jensen's birthday so special!

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas!  We hope everyone enjoys this wonderful holiday, and don't forget the reason for the season!

A New Fave Blog

I just have to share this with anyone out there who actually looks at my blog.  I love to redo furniture, I'm just not that great at it (yet).  But this blog is AWESOME for doing a lot of step-by-step and great do-it-yourself insider tips.  ENJOY!!!

Happy Halloween!

And again, I am so far behind on this, it really is ridiculous. :)  Jensen is 9 months 2 weeks old...where has the time gone?!  He is crawling like a mad man, pulling up on everything, cruising everywhere, and even just standing around hanging out (without holding on to anything!!).  I feel it won't be much longer before he starts walking (and what little sanity I have left will be out the window!)

He currently has 3 bottom teeth and the top 2 front ones are starting to try to come through...you can see one right on the verge of breaking through and the other is very, very swollen and red.  He eats everything you put in front of him...and I mean everything!  He took all of my rutabaga's off of my plate the other day and chose to eat them over his cheeto-like snacks.  He is definitely my child! :)

Ryan is loving 2nd grade at his new school...I am so glad that we opted to move schools this year.  We have ended up with such a wonderful teacher and I thank God every day for her...she has been great, and Ryan really loves her too.  He wrote her a note over the weekend just to tell her she was "greatest teacher ever".  How sweet?!

Tonight is Halloween, and we went to our church for "Trunk-or-Treat".  We had several trunks to treat out of, grilled hot dogs, as well as a huge inflatable slide and sumo wrestling.  Ha!  Ryan had a blast and got loads of candy and Jensen just hung out in his stroller and watched everything that was going on.  Here are a few pics from tonight...Enjoy!

**Note** for some reason,Blogger is uploading my pictures sideways.  I'm sorry. :)

9-11 We Will Never Forget

If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land. 

2 Chronicles 7:14

Let's Play Catch Up!

Wow!  I am seriously horrible at keeping up with this thing, aren't I?  Well, let's play a little catch up to let you all know what's going on in the Wooten house.

Jensen is 7 months 2 weeks old...I can't believe it!  It seems like I was just getting out of the hospital with him, and now here we are over half-way to his first birthday.  He has 2 teeth on the bottom, and I think he's working pretty hard at getting the top 2 as well...he sure is one grumpy baby sometimes!  He has been crawling since early July, so about 5.5-6 months old.  Now he pulls up on any and everything, and he's starting to walk along beside the couch, and he loves to hold someones hands and "walk" around...he really tip-toes :)He is working on his balance...he can stand about 2-3 seconds on his own before he plops down on his behind.

Monday was his first day of daycare.  He's doing really great, except he doesn't want to take their bottles.  The daycare I put him in will supply his formula and bottles which is great, but I'm going to have to send my own if he won't take theirs.  So, we're on day 3, and he's doing better, but still not loving it.  But he seems to be great other than that aspect.  He really is such a "people person" and he does great playing on his own too.  He's not one to really enjoy being tied down though...now that he has figured out his freedom in crawling/exploring, there's no stopping him!


Ryan started 2nd grade last week...I can't believe he is that old already!  We moved him to a different school this year since his regular school didn't meet AYP standards (although most in New Hanover Co didn't).  So far, it seems to be going great.  He's gotten S+'s every day, and if you know us, you know that's a big deal lately! :)  The new school requires uniforms; solid navy, blue, red or white polo with khaki or navy flat front pants/shorts.  I love it!  There is no longer the fight in the morning about what to wear...now its "what color shirt with what color pants" :)  Ryan's adjusting to it...he says it makes him feel like he's going to church every day.  Maybe I should just spruce up what he has to wear to church every Sunday (like a suit or something) and he'll appreciate those polos a little more! haha. 

I'll end with a couple of recent pics from Ryan's 7th birthday.  Enjoy!

Ryan's birthday present from my mom and Ronald...a pool!

Casey and I skating with Ryan at his birthday party at Scooter's

Ryan and Daddy cheesin' it

And, by far, the cutest pirate there!!!

Photo Book

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Quick Update, Mostly Pics

First time meeting big brother, Ryan

First time meeting Papa

One month

Two months, waiting for Mommy to get ready for church

Two months, Ryan loves to feed me

Two months, Ryan loves to snuggle and watch cartoons in Mommy & Daddy's bed

2.5 months, a little brotherly love

Just hanging out with my bro

Best buds already

Days away from 3 months, hanging out at one of Ryan's tball games

6 days shy of 3 months, first night I rolled over from tummy to back in my crib

3 months, 1 week.  First Easter!

Figuring out my "cat toy" ball that the Easter Bunny brought me!

3 months...I love bath time!!!

Wow!  I can't believe it's been 3 months already!  As of his 2 month appointment, Jensen weighed 12.5 lbs...I'm pretty sure he is well past that now!  We have just had to move him up to 3-6 month clothes, the 3 month stuff was getting way too tight!

Jensen seems to have always been a part of our family, yet it seems like he was just born...funny how life works out like that, huh?  He is absolutely such a happy baby.  The only time he isn't happy is when he has a tummy ache, which happens daily, but its only for a little while, then he's back to his smiley self again.  We just started putting rice cereal in his bottles this week...he's now up to 6 ounces of formula (sometimes with the rice cereal) every 3-4 hours.  He is pretty much sleeping through the night.  Sometimes we get up once to eat, depending on when the last bottle was before bed.  

His smile is infectious!  It's such a big smile...I haven't been able to catch a really great one yet in a pic, but I'm sure I will.  He talks non-stop and it's the cutest sound I've ever heard! :) He is already scooting all over the place, especially in his crib at night.  I can lay him down at one end of the crib, and by morning, he is at the other end, usually facing the opposite direction (or he has rolled over to his back and gets stuck there like a turtle).  I'm thinking that I'll start feeding him the rice cereal with a spoon within the next week or so.  That's about all of the update I have for now, thanks for checking in!!

Introducing Jensen Miles!

Jensen made his arrival on January 18th, 2011 at 7:57 am weighing in at 7 lbs and 20 inches long.  Surgery went pretty good.  I started throwing up at the very beginning...the spinal block meds made my BP drop and my pulse race, which in turn made me very nauseous.  That got straightened out and then Jensen was here! :)
The Dr said it was a good think I opted for the repeat c-section because his cord was wrapped twice around him and that could have been an issue if I had labored.  Good call! :)  After he was delivered, they gave me pitocin to help everything contract back down like its supposed to. The dosage is very high, and I had a hard time with it.  They said it was a normal response, but it made me sick again (vomiting) and I have a very good idea of what a heart attack feels like.  It seemed like there was an elephant sitting on my chest...I couldn't get a good breath in, but again, they said it was normal and just dropped the dosage a little bit.  Everything from there was kind of a blur.  I went to recovery for a while, then off to my room.  We had a lot of visitors, I don't really remember who all came that first day, I was still pretty sick and throwing up throughout the day, plus I also have the rare reaction to one of the meds from the spinal block that causes extreme itching.  I pretty much felt like I was going to scratch my face off, it was horrible.  That finally went away after the 2nd or 3rd day.  I attempted breast feeding while in the hospital, but very quickly gave up on it as soon as we came home.  He wasn't having a lot of trouble with it, but he wasn't latching just right, which was causing me a lot of pain and bruising, and I just couldn't stand the thought of doing it anymore.  He has done much better on the formula anyways, it seems he's getting more and is much happier because of it. :)  Then my milk never really came in either, so it all worked out for the best that I wimped out. :)

Now that we've been home, everything has gone pretty well.  I had a lot of discomfort from the surgery for the first 2 weeks, but that has all subsided.  I just had my 4 week post-partum check up and was given the all clear to return to a normal life (however normal it gets with 2 kids). haha.  I was very excited to see that I have lost 16 lbs since delivery, so that's all the weight I gained and then some...yay!!!  Casey and I are talking about trying p90x...I'm not certain I can do it, but I've got a lot of weight that I want to lose to get back to where I used to be and I know that, if I can stick it out with the program, it'll come off.  We shall see! :)

Currently, Jensen is a sick little boy.  I took him to the doctor on Wednesday afternoon for wheezing and a horrible cough, and he has RSV.  It seems likes he's on the mend, but I think it'll be a while before he's all better.  We're doing breathing treatments every 4 hours and that seems to be helping.  Today, Ryan has a fever, vomiting and diarrhea...it seems this whole house has been sick ever since the baby got here!  Casey had a stomach bug 2 weeks ago, and has had a cold throughout the whole thing too.  I'm the only one who has stayed healthy, so far.  I feel like I might just be biding my time. :(

Modern Baby Boy Birth Announcement

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Wow!!  I can't believe he's already a month old!!!!

Way Behind!

**NOTE:  This was a post that I started way back and never actually posted, so here it is **


Wow, I have gotten very, very behind on this!  I apologize for that, and I will go ahead and apologize in advance because I'm sure I'll be even further behind on updating once Jensen gets here.

Quick recap:
The pregnancy has gone great.  No major problems, concerns, etc.  No swelling, eclampsia, high blood pressure...nothing.  It has been by far a very uneventful pregnancy.  Not that I'm complaining :)

January 7th was my last day of work.  I opted to take an extra week so that I could finish up things around the nursery and just get myself physically and mentally prepared for what was coming.  Worked out great, since on January 10th, it snowed around here and schools ended up being closed the 10th-12th, so I would have been taking those days to be home with Ryan anyways.  I didn't get as much accomplished during those days home because, of course, we needed to play in the snow as much as possible.  :) 

A Little Concerned

So, I felt kinda crappy all night last night, and didn't get a lot of sleep.  But I got up this morning and got ready for work and took Ryan on to my sister's house for the day.  It was on my way from there that it dawned on me that I hadn't been feeling Jensen move around very much at all.  I actually couldn't think of feeling him at all since sometime in the middle of the night.  And my lower abdomen had been having some pretty noticeable cramps.  I decided to call into work, and then called the doctors office.  They didn't have any way of squeezing me in, so they sent me on to the hospital to get checked out.  Luckily, once I got there, Jensen started showing off and wouldn't stay still, which was great b/c I could feel him again and release some anxiety.  They still kept me in triage for a while to monitor the heart rate and movements, and he was perfectly fine.  They did say that I showed some contractions, which could have been Braxton Hicks or could have been the start of real ones, but they tapered off after about an hour or so.  They told me to go home and stay in bed/on the couch for the rest of the day, just to be safe, which was fine by me since I didn't sleep much last night.

I'm still feeling pretty crampy, especially if I'm up and about, and I guess he's running out of room because I'm not feeling him move quite as much as normal, but he's still active, which is a plus.  Now I'm just wondering if he's going to manage to stay put until the 18th, or if we're going to get our bundle of joy a bit earlier than planned.  The doctor said that if I do go into labor, being as far along as I am, they won't try to stop it.  So now its even more of a waiting game, and I'm not a patient person! :)

January 18, 2011

Sounds like just another day off in the future, right?  WRONG! :) That is the day that we have scheduled our c-section for Jensen...that will be my new little man's birthday!  We are so excited, but you know what else?  I'm starting to get nervous.  That's only 32 days from today...yep, you read that right, only 32 days!!  WOW!  I'm starting to feel the pinch, it seems we have a lot left to get done before he gets here.  I'm sure we'll be fine and have it done, but that still doesn't stop the stress.

We had our baby shower last Sunday, December 12th from 2-4 pm at the church in Maple Hill.  Although it was very very cold and rainy, we had a great turnout and Jensen received lots of wonderful goodies.  I'll have to take a picture of the nursery before we organize it...it looks like a complete madhouse in there right now.  We had been doing so well with keeping it clean after emptying it out, but now it has turned into the catch all for the Christmas shopping and wrapping. 

Speaking of Christmas shopping, I have 1 gift left to buy, then I will be D-O-N-E with shopping and that makes me super happy.  I haven't gotten much of it wrapped, but I did make an early morning stop at Target before work and picked up some more gift bags, so I might not be wrapping as much as I usually do.  I prefer to wrap because I love watching people actually open the gifts, but this baby belly is getting in the way of my sitting down in the living room floor and leaning all over the place to wrap, so I'm thinking I might be lazy this year with bags.  They're still cute and they still match my Christmas tree, which is a must for me.

I would like to put an image up of the Christmas Cards that I've sent out, but I can't seem to get Hallmark.com to let me do that.

I hope everyone has a great and wonderful Christmas, and I'll probably do another post after Christmas, we go back to the Dr on the 27th. 

Merry Christmas!!!!!

Soon & Very Soon...

We're at 7 weeks and counting, I can't believe it's getting so close!  I went for my last monthly appointment early last week and everything is still going great.  The nurse questioned whether or not I had participated in the Thanksgiving festivities because, believe it or not, I had not gained anything since my last appointment 3 weeks prior....woohoo! :) I have done so much better this pregnancy with weight gain, so I'm hoping I'll be able to lose it (and what was left from Ryan too!) a little bit easier. 

One thing that this pregnancy has taught me is that I can be much more proactive at things if I really put my mind to it.  I'm almost completely done with my Christmas shopping, which is something I usually haven't even started by now.  I've also learned that I'm really not as patient as I once thought I was.  I've done as much of my Christmas shopping online this year, or I've handed over the reign and let Casey go get it.  I just can't seem to handle the crazy mobs of people out there!  Any of it that I'm doing in stores is usually done on my lunch break or before I even come in to work in the mornings, so the crazies aren't out yet. 

This coming weekend is our baby shower and I'm so excited.  Casey's mom and sister are throwing it in Maple Hill at their church, and I know it'll be great.  Our bridal shower was there as well and we were very blessed then, and I don't doubt this will be any different.  I might not be convinced yet by my husband to move back there (I'm pretty certain I can't take being that far out in the middle of nowhere), but I am more than convinced that it is a great community full of people who would do anything and everything for those around them.  Hopefully I will have some pics up next week or so from the shower, and I have one or two of my sister and I with our bumps. 

We go for another appointment on Monday, and the last doctor had told us that we'd be scheduling the c-section date at this appointment.  So hopefully, this time next week, we'll know a more accurate date of when we get to meet our new little man!  This whole pregnancy has seemed to fly by, but now that its getting closer to the end, its creeping!

Jensen's growing....

and therefore so am I.  :) 

This is pretty much one of the first pics that I've had taken since I've been preggers...I'm not so much for pics of getting bigger and bigger, even if it is mostly because of my little rugrat growing inside.  :)  The countdown is on, 10 more weeks!