..Your mercies in disguise.

I'm seem to be having a hard day today...not sure if its because I've been away from Ella, Liss & Brady for almost 4 days now, or if its hearing the pain in my sissy's voice this morning on the phone.

Ella is still  doing wonderfully...she was extubated yesterday, so she's now breathing on her own again, and they have even been able to hold her (though not very comfortably, as she still has a lot of tubes), off and on. Slowly they've been weaning her off of her meds and I guess the last day or so she's been pretty upset  whenever she's awake, which has been hard for Lissa and Brady to watch. The Drs & nurses have checked her over multiple times and say everything still looks good, but it would still be so painful to watch your baby cry and not being able to do something to fix it. They nurses told them that Ella "does not like to be bothered (especially when she's sleeping!)" so basically, they said she'll let you know if she's pissed off...and tiny little Ella has quite the lungs on her. :) I wouldn't have expected anything less from Rilynne's cousin...ha.

Yes, I know newborn babies cry a lot, and we all know that, but given the circumstances it just makes it a bit more difficult because they find themselves wondering..is it something more? Is she hurting or hungry? Are they missing something? Ever since Ella was born (8 days ago), they've been giving her nutrients and vitamins through one of her IVs, but she still hasn't been able to actually drink milk..they said they have to wait until she's completely off these certain meds. ..Feed my baby!!!! I told Liss I think Ella is perfectly fine and that she's in the best place she could possibly be...Ella just knows they're holding out on the milk! That or she just misses her Auntie Ashy..aka "Madame M,"...and wants me to come back there and snuggle her. :) Either way, its really stressing Lissa out. They went back to the Ronald McDonald house so they could let Ella hopefully sleep, distraction free, and maybe get some sleep themselves...as you can imagine though, sleep doesn't come too easily in times like these.

So I'm praying for peace & strength for my beautiful niece and her amazing, exhausted parents, and hoping it makes it there soon, past LA traffic and straight to my Ella's heart. <3

This remains one of my favorite songs...I think anybody can relate to it. :)

We pray for blessings
We pray for peace
Comfort for family, protection while we sleep
We pray for healing, for prosperity
We pray for Your mighty hand to ease our suffering
All the while, You hear each spoken need
Yet love us way too much to give us lesser things

'Cause what if Your blessings come through raindrops
What if Your healing comes through tears
What if a thousand sleepless nights
Are what it takes to know You’re near
What if trials of this life are Your mercies in disguise

We pray for wisdom
Your voice to hear
And we cry in anger when we cannot feel You near
We doubt Your goodness, we doubt Your love
As if every promise from Your Word is not enough
All the while, You hear each desperate plea
And long that we'd have faith to believe

Courtesy of lyricshall.com
'Cause what if Your blessings come through raindrops
What if Your healing comes through tears
What if a thousand sleepless nights
Are what it takes to know You’re near
And what if trials of this life are Your mercies in disguise

When friends betray us
When darkness seems to win
We know that pain reminds this heart
That this is not, this is not our home
It's not our home

'Cause what if Your blessings come through raindrops
What if Your healing comes through tears
And what if a thousand sleepless nights
Are what it takes to know You’re near
What if my greatest disappointments
Or the aching(s) of this life
Is the revealing of a greater thirst this world can’t satisfy
And what if trials of this life
The rain, the storms, the hardest nights
Are Your mercies in disguise

..not to worry, whistle I'll be there.

Back again from LA today and I have to say that although I wish I could have stayed for days on end and stared at that tiny angel in the bed warmer forever, it was a lot easier coming home this time. Well, easier and harder...easier because she is just doing so, so incredibly well that it made me feel safe to leave her knowing she would be ok...harder because I had Ri in the backseat for the 3 hr car ride home and I could only toss so much plastic fruit back there. My car looks like a produce section.

So Ella had her chest closed today and made it through without a worry in the world! Literally, since the day she was born she has carried on like a perfectly healthy newborn baby, its completely amazing. I'm starting to think she was faking the HLHS and just wanted to be on tv...;) Seriously though, with the exception of one or 2 momentary heart rate drops (slight) and a reoccuring case of the hiccups (precious), Ella has been doing better than any of us, Drs included, had expected. She was taken off of her Epi (did I spell that right?) today, which I guess is a medicine that speeds up her heart rate for her...but she's doing it on her own already, so they took her off! Also this Tuesday they are planning on extubating her, which is the opposite of intubation where they had inserted a tube down her throat to add air to help her breathe...so basically, goodbye tube!!! :) One nurse also told Lissa & Brady they may be able to hold her in the next day or so....lets keep our fingers crossed. :) Ella has also opened her eyes quite a bit the last couple days and I'm bitter because I wasn't there for it! I did see a video though and she is absolutely breathtaking...peeking all around and blinking ever so slowly...trying to take everything in. Her daddy has been singing the beautiful song he wrote to her and both he and Lissa talk to her all the time and tell her about everyone who can't wait to meet her. I'll even admit, everytime I was left alone with her (ie: Liss went to the bathroom), I sang to her "Umbrella,"...the pretty, slow, Randy-Hose-dance version..not the fast Rihanna one. :) She told me she likes my singing the best, Brady. ;) haha...never. :)

So yesteday I had decided to go down to LA a day earlier and suprise my dad & Laura (and pretty much everyone else), because they'd flown in from CO a few days earlier and haven't seen Ri in a long time. Brady's mom, Susan and step-dad, Brad, got into town on Friday night from Utah, so come Saturady, we had a quite the gang at CHLA. You're only allowed 3 visitors at a time in this particular wing, but we kinda sorta got 10 people up there...not into Ella's room, of course, because there's good reason to limit it to a few...but the waiting room was completely empty and we took over. :) Ella is looking better and better everyday and her puffiness is going down rapidly as they drain her fluids....I even got to kiss her sweet little hand and the back of her head! Lissa can't even kiss the back of her head bc she's too short to lean up and over her bed warmer...:) One of the benefits of being tall today. :) We all took our turns visiting in her room, had a great lunch and then mom and I went over to the Ronald McDonald house (where Liss and Brady are now staying), to put Twisty down for a nap, so I could work on the message board to Ella. The Ronald McDonald house is soo nice, I can't believe how generous that place is. Their room looks like a standard, nice hotel room...a couple  beds, bathroom, big window, dresser & closet...and the tiniest flatscreen I've ever seen with 3 channels on it. Thank God for laptops.

We all ended the night by going back to "our" hollywood apartment, (thank you so much to the wonderful men who loaned this to us...I dont know them personally, but my family does, and you are rockstars) and visiting, watching some Gabba and giving Liss and Brady our poster board we ALL made for them! Thank you so much to all of you who sent me messages to Ella so I could put them on that board...they were all beautiful and I really think its something they'll treasure forever...and something that Ella can read someday. :)

Today I only briefly was able to see Ella because I wanted to hit the freeway right at Ri's naptime, but I kissed her precious cupcake head and told her I'd be back very soon and to not cause too much trouble without me. I also thanked her beautiful guardian angel, Lauren, who I know was standing right beside her the whole time, as she has been since the moment Ella was born. You are dearly missed, Lauren, but I'm eternally grateful to have you protecting and watching over my baby niece. We all are. <3

"Pay attention to your dreams - God's angels often speak directly to our hearts when we are asleep."

..to love would be an awfully big adventure.

I was getting stressed throughout today since I wasn't in Los Angeles anymore and didn't really know how I could give my detailed accounts of Ella's day! I'm sure that someday I will blog about something other than my beautiful niece, but for now I'm perfectly happy keeping her as the star. :) So as bedtime inched nearer I started to feel depressed that I wouldn't have tonights Ella blog and the phone rang from my sissy...wow, was I wrong. Before I get to the amazing story I'm about to share, I want everyone to know that Ella has continued to do wonderfully...I'm talking better than better. She is doing so well that if she remains stable over the next day, they will be closing up her chest on Sunday...which is very fast! They tell us "no news is good news," and lets just say...this baby has zero news!!! :) Tonight they started draining some of her fluids, which have been the cause of her puffiness and I guess this draining is the next step in the process to close her chest. I am so proud of my sweetheart and so thankful to God for helping her stay strong and keeping his best angels beside her...which leads me to the story.

A friend of ours, who shall remain nameless since we haven't actually asked her if we could write about this ...but I just thought it was too amazing not to, sent lissa a text earlier about a dream she'd had the previous night. I didn't know this, but apparently throughout her life this friend has had dreams where she can communicate and/or see people who have passed on. When Lissa started out the story this way, I sort of half rolled my eyes and said "yeah, ok," but she said "no, I'm serious, just listen." 

Our friend had a dream that she was walking through Ella's hospital with Brady, on her way to see Ella in her room for the first time. They got to a door and Brady told her he couldn't go any further with her and that he wasn't able to go where she was. When she stepped in the room there was a girl with blondish hair standing over Ella's bed, illuminated in radiant white colors, and she could tell she was someone who had passed on. The girl handed Ella to our friend, who held her in her arms, kissed and hugged her. When our friend turned to the girl and asked her who she was, the girl held out her hand, where there was a pair of angel wings upon it, in dark, bold black ink..like a tattoo, she thought. The girl then placed her hand against her own back. Though she didnt say her name, our friend got the feeling that it began with an L. (* I'm adding this in now, bc I'd forgotten it and Lissa reminded me that when our friend asked who the girl was she told her, dont worry, they'll know...she was right). The girl took Ella back to lay her back in her bed and our friend asked her, "can you just tell me if Ella is going to be ok?" She told her, "no matter what, she's going to be ok." At that moment our friend saw in her mind this girl standing over Ella's surgery bed with her hand on her, while the Drs preformed her heart surgery. This was someone who had been there the whole time, guarding our baby and continued to protect her even in this very moment.

The whole time Lissa was reading me this text (it was much more detailed, amazing and beautiful in her words, but we didn't feel it was right to post them without her permission), my whole body had broken out in goosebumps and I felt like I had a sort of electricity running through my body. Completely speechless and almost in tears.

Lissa had a best friend growing up named Lauren, who was very dear to her. Lauren was in a terrible car accident was she was 18 or 19 (this was about 10 years ago) and was killed, which of course was absolutely devestating to Lissa and everyone who knew Lauren. She had beautiful blonde hair. A couple years after Lauren died Lissa got a tattoo in her memory, on her lower hip, where nobody could see it unless she showed you, which she never did. Very few people know about this tattoo. The tattoo is of a pair of angel wings. I have chills all over again as I write this. This friend of ours has never heard about Lauren and would have no way of knowing this. * I'm adding this in now, bc I'd forgotten it and Lissa reminded me..but when our friend asked the girl who her name

Tonight I dedicate this blog to the memory of Lauren Slaughter, who has taken it upon herself to be my baby nieces very own guardian angel. I've never really believed in this type of stuff before, but there isn't a doubt in my mind that she's standing over Ella's bed, protecting her, as we speak. Lissa and Brady thanked her when they went in there tonight and I know I'll be making a very special thanks and prayer when I get there this weekend. God is good...all the time.

"Miracles are a retelling in small letters of the very same story which is written across the whole world in letters to large for some of us to see"

We will only just remember how it feels

Well I have to admit that I'm missing LA right now. More than I knew I would. I left AG to go there on Sunday and just got home about 40 minutes ago...I had a rather cramped and crammed sleep on the way home and was sprawled out across the front of Dana's truck, my head covered with clothing when I woke up to the sound of a woman police officer  in the window next to me who's voice reminded me of a pickaxe...ahh, we must be back on the Central Coast. Dana got pulled over for expired registration. Welcome home!

John & Rilynne weren't home when I got here and that sent me tipping over the edge a bit, because I've been wanting to see my Flutter for 3 days now, which is the longest we've ever been apart AND its her 8 month birthday today. So I'll admit, I lost it a bit and I think everything that's happened over the last 4 days just came crashing down on me. I swear I dont even feel like I'm the same person anymore and sitting her at our home computer just feels foreign. I realized that no, I'm actually not the same person anymore and its because half of my heart is back with my precious niece, hundreds of miles away. For those of you who have ever experienced heartache (as I'm sure most of you have), you know that its not just an expression, you can actually feel it in your chest and throughout your whole body. Sort of like right before you get the flu and your body/bones just start aching, only there's no medicine to make heartache go away, it just is.

My now almost 3 day old niece went in for her first open heart surgery today at around 8:00am. Mom, Dana, Maddy and I woke up around 6:00am at "our," Hollywood apartment and made it to the hospital by 7:15 to get some time in with her before they took her away. Brady was there holding and cuddling her and if you read my post from last night you obviously know Lissa was not. We looked down at Ella's perfect little body, not a flaw on it, and just tried to embed it our memories, because we knew that just an hour from then, it would never look like that again. The tiny little patches where they shaved parts of her hair for surgery were just a constant reminder to me of what was around the corner. She was so peaceful in her daddy's arms, I seriously think they both could have stayed there forever. I know I could have stared at her forever.

Ella's night nurses, who are amazing, crafted her a beautiful sign with her name on it, all in her colors and themes of what her nursery will be. (pink/black..demask, Paris themed) and hung it over the warmer bed where she sleeps. Things like this have been such a comfort to us because we know this hospital is the best of the best and these people work there because they love it, so our sweetheart is in great hands.

Leaving was not easy, I'll tell you that. One of the surgeons and the anesthesiologist came in to take her away and I just wanted to get face to face with them and tell them how special this baby is and that they needed to perform like they never had before. They were very sympathetic, kind and confident that Ella was going to be just fine. My mom made sure to ask the anesthesiologist if he had a good nights sleep the night before...he did. :) Mom, Brady, Maddy and I all held hands and said a prayer around Ella in her bed and gave her our goodbye kisses. We told her that her mommy was right there in her heart, though she couldn't be with her right then and that she loved her more than anything in this universe.

So away our baby went, down the hall and we were left with each and our fears of the unknown. They said with surgery prep, the surgery itself and the recovery period she would be gone for about 5 hours, so we headed back over to Lissa's hospital next door to check on her. It was just after 8 and visiting hrs weren't until 10am, so one by one we all snuck up the elevator when the guard was busy signing people in...this hospital is so oblivious. :) I seriously think I could put on a pair of scrubs and say I'm a new nurse there and nobody would question in or care. We got to Lissa's room and she was having a pretty hard time. All you moms out there can imagine what it would feel like to be basically bed-bound in a hospital, while you're baby is having heart surgery next door and not be able to be there for it. I would have lost my mind. So while Lissa was nothing short of heartbroken that she wasn't able to go, she was equally amazing and strong the entire time. My dad and Laura flew in from CO at about 10:00am, so we all spent the time visiting, filling Liss with the sugar and carbs that she missed for the last 9 months with her gestational diabetes and playing computer games. Even amidst all the chatter and small talk, you knew where everybodys mind really was and all the quick looks at the clock silently told each other that our hearts were somewhere else too.

At 11:00 Brady got a call from Ella's hospital where they asked him to come next door because the surgeon wanted to talk to him. Brady kept asking "well is she ok?" and whoever had called said they really didnt know anything, they were just instructed to call because the surgery was over and they needed to fill him in. He and Dana took off for CHLA and let me tell you, those were the longest 15 minutes of all our lives. Liss was about to pass out from the stress of not knowing what was going on and all our attempts at distractions completely failed. Finally she got the call from Brady saying Ella was just fine and that the actual surgery had only taken 27 minutes, instead of the usual 45-an hr. They'd found no surprises and she had done beautifully. Ella was being taken into recovery and we could visit her in a few hrs around one. Thank you, God.

By the time we actually ended up being able to go see her, it was about 3:30pm and Dad & Laura went first because they hadn't had a chance to meet her yet. They came out smiling, crying and saying how absolutely perfect she looked. I was next to go visit and it was one of the hardest things I've ever had to see. She just looked so very peaceful (they use a medication to temporarily paralyze her body for a few days so that it can have a chance to heal without her moving around or touching anything) and she was still the tiny, beautiful doll that she was before. But though I'd thought I had mentally prepared myself for all the tubes, so many tubes, I just wasn't ready for it. They have Ella's chest incision kept open for the next few days, just in case anything happens and they need to get in there, but they have a sort of cloth covering it. Underneath it though, you could actually see her little heart beating. I didn't look, but Maddy and Dana went in later and both briefly saw. Our precious angel looked just as perfect as she had when we'd left her at 8am. The truth is though, she was even more perfect now. These surgeons and this procedure have given our Ella the ability to live and I just wish I could thank them personally. She is doing soo well, you guys, everyone just continues to be amazed by her. So far she has defied the odds in every area possible and I just know she'll continue to amaze us. I keep thinking I just can't wait until the day I can hold my niece in my arms (they let me half hold her in her warming bed that morning, so I could put her back to sleep) and tell her what a miracle she is. She'll have play dates with her cousin (who Liss and I have decided is really going to be her sister) and she'll have the greatest family in the world.

I never dreamed I could love someone as much as I love my Rilynne, but with God as my witness, Ella May has stolen my heart completely and I couldn't love her more if she was my own. She will have the greatest & strongest parents, and she will have more love in her life than she could ever ask for. I can't wait to hopefully get back to her in LA in a few days, but until then, half of me will remain there with her.

This song has been playing over and over again in my head lately, so I had to share..kind of sums it up for me.

Litte Wonders

let it go,
let it roll right off your shoulder
don't you know
the hardest part is over
let it in,
let your clarity define you
in the end
we will only just remember how it feels

our lives are made
in these small hours
these little wonders,
these twists & turns of fate
time falls away,
but these small hours,
these small hours still remain

let it slide,
let your troubles fall behind you
let it shine
until you feel it all around you
and i don't mind
if it's me you need to turn to
we'll get by,
it's the heart that really matters in the end

our lives are made
in these small hours
these little wonders,
these twists & turns of fate
time falls away,
but these small hours,
these small hours still remain

all of my regret
will wash away some how
but i can not forget
the way i feel right now

in these small hours
these little wonders
these twists & turns of fate
these twists & turns of fate
time falls away but these small hours
these small hours, still remain,
still remain
these little wonders
these twists & turns of fate
time falls away
but these small hours

"... and pray it makes you whole"

(Before I start this blog, I want to tell everyone that Ella is doing so well and continuing to amaze us. We were told today that she goes in for her first open heart surgery at 7:30am tomorrow. Speechless. You can do this, Ella May...we're all here).

This is a long one...brace yourselves.

So I said earlier that I couldn't get up the energy to blog, but then I realized that more than that, I couldn't find a way to sleep. Thoughts, fears, worries, anticipation, sorrow, love, anger....oh anger....they've all taken over my mind. I dont think I've ever had so many thoughts crammed into one space at a time. Its debilitating. My heart is aching, aching, screaming for all of my prayers to be answered and for peace within my family and the families I've come to love now that I'm part of this "heart baby," club.

I had a moment earlier today where I told my mom that I'm having a hard time seeing God these days and I wasn't really sure where to go from there. Why would he allow these babies to suffer, why would he put them on this earth only to take them away, why would he leave their families behind with gaping holes in their now broken hearts? I'm still struggling with this, but the tiny glimmer of hope and knowledge I've found is that there has to be something bigger than this, that we can't see now or even begin to fathom. I believe in God and I believe in Heaven...so why shouldn't I feel peace that these angels are now in the greatest place they could ever be, with someone who loves them more than anyone ever could? Because my heart feels like its being chipped away at. And I mourn for their parents and the people who loved them most. And it just wont ever feel natural that a child should pass before their parents. So here I am, living in limbo of what my head is telling me and what my heart is telling me. I've never been a fan of limbo.

But then...

I wrote in my last post that when Lissa gave birth to Ella yesterday morning she was immediately taken away to check her heart and get her hooked up to things. Liss never got to hold her and only saw her for about 2 minutes total before Ella was transfered to the hospital next door to her, Children's Hospital LA. Liss had a C-section so was on mandatory bedrest for the first 24 hrs and we were told by our hospital that Liss wouldn't  be able to leave the hospital until sometime on Friday bc it was against hospital policy and not an option. The rest of our family who's here (Maddy, Mom, Dana, Brady and myself) were able to go next door and visit her, though not touch her much because of everything she's hooked up to and the fact that germs are EXTRA dangerous for her. It has been killing Lissa to not see her precious baby, hold her, have those first beautiful moments where your family meets her for the first time. We'd come back from visiting Ella telling each other "we really need to be careful not to gush about Ella to Lissa too much..we dont want her to feel left out or like she's on the outside looking in." ...that was really, really hard, because this baby is everything to gush about. When we found out today that Ella's surgery would be tomorrow (we knew there was a chance it could be that day, but were pretty convinced it would be Monday) it absolutely tore Lissa apart because she couldn't imagine having her day old baby go into heart sugery without her mom there..and without having ever had the chance to hold her...who could?Needless to say  it was torture for us to watch her in that kind of pain. She called her Dr, we talked to the surgeons next door (who were on our side!) the nurses, anyone, to see what we could do to get Liss in there to see Ella, just briefly, before her surgery. That door was shut faster than we could open it. Liss was contemplating discharging herself a day early and saying screw it to the Drs orders against it and there wasn't much we could do to convince her otherwise.

...so here comes the lighter part of this blog (I know its needed and I'm sorry to have to vent so much)...Maddy and I were taking the elevator downstairs around 8:00, going next door to kiss Ella goodnight, when I suddenly realized I couldn't watch my sissy's face in that pain anymore. I asked
Maddy, "should we go steal Lissa and sneak her over there?"  :) That smiley face is exactly what spread over Maddy's face, and if you know her, you know she was in 100%.  Lets do this. I called my mom as we were still traveling down the 7 floors on the elevator and told her our plan...
mom: And how do you think we'd be able to do that?
ash: we'll just walk her out, sneak her over and in!
Maddy: no, we'd definitely need a wheelchair.
Mom: Well obviously, she can't get over there without a wheelchair
Ash: So if I can find us a wheelchair, will you do it?
Mom:...sure!  (you were soooo doubting us, Mom!) :)
    LITERALLY, at this moment the elevator door opens on the 1st floor and there is an old, filipino nurse with an empty wheelchair. I'm not kidding, it happened just like that. We try and convince this lady that we need a wheelchair to get my sister around so she can get some air and after a bunch of back and forth, she says "well I could give you this one, but it can only be used by patients on the 7th floor where it belongs." ...7th floor?!?! Um, perfect? We travel back up the 7 floors with her and she insists on pushing it to Lissa's room (no good) but is then called away by another nurse who needed help. Maddy and I took that moment and as calmly and "normally" as we could, slowly sauntered back to Lissas room with the chair. Once we got to the room mom and Lissa couldn't believe it and we told her to hurry up, put a jacket on, put a hat on and get in the chair! We were all cracking up, rushing around and poor Liss started to get emotional about possibly getting the chance to see Ella. Got her in the wheelchair and off we went, down 2 long halls, past 2 nurses stations and into the elevator. We couldn't believe we'd actually made it past them!  Once we got past security and made it outside of the hospital you could just feel the relief pouring off all of us! We called Brady and Dana who were already in visiting Ella and they didn't even believe us. :) Racing Liss across the street we tried to get in Children's Hospital from a back door we always go though, because its way closer, but found that is was already locked so we pushed the call button and were told by a voice that this entrance was closed and we had to go allll the way around to the other side. There was a small group of hospital workers on their breaks right near us, and at that very moment some guy walked up to us and said "I'll get you guys in. You never saw me, I never saw you." ....is this really happening? He didn't even know we had an escapee on our hands! We rushed in the hospital, up the elevator, down the halls, down another elevator and finally made it to the last security man who said only Lissa and I could get in because I already had a visitors pass on from earlier and Ella's room already had the maximum amount of people allowed in her room. This was a super tough moment, because we'd all made it this far together and now they wouldn't be able to see Ella and Lissa finally together but mom pushed us and yelled "go!" and off we went...up the elevator, again, and finally approaching Ella's room. I dont think my heart has ever pounded in my chest so fast before. The moment my sister layed eyes on that precious baby laying there, I knew that I was witnessing one of the most beautiful things I would ever see in my life. It was unreal. We took pictures and just stared at the two of them really together for the first time. Just when I started feeling guilty about mom and maddy, there they were! Apparently my mom somehow got ahold of a visitors pass, tore it in 2, and put one half on her, half under her jacket so it looked whole...Maddy did the same with the other half. Did I mention my family is clever as hell?

So there we all were, together in baby Ella's private room, silent and just watching the two of them together. It doesn't get much better than that. Even Ella's nurse, who knew the room capacity was 2, said "let me just shut these blinds for you guys...I'll be right next door." We stayed for a good 20 minutes and decided it was harder to get Lissa OUT of that room then it was to get her in! :) We made our way back to the hospital 30 minutes after the time where they kick visitors out...up the elevators, down the halls and back into Lissas room...where they never suspected a thing. Best decision we've ever made.

I guess my whole point of this blog, besides sharing our prison escape adventure, is that throughtout the whole time, we kept seeing God everywhere. He put this in our hearts and made this happen...the man at the locked door, the empty halls, the kind nurse, the lady who appeared with the wheelchair at the perfect
second, EVERYTHING happening at the EXACT moment we needed it to, ...all of it. And more than that, in my sisters and brother-in-laws eyes as they stared down at this miracle baby that just came into our lives. So though  I know I'm always going to have questions as to why he makes the decisions he does..and maybe I'll never really understand completely...but in this moment I have never been so sure of the fact that God knows exactly what he is doing.

Please pray for my niece tomorrow morning and keep her in your thoughts. I love you, Ella May. <3

Heart to heart & hand in hand

At 7:59am today my life changed forever and like the Grinch, I'm pretty sure my heart grew 3 sizes. Ella May Beckstead, my first niece, came into this world hollering and ready to beat the odds that had been placed against her since we first learned she had a heart condition back at Lissa's 20 week appointment. Most of you who will actually read this already know about this, but for those of you who dont, here's my brief summary...:


Ella has been diagnosed with HLHS (Hypoplastic Left-Heart Syndrome), which is a rare congenital heart defect that basically means that she is missing half of her heart and instead of 4 chambers, it only contains 2. Wikipedia writes "Without life-prolonging interventions, HLHS is fatal, but with intervention, an infant may survive,"...so that's where we are now. Ella will have her first of 3 open heart surgerys sometime this week and the following 2 will occur at 3 months and then around 3 years of age. She has already shocked and awed her family (as well as the Drs!) by coming out larger than most HLHS babies (8lbs, 6oz and 20 inches long...a very good thing!) and not even needing to be on any breathing treatments or be intubated (I dont know all of the hospital and medical terminology yet, but I know I will soon, so bear with me), which is very rare. She has remained in good condition all day and I can't tell you what that has meant to our family. Even in my best of the best dreams she wasn't doing this good! Now you have to understand, Ella is part Moses, so that means she know what she wants and doesn't let anyone tell her what she can and can't do...this baby is going to be one tough cookie. :)


As beautiful as this day as been, it has also been equally tough, as Lissa has yet to be able to hold Ella and had only had a couple minutes to look at her before Ella was transfered to Childrens Hospital, next door to where Liss is staying. The Drs had predicted Ella was going to be over 10lbs so at that point decided they'd have to do a mandatory C-section....and look who came out 8lbs. :) So because of her C-section, Lissa has to remain on bedrest and can't go next door to see Ella until Friday, and as you can imagine, its tearing her apart. To have just experienced the most amazing moment of your life and meeting your precious, beautiful newborn baby and then have her immediately whisked away and covered in tubes and medicated...it doesn't seem like it should be allowed to happen in real life. Not to a baby. As I'm saying this though, I have to express just how grateful we are that she's doing as well as she is, because so far its been nothing short of a miracle. My brother in law (Ella's daddy!)Brady has taken on all roles today and fit so perfectly into each that you'd think he'd been doing it for years. He was able to hold our Ella a couple times and just the sound of his voice put her at ease and you could tell she knew just who he was. He has a big job to do, taking care of both Ella and my sissy, but Brady has done it wonderfully.  


 Its crazy how when you look at Ella, (assuming she didn't have any tubes in her), she looks like the healthiest, most beautiful baby to ever bless this Earth. And no, its not just that I'm biased...seriously!...this baby is gorgeous. My heart feels like its going to overflow when I look at her and see her little blinks and her tiny hands searching around her new spacious surroundings...you should have seen those skinny legs all stretched out!!!! I was as equally overwhelmed with love today as I was 8 months ago when my Rilynne was born. Ella has stolen my heart and I just can't wait until we can take her home someday. At best, she'll go home in 5 or 6 weeks, but depending on how things go, it could end up being longer. Until then, Liss and Brady will call LA (or more accurately "Childrens Hospital LA") their home, and it will be a 2nd home to the rest of our family.


I've been wanting to have a blog for awhile now but was too lazy to actually start it, so my precious niece gave me a kick in the butt today and here I am. :) This will be the end for tonight though, since I got up at 5am and I feel like my eyes are burning holes in my head...until next time, I ask you to please take a minute and say a little prayer for Ella, as well as Naya and Scarlet, who are babies that could also use any extra strenth and love you may have available. They're my final thoughts & prayers before I go to bed, one of the 1st things I think about when I get up and are stronger than most adults I know! There are a ton of other babies out there that are just as deserving of these same things,  so although I dont know them, I wish all of this for you as well.


Everybody go sneak in and give your babies/kids one last kiss for the night. :)