real quick

I have some pics to post later, but I had to share this little conversation:

Kenzee - Mom, look I dropped some toast
Mom - Oh, you better pick it up off the floor
Kenzee - Ummm No
Mom - Mckenzee Kathleen pick it up right now
Kenzee - Mama Kathleen, YOU pick it up right now

Yeah, try not to bust out laughing at that!!!

Sneak Peek

Since our Christmas cards are late (They supposedly shipped Friday), here's a little sneek peak. I think I eventually got 3 decent pics, but I thought these were abetter representation of our joy! As any parent knows, even though you are the one with the camera, they are the ones in control! Hope everyone is having a merry holiday season!

Cute Pics

Thanks for the "Kelly" dolls Grandma Janet & Grandpa George!! I love them!!

These are a few of my favorite things!!

I have no explanation for this, but it's pretty cute!

Kenzee getting ready for her photo shoot??

Kenzee with her Grammy and cousin Caitlin

Slow month

Not much new around here. We went to Mattoon for 4 days to spend time with Chad's family. It is always so much fun. It's usually rushed so we spent an extra 2 days there. It was a great time, we had time to relax as well as visit. Here's some cute pics from this Sunday. Uncle TT was here raking leaves so Kenzee had a great time playing in them. The first one is my favorite! And I love the last one too: Where'd TT go?

Halloween - better late than never

Here are a couple of pics of our little monkey with her witch and pumpkin friends. We met up with Amy, Haylee the witch, and Maddie the pumpkin for a quick dinner and some trick or treating in Nan's neighborhood. Then it was back to our neighborhood after Chad called to tell us that there were "hundreds of kids over here". We had a great time despite the killer sore throat I ended up with.

A little bit of everything...

Not a whole lot of good news around here. Evan de Mello passed away the day after we lost Kylie. They are playing together in heaven I am sure. Beth also found out yesterday that she has a new tumor in her lung. She had just finally gotten some good news earlier in the week. The cat scan showed that all of her other tumors had either shrunk or disappeared from her treatments. They gave her the okay to do another round of the treatment but just wanted to check out her lungs as a precaution. So now she will do radiation on the lung tumor before the treatments. Not much else going on around here. I just added a couple of songs for Kylie. They make me smile. Just getting ready to go back to work. I have worked from home a little bit this week. I will do the same next week, along with a few dr appts. Then back at it!

Kylie Sue Zike

Kylie Sue came into the world at 8:02 AM Wednesday October 3. She was 1lb 12oz and 10 inches long. The last hearbeat we heard was around 7:oo this morning. Sometime during the quick delivery she passed away. We were able to hold our beautiful baby girl and spend time with her while surrounded with our friends and family. It was very peaceful for me as well as Chad I am sure. The hospital gave us a beautiful memory box with a couple of things in it. They were able to get good little tiny feet and handprints. There was also a local photographer that volunteers to come and take pictures of the baby. He gave me the cd, I haven't looked at it yet. If anyone would like to see them, feel free to email me. Thank you everyone for thinking of us whether it was in your prayers, in person, sending flowers, calling. Whatever it was that you did, we felt everyone's presence and it meant so much to us!

Thank you....

For the many of you that already know.. Thank you so much for your thoughts, prayers, messages, & especially the cookies. They have meant so much to Chad & I both. We are doing pretty well in my opinion. I know that next week and after will be much harder though. So I ask that you all keep us in your thoughts and prayers in the future.
And for those of you that have no idea what I am talking about... The appointment last week that I was so upset about couldn't have been any worse. I was told by Dr Egley that our baby has cystic hygroma and non immune hydrops. This means that 1- there are giant cysts growing from the back of the neck and 2- the body and organs are retaining fluids. The end result is the baby has no chance at survival outside of the womb and very little inside of the womb. He said I could either deliver immediately or wait as long as I needed. Well, I wasn't ready to go right then, I needed to sort things out and letting Chad know what was going on was probably necessary too. Chad & I talked about things over the weekend and Chad wanted to do it as soon as possible, I wanted to wait just a week. I needed to prepare without putting it off too long. We met with Dr Boyd Tuesday morning to have everything explained. We both felt so much better after this. We got so many questions answered. Dr Boyd agreed with waiting a week. So I go in Tuesday at 6 am to start inducing. He is hopeful that things will progress quickly, but nature will make that call.

No news on the mystery baby

Well, I went to the Dr for aNOTHER sono today. The mystery baby continues to be just that. The midwife for some reason or another looked at the sono for LESS than 30 seconds and said I can't see anything, I am sending you to the specialist. Now maybe I was already frustrated but my thought is she didn't even give it a decent try. So now after paying for 2 $400 sonos, I get to go to the specialist and pay for an $800 sono! I don't know but I am getting really frustrated about 1. I STILL haven't seen my doctor 2. I feel like the midwife has never spent more than 3 minutes in the room with me after I wait for more than an hour 3. I have to pay THREE deductibles and 20% of 3 sonos and whatever other nonsense that the midwife isn't capable of doing. So I go Friday afternoon and I WILL NOT LEAVE until I have a due date and know the sex.

Evan de Mello

I sent an email to many of you a week or so ago about Evan de Mello. He is an amazing little boy with a very sad story. I have been following his story for about 2 months now and am just amazed both at him, his parents, and what all of the thousands of people that have been praying for him have accomplished. About a week ago the doctors warned his parents they couldn't do anything else for him medically. Well, all of the extra prayers are working and we need to keep it up. Evans birthday is coming up and instead of gifts, a friend of the family has made an appeal for anyone that can to donate $5 in hopes of raising $4000 for his 4th birthday. Make sure you read the journal and some of the guestbook entries, it will make you realize all that you have to be thankful for. I think they have really changed my outlook on a lot of things. Well please visit this website and pray hard for Evan and the de Mello family. www.cotaforevand.com

No news on the mystery baby

Well, I went to the Dr for a sono today. The mystery baby continues to be just that. We were only able to see the upper half of the body, therefore only 2 of 5 measurements were recorded and no idea what the sex is. Based off of the 2 measurements, I am between 16 and 18 weeks. So the good news is that I will get another sono to get the other measurements in 4 weeks. Maybe then we'll know something.

The Big Party!!

Kenzee had her birthday party this past Sunday at our house. We had lots of friends and family over for lunch and cake and ice cream. The kids spent much of the afternoon swimming while the big people stayed inside where it was cool. Mckenzee had a great time and got so many nice presents from everyone. As you can imagine the central theme was Dora. It's amazing they can get so hooked on characters at such a young age. (you know how I feel about that) At least there were no clothes involved. She loves everything though!

Welcome Caitlin Colleen McKenna

Caitlin Colleen McKenna came into this world at 4:30 pm today. She was 8lbs 12oz and 20 in long. Mom, Dad, & Aunt Michelle all did a great job! Aunt Michelle actually got to deliver! Congrats and great job!

My Baby is 2 Today!!!

Where has all of the time gone? It seems like yesterday she learned to walk and talk, now she is talking back! Kenzee is celebrating with several different parties. Her sitter Tammy had a party Friday, (pictures below), Amy is having brownies today, we (Amy, Haylee, Maddie, Taylor, Kenzee, & I) are going to ChuckECheese tonight. Her "big" party is Sunday at the house with lots of friends and family swimming, eating, and having a good time. On another note, Baby Cate will also be making her first appearance sometime today. I will be sure to post details of that with some pics tonight.

More on Beth

I talked to Mary this morning, she is Exhausted. She was going to head home with Molly (Beth's sister) and Tyson after lunch and let Ron stay here with Beth. She will finish up the last of her treatments today and head home in the morning. Mary said Beth has been in a lot of pain, but today was the first day of actual vomiting etc. The doctors were excited that, in all, they were able to do 13 of a possible 15 treatments. I guess they were only hoping for 11. The first one they missed because of the diificulties with the line the first day and the second one I believe they were letting her regain a little strength. Beth is such a trooper!! She can endure so much, but she still needs our thoughts, prayers, and support!

The first of 3 parties!

Mckenzee had her first of three birthday parties today. Her babysitter, Tammy did a little party for her and she sent me some cute pics, so here they are! Notice how cute her hair is when she is AT Tammy's. Tammy is the only one that is allowed to Touch Kenzee's hair. And now, as soon as she gets in the car, she rips it out. She used to at least leave it in after we left. I could at least let my kid leave the house 3 days a week. No more! Within five minutes of picking her up I hear "ponies all gone mommy!" Like she is so proud of this!! I beg and plead and try to bribe her to keep it in, to no avail!

Update

Mary left me a voicemail so I have a little bit of info. I guess that Beth had a pretty rough night last night, not sure what that entailed. She has still made it through all of her treatments though. The fact that tomorrow is Friday has helped her get through today. They will head home Saturday morning! That is all I know for now. Keep the prayers going!

Beth

I just talked to Mary (Beth's mom). They left Sunday for Loyola so that Beth could get a decent night's sleep before she started her treatment marathon. I will relay the medical info as best I can. Yesterday was rough as they struggled to insert a second port to begin the IV treatment. The drug (Interleukin-2) that she would be receiving can't be mixed with the usual saline solutions so they needed a second port. After being jabbed many times in her neck and feet, they couldn't get a second line to get the treatments started. This morning they decided that they really needed a second port in case the kidneys, liver, blood pressure, or bone marrow presented a problem, which is fairly common. If this happened they would need to have a second port available to treat it quickly. They sent her to a specialist that used an xray to do a pick line? I guess this went much better. The goal was to get 14 treatments in this week. 3 a day for 5 days, but they are already one behind because of yesterday's fiasco. After every treatment they monitor her blood pressure, bone marrow, kidneys, and liver. So far so good. They said she should start feeling the flu like symptoms soon so she won't be feeling so great. Ron, Tyson, and maybe Molly (Beth's sister) are headed up tomorrow to see her. As if this weren't enough for Mary to be dealing with, Katie is at OSF already 65% effaced at 32 weeks pregnant (with her first baby). Chances are she will be in the hospital on bed rest until she has the baby. Pretty scary to face without your mama! So keep not only Beth but the whole family in your prayers!!!!

Happy Birthday Mikey & Moddy

Kenzee wanted to say Happy Birthday to her Aunt Moddy & Uncle Mikey! These are a couple of pics from the cookout at Molly's parents house on Saturday. She also can't wait to meet Baby Cate, any day now!

Happy Anniversary Grandma & Grandpa!!

My Grandparents celebrated their 35th wedding anniversary this past Sunday. Kevin, Beth, Katie, Mike, & adorable baby Maddie were all able to join us for the occasion. They renewed their vows at mass and followed with a wonderful brunch at the River Station. They are such a wonderful example of faith and love for our entire family and everyone else that knows them. Oooppss, apparently I didn't get any pics of the 2 of them.

More updates

Beth will be in the hospital yet another day. We thought she would head home today, but I guess they are having a hard time getting her pain under control. Those that know Beth know she isn't a big baby like me. If she says it hurts, it must REALLY hurt. I plan on going up in the morning to see her, will update everyone then!

Update

The surgery went as expected and she will be at St Francis for a couple days before heading to Chicago for her consult! Keep praying!!!

Pray for Beth

Most of you know Beth, my best friend from 5th grade, and that she has been battling melanoma for about 5 years now. She had been doing several rounds of chemo recently, until they did a scan and found that some of her tumors had doubled in size very quickly. They stopped chemo and had decided to send her for a consultation for an extremely powerful drug that has many very harmful side effects (organ failure) but is sometimes worth the risk. This is to happen next week. In the mean time, she was home alone just taking a shower and fractured her arm in multiple places. Thank God she didn't pass out and was able to call her mom to come take her to the ER. They found that the cancer was in her bones and had eaten away parts of her arm. So today they are doing surgery to insert a steel rod in her arm and if all goes as planned she will be able to go home for the weekend before she heads to Loyola for her consultation next week. So please everyone keep Beth and her family in your thoughts and prayers. I will post any updates as I get them.

Happy Independence Day!!

Hope that everyone had a great 4th of July! We decided to take the relaxing route. The highlight of our day was going to the parade in the morning. Kenzee and Haylee had a blast as you can tell. There were lots of fire trucks with loud sirens, lots of candy, and some balloons and clowns and a few other things. We went home and napped while Courtney and her friends swam. We went to the marina to watch the fireworks last night but didn't stay too long, we had a better view driving home in the car.

Molly's shower

We had a baby shower for Molly last Saturday at Michelle's house. It was a great time with good food, games, friends & family. I think they have everything they need for the baby now, they just need to find a place to put it all. We can't wait to meet Baby ?Cate?

Click to play | Make your own Smilebox

Click to play | Make your own Smilebox

And then there were five......

BIG SISTER IN TRAINING

For those of you that haven't figured it out or are still in shock, yes there's yet another baby Zike on the way. I know, I know, there weren't going to be anymore, but...... Love to all, Chad, Kelly, Court, Kenzee, & ???