No more ventilator! Saturday morning we were shocked to hear they were going to take him off of the ventilator. When we came back at night it was gone. The sedation medications still haven't completely worn off and so he's on regular oxygen probably until Sunday morning. He just hasn't fully woken up yet. He's getting the tube out of his chest tomorrow and so we will finally be able to hold him. I'm so excited. He does have to get a PIC line put in tomorrow which is a small tube that goes through a vein in his arm up to his heart but it's just so that they don't have to continue putting in new iv's all the time and they can just use the one line.

Because he isn't eating formula or any real food other than the iv fluids his body can't flush out the belirubin so he has jaundice. That's the reason for the florescent light that has been on him for the last 2 days. He should only need it for another day. He gets to wear some foam sunglasses that cover most of his head. We are hoping that next weekend we will get to bring him home. It's hard coming home at night knowing he isn't there with us. But I've told Matt I'm sure I won't want to put him down once we do get to bring him home.

Ashton Connor Snell
6 lbs 5 oz 21 inches
January 21, 2008 8:55am

Ashton came into this world on Monday morning. He was born with a really bad infection and his lungs were a little underdeveloped and so he's currently in the NICU but he's improving everyday. After struggling to breath on his own he blew a hole in his right lung and so they are waiting for the hole to heal. After that they will slowly wean him off of the ventilator and see how he breaths on his own. Then they will have to reteach him to eat since he gets all of his nutrients through the iv. The biggest factor has been the infection which is like pneumonia. They don't know how he got it but they say some babies are just born with it and they don't understand why yet. Because of the antibiotics he's on he'll probably be in the NICU for a total of about 2 weeks. We're hoping that next weekend he might get to come home.
We weren't expecting anything like this and it has been really hard to deal with but it's getting easier everyday. Everyday we are falling more and more in love with Ashton. We are always over at the hospital visiting him and talking to him. Most of the time he's pretty sedated but he responds to us and our voices. He looks so perfect and is such a fighter. The ventilator he has been on is meant to take over his breathing but he keeps breathing on his own at a different pace than the ventilator. He wants to prove he can still breath on his own. Kaleb can't go into the NICU because of RSV season and he came to the hospital just as they were taking him away so the picture with him and Ashton is the only time he saw his little brother. There is a teddy bear that Kaleb gave to Ashton that sits by him and we show Kaleb the pictures of Ashton with the bear. We'll try to keep everyone updated. We know that everything will be fine and he just needs a little time to heal.

A New Year

This was taken a couple of days ago at 35 weeks. My last doctors appointment he said I was 1 cm and 50% effaced and just wants to make sure I make it to 37 weeks. It's crazy to think he could come in a couple of weeks but he could also wait another 5 weeks to make his entrance.

We always spend New Years up at Sherwood Hills Resort (about 10 miles outside of Logan) with my family. We had a lot of fun. We did a lot of swimming, watching movies and we even went bowling a couple of times. At the bowling place they had one of the tattoo machines and because my cousins were getting them Kaleb had to get some too. He had one on his arm and one on his back. As you can see he loved showing off his muscles and tattoos when he went swimming.

This is at Golden Corral. Kaleb loves the cupcakes and he made them look so good that even Matt had to try one.

Christmas

Christmas was spent in Colorado this year. We had a lot of fun with all of the family even though it was freezing cold. The news said that where we were was the coldest place in the country on Christmas Eve and it was -22 degrees. It never made it much above 0 degrees the whole time we were there. We had fun making gingerbread houses. Matt really got into it and even made a hot tub in the back.
It was really cute on Christmas Eve because the cousins all put out cookies they made and an orange and carrots for the reindeer. The oldest cousin, Caylee wrote a letter to Santa from all of the cousins and they all signed the bottom. Kaleb was so excited about the letter he had to sit on the table and watch.
Christmas morning all of the kids were up bright and early and were anxious to open presents. There was wrapping paper everywhere. Kaleb was so excited about every present and as they passed out the presents if he heard his name he would jump up and start waving his hands. It was neat to see how excited he was and how happy he was to get a present.
After opening everything Kaleb said "Santa is so nice to me." I thought it was cute. Matt was in the corner with presents and paper all around him.
This is the one attempt we made at taking the kids outside. We bundled them up as much as we could while still allowing them to waddle and they lasted about 5 minutes before they were freezing cold and wanted to come back in.
On the drive down to Matt's parents we stopped by the mall in Grand Junction to get out and walk around and we parked by this truck. Kaleb thought it was pretty cool.

We had a great Christmas. We're happy to be home although we're leaving tonight for another short trip up to Logan for New Years. I can't believe another year has gone. I also can't believe I'm nearing the end of being pregnant. I'm excited but nervous and I can't wait to welcome a new addition to our family.

I have a baby too!

Just before bed Kaleb came out of his room with one of his balls stuffed under his pajama shirt and came and told me that he had a baby too. Just like mommy he had a baby inside of his tummy. He thought he was pretty clever for thinking it up on his own so we had to take a picture. It was good to have a laugh after what we had just come home to. We came home from Sunday dinner and I heard dripping in our living room and found that we had water leaking onto our presents that were wrapped and under the tree. The tree is by our sliding glass door and there must be ice build-up on the patio above ours. So we had to unwrap a couple of our presents and air them out. We were lucky that the new printer we had under the tree was wrapped in plastic inside the box because the water was dripping right onto the box.

Other than that we had a pretty slow weekend. We ended up staying home on Friday and Saturday night which never happens but Matt has finals this week so it was nice that he had some time to study. I can't believe I'm almost 31 weeks. Only 2 more months until we have a baby again. It seems like it has been forever since Kaleb was a baby. We're excited for Christmas and I can't believe it's only a couple of weeks away. Kaleb wrote (well, colored) a letter to Santa this year and he would like "Bumblebee, a fishing rod, and a helicopter". That's what he tells everyone. If anyone knows anything about these Bumblebee action figures from Transformers they're extremely hard to find. We were constantly driving to different Wal-marts and finally an associate told us there is only 1 bumblebee per box and so you have to come right as they're stocking the shelves and hope there aren't other "collectors" (or as I like to think people who sell them for double on ebay) there waiting. So Matt was a trooper one night and woke up at 1:30am and went to all the Wal-marts and arrived home at 4:30am with Bumblebee in hand. Santa has a hard job but I guess someone has to do it. And not only that but Matt wrapped all of the presents this year. Usually my job and he was nice and took care of everything already. He's a great Santa!