7 Months Old

I can hardly believe Rachel is 7 months old today!! She's closer to being a year old than not.

Rachel is sitting up pretty well these days. Still has the occassional fall over, but not often. She's continuing to take her bottles really well and hasn't been having that "attitude" she was having at her mid morning bottle. I just figured out how to avoid the attitude...I stopped feeding her as soon as she got up from her nap and waited a while to feed her. We got to thinking maybe she just plain wasn't hungry when we were trying to get her to eat.

Anyways, Rachel is doing great!! Getting big and cuter and cuter as the days go by. Time sure does fly with your second child.

Ready for going outside...

Rachel's 1st Easter

All dressed up to go to church.

Rachel and Hannah

I'm not sure what Rachel was laughing at, but I thought this was a cute picture. LOL.

Enjoying the warm afternoon...

of being sock free!!!

What has her undivided attention you ask....?!?!?!

The TV of course! She's engrossed with Baby Einstein's Baby Mozart. She loves it!

It's the "Fraser TV Daze"

This blank TV watching stare can be found on her big sister, her daddy, and yes, her mother!

The Reminder is Gone...

I received an email from a friend yesterday. She was telling me that she had checked Rachel's Journey, and complimented on the recent picture of Rachel and just how beautiful she is. She closed her email with asking how I was doing. That really touched me because not many people have asked me how I'm doing with this journey. Perhaps some of you who check this blog regularly have wondered the same thing.

When Rachel was born, dealing with the cleft was really, really hard. It was such an emotional time following the days of her birth. For months, right up until her lip repair, there were many times during the day I would be so sad that Rachel had this journey to endure, not only sad for her, but sad that I didn't have a 'normal' baby. There were several times during the week all it took was looking at Rachel to break into tears. Her cleft lip was a constant, visable reminder of this journey. And now, since her complete lip repair in January, that constant reminder is gone. Yeah, Rachel has a funny looking nipple on her bottle, but in this day and age, there are all kinds of weird shaped bottles on the market. There is no longer an everyday constant reminder of her cleft.

Since Rachel's complete lip repair, just a little under 2 months ago, I am doing really good. Like I said, that constant reminder is gone. She still has a cleft palate, and a cleft aveolar ridge (her gum), but her lip has been repaired. Her repair was such a success, she looks awesome. With as successful and smooth as the repair went, it gives me nothing but positive thoughts for what the future holds when it comes to Rachel's journey. Of course, I give all the glory for how well things have turned out thus far to the Lord. He's the one who's answered our prayers and touched Rachel.

Swinging at the Park

We spent some time at a park this afternoon, celebrating the 1st birthday of Rachel and Hannah's cousin. Rachel was being fussy, so I thought I'd try her in the swing...and she loved it!

Mommy pushing Rachel

A Trip to After Hours Urgent Care...

Made a trip to the Pediatric after hours clinic this evening. Rachel's had a cold with a cough and a runny nose for a couple of days. But this afternoon she has been poking at her left ear and hadn't eaten her last two bottles well. When we attempted to feed her her last bottle, she was pretty fussy, so rather than possibly have a long night, I took her to be checked out. And just as I had suspected, she has an ear infection. Thankfully, she made it 6 months before getting her first ear infection.

Thankfully there was absolutely no one else waiting at urgent care, nor were there people at the pharmacy, so we were to the doctor, to the pharmacy and back home in only 45 minutes!!!

Rachel gets dedicated...

Rachel was dedicated this morning at church. Pastor Rick prayed a nice prayer dedicating her and her journey through childhood unto the Lord. And for us as parents to be able to raise her up to be a Godly young woman for the Lord.

We were blessed that all of our local family were able to join us for this special occassion. Following the church service, we had everyone to the house for lunch and fellowship.

Rachel and Pastor Rick

While Pastor Rick was praying, Rachel was trying to steal the mic!

Great Grandma and Rachel

Great Grandma was just one of our family members able to join us for Rachel's special day. Here she's holding one of her four great grandchildren, all granddaughters!

Once Again, Very Thankful...

I was watching the Discovery Health Channel late this evening and came across one of the many shows on plastic surgery. I've found these shows to be pretty interesting considering we now are familar to the world of plastic surgery, especially when it comes to correcting birth defects, etc.

This particular episode was about a little girl, who was born with a facial deformity known as Micrognathia, an extremely small lower jaw bone that can affect breathing, eating, and speech. It was the story of her journey to making her face whole.

This little girls jaw was so small, it affected her eating. She had to have an eating tube. Her parents litterally had to pour her formula directly into her stomach through a tube, in order for her to get nutrition. :::sigh::: I was moved to tears and was reminded of how grateful I am that Rachel has had no problems eating. Many times, cleft babies have difficulty eating and gaining weight have to have feeding tubes. We've been blessed that Rachel hasn't had any problems eating and is gaining weight exceptionally well...maybe a little too well. LOL.

The other thing about this little girl's story that touched me, was her inability to make noise...she couldn't cry, she couldn't say any words, she couldn't make a single noise. Because of this, a baby monitor with video capability was placed in her room. If during her nap she woke up or became aggitated, her parents would have no way of knowing unless they could see it happening. The little girl couldn't cry for her parents or make noises to alert them to her being awake, etc. Once again, I am so thankful for the fact that both my girls can make noises, squeals, and yes...even cry. Many times throughout the day I become so worn out with Hannah's constant talking or noise making or humming, as it NEVER STOPS! But this story showed me how grateful I really am that she can do all those things, even if at times it grates on my nerves. LOL.

Once again, I'm very thankful for the journey I have been given, and not given what could have been a more difficult journey.

Half a Year Old!!

Wow...Time flies. It seems like such a short time ago that Rachel was born, and here we are, March 1, and she's already 6 months old. Despite only being 6 months old, her little life has been a full one already with two surgeries and one hospitalization. And now, as we head into her second half of her first year, it'll be even more active with her palate repair on the brink, and just the normal business of being a growing and developing baby.

Rachel has recently started sitting up. I think her big belly helps hold her up.:) She can't get into the postion on her own, but if you place her sitting up, she'll sit up for a while. She's been teething for what seems like months now. She drools something terrible and goes through many bibs in a day and sometimes an outfit or two if the bib is forgotten to be replaced. LOL. She actually had a tooth pop through when she was 3 months old, but it went back up into her gums. Her two front bottom teeth look pretty swollen and look as though they will break through the gum soon.

Looking up into her mouth, her cleft gum has really come together over the last few months. Between her just growing and then maybe even the taping we were doing, and now with being a month post surgery, her separated gum is just about touching one another! Such a dramatic difference from when she was born.

Rachel is such a good baby. We couldn't have been blessed with a better baby. She's happy and pretty smiley. And brings much joy to our life and to our family.

A good close up...

of how awesome Rachel's lip looks.

Sitting Up!

If you look really closely(or click on the picture to make it bigger), you can see just how much of a leaky faucet she is as far as drooling...LOL.