2.

Today is Wrennie’s birthday. We celebrated it by telling anyone that would listen at Mass this morning.  Oh, and cake and ice cream, of course.

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It has been quite the 2 year journey with the little bird. When Scott took that picture, she was having trouble breathing and because of it, the nurses wouldn’t let me nurse her. So I just held my brand new baby and we stared at each other in wonder. She is only an hour or so old here, and so alert.

It had been a rocky pregnancy, with an extreme excess of amniotic fluid distending my belly and increasing every day. Half of the time, that signals that there is something wrong with the baby, but the perinatalogist could find nothing wrong with her in the ultrasounds.

After she was born, the pediatrician heard her heart murmur and sent her in for the echo. Her heart was so small, they couldn’t tell what exactly was wrong with it.  The cardiologist told me to make an appointment for a follow up echo when she was two months. She failed her hearing test several times in one ear, and we had to shuffle back in two weeks later to re-test. It was fine.

Despite all of this anxiety over her health, I truly enjoyed her as a newborn. She was so sweet and snuggly. She still is!

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By the time she was 1, they had diagnosed her heart defect as a stenosis of the pulmonary artery, which is very rare. Usually the valve is where the defect is. At that point, we had no idea what that would entail for her. Open heart surgery? Frequent monitoring and hospitalization? It was all a big question mark, and the cardiologist couldn’t provide us with any answers yet. It was all wait and see.

She was the sweetest little baby, and her favorite place was snuggled on my hip. She hit all of her milestones slowly but surely. Her eyes finally settled on a lovely shade of green.

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She is 2 today. Her heart has vastly improved as she has grown.  The cardiologists seem less concerned; however, they want to keep an eye on it, just in case. She has a big round pot belly that begs to be tickled, and her hair has grown into raven curls around her face that are frequently wild and out of control. She has the skinniest little straight legs just like her sister Ruthie that look pretty humourous underneath that ponderous belly. She is still the sweetest little thing, and is so nurturing to her baby sister and to her numerous baby dolls. She always has a baby doll tucked under her arm.

I love her so much, it hurts. She said, “Love you!” for the very first time to me when I was putting her to bed last night, and I melted right into a puddle on the floor.

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