Makin' her Mommy proud...

First of all, thank you all so much for your thoughts and prayers for our friends, the Deckers. I know it is such a comfort to them to have so many people praying for their comfort. They are doing as well as anyone could expect, but please keep them in your prayers.

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This last weekend I was out of town on Beaver (grown-up) Girls' weekend, so R and David got to have Father-Daughter weekend. Evidently, Friday night she decided she did NOT want to wear her Nite-nite Dress (aka nightgown) and picked out this from her closet for her pjs. And as you can tell in the following pictures, she hasn't taken it off since. Literally. Except for baths, but then puts it right back on again. (love the hat backwards, just like Romo.) Seriously, how proud am I?!?!?

I realize they all look the same, but these pics are over a 3 day period. Move over Jessica!! Tony's got a new fan!


David said this pic was unprompted... she just made the face for the camera. :) Goofy girl.
This was Daddy's first hairdo all by himself! He did a pretty good job of the pigtails!
She cracks us up!
Eating a little watermelon with breakfast.
We now can spell Romo, and are quite proficient at recognizing the number nine thanks to the jersey!
She was calling Cassidee on her phone, not sure what about though.

This is her "cheese" smile. Not that natural for her, but I'll take it for the camera!
Thanks Alicia for the jersey!! It is QUITE the HIT! :)

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Reagan update:

Got results back on her blood work, and R's peanut allergy is listed as a "high level 2." That is with level 6 being the worst. So, we are so thankful that hers isn't so severe that we have to worry about airborne stuff or anything like that, just making sure she doesn't eat peanut products. We can handle that for sure. :)

Brooklyn update:

Not much to report, other than lots of great kicking! We see my specialist again on Sept 6th, so prayers for that visit to go well would be appreciated. And prayers for David and me as we begin the hunt for the best surgeons for B. Thankfully, we have some connections with a friend who is a neurosurgeon who can give us some recommendations to docs here in Houston. Makes me feel so blessed to have an "inside scoop" and not just have go with whomever they assign. Other than that, things are pretty much in the holding pattern. Oh, and Reagan has started singing to Baby Brooklyn, which melts my heart. Today, she tried to pry open my belly button to "open it to Baby Brooklyn." :)

Updated Prayer Request

Our dear friends from church here, the Deckers, are in need of all our prayer warriors to get on their knees for them. If you wouldn't mind lifting them up, I would really appreciate it. Will and Natalie have tried for years for a baby, and Natalie was thrilled to be 20 weeks with twins. One of the waters broke last night, and today she went into active labor that the doctors could not stop. The boy and girl twins were born about 2:30 this afternoon, and are now wrapped in the arms of our Father. Please join David and me in prayer for our friends. I know there are so many of you guys out there praying on our behalf, so thank you in advance for thinking of the Deckers as well. We are hurting so badly for them. I just can't imagine.....
Love- J

Sweet Baby Girl

I have pictures!!!!

Introducing Brooklyn Hope!

I can of course see her sweet face, her arm, and her hand. The first one she is giving us a TigerWoods fist pump.... The second, she is wiggling her fingers, so her hand is kinda blurry. But I sure wish I knew what all the rest of that junk in the picture is! Well, then again, maybe I am better off not knowing.

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Our appt today was fabulous. He checked out Brooklyn and me thoroughly... and when I say he checked me thoroughly, that is NOT an exaggeration. Never had a pregnancy appt that was that "extensive." I'm used to women doctors, so it was kinda weird, and David just stared at the ceiling. Made me laugh, which I hope the doc didn't think was weird that I was laughing during all this. I digress....

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He said that Brooklyn had grown perfectly since we saw her last! She weighs 1 lb 3 oz right now, in the 51st percentile. Her bones, head, etc are growing right on schedule, and he was pleased with the measurements of the ventricles in her brain. The fluid is definitely still present, but he said it was "good" for what we expect of her. For any of you medical people, he officially listed the lesion on her spine as 3 sections, an L4, L5, S1... and he said as far as open neural tube defects go, that he would call what he sees as "mild." Whatever that means. Point being, he was pleased with everything. Also, he saw her legs moving around! I have definitely been feeling her, but never quite sure what she was capable of moving to cause the "kicks" I've felt. But she is kicking those sweet feet! Yay! And he said her feet are growing great with no clubbing, and along with the movement, that was a great sign. So, we are praising God for all of this news!

I loved when he switched to the 4D sono. We got these close ups of her face, and it was tear-worthy for sure! Thankfully, he keeps a box of kleenex right next to the table where I am during appointments. :)

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We had hoped to have more info on "where to go from here," like finding out about her surgeons and junk like that. But this was not evidently the appt for that. So we'll find out what we can on our own for now and ask those questions later. He did say that he expects this to be a perfectly normal pregnancy (easy for him to say, right? Nothing about all this feels normal to me!!), and depending on how big she gets, delivery by csection at 38 or 39 weeks. I had thought they would take her earlier than that, but I guess it is good to let her "cook" and get as healthy as possible before surgery. SO, looks like we'll welcome her around the first week of December!

Thanks again for all your prayers. We still have a LONG road ahead of us... December seems so long from now!! In the meantime, I'll keep you all posted if we know anything different. We are of course still praying first and foremost for complete healing of Brooklyn's little body, and are thankful that God is holding her close for now until He shares her with me. :) Oh, I just can't wait to hold her.

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Many of you know that Romans 5 is my favorite passage of Scripture. (Are we allowed to really have "favorites?")...

"3More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, 4and endurance produces character, and character produces HOPE, 5and HOPE does not disappoint, because God's love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us."

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Love to all~

D, J, R & B

Some of what we've been up to

Many of you have graciously asked for an update on Brooklyn... all I can report is that she has become quite a mover and a shaker. :) She's still pretty little, but she can kick/punch like a big kid. Which makes me smile. I tell her to work those little bones and muscles as much as she wants! We see the specialist tomorrow morning, so please be praying for that appointment to go well. I will report on it tomorrow, so stay tuned for that... hopefully I'll have lots of great news to share! I can't wait to see her again on the screen. I think it will do my heart some good, so I am thankful to have this new doc who does sonograms with the visits each time!

Didn't want to post without pics, so here are a few from the last two weeks. First, David and I celebrated 5 years of blissful marriage :) on Aug 2. We dropped R in the metroplex and went on a babymoon/anniversary trip. It was fabulous.
And although it would seem as if we are eating at a cafe right on the canal in Venice, we actually went to Vegas. This is not the hotel we stayed at, although we loved our hotel. But this was our favorite. The Venetian has the canals with gondolas going through it and everything! It is like you are outside, but with air conditioning. Lovely. Sorry for the dumb pic of me that David took, but I wanted to show how cool our lunch was that day.

We took a grand total of 5 pics while we were there. Amazing. But we had tons of fun together. Here is another slot machine that stole our money. But it was David's favorite because he got to play cards with Kenny Rogers. (it was a machine called The Gambler.)
We spent a recent evening with our dear friends the Isbells. Did some dining, and the kids did some dancing outside the restaurant to the music! :) They were twirling.
The weather was great that night, so we went to a new outdoor mall/town square place near here for ice cream.
Reagan anxiously awaiting her dessert.
First time with Marble Slab... yummy!

There was a big grassy area with live music, so the kids got to run around and wear themselves out.
Another first for R... getting a balloon and wearing it on her wrist. She did great with it, but Daddy lost it when putting her in the car to leave. Bummer.
UpsideDown Fun with Uncle Scott!
Also, went to see the allergy specialist for R to get her officially checked out for the whole peanut thing. The appt was GREAT... the office and doctor were VERY kid friendly. This is what she did while I got details from the doctor. :)
We don't get results on her blood work for a week or so. Man, was that ever a WHIPPIN to deal with getting blood work done on my sweet 2 year old. We got it done on the 3rd try... the second day. It was awful. But we survived. She still has the "owee" on her elbow with the bruises from where the ladies were DIGGING in her arm with the needles. Oh. My. Word. Mommy wanted to give R and herself a trophy after surviving all of that!!!!

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More later!!! I have lots of pics, so hopefully will have lots of posts in the next week!

Newest News

Again, can't say it enough, THANK YOU all so much for your prayers, questions, cards, emails, etc. for Brooklyn and our family. We are blessed beyond measure with the outpouring of love. Wanted to give everyone a quick update... although it really is just an adjustment to the direction of our prayers for right now.
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Many of you know we have been seriously looking into the possibility of having Brooklyn's surgery done in utero. There are two doctors in the country who do this, and it is all under the umbrella of a clinical trial. That comes with MANY MANY complicated issues... and so many of you already have given us the "green light" to deal with those issues with your help! Again, so appreciative. We've had offers for people to fly up to Nashville to baby sit Reagan for weeks at a time, offers for free flights, etc. Amazing. Well, thought we would let everyone know that we are now officially focusing our efforts elsewhere. I have been working REALLY hard the last 2 weeks getting medical records together, consent forms FedExed, phone calls made. But today, we were called and they let us know that Brooklyn and I are not considered candidates for their study. I evidently had a slight placental abruption at 15 weeks, and the team of docs has decided to exclude me from their study because of it. SO very disappointing, since it seemed really clear to us that this was the path we were to be taking. But we were also frightened by it and asked God to open wide the doors that needed to be opened, and close the doors that needed to be closed. So this one was closed today, and we are taking that as a direct answer to our prayers.
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So, from here... we were supposed to see our specialist this afternoon and were prepared to discuss where we go from this point... and excited to see that sweet baby girl again on the screen. The office messed up my appointment, to say the least (that is a LONG story that just makes me REALLY mad to go into it, so I'll refrain), so I didn't get to see the doctor. So, our appointment is now for the 19th. Please pray that we are given more great options for Brooklyn's care. I'll admit, this news kinda has taken the wind out of my sails a bit. David said we feel like the rug was pulled out from under us before we even got started. So we are a bit disappointed, but still focusing on being trusting. I am starting to feel desperate for some good news, so pray that we are given good news in some form or fashion at our next appt in a couple weeks. Of course, we are praying first and foremost for COMPLETE healing of Brooklyn!! I want the doctors to give one of those "we have no idea how this happened" and we can say "We do." :) Love to all-