The results are back

We finally got Mari's test results back. It took 5 weeks, but they are here.
All the results came back normal, which is great news. They wanted us to do the 4-hour test to check her growth hormone levels. We found out however, that our insurance will not cover the test. The fact that they would be injecting her with medicine to make the growth hormone be released they would not cover it. We thought about just paying for the test ourselves, but found out that the test is $300 at the cheapest.
The doctor told us just to hold off doing the test and we will take her back in at the end of the summer to get reevaluated to see if the test even needs to be done.
Until then we will continue feed her as much as we can and hopefully get her to grow on her own.
Thanks again to everyone for your concern. It was always so nice to have people ask me how things were going with the tests. It is so nice to know that we have so much support from everyone.

An update on Mari

We have had a lot of people curious about what we found out at Mari's doctor appointment last week, so I thought I would let you all know what happened.

For those of you that may not be totally aware of the situation with Mari here is a little update. Mari is very tiny for her age. She is only 15 pounds and 26 in. long, and is 20 months old. She is very petite. She was born normal size, but from the beginning of her life they have been worried about her lack of growth. At about 9 months they finally referred us to a specialist in Salt Lake. At first we were just encouraged to increase her calorie intake thinking that would help. They also ran a lot of tests to check her hormone levels. Everything came back normal, so once again we were told to try to fatten her up. It seemed to be helping because she was starting to put on weight and grow a little.

When we down last week I was pretty confident that the doctor was going to pat us on the back for doing so well. She had grown a whole inch and almost a whole pound. That was unfortunately not the case. He was impressed with her weight gain, but he is still worried about her lack of growth in the height area. He told us that her weight is following a consistent curve, her own curve since she is off the charts, but a consistent one. Her height on the other hand is not doing that.

He is having us rerun the tests for her growth hormone. We also had to get a hand x-ray to check for bone growth. If these test come back normal than we have to do a test called the 4-hour test. They will basically inject something to make her body release the growth hormone to see if it is releasing the right amount. It does not sound like it will be a fun day for her if we have to get it done.

That is what we know right now. To be totally honest I have never been way worried about the situation because I always attributed her littleness to genes, but after this visit it made me realize that there really could be something medically wrong with my little baby. I am just hoping and praying that she will be OK. It does make me extremely grateful for modern medicine and for the doctors that have stayed concerned about her and not just put her aside. We were told that if there is something wrong with her, we are lucky it will be caught so early.

We are grateful for that little girl. She may be small, but she really does bring a lot of joy into our family and everyone she comes into contact with.

We will keep you all updated once we know the results to all the test. Thank again for all your concern.

An Ode to Ryan

The last couple of days Ryan has been cracking me up. I thought I would share some of the funny little things he has done.
Today we went to Wal Mart and the whole time we were shopping he was pretending to be a character in Mario Kart. I found him on the diaper shelf and told him he needed to get down, he told me he was in a tube getting ready to race.
He is also pretty sure his birthday is next week, which it is not. He has been planning his party and informing me that all his friends are going to come and eat a rocket cake (the rocket from Mario Kart) and watch him open his presents. He gave me his party list and pretty much everyone he has ever made contact with in his life is to be invited. It is just cute to watch him get that excited for something that is like 8 months away.
Another thing that had me laughing out loud was I told him I had a surprise for him. He started guessing what it could be. His first guess was that we were going to go to Old McDonalds (which is Mcdonalds). His second guess was that I was going to give him an alligator. I don't know where that came from, but he was so sincere in his guess it made me laugh. We went to visit Alan at work, which is fun, but not quite as exciting as a new pet alligator.
He really is such a sweet boy. I feel like I complain about him a lot and his cheekiness, but there are a lot more funny and sweet moments than bad ones. I am very lucky to have him as my little boy.

Could this be the start of something???

This is obviously not at the reception, but it shows what a cute couple they make.

Last night we went to a wedding reception for an old family friend. He was the little brother of Alan's best friend growing up, Dave. Dave's family went with us to Disneyland this past fall. They have a little girl that is about 8 months younger than Ryan that is a riot. She and Ryan really hit it off in California, so needless to say they were pretty excited about seeing eachother at the reception.
This is where the story begins. The bride and groom were asked to come up to the front of the room and have their first dance while their nieces and nephews sang a song. They are up there dancing happy and in love. Everyone is watching. Then you look down and see Ryan and our friends little girl dancing with eachother. They are embracing and dancing in circles, just like the bride and groom. I hate to say it, but they totally upstaged the bride and groom.
Now, this would be a good story if I stopped there, but there is more. As the song and dance are coming to an end we hear the little girl say to Ryan, "Now, let's kiss." She then leans in and plants and big kiss on the lips. This may sound like a one sided love affair, but Ryan did not lean away from the kiss. He participated fully. There are some pictures that the photographer took that we need to get some copies of and will post soon.
It was an awesome night with some good laughs. Thank heavens for little kids and their innocense to keep us adults laughing.

Our big girl

We took Mari in for her 18 month check up this week and found out that she growing. She is now 15 pounds 3 oz. and 25 3/4 in. long. That is 11 oz. more than her last appointment and a 1/2 inch longer than what she was. I know that this may not seem like much, but where she wasn't growing very much, or at all, for over 6 months this is great news.
She is a great little girl. She may not be very big, but she holds her own. She is getting some major sass in her old age. She cracks us up every day and is starting to tease us. We are so glad that she is part of our family that she starting to grow a little more, even if it is an inch every couple of months.

Our first trip to the ER

Last night we had quite the little adventure. We were on our way out to go to dinner with Alan's dad. I was trying to get ready and could hear Ryan and Mari playing in the hallway. I then heard Mari screaming. Both Alan and I ran to see what was going on and saw the bathroom door closed and Mari's fingers stuck in the door. I opened the door and Alan grabbed her. We both looked at her had and saw her two middle fingers were bent. Alan describes it like a cartoon character who just had his hand smashed in the piano, and then their fingers are all wavy.
Needless to say we freaked out, she is screaming, Ryan is crying. It was a little crazy.
Alan told me we needed to get her to the ER because it looked like her fingers were broken. I am the paranoid one in the relationship, so when Alan says we need to get her to the doctor I don't question it. Thank Heavens his dad was there so we could leave Ryan with him.
Mari was crying the whole way to the Hospital and her fingers started to swell. This is when I start to totally panick.
We get to the hospital and they do some x-rays. Luckily there was a happy end to the story and nothing was broken. The doctor told us that she was actually really lucky because most kids come in with all their fingernails broken off or with major lacerations. She just walked away with swollen fingers.
Needless to say we had a little talk with Ryan about needing to be a little more careful with his sister and closing doors. It was sweet to hear him talk to her about it though. I could over hear him telling her that he was sorry she got hurt and that he doesn't like squishing her fingers in doors.
It was an exciting night, but one that I think I will be ok not repeating for a long time.

We're finally doing it!!

So, after months and months of talking about doing this, I finally got my bum in gear and started our family blog. Hopefully we will be good at keeping up on it. We can't promise that it will always be entertaining, but hopefully it will help us stay in touch with people better, and that is afterall the point of doing this!