Happy Birthday!

We had a very fun Thanksgiving this year. Arianna's birthday was on Thanksgiving this year! She woke up to this in her backyard....

Let's just say she was one happy birthday girl!

We had a wonderful lunch with family and then started the birthday celebrations.

I don't know how she did it, but she stayed up till 9 o'clock that night. She was so tired she slept through the entire night. :)

So I have to say this was one of the most emotional birthdays for me. I remember when she was born we would talk about "when she turns 3" all the time. We knew her birthday would fall on Thanksgiving and thought it would be great to host Thanksgiving at our house. Well that thought became a reality this week. I continue to be amazed at how far she has come. I guess every birthday is a bit emotional for me because it marks another year we've made it with our baby girl.

As for other news, Arianna has been excepted at the school district to receive speech therapy once a week. However, her pulmonologist does not want her attending any sessions at school during the winter. I'm still waiting to hear from the ST to find out how many children will be with Arianna. If it's one-on-one then I might allow her to go. If not, then I'll push for at-home therapy through another program.

Some of you may remember Arianna had a dental visit 2 months ago and needed to get a cavity filled and cleaning done at the hospital. I've been waiting for the insurance to approve this and finally I spoke with the dentist office last week and apparently I have to pay $400 for before they will do anything. I called insurance and they said everything is paid for and the dentist is trying to double dip. Apparently, the dentist office tried to get a professional hospital call approved for $88 and insurance denied it. Insurance has already approved this procedure to be done at the hospital so they will not pay for the doctor to drive there. So....this means they are trying to charge me $400 for the dentist to freaking DRIVE to the hospital!!!! You have got to be kidding me!!!! I'm waiting to talk with our pediatrician on Tuesday at Arianna's 3 year check up. I've already given her a call and she was going to call both my insurance and the dentist office. This is why I love our pediatrician! I'm hoping she has come up with a better answer than I have.

I thinks thats about it for us. I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving.

Mended Little Hearts BBQ

This past weekend was our Mended Little Hearts BBQ. We had such a wonderful time!

All but 3 are heart kids.

Aunt Lissa & Ari in the jumping castle. Definitely Ari's favorite!

Ari & Sofia

Heart Buddies!

Halloween 2009

I know I'm a little late but here are some pictures from Halloween.

All the kids before heading out

Alyssa & Arianna

(notice Arianna's mouth full of candy)

H1N1 Vaccine

After being on the fence about the vaccine, we took Arianna on Monday to get it. I'm SO relieved to have it done! She will need one more shot next month to be 100% protected so I'm just hoping they get another shipment in before then.

After weighing the pro's and con's we believe Arianna getting the swine flu would be worse than the shot. I know many of you are on the fence about it and I hope you come to the best solution for your child.

Train

Every time we go to Reid Park we always see the train go around the lake. We have always been so paranoid about germs that we have never let Arianna go on it. Well this weekend we changed that!






I can't tell you how good it feels to do normal things with my daughter. There is alot of hand washing involved but we do it.

Trip to Apple Annie's!

This saturday was our Mended Little Hearts trip to the pumpkin patch. We had a blast! We got to meet a new heart family which was really nice.

Photo and video editing at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Ortho appointment today

First of all...it's 1:40 am so if this post doesn't make sense...sorry

Today we went to Arianna's orthopedic appointment.

First we did the x-ray and then played Candyland for about 10 minutes before the doctor came in.

He looked her over and said he can barely tell by looking at her that she has a curve. He seemed very laid back.

Then he tells me she hasn't changed and still has an 18 degree curve. I quickly reminded him that her curve was only 10 degrees 6 months ago. Man this doctor irritates me!!!

At this point she is in no risk but if she gets over 20 degrees he wants to put her in a brace. :( At this rate he expects her to be over 20 degrees in about year.

He mentioned it's possible she won't get worse but didn't sound very sure about that.

Then the Hanger guy came in and checked on her orthotic inserts and her feet and said they look perfect!

For now we enjoy the next 6 months and will worry about the brace at our next appointment.

Sorry for being so short and to the point...I'm exhausted and have to be up early for feeding therapy. Speaking of which, Arianna finally weighs 26 pounds!!! We have been working on that for 6 months. :) Her height is 36 inches, which is a 3 inch growth over the past few months. I'm so proud of her growth!

Okay....good night~