Busy Busy Busy

Things have been nuts around the Carlin household. Lisa has been putting in large amounts of hours at work and Billy has been preparing for a trad show. Ella is getting so big. Soon we are going to have to switch her from a infant car seat to a convertible car seat. She is long and lean. Ella's hair is getting longer as well and we can now put it in piggy tails. She has been crawling on all four for some time now and is now pulling her self up to stand. Two days ago she started to "side step" when holding on to the couch. Walking is soon to come. On August 17th we had a very scary day. Ella fell down a flight of stairs and we had our first major boo boo to deal with. A trip to Children's ER showed that she had two small bruises and no other injuries. It was scary, but also showed us how resilient kids really are. Ella talks often and her favorite phrase now is "da da da da..." She also says "hi." Although we know she doesn't know what it means it still makes us laugh. Ella has also started kissing us back by putting her open mouth on your cheek (and sometimes licking it.) It's sloppy, but we love it. This weekend was Ella's first OSU game. Billy was sooo excited to put her in her OSU onsie. We also recently celebrated Lisa's birthday and she got her first birthday card from Ella. Billy has to go to Atlanta on Labor Day for work so Lisa and Ella are tagging along. On Wednesday Lisa and Ella are driving to South Carolina to visit with Lisa's Aunt Joan, Uncle Jerry, and Cousin Jan. Ella will get to meet Lisa's family and play with Jan's children Kasey, Mackenize, and baby Jase. We are loving this stage and can't wait to see what Ella does next.

Moooooo and Extremem Building

Extreme Home Makeover is doing a build very close to our house. Yesterday was demolition day so we headed over to watch. Lisa, her friend Elizabeth, and her boss Lana "snuck" into the VIP viewing area and were able to have an up close and personal view of all the designers, TY, the house, the production, Kelly Pickler, etc. It was hot out but the show gave out free water and ice cream to keep everyone cool and happy. Lisa didn't come out completely unscaved however as her chest is very sunburnt. It was very neat to see how the show works and we can't wait to stop by several more times to see the progress. Lisa's sister Lori knows the family and is very excited that they are getting a new home.

Today is Ella's offical last day as a five month old. To celebrate we tok her to Young's Dairy for ice cream and a time to visit the animals. Ella loves all of the animals and we think she just might be a vetranarian some day.

Ella and Lisa Health Update

Ella will be sixth months old on Monday so today she had her check up. She weighs 14 lbs 3 oz. She is 27 inches long. She is very advanced and is doing things 8-9 month olds just start doing. She is crawling (army crawl, but trying hard to get up on her knees) and has two teeth. The doctor gave us the go ahead to start her on veggie puffs. She is doing so great and we love seeing her grow.

On another note Lisa has been having some health problems and today we found out why. For the past couple of months she was having pain on her left side. It would come and go, but had been occuring more recently this past week. Billy had deviated septum surgery last Friday (and is doing well) so Lisa was off all week with him. Lisa made an appointment with her family doctor. The doctor told her she believed that it was diverticulitis, but that she wanted to have a Cat Scan done to make sure. She had her cat scan done and the results came in today. It is not diverticulitis. She has something called intussusception. Pretty much what happens is one part of your intestine goes in to another section kinda like a telescope that folds in to each other. If untreated it can lead to a cut off of her blood supply or it can gangreen. This is very rare among adults. It only occurs in 1-2 adults out of 1 million a year. 8 males to 1 female will get it. It is common in children under the age of two. Lisa's family doctor feels that Lisa will most likely have to have a portion of her small intestine removed. We go to see the surgeon on August 12th. We are both very worried, but are hoping for the best. We will keep people updated as we get more information.

Ella and Lisa Health Update

Ella will be sixth months old on Monday so today she had her check up. She weighs 14 lbs 3 oz. She is 27 inches long. She is very advanced and is doing things 8-9 month olds just start doing. She is crawling (army crawl, but trying hard to get up on her knees) and has two teeth. The doctor gave us the go ahead to start her on veggie puffs. She is doing so great and we love seeing her grow.

On another note Lisa has been having some health problems and today we found out why. For the past couple of months she was having pain on her left side. It would come and go, but had been occuring more recently this past week. Billy had deviated septum surgery last Friday (and is doing well) so Lisa was off all week with him. Lisa made an appointment with her family doctor. The doctor told her she believed that it was diverticulitis, but that she wanted to have a Cat Scan done to make sure. She had her cat scan done and the results came in today. It is not diverticulitis. She has something called intussusception. Pretty much what happens is one part of your intestine goes in to another section kinda like a telescope that folds in to each other. If untreated it can lead to a cut off of her blood supply or it can gangreen. This is very rare among adults. It only occurs in 1-2 adults out of 1 million a year. 8 males to 1 female will get it. It is common in children under the age of two. Lisa's family doctor feels that Lisa will most likely have to have a portion of her small intestine removed. We go to see the surgeon on August 12th. We are both very worried, but are hoping for the best. We will keep people updated as we get more information.

Billy's Surgery

Billy had surgery on Friday for his deviated septum. They also removed two bones out of his nose. He is having a hard time not being able to bend over, pick up Ella, play with her, etc but for the most part he feels pretty good. We appreciated having Lisa's dad, aunt and Billy's mom here to help out with Ella for a day or two so that Lisa could care for Billy. More updates will come.

In the Army...

That's right....Ella is offically ready to join the army! Yesterday morning Billy and I found Ella far away from where we left her. So we put her back on her play mat and watched her to see how she had gotten herself so far away. Lo and behold she wanted a toy and off she went...in a fast and furious army crawl! Our little girl isn't so little anymore and while we miss our tiny little peanut we love seeing her grown and explore! Now its time to baby proff the house!!!

Sparklers, Fireworks and More

We have been very busy since we last posted a blog and Ella experienced many first over the Holiday weekend. Billy's cousin Jonathon was getting married at a Marina at the Jersey Shore, so of course we went! Ella got to ride on a plane for the first time. She handled the trip fine, ours however sucked. Our first flight went from Columbus to Cincinnati...it was fine. Our second flight however was horrible. Lisa didn't have an assigned seat as she had Ella and only certain seats have extra oxygen mask. Our plane was replaced by a much smaller plane so 25 people got bumped...and of course Lisa was one of them. We took an offer for 800 Delta Dollars to fly into Baltimore and then they would pay for ground transportation to Philly (which is where our baggage was going!) Our flight was fine...Ella again did great, but things went down hill from there. Our cab driver was a large man and he kept falling asleep at the wheel. Lisa had to bump him awake. Then we get to Philly (safely thank goodness!) and Lisa's bag is MIA. We come to find that they flew it to Baltimore and it was there the whole time so they said they would have it to use by 5 am the next day. We then had to drive to New Jersey and it took forever. We also had to stop on the way to buy all of our health and beauty aides that were gone in the missing bag. We finally made it to our hotel 8 hrs after our expected arrival. The rest of the trip was great. Ella had her first trip to the beach, New York City, her first plane, cab, train and boat rides. She loved the city and got excited by all of the lights. She was so well behaved and we know that we are truely blessed to have such a wonderfuly little girl. She grows bigger and bigger every day and we love to see all of her new accomplishments. She has her two bottom teeth and several more on the way. She has eaten all of the stage one veggies. She loves carrots the most and dislikes carrots. She also started fruits and has eaten bananas. Not sure she LOVED them, but she did eat them all up. She rolls without any trouble from her back to her tummy (but still cant roll from tummy to back.) She reaches for her toys and tries to scoot to get them. She pushes herself around on her back and does a "back crawl." Ella loves the water and would get very upset when it was time to leave the ocean and/or the pool. She laughs often and is very happy, but when she is mad she is mad. Ella sleeps through the night and enjoys her routine. We have her on a good schedule and she knows and gets very upset. We can hardly believe she is five months old. She is getting so big and while we miss her being tiny we love how interactive she has become!