Christmas Pictures

Christmas morning in front of the tree at mom and dad Huyser's house.
Liam could fit inside most of the gifts under the tree.
This picture is from Christmas Eve with the DeWitt's and Huyser's. These are the 5 great grand kids from left to right - Gisele, Liam, Norah, Jacob and Deacon. They are all dressed in their Christmas pajamas. We had a special guest at Christmas this year - Santa came! I didn't get pictures of him because we had the video camera out instead. He brought gifts for all the kids. It was a lot of fun.

Great Grandma and Grandpa Huyser with all the great grandkids. Christmas was really fun with Jacob and Gisele running around, and by next year the other 3 will be running around too!

Cabela's Trip

Yesterday was Liam's first trip to Cabela's. The weather was not very nice, so we decided to take a drive with Grandma and Grandpa Huyser to the Cabela's in Hammond, Indiana.

Liam slept most of the time - no surprise there. We put him in this little kids chair. I think he could have took a nap there just fine.

Then Tim tried to feed Liam to the animals, but they were not very hungry.

REMEMBER

REMEMBER by: Tim DeHaan

Discussing Parenthood
The day you found our you were going to be a mom
The moment you told dad the good news
Keeping me a secret until the right time
Calling family and friends
Preparations for the nursery
Registering for gifts
Weekly updates by e-mail
Every precious ultrasound
Every beautiful heartbeat
Every silent breath
The memorable vacation to pictured rocks
Racing dad's truck
Every movement and every kick
Celebrating with family
Celebrating Thanksgiving and Christmas
Taking me to church
Praying for me
Loving me
Reading to me
Singing to me
The day I was born
The tears you shed
The hour you held me
The last breath I took
The lives I touched
The lives you touched
The lives I changed
The faith you have shown
The love you experienced
The trust you believe in

I felt your touch
I recognized your voice
I will forever be with you
In every gentle breeze
In every silent whisper
In all you tears
I love you so much,

Forever and for always,

Addison

Christmas is almost here!

Liam had another doctors appointment yesterday. He now weighs 8 pounds, 7 ounces and is 20 inches long. He is still not on the charts for percentages, maybe in another month or two. He also got three shots and a heel poke. I wasn't prepared for that, but he did good. Liam let out one big scream and he was done. He pretty much fell right asleep. His hemoglobin (iron) is still low, so we continue to be on a supplement for that. The monitor he is on for his apnea got downloaded last week and we got the results from that. We were hoping to be done, but no such luck. He apparently had 2 real events so we have to endure that stupid thing for two more weeks! Can someone please invent a wireless one? I can handle the electrodes, but the cord hooked to the box that we constantly have to lug around drives me nuts!

After Liam's doctors appointment we went to Great Grandma and Grandpa Huyser's house so Grandma got to hold Liam while Grandpa fed me goodies! Liam slept a long time and missed his afternoon feeding. I thought he would be cranky at night, but he just slept. We put him down at 10:30 and he slept until I woke him up at 7 this morning! This was the first time he has slept through the night! I hope it continues, but I'm not counting on it.

Don't worry, I'm still going to post some pictures of Liam. These are the ones that didn't make the birth announcement/Christmas card. I hope you enjoy them as much as I do!

This is the one that was on the card - just the full size version. I didn't know if you could tell on the card that he was in his stocking. We had quite the time getting him in and out of it. We almost had him stuck in it! I had to hold the stocking while Tim pulled his arms! I almost didn't want to post this next picture, but I thought is was too cute. This is when we tried to literally hang him from the stocking. He almost fell out!

Merry Christmas!

2 Parties Down...

Friday night we had a Christmas party at Dan and Amy's house with our friends Larry, Moni, Corinne and Danielle Marlink. It was a ton of fun - as always, and I forgot the camera! Grandma had hers, maybe I can add pictures if she could figure out how to e-mail them to me. Liam wore his shirt that Carter bought him, it is green, red and white and reads, "Good things come in small packages!" Norah had on a cute shirt too, hers read, "what Santa doesn't bring me Grandma will!" Isn't that the truth!

Saturday night we had another Christmas party with the Verbeek side (Tim's mom's side). We always have a great time with them too. We did manage to remember the camera and took a family photo. Our family sure has grown over the past few years, it is awesome! We will have at least one more next year as Joni is due in early May. Thanks mom DeHaan for having us all over! We love having Christmas there because she decorates so well. She actually puts up at least 8 full size christmas trees - all decorated in different themes or different kinds of ornaments. She is so brave to put them up with all the grandkids running around. They learn they can touch with just one finger, how cute!

As we were taking this picture, Chip (a.k.a. Christian) said, "Awe, ha ma," which is what Grandpa Verbeek used to say to Grandma all the time. It made us lauph, but we sure do miss you Grandma and Grandpa!

This is Nate, Em, Tim and Dalton. They all look cute except for the one making the funny face!

This is Aunt Jo, mom DeHaan (Judy), and Aunt Jane. They take a sisters picture every year at Christmas. We can't wait to see you all agian this summer at Hess lake!

Happy Due Date Liam!

Yesterday, Dec. 18, was Liam's official due date. It is just crazy to imagine him just being here. He is getting pretty big, so I'm glad I didn't have to deliver the chunker he is now! We celebrated the occasion with a few friends. Brent and Candace Nienhuis had invited us over to their house for a welcome home Liam/happy due date party. It was ton of fun. We shared food and fellowship and even played a few games. But Catch Phrase is being saved for New Years Eve. Candace had everyone write down advice for us on little cards, then she put them in a fold out album for us to keep. Then we paired up and everyone got to decorate a onesie for Liam. They turned out great. It will be fun to dress him in them all. Thanks Brent and Candace for opening up your beautiful home and Thanks to all are great friends for coming to celebrate with us. We love cute gift you all put together. It is a bucket with lots of stuff Liam will need this summer to go on the boat! What fun that will be!

A visit to Santa

On Monday night I decided to take Liam to go see Santa Clause. Even though the weather wasn't the greatest, I needed to get out! So I dressed him in his Santa's Little Helper outfit and headed to Treehouse Books in downtown Holland. I figured that would be the best place to go with the least amount of kids. Turns out that it's totally free there, you just have to bring your own camera.

Liam did great! He stayed awake the whole time. Santa said this was his smallest visitor so far.

This is not Liam screaming, he is actually yawning.
What do you think Liam asked Santa for Christmas this year? Daddy says he must have asked for a 1965 Shelby Cobra, mommy thinks he asked for more kisses!

2 Months Old!

Liam has officially turned 2 months old and is still not due until next week!

He has come so far in such a short amount of time. The 2 pictures below show a great comparison. He has filled out all over, but I love to see his hands and leggies and especially his cute double chin. I would never have guessed we would be pushing 8 pounds by 2 months. Mom and Dad DeHaan bought us a baby scale and brought it over tonight. We will get a better weight tomorrow when we strip him down for bath time. It will be fun to watch his weight growth more often now. Thanks Mom and Dad DH!

Liam struggling to breathe on his own just days after being born.Liam 2 months old practicing the ninja moves he loves to do. And I think he is starting to loose some of his precious hair!

A Few Pics

Liam went right to sleep after we took pictures of him for a Christmas/birth announcement card. We sure tired him out! Mom and Liam taking a break in between takes.
Liam's first camo outfit. We just had to laugh when we put this on him!

Second Doctor's Appointment

So yesterday we ventured out in the cold snowy weather for Liam's doctors appointment. He now weighs 7 pounds and 2 ounces. That means he has gained over an ounce a day since his last appointment 2 weeks ago. Now we can stop waking him up every 3 hours during the night to eat. I am happy about that because I didn't want him getting too used to waking up all the time at night. We also got his memory monitor downloaded. Liam didn't have any real alarms (so surprising considering how much it went off!) so he is off the caffeine! Do you think he will get those caffeine withdraw headaches :0) ? Liam will have another memory monitor download in two weeks and if he continues to not have any alarms, then we can get rid of the monitor! That will be a happy day! Now he is only on iron, twice a day. Liam had to get a toe poke in the office to test his iron. He didn't even wince! I think having him in the NICU made him tough. He is so used to getting poked and prodded. His iron is still a little low, so we will check again in two weeks.

This was his 2 month check up. We went over the 2 month milestones and surprise, Liam isn't doing any of them! Considering he wasn't even supposed to be born yet, we aren't worried. At least now we know what we can work on over the next 2 months. The one thing we have been doing is tummy time. He can pick his head up pretty good, but he doesn't always like it, so he will either cry or just falls asleep.

Last night I didn't set any alarms, but Liam woke me up at about 4am. I put his pipe in twice which got me to about 4:20, then I decided he was really hungry and he needed to eat. He had made it 5 hours. I was happy with that! When I was crawling back in bed, Tim woke up and wondered why I had fed him, I told him because Liam was crying and he had made it 5 hours! But he was really asking why I had fed him. I think he was disappointed that he missed out on the middle of the night feeding! So he got up at 7:30 to feed him while I slept in. Who says you can never sleep in once you have a baby? Thanks Tim!

Thanksgiving Weekend

Here is our little family on Thanksgiving morning. Liam is wearing his turkey bib. We went to mom and dad Huyser for lunch, then to mom and dad DeHaan for dinner. Liam slept most of the time. He managed to set off his alarm during prayer at lunch and a few times during dinner. I think he felt left out because he was in the bedroom by himself while the rest of us were eating a feast! Maybe next year you can sit by the table Liam!

After we were all stuffed it was time to feed Liam. First we changed his diaper and Gisele helped me out with that. She liked to hold his feet.
Dan, Amy and Norah came right before dessert was served... how convenient! Gisele and Norah liked to play together. At one point we even had Gisele holding Norah as she stood up. I can't wait to watch all of the great grand kids playing together at Christmas.

And of course I went shopping on black Friday. We've gotta continue the tradition, even though there wasn't any big sales I was trying to hit. My mom and Kelly and I always go. This year Moni and Tammy (my mom's girlfriends) went with us too. We have a blast filling the car to the max with all our packages. We really have it down to a science. I'm not going to give away our secrets, but we got a ton done and even managed to get in breakfast and lunch! I finished all my shopping in one day! Thanks to Tim who stayed home to watch Liam. They had fun too. Tim said they watched Ice Age 1 and 2. When I got home they were both still in their jammies. It was too cute!

Yes, we're still here...

It has been so nice being home with Liam and Tim this week. We haven't done much, which is great. We have had time to just sit together and love on our little guy. He pretty much just sleeps and eats. We have to wake him up every 3 hours to eat. I take the 2am and Tim takes the 5am. We'll see how that goes considering Tim goes back to work tomorrow (Mon). Liam is up to 55mL's - almost 2 oz of breast milk. We increase his feeds a few mL's every 2 days.

Our first outing was on Friday morning to the doctor. Liam checked out just fine. He weighed in at 5lbs 15 oz and 18 inches long even though he was still not due for another month! It is crazy to think he is supposed to be in my tummy yet. I can't imagine what it would be like if I was still on bed rest.

OK -I better try to get some rest because 2am comes too fast! I'll post more pics soon.

We're HOME!!!

This is Liam waiving goodbye to all his wonderful nurses that helped take such good care of him!
Taking a little cat nap while waiting for the doctor to give us the discharge instructions.

Three strikes and your out right? Well, at least in Liam's case. Today was the third time they said he was going home and we are outta there! Tim took a half day off in anticipation of Liam maybe going home. They wouldn't give us a for sure answer because he didn't finish his 16 feeds in a row until 11:00 today, and then the doctor had to give approval after that. We didn't get the official go ahead until 2:30 and we were gone just after 3.

I finally got the car seat checked yesterday and we both took infant CPR today. So everything was set, we just needed Liam! We are a little nervous about being home, no nurses to rescue us, but we are ready. He is on a monitor for his heart rate and breathing, so that is reassuring or it just freaks you out because the alarm is really loud. It hasn't gone off yet and we hope it stays that way.

He has really got the eating thing down, lets hope he has the sleeping thing down too - even though we will have to continue to wake him up to eat every 3 hours until he gets a little bigger. It is so fun to watch him sleep. He makes little noises and it sounds like he is laughing. It's so cute. We're going to try to catch it on tape. It's just something that you hope you will always remember once they get big and start to talk back!

We apologize for not really calling anyone and letting you know we are home, but we have just enjoyed this time together and wanted to sit and relax and be together - it's been a while. Thank you for all the prayers and support, Liam so often reminds us that God is good.

.

Low Hemoglobin

Liam was up to 8 feeding in a row as of this morning. Then I called to check up on him and he decided to get really tired. His nurse ordered more labs to check his hemoglobin again. It was still pretty low (8.2) even though he was on iron, so they decided to give him an infusion of blood. He had to get an IV, which he hasn't had in a long time. With all this going on, they thought it best to let him rest during his feedings, so back to zero and we start the count over again. We really thought tomorrow we were going to be bringing him home. They even have all of his discharge papers ready. I think this is the third time they have given the hint that he will be going home and Liam decides otherwise. We are trying to stay really positive. It may take a few days for him to catch up and regain some strength again. He did take his 5:00 and 8:00 bottles tonight, 2 down, only 14 more to go!

This is after his infusion. He was really tired and didn't open his eyes too much. They took his arm out of his shirt to put in the IV. You can really see how chunky his arms and cheeks are getting. Even his little hat is getting too small.

In Liam's Word's...

"Dad, seriously, would you put down the camera already? I think we have enouph pictures, besides, I need my diaper changed and I'm hungry."

"Oh, this pipe tastes so good. I think I will just close my eyes and go to sleep."

"I love my blankie. Do you see it has my name on it? Mommy said that her friend Kathy got it for me. Her mom makes lots of these. Mine even has cars on it!"

"This is grandpa and me having a good talk. He said I have to start eating better so I can come home. He said I would really like it there and I will even have my own room with no other kids in it!"

1 Month Old

I just thought this picture was so funny!

It looks like he is saying "arrrg," like a pirate.

This is Tim and I giving Liam his first bath.

We have to do twice before he can go home.

Aren't these booties adorable? One of Mom DeHaan's
small group friends made them for us. They fit perfect!

This is Uncle Kieth, Aunt Mary and Ashley. They came to visit on Sunday. They each got to hold Liam, but he just wanted to sleep!

Today Liam is 1 month old. I can't believe it. It sure does fly by. I can't imagine home much faster it will go once he is home. He is really improving. Yesterday he had 5 bottles in a row. It takes him about 25 minutes to finish 1.5 oz, slow and steady wins the race, right?

Well, Liam's nurse last night said that their census is way up. There was 96 babies in the NICU and 7 more on the way. Her goal was to discharge all the babies in Liam's room in 48 hours! Yeah right! I told her good luck and I could help her out with one of those babies! There are 8 babies in Liam's room right now. I thought is was full with 6! It gets really tight in there, so we probably won't have any visitors until he comes home. We want him to get maximum rest in between feedings so he does better. It is so busy in his room, I'm surprised he can get much sleep at all, but he doesn't seem to mind. he continues to gain weight, last night he was up to 5 lbs 2 oz. Way to go Liam!