Monday, July 27, 2009

Auriana can sit!


Here is Auriana sitting!!! She has come such a long way in the past 10 months and is getting bigger and doing something new every day!!

Orphans with Down Syndrome!



Since having a child with Down Syndrome, I have become aware of HOW MANY children are born every day all around the world with Down Syndrome and other birth defects and disabilities! Thankfully, we live in America, where Down Syndrome and other disabilities have become more accepted by our society. Around the world, most other countries are not as accepting, and as a result of that there are millions of orphans with disabilities that are living in orphanages not knowing the love of a family and many of them locked away in mental institutes at a very young age! Please consider helping one of these orphans by donating to their grant funds on ReecesRainbow, praying for them, or if you can bring them home!
Just look at those faces!!! Who couldn't love them!?!? All of these precious children in these pictures are listed for adoption on ReecesRainbow. Some of them have Down Syndrome (like my daughter), and some have other disabilities, but ALL need a family! I am particularly fond of the ones in these pictures and would love to bring them home if I could, but there is no way I could give them the attention they need right now. If you can, please ask me about them and I can point you to them!

meet the family...


Many of you have probably been following our story on our carepage since I was pregnant with our second daughter, Auriana. Since I originally created that when I knew she would have a heart condition and her heart condition has since been successfully repaired (thank God!), I have decided to make a page more focused on our family as a whole, rather than just Auriana.
As most of you know, I am Katie. I am mommy to Kylee and Auriana.
Kylee is my first born, she is my little "princess"... she litterally thinks she is a princess and that she should always get what she wants, always! She will tell you "...because I am Princess Kylee". She is, at the same time, very helpful and a wonderful big sister. Kylee loves to help me with anything that is something she feels makes her a "big girl". She wants to unload the dishwasher, she wants to cook, she wants to fold the clothes, and she wants to help with EVERYTHING when it comes to her little sister. Kylee is very smart for her age! She started talking when she was 6 months old, and now at 3 years old she likes to play computer games by herself and she can spell her name all by herself.
Auriana is following her sister's footsteps in becoming another "little princess". She is a little more laid back than Kylee, though. She is also our miracle baby. We found out Auriana would have a heart defect when I was about half way through my pregnancy with her. We were also told that with the type of heart defect she had, AV Canal, she most likely also had a chromosome abnormality. I refused any testing for chromosome abnormalities because the policy of the hospital I was at is that if a child is known to have a severe chromosome abnormality (such as Trisomy 13 or 18) they do not allow you to have a C-section in the event the baby is in distress during delivery. I ended up having to be admitted to the hospital when I was 32 weeks, and Auriana's delivery was induced at 35 weeks because she did not grow for 5 weeks! The doctor told me before I was induced that because she hadn't grown in 5 weeks and had a heart defect and a couple of other ultrasound markers, she believed that Auriana had one of the severe chromosome abnormalities and gave me a 1% chance of her coming our of the delivery room alive! We prayed and prayed, and had Faith, just as we did the entire pregnancy, and she was born ALIVE with Down Syndrome and AV Canal heart Defect! She has had a rough start, had to have open heart surgery at 5 months old, and is still to this day receiving all her nutrition through a feeding tube. She is doing much better than the 1% chance to survive that we were given though! She is now, at 10 months old, rolling around everywhere, can sign 4 words (eat, finished, mom, dad), starting to sit by herself, trying to crawl, starting to eat some foods by mouth, and is almost always happy!
I thank God every day for giving me both of my precious little girls!


Now, you've met our family.... follow us on a glance into our life....