Please Pray

This is just a quick reminder to everyone that Malachi's cardiac catheter lab appointment is tomorrow (Monday). We go in at 6:30am for his procedure. Following that he will continue to stay at St. Mary's through the day and overnight as they start him on some medication to lower the blood pressure between his heart and lungs. Please pray for all of us. Thanks!

Pictures of the Little Man

There's not much new around here, but I thought it was time to post an update again. The highlights of the week are:

• Our friends Meggan and Kyle had their baby boy, so Malachi went to meet his new friend Lucas Owen on Tuesday. Again, I didn't think to bring my camera-- oh, well. We'll get a picture of Malachi with his friends taken soon enough. :)


• We had some visitors for a couple of hours yesterday. Malachi got to meet his cousins Tulia and Zeke while my mom and sister (Rachel) visited. It was great to see all of them.


• Today Malachi and I took Blazer to the vet for his yearly check up. This was a new experience for us, as I have never been to the vet. It went well- Blazer meowed the entire way there and back, but was quiet for the Dr. It was pretty interesting carrying Malachi in his carrier in my right hand, and Blazer in his carrier in my left on the way in to the building. ;)

Below are some pictures I thought I would share. Notice how Malachi looks like a little old man-- you really wouldn't be able to mistake him for a girl, even if he was dressed in all pink. This baby is boy through and through!

John's uncle Ron and aunt Doreen and their kids Seth, Annika, Jakob, and Lukas meeting Malachi a few weeks ago.

I promise not to do this every time, but this is the last time he wore this outfit. It it the first outfit that Malachi has outgrown.

Again, I promise not to do this every time, but this is the last "Newborn" diaper that Malachi wore. He has outgrown those, as well.

Malachi meeting his cousins Tulia and Zeke.

Cousin Tulia holding Malachi.

8 lbs. 3 oz.

That's Malachi's weight as of today's appointment! He's growing by leaps and bounds. :) Only 2 weeks ago he was 7 lbs. 4 oz. I think he's starting to get a little more baby fat-- in fact he's almost grown out of his newborn outfits and newborn diapers.

I wanted to be the one to write about today's appointment, but John beat me to the punch. Malachi did really well through all of the poking and prodding... our Dr. spent a lot more time on doing the echo than normal as he was really hoping to get to the root of the problem. He seems genuinely concerned with Malachi's well-being, and I believe he is even taking extra steps to help him. We are very thankful for such a wonderful Dr.

After the appointments Malachi and I took a Spring walk around the neighborhood. We hear there could be another winter storm blowing through, so I thought we should get out while we could. It was windier than I had thought, so I ended up with cold ears, but it was still nice to be out and about.

One final comment--- We went up to Moose Lake for Easter on Sunday so that Malachi could meet John's Grandpa Winston. It was great to be with family, and special for John's Grandpa to meet the little boy with his name. We, being the shutterbug parents that we are, managed to forget our camera. Thanks to Ron and Doreen who took this picture for us! :) Grandpa Winston is 90 years old, so this is pretty special.

Things I've Been Meaning to Mention

Hello Folks! It seems like time flies by, and before I know it I've missed the opportunity to comment on/ share something. So this post is devoted to those things I forgot...

• A while back I was commenting on having to go on 2 field trips with my class, and being concerned about possibly going into labor while on them. I set up a plan with my school just in case, but a very lovely friend bailed me out of one of the trips. Carrie Johnson (a teacher I taught 6th grade with at Kellogg) called me up the morning of one of the trips, and offered to go in my place. It was completely unexpected, but OH-so-appreciated! I thought she deserved a shout out on my blog. :)
• John's been posting some pictures, and one of them I had meant to post. It's the one of Malachi in his swing. I was going to say that John was such a good daddy that he put together the swing all by himself one evening (I usually do all assembly-type work). The picture is of Malachi's first ride in the swing.
• The feet at the top of our blog are actually Malachi's feet with our wedding rings. We took him to get his pictures taken when he was just 10 days old. They turned out super cute, and I'll have to post some more soon.
• I'm back to singing on the worship team at church! I was able to sing for a super-fun choir weekend Mar. 15/16th, as well as sing on a regular team on Good Friday. It is great to be back, and John was a great stay-at-home dad while I was off at church.
• It is SO great that John is able to be home over the weekends now that Malachi is here. We get to go to church together (and sit in the cry-room ;) ), he helps with Malachi all day, and we just get to have some family time. It is wonderful!

From Mommy!

Hello Friends! John has done such a nice job of keeping the posts coming and updating often! I haven't had much of a chance to write in the last 2 weeks, so I want to start by saying THANK YOU! Thanks to all of you who have been praying for little Malachi for months now, and those who have just joined us, too. I really can't explain the emotions that passed through me when I was informed by the cardiologist that Malachi would not need a surgery after all, and that things were looking good for him. I truly feel that God worked a miracle in our little boy's body, and so we say- PRAISE GOD! Even now I feel that God is working miracles as Malachi's heart isn't "normal," but yet is functioning well. So, again thanks for the prayers and support you have offered. It's been amazing.

Now on to talk about daily routine-- things are going pretty well. Malachi has decided that between 8pm and 11:30pm is his fussy time, so we are learning to function in the midst of a screaming/ crying baby during that time. It's amazing what you can get used to. :) Other than that he sleeps well (for the most part), and I am adjusting to getting about 6 hours of broken sleep a night instead of my normal 8 continuous hours. This has been hard for me, but I am sure I will continue to adjust (especially since this part of parenthood appears to be unavoidable). :P

One random thought before I wrap up-- we know a lot of you have said that you really like Malachi's name. You might be surprised to know that it has been mispronounced quite a bit in the less-than-two-weeks since he was born. Everything from Ma-la-chee to Ma-le-key to Ma-lay-key, and still others. It's pretty funny, especially considering we never thought it was that different of a name. Who knew?

Nothing New

I am here to report that there is nothing new to report. We went to our regular Dr.'s appt. on Friday, and we're still in a wait-and-see mode for baby. As I suspected, the information we were receiving from the other Dr. we've seen for the past 3 visits regarding an induction was more a matter of personal opinion/ philosophy. Our regular Dr. is back and not really interested in inducing labor at this point, so I guess we'll see what this week brings. I was really hoping not to go back to work tomorrow morning, but unless something happens in the next couple of hours, I'll be back! I also have my last evening of conferences on Tuesday night-- I've prepped the kids to do student-led conferences so my sub could cover for me if need-be. Also this week in my classroom we have scheduled 2 field trips- one on Wednesday, and another on Thursday. I'm not sure what I want to do about that if I still haven't gone in... Hmmm... something to consider.

Anyhow, John built a bookcase for the nursery this afternoon, and now everything looks absolutely great. He's also done with ref-ing hockey for the season, so we are really ready! We'll let you know if the baby decides to come anytime soon!

Sarah's TOP SECRET PROJECT!

Alright folks! This is the post you've been waiting for! I finally reveal my TOP SECRET PROJECT!

Since sometime in September I have been doing a special project in the nursery. I decided that it would be really fun to paint murals of storybook characters on the walls of the nursery. I also figured that I love art and have always been fairly artistic, so I was prepared to tackle this project myself, as opposed to hiring someone. So, armed with my collection of storybooks (I'm a teacher, people!) I picked out 7 characters I thought would be fun to incorporate. Below you can see pictures of me working on the newly finished project! Hooray-- I FINALLY finished on SuperBowl Sunday (before the game started, of course!). :)

I kept it a secret for quite a while because I figured if it didn't turn out, I would just paint over it and no one would have to know! Once I finished one part of it and saw it was probably going to work, we started to leak the information (that's why some of you already knew about it). Here are some more pics!

(The opening page of Chicka Chicka Boom Boom and Curious George)

(Here's the Very Hungry Caterpillar)

(Now you see the cows from Click, Clack, Moo, Clifford, and Chrysanthemum)

(Continuing clockwise around the room- it's Froggy!)

Some closeups...