Thought I would share

Michael's awesome Christmas list: "I want a yo yo, a skateboard, a sauna, the Backyardigans Christmas movie, a pack of gum and 16 Wishes (a movie.)"

I thought I would alert everyone, in case they want to get a sauna too. I anticipate they might be a hard-to-find item. ;)

Well, isn't this convenient?

I just start blogging again and already I have a small prayer request. Funny how it works like that, eh?

So I had to go back for a second ultrasound because of low fluid and the baby having enlarged kidneys and they were not able to see the heart entirely.

I went for that ultrasound on Monday and had an appointment on Tuesday. They lost the ultrasound and it took them until Wed. afternoon to call back.

The kidneys are still enlarged and dilated, though the fluid is not so low. So, they said the baby has Prenatal Hydronephrosis. It could totally end up being pretty much nothing. Or it could be something, but it sounds like it is not anything life-threatening or anything. In fact, it sounded like the most common abnormality found on ultrasound. It is really likely it will be something the baby grows out of either before or after birth and it SOUNDS like the worst case scenario is surgery needed to clear up a blockage in the kidney or in the output tract to the bladder. The WORST WORST case would be prenatal surgery, but that doesn't seem to be the case we are looking at.

The amount of enlargement has not changed in the last 2 weeks. So that is good and bad. Not getting worse, but not exactly getting better. They want me to go in and get more ultrasounds as the pregnancy progresses, so that they can keep an eye on how the baby is doing and how the kidneys are doing. I am ok with that to a point, but I sort of feel like sometimes poking around leads to more times that they find things--whether they are issues or not. So I am not totally wanting a BUNCH of extra ultrasounds. I think I would rather go with a couple towards the end to check if things have cleared up or not, but we'll see what they say.

They offered me the chance to get followed by a perinatologist, but I would rather not. Again, from the times I have had to go to a peri before, I found he was quite busy, didn't really have time to check the chart beforehand, and it was generally an unproductive thing. Maybe I'm wrong, but I am just not sure I feel the need to do this.

So, I feel, overall, pretty good that things will calm down and be ok. But I would also really appreciate any prayers anyone wanted to offer that the baby would be ok. It is always nicer to have fewer issues, right?

Tap. tap...is this thing on?

I've been kind of busy lately. Blogging sort of took a backseat to getting all of the work done and still having enough time with the kids and to get done all that need to done.

So a small update and then some pictures. And then I will try to be better on top of blogging.

Our biggest update is that we are expecting our 6th baby at the very beginning of March (hopefully earlier, considering how big our kids get.) We know it is a boy and his name will be Maxwell Atticus Rehart. We'll just call him Max and the kids are super excited. McKay is especially sweet. I love seeing how sweet the kids are with each other. (Of course, this sibling sweetness does not extend into car rides. ;) )

I also got a fun new lens and have some pictures of Hannah, Ella and Michael. Hopefully Garrett and McKay will let me get a couple of them soon.