Pictures of Dominic's Surgery

C.S. Mott Children's Hospital is celebrating its 1 year anniversary this month of opening the new hospital building.  Annarbor.com is doing a story about the event and we were asked if a photographer could take pictures of Dominic before, during, and after his surgery to be used in that story.  The actual story won't be posted until Saturday or Sunday, but the photographer posted some of the pictures on his blog.  As much as we don't want to see our son actually having the procedure done, the pictures of the surgeon and the OR are really cool to see.  The pictures aren't too bloody or graphic, but there are some shots during the actual surgery just so you are warned.

Here is a link to his blog:
http://cournteysaccophotography.blogspot.com/2012/11/mott-childrens-hospital.html

Dominic is still doing great.  He was supposed to have his chest tube removed today, but they decided to keep it in for one more day, so hopefully that will get done tomorrow.

Love,
Nick, Andrea, Vince and Dominic

Dominic is doing great!

Dominic's surgery went great!  Later when I am not so tired I will post more details, but after two days of not much sleep we are all exhausted.  He has all of the berthing tubes out and he has most if the other wires off of him too.  He has peed and eaten food, so he is doing great there as well. He has even attempted to smile a couple of times!  We are still in the PCTU, but they think tomorrow he will move to the general floor.  Thank you for all of the thoughts and prayers!

Love,
Nick, Andrea, Vince, & Dominic

4 months old already

Dominic is already 4 months old!  Where does the time go!  Also, Happy Thanksgiving!  Hopefully all of you had a great one.  We ended up celebrating a little early this year as some of our family had Thanksgiving dinner on Sunday, which was great.  As for today we decided to stay home and relax.  We watched the parade on TV, watched the Lions lose, decorated a little bit, and watched Elf.  With Dominic's surgery coming up, we are enjoying some quiet time.  Speaking of that, we are still scheduled for the 27th, which is next Tuesday.  I can not believe it is that close.  We have spoken to a few people at U of M and they are great.  I expected nothing less, but so far we are very impressed with them, I am sure we will be with the actual surgery too.  We will be using the blog to keep everyone up to date with what is going on while we are in the hospital.  They have told us to expect to be there for 7-8 days.  We will be staying right in the hospital while Dominic is in the PCTU - the ICU for pediatric cardiology - and then after that we will move to a hotel near by.  Both sets of Grandparents will be coming down to help out as well.  We are lucky to have such great family that is willing to step in when things are a little crazy.  Here are some pictures from our 4 month "shoot."   

 He is sooo happy when he is naked!

 He has also discovered his tongue and the fun noises it makes

 He was modeling for me :)

 He is still not to sure about the whole tummy time thing

 We see a lot of this these days, he loves to eat his hands

 Baby kisses :)

 Big brother kisses

 I think they are going to be good friends

 Dont know exactly what Dominic was doing here, but we thought it was pretty funny

Love

Pictures of the Cider Mill, Pumpkin Carving, and Halloween

The last post had a lot of pictures already so I thought I would do a separate picture post of Halloween and the events around it.  

 Headed to the Cider Mill, Vince was very excited

 Dominic was pretty excited too :)

 Being that I don't have a picture of Vince in his Halloween costume on Halloween downloaded on this computer yet, this will have to do.  He has worn it several times :)

 Vince was a very good guts scooper

 Dominic got in on the action too.

Nick and Vince were the brains behind the pumpkins this year and I think they did a great job.  I was really impressed with the Detroit D.

When we got home from trick or treating, we were both soaked, so we had to take off the costume, but we still got to eat candy!

3 Months old and Halloween

Dominic is now almost 4 months old, but I wanted to get his three month pictures up before that happened.  Since we posted last time, Nick went to South Dakota for a week, Halloween happened, and Nick and I both had our birthdays.  We survived Nick's business trip pretty well.  It was only my second week back to work, so it was a learning experience.  Vince was the same age Dominic was when Nick started to travel for his last job, so I was grateful it was only for a week and not every week like it once was.  Vince loved Halloween, but Dominic slept through it.  We don't even have a picture of both boys dressed up, but next year we will make sure too!  Some how I was the lucky one to get to go out trick or treating with Vince.  It was cold and raining, but Vince had a great time.  He kept wanting to go to more houses and since it only happens once a year we did.  When we got home, Vince was very excited to look at all of his candy and to eat some of it.  My birthday was on the 3rd and Nick's was on the 5th of this month.  I turned 29 and Nick turned 33.  For the most part both days were pretty non-eventful.  My birthday was on Saturday so we just hung out at home and had a nice last minute visit from my dad.  Nick's was on Monday and by then 3 out of the 4 of us were sick.  Dominic got it first, then Vince, then me, and now Nick has it too.  We are hoping to all be healthy by surgery in about two weeks.  No new news on that end of things, but in about a week, we will get conformation of everything.  Here are some pictures of all the fun we have been having.

 This was his actual 3 month birthday, but Nick had to leave that day for is work trip so we just took some quick pictures.

 Dominic was not too into having his picture taken

 Here are the nice pictures we took after Nick got home

 I was pretty excited that we were all looking the same way in a couple of these :)

 Brother love!

 Such a big boy

 So these next two are pretty funny, with Nick he is all smiles and then with me, it looks like he is telling me, enough kisses :)

 Finally some smiles

  

Dominic's Surgery has been scheduled

We went to the cardiologist last Friday and had a good appointment.  It was a very long appointment because the did an EKG and Echo-Cardiogram again, but everything is maintaining how it should be.  They were very happy with his growth and said one of the reason he is doing so well is because the hole at the bottom of his heart is the smaller one.  Dominic actually has three hole's, two that need to be repaired and one that is so small, they don't think anything will need to be done to it.  The hole in the top chamber is the biggest one, but is not affecting him too badly at this point in time.  The Doctor told us a while ago that if possible they wanted Dominic to be at least 3 months old before surgery and to do it before flu season kicks in.  Some of that was dependent on if Dominic was doing well gaining weight and he is.  He weighed in at 12 lbs. 15 ounces and was 24 inches long.  The Doctor took a lot of time with us and talked us through what to expect as best as possible.  I can not say it enough times, Bronson is a great hospital.  All of the staff has been wonderful, whether it has been with Vince or Dominic.  The surgery is tentatively scheduled for November 27th at Motts Children's Hospital in Ann Arbor.  Being that Dominic's is not an emergency there is always the possibility that it could be postponed for one.  After surgery Dominic will most likely be in the hospital for 7-10 days.  We will all be staying in Ann Arbor during this time.  If the timing really does work out like this, it will be perfect because Dominic's Cardiologist has said he should be out of day care for six weeks and this would fit perfectly into Christmas break for the total 6 weeks, which means less time off from work.  We will continue to keep you all updated, but for now, this is all we know.  We don't have to go back to the Cardiologist until after surgery.  I know that many of you do, but if you would keep our family in your prayers that would be great.

Love,
Nick, Andrea, Vince, and Dominic

   

Up North

We wanted to get up north one more time before winter comes and Dominic has surgery so we went to Torch Lake two weeks ago.  It was a beautiful weekend and we were able to do everything that Vince loves up there.  He was able to throw rocks, go fishing, eat fresh donuts, play outside, see both sets of grandparents, go to Shanty Creek, and his new favorite - drive the boat.  We had to pack a whole summer into one weekend and we did a pretty good job.  Next year we will spend a lot more time up there, but this year it was just to busy.  Dominic also got to meet his Great Grandma Yuldine for the first time.  Both boys did surprisingly well on both car rides as well.   

 When we got there Friday night, Papa had a pile of rocks waiting for him

 Vince is a pretty wild driver, he likes to go fast

 Nick's huge catch of the day!  The worm was almost as big as the fish.

 Vince got to catch a fish too

 Great Grandma Yuldine

Four Generations 

Fall Color Pictures

So this post is just for fun, while we were up north a couple of weeks ago the trees were starting to turn, so I had to take pictures.  I think Nick got a little sick of me declaring how pretty everything was by the end of the weekend!