Good Morning, Good Night...

I was on the road again today with Owen for appointments. Thank goodness the roads were mostly clear and dry! God bless the road crews that work around the clock to get our beautiful Wisconsin winters off the roadways! As I was driving I noticed that since April I've put 10,000 miles on my mini-van... it has been well worth getting labeled as a 'Mini-van Mom' for all of these trips... I have to say, I would love to drive a sportier vehicle, but it's just not practical for us at the moment. At this particular moment I'm more about practicality than style in regards to my choice of vehicle. The spacious interior makes it easy to get the kids in/out and it's actually quite comfortable for the longer drives back and forth to the Twin Cities and Rochester.

Owen had his eyes checked in Stillwater and a heart ultrasound in Minneapolis- both appointments went spectacular! Dr. Schloff (Owen's eye doctor) is seeing measurable improvements in his eye crossing since surgery. We have been alternating patching his eyes in attempt to strengthen the outer eye muscles to avoid a second surgery. While a second surgery is not out of the picture just yet- things are improving without surgical intervention at this time. Since we have seen some nice improvements we are going to push a little harder and patch for 3 to 6 hours a day for the next three weeks and have another check-up on the 22nd of December. We'll go from there...

After the appointment in Stillwater we jetted over to Children's in Minneapolis to see Owens cardiologist. We would normally see her in St. Paul, but her schedule is quite busy and it just worked out that we could see her while we were in the area on the same day as his eye appointment. The Children's Hospital- Minneapolis is a beautiful facility with a nice cafeteria (where we had lunch), but the neighborhood it's located in is kind of shady.... ick! We definitely prefer St. Paul for that reason! When we hopped in the elevator to go to Owen's appointment there was a Mom and super cute little girl about Kiera's age getting in as well. I asked her if she could push the number 5 for me and you could just see how excited she was to push another button! Her mom helped her and when the little girl looked back to smile at me- you could see, her smile was just like Owen's. She had a little scar from her nose to her lip. I just smiled back and told her how pretty her smile was and it looked a lot like Owen's. Her Mom just smiled a polite smile to me- then I turned Owen (who was smiling like always) so he could see the duo. Then the Mom smiled bigger- she knew just what I meant by 'having a smile like Owen's'.   We chatted for a few minutes outside of the elevator :) They were from Northern Minnesota for check-ups as well. It was kind of nice to chat for a quick few minutes and relate to each other.

Owen had a 30 minute heart ultrasound before our visit with the doctor. He had to be very still for all of it- and he was! He drank his bottle and then with the help of one of the nurses we kept him playful and still at the same time! After a quick break in the office Owen's cardiologist reviewed his ultrasound and was excited to report the small hole in Owen's heart has finally spontaneously closed!!!  ....must be from all of the love you all send him! You just filled that little hole right up! :) We were also very happy to learn that the valve that gave the cardiologist some concern in the past is working very well and is a non-issue right now. With all of the good news the cardiologist told us to have a great day and see her in a COUPLE YEARS!!  AMEN! One less specialist visit on our calendars for awhile!

I also want to mention- since my last post we have been able to start giving Owen some toast & crackers! He LOVES it!! He can't get enough of feeding himself! ....he has also started to sit on the floor semi-independantly and has been getting to his knees and rocking for a few seconds at a time! -The AMAZING OWEN!

It was a really great day! Owen was so cheerful to everyone and his doctors... and we got all GOOD NEWS today! And to top it off the kids were really good tonight and we got a visit from Grandma and Grandpa Fox... I guess that's enough for now- Time for bed!

We hope you had a good day too! Thanks for all of your thoughts and prayers!

Hugs & Love, Sarah & Shelby Fox