A little Christmas Greeting for you all!

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Brinlee Hospital Book

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My Loves of a Lifetime

I have been thinking a lot lately about how blessed we are as a family.  I have so many things to be grateful for, and each member in our family is one of those.  I thought I would post a picture or two of the loves of my life just to try to catch you all up.  We all know these posts are few and far between, and that probably is not going to change.  I really hope that you all keep up the great work at posting more often than me though because they are so fun to read. ;)

So Brinlee has been walking for about a month now.  In fact, she is almost running now.  I thought this clip really captured her skills as well as her great personality.

 The girls posing about a month and a half ago.  They have both been changing so fast.  Brinlee has gained 2.5 pounds since her birthday July 25.  She is a whopping 17 lb, 15 month old now.  Aubree is quite the girly girl.  She has to have some form of pink on everyday.  Just recently she has started wanting to wear her hair down.  I have been missing the pigtails.

 Aubree got a castle cake complete with a princess and crowns for her 3rd birthday. Notice the color theme once again (pink, pink, pink, or yeah and a little purple).

 Barrett was a cowboy for Halloween, but this outfit would be him most of the time anyway.  He loves roping and wearing his boots with his pants tucked inside of them.

 Yes, I know you are surprised, but Aubree was a princess for Halloween.  Kellon was a motorcross rider and Brinlee was the scowling cow.

 My brother, Brady got married Aug. 7, and these are a couple of pictures taken there.

Kellon loves taking care of Brinlee, and she likes it most of the time.  These pictures, however, don't reflect that very well.  You can see the oxygen cord in this one.  We were so happy when Brinlee was taken off that leash about a month after we came home from Denver (Aug. 30).  She really started getting mobile then.





I took some pictures of the kids at the beginning of August. It was hard to get babies to smile and big kids to stop smiling (cheesy) when Mom was the photographer, but we managed a few pretty good ones.



I was bad and took her oxygen off for a few pictures.

 

My first grader that is already chest high to his Mom.

Kellon is so grown up and loving 1st grade.  He is reading pretty much anything now and even silently.  I am sure that my kids are geniuses (in my unbiased opinion).

What a natural.

I told Barrett to picture himself giving Aubree a swirly to get this "real" smile.



Doesn't Brinlee looked thrilled to be there.



And last but not least, the greatest husband and dad ever.



 We have had a beautiful fall here with lots of beautiful sunrises and sunsets that I have attempted to capture with my camera.  The leaves were also so pretty.

Heart Mountain at sunset









A beautiful autumn sunrise



The huge ash tree in our yard.

The same tree from underneath.





End in Sight

Just wanted to let you all know that the doctors are finally talking about the day we will go home.  If all of Brinlee's blood work and chest xrays look good tomorrow, we will be released to the Ronald McDonald House for the weekend.  Then we will have a post-op appointment Monday.  That means that there is starting to be a light at the end of the tunnel for us (and those that are taking care of our other kids :) ) Brinlee is really doing better.  She is starting to act like our smiley, fun-loving baby again.  We know that she is healthy enough to leave because she throws a fit everytime any healthcare worker (nurse, doctor or janitor) comes too close.

Lizzy and Angie are two of our CPCU nurses.  Brinlee was okay with them as long as she had her fuzzy.

Sporting her new hair flower I put together yesterday to match her outfit.

What else do we do at the hospital for entertainment?

"When can we go out there?"

Silly Daddy

Laughing is the best medicine.

The balloons from Grandpa and Grandma Barrett, Teecee, Kellon, Barrett and Aubree have been a fun toy.

Happy Birthday Barrett!

Barrett has been so anxious for this special day of the year since a week after his birthday last year.  He has asked me many times over the past year, "Mom, how many days until my birthday?"  I usually gave him a rough estimate and made sure he knew it was a long time.  Now look at how fast the time really has gone. We are so excited for Barrett to be a big five year old.  I can't hardly believe we have been blessed to have this special boy in our family for half a decade already. :)  I wish that I could be home to celebrate with him today, but he is going to get his daddy on his birthday--ssshhh its a surprise.  We had an "un-birthday" party for him the day before we left.

  We hoped that he would understand that we couldn't be with him today.  He was a great sport about it, but every once in a while he would say, "I am going to have my real birthday party at 9:30 at night so that Mommy and Daddy can make it because they are going to be in Denver."  We decided when Brinlee moved out of the ICU and was doing so much better that Brice should be his birthday present today.  Barrett is such a bright spot in our family.  He always gives really good loves and snuggles when we need them.  He is also a great friend to his brother and sisters, always willing to play spies with Kellon or house with the girls.  We love you so much Bert!!

Living separate lives

Right now our family is living two separate lives.  Brinlee, Brice and I are in Denver because Brinlee had her third heart surgery on Thursday.  We have been here since Monday, and it looks like we will be here at least a couple of weeks.  My cousin Marcie and most of her family have been in Denver this week, so we have met up with them a couple of times.  It is always fun to see Rocky and his girlfriend Tiffany since they live here in Denver while they are in physical therapy school.  Brice, Brinlee and I had a free day on Tuesday.  We decided to eat some Thai and Indian food and go to the zoo.  It was fun to have a carefree day before the real serious stuff started.

Brinlee has been holding her own since the surgery on Thursday.  It took 11 hours in the operating room, so she has taken some time just to get everything besides her heart functioning well again.  We miss her loves and smiles since she is sleeping under sedation all of the time right now, but she should be able to wake up in the next couple of days as she continues to heal and has more energy to spend on being awake.  In the meantime, I have actually have time to update my blogs and check my email.  I know you are all so surprised.  If you want to check out a couple of the most recent cakes Teecee and I have worked on, our new blog is sisterssweets.blogspot.com.

Kellon, Barrett and Aubree are staying with Grandpa and Grandma Barrett and Teecee right now.  They have been having fun picking strawberries--I think they are up to 8 gallons.  Also, they have helped wean lambs.  For the 4th of July Grandma, Grandpa and Teecee took the kids to the rodeo in Red Lodge yesterday and the parade in Cody today.  They are having so much fun!  It sounds like most of them crash in the afternoon because they are going from pretty early in the morning until later in the evening.  We are so grateful to them for taking care of the kids and everything at our house.  It definitely takes a load off of our mind to have that taken care of at home.

Where in the world has time gone?

Just playing with Daddy on a Sunday afternoon

Aubree was not too excited about Clifford up close at the library and I thought it was hilarious ;)

I have been getting a lot of grief about not updating my blog since last fall, so I decided to give a "brief" synopsis of our lives right now. We had a great Christmas and a welcomed "healthy month" of January, but that is where normal life as we knew it ended. Brinlee came down with pneumonia and RSV in February and was diagnosed the end of February with congenital heart disease. Brinlee and I spent 6 weeks in Denver waiting for her first heart surgery while Brice and the kids were here, there and everywhere. We have started a care page for Brinlee that has the details of our journey with her. The address is http://www.caringbridge.org/ Go there and then go to brinleegeorge for the website. If you sign up for the site, you will receive emails when I update the page. We are enjoying being back at home until May 25 because Brinlee is scheduled for her next surgery on May 27 in Denver. I am so excited for spring and have loved the flowers and bushes in my yard that have started to bloom. Above are a few pictures from the past month. Brinlee is already 9 months old! Kellon is loving school, and is a great little reader already--it is amazing how fast he learns. Barrett and Aubree are best friends and spend there days entertaining Brinlee mostly. Brice will be walking in two weeks for his graduation with his associates from NWC here in Powell. The craziness with Brinlee has put him back a semester for his bachelor's, so he should be done with classes in December and student teaching next spring. I am staying busy with the kids, yard work and a primary stuff