Jackson's Journeys in June...

Hello Everyone,

We are very excited to give you our Journey in June! We can't thank everyone enough for everything! All the prayers are keeping our little guy progressing in a very positive way! THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU.

Our June Journey starts out with LOTS of excitment (Picture of Jackson tells all)...as Nana and Papa Shepard are visiting! We couldn't wait and we definitely were ready to have them come visit. We have been anxiously awaiting the summer time for all the Grandparents to be able to come see their grandbaby. We also have been needing to see our parents too!
Our June schedule started off with ...
Nana and Papa were expected to arrive on June 5th.
Daddy was supposed to head to Tawain on June 4th and Mom was start work full time on June 6th.

Well, we were so happy that our events slightly changed. Dad's flight to Tawain was delayed until Tuesday, June 5th (thank you Texas Weather!) and Nana & Papa safely made it to Texas on June 4th!

June 4th:
Dad, mom and Jackson anxiously await for Nana and Papa to arrive.
Nana and Papa arrive....! They come in, wash their hands really well, change and love on Jackson.

After all the excitment from Nana and Papa's arrival we decide to go on an outting. Nana and Papa take Jackson to Target to get his exersaucer. Daddy wanted to see Jackson use it before he left so around 9 p.m. at night we are putting together an exersaucer. We did take Jackson with us too. We had to be very careful, but we had enough people that pretty much Papa and mom were able to attend to Jackson while Nana and daddy shop for J. We are pretty sure we won't be trying too many Target trips in the near future though. With 4 people it was easy but if it was only mom and dad, Target just wouldn't be ideal to take Jackson too. They stay busy even at night.

Also, Jackson was immediately okay with Nana and Papa. We were worried how he would react to them holding him, etc, as you never know how he will react. He loves visiting with people and watching them but there haven't been that many people other than mom and dad holding Jackson since he has been home from the NICU. He definitely had no problem taking to Nana and Papa. Infact, I think he enjoyed the change in "scenery"


Tuesday, June 5th-

Mom drops dad off at the airport, heads to work to donate blood at their quarterly blood drive! THANK YOU DELL for doing the Quarterly Blood Drives! They mean so much to so many families...

Our family will never forget the need for blood and how scary it was to know we could lose Jackson because we do not have enough O negative blood in the Austin area. They ended up finding Onegative blood in Dallas finally but with all the patients out there needing blood, it sure is great to have all these blood drives.


Well, mom started back to work on the 6th of June leaving Nana and Papa in charge after only 2 days of training. It has been 29 years since they had to take care of a little one full time - you need time to get some training.

They did a great job. Mom was able to go physically into work and see people! It was so nice. She started full time on the 6th, 7th and 8th. It was great to be back at work, see people and thank everyone in person (which she still has lots more thanks and hugs for people). However, the separation from Jackson was hard very hard.

Well, Jackson seemed to be living it up with Nana and Papa. It definitely helped knowing that Nana and Papa were taking care of Jackson during the first month of mom going back to work. After the first week things seemed to get a lot better and it wasn't as hard leaving Jackson at home while going into work (still wasn't easy) but wasn't as hard. It is hard to think that something may happen while mom is in the office and someone else would need to do CPR on Jackson so mom really is happy that she can work from home and does that more often now. Plus when the nanny starts mom will definitely be working from home full time. This way if something comes up, mom is there to help out in an emergency and it is hard to leave your baby with a stranger in your home.

Dad's first separation from Jackson:
In the interim Daddy and Jackson get to visit via Skype (video conferencing) and the separation for Daddy and Jackson was hard. Very Hard. Daddy sure did miss his little man and Jackson missed him.


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We sure do appreciate all those who are fighting for our country and who are separated from their families for months....THANK YOU to all the troops everywhere who are away from their families because they are fighting for us. THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!
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We also are looking for a Nanny again as the nanny we had lined backed out. We were very disappointed but we have found out that everything happens for a reason.


June 12th comes up and this means...our Physical Therapy appointment!

Ginger visits Jackson and once again Jackson can not stay focused as he just wants to watch Ginger. It makes it hard to do therapy but it is funny as he just loves her. It is hilarious to watch him just look at her and smile. Jackson's tortacollis (stiff neck) doesn't seem too severe this week. Jackson is wanting to crawl and we are very proud of his progress. He is frogging his legs out a little so Ginger drops off some "hip hugger" pants for us to use when we are doing belly time. Jackson doesn't seem to mind the pants at all. Ginger and mom discuss the helmet for Jackson's head shape. He has a slight flat head on one side. We are given a recommendation on a cosmetic surgeon whom also teams up with a neurosurgeon for an evaluation. Jackson is working really hard on crawling. He wants to crawl so bad and he is sitting up much better on his own now! We are so pleased with his progress!

During the week of June 12th, mom of course gets online and reads-up on flat head and helmets. She chats with Papa Shepard about it and calls the pediatrician's office to find out if he needs to see a cosmetic surgeon or neurosurgeon and get some background on some physicians. She ends up going to the Neurosurgeon to ensure Jackson's flat spot is only caused by positioning and not closing of the sutures. Of course our appointment date with the Neurosurgeon isn't until end of July.....but we are on the cancellation list.

June 10th: We start house hunting for Nana and Papa! Yes they are "just " looking but it was a lot of fun. We are finding so many things we can do with Jackson. We are very, very careful with what he touches, we touch and people touching him. However, we have been told to get him "exposed" a little. It is great to get him outside and around. Jackson picked out a few houses that he thought Nana and Papa should buy. One of them had a little boys room already painted with a football theme for him : )

June 16th:
Daddy comes home from Tawain and in time for FATHER's DAY! We all were very excited to be able to have daddy home prior to Father's Day. In the morning we just spent the day getting ready for daddy to come home.
In the evening we have a gift opening session for Nana and Papa to celebrate very belated birthdays, and Mother's Day gift.

June 17th: FATHER's DAY!
Happy Belated Father's Day to Daddy's!
Daddy's are so important to their little ones....you deserve a round of applause for all those GREAT DADDY's out there!

We are very excited as we get to watch Daddy and Papa open their Father's day gifts and Jackson helps them with the gift opening.


June 18th:
Well, great news, Mary from Dr. Aronin's office calls mom and we get Jackson in to Dr. Aronin office on Friday! Yes, Friday June 22nd! We are so very happy about his news. For those of you who know mom well, she is a worrier anyways so giving a month for an appointment gave mom way too much time to research things and worry : ) She is getting better about this though as Jackson gets older.

June 20th:
Nana and Mom have a girls night out and see Dancing with the Stars! It was alot of fun. So much fun we forgot to take pictures : ( The boys ordered Applebees and hung out together.

June 22nd-
Boy oh Boy are we happy. Dr. Aronin gives Jackson a great report and indicates that it isn't Jackson's sutures closing. She doesn't even think the head shape looks that bad. It is up to us to make the decision about the helmet but she mentions if it was her son, she wouldn't put him in a helmet as the headshape isn't bad. He also is spending much more time on his belly and there is still a window of time that his head will round out a little more. He is at the "slower" part of that curve for his head to round out (first 6 months is where you can see the most difference). Mom and Dad end up deciding to take the advice of pending the helmet at least for another month to see where we are at.

June 23rd-
We head down to Zilker Park to take Jackson on the Train and boy the fun we had....We walked around and then luckily the rain held off long enough for Papa to take Jackson on his train ride that he has been promising him since the NICU days. We had a ball. It was a little tense with all the people and kids around but Daddy sat in the seat in front of mom and papa, then mom and papa sat with Jackson in a seat together, then Nana sat in a seat behind us. The only people who could reach out and touch Jackson would be family. We of course made sure there was enough seats to do this -originally Nana and dad were sitting together, then we realized they had plenty of seats open for use to do this.

June 29th:
We are sad as the trip for Nana and Papa is coming to an end. They headed out on Friday, June 29th. Prior to departure, they ended up finding some property in Liberty Hill that are buying. They found the property on Thursday afternoon. We are so excited.

We also have another doctors appointment at Dr. Unites office for Jackson's 9 month visit! Oh boy, are we so happy to say that Jackson weighs in at 16lbs 13 oz and his heights is 27 inches long! He is doing very well and e get the go ahead to start Jackson on more baby cereals and progress our way up to baby foods : )

We get home from the appointment and tell Nana and Papa all the wonderful news from the appointment. Later that afternoon, Nana and Papa head on the road... it is so quiet at home now : ( We can't thank Nana and Papa enough for taking care of Jackson during June. It is a lot of work taking care of a little one and we appreciate all their support! We love you!




We are bored without Nana and Papa and miss the company but we know that pretty soon Grandpa and Grandma Spiess will be here so we are excited all over again and anxiously await their arrival.


July 2nd:
Diane starts as Jackson's Nanny!!!!!!!!
Mrs. Diane, Jackson's Nanny starts and what a blessing it is to have found Diane. This was a big stress for dad and mom over the past month. We just are so happy to have found her. We did go through a nanny agency to find Diane (Moms Best Friend). She is wonderful! She has been taking excellent notes on Jackson's feeds and schedules and prewires mom about anything she notices being a little different. We know she has only been with us for a week but Jackson really loves Diane. She takes very good care of him during the day. We are very happy to have Diane as apart of family.

July 3rd:
Jackson goes to his Development appointment at Children's Hospital with Mary Stoner. We are at the new Dell Children's Hospital Location and boy is it nice. We really like the new facility and so does the staff. We go through Jackson's development testing which is a series of tasks Jackson has to do. He has to try to pick up a cup, bang the ring on the counter, pick up cubes, follow the rings with his eyes, play peekaboo, etc. They evaluate Jackson against his corrected age which was almost 6 months old on July 3rd! Boy, Jackson is stocking up on his lollipop count that we owe him : ) We tell him after his appointments that he will get a lollipop or ice cream for being such a good boy....We have a lot of IOU's to Jackson. Mom is going to change the treat to apples pretty soon : ) (an apple a day keeps the doctor away)

July 4th:
Happy Happy 4th of July! What a wonderful day! Yes, we had more rain, but it was nice just to hang out and do nothing...well, mom cleaned the house! We even watched the fireworks on TV. This is a first for us (watching fireworks on TV)! It was actually rather fun. We joined in on all the songs they were singing and boy New York, Washington and Houston sure do a GREAT fireworks display.

We are very, very thankful to all for so many things. We are blessed to have all the support from our family and friends. We thank God everyday for Jackson's health and development. Thank you for all the prayers and we pray that this blog update finds everyone happy and healthy! We also are praying for all the families who are going through very rough times with the flash flooding. We look forward to drier weather.

We are very excited as although the week is quiet...we are anxiously awaiting the arrival of Grandpa and Grandma Spiess ..They left on July 4th and should arrive on July 6th!

We love you all and can't thank you enough for all your support.....Jackson can't wait to meet everyone!

Love,
Kyle , Erica and Jackson