Merry Christmas-Happy Birthday Jesus!

Hello Everyone!

We hope this post finds everyone happy, healthy and still very excited about the birth of Jesus. The Spiess household had a wonderful time celebrating Christmas. This was Jackson's 2nd Christmas at home as we were very blessed to have our son home last Christmas.

Jackson did get sick prior to Christmas but we are very happy to say that we think he is recovered from what he had. He went in and was diagnosed with an upper respiratory infection. The NP (Nurse Practitioner) listened to his lungs and they sounded fine! PHEW...then the next day he came down with a fever so they immediately but Jackson on antibiotics. His fever lasted 2 days and then we seemed to do a little better. He still had lots of drainage and a cough but they didn't think it was RSV which we were very, very thankful for. This occured on December 13th and Dec. 14th and he down for the rest of the weekend and then the majority of the next week. Jackson shared what he had with mom which was fine as long as she doesn't give it back to him. Mom went to the doctors immediately and they put her on antibiotics as a precaution since Jackson had been on them. We were very happy to have Jackson healthy again and getting his appetite back. He only lost a few ounces which was good news for us as we really thought he had lost more weight. We are not sure how Jackson caught whatever he had but we are as always very strict on the handwashing and only healthy people being around Jackson.

After the week of getting the household healthy again we were excited as this Christmas we were lucky to have Grandpa and Grandma Spiess come down and spend Christmas with us. Jackson loved to have the company and he started his babbling again. He talks and has been talking a little more but he went to town chatting with his Grandpa and Grandma especially at dinner time. He had lots to tell them and catch them up on. He is just babbling and will say Mamma/Dadda, but we are working on this.

On Christmas Eve Jackson opened his PJ's from Nanna and Papa and ;ut them on , then he read his Christmas stories. Mom's favorite is "The Story of Christmas". Of course still no church for Jackson, so dad and Jackson do their Father and son time together while mom attends mass. After Jackson goes to bed, Grandpa and Grandma relax after the long drive down here while dad starts to tackle the radio flyer wagon from Nana and Papa. Mom starts to help dad with the wagon (Dad and Mom couldn't wait to pull Jackson around in the wagon), then they arrange everything under the tree for the next morning...Plus we had to make room for Santa's gifts : ) Dad and Mom also took some time to relax and just sit and stare at the Christmas tree. It was nice to take a few minutes out of the busy day and talk about how Jackson will react in the morning.

The next morning Jackson gets up at his usual time (7 a.m. ish) and heads downstairs to get his morning bottle and wake up a little more....well once he saw the Christmas tree and the neat toys under it and the gifts, he was awake. He squealed and his eyes gleamed with excitment. We of course let him down to walk around and check out his new bike from mom and dad, his wagon and the gifts, then we headed for the bottle. Grandpa and Grandma wake up and we eat a little breakfast and start in on the stockings. Then we started opening all the wonderful gifts that were under the tree. Jackson loved so many of his gifts. He loved the tractor from Grandma and Grandpa and his tickle me elmo, his tricyle -everything. He was one overwhelmed little guy :- )

Later that evening we had our Christmas dinner and sat around and chatted. Jackson loved daddy's corn dish. He also enjoyed some stuffing.

Jackson's Journey's: End of September through End of November

Hello Everyone!


We hope that you get a chance to check up on this post....We know it is long overdue.

We can't post pictures to the blog right now as our computer crashed on us and we are working on repairing the hard drive. However, we did get the phanfare site loaded with pictures from October to November prior to the system crashing... You can find our family photo albums at the following link: http://spiess-archives.phanfare.com


We pray everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving and that this post finds everyone preparing for Christmas.


The Spiess Family had/has lots of Thanks to give out to everyone! We thank God every day for our little miracle man and are very blessed that he continues to progress well. We want to thank all the staff at the hospitals for their support during our NICU stay and for taking great care of our little man. We hope to make some rounds on December 17th- our "Spiess Family Day" also the day Jackson came home from the NICU to thank many people. Jackson however, will be hanging out outside as it is that nasty season (colds, flu, RSV, etc). We also can't thanks all our Friends and Family for their support. We can't thank you enough. The Ronald McDonald House we thank you for giving us a place to stay close to our little man during our NICU days. It means so much to be close to your baby when they are struggling to survive and then as they grow and start get Milk vs IV fluids. THANK YOU!





Jackson is 14 months old and twelve days! Corrected age is almost 11 months. We sure are getting big and he is growing fast.





So what has been going on with Jackson....Well, we left off with Jackson Big Birthday and then we rolled into October. Jackson had a fabulous Halloween. He was able to have Nana and Papa here for Halloween. We dressed Jackson up in the costume that he picked out. Yes Jackson picked it out. We showed him a Tigger costume and then the Lion costume and he went nuts for the lion costume. It was hilarious. There was a lady in the store laughing about it. We picked his outfit out pretty early so that he could go with us and plus we were excited as this was Jackson's 2nd Halloween but first Halloween we could put a costumer on him. We weren't going to take him trick-or-treating but...he loved to watch the kids so we put him in the stroller and stayed a distance from everyone, yet we were able to be apart of the fun . We went to our neighbors houses who know all about Jackson and the situation and "fake" trick or treated...as in we just had them act like they were giving him candy so we could get a picture.





In November we kept busy with trying to get the house in order- does that really every happen when you have kids though?



We also are preparing for Jackson's little brother to come. Yes, Jackson is going to have a little brother. We are very excited and very scared. We have kept this pretty low key about the pregnancy but mom is now rounded out and we are praying to make it to 40 weeks...The first trimester was pretty rough as far as morning sickness but now we seem to be back into the swing of things. Baby Spiess is at 20 weeks gestation now and due on April 22nd...or mom likes to say - April 22nd or AFTER...



Jackson is also very excited to announce he has two new cousins, Evynn and Avery. They decided to take after their cousin Jackson and be NICU babes too! They were born at 29 weeks and we thank God for their progress as they are home and from the emails and pictures they look really good. We pray they continue to do well and stay healthy. We also thank you for all your prayers for them. I know they were on the prayer list up in Michigan and Archbold.



We celebrated Thanksgiving with the immediate family (Dad, Mom, and Jackson). We kept pretty busy trying to get all our Christmas shopping done while mom had some time off work and dad was home, along with getting out Christmas decorations! We had a very good Thanksgiving and hope everyone else did too!



Jackson has grown so much over the past 3 months. It seems like our baby is such a little boy now. He still likes to be rocked, read to and sang to at night-(He can even fall asleep to mom's singing which is a miracle in itself- ha ha). During the days, Jackson is a mover and a shaker. He is checking everything out. He also waves, and likes to put his toys together and take them apart. He babbles alot. He says Dadda and Mamma however, he doesn't us the words to necessarily address us only on occassion. Developmentally through our therapy appointments, Jackson is doing really well in motor skills and is working on his speech. Developmentally through mom and dad, Jackson is doing excellent! We are so proud of him.



Jackson's doctor's appointments continue to be "normal" as in we only go when we need vaccines or shots. Jackson is now up to 20lbs w/out clothes on and 21 lbs with clothes on! We are so happy about this.





Jackson is definitely getting around alot more. He is WALKING - yes Walking. When we left off Jackson was crawling and wanting to walk in the last blog but he definitely is walking now. His movement keeps us on our toes and we love every minute of it. Jackson goes to bed around 9 p.m. at night and lately mom has joined him on that bed time. Jackson still averages his 10 to 12 hours of sleep. We are thankful that he is getting more towards 12 hours of sleep with his naps during the day as they say in all the books mom reads, how important the sleep is. This actually has worried mom for awhile but now that he is starting to take a little longer nap in the day, I think he will be fine. We are so blessed for where Jackson is at and we can't thank everyone enough for this as we know it takes lots of prayers and excellent medical care to have a baby born so early come so far. We keep all the NICU babies and babies in our prayers along with all of you!



We want to Thank all those fighting for us too! We know many were away from their families during Thanksgiving and will be away during Christmas. THANK YOU!



We hope to have another update right before Christmas but if not then shortly after. We also have Christmas Cards on the way.



Many Blessings to all of you,

Kyle, Erica, Jackson and Baby