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Mary Elizabeth is now officially 3 1/2 years old. She wishes it was her birthday, as it seems everyone’s birthday is lately and she has to wait a whole nother 6 months!!!!

Anyway, I must admit 3 1/2 is better than when she was 2 1/2. But we still have our battles. Over all she’s pretty good. She’s just very independent which can be a very good thing…. but she also thinks she’s the boss… which isn’t a very good thing.

She is doing great in school, she loves it completely. She does well in the class as she’s quite smart. She learned a trick in putting her own coat on (puts it on the floor upside down, arms in and throws it over her head). She cuts things non stop as she learned how to use scissors. I suppose she could’ve done it before if I let her… and now that she likes to do it, I have kid scissors at home. It was nice… until she cut up things she wasn’t supposed to – like someone’s card we got for their birthday right before we were about to leave! Oye!

She helps out a lot with her brother, getting him things and entertaining him. Sometimes she can be overbearing to him, but they really do love eachother. She is always asking to help out. Loves to cook and sort of pretend to clean… (wiping things with paper towel or sweeping).

She is always singing different songs, or making her own up and loves playing with toy guitars and drums. She is quite the little musical girl. Recently she was at her father’s show with us and got on stage with him!!! It was sooooo very adorable~!

She has a great imagination, as she has her imaginary friend. She sometimes will pretend to be in school and tell the kids what to do as if she was a teacher or something. She still loves dress up and to play with her dolls. She puts them to bed, dresses them over and over again and changes their gauze (as we change the gauze around her gtube every day as well). She also likes to put us to bed. Me, her grandmas, my brothers and so on. She’s quite the character.

As for her condition…. the upcoming surgeries are as follows:

December 11th- Dental Surgery. Not sure what will happen yet, but we are certain she needs work. One of her teeth are bothering her and another one at the top seems to have some decaying going on. Once again, this is a battle for her as she doesn’t have much, if any, saliva due to the malformation in her mouth. Also things get trapped in there from the lack of room and trouble chewing and eating. So she continues to see the dentist every 6 months and usually we juts go straight to the OR so he can clean and fix whatever needs to be done. We are hoping that when she is older we’ll have a better solution for her and well as we know adult teeth are a bit stronger. We heard about a spray that can act like saliva. We are researching this but so far have found its not good for children.

February 10th- Sclerotherapy. This should be her last sclerotherapy. Basically the injections are only good on certain cysts so they don’t have a lot left to do with the injections. We have seen some good results with the sclerotherapy, and some that we can’t see (deep pockets inside) have also been taken care of due to this so we are fortunate that it has worked well for her. The dr did note that some areas where the cysts were have a lot of tissue (scar tissue and fatty tissue) in it’s place which can be taken care of in the future, as sort of a plastic surgery when they smooth out things. But this will be when other things are taken care of.

So soon she’ll be going back to Dr. Waner. Some things we know will happen is she will definitely have some surgeries where they will have to do some cutting, which I’m sure will mean a drain- which I’m sure she won’t be happy about now that she’s older (haven’t had one in a long time). She also will have her tonsils removed at some point to create more room in the airway. And well that big jaw surgery will be in the future as well (around age 5 from what I know). So more to go, but as you know she’s a tough little cookie and a happy little girl with lots of love and prayers surrounding her always.

3 1/2 years later, she’s still one of our greatest blessings!

At 20 lbs 5 oz, and 27 inches long…. my little baby Andrew is 11 months
today! That means I have one month until his birthday when he turns
ONE! Oh my! The year has totally flown by. I cannot believe it. I
thought ME’s first year went fast but this whoa- just so much faster.
Having the two of them- you don’t have as much time on your hands.
It
is nice though that when ME is at preschool I get to spend quality time
with him while he’s a baby. Trying to cherish each moment – ya know. He
can certainly be a momma’s boy. But he loves everyone and always has a
smile for ya!
As you know, he’s been walking all throughout his 10
month – and sometimes he’s pretty quick on his toes. He’s learning how
to catch himself and be careful on rocky terrain so to speak.
He’s
now been saying BYE in addition to HI. And I don’t know if I mentioned
this, but he loves to sing when you sing. Though he can’t say all the
words he babbles and does this "aahh" type sound with the babble while
you sing as if he is singing along. He really looks like he’s trying.
It’s sooo cute.
And… He’s FINALLY getting his first tooth! Just Sunday his Aunt
Michelle felt something sharp popping up through the gums. It’s not
quite visible yet but it’s definitely there. Him and ME have been
pretty similar in their milestones but as for the tooth he beat her by
2 months. I guess my kids just get’em later ish.
So anyway….
with his birthday only a month away I’m busy planning. We’re having a
baby sesame street birthday party. I didn’t have time to go all out- or
the money, but it still will be really nice!

Now if we can just slow down the next month a little- that might help!

Mommy and Daddy are back from their weekend getaway. And they had a lovely time. Philadelphia was great! From the horse & buggy ride, sight seeing and going to a museum, then to the comedy club and dinner at night… they had a nice time. Lots to see in the city too and beautiful weather to boot!

Check out the pictures on the picture pages on this site to see some of the shots we took. Not too many but you’ll get the idea.

Upon our arrival home we were greeted lovingly by an enthusiastic little girl. Mary Elizabeth always puts a smile on our face. And she gave us the biggest hug. But of course she had a great time at Grandma & Grandpa’s house and also hung out with her Aunt and Uncle too!

Drew decided that he was going to pick up the pace with walking and now is letting go and walking across rooms and all. So it’s pretty much official that he’s full fledged walking. Sometimes he walks a bit sideways or diagonal. And sometimes he tries to run… I have to remind him that he’s still learning to walk, running is not yet an option! hahaha.

So all is well with the Raia family. 🙂 We’ll keep you posted on any other news.

Lots going on in our little Raia family…

First of all, Drew has weaned off of nursing this past week, which was very hard for mommy- I think I just hate that he’s growing up too fast! But he’s doing great with his bottles and has no problem with it… after all he’ll eat and drink just about anything- such a piggy.

And to add to our little man growing up too fast… he took his first steps today. Started with a couple coming from the couch to the gate that was up – and then 3 to mommy etc… then when we got home he took about 4 steps to Andy. So I’m sure more will come on that, yep he’s on his way to walking!

Thursday, Mary Elizabeth attended her first field trip with her
preschool. Mommy joined along. She just absolutely loved it. We went to
a farm nearby for apple picking. She did great, and well- I think she
enjoyed eating the apples just as much. She loved being around her
friends from school and having fun at the farm which was really cute
too.

Mommy & Daddy are currently excited because in 5 days they will head to Philly for their weekend getaway. It’s a much needed time away and we’ll have a great time- but we’ll most likely miss the heck out of our little adorable kids.