Thanks

Wow, what an amazing shout of support and encouragment. Thank you so much to everyone who has encouraged us with comments and emails and hugs. I liked Alex's comment..."I think people are genuinely happy for us!"...which was stated with a look of wonder.

I have felt so much hope and happiness during this pregancy and it is so great to finally share that with everyone. It has been a very easy pregancy so far, and I haven't had any trouble keeping up with things around here. I had a bit of night-time nausea in the beginning and started Diclectin for that, which was very effective. Other than that, no issues.

Just to 're-cap' for anyone who wonders. With each pregnancy, there is a 1 in 4 chance of the baby being affected by the same disorder as the girls. It isn't linked to gender, and there is no way for us to find out ahead of time. If we had pursued it years ago, we could have gone through the expensive process to find the genetic marker that would allow us to check the baby for that marker via amniocentesis. We still don't feel the necessity of knowing during the pregancy, we would much rather have hope for the future. When the baby is born, a urine sample will be taken, and we'll know within 7 days if the baby is affected.

We had a wonderful Easter, sharing our news with our families. You can see some pics below. The girls travelled very well (hopefully that means we can get out a lot during the summer). Ashley has had a few more medication increases and she is doing MUCH better. She still wants to be held a lot, but has many more happy, quiet moments.

Hope is doing fantastic. She had a few days of cooing, smiling and almost laughing when I played patty cakes with her. Shocking! The last couple days she hasn't been as energetic because the seizures tripled in number and kept her drowsy.

We had a productive day of appts yesterday. Hope got her first stander, and I'll hopefully have some pics soon. Ashley had her KidKart re-adjusted, and her feet/leg splints adjusted. I also found real shoes for the girls, which is truly a landmark. The girls feet are rather puffy and their toes curl under, so it's hard to find roomy shoes that fit their 'fat' little feet, and allow me to pull their toes flat. I can't imagine trying to stand with your toes curled under.

In the pics below, you'll see my Dad holding Ashley, while Brodie tries to read a story to his cousin, Ian. Ian couldn't bring himself to sit still though! My mom is holding Hope is the next one.