SWIMMING TIME WITH MY BROTHER!!!

Frankie & Sammi sharing an ice cream sundae!

Growing up....

Just a little update on Sammi....Sammi is walking from furniture to furniture and sometimes she tries to take off across the room and she makes it a little bit, but not too far before falling...but she tries really hard! She is starting to say more words and she loves to dance and sing, but most of all likes to do everything her big brother is doing (or at least tries to). She loves to play the Beatle Rock Band and DS with her brother, as well as the guitar and drums. Her laugh is as beautiful as she is! Sammi is getting ready for her next catherization next month to see if her first two surgeries have worked....so please pray for our little angel.....She still doesn't like to eat much solid foods, but she does like bannanas and frozen rasberry yogart and she absolutely loves chocolate (she tries to take Frankie's chocolate..lmao). We are enjoying every second with her....her smile brightens the room, her laughter is contagious....she has the best big brother in the world who doesn't every yell at her and gives her everything she wants...he even spends his christmas and birthday money on presents for her.....I have two awesome kids! We will keep you updated after her cath next month. Thank you everyone for your continued prayers, thoughts, text messages, emails, calls, letters, cards....they give us strength and they remind us that we are not alone and we have so many people pulling for Sammi - thank you, thank you!

Sammi update...

I havent' had much time latley to update my blog and many people have been e-mailing asking me to just write a little note on how Samantha is doing....she is doing great. She has almost recovered 100% from her surgery. She is happy and is crawling all over the place. She is "cruising" from one piece of furniture to the next and any day now, we expect her to take off across the room! She is saying more words now and she is definitely daddy's little girl - temper and all! I am having trouble with downloading pictures of her, but once I figure it out, I will post some new pics....Sam's next surgery is in July and then we find out at that time what the next plan is...thank you everyone for thinking of her and praying for her....we so do appreciate it.

Sugery 4/7

Sorry I haven't posted an update on Samantha's surgery that took place last Wednesday, I have just been really busy. Samantha made it through the surgery - she is in a lot of pain and is not eating very well, but she is okay. We have to wait 12 weeks before she can have a catherization done to see if the surgery worked or not and then we wait...wait for her colleterals to grow so they can do the third part (open heart surgery) or as they told us, if they don't grow then there is nothing left to be done. Thank you everyone for your thoughts, prayers, text messages and messages, Bobby and I really appreciate all of the support and care for Samantha.

Second Surgery Scheduled for 4/7

I promised I would let everyone know when Sammi's second major heart surgery is scheduled and we just scheduled it for next Wednesday, April 7th....after this one, there is one more HUGE surgery to go this year and then we can breathe easy for 3 years before the next one's start...

Going Ahead with 2nd heart surgery

Sammi's doctor called us yesterday and advised that the surgeon wants to go ahead with the second part of her heart surgery and that we should not be overly concerned with her aneurysm, as the aneurysm is surrendered by scar tissue. So we are now waiting for the call to set the date for her surgery, which they want to do within the next 3 weeks. After this surgery, she has one more that must be done before the end of the year and that is the huge one, where they will finish the unifocilization (making a pulmonary artery), put a coil on the aneurysm and fix the thickening of the walls of her heart. Then we can take a breather for a bit before the next round of surgeries start.

Samantha is doing great and she now started crawling. She is a really happy baby - she loves spongebob square pants, yo gabba gabba, books, music and she especially loves playing with Frankie.

As hard as this has been on her and all of us, she keeps fighting and she hasn't given up! She is definitely my inspiration!

Result of Sammi's cath on 3/1

Sammi's catherization results were not as positive as we had hoped for. They found an aneurysm near her lungs, so now can not move forward with the 2nd part of the unifocilization (heart surgery) until they figure out what to do. Her stenosis of the aortic valve is also really bad. We are waiting for her cardiologist at CHOP and her surgeon to have a conference call with 35 to 40 top pediatric surgeons/cardilogists to discuss her case and see how they should proceed. Everything they are doing for Samantha is new and as they put it, "they are paving new grounds with her" as what she has is the worse case recorded. Nothing has been easy and for once I would just like the doctor's to come out and say they have good news and that never happens. We should know more next Wednesday. I just ask that you all pray for Samantha - our little fighter needs your prayers right now. Thank you! I will post again after I speak to the doctor next week!

Samantha's weight

WELL ARE LITTLE FIGHTER IS STILL GOING STRONG AND PROVING ALL THE DOCTORS WRONG!!! SHE WEIGHS A LITTLE BIT OF 14 POUNDS NOW! SHE HAS SKIPPED CRAWLING, BUT IS TRYING TO WALK! HER NEXT CATHERIZATION IS MARCH 1ST AND THEN WITHIN 2 WEEKS AFTER THAT HER SECOND PART OF HER UNIFOCILAZATION.....SHE IS MY STRENGTH AND KEEPS ME FIGHTING! SHE NEVER GIVES UP!

Community Helps Our Daughter!

We are so greatful to our community for helping us to help our daughter...below is a link to a newspaper article on how they are helping our daughter and another little girl!

http://www.lohud.com/article/20100123/NEWS03/1230347/Stony-Point-Seals-get-ready-to-brave-cold?GID=w4rg51ZiH4uTBrQOvtgFmAalF3b2T/FUZXECQAoBFYA%3D