colin&julia.com

Lost

jtoke — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 01:08:42 +0000

I see you but I don’t

I hear you speak silence

personal obession turns me deaf

new life maybe reminded of fear not so sure

It’s my turn now

you figure it out.

No news is good news

ctoke — Tue, 20 May 2008 15:00:44 +0000

Hi friends and family,

So it’s been awhile since we have emailed any updates because things have been pretty calm around the Toke household. Parker is still a puker but they tell me he will grow out of it.

He says Dada and duck duck and ball ball and HIIIYA!
I have to say after all the scary it is so good to enjoy the good.

We have planted a garden and will be busy enjoying our backyard this summer so drop a line and let us know when we can catch up in person.

If you haven’t met Parker yet he would love to meet you.
If you live far away or close by we are always posting images to our Flickr site. Mostly bi-weekly I mean we are raising a baby we can’t be expected to update every week

So go check out our lives through our photos.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/juliatoke/

Hugs and warmest of wishes to all of you.
Julia and Parker

a weekend of firsts

ctoke — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 15:06:41 +0000

On Saturday Parker has his first swimming lesson at the Y. He did great, and even didn’t seem to mind the two dunks under water. He’s such a fast learning. its amazing.

Parker went to his first Indians baseball game at Progressive Field on Sunday. He was startled at first by the crowed chearing, but by the second inning he was really into the game and all the fans cheering.

how to defeat a sleepless sleeper (this week)

ctoke — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 17:05:29 +0000

Now that Parker seems to be back on the healthy train, along with Julia, the next item on our docket is to get Parker to sleep in blocks longer than 2 hours over night.

This week’s solution has us loading him up with rice cereal in the evening along with a 7 oune bottle right at bed time. So far its lead to him sleeping atleast 8-9 hours in a block.

Parker starts swim lessons this week at the Y as well!

Just who’s wearing the pants around here

ctoke — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 17:10:57 +0000

Julia is currently Sicky Pants. Parker is rockin’ the Crabby Pants. While Dad is just plain Tired-Pants.

Around the bend

ctoke — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 22:27:20 +0000

Parker made it through the weekend pretty decently. He was awake on and off Friday and Sat night… but by Sunday his cough had really calmed down. Last night he seemed a bit grouchy again at bed time and was hard to get to sleep, but finally went down for the night by 11. Julia and I keep playing with various bed time feeding amounts and we are discovering that he seems to like 6 ounces right at bed time, but then requires another 2 ounces a couple hours later before he’ll settle down for the night. Since we are trying to regulate his intake we think the later two ounces are gonna be something light like pear juice or pedialite.

It’s a dog, it’s a seal, nope.. it’s just croup

ctoke — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 20:48:14 +0000

Well Parker went to bed grouchy last night, and woke us up around midnight with a nice barking cough that turns out to be croup. So for the next few days we might mistake our crabby Parker-pants with a zoo animal, in hopes that it’ll break into a regular cold by weekends end.

Other notes of interest from a Doc visit is that Parker has really packed on the pounds since his last surgery and we can cut back a bit on his feeding schedule… so soon our little pudge ball will be a lean mean baby machine. Next up for Parker-pants, swim lessons at the YMCA.

When your twenty-one… you’re no fun…

ctoke — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 17:49:22 +0000

Download Video

boy genius Asleep in the afternoon

jtoke — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 02:46:54 +0000

Download Video

What’s going on in your zoo?

ctoke — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 17:16:24 +0000

After 4 and a half months of Parker living a less than stellar life (have we posted before that we figured out recently that he’s spent more of his life so far in the hospital than out?) Julia and I are so afraid to even say out-loud that we are basking in the light at the end of the tunnel.. but I think in the back of our minds we are both thinking it!

After expecting to be in the hospital for 10 days, we were so stoked to be able to roll home a meager 2 days after his surgery. Of course we got home to a mountain of snow at our house (after not having been home about a week)… but after about 2 hours of shoveling we at least were able to get our cars off the streets to comply with Lakewood’s snow ban.

After getting home Sunday, and now it being Thursday we are ecstatic to say that Parker is doing so awesome! In the first 24 hours he had a few issues with spitting up, but we think this was partly due to him being on regular formula (we have since switched him back to hypo allergic Elecare and that seems to have cured that). He also had a bit of a choking cough, but after confirming with our more than awesome Rainbow Dr.’s we stopped his Previcid doses and that seems to have licked that too.

Parker’s been pretty happy. His vomiting has stopped. His pukeiness has normalized, and his constant leakiness is a thing of the past! He is handling a normal feeding schedule of about 4 to 5 ounces every 3-4 hours with 6 ounces over night. His sleeping schedule is a bit mixed up but slowly but surely we are trying to get back on track and into a normal routine. The only obstacle in our way of that now: Teething.

Yup, Parker has started teething, and although its parental side effects are dealign with sleepless nights due to his crabbyness, we are pretty happy about it becasue it means all his problems haven’t sidelined him from maintianing a normal-to-advance development curve.

We want to give a huge thanks to our Rainbow Dr.’s: Dr. Todd Ponsky, Dr. Robert Parry, and Dr. Judy Splawski… all of which provided Parker with the support, care and miracle attention he needed to beat his Pyloric Stenosis! Thank you!