Another good day

Yeah. That's my cool scar (and my giant belly)!


Kung fu moves


Happy baby


SOOooooooo big!!

It was another BEAUTIFUL day here in Minnesota. It's about time. There was such a change in moods here in the Porta household. As I said in my last post, it has been a LONG winter on many different levels for us, so this nice weather is such a welcome change. It's hard to believe that three weeks ago I was a total wreck because my baby's heart was making him very sick and I was anticipating something bad happening every second of the day. Now we have a beautifully healthy, spunky boy who is doing new things every day (besides napping).

Elijah now says "Mama" and "Baba" (Dada) discriminately and we are working on "ball." He now does the SO BIG motions with his hands when we say, "How big is Elijah?" He does the sign for ALL DONE and MILK and he is working on BIRDY. It's so cute because whenever he is in a situation he doesn't like, he will do the sign for ALL DONE feverishly, over and over. The other day he was sitting on the bed in the loft and he pulled on a toy too hard and fell backwards onto the bed. He startled himself but didn't cry. He started signing ALL DONE as if to say, "I don't like this! What just happened?!" He has so many new, cute faces that he makes that Dan and I laugh at constantly. Things just seem to be clicking much more now than they did before surgery. His fixed heart has changed him! He is a new man and he's ready to take on the world.

I sometimes forget how complex his recent heart surgery was. I keep hearing Dr. Moga's voice in my head saying, "This is a VERY good outcome to a VERY difficult problem." He had a whole lot of major things done to his heart in this last surgery and he really could not have had a better outcome. We feel so fortunate. Elijah is an amazing, strong little boy.

I worked from home again today so I didn't get to enjoy the nice weather much, but Dan and Elijah got out for a bit. I'm back at work tomorrow through Thursday and then early Friday morning Dan and I are headed to FLORIDA! I'm excited but nervous. I have mixed feelings. I need to let it go and have a great time at Mike and Julie's wedding and release some of the tension that has built up over the past few months. It'll be good.

Thanks for checking in on us. We love you all so much! Elijah says, "BaambababbababMAMAMAmamammmamamaBamba!" which translates to: thank you for all the prayers, you are all wonderful!!