We moved!

From this:

To:

Jennie and I, Gracie and Hallie have trecked to EVIL Las Vegas!

I took a job with America First down here; an opportunity to market mortgages with my going on 10 yr employer.

We have been here since November, bought a home, and are enjoying life in the heat of the Nevada desert and its beauty.

Autumn

has reared its frame in all its glorious shades. Its broad, subtle arms brushing the native verdure, erasing all vestiges of summer with its brilliant palette of golds, reds, and yellows.

Mr. Frost has also made brief, recent appearances in the peaks of our proximate towering mountain ranges. He mocks us with his hushed, almost veiled contact; yet with his premature snowfall he reminds Utah natives how he will, in short order, be peevishly ushering in his harsh, wintry landscape.

Amidst all of these grand botanical and climatical metamorphises, Gracie's life has grown by epic proportions; at least physically and in relation to her initial petitness. She's nearly doubled in size from her original weight, and experienced seemingly cursory degrees of change in her face and mode of interaction with J and I.

She's beautiful and, as I mentioned before, she has completely hijacked my life in ways I never knew possible, providing me with degrees of gratitude and euphoria previously unknown by me.

J has performed admirably.

Personally, my revelations typically are a paradox of hindsight epiphanies, but I must admit I was accurate in my preconception that J would be a tremendous mother and I revel in the celestial reality that she is my wife and mother to Gracie.

She experienced infections from the pregnancy, initially stunting her improvement; however, she is finally, after 3 different antibiotics, returning to her prior form.

Through all of this shambled prose, I can say, I'm infinitely grateful and have realized endless blessings through it all.

Perfect

spaghetti.


Gracie is progressing ounce by ounce and has been feeding via bottle for approximately 5 days. Her greatest struggle being her over-anxiousness to eat; consuming her milk as quickly as her beautifully-tiny mouth allows..

She's somehow completely confiscated my life; no surprise to you current parents and grandparents.
She's demonstrated, for me, the paradigm of perfection, and reminds me to count my blessings and notice, more frequently, the plethora of "tender mercies" abounding in my life.

Your mom and I love you, Gracie May Travis. You presence is an enormous blessing in our lives.


p.s. NObama will soon be appearing on Itunes.

p.p.s. Ally, this post is dedicated to you, just so you know.

Back

to work.

It's good to be chomping at the bit again.

J has steadily and remarkably improved. She's starting to really resemble her old self. I know it means a lot to her. I'm proud of her and her desire to be a caring, watchful mother. It's mostly a waiting game now.
Gracie needs to continue to improve. (she is 4 lbs now and should be moved to a big-girl crib soon) 3 things must take place for her to graduate from the NICU: 1) She must be able to maintain her own body temperature. 2) She must be able to breathe on her own. (she's been doing this for a while now) 3) She must be able to have 2 days of consistent feeding.

I have no doubts she will be home sometime in September. She's a tough little girl.

Thanks, Mckay NICU staff,

Rare Public Anthem...

A few buddies from high school and I have begun writing some songs and formed a band called: Rare Public Anthem. Yesterday, with the kind approbation of my wife, I was able to go and record a bass line for our 1st song: NObama. Yes, it's political, but all band members feel strongly about our reason for opposing Mr. Obama, and why we don't want him to be the next U.S. president.

I realize how polarizing politics can be, but feel it important to record and share this song with as many people as possible. We have a facebook page http://www.new.facebook.com/pages/Rare-Public-Anthem/33261095335; check us out.

*Update*

J and Gracie are doing well. Gracie keeps improving. They are continuously increasing her food intake and reducing the amount of cords and tubes connected to her tiny frame.

It has been a rough week. Things have moved quite rapidly and my time with family is drawing to a close as I will be returning to work next wednesday.

I don't feel I should log out without mentioning again, the gratitude J and I have for the love and support from family. We are also infinitely grateful to the medical staff who has watched over our dear, Gracie May. The love they demonstrate to a daughter that is not their blood is overwhelming, and often, inexplicable. May God always bless them and their tender hands that clean, cradle, and care for our beautiful, tiny daughter. Thank you all!

The 2nd greatest love

of my life has arrived!

Gracie May arrived here from heaven at 8:17 a.m. on August 18th 2008. She came in weighing 3 lbs 13 oz., and 16 inches long.

She is aprox. 6.5 weeks early, but that hasn't slowed her down much. She's crying and moving and grabbing/pulling all her gadgets that monitor her precious little body.

She's staying in the NICU at Mckay Dee hospital. The nurses and other techs have been amazing. We feel so blessed that she has been vigiliantly taken care of by so many competent people.

Dr. Seale is incredible! We are so fortunate to have him as J's doctor.

Gracie was initially intubated to assist with her breathing, but in only one day was extubated, and is breathing with only a small amount of oxygen help.

She is beautiful and breathtakingly perfect. She is so loved by her Mom and Dad and also surrounded by aunts and uncles, grandmas and granpas, friends etc. who love her and pray for her.

May God continue to bless and protect our wonderful daughter.

We love you Gracie.

Thanks, to all the McKay staffing that has helped my lovely wife and daughter. You guys are absolutely and incredibly capable/helpful/competent.

Returned to Mckay....

Well, at about 3:00 p.m. today, J decided it was time to call her Doc., and see if she should come back (her ankles had swollen significantly and her vision was becoming blurred, and, as she put it, she was seeing spots). The hospital said: yes, time to return to the "homeland." I had anticipated this reality, because, throughout the day, she was falling asleep sitting up and she was content to just keep her feet up (for the most part and in comparison to her normal self).

Her blood pressure was escalated at aprox. 185/105 when we arrived; Travis and Shaylee came with us. At that point I assumed we weren't leaving Mckay until after the delivery (Gracie is 6-7 weeks early). Family has come and gone. Tears have been shed. I asked the charge nurse of the NICU if I would be able to hold Gracie when she came out; unfortunately, that's not possible. I will once she is stable, though.

J has foreshadowed about an early delivery, but tried to reassure us Gracie wouldn't be going to the NICU. For the most part Jennie, as per usual, has tremendous forsight/insight; but, this time her matter-of-fact statement was more hope than any inner, profound acumen. J, having worked at Primary Children's understands the difficulty of any kind of infant intensive care and with that kind of personal understanding, she might have exchanged her insight with hope, understandably.

Gracie will likely stay in the NICU for 4 weeks. I know we are in the Lord's hands, and I have confidence in the outcome.

My computer is wiggin' out, so I must sign off!

I love you, Gracie. I hope when you are old enough you can appreciate all your mom has already done for you. She is the best kind of person there is, and she will always be there for you.

Home again!

Initially, we were told J would need to stay at the hospital over the weekend, but this morning, Dr. Seale told her it was her choice: stay at the hospital, or go home on strict bed rest.

J chose home. I'm glad to have her back. The hospital, though great when needed, is not the most comfortable, welcoming place to be. Regardless of any mundane positives of having her home I'm just glad to see her face light, because she's home. Her smile saves me everyday.

We are anticipating a delivery in the next 2 weeks; at the longest. Gracie is 4 lbs right now, and we just want her to grow a little more before we turn off the oven and take her out.

Pappy (J's father) said she is going to be feisty, like his daughter.

When J was little (as told by her parents) she LOVED to climb out of her crib and feel freedom; so much, her parents decided to remove her doorknob in a futile attempt to keep her inside. Well, the true "always on the move," person that J is, she wasn't going to be told she couldn't get out of her room. She somehow figured out how to get the door open with a butter knife. Her dad says one day while checking on her to verify she was in her crib, he decided to look through the key hole, and there, on the other side of the keyhole, was a big, beautifully blue eye staring back at him.

Babe, you need to stay down! We aren't making anymore overnight stays at Mckay until Gracie is ready!

I love you!

Update*

Evidently, like J has told me on a number of occasions, Gracie wants to be born in summer. We are at the hospital, and Dr. Seale said that she will probably come sooner than later.

J has been having headache issues, and last friday she told me we needed to go to the emergency room, because, she had been feeling pretty sick over the last few weeks and Darla (the OBGYN's nurse) told her if it didn't improve to come to the emergency room. So that is where we ended up.

She had high blood pressure, but they were able to get it back down to normal/acceptable.
We came home and things seemed to go back to "normal."
Well, tuesday/today comes along and J decided to go visit Dr. Seale a day prior to her actual appointment, because her headaches hadn't subsided. They take her blood pressure and it shows 180/110, when the nurse sees that her eyes widen and when she tells the Dr., he decides to have her stay the night in labor and delivery. They found protein in a certain liquid discharge common to all members of the human race and most forms of life. The significance of the protein when found in said liquid is, when found in pregnant women, can mean they have toxemia. Meaning potential harm to the baby.

So, I'm here in Mckay, sitting next to my beautifully pregnant, tired wife watching Rocky Balboa and updating the blog. Dr. Seale will let us know tomorrow if he feels the baby will be here soon. J has learned a valuable lesson learned in the last Rocky movie: "Life isn't about how hard you hit, it's about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward." J moves forward everyday. Her faith, determination and stubborness are somewhat intimidating, inspirational, and enigmatic. I am not as familiar with staring into the gaping mouth of fear and grinning.

We're anxious to see our daughter, but we don't want to make any visits to the NICU.

We're grateful for Dr. Seale and the tremendous care he has provided to our family.

I will update when more information is available.

That maturation of all things!

Though the heat of summer persists, the shadow of autumn casts its figure on the evening light.

For as far back as I can recall, the change from summer to fall has had some strange, nostalgic value for me. I don't know if it's the slow decrease in hours of light, or the decline in presence of chlorophyll in the Utah foliage; but I've always felt like a strange passenger on some cherubic voyage.

Paint me crazy, but I enjoy the cool, autumn breeze and the bright myriad of colors that subtly begin manifesting on the barbarous slopes of the ever-vigilant, wasatch sentinels; until reaching the nirvana of absolute illumination.

The baby is growing. J is finished. She's had enough! We are ready for Gracie to wake us up at night and return to some semblance of normalcy in our humble abode.

My wife, the ultimate trooper! I admire her ability to function.

I've

been asking myself, does one need to be highly opinionated to be a prolific blogger, or merely observant? I find I don't always have an opinion about too many things. I don't get riled over much.
Maybe I should allow my emotions to get the best of me more often.

I think trees are important.

Anyhow, the hebrew alephbet is causing me some problems due to its unique, non-latin based letter structure.

Blogging.

I'm not the most proficient blogger. Nor am I very consistent in keeping a journal (the most consistent I ever have been writing in a journal was on my mission).

My dad has started blogging recently and so I sent him a link to mine. His response to my link was "thanks D____; I actually visited your blog one day while mom and I were out of town, you
hav(e)n't updated since November."

Due to his unintended chastisement, I have decided to update.

J and I are married. We're pregnant and we're expecting October 3rd.

The pregnancy has had its moments. J has had some not-so-exciting experiences: an overnight stay in the hospital, 3 hours in the insta-care stuck to an IV, and many days "basking" in the glorious presence of the toilet.

Oh how I love and admire my wife.

I am still working at AFFCU and am currently working in the mortgage department.

I drew a picture for my brother-in-law and have had the desire to keep drawing/painting.

I am digging on a new band named Fleet Foxes.

I am trying to learn Hebrew and Greek and any help/suggestions are most welcome.

I am trying to prepare to be a good dad for our soon-to-be daughter. J will be the best mother.

Wowzers.

Fine, "wowzers" isn't appropriate English, but it expresses what I feel today.

Time flies: "Tired of lying in the sunshine, getting home to watch the rain, you are young and life is long, and there is time to kill today, and then one day you find, ten years have got behind you, no one told you when to run, you missed the starting gun..." Floyd puts it into words that aren't always meaningful, but when I think of time, this song begrudgingly enters my thoughts.

Anyhow, it HAS flown, Jennie and I are less than two weeks away from our wedding, and plans have ebbed and flowed, I'm just trying to be a supportive, grateful fiance. I think, in part, I've had some success.

J, continues to support and love me as if I was somehow deserving of such treatment. I'm overwhelmed by her all of the time. She brings the best of me forward, and gives me so much purpose and hope.

She still works at Primary Children's Hospital, and she is the best Medical Aide in the PICU. The way she speaks of the children and their families always helps me forget about myself. She is so thoughtful and loving towards those who are in such difficult situations and feels their pain.
She is the truest person I know.

Things with myself are un-changing. I just kind of roll with the punches as always.
I'm hoping to start doing photography on the side. We'll see how it goes.


So, things are going well, the 6th of December we will be married at the Lion House.

So,

I should be closing on a condo in the next week, hopefully.
I'm filled with a sense of urgency and excitement.
Maybe I can start growing up, but just a smidge.
The condo is located close to my grandparents house, and
it is a quiet blessing. I didn't plan it out this way, but I'm
glad I can keep a watchful eye on them; plus, a free hot dog
now and then never hurt either.

This is just a speck on my horizon; however, as it is gratefully just the
first step in a series of much bigger, more important steps.
I can't wait for Jen to move in, and we can start our life together.
I sometimes hear the sound of children's laughter in my sub-conscience,
and feel so blessed that I will have the opportunity to be a father and a husband.
I hope I can be a portion of the husband/father my dad is.

I'm blessed abundantly for the parents I have, indeed, my entire family
and extended family are a grand blessing.
They have always loved and supported me through my
"deepening trials" and my numerous successes.

I love you all.
D