HOME!

Of all the posts I will EVER share on Gracelyn's blog, I am pretty sure this will be one of my favorite. Those that have followed Gracelyn's journey know that this surgery was one of my biggest fears. It wasn't the surgery itself. We've done heart surgery twice before and I knew we could get through another. It is just everything that follows. Having a single ventricle heart has it's complications. It scares me. Also, once she starts having complications again, there isn't another "fix." There are things to help along the way, but if her fontan fails and things go south, a heart transplant is our only option, and it's not a guarantee. Having said all that, now that we are done with the surgery part of things and on to recovery, I really feel great about Grace. My mommy heart feels like she is going to do really well with her new heart structure. 

There isn't much to say. The pictures will speak for themselves. I do, however, want to thank our families for making such an awesome homecoming for Grace. Grace and I had no idea what was going on. Once Jeff let us know all the decorations in our neighborhood were for her I began to film her. She was really excited. She kept saying "They are everywhere. " (I've only posted part of the video, it's too long and won't let me post it all. ) She was super cute when she realized what was going on. Most of our family (on both sides)  live with in blocks of our home. They were all there. The cousins were at the corner and they ran down the road with us as we drove. The yard was filled with hearts that had messages from family and friends. There were balloons everywhere and the entire neighborhood was covered in pink ribbons. My parents live a few streets over and even their road was pink. It was very touching. As we drove Grace around to see the ribbons, my darling 3-year-old said, "Dis is all foe you Dracie." Her Aunt Camee had thought ahead and bought hearts back in February during all the Valentine's sales. The fence, door and her bedroom were decorated with those. There was an awesome Welcome Home sign made by another Aunt Cami. All of our family had their names written on it. We loved it! Jeff's three sisters, Tara, Val and Hilary were responsible for all of the balloons and hearts in the yard. Thank you to all of our friends and family who helped with her homecoming. It was wonderful...for ALL of us.

We walked Gracelyn around the yard to see all the fun hearts. We couldn't hold her back at times. She was making me so nervous. The NP stressed that she was to not do much more than walk for the next six weeks. Even swinging on the swings is not okay. We chased her around the yard with her oxygen tank. At one point she even jumped off our front steps!! Wish us luck! It's going to be a long six weeks entertaining her. Jeff feels like, even though she only had surgery a week ago, she is feeling more energy than when she went in on Monday.

I'm glad to be home, not only for Grace, but for her siblings. This little guy did great with my parents, but he is such a mama's boy. He didn't let go of me Saturday.

It was so awesome to watch Grace walk around the yard, dragging her own O2 tank, less than a week after major open heart surgery. As a heart friend said, "Nice job on making the Fontan look easy." :)

It was so awesome to look out our back door and see even the neighbors back yard with ribbons. They knew we'd see it from our house.

I think she may have over done it at her "Surprise Party," as she called it. We tried to have a picnic out side for dinner and she didn't last 10 minutes. We couldn't find her and so we followed the O2 cord. She had put her self to bed. It was so nice to be home, with everyone under the same roof.