A Birthday Memorial -- Lukas Benjamin Baker

In a little over 1 week we will celebrate our son's 1st birthday.  It's hard to believe a whole year has gone by.  We miss him dearly.

In his honor we invite you to participate with us in a Superhero Collection drive benefiting Primary Children's Hospital (details below).  We'd love to include anyone and everyone who felt touched by our little boy and his story.  If you know of others who would like to participate, please invite them on our behalf.

Thank you for your continued prayers and support.  We have felt so much love and are deeply grateful to know firsthand of your goodness and service.

Happy 1st Birthday, Lukas!

With love,
Jonathan, Melissa, Chelsea & Lukas

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Lukas' Superhero Collection

July 1st - July 6th

Gathering Superhero figurines for Primary Children's Hospital

Spiderman, Superman, Hulk, Thor, Iron Man, Captain America, etc.

Figures can be New or Gently Used

Please no villains or weapons

Drop them off at your convenience 9am - 8pm daily July 1st - 6th

129 East 6715 South, Midvale, UT {basement}

Or mail your donations, arrival by July 5th, to:

Melissa Baker

129 East 6715 South

Midvale, UT 84047

We also invite you to light a sparkler on the 4th in memory of Lukas, our little firecracker!  

We wish you and yours a Happy Independence Day!

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Lukas meets his Grandma

On March 3rd, 2013 Lukas and his Grandma were reunited. We are saddened by our loss, but also happy to know that Lukas and his Grandma are together.

We love you Mom and Lukas!


Here is a link to a 10-minute video with some fun pictures of Peggy: http://goo.gl/DBHtv

Here is an excerpt from his grandma Peggy Baker's obituary:

Peggy Young Baker
1948 ~ 2013

Peggy passed away peacefully at home surrounded by her family on March 3, 2013. She was born November 14, 1948 in Frederick, Maryland to Newell D. and Joanne Strong Young. She married Brent Lynn Baker November 6, 1969. They raised their family in Midvale, Utah.

Peggy graduated from the University of Utah, Magna Cum Laude, in French and English. Her greatest achievement, however, was raising six children and one husband. Peggy loved children. Her house was full of them-her own and all their friends. She worked many years with cub scouts, and a time with girl scouts. Peggy worked in an elementary school, especially loving her time in the school library. She inspired children to success, as evidenced by her five sons' Eagle Scout awards and her daughter's Young Woman's Medallion. Peggy enjoyed travelling, particularly visiting her sons' mission areas, meeting the people they had served. Peggy also enjoyed the outdoors-camping, hiking, and going on long walks. She faced her declining health with courageous optimism, sharing and receiving hugs with everyone.

In lieu of flowers, the family appreciates contributions in Peggy's name to Alzheimers Association, Utah Chapter (801.265.1944).

A special thanks to Danville Services for their home care support, especially to Julia and Claudia, the best caregivers in the world. And many thanks to Inspiration Hospice for their kindness through Peggy's final weeks.

Our 2012 Christmas Letter

2012.  What a year for the Bakers!

As most of you know, the first half of this year Melissa was pregnant with our second child.  At the routine 20-wk ultrasound we learned our baby had the deadliest of heart defects:  Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome (HLHS).  We were devastated and beyond overwhelmed.

Over the next 4 months with amazing support from multiple medical teams, we examined all of the details and made the hardest choice we have ever faced.  We finally felt at peace when we decided to bring our son home after his birth.  

Lukas Benjamin Baker was born on the 4th of July—our little firecracker.   Though short, his life was happy and filled with love.  He spent time in the sunshine and felt breezes on his face.  He saw the stars, heard the crickets, and got a lecture from his older sister.  He built block towers with daddy and sang lullabies with mommy.  Over 90 people visited and held him and he looked each one in the eye—changing their hearts with his broken one.  We smiled and laughed and cuddled him endlessly.  We were a happy family of four for 2 ½ perfect days.  

Lukas died peacefully in our arms in the dark hours of early morning on July 7th, just moments after receiving his Name and Blessing ordinance.  In the deep pain of that farewell, as our family gathered, the sun came up, slowly filling our home with light.  It was beautiful.

While Lukas has been center stage this year, we’ve had other noteworthy experiences:

• We celebrated our 5th wedding anniversary in Midway, Utah where we honeymooned.
• Jonathan celebrated his 10 year anniversary working at L-3 Communications.
• Melissa took up a small part-time accounting job near home. 
• Chelsea celebrated her 3rd birthday—lighting candles, singing, and eating cupcakes at breakfast, lunch, and dinner.  She’s not spoiled, right?  :)
• We vacationed in:  Rexburg, Idaho; St George, Utah; Jeremy Ranch, Utah; & Ririe, Idaho.
• Jonathan got a new ride:  a 2006 Ford Focus we bought in April.  No more carpooling!
• Melissa exploded the canning this year, bottling 26 quarts each of peaches and tomatoes. 
• Chelsea started “Mommy Preschool” and begs for it multiple times every day. 
• We hosted a big Halloween party and Chelsea chose at the last minute to ditch the girlie fairy costume for the stuffed pumpkin suit.  She keeps us laughing!

While our hearts are still grieving, they are also overflowing with gratitude.  We feel blessed and buoyed by your many prayers and loving service on our behalf.  You have carried us through the darkest of storms, and God has slowly filled our lives with light again.  In this season of lights and presents our thoughts are turned to the gift of His Son.  We celebrate His birth.  We study His life.  And we are humbled by His death that will one day grant life again to our son.  We will be a family again, forever.  Life truly is beautiful.

This year we wish you a tender and peaceful holiday season.  In the joy of your celebration, may you feel of our love and deep appreciation.

With love,

Jonathan, Melissa, Chelsea & Lukas Baker 

Family Pictures w/ Lukas

On Thursday night after Lukas was born, before Lukas was even 24 hours old, we had our family pictures taken. The pictures turned out amazing despite the fact that it was a bit past Chelsea's bed time and she was melting down just minutes before.

We wanted to give a special thanks to Dave Ward for sharing his talent with us and for taking these amazing pictures.

Note: Click on the first picture to open all the pictures to a full-screen view.

                                                                       

Chelsea & Lukas

When Chelsea woke up on Friday morning after Lukas was born we decided it would be a fun little family moment.  We put Lukas on Chelsea's bed to let them "play" together.  Chelsea wanted "her camera" to take pictures, so of course we decided to capture the moment with a video camera.  To me it seems like they are old friends, yet they had only been together for one day.  What a beautiful moment and memory!

Enjoy this video!

Chelsea & Lukas 1080p from Jonathan Baker on Vimeo.

Beautiful Slideshow - Created by Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep

!Kleenex ALERT!

These pictures are so precious to us.  Julie, with Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep, came to the hospital to take these beautiful pictures.  These pictures were taken just an hour and a half after Lukas was born.

Melissa looks so amazing in these pictures, when you consider what she just went through just an hour before.  What an amazing mom!

http://shareitvideo.com/watch.php?v=241555793126151

We love you Lukas!

Lukas Benjamin Baker passed away peacefully in our arms early this morning.

Thank you everyone who was able to visit and share the love he brought to this earth for his short life.

At this time we are not accepting visitors. We will announce funeral plans as they are made.

 Please take a moment to cherish a life today on our behalf.

Thank you for all your love.
Jonathan, Melissa, Chelsea, and Lukas Baker

A few pictures... finally

Lukas Benjamin

It's a BOY!

We are so excited that Lukas Benjamin has arrived! It has been an emotional few months leading up to this point, but we are so glad he is finally here! We are humbled to receive such a wonderful spirit into our family. Our family will never be the same!

When: July 4th @ 8:03pm (just in time for fireworks!)
Weight: 6 lbs 13 oz
Length: 22 inches (just like his big sister.)

The delivery went well. Melissa was a champ and was able to deliver un-medicated. Melissa and Lukas are doing well. Thanks to the help of a wonderful medical staff, we were able to leave the hospital at 12:18am. As I write this post Melissa is sleeping in her own bed and loving it. We are accepting family visitors Thursday after 2pm and general visitors on Friday.

After having been told in February that our baby has HLHS, there was much soul searching, researching, crying, praying, and discussing. In the end we chose to bring this baby, where he will live a comfortable and peaceful life. We have been told that his life expectancy will be anywhere from 3 to 22 days. We will try to keep our blog updated with information on the baby's condition. However, our #1 focus will be spending time with the baby and visitors.

Once we get settled in we'd love visitors. We want to share this short and wonderful time with everyone that wants to visit. In order to maintain our toddler's napping schedule we only ask that no visitors arrive from 11am to 2pm. We are open to visitors at all other times. We plan on staying at home as much as possible, so feel free to stop by when it is convenient for you.


Here are some fun charts showing the distribution curves of his weight and height:

Are we there yet... almost!

The last few months have been filled with contemplation, prayer, research, and many emotions.  We didn't want to make the decision of surgery or Comfort Care quickly, but we also felt that we needed to decide what we wanted to do before the birth of our baby. Making this decision has been the most difficult choice we've ever made together, and we haven't taken it lightly.  There were times during the past months that both options have felt good, but in the end the treatment that we felt most at peace with was comfort care.

We are currently at the hospital and Melissa is making good progress.  We are hoping that this baby arrives today, July 4th. After the delivery we will spend some time in the hospital to make sure that mom is well enough to return home.  Once we are discharged from the hospital the baby will be transferred to hospice care to keep it comfortable while at home.  The life expectancy for this child is anywhere from 3 to 22 days, with the average being 12 days.  We will cherish every moment of this baby's life.  Jonathan has been able to take a month off of work, so we can all be together for this.

During these last few months we have felt an incredible amount of peace and comfort. We know that this is in part due to the many prayers offered in our behalf, Thank You!  We feel so blessed to be surrounded by such wonderful people.  We also gather much strength knowing that this child will be part of our family forever, even if only for a short time on earth.

p.s. Stay tuned for more info to come in the next few days.

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Gender Guessing Pool

As you know, we are expecting our second child in about 4 weeks.  Since we didn't learn the baby's gender, we invite you all to join our fun guessing game...

To play, just answer the questions below
1.  Gender
2.  Birth Date
3.  Birth Weight

To win, you MUST guess the correct gender, then be closest on the Birth Date.  The Birth Weight will help determine any necessary tie breaker between possible winners.

Any guess will be considered valid as long as it is entered BEFORE the onset of labor.  Yes, the onset of labor marks the END of the guessing opportunity, so don't delay--post your guess today!