November 22, 2008

"Look, it's mousse!" My stepmom was convinced today, for a few brief seconds, that the hospital was so concerned with everyone's hairstyle that they mounted little cans of 'mousse' on the walls everywhere in the hospital. She then proceeded to rub it in her hair! Okay, so really she knew it was foam antibacterial purell, but she did pretend to rub it in her hair. (and accidently got it in there!) Ha ha!

Well, as you can tell from the pictures and the story, we didn't go to the zoo today. Adam woke up sick with a bad cold, and Riley had a very yucky (VERY!!!) diaper this morning, combined with a low grade fever so we figured a day at home would be good for the both of them. Sooo...Mindy, Danielle, Caleb and myself went to the hospital to turn in some bottles of breastmilk for Bree, and to stay for a visit.

Today we got to give Bree a bath, and Mindy got to give her a bottle again! Bree was a champ during her bath, and she got so hungry from her bath she ate all 35 cc's in her bottle! Woo hoo!

Hope this finds everyone happy, healthy, and in love with life!

November 21, 2008

As of today Bree has met all of her grandmas! She still has her great grandma Ogden (Nana) and Gram (who is her great great grandma) to meet, but she met her Gamma Mindy today. Gamma got to change her diaper and even feed her a bottle. So far, I have been the only one to give her a bottle so I decided I would let Gamma have a turn.

Bree also got to meet Auntie Danielle and Uncle a-buh (Caleb), but they were too scared to hold her so I didn't get a picture of them with her. Bree is doing well today and I hope to see some weight gain from her tonight. She had lost five grams yesterday so I am hoping that she at least gains that little bit back. For some reason, I have been worried about her weight as of lately.

Hope this finds everyone happy, healthy and in love with life!

November 20, 2008

Good afternoon everyone!

Bree is doing well today! Riley is crying and tugging on my short, and I am doin pretty good. Adam is at work today, and will be at work until about 930 tonight. Riley and I will be going to R groups tonight so I am a little hesitant. It starts right at her bedtime, which I could bring a pack and play, but I don't want her to go to sleep just for an hour. So we are going to try and tough it out...we'll see what happens. (wish me luck)

I forgot to tell everyone that Bree moved from station 10 to station 21 in the NICU. We were told in the beginning that as we get closer to moving home, that she will become more and more secluded. This new area is in a room with three other babies (four beds total).

These pictures are from when I last went and saw her, isn't she the cutest?

Hope this finds everyone happy, healthy and in love with life!

November 19, 2008

Good evening!

3 pounds 14 ounces!!!!! We are nearing the four pound mark...woo hoo! It is so ridiculously exciting. After the past few months going so slow, and counting grams instead of ounces it is so odd to have things 'speed up' as of lately. We were told the unofficial weight limit for her to go home was at least four pounds. So we are hovering around the edge of it.

She is also being given every other feeding by bottle. This has only been in effect today, but she is doing well with it. She does struggle with waking up at night to take the bottle, but for now she needs her rest more than they need to wake her up to take it from a bottle. They will try to give it to her but if she seems too sleepy, they will just put it in her feeding tube. Before she goes home she will have to be nippling all of her feeds, but this is a step in the right direction! Baby steps are a good thing....

Riley and I had a fun day today. Our friends, Pat and Danielle were moving today so I watched their kiddos while they moved all their stuff. Riley played really hard today with Aidan and Ivy and I am hoping for a long night of sleeping (for both of us!). Speaking of which, I am going to go shower and head to bed...

Hope this finds everyone happy, healthy and in love with life!

November 18, 2008

Happy Birthday Ashley! It is my best friends birthday today and she turned the big 2-2!

In honor of her birthday, Bree had her first set of immunizations! Okay, so she didn't have them just for Ashley's birthday, but I will always remember this occasion when her birthday rolls around. :) Bree got some tylenol about a half an hour before her shot (it was a combo of like three different vaccinations). When she did get the shot, she did the silent cry-so-hard-you-can't-breathe for a good 10-15 seconds. I am not one to freak out about things, but she had me rubbing her head and telling her "Breathe, love, it's okay!". Her face turned a bright shade of purple, and when she finally caught her breath she was all tuckered out.

After she had a good rest, I was able to bottle feed her. She took her whole feeding like a champ! (30 cc's!!!) She is able to pace herself now, so she doesn't choke at all when she is eating. The speech therapist sat with me while she ate to make sure I was holding her the right way, and that she was latching onto the bottle okay. I was also told that I need to bring in the bottles that we will be using at home so she can get used to them before she goes home. This is the first time someone has mentioned her going home in a general sense so it was exciting to hear that! Since we are still using bottles with Riley, I will probably go pick up a few packs of bottles for Bree to have at the hospital so we aren't taking from our stash here at home. :)

After her feeding I needed to get going because I had told Aleasha I would be back around four to hang with her and pick up Riley. I got Bree all settled in her bed, but she kept spitting up. I sat her up and was wiping her mouth when she started getting really fussy. Out of curiosity, I checked her diaper....yup! Poop! and lots of it! I changed her britches, and got her all settled in snug and cozy while her nurse, Becky weighed her diaper. 22 grams of poop! 30 grams is an ounce, so that was a lot for a little girl.

Thinking that her acid reflux was bothering her, I put her in her bouncy seat sitting up. Since it is outside of her isolette she needed another blanket so I went and got one. While tucking it around her, my littlest monsters face turned red and I heard a little bubbly fart. Ugh! I got her out of her seat, back on the bed...and yup! More poop! and even more of it! I got all the 'supplies' gathered (diaper, wipes) and went about changing it. I wiped her little toosh, and got a second wipe. While wiping for the second time she pushed out a whole nother load right onto the wipe I was holding! I gasped in surprise and both nurses who were in the room rushed over thinking something was wrong. When they found out what happened, they all cracked up. Guess how much all that poo weighed? 28 grams!!!! Our kiddo pooped out about 2 whole ounces today! Jeez!

Now some of you who are reading and don't have kids probably are thinking I am either gross, have a sick mind, or just have issues and am obsessed with my kid's poop. Trust me, once you have kids, you will talk about poop, rejoice when your kid does poop, and worry when they don't. You will even discuss their 'poop habits' with friends. Just trust me on this one. :)

Hope this finds everyone happy, healthy and in love with life!

November 17, 2008

Good evening!

Our littlest monster is gaining weight like crazy! She is now 3 lbs 11 ounces! We are nearing the four pound mark...woo hoo! She nippled her entire feeding again today. She's up to 30 cc's a feeding...what a big girl! Tomorrow I am going in in the morning to sign for her to recieve her immunizations, and to hear their talk about them all....I am not sure if all of that is different with preemies, but we will see. It makes me a little nervous about putting something in her body that has the possibility of making her sick. We work so hard and pray so much for her continued health that it seems silly to inject her with stuff. However, I know it is for a good cause. It is just me having a "mommy moment" ("This is my baby! Don't touch it!!!!").

Last night, I was laying down and resting on the couch and Riley had come over to me. For some reason she decided to throw her head back against me as hard as she could. She caught me right on my lip!! It brought tears from me, and lots of ice right after! I had a swollen split fat lip for the rest of the night, and I have a nasty sore on the inside of my lip now. I know it won't be the last time my children contribute to an injury of mine, but it was for sure one of the most painful!!

Riley is learning animal noises as of lately. We have the monkey noise down..."ah-ah-ah". Mind you, this noise is not complete without bouncing up and down while you are making it. We are also working on the cow noise....if you say "mmmoooooooooo!" she will answer you with "mmmmmmm". I think the "ooo" part will follow one of these days.

"The itsy bitsy spider..." We all remember this childhood song, and we teach it to our children when they are small as well. Riley LOVES this song! She knows most of the hand motions..."The itsy bitsy spider went up the water spout" part is executed perfectly..."down came the rain" is done great!. "And washed the spider out" is a little iffy. She just crosses her arms in front of her self. "Out came the sun and dried up all the rain" is just dancing (maybe she needs a break from all the seriousness??). "and the itsy bitsy spider went up the spout again" is once again...perfection! All this is followed by clapping, and the song is repeated. Over and over and over again....she never tires of it!

Hope this finds everyone happy, healthy, and in love with life!

Milestones

This is something that I have been mulling over in my mind for the past few weeks and I feel like I need to write about it. There are so many things that we have taken for granted. When Riley was born she breathed on her own, could nurse and eat, and she was perfect in every medical sense. With Bree, it has opened our eyes to a whole new way of thinking.

When Bree was born, she could not breathe on her own, could not eat at all, and in fact her heart had stopped beating at her birth and she had to have CPR right after she was born. She has had milestones that not many children have. The fact that she is alive right now is the biggest milestone of all. Her milestones as of today are as follows:

- Came off of Oscillating Ventilator (went to a Jet Ventilator)
- Her brain bleeds stopped growing and stayed at Stage Three
- Came off of Jet Ventilator (went to a Conventional Ventilator)
- Started on feeds slowly but surely
- Came off of Conventional Ventilator (went to CPAP) (HUGE MILESTONE!)
- Came off of CPAP (went to humidified high flow oxygen)
- Bree is big enough to be stolen, and she gets her Baby Lo-Jack
- Bree is big enough to have a real bath, instead of a sponge bath
- She gets up to full feeds and is tolerating them well
- Came off of humidified high flow oxygen (went to regular oxygen)
- Started nippling one feed a day
- Bree's brain bleeds have gone down to a stage 2

Look at all of that! It just amazes me when I stop and think about it. It has been a hard road, and one that I never thought that I would take. However, we love Bree more than anything, as we do with Riley as well. We are thankful to God for his goodness, his mercy and his amazing healing power. He does more than we realize...and it is through the power of prayer that Bree is here and doing as well as she is.

We will not ever take one milestone for granted for either of our girls, but especially for Bree. She is already making noises (little grunts and normal newborn noises), but her first giggle will be such a sweet sound. Her first steps will be a huge celebration for her, and we will all dance with joy when those occur. Just the thought of watching her grow up with her older sister through the next few years brings tears to my eyes.

This whole experience has made me more appreciative of what we have. Some people would take this experience as ask "why me?" and feel bitter and angry that their child had to be born so early. I look at it, and I do wonder why, but I know that God had a reason and that it fits perfectly into his plan for our family. Our eyes have been opened to the true miracle that life is, and what it has to hold for our future.

I hope this finds everyone happy, healthy and in love with life!

November 16, 2008

Good afternoon,

We have little updates on both of our girls today! Yersterday I noticed a little bit more white in Riley's mouth., she's getting another tooth! After two to three weeks to teething, I can see the beginnings of her upper left front tooth coming through...yee haw! That brings her teeth count up to a total of five...she's just like her mama. I was a little on the late side of getting teeth when I was young.

Speaking of myself, I am being hit hard by this cold. I keep hoping that when I wake up in the morning I will feel a little bit better, but for the past two mornings that has not been the case. I hope that I start feeling and getting better soon! I cannot go see Bree until I feel super 100% better. I was so out of it this morning I didn't do anything but lay on the couch and blow my nose. (it seemed like I was blowing it every 30 seconds!!)

We are finaling out of our house on base tomorrow so we did have to make a trip out there today. After much cold medicine, I went to clean the appliances, Adam painted Riley's old room, and Riley ran around screaming and crawling in and out of the closets. I didn't last too long there so we are home (new home) and Adam is running out later tonight to clean up the rest. As of tomorrow we will be officially out of our old house!

EXCITING NEWS ALERT! I just got off the phone with Bree's nurse and she nippled her WHOLE feeding!!! What a big girl! I am so proud of her...it does take a lot of energy out of her to do that, but the fact that she can is a huge thing. It is just a manner of her gaining weight and getting stronger so that she can start nippling feeds more and more and more. All of these little milestones are bringing her closer and closer to coming home with us!

Hope this finds everyone happy, healthy, and in love with life!