Day 99 - A New Job

Ok, I hate to admit it but I have officially accepted that I will not be sending out Thank You cards for all the wonderful gifts and support we've received from Milo. If you did support us in that way, please know that we really truly appreciate your thoughtfulness - all the baby presents we got were perfect and are being put to good use. Thank you a million times. I feel bad for not making time to send out individual thank yous but I hope you will understand why I never managed (here's a picture of the reason).

A picture of why I never got around to sending out Thank You cards

My brother officially got offered a job as an actuary, a long-term goal of his that he has been diligently working towards. He was offered the job last week and they would like him to start as soon as possible. This shift will leave his current job open and after almost everyone in our family suggesting it (and after an in-depth conversation with Shelly) I decided to apply. Yesterday, I had an interview with the CEO of Discover With Doctor Cool, a company that sells earth science kits for kids, and he offered me Daniel's job on the spot.

Today was my first day training with Daniel. I will have him for another week while the office is closed for the holidays and we train at home and then a couple more days after the office reopens. He has promised to stay available for questions though and by living with him, I make his vast stores of experience easily accessible if I need it. I will be taking over everything related to Amazon for the company which is a huge spread of duties. We spent six hours today looking over the portals and support programs I'll need and we barely scratched the surface.

Milo is doing great. I hate to have to leave him every day to accommodate a 40-hour work week, I had hoped to have more time at home with him before that happened. Financially, we would have been fine for another couple months however, this seemed like too good of a job opportunity to put off as it would not be there available for me if I waited. Today was Shelly's first day alone with him and it went fine. She wasn't able to put him down while he slept though meaning that she couldn't do much more the bare basics of feeding him and pumping. I missed him so much when I got home.

We did a lovely Christmas photo shoot the other day and the pictures turned out so good!




Here are various other random photos I have taken since the last blog.

Milo's outfit matched the bed

Milo sleeping in his bed

Milo almost fits hit big overalls and they make him look so cute and chubby.

Cute sleep shirt we got in Portland

Milo enjoying our giant bean bag chair

Grandma Cat holding Milo for the first time (they've all done it now)

Morning snuggles

Day 92 - Week 13 (2 Weeks old adjusted) and exactly 3 Months

The good kind of chubby

Time for another update and a lot of cute photos. Milo is getting so big. We had a doctor's appointment yesterday and he weighed 9lbs 14oz! Exactly 7lbs more than when he was born. The doctor said he is doing so well we can let him sleep 4-5 hours between feeds if we want and our next check up will be in a month instead of weekly slash every two weeks. I was very excited when I got the news about his feedings being okayed to be extended an hour because I often set my alarm and wake us both up for feedings. Too bad he had gas last night and woke up every three hours in discomfort and than realized he was hungry. Maybe tonight he will go a couple five hour stretches and let me get some good chunks of sleep.

I am glad we get another month before his next check up. For our last two doctor's appointments, his doctor wanted to check his anemia and scheduled a blood draw right after our appointment (and I believe we'll have another one next time). He is showing signs of improvement and his last results were really good. Unfortunately, the blood draw was a little rough. I think because he was "3 months old" they were no longer supposed to do a heal prick and tried to take the blood from his arm instead (perhaps not knowing that his adjusted age was only 2 weeks). He yelled the whole time they held his arm straight, more at the arm being held tightly than the need prick we suspect, and they ended up not hitting the vein right anyway. After that we requested the heal prick and he took it much better, a small whimper when they poked him and then relaxed and actually fell asleep while they squeezed the blood out.

Waiting to get his blood drawn

Oliver, Noah, and Megan were feeling a little sick the other day (after finding out a cousin they had visited was recovering from the stomach flu), so Shelly, Milo and I skipped town to stay at my mom's place in the hopes that we could dodge the illness. I knew it was a long shot though as I had spent a lot of time with Oliver, including sharing food with him the night before.

In the end, Oliver seems to have caught a cold not a flu? Perhaps he got it at his kid group and not from his cousin after all. I ended up getting a sore throat that lasted several days and no other symptoms and Shelly and Milo still seem to be doing well. I am hoping my sore throat will go away soon with no worse repercussions. We did manage to get nicely settled in at my mom's house and there are even some benefits to being here over being at home. 1. Mom is happy to hold Milo whenever we want to have a meal together or do anything giving us a free hand more often than we have at home. 2. The bedroom is way bigger making it easier to do sleeping and feeding in the same room. 3. The travel bed we are using is the exact same height as our bed and the side of it goes all the way down, unlike the heavy duty crib we have at home, making it much easier for me to snuggle Milo back to sleep in the middle of the night without waking either of us up too much.

Milo is growing so much! Today he managed to take a full feed's worth of food directly from the source which he has not ever managed to do without a nipple shield. He continued to show signs that he was hungry after eating 80mls from the breast so I fed him another 70mls from the bottle and we ended up with the biggest spit up event we've seen to date. It is great he got so much at the breast and a good sign that we can no longer completely trust his feeding cues. He had the same reaction after his next breastfeeding session except we purposefully limited him to his allotted amount of food, he stayed up another 3 hours giving us hunger cues and refusing to sleep until I finally (and for the third or fourth time), let him comfort nurse on me until he fell asleep. He is sleeping now and I am thankful that I have the doctor's okay to let him go five hours between feeds because otherwise I would need to wake him up right about now to eat. Instead, I'll see if he wakes up on his own in an hour or two. It seems he is losing his tolerance to loud noises while he sleeps just from being away from Noah and Oliver for a couple of days, already he fusses and wiggles at noises and just now he opened his eye from a dead sleep just to Shelly staring at him (we have no idea how he sensed it).

Ok, that's all the updates for now. Here are the promised pictures.

Milo in his going out hoody

Nona enjoying snuggle time

Christmas outfit

Afternoon snuggles/nap

Milo comforting himself with his own arm

We got a picture of Noah to compare to that old photo of Milo....

Old photo for comparison

*Need a new version of him in this seat but it started to sag too much and he doesn't like it anymore so we got a new one. I still may get that photo though, just for fun.

Noah enjoying the lovesac after a nap

Echo's "reward" for refusing to get off the nursing chair

Rocky's "reward" for refusing to get off the changing station

Cousin Time Photo Series (I couldn't pick a favorite)

Happy Boy

Milo's New Best Friend

Cozy Caterpillar (his foot escaped)

*Photos in reverse chronological order

Day 76 - T Minus 1 Day

Tomorrow is Milo's Birthday! Or at least what would have been his birthday if he had had the patience to wait in the womb. Week 40 marks the beginning of his count up to mile stones. When you are working with a preemie baby, you watch for their achievements based on adjusted age, that is the age he would be if he were born tomorrow. For example, today he is minus 1 day old adjusted though he is 10 and 6 days weeks actual. For the first two years of his life, we will be judging things like his development, when he can start foods, and doctor's appointments based off of his adjusted age. After he is two years old, it doesn't really make a difference anymore and we can start judging all those things based off his actual age.

We went on a walk today. The weather was gorgeous, the sun was out, and the stars aligned timing-wise for Megan, Oliver, Shelly, Milo and I to all get out of the house for a bit together. The new stroller we have is excellent for walks and Milo slept the whole time, cozy and warm in his little stroller nest even though it was pretty cold outside (special thanks to his GG-Ma and GG-Pa for the stroller and his Nona for the carseat that fits into it).

Mamas Club

Milo has been doing really well and is still eating and sleeping great. In fact, the other night, my alarm didn't go off and he ended up sleeping 5 hours between feedings instead of the 3-4 that was recommended by his pediatrician. He was very hungry when he woke up but other than that we saw no ill effects. He eats so well and sometimes will eat again after 1 or 2 hours so he is definitely getting enough nutrients. I've been setting and double checking two alarms ever since then though as he really shouldn't go that long too often because he can get dehydrated pretty quickly at his size. I have also been letting him keep his hands out of his swaddle even though he doesn't fall asleep as easily because he is more likely to wake me up hungry if his hands touch his cheeks and remind him. I am really looking forward to when he is just a little bit bigger and is cleared to sleep as long as he wants between feeds. I suspect it won't be long from that point until he is sleeping through the night.

Cute Hat Club

I am also glad to report that he seems to be adjusting to falling asleep flat on his back. He still doesn't really like it when he has gas but last night I was able to put him down in his crib and he just hung out quietly awake for about half an hour before falling asleep. He has had longer and longer wakeful periods which makes it really fun to talk and sing to him. This evening, he at an extra big meal, like he has been in the habit of doing right before bedtime (which makes it great for letting him hit four hours of sleep during the first part of the night). In fact, over the course of an hour he at double his normal feed amount. After which time, I set him in his bounce chair which he usually loves but he was all wiggly and awake so I picked him up to snuggle him and put him on my shoulder in burp position which almost always conks him out but he continued to wiggle and struggle until I put him flat on his back at which point he fell straight asleep. I took this as a sign that it was time for bed and put him down in his crib where he quickly passed out for the night.

How Milo Sleeps Now (except in his own bed not ours)

We are really looking forward to Christmas and Shelly and Megan have begun decorating the house. It looks great with all the lights and several mock Christmas trees with ornaments since we don't plan on having a real one. Milo even got a couple ornaments attached to his mobile and he has shown interest in looking at them.

Christmas and a new bounce chair

After almost two weeks of being home, we have gotten into a bit of pattern and even had time to access and change our habits for things that won't work longterm (like how we separate clean/dirty bottles, and how many paper towels we've been using). We have also started setting in writing one or two things we would like to accomplish each day. It is incredible how quickly a day goes when it is broken into three hour chunks with each chunk requiring a feeding, a diaper change, and an indefinite amount of snuggle time. I feel it especially as I have been sleeping in until 10 or 11 (sometimes 12) to make up for getting up with him in the night. I generally wake up, have some coffee, hang out with Milo for a bit, and then glance up to notice it is getting dark outside at which point I generally lose all motivation to accomplish anything and choose to spend the rest of the evening cozily on the couch. Last night, I broke the cycle by having a late evening coffee and managed to do fold some laundry, but I really hate that it is getting dark so soon.

Cute Socks Club

In any case, on my to-do list for tomorrow is to finally sit down and write some Thank You letters for all the amazing support we have received from family and friends. I am sorry it has taken this long as I really hope people understand just how much we appreciate all the baby things, food, and words of encouragement we have received. There are so many people who have been so kind to us that I may not be able to get to all of them tomorrow but I will keep chugging away and hopefully get them out soon (although, I may delay even further if we get a really good family photo tomorrow and I decide to include a copy for people).

Megan working from home (and Oliver posed to look like he is involved)

As we start to feel relaxed here, we must remember to stay on high alert for all germs. Milo may be getting bigger and stronger but a simple cold could really set us back and potentially send us back to the hospital if it diminished his ability to breathe. We have really been thankful for everyone's understanding of our concerns and willingness to stay away when sick and follow our hand washing/touching policy. We have our fingers crossed that we can make it through this cold and flu season without an incident and give him some valuable time to develop an immune system and strengthen his lungs.

An old picture of Oliver just for fun (he picked that outfit)