Have you seen this Pooh?

Name: Winnie the Pooh
Age: 1 day old
Date of birth (aka: inflated): 10/12/08
Missing since: 10/12/08

Pooh was last seen at approximately 9pm last night, wearing a red t-shirt and carrying a bouquet of pink balloons. He was last seen floating above the steps on our front porch. His pink balloons were found unharmed. If anyone has any information on the whereabouts of this missing bear, please leave a comment on this blog.

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Ok, in all seriousness...are you kidding me? Some passer-by actually stole our Winnie the Pooh balloon??? At first we thought that maybe he just couldn't hold on tight enough because of the crazy Santa Ana winds, but after some careful forensics work completed by Detective Daddy, it was concluded that the ribbon that tied him to the porch was cleanly severed by some sort of sharp object. Maybe scissors. Maybe a pocketknife. The weapon has not yet been (and probably never will be) recovered.

The motive as well, is still unknown. All fingers point to a parent passing by who just wanted to please their child. Or possibly a silly prankster.

She's home!

Details coming soon...

PO'd

No, no, silly. I don't mean PO'd as in ticked off. I mean PO'd as in "by mouth"! That's right...Abigail is taking every meal by mouth!

So why am I so excited about this, you ask? Well, for one thing, it's one step closer to being home. Secondly, well, I'll let you see for yourself...if you can see...the picture is small (technical difficulties.)



Well? Do you see it? Do you see what I'm talking about?

Of course you don't! It's not there! That horrible feeding tube is not there! They took it out today. I thought it was going to be a few days before they did it, so what a pleasant surprise to arrive at the hospital and see that it was gone. Once again, there I stood at her bedside...crying. This time it was happy tears though. It is starting to be a regular thing for me...the happy tears, and I LOVE it!

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Ok. So enough about that. I just have to show you this picture too. You have to see her shirt.



No no, your eyes are NOT playing tricks on you. Those ARE in fact golf balls on that shirt. I guess this is what I get for going to bed early and leaving Daddy alone with the internet.

Actually, in all honesty, it's very cute. And Daddy meant well. And doesn't she look good in green?

Getting big, yet still tiny

Sometimes I feel like the pictures don't do her justice. Neither for how cute she really is (I know...I am biased), nor how small she is. So here she is being burped by her Daddy. I know it's her back side, but look at her compared to her Daddy's hand! She's tiny!



And by the way, do you think her hair is blond or red? Because above it looks blond to me, but check this out:



Now it's red don't you think? I guess time will tell...

So here's the latest and greatest...she's 3 pounds 10 ounces. About 16.5 inches long. Her meals are now "ad lib". This means it's up to the nurse whether to feed her by bottle or tube, depending on how alert she is. She has taken every meal by bottle except for 6pm last night and 6am this morning (they didn't want to wear her out too much). They are also now letting her eat as much as she wants, instead of keeping her on a volume schedule. She's been taking about 40 cc's or so. This is AWESOME news. They may even take that stupid tube out of her nose in the next day or two. She's still in her condo because she's a little too small to maintain her own temperature. I guess she needs to weigh another 100 grams or so in order to accomplish that feat. During rounds today the doc said her growth chart is "gorgeous". Yay!

So way back when (6 weeks ago) I got this adorable little name plate (beautifully crafted by ML) to put on Abby's bed at the hospital. It was made with lots of love, using the same colors as are in her crib bedding. Today I decided I would bring it home and frame it. It's the first piece of art that I have to put in the nursery. Isn't it cute? Thanks to Merry Lynn for making it. We love it and can't wait to hang it.

Beauty Parlor

Abigail had a busy day today. She started at 6am, getting her ostomy changed. Then she relaxed for a bit until we got there at noon. I gave her a bottle and she drank the whole darn thing in minutes. Then we took turns holding her until 3 o'clock, when we gave her a sponge bath. Nurse Mandy showed us how to wash her hair, and boy does she like to have her head rubbed!









When we were done with the bath, she slept some more. Daddy read her a story called the Clumsy Crab. Then 6pm came he fed her! For the first time ever, Daddy got to feed his daughter. He did great, paced her perfectly and once again, she finished the whole darn thing. She is such a good eater!



I almost forgot to mention, she is a whopping 3 pounds 8 ounces! Oh, and she ripped her feeding tube out again last night. They had to put it back in AGAIN. I REALLY think she is trying to tell us something.

I wonder...

I couldn't stop thinking about Madison today. She is in my thoughts every day...but for some reason especially today.

I wonder what she looked like.

Did she have the same fingers and toes?

Did she have a mole or a birth mark? Something that would have made it easy to tell them apart?

Would she have been as fiesty?

Would she have cried as loud?

I wonder if I will always regret not unwrapping her from her blanket when I held her and told her I loved her.

Or if I just regret it right now.

Update...

Abigail had to have a blood transfusion yesterday. Everything is ok, she just isn't making red blood cells fast enough. She was looking really pale, but now that she got the blood her color has come back and she looks so much better. Once again we heard the infamous "it's a preemie thing". She has an IV back in her again but just for a couple of days. I think it may have been more painful for me to see her with that darn IV in her arm than it was for her to get it put in there. She is so tough and such a fighter and I don't know how she does it. They are all such fighters, those NICU babies. And it makes me so sad that they have to be there.

Brian has a theory. It's that all babies should get a fair shake and come out healthy. Let the parents screw them up later, but geez, give 'em a break to start.

I don't know. I thought it was a good theory.

On a happier note, yesterday the developmental therapist told us, and I quote, "She is the poster child for bottle feeding". And yes, when she said "she", she was referring to Abigail. I'm not trying to brag or anything, but what else is a proud Mommy to do? Let something THAT big go unmentioned??? We are SO proud of her I cannot even put it into words. She is getting a bottle every third meal now. Today she hit the magical 1500 grams (3lbs 5oz), so they have begun to wean her off of the heat in her condo. She's almost ready for an open crib!

Well, they have told us we better start getting ready because "she will be home before you know it." Again "she" = Abigail. Anyone know when "before you know it" actually is? 'Cause I sure don't and I couldn't find anyone in the NICU that did either. Nonetheless, just in case it's soon, I took the mandatory CPR class today. And I called the pediatrician we want to use to make sure she is taking new patients. And I daydreamed about putting the nursery together...