what's missing?

32 grams a day....

1750 grams. that is 3lbs 13.70z .... wow. that is double her birth weight plus a little.

Room with a view

It's hard to see .... but there really is a big girl in this bed .... This open bed! No more isolette!!!

shortest post ever

Hi. I'm SUPER pooped .... I don't have the energy to post any pictures but I did want to let you know that Olivia now weighs 3lbs 11oz. We're hoping she hits 4lbs this week ... then she'll get her immunizations (one a day over a course of five days) ... then come home. In theory. There is no way for the doctors to actually put a date on it at this point. They did say she would be in an open crib in the next day or two. It's hard to tell from the pictures just how much she is growing ... but if you can imagine, it is almost time to replace her hospital id wrist and ankle bands ... that should tell you something!

March 23rd .... 11 weeks old

Quick little cry

Here is a quick little cry from Olivia .... she doesn't do it very often ... or for very long ....

In the right corner...weighing in at 3lbs 8.5oz...Lightweight Champion Olivia Grace!

sweet kisses

Two posts in one day... I couldn't resists posting this little video. Be sure to listen and watch Olivia's lips after I blow her a kiss goodnight.

I want to bring her home!

I have learned a lot from this experience and the lesson i am currently working on is one of patience. I am ready to have my baby girl at home with us where I can do the things that new moms are supposed to do. It has been tough to just "sit by" for the last 75 days. It is not enough for me to be ready or for Mike to be ready or for everyone to be ready .... it will only be time when Olivia is ready. She is doing an awesome job of preparing for life outside of the hospital... I'm not trying to rush her... i'm just feeling, well pretty much all of the anxieties that a 37 week pregnant woman would feel i guess. playing the waiting game...waiting for my baby to come home. We are doing the "nesting" thing at the house as well. Cleaning and arranging...preparing.... We have almost completed the nursery (curtains and picture hanging pending) and i'll post some of those pictures in a seperate post underneath this one later tonight. Dinner's ready....gotta run.

Girls got style

Hi again. I hope everyone is doing well.

This week we had great time with the NY Melvilles. Grandma, Grandpa, Uncle Dan, Aunt Rachesha, and cousins Yvonna, Joy and Madison came to visit. Thank you for coming down to see us!!!

Olivia is changing so quickly ... we can't make it too long before we all get together again.

Speaking of Olivia's changes....

Tonight she weighed in at 3 pounds 6.5 ounces. The nurse also reduced the temperature of the isolette again. Olivia is doing an excellent job of maintaining and regulating her body temperature. As part of being able to do so .... she is now able to wear clothes!

The nurses are adjusting the amount of iron they give her based on her body weight. Other good news is that her reticulocyte count is just over 5 and her hematocrit is back up to 25 on her own. ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reticulocyte ).

You should scroll back up to see that first picture again. I just love it. She was really listening to everything her Dad was saying...intently. Very sweet to see them together. I would normally take a picture of both of their faces but Mike thinks he has picked up a cold and the mask he was wearing was not as fashionable has her outfit.

Big Girl

March 14

March 12

We've had a couple of great days. I apologize for not updating or posting pictures. Olivia is adjusting well in her new enviornment. It is much more quiet here then in the DUKE ICN. Monitors are not alarming all of the time, not much foot traffic, only a few other babies making noise... it's a whole new atmosphere. The school of thought and approach to things is different as well. We are very much seeing a "feed and grow" approach. All of the nurses are trained on a level III care, and they have had to run a few familiar tests (x-ray and blood tests like hematocrit, electrolytes, etc.)... but it is not as intense. Her hematocrit is 26 again. They don't want to transfuse her so what they are going to try is.... giving her iron supplements in conjunction with a series of injections of Epigen (?). The thought behind this is that it will help tell her bone marrow to produce more of her own red blood cells. Tonight will be her first dose of iron (put in the milk). They only introduce or change one thing at a time to make sure she can tolerate. The first change was to reduce her feeds from 3 hours on 1 hour off to 1.5 on 1.5 off. The goal is to get her to a bolus (gravity) feed all at once every 3 hours. She tolerated that first step so the next step was to add some protein powder to the milk. She has been tolerating that so now they are adding small doses of iron. Ultimately they have to add some multi-vitamins as well. One of the blood tests showed that she was not getting enough of certain things for her bones to be strong. It is all in steps. One at a time. The two biggests bits of news that I want to share are.... As of tonight Olivia weighs 1334 grams. That is equivelant to 2lbs 15oz! Big stuff. The other exciting news is that we were finally able to breastfeed! We got a round of applause from another mom in the nursery that heard me cheerfully exclaiming "she's doing it she's doing it she's really really doing it!!!" It was a very short time because it is a lot of work for her to be out of the bed, keeping warm, being handled, etc.... (burning calories) but I'm just so glad even for the few minutes we got to spend. Olivia and I spoke today about the company that is coming this weekend and we are both very excited about it. We hope everyone has a safe trip and we look forward to seeing you!

Road trip.....

Look who got to take a road trip. Today (Sat. the 8th) Olivia was brought by Lifeflight from Duke to Wake Med in Cary. She arrived at about 3pm and her dad and I arrived shortly after. Just in time to listen in on the briefing.

What a different world. We were only there a few hours but it was long enough to notice all of the differences and some of the similarities between here and at Duke.

First of all there are only 6 babies in this special care nursery (the most they have room for is 8...with maybe an exception for 10) opposed to the 50-60 babies in the NICU. The bed is a different style and the monitors are slightly different but Mike has both the bed and the monitors figured out already.

The nurses have all been trained in level 3 care but the nursery itself is a level 2.

I'll post more about the nursery as we all settle in and figure things out.

--- her arrival weight by their scale is 1208 (Duke's departure weight from the previous night was 1275). she had 2 bradys for Renee the night before and has had two for Stacy at WM. One requiring stim and the other not.

Someone is really filling out nicely