15 Months - Another Installment Directly From the Source

Ok, here we go again!  I had my 15 month appointment at the doctor today so that means it's time for another post.  Come with me and I'll take you for a ride. . .

We'll get going as soon as I start this thing.  Mom, can I have some more quarters?

The doctor today said that I made "a leap" on my growth curve.  Apparently gaining 3 pounds in 3 months really impressed her (moving me from the 9th to the 24th percentile).  I was 22 pounds, 15 ounces, was 31 inches tall (41st percentile), and my head was 19 inches (77th percentile).  Hooray!  Besides that good news they also made me take off my clothes again and then get a couple shots.  Those people are just plain mean.  I don't think we should visit them anymore, but I think Daddy and Mommy might keep dragging me there.  At least they gave me a free book about frogs.  Still didn't make it worth it if you ask me. . .

I've been sick a couple times over the last few months.  Nothing too major though.  I did have a pretty high fever and do nothing but sleep for about a day, but after that I felt fine.  Luckily Grandma was here then and liked holding me.  I'm also in the process of cutting 2 more teeth on the bottom (which will give me a grand total of 8).  It's no fun.  I keep bringing Mommy my Tylenol but she only gives it to me every so often.  I just LOVE that stuff.  It tastes so good.  I'm also pretty accident prone.  I'm just in such a hurry to get everywhere.  I'm afraid I might miss something!  I bonk my head a lot and get bruises.  Oh well.

I'm also starting to learn how to do artsy stuff.  Sometime I finger paint, or throw crayons on the floor, or put stickers on Mommy's face.  I really love it when I can get the top off of Mommy's stuff she puts around her eyes and draw cool things on my face.  I think I do it better than she does.

 At the doctor today she said that kids my age usually have about 6 words.  I'm not sure how many I have.  I'm saying things pretty much constantly but Dad and Mom don't seem to understand much of it.  They need more practice.  Almost every animal I see is a "dog" or occasionally a "cat."  I really love to read "books" (especially Dr. Seuss and SkippyJon Jones).  I repeat random things Dad and Mom say in an attempt to make them excited (the other day I repeated "bug" and "cow" and Mom for some reason thought that was awesome).  I am started to understand a lot more of what they're saying though.  I guess I need to learn their language if I ever hope to let them know what I want.  I know what it means when when they say that have milk for me, or I know that when they say "nap" they're about to put me in my crib.  Most importantly though, I know that when they say "snack" or "breakfast" or "lunch" or "dinner" that it's time to chow down!!!  Now I shall share some pictures of me eating. . .

I LOVE GRAPES!   I like to just keep stuffing them in until my cheeks are full.  Then I can save them for later

I still like vegetables ok, but not as much as I used to.  I'd rather eat fruit or dairy (yogurt, cheese, oranges, pears, or GRAPES preferably.  Did I mention that I like grapes?)

Hmmm.  Oat-bran muffin. You want some?  I often try to share my food with Mommy and Daddy but they don't always want it. I just figure that if I taste it and don't like it that I should just take it out of my mouth and offer it to them.  No sense in wasting it.  That's just silly

Daddy decided that I should have a doughnut after my shots today.  Man was it good stuff. I've never had one of those all to myself before.

And here are a couple shots of me at Romp and Roll playing with this weird thing with wheels.  Some days I love going to play there and other days not so much.  I really just want to go outside and walk around.  I love doing that.  Mommy said after my nap today that we can go to the park because it's pretty warm outside. Yip! Yippee! Yippito! (as SkippyJon would say)

And for our final shot, here is me sitting on my friend the cow.  Some really nice people at church gave this to me because their kids don't want to sit on him anymore.  I'm a cowboy! Later taters!

5 Months

Gabriel turned 5 months old today!  Here are some pictures and random tidbits about the last month. . .

Such cute cheeks

It seems like in the last couple weeks Gabriel has started to do so many new things.  Even little things.  He clasps both of his hands together in front of him, pulls his legs up and grabs his feet, and sucks his thumb more efficiently and seems to want a pacifier less.  His major new trick is rolling off of his tummy and onto his back.  That being said, he has decided that tummy time is no more.  He stays on his stomach for a few seconds and then rolls on his back.  He's pretty happy to be able to end the tummy time torture at will now I think.

Still such a happy and smiling baby

He also went on his first major roadtrip.  We ventured to Baton Rouge to visit some friends (it was to great to see the Nasses! And we can't wait to meet their little boy once he makes his appearance several months from now). Gabriel did much better in the car than we thought he would.  We drove at night with the hopes of not messing up his sleep schedule too much.  On the way out he was a little fussy, but on the drive home he basically slept the entire way with stopping once to eat.  He woke up for good when we were about 30 minutes from home.  Taylor may have been really tired from driving, but at least Gabriel stayed on track and wasn't too worn out.

Checking out some fish

Baton Rouge has some yummy food.  I think he wanted a big bite for himself

Gabriel is really starting to be very aware of everything.  When things move or people walk into the room he gets very distracted.  He hasn't really cared about stuffed animals before, but last week he made a new friend that he likes to spend time with (mostly grabbing the long arms and sticking the hands in his mouth)

Not quite sure what to think of him during their first encounter

But he quickly decided that they could be friends

He's also gotten so much better with sleeping.  He goes to bed between 7-8pm and wakes up for the day around 8am.  He eats a little late night snack around 10-11pm.  He sometimes wakes up and makes some noise but many nights he sleeps until morning.  The last several times I've gotten home from work around 8am he's just in his crib sucking his thumb and making no noise.  I wonder if he wakes up a lot and just stays there silently.  I guess he's trying be polite and let us get a little extra rest before he wakes us up ;)

One of his favorite toys remains his plastic rings.  So simple and easy to "eat".  Speaking of toys, I think he's about to graduate to some much more interesting ones since he's moving around more and becoming more alert.  Speaking of eating, I think that soon we will be starting to try giving him a little cereal every day.  We'll see how that goes and I'll certainly be taking pictures.

He loves to be held in a standing position.  He even stays standing if you lean him against something.

Can you guess which parent picked out this outfit for him? 

He is almost sitting up by himself now too.  He just needs a little support.  He's getting so big and strong

Washcloth in the mouth. . .yummy

A whole new perspective on bath time

The weather has been so nice some days and it's great to get out into the fresh air.  We're starting to explore the outdoors.  Unfortunately our favorite people watching spot, the Caribou Coffee at the Forum, closed last week.  Gabriel and Taylor had some fun outside the other day though.  The manager of our apartment complex secretly took this shot and sent it to us.

Other than that nothing new!  Just enjoying watching him explore the world.  It's so much fun to watch him learn and grow :)

Special Care Nursery

The day after little Gabriel was born is a little bit of a blur to me.  So many things happened.  But to back up to where I left off last time. . .

When we were in the delivery room after the birth Dixie remarked that the placenta was quite small.  Due to that and the fact that his heart rate had issues during labor the protocol was to send the placenta to pathology.  Also, when she was collecting the cord blood for banking she remarked that the cord was exceptionally small and she wasn't sure if she could get enough blood.  I thought very little about either of these thing at the moment (I was too busy being overwhelmed by the fact that I'd just met our sweet baby boy).

A NICU nurse came to the delivery since there was some meconium present when my water broke.  She checked Gabriel's blood sugar shortly after birth and commented that it was low (I can't remember the exact number.  Somewhere between 30-40).  He ate a tiny bit and she checked it again about 30 minutes later.  It was slightly above 40.  She told us not to worry, but that they would check it every hour for a couple hours to make sure that it kept going up.

As the night went on I can't remember exactly how many times they checked it (his poor little heel still has scabs on it) or exactly what the numbers were, but by about 6:30 am on Sunday morning the nurse came to tell us that it was still less than 40.  I could not get him to eat anything and the nurses in the nursery could not get him to take any formula either.  We were told that they were moving him to their Transition Nursery (basically, you can stay there for a few hours until they decide if you're stable enough to stay on the postpartum floor or if you need to be admitted to the NICU or Special Care Nursery).

The neonatologist came to see him shortly after he was brought down.  We were there when he came by.  He took no time in saying that the safest thing was to admit him for 24 hours to monitor him and make sure that his blood sugar stabilized and that he was able to eat.

I don't think that I've ever felt so scared and overwhelmed.  I hadn't slept in who knows how long and this was certainly not a scenario that I had prepared myself for.  I know very little about babies, but I think that my nursing brain tends to jump to the worst care scenario when it comes to medical things.

Anyway, over the next couple days the drill was to try and get him to eat.  If he couldn't take in a certain about the nurses would supplement it with tube feedings.  His blood sugars stabilized once he was able to get adequate intake going, but it really was mostly tube feeding at this point.  He had very little energy to eat anything himself.  Also, his bilirubin climbed for a couple of days and his platelets dropped for a couple of days as well.  On Sunday and Monday he ate very little himself, but the nurses assured us that at some point a switch would just flip and he'd start eating himself.

Talking with the neonatologist (who was great, by the way), he said that all of it could simply be explained by the fact that his placenta and cord were so small.  He just didn't grow like he should have toward the end of the pregnancy.  There's really no way to know exactly why that happened, since the ultrasound at 20 weeks was normal.  When I talked to the midwife about it the day we were discharged she said she'd seen that happen when people got very sick toward the end of their pregnancy.  I had a virus for several weeks in October, but who knows if that contributed or not.

I was discharged from the hospital on Monday night, and little Gabe just wasn't ready to come home with us.  That was a rough night too.  I did not anticipate packing up the car to go home without him when I anticipated his birth.  He was moved that evening to a different part of the nursery though, where babies that aren't quite as sick can still be monitored, but there is a little more privacy and space.  They took him feeding tube out that night as well.  Even though he still took a very long time to eat and had to be forced a little, he could at least get down enough to stop tube feedings.

On Tuesday the doctor decided that he needed just one more day before he came home.  His platelets started trending up, but he wanted to make sure that the bilirubin had peaked since it was still climbing.  As frustrating as that was, we certainly wanted to make sure that after everything that he'd gone through he was ready to come home and wouldn't be bouncing right back into the hospital.

One more thing that I simply must mention.  I have never been so impressed with a group of nurses as I was with everyone we came in contact with in the nursery, on the postpartum floor, and in the lactation department.  I've seen a lot of nurses in a lot of different hospitals and work environments, and never have I seen a group so competent, compassionate, and passionate about what they do.  Every single one of them was so supportive and helpful.  They let us ask a million questions, let us take care of him (feed him/change him/hold him) as much as we wanted, taught us all kinds of tricks and ideas for how to get him to eat, and at the same time encouraged us to rest and take care of ourselves.  One night when we were there the nurse told me that I had to go and take something for pain and sleep, even if that meant missing his 3 am feeding.  I needed someone to give me that permission since I had been up all day and night and had barely rested myself.

This has gotten long enough :)  Needless to say, we got to take Gabriel home on Wednesday afternoon.  He is still learning how to eat better, which is frustrating, but we're trying to maintain perspective.  He's doing so much better than a week ago.  We can't expect him to learn it all in one day.  When we went to the pediatrician on Thursday he had gained a little weight and we'll take him to get checked again later this week.  Never have I been compelled to pray about something so fervently, and never have a seen God so quickly answer prayer.  Every day he is so much better and I am amazed.  What a beautiful blessing this sweet little boy is to our family.

Loki

I know that this may be a random thing to post, since it's not specifically about the baby, but I'm slightly worried about how Loki is going to deal with this change in her life.  She's always been an anxious little dog and tends to have a hard time adjusting to new things (like if we drive her anywhere she hasn't been before she gets sick in the car).

The first thing that seemed to grab her attention that things were changing was when we moved the desks out of the second bedroom (Taylor's desk is now in our bedroom and mine is in a closet since I rarely use it anyway.)  We could tell that the furniture being out of place tipped her off that something was happening.  We also recently took a chair that's in our bedroom and moved it into Taylor's parents basement to make more space.  This was the chair that she used to jump up onto our bed (one of her favorite chill spots during the day and when I'm in the shower in the morning.)  We left the ottoman that goes with the chair in place so she can still get herself up to the bed, but it's still different and she can tell.

She seemed to get a little freaked out when Taylor was setting up the Pack-n-Play, so we decided to put her in it to show her it wasn't scary.  She was less than amused. . . .

Another thing that I wonder about for people with dogs is, how do you teach the dog which toys belong to them and which belong to the baby?  Loki has always been very simple in her toy preferences.  She has a couple plastic balls she bats around, occasionally a rope she chews on, and she likes to eat her little rawhide bones.  We never really buy her stuffed things because she chews them up in 5 minutes.

We've gotten a few toys so far for the baby.  I put them in a basket that was under the crib.  Taylor witnessed the other day Loki crawling under the crib and scratching at the basket.  When the baby starts playing with things that look fun to her I hate to scold her like she's doing something wrong, but we obviously can't have her eating all of the baby toys either.

I'm sure we'll figure this out one day at a time once Baby Rollo is here, but I do love our dog and I want her to adjust well to this change in her life.  She's had domain over everything on the floor for the past 5 years and I know she's going to be less than thrilled with having to share :)

Baby Owner's Manual

Erika got me this for Father's Day:

She knows me all too well. Though, I suppose this would not surprise anyone who knows me. I am finally done with my PCA licensure studying so I can start reading the manual. Generally, I am not a manual kind of guy, and I like to figure stuff out by trial and error. But, I suppose in this case I should probably consult the manual before using the product.