4 months

The kids are doing well but we have started a busy week.

Scarlett is struggling with taking her feeds.  I think she may have heard the H word being tossed around and was worried she might have to leave her brother behind.  She took all of her feeds last night and is doing ok today so far, but over the weekend she missed a couple and took an hour to eat a few others.  On a positive note, she is gaining weight so the medical team isn't worried about her nutrition, only her behavior being different.  She doesn't have any symptoms of an illness (fever, bradicardia, desaturations, etc.).  As of this evening, my best guess is that she doesn't want to be on our schedule (3, 6, 9, and 12s), she wants to be on her own.  She will wake up and cue early or late, but the doctor won't let us go "ad lib."  I am very happy to announce she is now 9 pounds 4 ounces!

Grayson's lasix were discontinued today, after he had already had his daily dose.  He is at 8 pounds 12 ounces!  Hopefully he will be OK off the lasix and be able to follow his sister to the zoo this weekend or early next week.

Both kids had their Retinopathy of Prematurity (ROP) exams today and their eyes are "complete!"  This means their eyes have developed normally!  They won't need another exam until 1 year from now.

Scarlett passed her SAT test last night.  They hooked her up to a higher accuracy monitor and did well.  She will have her car seat test tomorrow.

Both kids are getting their 4 month immunizations tomorrow.  We will have them do it in the evening after we are both there.  I am not looking forward to that...

In other sad news, Grayson has a hernia and will need surgery before he checks out.  We didn't schedule it yet but hopefully they can get him in late this week.  They will want him to spend the night of his surgery in the hospital for monitoring.

And lastly, on a bittersweet note, Trish will be working her last day for a while tomorrow.  The Practioner asked her to be available more often to make sure Scarlett's eating OK.  We assume she is eating better directly from Trish because she is still gaining weight even when she's not taking her other feeds as well.  Oakstone has been an amazing place for her.  She has had challenging days but loves what she does and the impact she has.  She also has an incredible work family that loves and supports her.  I have had the privilege of seeing that care in action the last couple months and can't imagine how hard tomorrow will be on her.  Of course we don't anticipate that tomorrow will be a "Goodbye" but a "See you soon."  

So here we are, on day 121.  The elasticity of time is playing a cruel joke as each day now seems to last forever.

Here are pictures.  Saturday was week 17 and Sunday was 4 months.

And a couple bonus:

 Her sleeping positions crack me up!