Reagan's First Christmas

The rest of December until Christmas passed uneventfully... a very wonderful and long overdue visit from Aunt Hannah brought much laughter and new dinosaurs for Ryan and goodies for Reagan, too.  Not that you'd know it from the last few days, but the weather allowed for a walk on the trail and a selfie (which I have discovered, is impossible for me to figure out how to take the picture while looking relaxed-- note the amount of concentration on my face):

Reagan's first Christmas approached with much anticipation... I think even she felt the excitement in the air!  Here she is on Christmas Eve:

Reagan's first solids have been avocado (big hit) and carrots (equally big hit).  I am discovering that this child LOVES to eat!  How refreshing!!

Reagan was up all night Christmas Eve into Christmas morning with what I assumed were teething discomforts.  Her fever hovered around 101.5-- not unusual for teething.  However, mid-morning on Christmas, Mom and I both realized that she suddenly felt much hotter.  We took her temperature and the thermometer beeped at 104.2.  We knew we had something other than teething on our hands.

Leaving her presents unopened, we immediately packed a bag for her, got Ryan ready to go to G-mas, and headed out the door.  RK and I went to the ER and Mike took Ryan to Cathy's.

 My Christmas dinner consisted of water and a pepperoni Hot Pocket....

Lab work and a sterile urine sample revealed a massive kidney infection and UTI.  Reagan spent two nights in the hospital where she received three doses of Rocephin, and then was sent home with further antibiotics which we continued for eight days.  Reagan had a kidney ultrasound done on Christmas Day, which we would later compare with another ultrasound three weeks later to see if the swelling in the kidneys was temporary or indicative of further renal issues.

Reagan wanted to hold her hands so badly, and couldn't figure out how to do so with the IV......

...but she finally found something that worked for her:

 Reagan still enjoyed receiving lots of love throughout this ordeal and spent much time with family:

Eventually, her brother helped her open all of her presents, and we vowed NOT to spend next Christmas in the hospital!

CHUNK!

Yesterday, Ryan and I both had off of school due to the weather.  He played in the snow, built a snowman, and made a snow angel.  I cooked breakfast, comforted Reagan since her teeth are still giving her trouble, and managed to sneak in a half hour nap during the day.

What's unusual is not what I DID do... it's what I didn't do.

For the first time in four months and twenty-seven days, I did not write down every time Reagan ate.  I did not add up the totals, calculate the number of ounces eaten, and plot it on my mental growth chart.  I did not look at how the day or week was trending in comparison to previous days and weeks.

When she was hungry, I fed her.  When she was done eating, I stopped, regardless of whether there was a few drops or an ounce left in the bottle.

And you know what?  I was less stressed (of course).  But not only that, I came to a realization:

I HAVE A CHUNKY BABY!!!!!

See for yourself:

Those pudgy toes... those chubby fingers!  Never in my life did I think my little NICU peanut would fill out so beautifully.  And the most important evidence of all is her beautiful smile!  She's happy... she's healthy... and I need to STOP WORRYING and thinking otherwise!

I feel great going into our (hopefully LAST?) weight check on the 19th.  I'm confident she's going to pass with flying colors.

It's funny... when you're not writing everything down and trying frantically to remember what you might have missed, you have a few minutes longer to kiss those baby toes!

4 month checkup

Wow, am I really behind on this one!

 Miss Princess' four month well visit was two weeks ago.  Her doctor was running behind so we spent the time playing peekaboo.

Reagan is still a peanut, but we knew that and expect her to always be on the smaller side.  She weighed 11 lbs, 15 oz, which puts her in the fifth- to tenth-percentile weight wise.  She is 24.5 inches long (50th %ile).  The doctor would like us to come back for another weight check on the 19th of December just to be sure that she is gaining a certain number of ounces within that four-week time frame.  This past weight check, for example, she had gained twelve ounces in three weeks, which is good.

We also reached another milestone!  Reagan rolled over from back to tummy all by herself Thanksgiving morning.  I woke up at 5:30 because she was crying, and here it was because she had flipped herself over and then didn't know what to do, so she got mad!  We're still working on how to roll from tummy to back.  She does very well with tummy time and sits assisted on a regular basis for twenty to thirty minutes or so if she's in her saucer seat (an on the floor saucer, not one where her legs are dangling).

The doctor also said we could try oatmeal if we wanted to.  We did it once so far:

She mostly used her tongue to push the oatmeal out, and made a face at the taste... I don't think she's ready yet.  My favorite thing was Ryan complaining the entire time that he wanted out of his high chair and didn't want to watch her eat!  We're going to wait another week or so and try again with veggies instead of oatmeal, as she may find the taste more palatable.

Last weekend, Ryan, Reagan, and I took an outing to the Science Center, and then afterward, to Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. for lunch.  They put us in a two-person booth, which meant I mostly stood the entire time, but that was OK because both kids enjoyed themselves.  Reagan laid in her side of the booth and mostly looked around and cooed at the waitress.

Our crafty booth setup (I only stood up long enough to take this picture, then I was holding onto Reagan)

How cool is the shrimpin' boat that Ryan's meal came in??

We sat some...

...and we chilled some, too!

We also had a fabulous time watching our brother play with the trains!

One of Reagan's favorite things to do is to lay in her crib and talk to the animals on her mobile.  We are quite the talker... but as you can see, we're a little more reserved when it comes to other babies!

We made a new friend at Kohl's.  Only one of us was ecstatic!

When the other baby tried to hold her hand, the pouty lip popped out and social time was over.  Reagan definitely has clearly defined spatial boundaries!

We are firmly teething:

Revving up...

Full throttle...

Nom nom nom...

...nom some more...

Ahh, that's better!

Nothing poking through the gums yet, though.  Ryan broke his first tooth at five months exactly, so we'll see when Reagan's decide to show!

The house is decorated for Christmas, and Ryan's excitement grows every day as we count down.  On Sunday, Reagan enjoyed looking at the lights on the tree while cheering for the Ravens:

"Ooh, lights!"

"Yay, Ravens!"

ENT Follow-up

While I was in Oakland for a conference, my Mom and Mike went with Reagan for her ENT follow-up.  The scope revealed no changes in the state of her laryngomalacia, meaning that it's not worse but it's not improving, either.  The bumps of extra tissue along her esophagus were visible.  The doctor mentioned that these could be shaved off, but that he didn't know if the surgery would actually help her or not, so it isn't worth doing.  He did request that we schedule another sleep study, which will occur on December 19.  We're all very much hoping that this will show a reduction in the number of disruptive events she has per hour (our previous number was 37 per hour, which is severe).

Growing Girl!

I am so pleased to say that Reagan has had a wonderful couple of weeks.  She is growing nicely, and her cheeks are really starting to chub out!  I'm loving the baby squish that is slowly developing on her body.  She's still a skinny baby, but definitely getting bigger.

No question that she's Daddy's girl!

We've had an incredibly busy week.  Ryan had a blast on Halloween as Jupiter!  Reagan was going to be a leopard but the costume was thick fleece with extra padding and much too warm for the mild weather that night.  She hung out at home and helped Grandma hand out candy to the Trick-or-Treaters while we took Ryan to "Trunk or Treat" at his school.

       Ryan and his teacher, Ms. Beth                                           Ryan loved the giant slide!

Ryan is developing a great interest in cooking and baking lately, so we came back and he made "brutter cookies."  I had pre-cut the butter into tablespoons so that he could count them out himself.  The recipe called for six tbsp of butter for the dough and eight tbsp for the icing.  After we mixed up the dough, we went to make the icing and I realized I was two tbsp short... only to find out that Ryan had added them to the dough because he "loooooooves brutter!"  I actually think the cookies tasted better this way....

Making a turkey during Kid's Club at Michael's

Now that Reagan is getting bigger and healthier, it leaves more time for fun things, like dressing her up in cute outfits!  One of my favorites so far is her skinny jeans and button down cardigan.

This coming weekend, I will be in Oakland, CA for a multicultural education conference, in which I will be presenting a roundtable discussion-- my first!  While I am excited and a little nervous, I'm feeling some anxiety at being so far away from Ryan and Reagan.  It's only two nights and three days, and it will give me the opportunity to visit with my grandmother's cousins from Fresno, so I'm focusing on that.  And, as Mike has reminded me... two nights of uninterrupted sleep!  Somehow though, I think I'll still wake up anyway because I'm used to it.  I'm comforted by the fact that my Mom will be down, and I know Ryan will have a blast with Yia Yia, G-ma, and Daddy and probably won't even remember that I'm gone!

Ryan has gone with Pop Pop and I to the airport when Pop Pop has conferences, and he is very interested in planes and airline travel.  Since he will be going with me to the airport on Friday morning, I decided to take him there after school on Tuesday so that he could see what it's all about.  We went up to the observation area at BWI, watched several planes taxi and take off, played in the children's area, and relaxed with some juice!  He got a mini Southwest plane replica at the "Plane Store" to round out the trip.  He found the moving sidewalk especially amusing.  Good times for all!

On the Mend

Baby Girl's ear infections and sinus infection are definitely improving... Hooray!!

The air purifier is remarkable... I notice a huge difference, largely because I walk into my house and I smell.... nothing.  Which of course, makes me wonder exactly what the house smelled like before.... but I'm definitely noticing a complete absence of smell.

Healthway 20600-2 Purification System

It's pretty large and isn't very attractive, but it definitely does the job!  For Christmas, I'm thinking maybe some lights and ornaments will help??  Nah, probably still won't fool the kids... they'll still want the tree up.

Reagan still isn't eating enough during the day to get her through the night.  She still eats twice per night... usually once around midnight and then again at 4 or 5.  Two nights ago, she ate at 3 and 8, which was incredible!!  Something like that would definitely be an improvement as to how much sleep Mike and I are getting!  One thing that has been WONDERFUL this week is.... our first week since she was born with no doctor's visits whatsoever!  If all goes well, she won't have anything until her ENT appointment on November 8th, and her 4-month well visit on November 19th.  

In other nighttime news, Ryan is having some trouble lately with wetting the bed and then wanting to sleep with us since his sheets are wet, so I got him this chart and hopefully that will help motivate him!  

Ryan had a blast Trick-or-Treating with some friends this past Friday.  

He's actually going to be Jupiter for the "real" Trick or Treating but in this case, his costume would have been ruined because it was trick or treating in a strip mall with about 9,000 kids.  Violet's (the cutest iced donut ever!!) mother offered to take him so that RK didn't end up out in the cold while being sick and I was so thankful!!!  Ryan had a wonderful time, which was really important to me since sometimes, it's hard to give him all the attention he deserves and wants.

We also spent some time on Saturday with Mike's uncle and his wife from South Carolina... and they brought their new 10 week old puppy, Otis!

He is part Border Collie, part St. Bernard, so he is going to be very big!!  Ryan loved playing with him while Reagan watched.

Sunday morning started off with brunch, cooked by Daddy and Ryan!  The kids were chilling out in diapers until it was time to get dressed and head off to the NASA Goddard Visitor's Center.

Ryan says, "Cheese!!!"  Reagan loves her Robeez that we found at Once Upon a Child!

Posing in front of one of the murals

Sitting in the Gemini 7 replica

Captain Ryan and Co-Pilot Daddy!

Playing around in the gift store

Ryan had $15 that he was allowed to spend for the day.  In the gift shop, he chose a space shuttle, a bouncy ball, and a parachute rocket, all of which just so happened to total $14!!  Ryan is an excellent shopper with very discerning taste.

After the Space Center, it was off to Ruby Tuesdays for lunch and Red Velvet cupcakes for dessert!!