Another Weekend

The neurosurgeon follow up went well. He snipped the ends of her stitches so they will come out faster, but they could take another month to completely dissolve. Our next follow up with him will be around Thanksgiving. They will do an mri to make sure the shunt is still working as it should.

The next appointment is Monday evening. This one is a physical therapist from the early intervention program.

Tummy time today was impressive. She can push up and lift her head, looking around. She’s started moving her arms more, like she knows she needs to use them to crawl. She can kick off very well against our hands and propel herself across the mat with just her feet. When I’m working, I keep her loosely strapped on my chest so she can build her arms up.

We bumped her volume up to 90 mls tonight. She’s been finishing 80 pretty consistently, and she’s been waking herself up about half an hour before feeding. We think she’s ready for a little more. This will make mixing up her milk easier, since the recipe is in units of 90 mls. She gets a protein fortifier for extra calories and protein (shocker) and rice cereal for her acid reflux. The rice thickens the milk a little, so it stays down easier.

Hopefully the combination of tonight’s bath, which she thoroughly enjoyed, and a little extra milk will help her to sleep better tonight than she did last night. It’s now about 9pm, and I was awake from midnight to 2am, and from 4am until now. There was a 45 minute nap in there around 3. We all need sleep! 

Shopping Spree!

I finally made it to the store to pick up some things for Little Miss Minion. Since we can’t go together, it severely limits the times that we can go.

We have 7 Dr. Brown’s bottles now, instead of just the one they sent us home from the hospital with. We can clean them all once a day now, which will be fantastic. I found Preemie flow nipples at the store too, which I was surprised to find because preemie stuff is hard to find, now that I’m looking for it. I boiled and dried them all this afternoon, so they are ready to go.

I got her a bathtub, which we will be using tonight. It’s more of a mesh recliner that you put in the bathtub, but she’s never had a real bath before, so this will be fun. I got all of her towels and washcloths and soaps put away in her bathroom, plus cleaned the shower because we never use it and it was dusty.

We also realized/remembered that we have actual bibs for feeding her, so that’s been nice today. I got some more swaddle pods in a lighter weight fabric, so we don’t have to worry about washing the one we had.

I got a mirror for the car so I can see her while I’m driving. I picked up a small package of generic wipes to see if she tolerates them. We can buy 800 for about 14 bucks vs 50 name brand ones for 12 bucks. I picked up some more dish soap, since we are going through that like crazy with washing her bottle and my pumping stuff.

I went through my “new mom” coupons and found a bunch of good ones that I used, plus a 15% registry items one, plus a buy one get one Starbucks. All in all, an excellent shopping trip.