Monday (February 6)

More good news! Silas is doing great. He has continued to improve since his move to the yellow nicu. He has went down from 4 ml air flow to 2 ml air flow on his high humidity nasal cannula. This is huge! Last week he was on 5 ml. He is slowly coming off of that altogether. When it is gone completely (hopefully by the end of the week) he can a.) be moved to a real crib, b.) start wearing clothes, and c.) start bottle and breastfeeding. Yay!!!!

Also, he is off of the continuous feedings through his feeding tube. They are now feeding him every two hours through the feeding tube. Next, they will work up to every three hours for feedings. This will get him ready and on a schedule for his bottle/breast feedings.

All of these things add up to a very exciting week ahead for Silas. He will have some things to adjust to but the nurse today said that he is doing so well that it wouldn't surprise her if he was in a crib, wearing clothes, and taking a bottle by the end of the week.

I held him for a long time this afternoon. We visited. He nuzzled at my breast. (He's a natural, I tell ya.) He fell asleep. I watched Midnight in Paris starring Owen Wilson on my Kindle while he slept. We had a great time.

And then he went back to his bed, I talked to the nurse, and then I pumped more milk. The whole afternoon flew by and I realized that it was past supper time. So, I headed downstairs to eat. He is on a schedule where he gets his bath and "hands on" time at 8:30. I made it back upstairs before 8:00 (I got caught up watching The Voice while I was in the cafeteria). There had been a shift change and the new night nurse had a lot to do tonight so she already had his bath and care times done while I was at supper. I was majorally bummed! I love helping with his bath! He was already back in bed and swaddled in a sound sleep when I got back. I wasn't gone that long! Anyway, he weighed 3 pounds, 10 ounces tonight. And, guess what? He grew another inch this week! That is an inch a week for the past three weeks! He is now 17 1/4 inches long! Praise God for answered prayers because our boy is really growing now!

Other fun things about today: I discovered the best hot chocolate ever at the coffee shop downstairs. Yum. I was brave and turned the cafeteria tv to something other than ESPN. I'm not sure if that's ever been done before. And, I listened to Harry Potter on the audiobook all the way to St. Louis today and let me just say, that it was awesome!

Oh, and P.S. The Yellow Nicu is where all of the crying babies are. Wowza! You can tell these babies have good lungs.