6 weeks old already!!!

Here are a few pictures daddy took, I swear she gets more and more precious everyday!!!! We went to the pediatrician yesterday and Mackenzie is up to 6lbs 3oz!!!!!!!!!!!! She is growing and thriving well. She got her Hepatitis shot, which she most certainly did not like, and will get her 2 month shots in only 2 more weeks. I can't believe she is 6 weeks old already. I think because she was in the hospital so long, I missing about 4 weeks of time. Anyway, she is doing well and she cannot wait to meet the rest of her family!!!!!

Ready for Santa...

We had a very quiet, uneventful Christmas morning!! It was different, but nice to be home alone with Mike and Mackenzie :-) We had a gift for each of us, and then we had some gifts from some of our friends in Gville for Mackenzie. After gifts, we went to Mike's boss's house for lunch with him and his family. It was fun, we had great food, and best of all we didn't have to cook!!!!

Bath...and Chair

This is a picture of my new glider my mom and dad got me. I am so excited it is finally here, I ordered one online about 3-4 weeks ago and recently found out it was on back order until the end of January. So, not wanted to wait until then, I cancelled that order and ordered it from another website...and here it is!!!!!!!!

Here is Mike working hard to get it put together :-)

Well, our latest discovery is that Mackenzie manages to poop and pee outside of her diapers at times!!! She has been wearing newborn sized diapers, but today I had to break down and buy some premie diapers. They say that they fit up to 6lbs and she is almost there so I was trying to make due with the ones I already had, but she made it very clear this morning that they are a little too big. As a result she got "hosed" off in our bathroom sink!!!!!

She was not happy that daddy wanted to take pictures of her at that moment...she was naked for goodness sake :-)

New Stuff

Well, we had to run to Publix today for some last minute things and Mike found these cute little shoes for Mackenzie. The funny thing is that they are key chains!!!!! They are the perfect length, but they are not quite wide enough :-) I took a picture of them next to her so you could see how small they are!!!!!! I wish they would have fit her, they are really cute :-)

Well, yesterday Mackenzie and I went to the hospital where I work to see some friends and have lunch. The hospital provided a free lunch to all employees and it was actually a decent meal :-) While I was there, I ran into the pediatric Gastrointestinal doctor that works with us and I had a few questions for him concerning Mackenzie and her reflux symptoms. He told me to come to the office and he would see her right away!!! (It's nice having some connections sometimes) Anyway, she does have reflux, and we have started some medicine that will hopefully help the situation. All babies have reflux, but we don't want it to effect her weight gain in any way. It also makes her uncomfortable at times, and we don't want that either. Her weight at his office was 5lbs 10oz...so she is still on the right track. The idea is to have less episodes of choking and spitting up and she will gain weight faster!!!!

Working Hard :-)

Well, I cannot explain how wonderful it is to be home with Mackenzie. Our first couple of nights have actually gone quite smooth. It helps because she was already on a schedule from the hospital.

This morning, I jumped in the shower after feeding her and when I got done I went into the living room to check on her and I found her like this!!!!! I thought is was the cutest thing I have ever seen :-)

FINALLY HOME!!!!!

Well, we thought it would never happen...but Mackenzie is finally home. She was discharged from the NICU this morning, and so far the day has gone smooth. We got to have lunch with daddy and now she is napping in her swing :-) Above are a few pics from today :-)

Picture Tag

I was tagged by Laura to play a little picture game.
Here are the rules:
1) Choose the 4th folder where you store your pictures on your computer
2) Select the 4th picture in the folder
3) Explain the picture
4) Tag 4 people to do the sameNo cheating (cropping, editing, etc.)

This picture was taken the day after Mackenzie was born. As you can see, she is still on the vent. I was not able to see her until later that afternoon, but Daddy was at her side so I didn't worry all that much :-) She seems to be quite comfy with Daddy there with her...and I know he loved it when she "grabbed" his finger and would not let go. I am so grateful to have such a wonderful, caring husband who loves our precious girl :-)

I am tagging Angela, Amy, and Kristy :-)

News...

Well, we thought Mackenzie was coming home today. As usual, the different doctors tell us different things, which by the way is annoying the heck out of us, and so she cannot come home until tomorrow. Technically, they have to keep her for 72 hours after any kind of "event". Since she had a little choking episode at 6am on Sat morning, she can't leave until 6am on Monday. The doctor did comprimise with us and told me she would write DC orders at 6am before she leaves that way we won't have to wait around all morning tomorrow. SO.....we will be there for her 5am feeding, get our paperwork, and get the heck out of that place!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Don't get me wrong, they have taken good care of Mackenzie, it's just been frustrating dealing with 50 different doctors how all have their own opinions on things and it seems like they all do what they want which is most of the time different from the next one. It's made the whole NICU roller coaster a little bit harder for us. So please pray for our daughter today for her to have a good night and to come home in the morning :-)

Coming home soon...

Well, Mackenzie was supposed to be discharged on Saturday...but she had a little choking episode early Saturday morning, so she couldn't leave. They had been adding a little rice cereal with the breast milk to help with her reflux issues, so I think she choked on it. Maybe the nipple hole was cut a little too big, maybe she got a "chunk" of cereal, maybe the nurse was not pacing her.......who knows, but we have been there to feed her every feed since then and she has done fine. Anyway, as long as she has a good night tonight, she's out of there in the morning!!!! So with that said, Mike said he will be there every feeding tonight to make sure she does good.

The pictures above are a little "photo session" we had with one of the NICU nurses the other day. We got to dress her up and take a few pics with her in clothes instead of hospital blankets! It was a lot of fun, I don't think it was all that much fun for her, but she did pretty good during the whole thing :-)

Proud Grandma

I know it's been a while, and I'm sorry. As you know, we have been busy around here :-) Well, Mackenzie is doing GREAT!!! She still drops her oxygen level sometimes while she is taking a bottle, but they tell me that it's expected because of her immaturity. It is something she will out-grow with age. We just have to watch her very close while she is eating, we have learned that we literally have to take the bottle out of her mouth every few minutes to let her catch her breath. She has not learned the cordination to suck, swallow, and breath all at the same time. When she is breast-feeding, she does great. It is more "natural" and she does not have the same problems as with a bottle. Long story short, she is still on track and doing well. If everything continues to go well, she might come home as early as this weekend!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Last weekend, Mike's mom, sister and "other mom" came to meet Mackenzie. It was their first visit and we enjoyed having all of them here.

New stuff...

Well, yesterday was not a good day for our little munckin. She was very lethargic and not acting like herself. She was also having a lot of problems keeping her oxygen levels up while she was eating. They did a bunch of blood work to make sure she didn't have an infection, which thankfully all came back normal. We have considered the idea that she may have acid reflux which is very common in premature babies, but they do not test them for it at her age. Long story short, through the night she continued to have problems with her feedings, so they put the NG tube back in her nose to feed her and let her rest. I was able to have a long talk with the doctor today, and what we came up with was this.....They removed her NG tube a couple of days ago, so she has been taking everything by mouth since then. They were testing her, they wanted to make sure she could handle it before she came home. Well, her little episodes we believe were caused by complete exhausion. So, since last night, she is going back to taking every-other feed by mouth and the rest go into her NG tube. That way, she is able to "rest" and still get the nutrition she needs to continue to gain weight and get stronger!!! We will do this for at least a few days, then try her with taking everything by mouth again and see how she does. I am so grateful that they did "test" her while she was there and not wait until she was home. Technically, she is still only 33 weeks old...they normally don't even give babies that young a bottle at all, so she is still doing better than expected, she just was letting us know that she was not quite ready to come home. So, we had a little bit of a set back, but nothing unexpected or conserning at this time. She is up to 5lbs 6oz today!!!!!! We fed her on two separate occasions today and she did great. She just needs reminding that she needs to take breaks and not suck the bottle until she's blue in the face :-) She will learn, with time and maturity she will have it down in no time!!!! Please continue to pray for her while she continues to get stronger and closer to being able to be home with us!!!!

New things...

Well, today we learned that Mackenzie is having "breath holding" episodes every couple of days. Her oxygen levels drop into the 60s and 70s and she sometimes requires a little stimulation from the nurses to bring them back up. They are not all that concerned due to her age, but we are still unsure as to when she will be able to come home. It's looking more and more like an apnea monitor will be coming home with her too. Other than that, things are going great. She is eating well, gaining weight, and maintaining her temperature well. Today she weighed 5lbs 4oz!!!! The pictures above are taken by daddy. He was feeding her and let go of her bottle for a second and up went her hands to make sure she did not miss a drop!!!! It was so cute, luckily we had a cell phone there to snag a picture :-)

Counting down the days....

Well, Mackenzie has graduated from eating every-other feed by mouth to every feed by mouth!!!!!!! Which means no more NG Tube!!!!!!! She took every feed yesterday and last night by mouth and still gained weight which means she is showing us that she is figuring out how to suck, swallow, and breathe without tiring herself out!!! Unfortunately, on Monday she had an episode during the night where her heartbeat slowed down and she was holding her breath. It took a little stimulation from the nursing to get her going again, so therefore she has to stay for at least another week. Of course I would rather her stay in case it happens again because she is continuously monitored there. The doctor told me today that if she does good for the week, she will be able to come home early next week. If she has another episode, then they will discuss the possibility of her coming home with an apnea monitor...which honestly would be fine with me!!!!! It's not a big suprise that this happened, it is very common in premature babies...we will just have to wait and see what happens!!!! Thank you to everyone for your prayers...God is working his charm with our little girl and we are very grateful for the things he is doing in her life already.