December 8

We have had a busy week full of Tiny K and home health. Ok...so not really. In fact, by Friday I was getting a little stir crazy!!! Ella is officially 3 months old!!I will make that a post, hopefully tomorrow. I left Wyatt in charge of the crew and went to Hobby Lobby and bought the stickers. Then there was the trip to Target and Kohls. I am getting a little tired of seeing my four walls. I am starting to think about repainting!! Things are going to start picking up as far as activity once Christmas break gets here and the boys are at home all day.

Ok....So Tiny K came on Monday. Physical therapy evaluated Ella to make sure she was on target. There have also been concerns that Ella may be a bit tense. Jenny the PT evaluated her and thought Ella was doing a fantastic job!! She did not think she was tense at all. I would like to thank the big brothers for getting her to relax and helping her with her stretching. I do have to remind Brody that she is not made of rubber. Ella will not qualify for pt services. The occupation therapist also came to evaluate Ella. She was very pleased to see that Ella was very willing to take a bottle and would even ask for it. She felt that her biggest issue with Ella is that she is overwhelmed by the amount fluid and is a little unsure with what she is supposed to do. She is going to keep Ella on her case and have the dietitian come and meet with us on Monday to see about thickening up the liquid until she is able to control it herself. Otherwise, we just talked about the normal this is what you can do at tummy time, and here are some fun ways to keep her head up and here is something you can do to help her practice her eye tracking.

The home health nurse has come four different times to visit Ella since we have been home. I was told that all scales will be different. This has proven to be true. At the doctor's office Ella weighed 8 pounds 7 ounces. At the first home visit Ella weighed 8 pounds 4 ounces. The next visit was 8 pounds 5 ounces and then 8 pounds 7 ounces. She is gaining weight, just slowly. I increase her bottle amounts each week. She will go up to 80 mls a feeding tomorrow. However, I have gotten to the point that if she acts like she needs more to eat, then she gets it. We have pounds to pack on!!! Ella is starting to really act like a baby more and more each day. She interacts with the boys and LOVES her bouncy seat. I personally am not enjoying it as much since it literally plays the SAME THREE songs over and over and over. Poor girl did get a stuffy nose this week. I blame it on the boys...all three of them! No matter how much hand washing and cleaning, Ella and I both ended up with the stuffy nose. It makes it a little hard to eat, but she was a rock star this evening. At 5:45 Ella acted hungry so we gave her a bottle and she ate  45mls in about 10 minutes and then kicked it out. We don't push her and want to create a problem, so we just waited for her to give us hunger cues plus she was a bit early for her feeding. By 6:30pm she was giving us hunger cues again so we gave her the rest of her bottle and she gulped it down plus an additional 30mls! That equaled out to be 105 mls by mouth!! She eats every three hours, so 9pm rolled around and she acted hungry again. She at another 50 mls and then kicked the bottle out and had the "I am so full" look of content on her face. Usually with her 6 and 9pm feedings she should total out to have at least 140 mls. This girl had 160mls by mouth!! Big deal at our house!!