Super Cute

One of the nurses took a very cute picture of Brandon the other day. We also finally got a decent picture of Katelyn smiling. She smiles a lot but he delay on the camera can makes it hard to capture in a photo.

Brandon is doing well in back at UVRMC. The best thing is that his oxygen has been able to be reduced quite a bit. Yesterday, the results from his Blood-Gas test were the best they had ever been. This means that he is breathing well and in particular' exhaling the carbon monoxide well. We have continued to work on getting Brandon to nurse. He hasn’t done a stellar job. He does OK at times but he also has feedings where he doesn’t eat much. There are a lot different things that can play a part in his progress. They are still finishing weaning him from his pain medications. This can take a while and can often cause difficulties in nursing. The nurses also believe that some of the noises in the NICU may cause a distraction so they moved him to a private room to see if it would help. Amy continues to nurse him four times a day. While this is still difficult, it is certainly much better now that he is close to home.

Katelyn is also doing well. She is getting much better at sleeping for long periods during the night. She also seems to sleep very deeply. This can be scary for me when I see her so asleep that it takes a lot to make her stir. When she sleeps so deeply sometimes the monitor doesn’t pick up her breathing as well and it sets off alarms. I glad we have the monitor but when it goes off, even if I can tell there isn’t a problem, it can still cause me to jump. She weighed 8 lbs. last week. Even thought this is very tiny for a baby that is almost five months old, I have to remember that she is a lot more than 4 times her birth weight. She is also gaining weight really well now. She still hates bottles.