Happy 1st Birthday!

Well, as you may know by now Ryan just turned 1! It's amazing that it's already been a year. She's come a long way from her low weight of 2.3 lbs. She's now 20 pounds and healthy as can be! I decided to update her blog with a bunch of pictures and a few videos in honor of the occasion and since I've been quite the slacker in getting it updated. I think there are 8 posts total so you may have to go to the next page or use the Blog Archive links over there on the right in order to see all of them.

Here are a couple of videos of her birthday cupcake. Please forgive the awful singing or mute your computer for the beginning of the first one. :) I split it into 2 parts so that it wouldn't get rejected.

11 Month Video...

Learning to crawl and not necessarily happy about it. :)

Day 60 - Mama I'm Comin' Home

Did I just quote an Ozzy song? :)

Yes, it's true - we have a date for Ryan to come home! She'll be leaving with a monitor so we have training on that tommorow afternoon and I'll be rooming in with her Tomorrow night. If that all goes as planned I'll be bringing her home with me on Friday. Normally this would all be Heather's territory but given our current circumstances I'm filling in for her. Here's a video from last night (shot by Sam and Madi).

Day 56 - Busy Week

This has been a really busy week for us with Heather having to make the trek down to Emory University Hospital several times. I've had a hard time getting updates posted so you'll have to forgive me. Ryan is still doing really well. She weighed in last night at 5 lbs. 1.5 oz! They obviously can't give us a time frame on when she'll be coming home but it appears that there is a reasonable chance she will be cut loose by the end of next week. My mom is coming back to town tonight so that should free up some of my time for doing important stuff like posting on the blog ;).

This video is from last Sunday, Nov 9th.

Day 47 - Are We There Yet?

So, could day 47 bring better news than day 46? Perhaps. Ryan is now 4 lbs. 10 oz.! That's not the news but it is a great sign. The real news is right here inside this video. Make sure you watch it BEFORE you go on to read the rest of this or it will ruin the fun...

Okay, so little miss "on my own agenda" has had a history of just deciding out of the blue that she's ready to do something. For example, one day she was on her air (and needed it) and the next day she went without it and has been going along perfectly ever since. It seems that today is the day she decided that she's ready to drink from a bottle. Literally 24 hours earlier they were concerned about her reflux and how long it might take before she could actually hold an entire bottle in without ralphing it back up. Those are some powerful prayers you people! We went to see her today and she had already had 2 bottles without any problems and Heather fed her a third while we were there (she eats 35cc every 3 hours). She's had two since that one and not one spit-up today. That might explain the 4 oz. weight gain. Her nurse told us that given her sudden desire/willingness to eat that we should start looking for our car seat so that we can bring it in and get it approved. Yes, they do have to check it and approve it before they will let her leave. I don't know that it necessarily moves her go home time frame up any, but I would think that it makes it much more certain that she'll be spending Thanksgiving with us. So it begs the question... What constitutes a miracle? ... and ... Are we there yet?

Day 42 - 4 & 4

Lots of updates coming in today. Ryan weighed in at 4 lbs. 4 oz. last night! She's been gaining weight steadily lately which is awesome. You'll also notice in the video that her nasal cannula is gone! They took her off of it yesterday morning and she's been doing great. It's nice to see her with just the little feeding tube and hopefully that will be going away soon as well. Her nurse called this evening just before she left and said that they moved her out into the big room. That's actually really good news because the next move she makes will be HOME! That may also indicate that she's going to be starting up the bottle feeding before long. We'll keep our fingers crossed.

Day 39 - Two In A Row

Look at me go! 2 days in a row now. Heather had her thyroid surgery today (everything went great) so I went down and hung out with the baby for a little bit.

Day 30 - Big As A Bass

Ryan is 3 lbs. 5 oz. today! That makes her as big as most of these bass, which is sayin' something. Although I'm not sure what. My boss did tell me that I should take up fishing with everything that we've had going on. Maybe it's just on my mind. Anyway, she's been gaining about an ounce a day for the last several days and is looking great. She's really starting to fill out as you will see.

I snapped this quick video so you can see how her color has changed and she doesn't look quite so scrawny now.

Day 27 - Just A Quick Video

Not much to report today, just a quick video of the baby (in her new hat) and mom.

Day 23 - Room With A View

Ryan has a new room. She's old enough now so she can be in a room with windows. It looks out over the construction on the new main entrance to the hospital but it's nice to have some natural light in there. She still hanging around the same weight but it did creep up a little bit. She was 2 lbs. 13.7 oz. and is still getting her max on food. They were able to remove her PICC Line yesterday so she's only attached to her oxygen and the feeding tube now. Other than that not much has changed and we kind of like it that way. No more surprises please.

Day 21 - Bye Nanna

My Mom had to head back home today so we went by the hospital to see the baby before she left. Ryan is 2 lb. 13 oz. and is now at her max feeding (23 ml). She seems to be tolerating her food well so they will probably be taking her PICC line out soon. They were also planning on moving her to a new room this afternoon or this evening. She's "big" now so she gets to move to a room with a window. Here is a video from today. Toward the end of it you'll see Madi's hand pop in. It will give you a better idea of how small Ryan is when you see how Madi's little hand dwarfs her.

Day 17 - Heading Home

Heather was finally paroled from the hospital today so we went down to see Ryan before we left. Not much has changed since we were down there last night other than they are still bumping her food up every 12 hours. It's a good sign because it means she's digesting well and of course she should continue to gain weight. Our friend Julie made a little hat for her so that she won't have to wear that giant yellow one again (hopefully). She's wearing it in the video today. Oh, and if you're wondering what the red light is on her foot (from the other videos), it's her O2 sensor. I'm not sure if it's pre-programmed to turn on her check engine light at 50,000 miles but I'll let you know.

Day 16 - What Happened to Day 15?

I did go down and see Ryan yesterday but it was kind of late so I didn't want to bug her. She was snoozing away quietly so I let her sleep. Today however, Heather and I went down and she was WIDE awake! She is still doing well with her feedings and they continue to increase her 1cc every 12 hours. She has been gaining weight again and as of tonight was beyond her birth weight. She weighed in today at a hefty 2 lbs. 11 oz.! Before we know it she'll be the 20 lb. baby that people dream about, right Reba?!?! There are a couple of good videos here where you get to see her doing more than just peeking out of the corner of her eye.

Day 14 - Moms Turn

Well, the baby is still sitting tight at 2 lbs. 7 oz., nothing has changed with her air and they are increasing her feeding to 7ml. The BIG news of the day was that Heather finally got to go down and hold the baby for the first time. The only hat the nurse could find was a giant yellow one. It served the purpose but kind of made the baby look like that one guy on the Fat Albert cartoons. Anyway, it was really cool and I was glad that Mom and baby could finally get some up close time.

Day 13 - A Good Long Look

Not much has changed with Ryan. It's the usual air-on air-off for now. That will probably go on for a while as she grows and gets better about her breathing. She's also staying steady at 2 lbs. 7 oz. but they did increase her food intake overnight and she's tolerating it well. The video I got isn't anything earth shattering but everyone seems to like them so I thought I'd post a good long one.

Day 11 - Say Cheese

Ryan was either in a really good mood today or really gassy. She was smiling an awful lot. I'm thinking gassy. They got back to feeding her again. She's getting 2ml of formula every three hours and still holding at 2 lb. 6 oz. The nasal cannula is still on to force a little bit of air into her lungs and keep that apnea under control.

I took a quick screen capture of Ryan's toes sitting on the end of my finger. As you can see, all five of them fit right there.

While I was visiting I was able to hold her for the first time. The nurse snapped a quick video of it for me.

Day 10 - Sister Act 2

Before I start I want to say "Hi" to the 6th graders at Lamar Middle School in Flower Mound, Tx. Thanks for checking in on Ryan! We'd love to hear from you so feel free to leave us a comment.

Okay, so the baby is eating again today. She's still on the nasal cannula because her apnea kept setting off the breathing alarm this morning (they had taken it off). I brought the girls down again so they could see her and of course they love it. Brooke keeps telling me that she wants to take the baby home. I don't have an update on Ryan's weight cause I forgot to ask.

Here is a quick video of Madi and Brooke singing to her and at the end we go inside the Omni Bed.

Day 9 - Baby Meltdown

Okay, soooo day 9. She's back up to 2 lbs. 6 oz. but she she didn't digest her afternoon feeding so she's NPO until tomorrow morning when they will try feeding her again. They also put the Nasal Cannula back on to give her a little break. She's still just getting room air but it makes breathing a little easier. She also had a bit of a meltdown while I was there. Apparently she did not approve of the nurse trying to help her out.

Day 8 - n02

Well, Ryan hit her one week mark today. She weighs 2 lbs. 3 oz so just like every other newborn she's dropped a little weight. She should start gaining it back anytime now. I went down to see her and a few things have changed. She no longer has any oxygen on so it's straight room air for her now. They had to take the stomach tube out of her mouth and put it in through her nose because she kept grabbing it and trying to pull it out. Since she's at her week mark they put in a PICC Line and will be removing the last tube from her stomach so that it can close up.

Her bowel sounds are starting to improve so they are doubling her feedings to 4 per day which is great news. I also got to change a diaper while I was down there. You'll see in the video that the first round of decorations are up. I told them that we may well wallpaper the place by the time she goes home and they didn't act like that would be a problem.

Day 7 - Sister Act

We finally had the girls come down today to see their new baby sister. They were REALLY excited to see her as you can imagine. Brooke still hadn't quite grasped the idea that she was here already so it was good for her to see that she wasn't inside mommy anymore.

As far as the baby goes, they didn't make any major changes in her setup. She's still breathing room air and giving her nurses lots of attitude which they say is a good sign.