Julia has had a few good days. After some rough days at the beginning of last week, it was really nice to see some improvements. On Friday, all of the girls were able to visit the NICU again, for the weekly “Ice Cream and Isolettes”. (yeah! ice cream) They get to color pictures that get put on Julia’s isolette
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The sister’s artwork
After taking the girls home, Erin went back to see Julia and for the first time was able to hold Julia in her arms. It was quite a treat to finally be able to hold her. According to Erin, Julia is so light that it felt like holding just a couple of blankets in her arms. What a sweet moment for them.
Yesterday, Julia continued to do well, so they decided to give her a real “tub” bath and not just a sponge bath. The nurses called us and we were able to watch it on the web cam they have over her isolette. (Really nice feature of the NICU) They said that she really loved her bath and was calm throughout it.
To add to the excitement of our Saturday, we also now own a new 7 cubic foot chest freezer. It is dedicated to one thing only. Milk storage. To be more specific, breast milk storage. Our fridge freezer was pretty much busting at the seems and after some encouragement from a good friend, (Thanks Amber..) I caved in and we bought the new freezer. So you know we already have a nice one, but it is well stocked with beef and other items. We didn’t want to risk the milk to get cross contaminated. Erin calls it her liquid gold, as it is the best thing for Julia, and it’s a lot of work and time to pump every 3 hours.
Tonight, Julia is up to 5ml of milk every 4 hours. (basically 6 teaspoons a day) We hope this helps her grow quickly. Her lungs are still the biggest concern right now, but they look to be improving at a “baby step” pace. She is slowly having her oxygen and nitric oxide levels weaned. This means they don’t have to give her so much to keep her blood oxygen levels where they need to be.
All in all a pretty good weekend for us. Thanks for all the love, support, and prayers.
4 comments:
You should call your freezer Baskin Robins. I love the picture of Julia getting a bath. It was nice to visit last night with you and Julia last night. She gets bigger every time I see her.
I am so glad Erin got to hold her baby in her arms. Your girls did a great job decorating the isolette. I bet Julia is happy when she sees her big sisters artwork.
YEAH!! I'm so glad that Erin got to hold Julia...what a special time! I'm also glad that Erin is able to produce all the milk that she needs to. She'll probably be good at doing both bottle and breast feeding.
Thank you for the updates. We think about you a lot!
So glad you got to hold her Erin! AND WAY TO GO on pumping! That is awesome and so hard I am sure. :)
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