Adventures in Babysitting

So I'm starting to panic a little about finding a babysitter for Brecken when I go back to work. We have a lady that is going to watch him 2 days a week but she doesn't want to do any more than that since she still has an 18 month old at home and a 3 year old at home also, that only goes to preschool 2 days a week. So we're still looking for someone to watch Brecken the other 3 days. Josh had talked to a lady he knows this summer that said she might do it, and to call her this fall. Well, we found out last week that she dropped her youngest child off at the home of a family we know, and then never came back to get him. Her husband had to come pick him up, and told the family that his wife left him again, for another guy. Then a few days later, the lady called her husband and begged her way back home.

Needless to say, we won't be calling her.

Last night, our neighbor's grown daughter told Josh she'd babysit. Josh did NOT say "great!" because this is the lady who always brings her own kids to our neighbor's house and screams cuss words at them all day long.

Won't be using her, either.

Ugh. Who knew it would be so hard to find a babysitter! There aren't any daycare centers here in Saratoga, so that's not an option. We have one month until I go back, hopefully something will turn up!!

Lions and tigers and bears, oh MICE!!!!

A couple weeks ago while my parents were here, I was sitting in one of our chairs in the living room and a mouse ran across the ottoman right in front of me. I HATE mice. And we couldn't catch the darn thing. My cat, who is extremely lazy, caught smell of it that evening, but couldn't catch it either. The cheeky little mouse ran up the curtains right beside my cat and walked across the curtain rod. By the time we got up to get rid of it, it vanished. We've caught sight of it a few times in the past couple weeks, but haven't been able to catch it with the mouse poison or the mouse traps yet. It's a tricky little thing, and Charlie has no interest in coming out of my bedroom during the day unless it's to eat. :) HOWEVER, last night I heard a noise and I looked over, and that darn thing was taking a candy corn out of the bowl of candy corns sitting next to the chair. I was in the leather chair with Brecken. It ran back down the table. Josh pulled the couch out, and saw it go underneath the fireplace. (There's about a 6 inch gap under the fireplace and cracks that go somewhere, out to the garage, I'm assuming.) So I watched the fireplace while he ran to his friend Jared's up the street to get some plywood and he drilled the plywood into the bricks and then caulked around it. Hopefully that took care of the problem. We knew it was back there somewhere and set mouse traps and poison, and when Josh checked the trap a few nights ago, it had shut, but no mouse inside, so he had to re-set it. Stupid mouse. Hopefully it is GONE!!! It gives me the heebie jeebies.

Houston, we have a smile!

I could tell that Brecken has been trying to smile for the past few days, so I've been watching carefully. Last night, Josh got the first smile! Then the second, third and fourth! How many smiles have I gotten? NONE. We must have a daddy's boy on our hands. Either that or Josh is funny looking. :) Brecken is 6 weeks old today, and I wondered how far "behind" he'd be in milestones like smiling, since he was a preemie. My nephew Ryan smiled a week and a half earlier than Brecken did, so Brecken's not doing too bad!! Way to go, Buddy!

We had another extremely busy week last week. Josh's mom and dad came for a couple days and as soon as they left, Josh's brother, sister-in-law and their two kids came to visit. They'd actually been here all week hunting, but staying with Annie's cousin. They spent the later part of the week at our house. Now, with no company, it's time to get back into our routine.

busy week

We had a busy week last week, that's why this hasn't been updated in a while. Wednesday, Brecken turned one month old! That was celebrated by taking a trip to the doctor for his one month check up. Brecken wasn't excited by that because he had to get naked. :) He's gained a pound since being released from the hospital! Yay! He's up to 7 pounds, 5 1/4 ounces. He's also just over 20 inches long. Small in the percentiles though, which we expect for a preemie. His head is in the 25th percentile, his length in the 20th percentile, and his weight in the 10th percentile. Dr. Jake wasn't concerned though, since he was so early. As long as he keeps growing, he's good. The rest of his check up was great. Everything looked perfect, including his ears (thank goodness since Josh had so many problems with his ears as a baby) and his chest tube incision. It is still very noticable and will probably have it for the rest of his life, but Dr. Jake said it should fade sometime.

Thursday, my mom and dad came to visit. My dad hasn't seen Brecken since he was still in the NICU and my mom hasn't seen him since he was still in the Infant Care Center. My sister and Ryan came over for the afternoon too, because we had a baby shower at my school. My friend Deb threw it for me. It was supposed to be in September, but plans had to change. :) We got lots of great gifts from my staff and we sure appreciate everyone's kindness!

Friday, Josh's team went to Pine Bluffs to play football. They lost, so they won't be going to any playoff games. :( My mom and I spent Friday re-arranging my kitchen and dining room and getting a good cleaning in.

Yesterday we all went to Casper where Brecken got to meet his Great-grandma (my mom's mom) and his great aunt and uncle, Leona and Kent. We went up there for the State Marching competition. It was held outside this year and the weather was beautiful. We got home last night.

Well, that's the update for here. We're just being lazy today, watching football on TV and catching up on some sleep.

Kara

due date

I forgot to mention earlier that today is Brecken's due date! And instead of having a baby, we have a 4 week old at home. He's 4 weeks old today. He was exactly 4 weeks early. Man, how our lives have changed in the past 4 weeks!

first day trip

We went to Cheyenne on Saturday, just to hang out. There wasn't anything to do at home, so we decided to get out and have some fun. We had some coupons for the Sears Portrait Studio so we got some pictures of Brecken taken. He was awake the whole time which really surprised me, he's usually asleep all morning! My sister and her husband and 3.5 month old came over too and got pictures taken as well. Then we all had lunch at Red Lobster, where Josh's cousin Kevin joined us. Then we did some shopping in the afternoon, then came home. Brecken did great. Soon, we'll have to get back to Cheyenne for Josh's cousin's wife to get some pictures of Brecken. Stacey does the most beautiful pictures- I can't wait.

Also Saturday night, Brecken got the hang of nursing! I don't know why he got it all of a sudden, but he did. He's slowly getting better- but it's hard work and he falls asleep after not too long. But that's OK- baby steps. We have to build up his stamina for nursing just like we did weeks ago with his bottle. So he's taking most of his food still from his bottle, but we'll get there. Slowly. :) I know he can do it though. I remember back to Children's where he was only eating 10 ml's of milk from his bottle and it would take FOREVER for him to get it down, and most of the time it had to go down his feeding tube because after about 4 ml's or so, he was just so, so tired. Now he's sometimes eating 100 ml's in one sitting and scarfing it down! What a trooper he is. I'm so proud of him and his accomplishments, and I tell him that every day.

This morning, in the middle of the night actually, while feeding Brecken, I started thinking about those little babies that are probably still in Denver. I think about them a lot and wonder how they are doing. Little Joseph, with the cleft palate (did I spell that even close to correctly?) and the shortened lower jaw who had surgery to lengthen the jaw a couple days before we left for Laramie again, I wonder if he's breathing better. The poor guy couldn't breathe and it would make him panic and then he REALLY couldn't breathe, poor baby. And little Karson across the hallway who was born at 28 weeks, I wonder if his mommy got to transfer him back closer to home like she was hoping to. And little Sam down the hallway, who was also born at 36 weeks and had Down Syndrome, I wonder how he's doing. His mommy is a biology teacher so she and Josh had quite the conversation. I wonder if he's home yet. And baby Gia, whose little cubical had exploded with pink things. I never did find out why she was there. And I will never, ever forget the mommy and daddy of the little baby born the first Wednesday we were in Denver, who was taken off life support 4 days later on Saturday. His station was next to ours in the NICU. His blood was being taken out of him and run through an ECMO machine, to put oxygen back in the blood or something like that, because his heart couldn't do it for him. That poor mommy and daddy, what a hard decision to take your 4 day old off life support. I thank God for my little boy's health. He was certainly sick, but by FAR one of the healthiest babies there. Thank the Lord.

My little man is waking up and is ready to eat- better get to it. It could take a while. :)

Kara

recognize this baby?

Here he is, Brecken Levi, on the hospital website! We didn't get the picture taken like all the other babies when he was born, since Brecken left in an airplane. So we had it taken when we left the second time. :)

http://www.growingfamily.com/webnursery/babypage_view.asp?URLID=3Z3A7M5B0F

We went to Josh's game against Hanna this afternoon but it started pouring rain so we had to leave. :( Saratoga was ahead 28-6 with 9 minutes left in the 2nd quarter, so I'm assuming we might win.

If anyone is interested in how much a trip to Denver Children's Hospital costs, we got the grand total in the mail today. Not as much as I thought it might be, but enough to take your breath away still! $54,648.33. About $5400/day on average. It didn't break it down into how much his IV was, chest tube, diapers, etc. It just gave us a grand total. Yikes. Thank God for insurance.

hungry, hungry hippo

We've had a hungry, hungry hippo lately! Last night, Brecken at 65 at 8:30, 60 at 10:00, 90 at 12:30 a.m., 80 at 4:00 a.m., 60 at 7:00 a.m., and 70 at 10:00 a.m. And now he's squirming again at 11:30, I thought I might get lunch in before he does, but it's not looking that way! Glad he's hungry. It'll be interesting to see what he weighs when he goes in for his one-month shots. He'll be one month old next week already- man, time flies.

While I'm here, I just want to thank everyone that has sent gifts for Brecken. I really am writing thank you notes, it's just taking a bit of time. (But I AM halfway through the list!!) You WILL get one though!

first real bath

Brecken had his first real bath Sunday night and hated every minute of it, as you can see by the picture. The only part he didn't scream through was getting wrapped up in his towel at the end. :) He doesn't even like getting his face wiped- he screamed at me for that yesterday, too! I told him we can't go out in public meeting people with a messy face! (We were on our way to my school to help my sub out with some things after school yesterday.)

He slept for 4 1/2 hours this morning before I made him wake up to eat. He last ate at 5:00 a.m., and I woke him up at 9:30. He must have been sleepy! He's been sleeping pretty good (KNOCK ON WOOD), only waking up when he's hungry at night. He's awake a little more in the day, looking around at things. The dogs are still in love with him and love sticking their noses in the slats of the cradle and then growling at us- like they want him to come out and play! Charlie spends most of her time sleeping, so I'm not sure what she thinks of him still.

we should buy stock in Pampers.

Brecken hasn't even been home a week and we already had to empty the diaper genie. MAN, that kid goes through diapers like there's no tomorrow. The fortifier packets are all gone though, so maybe drinking regular milk will help with that problem. And his belly button FINALLY fell off last night, (now we can give him a real bath!!) so maybe he won't leak through his diapers so much anymore because now we can pull them up all the way. That will help with the wet jammie problem. :) He's been getting on his own schedule to eat since sometimes he's STARVING after 2 hours instead of 3 hours. I'm not going to make him wait an hour just to keep him on schedule, that would be mean! He's also eating a lot more now- he can eat 70 ml's instead of 60 sometimes. Last night he ate 70 at 9:00 p.m., 70 at 11:30 p.m., 60 at 1:45 a.m., and 70 at 6:00 a.m., I believe. He's hungry sometimes after 2 hours, sometimes after 4 hours. I guess it all averages out to 3 hours. :)

The dogs were so excited to get home on Friday. They've been really good with Brecken, too. Birdie likes to kiss Brecken on the head and Hogan likes to know what's going on, but after that, they leave him alone. They've only gotten up once with me to feed him in the night, too. When they came in on Friday, Brecken was in the cradle in the living room. They both could smell a new smell right away, and figured out it was in the cradle. They stuck their noses through the slats- it was pretty cute. Then Hogan discovered he could put his head over the cradle and see the baby up close. They haven't bothered him though- they've been really good with him!

Josh's team lost on Friday. :( They played Burns and lost 28-6 or something like that. Now Burns HAS to beat Southeast and Saratoga has to beat Pine Bluffs if they want to be in the playoffs. That's the only way it will happen now. Josh is pretty nervous. I just became a Burns fan so they'll beat Southeast. :)