Musings on My First Holiday Season as a Mother

I can't believe it, I was admitted to the hospital more than 2 weeks before Halloween and here are staring down the barrel of Thanksgiving.  This weekend I decided it was imperative D had an outfit or something that said "My First Thanksgiving".  I mean, what kind of mother would let their child's first Thanksgiving pass without a cute piece of clothing?  So, Saturday night I dragged Nick to Carters, Osh Gosh and Babies R Us.  Apparently, no one else waits until the weekend before Thanksgiving to buy such things because we found nothing!  Then, last night I went to Target...nothing.  Before I gave up completely I popped into Kohl's and there it was...a bib the size of D.  Of course he won't really need it, but I pomise you there will be pictures documenting his first turkey day in his new bib (to be seen in a later post).  And then there's Christmas.  What do you buy a newborn for Christmas?  I bought him his first gift last night...The Lion King DVD.  Okay, maybe I just really wanted it, but isn't the point of having kids so you can be a kid yourself sometimes?!?  It's hard to believe we are going to get to celebrate Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Years with Dominic when 2 months ago we were just hoping he would make it before the first of the year so we could get the tax break.  He must be like his mother and just love the holidays so much he couldn't wait!

We have had another big day here in the NICU.  This morning the nurse practitioner came in and told me D is behaving like an older baby.  He is doing so well with his feedings that they he hasn't taken any by tube today and tomorrow they are probably going to let him ad lib.  This means we will still feed him every 3 hours but he will determine how much he eats.  We won't stop him but we won't supplement him either.  If he is able to do that and keep his weight up, the tube is coming out!  So, please, if you are so inclined, say a little prayer that he continues to rock out the bottle feeding.  And, speaking of keeping his weight up, my son is a porker!  He gained 93 grams today...yes, 93!  He is up to 4lbs 10.2oz.  The nurse warned he may drop tomorrow because he has had such ridiculous gains, but we will just have to wait and see.

Snacking on his hand while waiting for his weigh-in