the eric update - day 119: first halloween!

in our previous lives as non-parents, kris and i weren't very into halloween. but this year i found myself wanting to celebrate little odin's first official Big Holiday ( well, other than the fourth of july of course. so, at the last minute we rushed to our local target and found the only costume they had left for a 0-3 month old, which happened to be a dalmation outfit.

he wasn't really to impressed with the whole process of being forced to wear an the enourmous costume ( it'a little hard to tell, but the pants are pulled up to his armpits ) and eventually we had to bring in the supersized paci for additional support.

cadence stops by to inspect the new, curious looking dalmation outfit. despite being momentarily perplexed, she decides that the little odin isn't going to give her any treats and goes about her merry way.

the eric update - day 118: separated at birth? sisu power! bundled in the "bundle me".

we visited an aunt and uncle of odin's this evening and they had some pictures of their son, mitchel, who looks like he could have been odin's twin brother. the picture of mitchel was taken when he was around a month old which is only a couple of weeks older than odin is now ( speaking in age adjusted terms of course ). since odin looks so much like his cousin now, it'll be fun to see if looks just as similar 10 months from now. as you can see from the picture, odin will have to put on a bit more baby fat in just a few short months.

odin's shirt was made by his grandma salmi. sisu is a finnish word that means "stamina, perserverance, courage, and determination held in reserve for hard times", which we think is a perfect motto for little odin.

now that the weather is getting a little cooler, we've adorned his car seat with a "bundle me" fleece insert which keeps him quite warm during trips outdoors. we purchased the "bundle me" on the advice of another micropreemie parent and it really is a handy way to keep him warm. you can even completely zip the cover shut on the chance you find yourself surrounded in public by the sneezy, unwashed masses.

the eric update - day 117: on finding "normal".

well there wasn't much going on today, except the requisite sleeping and growing ( and feeding ) that is all part of the territory of having a newborn in the house. in fact, it's amazing how quickly things seem to returning to "normal". other than other than dealing with his home monitor ( loose lead alarms, batteries not staying charged lead wires getting in the way while changing his diaper etc. etc. ) or having to be constantly on guard against putting him into situations that might lead to him getting sick, i'd say that our daily life is quickly settling into a routine. although even as write those words, i wonder if in a week i'll be regretting letting myself think such optimistic thoughts.

i'm thinking that as things settle down, i'm going to probably move towards creating something that looks more like the excellent "10 years of my life" project with occasional posts that look more like the trixie update. in other words, i'd like to see if i can keep up taking at least one picture a day for the indefinite future, but you'll probably see a lot less verbiage associate with the photos. while it might be bordering on obsessive compulsive, i think it might be interesting to create a continuous record of the changes that little odin is going through, even if some days are a little less interesting than others. i'm sure i'll still produce the occasional longer post detailing significant milestones, but it will probably be a lot less frequently than it has been in the past.

oh, before i forget, i finally made a trip to the post office and picked up quite a few more postcards! even though we're not in the nicu anymore, you can still feel free to send odin a postcard any ol' time you want. i really am still working on a way to best show where all the cards are coming from and what they look like.

also - a bit of administravia - don't be suprised if i change the structure of the site around in the coming days to weeks. "ex machina" existed for a long time before "the eric update" came along and if i get around to posting about the geeky, boring topics that i've been rambling on about for nearly five years, it might be nice to keep things separate. people who want to come for the photos and "eric updates" can come for the that while the old school "regulars" might be happy to see me return to the superdork topics that seemed to occupy so much of my time.

the eric update - day 116: a fieldtrip to the old nicu!

it's hard to believe that it has been almost 40 days since we left the old nicu! today the weather was nice and it's only a few blocks away from our house, so we decided to drop by and let all the staff marvel at his progress.

of course, everyone was quite happy to see him and couldn't believe how big he's grown since the last time they saw him. we didn't get to see all his old friends because they weren't working on the day shift so we'll probably make a return visit before winter.

most everyone reads the website which made it difficult to take pictures of the shy nurses ( peggy, i'm talking to you! ) :-)

the eric update - day 115: first visit from a home nurse. and kris' hospital bill arrives.

one of the advantages of living in the state of michigan is that it seems to have a fairly good set of support services for preemie babies and their parents. as i've written about previously, in addition to our "regular" insurance, eric also qualified for medicaid since he was in the nicu for longer than 30 days. and he's also qualified for other supplementary support programs that help pay the bills and provide access to a laundry list of services.

in addition to helping to pay the bills our county provides home health nurses that will stop by and weigh him and take his length and make sure we're not falling apart at the seams.

today was the first day the nurse dropped by; she was very nice and kept commenting how great odin looked. it was impossible to not secretly wonder if she's evaluating how suitable we are as parents and scribbling notes about not cleaning up all the dog hair laying around. but all-in-all she seemed fairly harmless and didn't seem like the kind of person who would take odin away for not keeping an obsessively clean abode :-)

note that this is not the same home nurse that will come and administer his rsv shots, so we've got a lot of nurses coming around the house.

he hasn't gained any weight since his last weighin, which could be cause for some concern if it continues to not keep up his weight gains. overall, he's gained an appropriate amount of weight since leaving the nicu, even though he hasn't added an ounce in a week. but if he's still sitting at 6 pounds 10 ounces in another week, we might need to think about nursing him less often since he doesn't get any caloric fortifier if he's not getting a bottle. the lack of fortifier combined with the increased energy that it takes to nurse could be the cause of him not gaining weight.

then again, it might be that he's just in a lull before packing on a few more pounds, so we won't make any changes until we see the results from his next weigh-in.

the home health nurse also measure his length which was about 19.25 inches, which means he's grown over 7 inches since he was born!

the final for kris' hospital stay finally came in the mail. remarkably, we only owe $500 on the $15,000 bill after insurance pays their part! i don't really know how we could owe so little since we have a 10% copay, but i'll take a break wherever i can get it. we still haven't seen a bill for little odin's stay in the nicu, but i'm guessing that it will probably be well over the intial estimate of $1 million USD. luckily, his medicaid coverage picks up the tab for everything that our insurance doesn't pay for, so we haven't had to pay a dime for any of his care.

in some small way we're lucky that he was in the nicu for longer than 30 days and qualified for medicaid, since otherwise we'd be in a world of financial hurt right about now.

the eric update - day 114: everybody poops. sometimes.

well the big news today was that odin pooped!

you see after a long streak ( ha! no pun intended ) of being quite regular, he handn't pooped for almost 5 whole days; a few people told us not to get too concerned, but we broke down this morning and called our peditrician who confirmed that it was nothing to be worried about as long as he didn't appear to be in pain.

apparently wee ones can be quite efficient at utilizing milk, especially if they're gearing up for a growth spurt and can even go as long as a week without pooping. in the nicu, they were very aware of how much and how often he pooped and any slowdown was carefully monitored. if he went longer than 24 hours then they'd give him a suppository to keep everything moving along. but i guess we're not in the nicu anymore and now he gets to poop whenever he wants.

while i'm talking about poop, i suppose it's appropriate to put my two cents in on The Great Diaper Debate. i think i agree that no matter what anyone will tell you, nobody knows whether cloth or disposable diapers are better for the environment. so we decided to go with the convenience of a disposable diaper with an eye towards at least trying to be somewhat environmentally friendly and sensitive to what kinds of materials we were putting against odin's skin.

so after much consideration we opted to use tushies diapers which are free of artificial chemical absorbants found in many "natural" diapers and made from blend cotton and wood pulp fluff. so far, we're very happy with them. they cost about the same as traditional disposables and seem to control leaks much better than your average eco-friendly brands.

the eric update - day 113: another walk around the block! and a belated milestone observation.

oh c'mon, it hasn't been that long since we got home from the nicu; so don't give me any gruff for posting a photo of our second walk around the block.

it still feels wierd - in a way that's almost impossible to describe - to walk around outside with odin.

it's almost like it's not real ( as strange as that might sound ).

i really dropped the ball and forgot to mention that yesterday was odin's 16 week birthday and his 4th full moon birthday. i guess it says something that weekly and lunar milestones are ever so very slightly less remarkable.

i just double checked and it looks like every 28 days is not quite a full moon, but i'm going to celebrate them anyway because, well, i'll use any excuse to photograph a beautiful autumn moon.

the eric update - day 112: progress with nursing!

after sixteen weeks of pumping 8-10 times a day and producing a huge inventory of milk, i'm happy to report that little odin seems to finally be getting the hang of nursing!

right up until a few days ago, it didn't look like he was going to be a great nurser. getting milk from a bottle is a whole lot easier than getting it directly from The Source and while he'd nurse every now and then, many, many times he'd pitch a fit until kris relented and gave him a bottle.

but in the past few days, kris has been working with him and learned that she needed to start nursing well before he started obvious signs of getting hungry to prevent him from being hungry and frustrated, which inevitably would lead to a world class tantrum.

and while the issue has raised a minor brouhaha in the past, i should probably disclose that little odin's tantruns showed all the classic sings of nipple confusion, including opening his mouth but not latching on shaking his head from side to side, rearing back, looking for the nipple and appearing puzzled and quite agitated.

but thanks to a little more work on kris' part over the past few days he's begun to almost exclusively nurse and is only occasionally taking a bottle, which is really great news. many micropreemie moms find that their milk supply will "dry up" after months of pumping if the baby hasn't begun nursing in earnest, which is not only a tough thing for the mom to go through, but formula can be quite expensive.

it's really quite amazing that kris pumped so often for so many months and it really looks like all her hard work is going to finally pay off.

update: holy crap! i can't believe i forgot to note that day 112 was odin's 16 week birthday and his 4th full moon birthday!

the eric update - day 111: a visit from uncle matt and auntie deb!

well, they're not his "real" aunt and uncle, but matt and deborah might as well be; they've been patiently waiting for a long time to get a chance to hold little odin and now that odin's cousin is around visitors get a two-for-one deal on holding babies. it's still fascinating to see people's reactions when they see him live and in technicolor after seeing only pictures for 111 days. these days, the first reaction seems to be shock at how big he's getting, which is quite a different reaction that even just a few weeks ago.

what you don't see in the pictures is that they brought their dog, malbec, from chicago so there are five (!) dogs running around wreaking havoc while this picture was being taken.

while there was less sneezing today than in past few days, odin was still had a stuffy nose this morning that once again cleared itself by the afternoon. he's not running a fever or exhibiting any signs of getting a cold so the source of the stuffiness is still a mystery.

there's big news to report on odin's progress with nursing! but i'll wait and write more on the trials and tribulations of breastfeeding a micropreemie tommorrow.

the eric update - day 110: transient sneezing and stuffiness. and on being a little baby sponge.

today, like most days these days was fairly quiet; we started the day a little worried that he might be getting a cold, since he awoke in the morning with a stuffy nose and he's had a few sneezing episodes since his hernia surgery. the day after his surgery he sneezed something like 15 times, which is quite unusual. our pediatrician didn't think much of it unless he started to run a fever, which he hasn't, but the stuffiness and sneezing had us on edge for a few hours; however as the day unfolded both symptoms seemed to disappear. hopefully he's not developing allergies to the dogs. although i suppose if that were the case, he'd be stuffy and sneezy around the clock.

odin still seems to enjoy sleeping most of the day staying awake for much of the night. hopefully he gets the whole day and night thing worked out soon so we can get back to a more sane sleeping schedule. but regardless of the time of day or night, it's really amazing to watch him begin to really take an active interest in his surroundings when he's awake. odin has always been attentive and alert, but in the past week we've seem him become even more engaged with his environment.

this evening, we were twirling in slow circles in the kitchen while i was talking to odin and holding him out in front of me.

he had this exression on his face the entire time as if he were soaking in the entire experience like a little baby sponge.

the eric update - day 109: approved for rsv shots!

we learned recently that little odin has been approved to receive shots to help prevent him from getting something known as respiratory syncycial virus (rsv). healthy, full-term babies can often weather a bout of rsv with no ill effects, but micropreemies are at much greater risk for developing llife threatening complications from the virus, so we're very happy that he's going to be getting a monthly shot of "humanized monoclonal antibodies" which are marketed under the brand name of Synagis® (palivizumab).

rsv is the leading cause of viral death in children under the age of five and each year each year, as many as 125,000 children are hospitalized with serious rsv disease.

since odin was born at 25 weeks and is less than 6 months old it's not terribly surprising that he was approved to receive that shots as we enter into "rsv season". what is surprising is that our insurance company is going to not only pay for the shots, but they're also going to pay for a nurse to administer them at home, which will help us avoid risky visits to our pediatrician's office, which is the very place one would expect to encounter snot-nosed kids spreading the virus like wildfire.

home delivery of the rsv medicine can cost anywhere between a $1,000-$2,000 a shot and must be given monthly, so many micropreemie parents who have insurance plans that don't cover the injections can find themselves in the uncomfortable position of choosing between food on the table or giving the child a potentially life saving medicine. i subscribe to a preemie discussion board that's flooded with messages from distrought parents who are struggling to figure out how they are going to pay for the rsv shots after their insurance company deemed them ineligible.

needless to say, we're feeling mighty fortunate that we're not going to have to pay a single penny for the shots.

the eric update - day 108: a speedy hernia surgery recovery and super humungous weight gain!

woohoo! little odin did so well over the night after his inguinal hernia surgery that they decided early in the morning that we could leave as soon as we were ready.

after they removed the intravenous line ( you can see the mark on his right arm where the IV was placed ) and before we put his monitor back on, i decided to snap a quick picture of him without any wires. the IV has made him a little puffy, but i thought at the time how big he seems to be getting. later in the day at our pediatric appointment, i'd be suprised to find out just how much weight he has been gaining of late.

after his home monitor was attached and we bundled him in his car seat, i got wierdly sentimental at the thought that we hopefully might not see the pediatric ward ever again.

we had a busy day today; after getting released from the hospital, we had a few hours to relax before trekking off to our pediatric doctor's office where we were quite surprised to find that he gained almost a pound since his last peds appointment! that's right, he flew past the 6 pound mark and tipped the scales at 6 pounds 10.5 ounces or just over 3 kilos! the nurse's jaw just about hit the floor when she saw the scale lcd screen.

some of the weight gain is due to water retension related to his hernia surgery, but it's likely that most of it is real. before his surgery they weighed him and found that he was a burly 6 pounds 5 ounces and that was after not eating for 8 hours. i'd guess that he's "really" somewhere between the two numbers, which is stupendously good news.

the pediatrician couldn't stop remarking about how good he looked, which instantly turned us into proud, beaming parents.

the eric update - day 107: inguinal hernia surgery and a speedy recovery?

well, today was the big day for inguinal hernia surgery! the whole process went very smoothly; we stopped feeding odin at 1 a.m. ( i think from his perspective not eating was probably the most traumatic part of the entire day ) and at 7:30 a.m. we took him to the hospital to be admitted and prepped for surgery. at 9 a.m. he was wisked away for the surgery ( despite numorous attempts on my part, i couldn't convince anyone to let me watch the procedure ), which only took about an hour.

after being wheeled into the operating room they administered a general anesthetic and put him back on the ventilator. during the surgery, they made two small incisions near his groin which allowed them to close the openings in his abdomen which were causing the hernias. near the end of the surgery, odin was given a shot near the base of his spine known as a caudal block which is a form of postoperative analgesia. thanks to the effects of the caudal block, odin only needed occasional does of tylenol to help manage post-op pain.

soon after he was out of the operating room, they brought us into the post-op room so that we could be with him as he woke up. it took about a half an hour for the general anesthetic to wear off and he required an oxygen mask to help him to maintain his blood oxygen levels, since the lingering amounts of general anesthetic left in his system would occasionally cause him to forget to breathe, which is quite normal.

odin stayed in post-op for about an hour and was then wheeled off to his own private pediatric room. after about 5 hours he let us know that he was quite tired of only getting intravenous fluids and he started guzzling bottles. amazingly he didn't seem to have any nausea and was able to keep down his normal 45 cc bottles, which is a great sign that he's going to recover quickly and not have his "reserve capacity" wiped out like he did after his ROP surgery!

he'll stay in the hospital overnight just to make sure that he doesn't develop any complications and to give him plently of time for the lingering effects of the general anesthetic to wear off and if everything goes as planned he should be released early tommorrow morning.

it's amazing to think that with a little luck, maybe - just maybe - little odin won't ever need to see the inside of another operating room again and we can finally close this chapter of his story and move on to day after boring day of sleeping, feeding and growing.

the eric update - day 106: no more eye surgery needed! visiting grandparents. preparing for hernia surgery.

today was the big day for our trip to the detroit area for a specialist eye consult to see if little odin needed anymore eye surgery.

odin did great on the trip and didn't complain once during the 2.5 hour car trip or the wait in the waiting room. after we were ushered into the exam room, kris decided to read him a little bit from white fang.

she read him the entire chapter of the law of meat, which seemed an oddly appropriate choice of reading material; he always seems so attentive when he's being read to and it's fun to watch his facial expressions.

right as kris finished reading from the white fang chapter, the resident ( doctor in training ) came in and began to examine his eyes. as we've seen before the exam involves putting dilation drops in his eyes and then turning the lights down low while holding a magnifying lens above his eye and shining a bright light into the eyeball which will illuminate his retina.

the junior doctor immediately exclaimed how beautiful a job was done with the ROP surgery. he said a couple more times that the laser surgery looked very, very nice.

he also said that little odin is one of the most well behaved patients he's seen, which made we wonder if he just says that to everyone.

while the resident seemed fairly positive about the condition of odin's eyes, the final judgements would be passed after the exam by the senior doctor on staff.

after the resident did his exam, the apparently world renowned antonio "tony" capone ( and yes, i really wanted to ask if he was related to al capone, but decided he was probably sick of getting asked the same question by all his new patients ) came in and did his assessment. he also immediately commented on how great the odin's post-ROP surgery eyes looked ( kudos to dr. droste! ).

after about a minute of examining odin's eyes, he quickly said, "perfect! his eyes are perfect. no problems." and the ridges caused by the ROP that caused the initial concern have already dissapeared!

wooohooo! no more eye surgery will be needed! not even anymore laser surgery!

just in case you were wondering, at least as far as odin is concerned, there really is no better way to celebrate not having to have any more eye surgery than by having a bottle while wearing your new crocheted knit cap given to you by a very thoughtful friend. there really isn't.


on our way back home from the eye exam, we stopped by grandma and grandpa snowdeal's house ( they live relatively far away from our house, but relatively close to where we needed to go for the eye exam ) and told them the great news!

during our visit grandpa snowdeal was tested on his bottle feeding skills and passed with flying colors.

now if he'd only be willing to take the diaper changing test :-)

so today went quite well and we're hoping we'll have as much good news to report tommorrow after his hernia surgery. we're taking him to the hospital at 7:30 a.m. and he'll be prepped for a 9:00 a.m. surgery. if everything goes as planned, he'll be out of surgery by 11 a.m., but we'll all be spending the night at the hospital to make sure that he has a smooth recovery. hernia surgery is pretty routine, as far as surgeries go, but we'll be quite happy when he's off the vent and back home safe and sound.

please feel free to think a good thought tommorrow at 9 a.m. eastern as little odin is getting wheeled off to the operating room :-)

the eric update - day 105: a 15 week birthday! odin versus the inchworm! and a busy week.

odin has been practicing his crawling moves lately and today, on his 15 week birthday, we decide it's time for him to compete against the lamaze musical inchworm. before the race starts mauja give odin a little moral support.

malamutes are thoughtful like that.

despite some dirty tricks on the inchworm's parts, mauja steps in and ensures that odin is able to beat the inchworm fair and square!

it's a good thing he's focusing on getting stronger because we have a big week this week. tommorrow, we'll be travelling across the state to detroit, michigan for an specialist consult to see if odin needs more eye surgery. and then on tuesday we go back to the hospital for his inguinal hernia surgery. and if everything goes well, we'll be out of the hospital on wednesday in time for another peds doctor appointment.

phew.

the eric update - day 104: on odin's original due date and age adjustments.

it's hard to believe, but 104 days after he was born, odin celebrated the arrival of his original due date. that's right, if everything had gone as expected, little odin wouldn't have been born until today ( give or take a few days ).

odin celebrated today by hanging out with a bunch of extended family members, including grandma and grandpa salmi who came all the way from the upper peninsula of michigan and were very happy to finally get a chance to hold their grandson.


odin also spent a little time with his cutie new cousin, wheeler francis griffin-salmi. it's more than appropriate to take a picture of the two of them together, since they are almost exactly the same age, gestationally speaking. obviously wheeler has packed on a few more pounds while in the womb for 15 weeks longer than odin. in addition to the obvious indications, there will likely be more subtle differences between odin and wheeler that will only reveal themselves over time.

it can sometimes cause micropreemie ( and preemie ) parents no small amount of grief when people don't understand that you can't judge their progress merely by looking at their chronological age, but you rather have to adjust things by how many weeks early they were born. in other words, in a very real sense, little odin is simultaneously both 104 days and 0 days old today.

the eric update - day 103: the return of pooh and piglet!

after having gone missing for awhile in the new nicu because of concerns about dust, pooh and piglet return to marvel at little odin's growth. except for the brief banishment at the new nicu, they've been around through thick and thin.

piglet is commenting about how he remembers when odin was "thiiiiis big".


pooh and piglet stick around for and outfit chance and notice that little odin is wearing more and more "regular" infant clothes!

they can't quite believe that he's outgrown many of the preemie outfits that looked so large just 30 days ago.

the eric update - day 102: hungry odin and concerned cadence.

odin decided that he was hungry about 40 minutes before he's normally ready for food. he just woke up in his bouncy seat and decided he'd let everyone within earshot know that it was time to eat. really time to eat.

cadence is not used to this sort of thing happening and looks as if she's really wondering if there's anything she can do to stop all the racket.

the eric update - day 101: a papasan cradle swing. on the odds of the a deli line ticket and testing out the crib.

i've put together more toddler toys in the past few weeks than i have in my entire lifetime. my latest adventure in following obscure instructions came when it was time to put together little odin's new nature's touch baby papasan cradle swing.

rather than putting him to sleep, it seems to do a good job of keeping him wide, wide awake; whenever he's sitting in it, a look of bewilderment comes across his face as soon as you turn the swing on. maybe it just takes time. i guess after months of laying on a bed that didn't move very much in the nicu, it's probably a little disconcerting to sit in something that sways to and fro.

on the off chance that you saw me laughing to myself while i was standing at the deli counter at the local grocery store, it was because i was wondering the odds could be that i'd walk up to the deli counter today - the first day that i've gone grocery shopping in months - and grab the E4 queue ticket?

for the new visitors who might be scratching their heads at why i would photograph a deli counter ticket, it might help to know that E4 is little odin's other nickname ( see, eric c. snowdeal iv is E4, eric c snowdeal iii is E3 and so on and so forth ).

at night, little odin sleeps in a co-sleeper that's attached to our bed, so he's not too far away if the home monitor goes off. but during the day, we've been experimenting with putting him in his crib in the nursery.

it's hard to imagine that someday he won't be on a home monitor and we won't ahve to constantly be vigilent about whether or not he's stopped breathing.

the eric update - day 100: first eye exam on the 'outside'. a future road trip for an eye surgery consult.

today, we had our first post-rop surgery exam. unfortunately we had to wait for awhile to see the doctor, but luckily kris had the foresight to pack a bottle because bad, bad things would have happened if we had found ourselves stuck in the office without little odin's afternoon feeding. i'm still getting used to the logistics involved in feeding every three hours and didn't really think to bring a bottle . "good thing i have kris around", i thought as i heard my own stomach rumble.

eventually, dr. droste, the same doctor who did his initial assessments and rop surgery arrived and performed a thorough exam. he found that eric is farsighted, which is normal and doesn't mean that he's going to be farsighted forever; as a baby's eyeballs grow, the farsightedness should slowly diminish. he also discovered that the conditions that prompted the intial surgery ( stage III ROP with plus disease in all "twelve hours" of both eyes ) are getting much better, despite the burn "take rate" being slightly slower than he normally likes to see. woohoo!

however, there has been some damage to little odin's retina that dr. droste wants to have evaluated by a specialist all the way across the state to see if additional, more invasive, surgery might be required to prevent any more extensive damage. the proliferation of blood vessels that occured with the ROP has created a slight ridge in a portion of both eyes that is "slightly elevating" his retina. and while the elevation is minimal, it can still lead to retinal detachment, so dr. droste wants someone to take a second look and assess the situation.

so on october 18th, we get to take a field trip to detroit on the eve of his hernia surgery.

"be prepared to be in the waiting room for a long time," he said.

"bring a lunch."

the eric update - day 99: first trip to the peds doctor!

phew. today ( day 99 ) was a big day. before all the new baby excitement started, kris and i took odin to his first appointment with his pediatric doctor. it's relatively routine to meet with your peds doctor soon after leaving the nicu so that there's disruption in the continuity of care. eric passed all the tests with flying colors and the big news ( no pun intended ) was that he tipped the scales at 5 pounds 12 ounces or about 2608 grams, which means that he's gained 5 ounces after being out of the nicu! it's a great sign that he's still gaining weight despite the "stress" of going home and his doctor was very pleased to see that eric didn't seem to be a troublemaker when it came to gaining weight.

while all signs indicate that little odin is a very healthy micropreemie, his doctor will still want to keep a close eye on him and we'll be bringing him in for weekly visits for at least the next 3 weeks; however as flu season really begins in earnest, we'll probably have a home health nurse come to our house to prevent the risk of infection that exists when you're hanging out in a pediatrician's office once a week.

the eric update - day 99: odin's cousin cometh!

as predicted three days ago, odin's cousin is coming tonight! ruby, the little fairy princess, decides to help things along with a belly touch and wave of her wand ( unfortunately out of the picture frame ).

stay tuned!

boy, this should really help the sweeps week ratings for the snowdeal show ® :-)

you might see pictures faster than i can post them here by going here.

maybe i'll post a running commentary below. we'll see if i can keep it up through the night.

-----------------------

05:30 p.m. EST: we arrive home after going to little odin's first peds appointment. diane greets us and tells us that she's having the baby! contractions are 3 minutes apart and not very strong.

05:30-07:30 p.m. EST: guests arriving ( close friends and family ) many meeting little odin for the first time.

8:00 p.m. EST: diane's taking a bath. i have a sudden craving for hot chocolate, so i'm going to venture out and get some cocoa. i hope i don't miss much.

9:46 p.m. EST: whistles. not much going on. hot chocolate being made. house cleaning being done by the obsessive compulsive amongst us. contractions are still 3 minutes apart, but increasing in intensity. still not strong enough "to take her breath away". midwife doesn't think she needs to be here yet. maybe by 11 p.m.

11:27 p.m. EST: hmmm. i thought second births were supposed to go fast. we're on the third pot of coffee for visitors. contractions are still three minutes apart, but getting "quite strong".

12:40 p.m. EST: diane is on the couch, commenting casually that she's feeling like she might want to start pushing with the contractions. time to call the midwife.

1:05 p.m. EST: o.k. the official bets on when the official time of birth will take place are in.

me:    2:45 a.m.
michele:   2:57 a.m.
cindy:   2:53 a.m.
gina:  3:30 a.m.
deb:    3:11 a.m.
steve:  3:20 a.m.
diane:   3:45 a.m.
kris:   4:48 a.m.
pam:    3:37 a.m.
wendy:   4:25 a.m.
linda:    4:05 a.m.
dan:    2:49 a.m.
wendy jo:   2:39 a.m.

1:15 a.m. EST: the widwife arrives.

1:40 a.m. EST: well, most of the bets are wrong. diane is "only" dilated to 6 or 7 and the midwife declares that she'll have the baby in more than a couple of hours but before breakfast. hmmm. maybe a nap is in order.

2:00 a.m. EST: the water breaks! and she's pushing!

2:18 a.m. EST: it's a girl!

the eric update: howdy stranger!

i haven't felt the need to do this in awhile, but there are enough new people arriving due to simulatenous linkage from daddytypes, bloggingbaby, jason kottke, andy baio, matt haughey, kati, nursingmom.net, heli's heaven and hell radio and snakehairedgirl that i really feel that i should take a moment to welcome everyone.

howdy!

if you're wondering what all the hullabaloo is about, it's probably easiest to start here and then scan through the july, august, september and october archives to find out why everyone is quite happy to see little odin come home after 96 days in the nicu.

the eric update - day 98: first trip around the block for a little fall color!

while we're fine with going on the occasional anonymous field trip to the local big box store, winter's coming soon and we probably won't be making too many treks outdoors during the height of cold/flu/rsv season, so it's important to get out while the getting is good.

it was a beautiful fall day today, so we took a quick trip around the block in our baby trend expedition jogging stroller travel system ( parenthetically, the "insert" you see in the car seat/stroller is a kiddopotamus snuzzler which does a great job of keeping micropreemies feeling bundled ).

incidentally, the stroller isn't the kind of thing you'd want to take for a quick trips that involve lugging it into and out of a car, since it's pretty weighty, but since autie diane trained for the chicago marathon with ruby sitting in it, we know it's fairly durable which is what we need should we ever get around to training for more marathons.

on the short walk we met a woman walking her dog and she commented as she walked by, "oh, a new one."

"well, he's actually over three months old. born quite early he was, " i said in my best impression of yoda.

"oh. one of those miracle babies then," she said in a wierdly nonchalant tone.

the eric update - day 97: simulate the nicu? a field trip!

well, our first big lesson is that no matter how many feedings we might have been doing at the nicu, it's not quite the same experience unless you're doing the 3 a.m. and 6 a.m. feedings back-to-back while realizing that you'll be doing 3 a.m. and 6 a.m. feedings back-to-back for quite some time. it's tiring! and i think that little odin might have days and nights a little mixed-up ( not an uncommon problem with micropreemies ) or he might be uncomfortable with all the quietness at night ( again, not an uncommon problem with micropreemies used to the noise of the nicu ), because while he'll sleeps just fine during the day with all manner of noise and commotion going on around him, as soon as we try to settle in for sleepy time at night, he seems to enjoy practicing his vocal cords. maybe i'll have to go to greater lengths to simulate the nicu environment so we can all get a good night's sleep.

we're went on our first field trip today! we had grand visions that his first outing would be to a museum or an art opening. but instead we had to go to a meijer to get A Very Important Thing that we had somehow found ourselves lacking.

you see. we didn't have a "diaper pail". and one must have a specialized pail for disposing of diapers or one will find oneself in a mess rather quickly. so our first field trip involved quickly retrieving a polder step-on trash can, which we heard does a great job of keeping nasty odors in the pail and out of your house.

odin had a great time and seemed like all the lights and sounds, which i suspect probably might feel more familiar that our quiet, dimly lit house. and his monitor didn't go off once! whooohooo! ( although i'll admit that i was secretly hoping we'd get at least one harmless 'loose lead' alarm so i could get see how people might react to the ear piercing sound emanating from an otherwise normal looking car seat. )

taking a micropreemie out in public is a controversial thing to do and there is probably more than one nicu parent who is cringing when they see these pictures. online preemie discussion groups often host Great Debates as to how much one should insulate one's little wonder from the great wide world and many parents can find themselves paralyzed with the fear of putting their child at risk for contracting something that will give them a one way ticket back to the hospital.

but he, himself ( amongst others ) once told us that we shouldn't be afraid of big, open spaces. it's the small spaces where trouble lurks; the churches, and relatives homes and day care centers where people will quickly come up to you and touch your baby. but big spaces where you're anonymous are o.k. as long as people don't come up and touch or cough or sneeze on your child. ( and certainly there are exceptions to this rule, so consult with your doctor to see what's appropriate for you :-) )

so, if i see you in public and you start to put your hand out to touch him or pinch his cheeks, don't be suprised if i tackle you and shove a bottle of purell into your hand. it's nothing personal, and in fact, we have to try extra hard to not touch him after we've had our hands sullied by "the street".