February Foto Dump!

             

          Due to my own negligence...or better stated; lack of time over the last month or so - I just decided to DUMP a few of my favorite clips to capture February!

                                       A bit random; but here goes.....

Retta makes it very clear when she is not feeling photogenic. She has a way of slouching her body to where she can slide down anything when she is the least bit interested in something.

...Finally she fell asleep here and we snapped a few!

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 A rain storm caused our power to go out for a few hours in the middle of the day; so I bundled Retta up in the warmest items of clothing we could find and had a photo shoot! It got chilly in the house, but Retta was all smiles!

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We practice "tummy time" ALL DAY LONG! Our OT, Barbara thinks Retta is more in the workout zone when she wears a headband - what ever helps! Retta is slowly gaining better muscle tone, but she still remains pretty hypotonic. This is just a part of Down Syndrome. We are currently working on rolling over. Retta still needs some help with this, but she is persistent and such a hard worker! It's way too early for the Bumpo...but we had to give it a try...don't tell our OT - she is not fond of Bumpos!

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& the best of the piggies! We finally figured out what to do with all that hair! Now we need TWO bows in every color!

\Retta's weight gain has slowed down a bit during the month of February. She roughly gained only a half pound...most likely due to her increased activity level and intense workouts! (She hit 9lbs 3oz!)  However, the cardiologist is still happy with how she is progressing. Retta will be presented at conference today (Thursday) so we'll let you know when the big day will be as soon as we hear!

 

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Little steps in the right direction!

One Month Old....just home from the NICU!

(5lbs 8oz)

Two Months Old...and a much happier baby at home!

Three Months Old! Fitting into 0-3 month clothing...kind of.

Four Months Old!

(8lbs 15oz.)

...Sport'n the piggies...

& practicing head control!

                                      ....there she goes!

5 months old will be here in a few days!

If I can pull it together; there will be more to come - complete with an update on surgery plans.

Giggly Sunday Morning!

Retta has kept us busy since Christmas! Much has happened over the past few weeks...

1) We hope it is safe to say that Retta has now fully recovered from her upper GI.  That barium was nasty...thank goodness it is now behind us!

2) Retta had a little set back in weight gain due to the barium; however on January 10th (3 months 4 days old) Retta weighed 8lbs 4oz! (she later pooped a good 4oz; but we are giving her credit for it!)

2) In addition to occupational therapy - weekly speech therapy and nutrition has also been added to our ECI services! This will help with Retta's feeding and ensure she is gaining enough weight to get her to the big 11 lbs by 6 months!

3) And with help from our new speech therapist; we changed pediatricians! We LOVE Dr. Tardy!  He is very thorough and has invested a ton of time meeting with us and looking over Retta's medical history (dating back to her NICU stay).  Having a physician who can act as the "quarterback" of Retta's medical team is exactly what we needed!  We can't believe that he actually calls us on the phone - just to check in and make sure we are doing OK!  Having reassurance from a physician who seems to better understand the stress of caring for a medically fragile child has already made all the difference in the world!  Since there several medical conditions associated with DS that will need to be assessed for as Retta grows Dr. Tardy is making a "care plan" to guide us through Retta's first year!  He takes a conservative approach to new issues and places focus on Retta's quality of life!

4) Retta is now sleeping through the night....well, we are now ALLOWED to let her sleep through the night.  (Another plus to the new pedi!)  If Retta had It her way she would have been doing this from week eight.

5) I went back to work! Well, kind of. It would be nice to be able to go in and help out a day a week or so to break up the monotony of these hour long feeds. Bapcia was able to come over and watch Retta last Wednesday which enabled me to get a few things at the hospital taken care of in hopes of going back.

6) And the best thing; Retta has started to smile! I struggled to get the phone in time to record Retta playing with Szymon this morning. I caught the end of her chuckle session...

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Strollin'

The Lord directs the steps of the godly. He delights in every detail of their lives.

~ Psalm 37:23

      With the fabulous 70 degree weather we have had this week; Retta and I decided to venture out a few times for a stroll around the neighborhood after our appointments! Dad was jealous to hear that we went on our first walk with our dear neighbors ....without him. So he was motivated to put together the B.O. B. which had been sitting in the box in the garage for several months.

Handsome John Edmund and Miss Mae about to take off in their Snap-n-gos!

 

I have to say it truly made me feel like a "real mom" to power-walk the neighborhood with B.O.B. in hand!  Ahhh...fresh air, sleeping baby...LOVE IT!

Retta's 1st Christmas!

Thank God for this gift too wonderful for words!

~ 2 Corinthians 9:15

               Merry Christmas! We had a wonderful first Christmas with Retta filled with lots of family, lots of love and lots of presents! We started off our celebration at Bapcia and Jaja's house Thursday evening where we partook in the making of traditional Polish pierogi...which was later consumed at theWaclawiak Christmas Eve dinner. Yum! 

             We arrived late to the Christmas Eve festivities due to a minor hiccup. Just when we thought we were free of medical appointments we found ourselves on the phone with our pediatrician Christmas Eve morning. Thank goodness Dr. G was on-call for the practice! Retta started vomiting at 3:00 AM what appeared to be bile - complements of her upper GI and barium swallow on Wednesday. To make a long story short we got the vomiting under control with Pedialyte and were able to avoid heading back up the the hospital. We spent the most of the holiday talking about Retta's bowel habits... thanks to the delightful Barium. But in the end everything was just fine. The upper GI procedure was really pointless as we were already aware that Retta was refluxing...but after much resistance on my part...we finally went through with the procedure. Now the doctors are covered and it is medically documented that YES Retta has reflux and YES we should proceed with the preventative measures that we already have in place to reduce her reflux and risk of aspirating. Goodness!



          Miss Retta continues to be a little trooper despite all she has been through! She brought everyone lots of smiles on Christmas Eve! Here she is hanging out with Dad in the kitchen at Bapcia and Jaja's house.

         Grandpa, Grandma and Uncle Brian (Santa and his elves) arrived at our house late Christmas Eve night!  We slept in and woke up to sausage balls baking in the oven! It wouldn't be Christmas morning without sausage balls! We hung out in our PJ's past noon, slowly opening presents and indulged in a wonderful Christmas brunch of special treats we only see once a year! Retta won with the most presents under the tree...despite sleeping through the process of opening them! We actually almost lost her under all of the wrapping paper for a quick moment!



         

        Later Christmas day, Szymon's parents joined us all back at our house were we continued to eat, drink & be merry!

Matching mother-daughter Uggs!

         Dad started to have a little too much fun Christmas night and broke out his hideous plastic jacket he purchased from Buffalo Exchange on the Drag years ago. (I have personally given this jacket to Goodwill at least five times now. Somehow it always finds it way back to Szymon's closet!) We completed the look by adorning Szymon's gorgeous hat hair with one of Retta's hair bows. Like father, like daughter!

This is the start...



This is the start...







This is your heart...

...This is the day you were born!

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This is the sun....

These are your lungs ....

This is the day you were born!

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And I am always, always .....always yours!

A Quick Run-down!

"Hello my family and friends!"

The Lord directs the steps of the godly. He delights in every detail of their lives.

~ Psalm 37:

OK, so I really don't have a good excuse for the lack of updates over the last three weeks...other than the fact I'm providing complete care for a newborn and managing her ongoing medical care. ...Not to mention, Szymon & I both came down sick last week. I absolutely dislike being sick and now can say - I even more so dislike being sick while caring for a baby around the clock!  But we survived and thank goodness Retta has yet to display any symptoms (we were really worried!)
 
So here are the high points to catch everyone up!

We are happy to say that over the past few weeks Retta has started to significantly gain more weight thanks to a new fortifier we are using (DUOCAL) to make my breast milk a super charged, high-fat, protein shake! Within the first two weeks with the DUOCAL Retta gained 15 oz on the pediatricians scale. We have fun telling Retta she is going to the doctor's office for a "weigh in," as if she is a wrestler preparing for a match. Szymon enjoys weighing himself and then weighing himself while holding Retta & subtracting the difference before bath time to get an extremely rough estimate of her progress. (FYI...Szymon gained 4 lbs on Thanksgiving day!)  

Due to the fact that Retta is weighed on various scales at all of her doctor appointments it is hard to say exactly how much she weighs. We like to strictly go off the pediatricians scale for consistency. Our next official "weigh in" is next week...but at our last pulmonology appointment on the 12th she weighed.......

..........7lbs 8oz!

                          Big Girl!

Bath time!

With Retta's increasing appetite she has starting to take (most) of her feeds in a more timely fashion (20 to 30 minutes)....every 2 to 2 & a half hours.  We now have the "OK" to feed her pretty much whenever she is hungry with little concern for fluid overload.  So I am feeding, pumping, feeding, pumping, feeding, pumping and feeding. With the increased intake she has started to sleep 6 to 7 hour stretches at night just within the last few days! (I hope I did not just jinx myself by sharing that).

ECI (Early Childhood Intervention) also came out and completed their series of evaluations over the past few weeks. We are now receiving bi-weekly visits (at home) from an occupational therapist (OT). In the future physical therapy and then speech therapy will be added.  Retta knows when new voices are in the house and likes to perform. She has shown off her skills every visit and even taken me by surprise! ...now why she will not take a bottle in 15 min when I'm the only one home ....I have no idea...?
The surgeon who completed Retta's duodenal atresia repair gave us the "OK," to no longer follow with him as Retta has healed nicely from the procedure.  However, our Pedi decided to add a GI specialist to the mix to assist us with Retta's ongoing reflux. The surgeon explained that in addition to being premature Retta's stomach anatomy (from the surgery) is contributing to the reflux, but hopefully in time she will grow out of this.


While at home, Retta has also had the opportunity to meet several friends who have stopped by! This has been SO nice; since our only outings are strictly medical appointments...and I have started to go stir-crazy being cooped up in the house.

Meeting Cheryl, Kiera and Tanya!

Meeting Angie and Nicole....and their pregnant bellies!

EATING, SLEEPING, MEDICAL CARE and PLAY...the life of Loretta Mae!