Day 35, Saturday, December 18

Well, that wasn’t the “click”. Tate had a hard time with both of his bottle feedings today. He took 15 ml at 3 pm and only 9 ml at his 9 pm feeding. He gagged a lot and wasn’t really interested in trying. Jamie thought the nipple on the bottle was a different one than the one we had been using, so that could be part of the problem. We’ll have to check with his new nurse tomorrow. He did burp once for Jamie but so far I haven’t ever got him to burp.


The NP told me I could still do “dry nursing” with him so he can practice his latching and sucking so I did that with him after both feedings today. He did great! At 3 pm he latched right on and started nursing. I only let him nurse for about 5 minutes cause I was worried about wearing him out since he had just worked on taking a bottle. At midnight I kangarooed him again and since he hadn’t had a bottle at that feeding I wasn’t sure what he would do. He only wanted to suck! He has never been like that before and it was encouraging to see. I let him nurse for awhile then thought I shouldn’t wear him out so I switched him to just kangaroo. He would NOT quit rooting around and smacking his lips. So I let him nurse a little more then stopped again. He still wouldn’t stop rooting. Then I got him his pacifier and he sucked on it for the rest of the time I held him. And I held him for 50 minutes! I finally put him back to bed after that cause I was worried that he had been up for too long. That might be the longest he’s ever been awake too. He weighs 4 pounds, 10.5 ounces today.

Tate met his Great Grandma and Grandpa Stinemetz and his Great Uncle Alan today. They were driving home from Jamie’s cousins’ graduation and stopped to see us. Tate slept through the whole thing but did pop an eye open for Grandpa.

Several of my family came over today and started moving furniture around and setting Tate’s nursery up. They moved all the office furniture, paraphernalia and junk downstairs and then set up the crib and the changing table in the old office. Hudson wasn’t real happy about it because he has been telling me that he wants Tate to share his room! He told me again when I was putting him to bed that his bed isn’t supposed to be in the office, he wants it in his room. Too sweet. The only thing in the room is the crib and changing table, and a few clothes hanging in the closet. No decorations or anything yet. But I love going in and just looking at it. Makes it all more real that he will be home. Someday. Soon.