Big NEWS!!

FINALLY- after 2 months, 2 weeks and 2 days, Duncan was FINALLY moved into the intermediate room!! This means that he is now at a level 2. I was so excited when I found out that he had been moved. It has been a long, long journey and I am so looking forward to the end of it. I feel like Frodo in Lord of the Rings, I have to get to that cliff and the journey is long and at times seems impossible, but it has to be done and no one can do it for me no matter how badly they want to. It has been emotional and exhausting
We were told that he will probably only have to be in there for another 2 weeks. He might come home on oxygen, it will just depend on how he does. The Dr. said that she would rather send him home on a small amount of oxygen rather than keep him there where he runs the risk of getting an infection.

I will keep you updated on what the progress is.

Bath Time

We got to help give Duncan a bath for the first time. It wasn't his first bath, just the first time we had been there when they gave one. He did so great. He LOVED it. He isn't ready for a bath tub, so we bathed him in his bed.

Then his nurse wrapped him up to wash his hair. She washed so I could see how to do it, he just loved it.

Eyes wide open the whole time.

The reward- a nice warm bottle.

Duncan is doing really great. He is 4lbs. 7oz. He is gaining about an oz. a day. They are weening his oxygen down and trying to get him off the vent completely. He is almost there. I think in a couple of weeks he will be off of it all together. He is now taking most of his feeds by bottle. I have tried breastfeeding him about 4 times now. He is latching on, but the milk doesn't come out fast enough for him. Yesterday he did really well and I was able to feed him for about 15 min. Today when I tried, he just kept smiling and not really sucking. He was just being funny.

So Cute!!

How cute is this picture!?! I was holding him and just happened to have my phone out and he started smiling so I snapped this one. I love it. Duncan is now 4lbs. 1oz. He is doing great and is getting used to the bottle and really likes it, he just can't stay awake long enough to finish it. The rest they feed through his tube.

Doing Great

Duncan is doing Great!! He has made amazing progress in the last week. He is off the CPAP and he is loving it. He looks so much more comfortable with the new nasal canala flow tube. A couple hours after being on the new tube they took a blood gas and it came back "awesome" as his nurse said. Friday they started giving him his immunization shots. I was really nervous about him getting those. But he did really well. They gave him Tylenol to help with the pain. The other great news is that today I was able to bottle feed him!!! They decided to try starting him on one bottle feed a day and see how it goes, well he chugged that bottle like a champ!! One thing that preemies have to learn is how to do is suck, swallow and breath at the same time. I really think it helped that the nurses and Justin and I would give him his pacifier whenever he was being feed, I think it really made a difference. I was impressed, I really didn't think it was going to go well, but again this little guy has proven me wrong. He is almost 35 weeks old and the nurses have said that around this time things just start to click with them.

I feel like Duncan has been extremely blessed and I know that Heavenly Father has been very mindful of him and has poured his blessing on him. There is another little preemie boy in his pod and he had to have the heart surgery to close the hole in his heart and we were talking and she said that most preemie boys and some girls have to have that surgery. She said she was shocked that Duncan didn't have to have it and that his hole closed only after one round of the medicine to close the hole. She said she has only seen that happen twice since she has been there. I know that it is because Duncan was given a blessing and Heavenly Father blessed him and Justin and I. He has really blessed me with peace of mind in some of the most scary situations. I am just so grateful to my Heavenly Father. I am so grateful to everyone that has been praying for him and putting his name in at Temples all over the world. Thank you so much.

Events of the week

Before the play, Nana came to visit Duncan. I think she was excited because Justin and I have been the only ones that have really been able to touch him. If you can see he is holding her finger. We also got him a 2 month present for going into his big boy bed, a mobile. He really likes it. The music is very soothing.

Today Justin and I went to Flagstaff for the day. We went to see Duncan and make sure he was doing good and then we headed to Flag for this Arizona Celtic Festival. It was really cool. Literally, the weather was so cool there that I was ready to buy a house. It was in the low 80's and it rained and felt oh so good. It was a nice relief from the 115 degrees we have been having.
The festival is put on every year. This was our first time going. I was reading the Arizona Kids magazine in the hospital and saw that this was going to be this weekend, and if you don't know Justin, he loves Scotland and all that goes with it. He loves swords and has a large collection of swords. He was really itching to get a sword and I know he really wanted one, but they come with a pretty price tag. He didn't get one, but he had a good time looking at all the cool swords. Also the kilts. Oh my, they were beautiful. The wool was so nice. They had live music and an area for kids, and they had dueling, and the men came out in their kilts. It was so fun.

This was a group of men that won a trophy for Scottish athletics. This log toss, it has a more specific name, but I left the paper in the car and I'm too tired to go get it. I was so mad at myself I was getting ready to take more pictures and the battery in my camera died.

After we left the festival we went to the mall there, it is a very small mall, but it had better stores than Arrowhead. We drove through town by NAU and headed home. We went back to the hospital and Justin got to hold Duncan. He was so cute, he kept trying to pull out his CPAP and I could tell that Justin was getting nervous and I told him this is what babies do. He was also getting fussy because he was sleepy and he was trying to fight it, again I reassured Justin this is what babies do. We got exciting new while we were there, the Doctors came around to get updates on babies and they were talking about Duncan and the Dr. said to put him on high canala flow oxygen tomorrow-so this means NO MORE CPAP!!! For now anyway, and hopefully no more. His poor nose looks like a piggy nose so this will feel much better and his nose can recover and go back to normal. He now weighs 3lbs. 14oz. He is almost 4lbs. I think by Monday he will be too.

So as I said, it was a busy week, but fun at the same time.

"Wicked"

This has been a busy week, so I am going to just start in the order things happened. First, my mom and I went to see "Wicked" and it was so great. We had a good time. The music and acting was just great. I actually didn't know that much about the play other than it was about the witches from the Wizard of Oz. It had such a great story and can I just say that as a blond, Glenda was great. I loved the song Popular, the actress that played her was hilarious and did a wonderful job. The actress that played Elphaba was great as well and can I just say that I am glad that I don't get painted green each day. If you can get a ticket you must go see this, it was fantastic.

Big Boy. . . Sort of

My big boy bed

Me being swaddled with my buddy close by-this really makes him look like a little peanut!

My first cute outfit to wear

Duncan got moved into a "big boy" bed during the night. He is able to keep his body temperature where it needs to be on his own so he was moved into a crib type bed. He looks so cute in it. It makes him look so little, well more than he is. Being out of an isolet means that he gets to wear clothes and he gets swaddled, which he loves. He is doing good. If his blood gas tests continue to come back good then they will start weening him off the CPAP. I don't think he will be off of it for another week or so. He tends to move forward and then take a step back. So I'm hoping they don't take him off of this too soon. I really don't want them to have to inti bate him again, and I'm sure he wouldn't like it either. We're going to go buy him a mobile to put on his bed, and I think when we are done with it we will donate it to the NYICU, I think they could use those.

He loves his bed and so do I because it means I can hear him cry more. I know that sounds strange, but when you haven't been able to hear your baby cry for almost two months, it is a sweet sound. It also means that I can give him kisses!! He loves his binky and he loves to look at me, close his eyes and then quickly open them again to see if I am still there. I tried to kangaroo care him the other day and it just didn't go well. It is really hard to do with the CPAP in, he can pull it out easily and I can't see him to put it back in. The outfit he has on is a preemie and it still swallows him. We had to fold the arms because they were too long. He is 3lbs. 9oz. He did go down, but Justin and I think the blood is what made him weigh so much before. He is adorable and precious and I just love him and can't wait until he is moved into the intermediate room, that just means one step closer to going home.