The Fort!

Well today was the second day that Michelle has been back to work. Well, she could have been back to work a lot sooner but her work was saying that they couldn't give her the hours. Well it was a crock for as I was concerned. On Monday, she had a talk to her District Manager. He was letting her know of a possible new position that he wanted her to take. I hope that she does, but Michelle has some doubts that she might not be able to do the job.


Well this morning I got with Christopher; it was about five thirty or so, and Michelle was practically at work, I here this little cry from Noelle up stairs. Well she thought that she would be able to sneak in Mommy and daddy's bed. Well to her surprise we were not there. So she started shout for Mommy. Its so funny when she does it though. Well I called up to her and let her know that I was down stairs feeding her brother. So she came down the stairs and see whats up.

Well she came down stairs and found a box in her way to me. Then she saw the cat go in the box - at this point the box was on its side - so she followed suit and when it the box as well. She seemed to be having fun with it, so why not let her. It was kinda one of those moments where the kids are sitting around the Christmas tree and opening presents, and the kids are done opening all of there presents and start playing with the boxes instead of the toys. Ya, it was like one of those moments. After a few minutes pass she comes up to me and asked me to build her a fort. She knows what a fort is only because her uncle and aunt introduced her to them trying to play house with her. In all reality I really didn't want to build her one, only because I was just a little tired yet. It was just how she asked it was got me. She pulled up all the stops and brought out the big guns. She tilted her head just so slightly and pouted her lips and just stared at me with her big bright blue eyes and asked, "Daddy will you please build me a fort, please daddy, please." That's all it took. I will somehow will have to learn how to build a defense on an attack like this. Otherwise I will be in some serious trouble latter on!


Well so I got the utility knife out and a big roll of packaging tape and went to town. By the time I was done she had a pretty decent sized box fort. It looked pretty good if I would say so myself. Soon as i was done it wasn't even two seconds she already was crawling in there and bringing her dolls and puppy (her stuff animal security blanket) with her. She came back out and said that it was dark in there and couldn't see, so I cut a couple windows in the top that served a dual purpose, one to let light in and second so that I can see her in there. When I talked to my wife about nine or so, she was telling me that Noelle was going to town with it. There was just when one problem, it was too dark again. So my wife fixed the problem by putting one of those glade fake scented candles in there and I guess it lite it up like a lantern while camping. I am pretty sure that had a lot of fun with it.



Here is a very crude example that I came up with the two empty boxes that I had. It wasn't much but it was very thing to my daughter. Who knew that a couple of boxes could give endless fun to a two year old. I can only imagine when little Christopher is old enough to play what kind of things that they are going to get them selves into.

Its the weekend!

Well its been a very fast pace week. Having to go to work and run around doing this and that has seemed to pass the time very quickly. Like Friday, I got home about three thirty or so from work and walking around downtown phoenix taking pictures of random stuff and see how it would turn out. Anyhow I got home, and to my surprise Michelle was up with little Christopher just feeding him and trying to get him back to bed. So I decided to get a bite to eat real fast and have some conversation with my wife for a little while. After some time passed I headed to my bedroom to crash for a while, but on my way up the stairs miss Noelle thought it was time to get up, so instead of fighting to get her back in bed, I gave her an invite to our room to sleep. Obviously she took that offer as fast as she could.

After what seemed to be just minutes it was time to get back up and get going again. Christopher had his one month shots and check at the doctors. He did alright with the shots and stuff, but to my amazement he is now ten pounds. So in about two weeks he has gained about three pounds. I personally couldn't tell you if that is good news or not. The positive thing is that he is growing and that's what counts.

Well its now about five fifteen and its time to go back to bed again. I feel that I need to do some thing special with the wife today, given that she has been couped up in this apartment all week and been watching Christopher for the majority of the time. Maybe I can get Grampa or Grama to watch the kids.

nite.

A hard morning

Well the wife had her first day back to work today. That meant that I had both kids for the whole day by myself. So far I have had a rough morning. I got home two thirty this morning from work and went to bed. It wasn't before to long Michelle was getting up for work so that she could catch the bus. At the same time Christopher was waking up letting me know that it was time to change his diaper and feed him. Well I managed to change his diaper with out a problem. While I was doing that Michelle went down stairs to make him a bottle for me. So Michelle hand me the bottle after I got comfortable with him and then turn on the TV for me so that I wouldn't be board out of my mind. It took Christopher about forty five minutes before he was just about finally done. At the same time Michelle was heading out the door to catch the bus. Just when I thought that I would be able to get back to bed, here come Noelle down the stairs looking for mommy. Now you have to remember that this was about four forty five when she came down the stairs. I simply told her that mommy had to go to work and will be back soon and tried to get her back in bed. Well that failed, only because she was hungry.

Well its now going on ten and Noelle still is up I have had to feed Christopher twice since then. He still doesn't seem to want to go back to sleep. I believe that he is still a little bound up because of the iron that is in the formula. So I feed him about a ounce of good old apple juice. Well I already know that it will give a baby the most nastiest diaper that any body will have to change, but if it will help him have a bowel movement I am game.

Lets seem what happens, all I can do now is wait. I just hope that I can get some shut-eye before I have to go to work next.

Home coming of Christopher

Well yesterday we got the go ahead to bring home our son from the hospital. It was the best news that I have ever heard. It was weird, I almost had to do a double take when I saw him first yesterday. I walked in the pod in the NICU that he was located in, and of course Aunt Christy was holding him. I glanced at him like I always do and I noticed something different about him. I took another look at him when the nurse just walked back in the room and said that he was off his oxygen. I raised my hands and jumped for joy. It was the best moment sense he was born. The nurse further told us that he had accidentally pulled his nose piece off during shift change and they hadn't noticed until they looked at him. He seemed to be doing fine and was tolerating regular air with out it so they went with it, and if he started to have problems again they would have put the oxygen tubes back on him.

Today was the day though. We woke up bright and early this morning and headed over the father-in-laws house to have some of his famous German Pancakes. Originally I didn't think that I wanted any so I just 0pted for eggs with cheese. At first I didn't think that I was going to be able to stomach any pancakes because I was still a little wheezy from the night before. I wasn't feeling good for some strange reason. Maybe it was the exciting news of my son coming home or headache that I had all day. Well I ate the eggs, then i had a small German pancake.

After breakfast my wife with my daughter and I got in the truck and off we went to the hospital. We got to the NICU and found out that he had moved to a new location in there, and was quickly greeted by the nurse that was taking care of him at the time. We went through the process and paper work of discharging our son. At the same time he seemed to be a little hungry so Michelle fed him. Once everything was done and his belongings was collected we went back to my fathers-in-laws house for a brief home coming party. It wasn't much but it served the purpose. We were there for a while and thought that it was time to go home to spend some quality time with our son.

I have more photos to post in a later blog.

Continuing from my last blog...

While all of this was happening, there has been a lot of support from the family. My daughter which a little new to all of the events that happening was being passed around from her aunt, uncle, and grand parents. After a week of not being able to come home she started to cry in frustration of being passed around. Unfortunately she couldn't, with my home early from the hospital and going up to the nicu it was a little difficult to have her at home.

After a week my wife was a little more mobile and things were on the up and up, and Noelle came home with the understanding that she had to take it easy on mommy. It was nice to have her back at home with us. Just like it was nice to introduce her to her new baby brother. That moment was long coming. This entire time that he was in special care up to now we hadn't been able to touch or hold him. That was little frustrating for my wife specially when she wanted to hold him and cradle him close to her and try to make him feel better.

Any how, we took Noelle to see her brother for the first time. It was interesting to watch her look at him and try to touch him. I just couldn't see if she understood that this was the real deal and not just one of her baby dolls that she like to put on the floor and cover with dish towels. This entire time she has been so excited to have her baby brother next to her, as she would say, " I want to hold him, and change him, and give him a bath." Its just funny what two year old would say.

Few days after the transfer of my son to the new hospital, he keeps showing progress. My wife and I keep traveling up there to get updates and give support to our little one. Over the last few days he has progressed from a cpap machine to just a nasal cannula to which he is breathing room oxygen with just a little pressure behind it. We are now able to hold him and feed him which my wife is just relieved about; and though, I know that Noelle really want to hold him, she is just too young to do so.

All in all things are looking up, I just hope that he will be able to come home soon.