7 Months Old (Actual)

Henry turned 7 months old on Friday. It is hard for us to believe that so much time has passed. Our time in the NICU seems surreal when we give it much thought. When I look back on the pictures from his birth and the first week when he had the edema (major swelling), I get rather emotional. I don't know how we made it through the experience, but I'm obviously thankful that we did. And, I am very proud of Henry. He is special. He has an iron constitution.

We've had a relatively calm month (knock on wood), which has been great. Henry's nights have included at least one four-hour block of sleep, followed up by one or two two-hour blocks of sleep, which has been really nice for us.

Henry had a good week. His weight gain continues to be excellent.

Thursday (11/29): 13 lbs 8 ozs
Friday (11/30): 13 lbs 8 ozs
Saturday (12/1): 13 lbs 9 ozs






Grammy came over on Thursday morning to watch Henry, because I was giving a guest lecture in one of my department's graduate classes. Henry had fun in his bouncy seat. Grandpa visited in the evening.



On Friday, Henry wore his new coat (a gift from Grammy) on his morning walk. It looked very sharp with his Gap outfit (from Michele). Grandpa came in the morning and stayed until 2PM. We had a visit from Tara, Henry's developmental coordinator through the Division of Developmental Disabilities. Tara is also his developmental specialist. She'll be coming over once a week to observe him. Henry showed off his bouncy seat, which he loves. And, he did a tummy time push-up for her.







In the evening, it began to rain. The rain was light when we went out for our walk (with umbrellas). Henry looked very tired. Jeff had taken off Henry's cannula to give his face a break. Henry's has been scratching himself during his attempts to get the cannula out of his nose. We tried to get Henry to sleep, so that Jeff and I could watch a movie, "Flag of Our Fathers" (a Netflix that we've had since April). We watched about 7 minutes of it. Henry was incredibly fussy. He didn't want his bottle. He didn't want to be in his bassinet. He wasn't wet. Jeff and I decided that a bath would calm him. Henry and I did a little tummy time and played, while Jeff fixed him a bath. Henry loved the bath. It did calm him down.







After the bath, I took some pictures of Henry's left foot against the prints that were taken in June. It looks like his big toe is about half the size that his entire foot was when he was a little older than a month old!







We put the cannula back on him before putting him to bed. By that time, Jeff and I were exhausted and went to bed.

Grammy bought Henry a winter outfit that we put on Henry for his walks in the morning and evening today. Grandpa came over in the afternoon. I made a trip to Babies R Us and bought Henry a reindeer hat, which goes nicely with his snowman suit. I also bought Henry a BebePod seat. It looks like a Bumbo seat, which is impossible to find because of some bad publicity due to some stupid parents who put the seat on top of a counter and then their baby got hurt badly when it tipped over and the baby fell off the counter. We tried the BebePod out, and Henry seemed to like it. It will, of course, stay on the floor (which is where common sense suggests it should be).

I took Henry's cannula off in the afternoon. He had scratched his face bloody again. Incidentally, we do cut his nails regularly. We kept a close eye on his color while the oxygen was off. His color looked good. Very healthy.

Grammy brought dinner this evening. We had dinner while watching "The Duel in the Desert" (ASU vs. UA in football). Henry sacked out on Grammy as soon as she arrived. That was a good thing. He was getting fussy and hadn't been responding to Grandpa, Jeff, or me.