Homecoming

Presidents' Day will always hold a special place in my heart. This past Presidents' Day, our little Reagan came home from the hospital.
It was a big day for all of us...and one that almost didn't quite happen. Over the weekend, the doctors and nurses kept telling us that Monday would be the day, if everything continued to go okay. Monday morning came, and I was at the hospital bright and early. I'm pretty sure that sleep was completely elusive the night before. During the doctors' rounds, they asked me if I wanted to take her home. The obvious answer was YES! Thus began the long round of paperwork, ya know, to ensure that yes, the hospital released Reagan to her parents, and yes, that we are her parents. In the midst of all of this, Reagan had a brady (or a heart rate drop). This made my heart pretty much stop....because bradys mean more time in the NICU. However, the neonatologist decided that because it was not an extreme brady, and she self corrected immediately, she could still come home! Hooray! Plus, Reagan was already going home on a heart monitor, so the doctors thought it would be just fine. It might've helped that I've basically been camped out at the NICU for the past six weeks, and participated in rounds, knew what was going on with Reagan, and read everything that I could about it all.
So, by about 2:30, we were packing up all of her stuff at the hospital...you would never believe how much STUFF a little tiny baby could accumulate while in the hospital. Edmund went to get the car, and Reagan got to ride down stairs with a nurse escort (and mom) to the door. The hour and a half drive home went really well, she handled the drive (and Pennsylvania potholes) really really well.

We got home with Reagan, and introduced her to Shelby, our 65 pound, five year old yellow lab. It was really fun to see how Shelby took to Reagan. While Reagan was at the NICU, I would bring home her blankets and clothes, and before I washed them, I would let Shelby smell them. I read in a couple different articles that this helps dogs take more ownership of a baby. Shelby is already looking out for Reagan, and doesn't like it if we don't immediately respond to any little noise Reagan makes.

Did I mention Reagan makes lots of little noises? She's not a particularly fussy baby (except when she's hungry) but the girl makes all sorts of noises.

So far, Reagan's not really on a specific schedule. I'm kind of waiting until she hits 40 weeks gestation to do that. But because of the NICU, she's sort of self regulates a schedule, so we can kind of anticipate when she'll be awake and eat. Right now, we've moved from 2 1/2 hour stretches of sleep to 3 to 3 1/2 hour stretches. We are definitely looking forward to when she goes 4 hours at a time.

Did I mention that having her home is bliss? Pure bliss.

And exhaustion.

But all new moms feel that way, so that's a good normal thing.

After having her in the NICU for 6 weeks and 1 day, I will take the exhaustion and whatever else comes along just to have her home.

First ever tummy time!!

Mommy and Reagan were in a pink/black/grey kinda mood!!

Had to wish her Uncle Tony a happy birthday!!

Needless to say, I'm staying at home right now with my little girl. She's keeping me uber busy, but it's a great thing. I'll try to post more often... Look for a posting about her room coming later this week!