24 Days

William has had a good few days- he came back off of the oxygen Tuesday and has been doing great taking his bottles.  He has also done awesome at breastfeeding- so that makes me one happy mama!  He had 2 brady's today and he has to go 7 days without one in order to go home- so praying for no more of those.  He has also been gaining weight well- up to 3 lbs, 11.3 oz.  We are very thankful for his amazing progress so far!  A few pics from the last few days:

Happy Jack in the backpack with Opa!

Update

William went back on oxygen on Tuesday.  They were worried he had an infection because he was having low oxygen saturation, but thankfully they ruled  out infection.  Now the doctor thinks the desaturation are from prematurity, so hopefully he grows out of them and the need for oxygen.  He had been off of the oxygena full 8 days, so we are sad that he is back on it now, but hopeful it's not for long.

William is gaining weight this week- up to 3 lbs, 5 oz as of last night.  He is taking his bottle okay- he took a full bottle for me yesterday finally, so hopefully he will do that again today.  We are still working on breast feeding- he latched a little bit yesterday, so hopefully as he gets bigger and stronger we will have better luck with that.  Thanks for all of the prayers.

Two weeks

William is two weeks old today.  Not going to lie- we've had a bit of a stale week.  William hasn't taken a full bottle since Tuesday and he hasn't breastfed.  We were moved out of the Pavilion NICU on Tuesday to the Texas Children's Level II NICU and I will say, it is quite different.  Very loud, lots of crying babies around, lots of alarms going off.  It's a whole new environment- and I think it has been wearing on both William and us.  Each time we try to feed him, he's been very tired and does not wake up to feed.  My prayers are that he begins to get used to the new environment and that he starts taking his bottles.  In order to go home, he must be taking all of his bottles (8) and be gaining weight.  He is not even taking one right now- so lots of prayers that he gets the stamina and energy to begin feeding.  He also has not gained much weight since he was born- he's at 3 lbs, 1 oz and he will need to be at least 4 lbs before he can go home.  We are saying lots of prayers for a better week and for progress on both feeding and growth.

In positive news, William is still off of his oxygen, so great news there.  He's also cute as can be :)

Jack kissing William's isolette

William's impression of the Longhorns performance on Saturday :/  At least Daddy's Aggies won!

William David Weigle

Matt and I are so excited to announce the birth of our son, William David Weigle, on Monday, August 25th at 4:32 pm.  William was born at 32 weeks and 2 days gestation and weighed 2 lbs and 13 oz.  He was 15 3/4 inches long.  I developed severe preeclamsia with William as I did with Jack, so the doctor's decided it was necessary to deliver.  We are so thankful for the extra weeks and days that William was able to stay in my belly- he is doing so very well. 

Fortunately, I was able to get the suffoctant steroid to spur his lung development at 28 weeks. William came out breathing on his own and screaming- he was not happy to be leaving mommy's belly :)  He was put on CPAP to help him with his breathing shortly after he was born.  After one week on CPAP, they took William off of the oxygen this Monday (9/1) and he has been off ever since... and doing great!  Only one week on oxygen- compared to four months on oxygen for Jack- amazing.  The doctors gave the okay for William to take his first bottle yesterday- and he sucked the whole thing down, no problems.  We are hopeful he continues to do great with the sucking/swallowing and feeding. 

Boys- you can disregard this part if you'd like :)  Another amazing thing is that William tried to breastfeed on his own yesterday.  We were doing skin-to-skin and he just started trying, so we didn't stop him.  It was pretty amazing!  I pumped for 9 months with Jack and he was never able to breastfeed, so it makes me so happy that it might be a possibility to breastfeed William.  I've been pumping since William was born, so I'm trying to do that as much as possible to get my milk supply good and ready for him when he is ready.

We wanted to thank everyone for your prayers the last few months- 7 weeks of bedrest and in and out of the hospital- it has certainly been quite a roller coaster.  It's already moving so fast with William compared to Jack, they are saying he could be home in 2-3 weeks depending on how the feeding goes.  Pretty amazing compared to the 95 days that Jack was in the NICU.  Thanks again for all your thoughts and prayers- we love you all!

Matt, Christine, Jack, William and Tucker

Recent pictures

Below are some more recent pictures (see my post below for a written update on how Jack is doing!)

Fourth of July with Mommy

All of us in the Fourth of July neighborhood parade in Houston!

Matt won first prize for stoller decoration!

Happy boy :)

Buddies

Jack's down dog pose this AM

and Matt's graduation in May!

Jack's Baptism Pics- April 27th

Jack's Godparents- his uncle Eric and Aunt Erin

July Update

Wow, it has been WAY too long since my last update!  We've been out of town almost every weekend since April, so life has been busy busy to say the least!  We've had weddings, seen family, gone to the lake, had baby showers- it's been a great summer, can't believe we're almost at August.

Jack is doing GREAT!  He got off the apnea monitor in March, right before I went back to work on April 1st.  It was amazing for him to finally be wireless!  We hadn't been able to walk around the house or take him out without some sort of cord attached, so it was definitely freeing to be rid of both the apnea monitor and oxygen.  I started back to work part time (4 days a week now) April 1st and that is also going well.  We were able to hire Greg and Erin's (Matt's sister) nanny (they moved to Oklahoma City for Greg's job in April), so the timing worked out great there (although we were so sad see them move from down the street in Houston!)  Marisol is wonderful- Jack loves her and we feel blessed that Jack is in such great hands when I'm gone during the day.

Jack is up to 16 lbs, 10 ounces- the doctor was very happy with his progress weight wise at our appointment two weeks ago.  It was his 9 month appointment- wow, time flies!!  We've been working on eating solid foods (stage 1) and he's done a great job in the last month.  We have ECI coming to monitor his eating and they are very impressed with how well he is doing.  Think we will be starting stage 2 foods in two weeks, so hoping that goes well also!

All in all, we feel so very lucky- thus far, Jack is perfectly healthy, which is such a miracle considering all that we were faced with in the NICU.  We are on normal pediatrician visits and no specialist visits, just like any other infant now!  Jack has started sitting up and is rocking on his knees- he has some pretty funny positions that look like some hard core yoga planks and down dogs to me!  Matt and I need to start baby proofing the house stat, think he could be crawling any day.

Below are some updated pictures from the last few weeks.  I'm trying to make sure that I start being more regular about posting, so please call me out if I'm not!  :)

Jack's first crawfish boil

With Tucker, Nana Opa and Mimi

Jack with his first Easter egg

Mommy and Jack before Easter service at St Martin's

Daddy and Jack

Our hip little man  :)

Jack and Grandpa Doug