When eBay Goes Wrong

Just look at that face. It is like he is thinking "Mom, what in the world am I wearing?". You see, one of his nicknames is Fletcher Flycatcher (when my sister was babysitting me in my mag-induced haze for a couple of days after his birth she got really bored so starting typing in random questions to the Yahoo questions site, including what middle name goes with Fletcher... "Flycatcher" was our favorite response).

So naturally I have to indulge in the occasional frog-themed outfit, toy or nursery accessory (but I am doing my best not to go overboard). Well, I have a couple of burp clothes in this cute frog print (it is in the rim of the hat he is wearing) and when my sister saw this outfit on eBay she told me about it and I entered a bid out of curiosity to kind of fish for the price. Obviously, and quite inadvertently, I won the auction. It is really even more over the top, considering there are matching shorts that he is not even wearing plus the hat actually has two knotted corners that stick up, but have fallen back in this picture.

I usually subscribe to the less is more philosophy in dressing Fletcher, but I do have to admit that I think the fly on the shoulder of the onesie is kind of cute.

Losing Oxygen

Finally, losing oxygen is a good thing. Our medical supply company called today and said they would be by to pick up our oxygen tanks. Fletcher has been completely off supplemental oxygen since July 11th, and was only on it at night since May 30th, but we still had the tanks at our house just in case. Of course wearing the cannula didn't always mean he was actually getting supplemental oxygen. The top photo was taken on March 4th and the second is from May 26th. I love to compare the size of the adhesive patches relative to his cheeks. It really illustrates his amazing growth.

We have a two-story house and Fletcher's nursery is upstairs, so we had the big tank next to the stairs and 50 feet of tubing for the nasal cannula, so we could have him upstairs or down without having to move the tank. After nearly five months, that tank had become a fixture in our house. The entryway looks naked without it there.

I did manage to talk the delivery guy into letting me keep one portable canister at the house in case of an emergency. I highly doubt (and definitely hope) that we'll ever need it, but it is a nice little security blanket for me (of course this is coming from a mom who insisted that her boy stay on supplemental O2 during the day for a month after the NICU said his saturations were adequate... "adequate" just didn't sound like a word I wanted to use when describing Fletcher's oxygenation after all he'd been through).

We also had our last home health nurse visit today (another measure ordered solely for the benefit of pushy, insecure mom). Fletcher has been growing well, weighs 14 lbs 8 oz, his oxygen saturation was 97, and his lungs sound good. Can't ask for more than that.

Formal Introduction and Blog Resurrection

I had the best intentions of turning this blog into a chronicle of Fletcher's stay in the NICU, both to update friends and family and to have a personal record of our hospital stay. Well, life got in the way.

As evidenced in his birth announcement, Fletcher has been home for four and a half months-- a whole month and a half longer than he was in the hospital. I haven't taken up this blog again (as if one entry really counts as starting a blog) because I felt like I needed to go back and record his life from the beginning in chronological order and as each day passed the prospect got more and more overwhelming.

So, I have decided to jump back in and start with the present, adding recaps of Fletcher's NICU experience and first few months along the way... when I get around to it, that is.