A month of firsts.

First plane ride, first boat ride, first visit to Grandma and Grandpa's in Aptos (via the plane ride), first full night of sleep (of course not to be replicated ;-), first rice cereal, lot's 'o firsts! And it's been over 7 weeks since our last hospital stay! I'm a bit superstitious so I probably shouldn't be discussing all of these things (as not to jinx) but it's been a good month for Ian. I wanted to put it down in writing. He's holding his head up much longer as we work with him, although he's still got a long way to go. And that's okay, we'll wait and keep working on it.

It's really hard to believe that we're taking all of these major steps so early on with this fragile little guy but we're trying to treat him as "normal" as possible. In between all the meds, breathing treatments, doctor and therapy appointments, and just general medical upkeep, he's a baby and needs all kinds of experiences to allow him to grow and thrive.

Besides his coming around to being more aware and responsive to everyone and everything, we've conquered another major hurdle with Ian. The only thing that goes though his g-tube for the last month is meds, we no longer feed him through it. He's still nursing, but not as consistently. We went through a couple weeks of major choking while nursing so I had to back off a bit. It just seemed the benefits of my milk couldn't outweigh the issues from choking. I tried to pump more but, as expected, didn't get much. It seems as soon as I made the decision that I had to give up, he became more in control of it and now nurses much better. Maybe because my milk supply has lessened, who knows.

Lila, on the other hand, has become more challenging. Don't get me wrong, she's an amazing little girl, but the 3's far out-challenge us than the 2's did. She's constantly correcting everything everyone says, she feels she needs to be in charge and bosses everyone around as well and she's often just plain bratty. Sometimes she's amazing, and other times, non-stop pushing of buttons. As they say, I'm sure this too shall pass, it's just tough to go through with everything else we're dealing with. To be honest, in the past week, she's become much better, so hopefully, it's passing now ;-) We've just had to hold our ground on how we deal with it. Trying not to squelch her spunk but mellow out the obnoxious way she goes about things so people, including Mommy, will want to be around her ;-)

To add to our craziness, we are finally having the work done on our house. Absolutely not the best time but when is it, right? For those who know us, you've heard us talking about it for years. The people who sold us our home neglected to disclose there were issues with settling. We took them to court and won but they he disappeared, resurfaced again in a year and claimed bankruptcy. So we are having the house lifted and supported. There's dirt everywhere, holes all around the house and in our living room, an absolute mess. I guess as with everything else we are going through, it's rough while it's happening but will be wonderful when we've moved passed it.

As we embark on the 6 month mark, we've come a long way! It really seems more like 6 years to me. Thanks to everyone's positive energy directed towards our little fighter, he's thriving almost like a "typical" baby would. We know he will always have challenges but he's a fighter and will persevere. We couldn't have done it without all of the support and we thank you.