We got to hold her!

First Family Picture

Second Family Picture

Happy in Mommy's Arms

Apple, Daddy and Me!!

I woke up for Apple!!

Back to Sleep!

My Daddy!

They unwrapped my burrito

Daddy has the best kiss!

Learning to suck! Me and My Pacifier!

Tucked back in!

What an amazing day yesterday was. Most people take the little parts of having a baby for granted. Being able to see them, being able to hold them, having them poop! All of these things have been such milestones that we will cherish forever. It was so hard having to wait 7 hours after giving birth to be able to see our baby. It has been even harder having to wait almost 2 weeks to be able to hold our daughter for the first time. So it was such a treat to be able to hold our little pixie for the first time yesterday. I had gone to drop my dad off at the airport and dropped Casey off at the hospital to be with Dylan. When I came back the nurse had told me she had offered to let Casey hold the Dylan while I was gone, but he said he better wait until I was back. This made me so happy. I know he was itching(slash nervous) to hold her, but I really wanted to be there for the first time she came out of her bed. So, I got there at 10:00 with Uncle Craig (Great Grandpa and Andrew were somewhere lost in the hospital), and the nurse asked who wanted to hold Dylan first. Of course I really wanted to be first!! Who wouldn't?!?! But, I really wanted Casey to be the first one. Seeing Casey hold his first baby brought tears to everyones eyes. Yes, he had held Madison Martin before, but she was over a year old before he would even think about putting a finger on her for fear of dropping her. So, he was about to hold his first baby, and it was HIS DAUGHTER. The way he held her made you want to giggle. He had her head in on hand and body on the other arm. I don't quite know how to explain it other than awkward. But the way her just starred at this little girl just melted your heart. Most people that are reading this know Casey, and they know how much of a hard ass he can be. But he has been more than I could have ever expected with this little girl. So caring, so loving, so amazing. I know that he is going to protect her every step of her life and that nothing is going to ever harm this little angel if daddy has anything to do with it. And I just knew all of this from that first time he held her and just sat looking at her. I got my turn later, and WOW!!! It was just so nice to spend the day rocking my little girl. She never opened her eyes or even woke up, but that was fine with me. Just being able to have her in my arms was all that I needed. Both grandma's held her by the end of the day, I thought the nurse was going to have to peel her out of their arms.

We went back to the hospital this morning. Dylan's bed had been moved. This is a very scary thing when you walk into the ICN and your child's bed is gone. She had been moved from the West Wing (Surgery/High Care) to the North Wing (Special Care). She was fast asleep when we got there. We have been trying to get her to start sucking since it is not a natural thing for Dylan. We need to start getting her ready to breastfeed. So, we placed the pacifier in her mouth and she sucked away. This too was very exciting. She looked so perfect all wrapped up like a burrito in her bed. It gets very hard to leave her sometimes.

We also spoke with the Neonatologist yesterday. Dr. Shimotake said that Dylan is doing so great right now, but we need to be prepared that this is the time that she will start making steps backwards. This is something we have always been prepared for, we just hoped it would never happen. The next step we are wanting to accomplish is having her Repolgle removed. The Repolgle (pronounced repogel) goes into her stomach and drains all of the junk out. It is currently a very murky dark green bile. We want this to turn clear and as soon as this does it will be removed and they will begin to feed her my breastmilk. As of now there is no changing of colors, but the doctors have said this could take a while. So as of now it is just a waiting game. In the meantime the doctors are weaning her off of the morphine. She was at 30 mikes the 2 days after her surgery, they have been reducing her morphine by 3 mikes every 12 hours, we have her at 13 mikes currently and at 4pm she will be reduced to 10 mikes and after that it will be PRN.

Everything still looks great, thank you for all of the kind words and prayers we have been receiving. We are very sorry if you have called or emailed and we haven't returned your message yet. As soon as we get a moment to catch our breath we will give everyone a call or email. And all of the messages that have been left on the blog are SO appreciated also, it is nice to know that people are reading this! Much love from the new Smith Family!