Prunes?? Anyone??

I told you, he likes prunes :) Tommy almost 6 months old!

Tommy enjoying eating food now!

Tommy tried his first baby cereal on Monday, May 28th. I didn't think I was hitting the road to FL the next day. He seemed to like it fine. For some reason I was waiting for him to be 5 months old before trying it...
Trying his first cereal at 5 months old!

After arriving back home from our second FL trip we continued with baby cereal and added some fruits and veggies. I thought I'd be nervous introducing new foods since he was a preemie...not so much. He's so lucky to be the 4th kid! I do try to only introduce one new food per day. The other three (NO JOKE) had to wait three days??? WHY?? Allergies do not run in our family?? Silly mom! He's definitely a fruit boy. Tolerates veggies, and literally CRIED with peas. He definitely tolerates veggies better with a little fruit mixed in. Thankfully he likes prunes, he's been a bit constipated. I'm guessing with his iron supplement and the added solids it has stopped him up some. He goes in for his 6-month well baby check up on the 26th (a day late)....I can't believe my little guy is almost 6 months old!

When we arrived home and he finished his antibiotics, I took him in for a follow up with his doctor here. All was well and he weighed 11 pounds, 6 ounces. This was a bout 10 days ago and he's been gaining about an ounce a day, so my guess is he's right at 12 pounds even today! In Florida, at the doctor he weighed 10 pounds, 11 ounces...I couldn't get over that weight. That was exactly an 8-pound weight gain since birth!

Kimberlyn and Robby with my Grandma, their Great Grandma!

Tommy and Kimberlyn with my Grandpa, their Great Grandpa!

COUSINS!! Robby, Kimberlyn, Kaitlyn and Baby (not so baby anymore) Robby

WHAT LOVE! Cool cousins, Brice and Robby!

Finally, something about poor ole Tommy!!

Well, he is doing fabulous! He had his first cold on the drive down to Florida (late May)...he had a little runny nose and some congestion. He proved he truly is a Nance kid as they all (especially the boys) have this very sensitive gag reflex. He puked about twice a day (IN THE VAN TOO) and on the third (last) driving day the kid puked 3 times at which point I wanted to pull off the road, crawl into a ditch and cry! Seriously, if he puked one more time en route, I would have had to find a place to do laundry! This paired with Mom still being alive made for some serious stress. The doctor estimated Mom would have passed before I arrived in FL. Since she was alive, like any normal daughter, I really wanted to hold her hand one last time....I was able to.

Tommy seemed happy, just whenever a little cough came up, he puked...out his nose, projectile puking! On Friday my sister-in-law arranged for us to be able to "walk" Tommy in at the doctor's office she worked at, IF we needed to. I'm totally anti-medicine UNLESS needed. I decided to take Tommy's temp as he was feeling warmer than usual, he's a Nance kid- always HOT! He had a 99.3 temp. I called out pediatric clinic at home and spoke with his nurse...yep, since he is a preemie and at risk yadi-ya-ya, she said I really needed him to get a check up or go to the ER.

I gave him Tylenol and went to the doctor. Super nice lady, BUT now his temp had gone to 100.4. This is the cut-off for this office to admit the 2-month old or less baby to the hospital for more testing. See Tommy had just turned 5 months, but adjusted was just 2 months old. THANKFULLY, she let us try an antibiotic (due to the situation with Mom) and made me promise to take him directly to an ER if anything changed for the worse. He did great and the fever left...I was running on very borrowed energy as I was doing this trip w/o Larry. I just prayed that he'd keep his formula down while I fed him.

Larry flew down to FL for Mom's memorial service and then drove home with us. I was so happy to have his help. I think it was pure adrenaline that got us down there and I didn't know how I was going to get back home alone.

Our new house....in August anyhow :)

I couldn't help but post a picture of this! I'm so excited to move, I know you couldn't tell :)

In loving memory of Mom...

and Grandma
Patricia Emerson
February 14, 1948 to June 3, 2007

Sorry for the delay in posting on here...my Mom went into the Hospice home on May 22nd and passed on June 3rd. Hospice was marvelous at caring for her and keeping her pain free in her last days. She is in a way better place now.

Although this blog was started to let friends and family follow our journey to Tommy-- Quite frankly, I haven't updated this blog because it turned into keeping mom, my #1 blog-fan updated and feeling close to us since we were so far apart and she wasn't able to visit until Tommy was 3 months old. Although our friends and family are important to us...I somehow got in the mind set that I was "writing to mom". See mom had lost her ability to speak in November. Therefore calling her and sharing life's daily excitement wasn't possible...so I just wrote about it and added pictures. Mom checked the blog first thing in the morning and last thing before bed.

So please accept my sincere apologies for not updating sooner. I appreciate all the thoughtfullness of checking in on us and the prayers. I have lots to share with you and hope to upload pictures soon.

Quick update...

We got in from Florida last night. I'm doing wash and repacking to drive back down. My mom is in no pain at all and fairly comfortable on some good pain meds at a very nice Hospice Home. I don't expect to see her alive again. We had a fabulous (considering the situation) time Saturday night hugging, crying and saying goodbye. She's going to a far better place very soon. They are suspecting it may happen in 2 days....

On an exciting note, Tommy (and the other kids) did fabulous on the very hard emotional trip. That long of a trip with such short notice is hard, but they did a great job! Tommy turned 5 months old on Friday, obviously no weight update. 5 months was the target age I put in my head for starting him on baby cereal. Not sure why I waited so long, the kid has had ice cream with hot fudge already :) Okay, so it was just a teeny bite, but still. He was way ready for his cereal this morning and ate it all gone and rather fast. If you didn't know it was his first time, you'd never have guessed so. I do have pics and will try to post some soon. Quite honestly, I'm not sure I'm ready to download the camera right now. We have gotten a lot of pics with my mom and the kids on there.

The best part is that medicine Tommy took to help movefood through him to prevent huge spit ups and vomiting....well we had him on a very low dose but thought it was still doing something. We lost it in FL, actually all his meds were together and lost. We could not find them anywhere and I was very stressed...turned out he hasn't spit up but once or twice which is completely normal. We found the meds 2 days later, but obviously have not used the reglan anymore. We did start his iron supplement back up :)
I sincerely appreciate all the prayers. We are hanging in there, most of the time doing well...and rightfully so, struggling with emotions at other times. I thank God the older two got to have a nice visit and say goodbye to their Grandma. I wish they didn't have to learn so much about death at such a young age.

Tommy's first trip...

No time to really update now, we are going to see my mom who has requested hospice in her battle with ALS. Please pray for our family.