Serenity: 7 weeks old (Gestation: 31 weeks 2 days)

Serenity is 7 weeks old today! The last I checked, she was about 1 lb. 14 oz., which is above her birth weight of 1 lb. 6 oz. but she still is a little endemic (holding fluid), so part of that is showing in her weight. However, she does seems to be growing just a teeny tiny little bit.

When I went to the hospital this morning, I did my 3 minute scrub-in, as usually, and headed for Serenity's isolate. Kim (one of Serenity's primary day nurses) seemed excited about me taking a peek at her. And what I saw was a beautiful little baby girl, all fixed up with a headband made out of ribbon, and a ribbon tied into a bow on the headband. How adorable is that?! Her first headband! And she had a purple pacifier in her mouth that she was actually sucking. I cannot express how much joy it brings to my heart to see my little angel doing normal newborn things.

So, while we (Kim and I) we blubbering over Serenity's cuteness. We started talking about micro preemie clothing, and the fact that there really isn't any out on the market to buy. She was telling me about a certain type of shirt that she thought was made to fit micro preemies and we decided to go dig around in the clothes closet to take a peek at what kind of itty-bitty clothes were in there (not much for her size people, unfortunately). We ended up finding a preemie button up shirt that looked pretty small, and seemed like it would fit her chest fairly well. So, like giggling little girls, we decided to try it on her to see if it fit. And although it fits more like a dress, and we had to roll the sleeves down a little, it looked SO adorable on her!

Talk about a fun afternoon! I thoroughly enjoyed getting my baby girl all dolled up. She was beautiful to begin with, but there is just something about seeing her looking normal that made her seem so much better than she is. She really was having a good day today, though. She was looking around a lot with her cute brown eyes, and sucking on her pacifier like a pro.

On the medical side of things, everything seems fairly stable still. They are continuing to wean her oscillator settings, and will hopefully be getting her switched back over to the regular vent soon (either tonight or tomorrow morning is the chatter). At first I was hesitant about going back on the vent, but the vent means we can do kangaroo care, and I'm all for that. :)

There is also chatter about when they will begin feedings. The doctors and the surgeons sort of have differing opinions, and neither of them really seems to be wanting to give the orders--I think out of nervousness that it won't go well. But the good news is, she is getting really close to real food!

So, overall, today has been a great day! And I have decided to leave you all with some photos of our fun adventures playing dress up. Enjoy. (She kept peeking at me with one eye <3)