Cheryl and I are getting a few more minutes sleep. We have gone from 8 feedings every 3 hours to only 7 feedings every 3 hours and 25 minutes. (not quite sure how to handle day light savings time)

Well, tomorrow's a big day. We have the appointment with the cardiologist in the afternoon.

Just so you know, if you happen to call during the day and Cheryl doesn't answer, its not because she's not home. (unless we are at one of our 3 Dr's appointments this week). Feeding Rose can take up to an hour and if Cheryl doesn't remember to put the phone next to her before she starts then she has to let the answering machine pickup.

Well, tomorrow's the visit to the surgeon that put in the G-tube, Dr Height (spelled phonetically). I hope he puts in that cool flush mounted G-tube button.

Well, things are getting back to a more normal routine. Cheryl is sitting on the couch nursing Rose. Katie is gyrating around the family room, singing to her new N'Sync CD and Erin is upstairs listening to her new Britanny Spears CD ( a former mousketeer that made it big). They both got CD's for good report cards

Rose went to her 3rd Dr's appointment, Dr Hight, to have her G-tube and her incision checked. Everything looked great. No G button this time. It seems like the basic theme of the three appointments this week is that she's doing fine and everybody wants to take a wait and see approach. She's actually too small for a G-button. She needs to work up a few line sizes before she's ready. She could do quite a bit of growing and still be using the G-tube or button if the heart surgery really isn't until the summer.

I think the next thing that Cheryl and I have to figure out is how to deal with our prolonged hospital vacation. I think we were expecting a brief break and then going right into the heart surgery again. Now I think we are going to have to do more of the old normal things in our lives while including Rose.

Well, no big Dr's appointment for a few weeks. There's always the weekly weigh ins by the visiting nurse to look forward to.

Things have been going well. We had a pretty quiet Easter weekend although a few more nice days like this and we are going to have to get the stroller out. I think Rose is getting a little bored with the inside of our house. She definitely lets us know when she's getting bored and wants a change of scenery.

On the medical side, Rose has been doing a good job of putting on weight. Last Friday (the day after she came home from the NICU) Rose weighed 7 lbs 13 oz. This past Friday, she was up to 8 lbs 6 oz. That's 9 oz in 7 days. I guess for you and me that's only 3 quarter pounders but for a baby her size an ounce a day is good weight gain and she's been doing better than that.

Interesting Rose facts: She doesn't have too much hair but what she does have does have quite a reddish tinge to it. Time will tell.

We did have one tough moment this week. Katie is a little concerned that Rose will on occasion stick out her middle finger. I tried to explain to Katie that Rose is not aware she is doing anything wrong and certainly has no bad intentions. Katie still did not appear to buy my explanation and seemed convinced that Rose was in trouble but just not aware of it yet.

A definite highlight this weekend, we all made it to church together on Sunday. That's a first. It was perfect stroller weather. So we got a walk It might not sound like much but I do feel like we have attained another major milestone. We actually went somewhere together as a family, all five of us, and it wasn't a Dr's appointment. Church went well. Rose let out a couple of good cries. I think she liked the acoustics.

Dr. Leopold did an ultra sound of her heart. Everything looks pretty much the same as the last time he looked when she was in the NIC Unit. All babies have three short circuits that close when the baby takes theier first breath. Rose's haven't quite closed so they will take a look during the surgery and close them up then, if needed. Its not really that much more of a big deal on top of what was already involved with the surgery. Dr Ellison will be performing the surgery at Children's in Hartford.

Dr Leopold thought we were ready to start thinking about scheduling the surgery. He thought Rose looked good. Everything was positive. We were pushing to get her off of her diuretic medication and he agreed with us, so we were pretty happy with that. He did kind of catch us off guard. We were talking about the benefits of her putting on more weight before the surgery versus Rose getting the surgery sooner so she could put it behind her and get on with the normal baby development things. I think we were expecting another low key check up and before we knew it we were talking about

scheduling surgery in a month or so. Late May to early June. The stay in the hospital should be about a week.

We also talked about Rose getting out for visits more. Dr Leopold saw nothing wrong with visiting as long as everybody is healthy and we follow our normal precautions. So it looks like we will be getting out more.

her. I think if there was a sport that just involved marching in parades she

would do it year round.

Oh, yeah. We got a call late yesterday from the nurse that schedules Dr

Ellison's surgeries. Looks like the day is May 24th, a Monday. (Sorry about that Suzanne M.) Well, we are glad to be getting on with it but, of course, more than a little bit nervous. Rose seems like she's ready. She's looking pretty strong and active these days. We are hoping that we can get through this, Rose can recover and then just concentrate full strength on her developmental stuff.

Not that she didn't make it a little suspenseful. For those of you that having been scoring at home, Rose had good weight gain the 1st 2 weeks she was home, close to a pound, up to 8 lbs 13 oz. Then last Friday, we went to the cardiologist and they weighed her and she still weighed that same after a week and half. We spent quite a bit of time that day just talking about how inaccurate there scale probably was. But this past Monday, Rose had another check up with the pedi Dr. and she stilled weighed 8 lbs 13 oz. Rose had been spitting up a little and been some what uncomfortable with her feedings so we thought she might have been burning up some calories that way. Anyway, Dr Levine changed her feed to 2/3 breast milk and 1/3 soy formula and that seem to have made a big difference. Rose went back for another weigh in yesterday and she had piled on 6+ ounces. She now weighs a whopping 9 lbs 3.5 oz.

Another story or medical measurement inaccuracies. The Pedi nurse measured Rose's height on Monday at 17", on Friday she was 22.5". That's over an inch a day. At that rate, those college basketball scholarships should start pouring in any day now. Let me see, at an inch a day, she will be over 7 feet tall by the time she's 4 months old. Kids grow up so fast. OK, she was actually about 19" when she was born, so she's really grown 3.5" in 8 weeks. Oh, well, maybe I was getting ahead of my self on those college basketball scholarships.

Rose has been to two of Erin's softball games. 1 win and 1 loss. Tonight will be number 3, under the lights at Welch Park. Rose seems to enjoy the games although the bleachers can get pretty noisy when there's an exciting play on the field. I'm going to have to get her some ear muffs.

Rose is getting pretty active. She's really starting to make a lot of interesting faces. You forget all the motions and contortions that a little baby goes through when they are waking up. It's about a 5 minute exercise of stretching and rubbing her hands in her face and making various cute baby sounds. Very fun to watch. Its amazing how you forget these things that babies do.

Rose has a pretty busy social life. She's been making most of Erin's softball games. Saturday they were on the winning side of a 40-7 blow out under the lights at Welch Park, a 3 hour marathon that only made it through 4 innings. Thursday was a close loss in extra innings.

Katie is playing micro soccer on Mondays, not a good spectator sport but Kate has a lot of fun. Much more action than T-ball was last year.

Friday, Rose went to see a play that Erin's Girl Scout troop put on a play for Katie's Brownie troop. All 3 kids at one activity, its kind of like having all the planets line up. They had a cake afterwards to welcome Rose which was very nice.

Next week looks pretty quite. More visits from Karen T. No Dr' appointments until the 19th when we go to see Dr Ellison for Rose's pre-op visit.

... and of course, next Saturday is a very big moment for Rose, her 1st Shad Derby Day.

Well, everybody has to experience their 1st Shad Derby Day eventually. Rose is fortunate enough to be able to do it in her 1st year of life (this must seem pretty strange to non-Windsor people).

Rose will be going down to the festivities early to watch Erin and her Uncle Joe and Aunt Liz and Uncle Kenny run in the 5K. At 1:00 she'll be watching her Mom and 2 big sisters march in the parade with the Girl Scout troop.

Rose's surgery is still scheduled for May 24th - We have a pre-op visit with the surgeon, Dr Ellison, on the 19th. I am assuming surgery plans should get firmed up then. The hospital stay is about a week and we hear that it takes about 3 weeks before the kids are pretty much recovered - that would be mid-June-ish.