Corn Fed Kansan: So far so good

Lorena has been home for over a week now. Honestly, it is hard to believe! It seems pretty normal to have her here with us so that tells me we are getting used to having a newborn in the house. She eats about every 3 hours during the day and about every 4 hours during the night. Sometimes she still has some problems with eating, but she is improving everyday. I am tired but I guess that is to be expected with a newborn.

We must still treat her as a newborn. We haven't let anyone touch or hold her since she came home. I will probably relax these rules in a month or so, but we just have to be extra careful because her immunities are still premature. We want everyone to see her but it is best to wait to visit when she is older and stronger.

If you work with me or know me very well, I love following the rules, doing things the right way, or "doing things they way you are supposed to do them." I wish Lorena had an instruction manual. Not that I would read it though, I would have Dan read it and give me a quick version of what to do. Dan loves reading instruction manuals (he reads manuals for all the tractors while letting the GPS do the steering). This seems odd to me and would be very boring, but he truly enjoys reading instructions and knowing how to fix things! I remember a few winters ago, Dan got a used oil burner for the shop. He had to do some repairs but didn't have an intruction manual. He took the whole thing apart and built a diagram of all the parts so he knew how to put it back together. Dan found one dealer who helped him over the phone to get the burner going again. In all his years dealing with these oil burners, the guy told Dan he had never seen someone put one back together without the intruction manual. My husband is much smarter than I am at a lot of things. I do have the Masters Degree in the household but I still can't understand some basic things that come easy to Dan. Not sure how I got side tracked about Dan, must be lack of sleep...he has been doing a great job with Lorena and I wanted to give him some praise..even though he doesn't read the blog :-).

Lorena has a busy week coming up. She is getting her 2 month shots tomorrow. The NICU suggests keeping preemies on the same schedule as full term infants. We just have to to the Health Department in Washington for these vacinnations. On Thursday we have to go to the pediatric opthamologist in Topeka to check out Lorena's ROP (retinopathy of prematurity). She will look at Lorena's retinas and hopefully things will check out ok.

Thanks again for all the thoughts and prayers along the way. Lorena has come so far in her short life and is a blessing to our family.