Reagan is home! (6 weeks old)

Sorry for the delay in posts. After 41 days in the nicu, Reagan is home! She is 19 inches long and weighs 5lbs 15 oz. I was so sure she would make it to 6lbs but of course she has to prove me wrong. She was being bad and still having bradys so she ended up coming home on a monitor. Tim and I had to be taught how to use the apnea monitor Friday morning and then Reagan was able to come home. Reagan has two leads stuck on her..one for breathing and one for heart rate. So far, the monitor has gone off for low battery and the leads becoming unstuck.

Avery has been THE BEST big sister ever. She is so excited to have her home and help out. When she first got home, Avery ran into the pantry, got a Fruit by the Foot and brought it over to Reagan because I told her it seemed like she was hungry. For those of you that don't know Avery personally,  this girl loves her Fruit by the Foot. She doesn't want to share. Later that day, she ran over to her room, grabbed like 5 small toys and brought them all over to Reagan. Avery is NOT the sharing type and she was sharing all of her favorite things with her sister. It was probably the cutest thing I have ever seen. It literally melted my heart and I am not the sappy type.

I don't know if I mentioned it before but the social worker came in and talked to me 2 weeks ago. She said that if Reagan makes it to 30 days in the nicu, she qualifies for medicaid. I told her that we make too much money and she said that our income didn't matter when she was in the nicu for 30+ days. She also said that when we have medicaid that we automatically qualify for WIC (Women, Infant and Children) which would give us vouchers for formula. Right now, Reagan is on Neosure which has increased protein, vitamins and minterals compared to "term" formula. It is $16.99 a can for 14 - 6oz bottles..in laymens terms...its expensive. The can will last us about 3 days. It would cost us about $170/month which is crazy.

I got Reagan's medicaid cards in the mail today but I have to pick a medicaid plan. There are about 5 different plans. She has Cleveland Clinic insurance as primary but will have medicaid as secondary. I will be going to the WIC office this week to try to get qualified. I used to be a cashier at Giant Eagle when I was younger and would hate when people would come in with WIC vouchers, just because it would go against my "items per minute scanned"...open mouth, insert foot..this would totally benefit us right now and we would be grateful.


I will post more pics in the next few days of how good Avery is as a big sister, but in the meantime, here are a few....


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She is AMAZING!

I like coupons at CVS just as much as Mommy does

Leanne and Aria got Reagan a new outfit!

She is so awake!

A past parent from the nicu handed out gift bags. How nice!

We bought a matching stocking for my sister, Reagan!

Yay! Reagan is coming home!

Look how cool Reagan's room looks!

Reagan is one month old!

Reagan has had a pretty good week. The only thing keeping her in the nicu is that she continues to have brady's. Most of the time they are when she is eating or right after, though sometimes they are random and when she is sleeping. She is now being fed "ad lib". They used to wake her up every 3 hours and now they don't wake her up unless she has been sleeping 4 hours. Basically she can eat every 3-4 hours, depending on how awake she was.

As of last night, she weighs 5lbs 4.6oz! She is a beast! lol

Avery has been paying a lot more attention to her baby dolls lately. She wants to feed them and dress them...we use her old preemie clothes :)  We had conferences with Avery's teacher and it went pretty well. Her teacher was on maternity leave until the beginning of October but she said she has seen an improvement since she started back. Obviously the main things we need to work on are communication and also number and letter recognition. They said she does well with colors and shapes. Every morning they have to find their name out of all the names in the class and Avery always finds her name so that is a start with letter recognition.

We brought Avery to see Reagan a few days ago. She seemed much more interested in Reagan this time. She even helped feed and burp her. She wouldn't hold her but that will happen one of these days.

Me and Mommy at my pre-op appointment. I got to see Dr Love again. I was actually good and opened my mouth wide enough that she didn't need the tongue depressor. 

Feeding my baby

Mommy and Reagan smiling

Practicing

The nicu gave me a big sister sticker!

Look at that cute little girl. She must take after her big sister!

Family picture

Getting a good look at my baby sister

Awww

I only had one meltdown when I was visiting...this is what I do when I go to stores sometimes and this is why Mommy doesn't really like to take me shopping.

I then started to come around and wanted to help feed Reagan

Kisses

On my tip toes..checking on my sister

More Reagan smiles :)

She is just chilling

This is Mommy's work friend, Theresa's daughter, Karrah. She has been following me since I was born!

This is Mommy's coworker and friend, Theresa. She came to see Reagan and she likes to read my blog! Mommy's coworker Nichole came to visit this week too but Mommy forgot to take a pic :(

Daddy loves his fireplace! I think its 4th on the list of things he loves after me, Reagan and Mommy. 

Mommy and Daddy got to go out to dinner/have drinks with Uncle George and Aunt Janet. This was supposed to be an annual tradition where Grandma and Grandpa B watch me, Kaitlin and Eddie but the last few years I was in the hospital around Christmas time so it hasn't happened recently until now.

Reagan is one month old!

I am so cute..I see where Reagan gets it

The many faces of Reagan

My sister is sooooo long. Her feet are peeking out at the end of her gown! She has long legs..she doesn't get that from me or mommy. 

Grandma B had surgery on her hand and will be off of work for a few months so I had to make her a sign. 

I was trying to hold a sign and markers at the same time..it was hard work

And....I only have one marker left. I told you it was hard work.