11 Months

As you may have noticed on the little lilypie worm at the top of the blog, that little boy is getting close to the end of the worm....WOW! 11 months old yesterday. Unofficial weight (meaning taken at home on our scales): 15 lbs. Still wearing 3-6 month clothes, but starting to out grow the smaller ones. 2 bottom teeth with hints of a couple more on top. He has grown a lot of hair this month...the spike gets longer but so is the rest of his head that used to be bald. It now has a nice layer of soft fuzziness that is getting longer. His 10th month brought an explosion of physical awareness..he started looking stronger and doing more. This 11th month has been his happiest month so far. He laughs, talks, squeels, giggles, and interacts so much. I would go so far as to call him a ham-- espeically at about 10:30 at night....he is feeling really good then! I feel like we've watied forever ro this and I'm so glad. It is so much fun.

Here are a few pics of the last week:
Wearing Daddy's hat from work. How could you NOT buy a Mueller building when you see this?!!
OK, I am not happy that Kanyon has crooked foot and we are defintitely working to get it fixed, but it is such a little trademark that sometimes when I see it I just think its cute. Well, the other day we were "getting out" and driving and I turned to look back and I saw those sweet feet with that one little crooked one that melts my heart. I just had to take a picture.
Snoozing after his morning hunt. (not really, he's just wearing camo.)
Now for the 11 month pictures...which I happened to be taking at about 10:30 last night (remember what I said earlier about 10:30). Well, he was having a good ol' time rolling all over. That is what he's doing in the first one...preparing to roll and laughing like its hillarious!
I snapped this in an instant between rolls and goofiness.
I didn't plan on this being a long post, but I'm not through yet. I have to honor the 11 months! Some will be heavy, some light, some are universal to all new moms, and some might be unique to our "experience".

11 Things Kanyon Has Taught Me

1. 1 pound micropreemies don't have booty cheeks. The first time I changed his diaper I almost freaked. His hiney looked like an elbow! The nurse must've noticed my surprise because she said, "He doesn't have cheeks...cheeks are fat and he has no fat."

2. Speaking of, he taught me how to change a teeny tiny diaper and not pull out any tubes, IV's, or cords. Tricky.

3. A baby so tiny could carry me through the darkest days of my life. He truly did and still does.

4. TOO much medical information ranging from his first day of life to now, I know way more than I ever planned on.

5. How to make just the right sound to make him laugh. I learned last week that that sound is not universal. I tried to make our friend Blake laugh so I made the sounds Kanyon likes. Blake just stared at me. Kinda makes you feel dumb.

6. Put your finger behind the zipper when you zip his PJ's to keep from zipping up some skin. Learned that one the hard way. oopsy.

7. I can do just about anything with one hand.

8. Pain doesn't care who you are.

9. Age is just a number...we grow at our own pace no matter what age we are (or ages in Kanyon's case..he has like 3 different ages).

10. We have the best families and friends in the WHOLE world. Seriously, we do.

11. GOD never leaves us.

OK, I don't feel like figuring out how to get the video to post on here, so I'll give you the link. I told you this has been Kanyon's happiest month....click on this link to see and hear this happy boy. (try not to hear his annoying mom's voice...so embarrassing.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hf3k2BXOUPQ

Kanyon's Menu

I really don't have much new to post about, but I thought you might be interested in seeing what kinds of things Kanyon likes to dine on each day. Here is a sample of his menu the last couple of days:

Drumsticks....he loves a good chicken leg!

same thing here, i just couldn't pick which picture to post!
My shoulder. I have a permanently soggy shoulder.
Butterfly wings...a delicate, yet delicious snack.
Mommy's milk....by far his LEAST favorite thing to put in his mouth. Based on his eating habits, its a miracle that I was able to catch him with the bottle in his mouth. Usually he clamps down and won't open.
Elastic...chewy and long lasting. He holds this blanket when he is taking a bottle. It has a little loop on it that I think is made to attach a paci. This little loop is Kanyon's latest obsession. He always manages to find it and go to town on it.

Eating blanket...silky and furry. Again, this is his blanket we use for eating. Without fail, he prefers the blanket to the bottle. Must be good. And yes, I've tried hiding the bottle in the blanket to sneak it in his mouth...doesn't work. He's a quick one, that Kanyon.
Frog Legs!!!
Bandana..every good Cowboy has one. We don't really have a blaket for him to carry with him or whatever (I do, but I'm waiting til he's older). He loves to play with things and eat them, so I figured I have tons of bandanas. They make a nice blanket, but allow him to maintain his manly-ness.
Tiger tail...he's quite an exotic eater.
Not pictured:

The ever present and always yummy-- hands

Mommy's hair. (Impossible to get a picture of him since I have to lean over..plus, I really try to keep it out of his mouth...that's nasty. )

Just a little taste of our last few days. Happy Monday!

Toys, Hats, Cousins, and Teeth

Happy belated LOVE DAY from our little CUPID!
Long time no blog, huh? Before I forget...we had our hearing screening that our preemie clinic Dr. suggested. He wanted to do this to make sure he wasn't not looking at things because he couldn't hear them. We didn't think that he had a hearing problem, but just wanted to mkae sure we MADE sure. Thankfully everything was normal. It would just be a cryin' shame to have the sweet ears he does and not be able to hear!

Ok..on to the TOYS!
Kanyon was played out. I guess all those toys aren't really that cool. The Palm Tree however, is fascinating!!
You might have to look kinda close at this one. When I put Kanyon on his tummy, he ALWAYS puts his right arm down to his side....we don't want him to do that. The other day I heard his chicken rattling and I thought, "OH GOOD! He's reaching for something." He was reaching all right...BEHIND HIM with that arm in the WRONG place. It's the no-look reach! Crazy Kanyon!
HATS! We had a few days where it was nice and sunny and kinda warmish. I realized that I needed to cover his bald head out in the sun, but I had never done that other than with warm winter hats. Luckily we had our hat that Cousin Sayler sent us last Christmas when Jayde and Kanyon were just tiny little pieces of excitement (and nausea) in my tummy! It was perfect for the sunny day protection and a snack for Kanyon all at the same time!
This new hat was part of Aunt Nancye's Valentine treat.
Speaking of.....Kanyon spent lots of QT with Auntie Nancye this weekend. We went to Paris and she came to love on Kan Man. He got to hang with Great Aunt Gwen Ann too, but those pictures are on my mom's camera.

Paris means COUSINS!!!!!!!! Avery and Roselyn were too much fun. Saturday night they got all wound up playing on the chair. They started out fully clothed, but wound up in just diapers. If you look closely you can see that Avery is sweating! They were having so much fun jumping and playing.

High fives and Walkmans are so last millennium. These two are SOOOO 2009

They give daps/knuckles

(does it make me so 1990's if I don't even know what to call it)

and rock out on an iPod. They've got some MOVES!

I'll leave you with this precious boy and his 2 pearly whites!

Dr. Updates

Before I update about the Dr. visits I have to share a few pictures. Kory and I had a great idea to make our sister-in-law Sydni's birthday card using Kanyon and Ollie. Well, as you can see, it didn't turn out like we had planned.

"OLLIE SIT!!!!!!" "Kanyon, don't eat the sign!!!"
Notice Kanyon's blue mouth. Yes, he ate his sign so his mouth turned blue.
Checking out his blue lips
Saturday was a great day for us! Paul and Katie drove down to visit for the afternoon. It was so fun!!! Kanyon loved them so much! As you can see in the picture, Paul and Kory had to put Kanyon in his J's. Thanks Paul and Katie for coming!!!!!!!!!

Kanyon really and truly responds to his dad's voice unlike any other noise or voice. I loved this picture...and as you can see, Kanyon had a killer zit on his chin. It was so bad, but it is almost gone.
What could daddy possibly be doing????? Feeling his TOOTH!!!!!!!!!!! Yes, he has a tooth. One of his bottom ones is starting to pop through. He's showed no signs of it bothering him so we had no idea it was coming. I really can't believe it..he seems too little to have a tooth.
Mom did the spoon test. You could hear it clicking. The one right next to it might be coming in too.
OK..now for the Dr. stuff. Me and Mom headed to Dallas early Monday morning. Kanyon had his appointment with the eye Dr. there at Children's. He said that his retinas look good and that his perscription looks good so his 'eye balls" look good still. We are really glad about that. We did find out that Kanyon's cross-eyed days are numbered. He will have surgery to correct that March 18th. The Dr. says it may not completely solve the problem as far as Kanyon's tracking and looking at things. That could be processing in his brain that is slow. But, the surgery needs to be done and it could only help him see better, so we're hoping for the best there. Yes, another surgery makes my tummy hurt, but I know this needs to be done. I kind of expected that. It will be a day surgery, so that is good. After our appointment Mon. morning, we headed to the hotel to chill until our next appointment Tuesday afteroon. We had a fun time hanging out in the hotel...kind of like a vacation since we were somewhere new. These Dallas trips will be more fun when Mom and I can take him shopping with us! But we really enjoyed relaxing just the 3 of us. Tuesday afternoon we went for a feeding evaluation. We're trying to solve the mystery with his eating. He HATES it and throws a fit and won't open his mouth and therefore it takes us at least an hour to feed him. They did a thing where I fed him this wierd stuff and they could watch it like a video X-ray. The good news is there is nothing going wrong as far as how he's swallowing. No aspiration or anything like that. They did seem to think he was more efficient when the liquid was thicker. SOOO they gave us some stuff to thicken the milk and hopefully that will make him more comfortable and if he's more comfortable, then maybe he won't fight it as bad. I wish there would've been some magic answer to solve the problem, but I gave up on that a long time ago. Hopefully this will help. We'll see.

Cutie in the hotel

Of course they dilated his eyes, so he got some sweet shades to wear in the sun. I posted way too many pictures of this, but I just couldn't help it. The first two look like the return of gangsta Kanyon!

This one looked like Avery to me
This was not Kanyon's first time to wear shades. Remember this? Less than a week old...less than 2 pounds. But very very cool.

We have this month's RSV shot today (hopefully this is not our last, we're hoping our insurance will do one more in March) and then we should be through with Dr. stuff for a couple of more weeks! Kanyon is such a trooper through all of this traveling, Dr. offices, all the junk they do and then just being dragged around all over. He takes it all in stride and never misses a beat. Thank you Kanyon!!

House Arrest FAQ

People are always asking me about what we lovingly call "house arrest" and how it works. Well, though none of us have had a run in with the police, we must abide by the laws of a micro preemie. Or as I like to call him, a "recovering micro preemie". With all of the questioning and curiosity, I figured I'd have a FAQ segment here on our blog. If you don't care about that, scroll down and enjoy a few pictures.

What is house arrest? Kanyon is the one on it, but since he's my boss, I pretty much am too. That means Kanyon can't get out in public. We have a few "safe places" we can go, but for the most part he's at the casa 24/7....me too.

Why? Germs. His immune system is still growing and developing. Something that wouldn't even surface in an adult could make him sick. Just a runny nose to a healthy baby or child might be major sickness to him. Especially with chest colds...his lungs had a tough start, we gotta give them some extra care. We just don't want to risk it...not worth it.

How long will it last? We will do this through cold/flu/RSV season (Oct.-March). Hopefully we'll get our RSV vaccination in March and we can start to get out by then.

Where CAN he go? For the first 3 months Kanyon was home, we didn't even take him to church but we decided we weren't going to trade off Sunday mornings anymore. So we all 3 go to Sunday morning church, but that is it. Kory and I trade off for Sunday night and Wed. night. He also goes to lots of Dr's (that seems crazy, huh..that is where the sick people are). As I mentioned, we have a few safe places. My Grandmas house and my aunt's house (no kids) and one day we went to visit a friend that also has an infant that is not mobile so we can keep them away from each other.

Are you going stir crazy? Honestly, I really thought I would. There are days that I might feel a little cabin fever, but it really isn't bad. I'm surprised by this because normally I'm a "go-er" but I guess I just know that this is where we are right now, so here we are! When its my turn, I get to go to church and if I need to run an errand, Kory will stay home with him so that is nice. When we can, us girls here get our husbands to watch the kids so we can go to dinner, that is nice. Plus, there are worse things than staying home........like driving back and forth to a hospital and sitting in a NICU all day.


Errands we can run: bank, dry cleaners,...well, that might be it. Sonic is our treat if I feel like we need to get out. Happy Hour..can't beat it.

A Phillips Phamily Night on the town: If we do get a hankerin' for a night out we will feed Kanyon and put him in the car...we will choose a drive through and eat it in the car or bring it to the house. Sometimes Kanyon and Kory will drop me off at Target or something and go get the food, then come get me. We also still enjoy the WONDERFUL gift cards our friends and family have given us (THANK YOU THANK YOU)....they are GRRRRRRRRRRREAT. Call it in, pick it up....Nice Dinner...still in PJ's. Speaking of....

Attire: Mine: Mostly PJ/Lounge clothes There are definitley days that I don't "get ready" I mean seriously, what is the point. I do put on my "nice" PJ pants on the days we have a therapist coming over. Kanyon: pretty much the same.

TV: Yes, its is on most of the day. Not because I'm watching it, but I need the noise.
Shows I used to not be able to stand, but now I actually watch: Jeopardy, Roseanne
Shows I used to hate and still do: Judge shows and Soaps
We don't have cable so I'm at the mercy of my rabitt ears. They're usually nice enough to give us 3-4 channels. That explains how I've managed to stoop to watching Roseanne.

Have I let myself go? Yes. Hopefully I can catch me again when we are a little more normal.

On a side note I have to tell this story. Right before I got married, a wise older man felt the need to give me some marital advice. He said, "You need to look good and smell good when your husband gets home." Ooops.. I hope he doesn't read my blog, he would be seriously disappointed in me. I look like a nun and smell like spit up or the day's choice of baby food. Oh well.

What do you do all day? I'm sure all stay-at-home mom's get this question and I really don't know how to answer it. MOST of my time is feeding him its a 1-1 1/2 hour deal every 3 hours. In between I do his therapy with him, play, and let him get a quick nap in before it is time to eat again. I'm still pumping and I do try to keep a decent house. We have therapist here 3 days a week for about 45 min-1 hour.

Any more questions, just ask!

Here are a few pics from the last week:

I thought he looked so chilled laying back on Kory. Notice the slobber, nice.
He's starting to find his toes:
This is the picture that is on one of his PJ's...maybe my FAVE pair and he's getting close to outgrowing them. GREAT Aunt Nancye gave them to him before he evem came home. I love them becuase they're soft and because this picture really looks like Kanyon. Do you see that the little boy's bald head has a spike of hair sticking up?!! Funny, huh?

Speaking of Aunt Nancye, I think Kanyon inherited something from her. She can whistle really loud with her fingers in her mouth. Just a minute ago I heard a faint whistling sound. I looked down and Kanyon was chewing on his fingers and "talking" at the same time. It was making a whistle sound!!! HE CAN WHISTLE!!!!!!!!! Some things may take him a while, but his whistling is way way WAY advanced! Thanks for the genes Aunt Nancye.