What a month it's been! The first couple weeks with Ritter weren't too crazy, we were just taking it easy trying to adjust to our family of 5. At Ritter's 2 week appointment, he was only weighing 5 lbs. 14 oz. which was only 2 oz more than the week before, so the doctor told me I need to be monitoring his weight gain. He was struggling to nurse because he'd gag every time, but after that day something just clicked and he started eating much better and quickly gained more weight. At his 6 day appointment she also told me that based on his size, his lack of muscle tone and a few other things, he was probably born more at about 37 weeks than what we thought at 38 and a half. No harm done, he just needed time to get caught up now.
4 days old- look at those scrawny arms!
{2 weeks old}
Deeg and Griff have been spending a lot of time enjoying the backyard while mom "ignores" them to take care of the baby!
Since I'm not ready for the germs from church to come home to our baby, we've all been staying home from church. We get a little restless on Sundays, so one Sunday we decided to take a drive up Logan Canyon and get out and walk around a bit. The kids loved seeing the water, and we loved seeing the beautiful leaves turning colors!
Meanwhile, Adam started looking for another job after his company decided they probably wont be doing work in Cache Valley any more and asked him to move to Salt Lake. He immediately got a few interviews and then was offered a job working on a Proctor and Gamble plant in Corinne (near Brigham City). He gave his previous company 2 days notice and started the new job about a week and a half ago. The new job is all around better, I think. He works 45 minutes away and works 10 hour days, but they only work 4 days/week. They take off a Friday one week then a Monday the next week, so we get 4 day weekends every other week! His first day at the job, Adam's parents were in town and spent the afternoon playing with the kids and I, then went to Deegan's kickball game with us.
A week ago we started harvesting our grapes and currants from the backyard. I got just short of half done and decided it was time to get them juiced before picking more. I picked 3 of those yellow buckets full while Adam picked all of the currants and we canned about 15 quarts of Grape Currant juice. We were beat by the time we finished, so the other half will have to wait another week or 2!
On the day Ritter turned 4 weeks (last Wednesday), I made an impromptu appointment to see the pediatrician (Dr. Clawson, who I love as much or more than I love Dr. Kirkman!) because I thought Ritter was starting to show signs of Reflux like Griffin had. Since Adam started the new job, our current company insurance ended the end of September, and we have a 90 day wait for the new insurance. I figured I'd better get him taken care of while it was cheap (for some reason, the idea of getting temporary coverage elsewhere or COBRA never occurred to me)! Dr. Clawson is in Ogden, an hour away, but I just can't find anyone I love as much as her, so it's worth the drive and a day to spend with family usually. I planned on taking him in, getting a Rx and then hanging out for the rest of the day with my sister. When I took him in and described his symptoms, Dr. Clawson acted a little concerned and said it sounds more like Pyloric Stenosis than just Reflux. PS is a condition where the Pylorus (a muscle between the stomach and intestine) builds up too thick and blocks off the intestine. She examined him and was pretty sure that's what it was, so she ordered an ultra sound over at the hospital for a couple hours later. (His weight gain was doing better at 6 lbs. 15 oz.) She told me that if it was indeed PS, he'd need to go right to Primary Children's Hospital in Salt Lake to prepare for surgery that night. Way to make a mom panic! So I called Adam and made sure he was kind of on "standby" in case he needed to leave work early and meet up with us. We went to the ultrasound, and after a couple hours of trying to figure out what I was going to do and trying to accept this chaos, I had pretty much accepted that he was going to be having surgery and was all prepared! During the US, the tech was having a really hard time finding his pylorus, so she got another tech to come look. They found the pylorus and one said to the other "Yep, there it is". So I was about ready to pack up and head to SLC! They left to send the results to the doctor and then came back with Dr. C on the phone. She told me the didn't see anything yet but that it often doesn't show up in the US early on, so we may need to do another one in a few days. She said to give him some of Griffin's reflux medicine for now and see how that helps. Whew (kind of)! It was a huge relief to not have to worry about surgery that day, but I've been overly anxious since then, watching to see if he's going to get better or worse. The next day Dr. C called to check on him and he hadn't been throwing up as violently as the few days prior, so I told her he was much better. Of course, that didn't last long and he started throwing up again in Thursday night and a lot more on Friday. The weekend was kind of back and forth like that, so at this point we're still just watching him to make sure he's not losing weight and getting dehydrated.
{ATK}
Saturday, Adam and I needed to get out of the house and just relax, so we took the kids for a drive to see Adam's new work place and then went to ATK to see the missiles and then to Promontory Point to see the trains. The kids loved the rockets and the trains and it was a nice day of just being together to wrap up the month!
