"By the End of THIS MONTH"

We've been hoping for this... but today we heard it straight from Dr. Hiatt: "we're shooting to have the babies home by the end of this month." There are no words....

Brooke spoke to Dr. Hiatt and his nurse practitioners today and they all seemed to agree that Lily and Charlie are doing so well that they will be able to come home within the next two and a half weeks. And even though Brooke told me this when I spoke to her immediately after school, I still teared up when Dr. Hiatt said the same thing to me when I arrived at the NICU. And I teared up again when I was telling one of the nurses about it. And I teared up again when I was waiting from Uncle John to arrive for his visit. And I'm tearing up again now as I write this.

Of course, we have to temper our excitement with restraint. We know all too well that things can (and often do) turn in an instant. As we saw with Annaleigh, things can look great one day and then suddenly change just a few hours later. So we can't let ourselves get too excited. (I say this and know it to be good, logical advice, but that doesn't mean it isn't happening anyway.)

Both Lily and Charlie continue to do well with their feedings and their breathing. Charlie was able to take his noon bottle for Brooke without any episodes and the plan with him is to only keep him on any sort of breathing help when he eats, which means that he'll be breathing on his own for most of the day! Lily should be able to be put on the Low Flow Cannula within a few days so she's not too far behind her brother.

So all is good today and we couldn't be happier about it. Now we've got to try and keep from getting too ahead of ourselves with excitement for their potential homecoming!


Hopefully there won't be too many more pictures of Charlie with a nasal cannula!


Lily is trying her best to explain to her mommy that she really needs her bottle immediately. Poor Lily. She's got it so rough.


If you haven't seen this yet, NASA just released the latest round of pictures from the Hubble Telescope. The "headlining" picture from the group is called "Butterfly Nebula," and I think it's just so utterly beautiful. I know it's just a coincidence, but butterflies have taken on such a new meaning for us since Annaleigh died and knowing that this is out there somewhere in the heavens makes me happy.