Chug! Chug! Chug! Chug!

Is it possible to develop a drinking problem when you’re only 9 weeks old? If so, we need to keep our eyes on Lily.

She got a bottle for the first time yesterday and didn’t seem to want it. She took some milk into her mouth and then promptly spit it back out. So there were no expectations that she would do much better today. We were wrong.

Brooke sat down to feed her this afternoon and was shocked that Lily started sucking away on the bottle as soon as it was in her mouth. That in itself was great to see. But then Lily kept going… and going… and going… until the ENTIRE BOTTLE was gone. She didn’t stop to breathe, she didn’t stop to burp, she didn’t stop for anything. Lily chugged her bottle. The whole thing lasted less than five minutes from start to finish, and by the time the bottle was empty Brooke was in tears from laughing so hard and Nurse Julia had called over any other nurse who was in shouting distance to watch Lily’s keg-party-like drinking.

For a late-night encore, Lily decided to drink another ENTIRE BOTTLE. She's totally upstaging Charlie. The 9:00 feeding wasn't quite as fast as the earlier one, but just the fact that she did this today is awesome. To make the evening even more special, Lily finally gained that little bit of weight we've been waiting on for three days and she's now officially 4 lbs! Go Lil!

Since I was at school during the afternoon feeding and home by the night feeding, I was not privy to the dietary portion of The Lily Show. Fortunately, The Bug took it upon herself to arrange some entertainment for me, too (though my entertainment was a bit more stinky than Brooke’s). I arrived at the NICU after a long day at school wanting nothing more than to hold each baby for a little while. Usually, when a baby is going to come out for a cuddle, the nurse changes the baby’s diaper and then checks the baby’s temperature. Since we’ve become more comfortable handling the babies lately, Nurse Julia offered to let me do the routine on my own, which I happily (and ignorantly) agreed to. Little did I know what Lily had planned.

There was a little pee in her diaper so I cleaned her up and put a new one on. No big deal. But as I started to put her onesie back on, I smelled something a little funky. I turned my head to Julia and said “could she really have just…?” Julia said to check. I checked. It was. Julia laughed, happy that I was the victim of Lily’s poop. So I cleaned her up, removed the now-dirty diaper, and slid another diaper on her. Before I could even close this diaper up, I heard a muted squishy sound and was hit but an unholy smell. She had pooped again! Again, Julia laughed at me. So… I cleaned Lily up (again) and slid a new diaper under her (again). And just as I had lifted her tiny legs up to their highest point so I could get the new diaper all the way under her, Lily started to pee. All over. Since her legs were propped in the air, the pee went all over her stomach and down her back, and everything got quite messy. By this point, Julia was beside herself, sure that Lily was helping her get revenge on me for giving her a hard time yesterday for encouraging Brooke to buy more baby clothes. As I finished putting what was her fifth diaper in 10 minutes on her, Lily lay there happy as could be, pleased with herself and the mess she had made for me.

So Brooke and I both got our own version of The Lily Show. They were different from each other but both were extremely entertaining.

Charlie didn’t quite put on a show for us, but he did manage to impress us all. He heard about Lily’s antics and so decided it was time to grab some headlines of his own. He managed to down an entire bottle of his own. He has taken about half his feeding with a bottle three times, so this was a big jump. We’re a bit worried that he may have done it because the milk was freshly pumped instead of frozen. We can’t let Charlie expect the fresh stuff every time because Brooke can’t keep up! Plus, we’ve got an entire freezer full of frozen milk that he’s got to eat.

It was an eventful day at the NICU. We had a lot of laughs and a lot of milestones. We’re so proud of our beautiful babies!


Charlie is trying to figure out how to get his thumb back in his mouth. I'm happy to report that he figured it out (about three seconds after I put the camera down).


Nurse Julia loves to put bows on girl-baby's heads. Doesn't Lily look pretty?