Lots of a good news...a little frustrating news.

We just met with the pediatrician, and had a lot of good news, but a little frustrating news. Claire is making wonderful progress, but it looks like she is stuck in the hospital for a few more days (not going home tomorrow). In a nutshell, although she is progressing, they want to make sure she is not going to have any problems at all when she goes home, so they want to keep an eye on her for a little longer. Claire had a wonderful latch this morning, and even managed to produce from Valerie's breast...it only took her a couple of good suckles, while the breast pump takes at least 15 minutes to get anything...pretty amazing if you ask me. We were hoping for one of those latches yesterday, which might have gotten us closer to home, but we'll take it today. So we have to sit and wait more, but we are still making wonderful progress.

On the good news side, Claire has been maintaining her temperature wonderfully...even after changing her and feeding her and being outside of the warm blankets for several minutes, her temperature is right where it is supposed to be. Her bloodsugars are also right where they are supposed to be. So two-thirds of the "going home" puzzle is in place, just need a little more progress on the feeding side and we'll be on our way.

Valerie is probably going to be discharged today, and we may do a "hotel stay" (basically a hospital room, but no nurses or meals for Valerie), but the nurses said that it wouldn't be much better than going home since we only live 5 minutes away, so I suspect we will head home between feedings to get rest and get things ready for Claire.

And have I mentioned how wonderful Claire's nurses have been? Valerie has had good nurses too, but I have been really impressed with the Special Care nurses...very patient with a pushy father who has lots of questions and who has not had much sleep! We know Claire is in good hands, and our favorite nurse is on the job today, so we feel good taking some time away to make sure we are ready for Claire when she comes home (let's just say we planned on using most of the last month to get ready, so we have a little work to do).

Many thanks for every one's emails and thoughts. We'll keep you posted as we get more information.