Emilia is 4 weeks old

Emilia is 28 days (4 weeks) old today. In gestational age, she is 29 weeks and 5 days.

Yes, she has grown, in weight and length both. She weighs 1150g today and I think she is almost 35cm in length. She was born 870g, so little by little, she's growing.

An average fetal weight for 29 weeks gestation is 1379g, 10th percentile is 1145g and 90th percentile is 1613g. Anything between the 10th percentile and 90th percentile is considered "normal", so I would say Emilia's growth not too far behind. Her growth is actually remarkable given that she is not in the womb any more and she lives in a stressful environment.

She is fed my milk again, now at 14 ml every 2 hours. She will reach 15 ml tomorrow, which is considered her "full feeds".

Yesterday she had massive massive poop in her diaper. I had never ever seen anything like that. It was sticky, yellow colour, seedy poop. Piles and pile of it in the diaper. The dirty diaper weighed 40g (In NICU they weigh every wet/dirty diaper to measure how much babies pee/poop). As soon as I put a new diaper under her bum and wiped, she pushed out some more yellow stuff. On the new diaper and the wipe.
So I took it out and put another new diaper and AGAIN!! she pushed out some more. The nurse said it could be because I was stimulating too much when I was wiping her bum. I almost thought she was doing it intentionally because I was the one changing the diaper.

I have resumed the Kangaroo Care. I am holding her 1-1.5 hours each day, singing and talking to her while she's sleeping on my chest. What a great feeling it is. Also, she breathes more rhythmically and regularly when I hold her. 1.5 hours is very short when we are together. I just sing the same songs in an infite loop and scramble all the lyrics too but she doesn't seem to mind at all. The terrible part of this is Emilia cries when we put her back in the incubator. Today, when we put her back, she had a tantrum - she was crying for a long time (though we can't hear because she has ventilator tube in her airway) and didn't settle. The nurse tried changing her position in an attempt to make her feel more comfortable but Emilia was resisting it and stiffened her neck and head to not move the way the nurse wanted. All this time, she was crying and I had to somehow console her. I cupped my hand over her head and let her grip on my finger. We stayed that way for a while and finally she calmed down and opened her eyes looking at me. I wonder if she was able to make out my face.

Emilia is more interested in sucking on a soother nowadays. Even without a pacifier, she chews and makes sucking movements, which is a good developmental sign. She will soon have to learn that she needs to suck in order to get milk in her mouth and tummy, as she is currently fed passively and does not associate sucking with becoming full in her stomach.

She is really cute, especially when she opens her eyes. Right now, I would say she looks like Daddy (and his dad). I was hoping that she would take after me.

We still haven't registered her birth. I meant to do this 3 weeks ago...but somehow I keep forgetting to do it when I come home from the hospital. Also we still haven't got a middle name for her to put on her birth certificate. We want her to be Emilia something something Lee, not just Emilia Lee.