Emilia is 3.5 months old

Emilia has been sucking in her lower lip and biting it. I tried looking in her mouth and checking her gum but I don't think she is teething yet. Maybe she now found a substitute for a soother which keeps dropping from her mouth when she cries?



And now she brings her both hands together and loves putting her fist in her mouth.

She has been giving us a lot of problems with sleeping. She resists naps and sleep and we spend a lot of time soothing her in trying to make her fall asleep. Last several days, we have been taking her out for a car ride because she couldn't fall asleep despite being sleepy and tired. She was such a good sleeper so I don't know if this is temporary 3 month old baby thing or she really has a sleep problem. I hope it doesn't get any worse than this.

Merry Christmas from Baby Lee

Merry Christmas everyone! This is my 1st Christmas and I will certainly appreciate lots of presents from mommy, daddy, and of course, SANTA!!

We took her first Christmas photos at home... yeah, we didn't want to go to a professional photographer for various reasons (with colds going around and other things) and we tought we could easily shoot some X-mas photos of Emilia. Well, we were WRONG. It is so hard to take baby pictures, especially because Emilia does not yet have a full head control and sitting upright with a steady head for more than 3 minutes is too tiring at her stage. In the end, we got some nice ones but I am too lazy to touch up the photos (things like our living room window shutters in the background).

Emilia's 100th day party

Despite being anxious about catching a cold, I invited our immediate family members to celebrate Emilia's 100th day in adjusted age. She's been through a lot and I think she deserves a nice party, pretty cakes, a beautiful white dress, and lots of photos.

Ex-preemie gets hospitalized for a cold

Yesterday I got a surprising email from a mom I befriended with during the NICU days. Her daughter's incubator was next to Emilia's and she and I were quite close before they got transferred out..

Any way, her email was telling me to watch out for a cold/flu because her baby got hospitalized again because she got sick with a cold. Apparently a visitor (her niece) had a cold and my friend's whole family came down with the cold too. For some reason, her preemie baby girl was the last one to get sick, but most seriously ill. She was too sad and upset. She said all the alarm bells and noise in the hospital brings back the terrible memory from the NICU days and the worst is having to watch her baby cry.

Her email was a sad reminder how vulnerable our babies are just as the holiday season is starting off with more visitors into our house. I do ask them to wash their hands before touching Emilia but I really can't see if they are washing thoroughly or simply dipping their hands in water. Also not everyone knows that after you wash your hands, if you touch other things, like your cell phone, your hands are not clean any more. That is why I have the alcohol sanitizer near Emilia all the time. Sometimes I don't want to nag people to use the sanitizer because I might offend them, but offending my guests might be better than having Emilia back in the hospital.

Emilia is 3 months and 1 week old

Bringing Emilia home also brings me a series of medical appointments, almost one each week. Perhaps having a newborn baby is the same too. I don't know.
RSV shots, her paediatrician's office, physiotherapy, CCAC visiting nurse, York Region Early Intervention, NICU follow-up clinics, eye check-up, Sick Kids respiratory... and today I got a call from York Region that it's almost time for her infant hearing follow-up test. She needs to go all the way to Ajax for a hearing test next month.

She might be going through a growth spurt right now, but she's been waking up more frequently in the past few days. I have been just feeding her whenever she's fussy but I am not sure if that is what I should do. I don't want her to get into a habit of getting fed (or being put on breast) when she cries.

Respiratory wise and growth wise, she is doing well, I believe. I just hope she does not resist too much when it comes to her sleeping (and nap) time. There was a time when I just put her in the crib when she was drowsy and she would just fall asleep herself. Now, on some days, none of my soothing techniques works and it drives me crazy.

Her 100th day is coming up (Saturday). I am going to have a small party with my family on Sunday. It's not her "real" 100th day any way, but I want to do what I couldn't do while she was in the hospital.