Hooray for Flara and Noël!

First, little Flara had her upper GI studies this afternoon, and they are normal!!!! We are so thankful! She was switched over from 1 liter on her high flow to 1 liter of a regular nasal cannula. Yippee! No more water floods dousing her poor little nose and gagging her! Her white blood cell count is still a little funny, so another blood culture was pulled from her central line today. So far, the urine and central line cultures from the other day have been negative.

During my quick visit today, I held my sweet girl but didn't get to nurse her. She couldn't eat anything for four hours prior to her testing, so I only got to hold. When I cuddled her in close, she tried to eat my neck. Poor little baby! When I didn't give her what she wanted, she let out two very cute little cries. It broke my heart! I didn't get to visit her yesterday either, so she had to miss out on two days of quality mommy time. =(

Finally, her head measurements seem to be right! Her head was triple-measured by three very good nurses =) who all came up with the same number. Since it's been mentioned a few times that her head hasn't been growing as well as it should (although we can all see that it has been), it was good to get a measurement that actually *proved* that there is growth!

Flara almost reached 3 pounds, 14 ounces last night. It's hard to believe we're nearly double her birth weight from 8 weeks ago!

So, what is Noël's big news? Tonight, while she and I were eating supper, she almost frantically began telling me "di...di... di....di" and pointing to her diaper. She's been doing this since the week Flara was born, but she never does anything with it. So, I first said, "eh, let's finish supper," but she became more insistent. I asked her if she needed to go peepee on the big girl potty. She immediately responded with "yeah, pee." I quickly lifted her out of her seat, and placed her on the floor. She ran to the bathroom. As I was getting her diaper off, she grabbed her Dora potty seat and put it on the big potty. I sat her up there and expected nothing. But, no! She actually went potty! I squealed with delight-- she squealed with delight. We clapped. Then, clapped some more. She was so proud! (She even pulled the shower curtain around her while going potty for privacy. Too funny!) She asked for toilet paper, then wiped not once, but three times! She got down, flushed the toilet, put her Dora seat back off to the side, then put the lid down. I was elated. As a reward, I gave her some chocolate chips. =) I didn't figure I would really try potty training until she hits 2 in February, but as long as she seems ready, then I guess we'll go for it!