Still not home...

We were hoping today would be Carter's second home coming but unfortunately, he is still in the hospital. According to the doctor, he isn't eating enough. He thinks Carter hasn't had enough practice eating and therefore, he isn't eating what a baby his age should be eating. Not to sound sarcastic...but the poor thing hardly ate when he was at home because his stomach was in knots, and then he was on iv fluids for 7 days without eating...no wonder he doesn't seem interested in eating! At his 2:00 feeding today I practically force fed him his bottle (they give him bottles so they know how much is getting into his tummy) He definitely didn't want it all towards the end, but I was determined for him to eat more than he had been eating. He didn't spit any back up, so I don't think I harmed him! The nurse said it was good practice for the future when he doesn't want to eat his green beans and I force him to eat them anyway! Joe is there now and is going to do his 5:00 feeding and I'm going back for his 8:00 feeding. I feel like we will be more "forceful" with him and coerce him to eat more than the nurses would. If he could get his own room where we could stay with him, we would stay overnight and feed him too, but he is still in the intermediate ICU nursery and he shares a room with two other babies. You can sit in there with your child 24 hours a day, but you can't sleep there. If you are in the room, you have to be awake! So, we have to trust the overnight nurse to make him eat as much as possible. Please pray that he increases the amount of milk he takes in and that it will be enough to get him home tomorrow or Friday.

Here are his latest and greatest pics:

My Steeler hat that my Great Aunt Carol made me! The nurses think I am adorable. Me and Daddy wear our Steeler hats with pride and the nurses think we look just alike!

This one is blurry because I'm trying to learn to use the manual settings on my camera and I took all of these photos without the flash. Carter wanted to sport his new valentine outfit for the nurses.

This was taken on Monday, the first time he was allowed to eat. The amount he was given barely filled the bottle nipple! It was only 5ccs which is only .17 ounces! He loved it though!

My big sister Hannah loving on me! Do you like my hospital pacifier? It's almost as big as my head!

Gazing at my beautiful Great Aunt Barbara!

What I really think about this hospital!

My sweet sister, Emma.