Rice!

It's been a big week for us! We took Cade to the doctor last Tuesday for his next round of shots and checkup. He weighed 15 pounds, 2 ounces (40th percentile) and was 24 3/4 inches tall (25th). He's slowly gaining on the other kids his age despite being six weeks early. He had to endure four shots and was a big trooper. It was definitely more traumatic for him this time. It's tough to watch your kid cry hard like that. :(



That night we fed him solid food for the first time. Susie found the organic brown rice cereal, so we mixed that up with some of mom's milk and got to feeding! First we tried one of his normal bottles but the rice was stopping up the nipple so we switched to a sippy cup with a soft top and bigger holes. He made some funny faces for us, either because the food was coming out so fast or because it was a new taste and consistency.


This kid has no clue what's about to hit him in the mouth.

"Do you seriously expect me to eat this crap on a regular basis? Where's the plain old milk?"

On Thursday, while at the sitter's in Bloomington, he threw up. We wondered if it was in reaction to one of the vaccines he received or if he just wasn't used to the rice. He wasn't eating much at all and Susie got some Pedialyte and he was able to drink that and keep it down (and stay hydrated). Things went well until Saturday. I was flying home from a business trip to Florida (more on that later) and Susie was driving home from B-town. She may have caught the virus from Cade because she was sick and weak driving home. When she got back to Owensboro she went to the Estes' house and was taken to urgent care by them and another friend, Lisa Walker. The doctor told her it was probably a virus and to sleep it off and drink lots of fluids. He gave her some medicine that would knock her out and she's been pretty much sleeping ever since (it's 5:30 pm and she left the doctor around 1:30 yesterday)! She's kept some food down today, and I've been able to spend a lot of quality time with my boy.

After a rough night last night and getting him ready to go to church in time for soundcheck I have to say that I have a new respect for what Susie does when she takes Cade to Bloomington and really for any single parent out there. So Cade and I have had a couple prayer times for Mommy and are hoping she feels better soon!

In other news, I was able to see the space shuttle launch on Friday night! It was supposedly one of the last night launches, and I was able to watch it from our plant in Merritt Island. Air Liquide supplies all of NASA's nitrogen requirements for the launch via pipeline. The plant is about nine miles from the pad, and I climbed up on top of one of our tanks to watch it. The pictures I've posted don't do it justice. The sky was as bright as day, the rumble was loud, and the earth shook pretty violently where we were (nine miles away!). It was a pretty incredible thing to watch. Made me wonder what it would be like strapped into the thing that makes the earth shake like that.