Cattle Drive and Weight gain...all in the same day

In honor of this weekend's rodeo the next town over, we had an old-fashioned cattle drive down main street today at noon. We have been truly enjoying all of the festivities of the summer in our new town and we are looking forward to going to our first rodeo Saturday. (hopefully the threat of rain and 95+ degree weather won't keep us away)

In other news, Timothy gained 3 and 1/2 ounces over the past 48 hours! We are now allowed to increase his dosage and back down the time to 22 hours. As long as he keeps gaining weight, we can keep working the time down so he will have a few hours unattached to the pump. We did use more burp clothes than the first day, and I had a couple of outfit changes, but he is still doing better than he was just a few days ago. :)

A one-burp-cloth day

Now that we have moved and changed all of our doctors, specialists, and therapists, we have a new plan of action for Timothy's healthcare. According to our new GI specialist, Timothy may actually have a milk allergy. I am really interested in the outcome, because we asked ALL of our former doctors about this and they were all VERY sure that he did not have a milk allergy. He has been switched to a hypoallergenic formula that is broken completely down to the amino acids and we started a 24-hour drip with a feeding pump. Just switching formulas helped him put on a whopping 5 ounces this past week! Adding the feeding pump into the equation should help too because so far today, we have used only ONE burp cloth. (As a side note, we own at least 2 dozen and do laundry every 1-2 days because we are constantly running out of them) Who wouldn't struggle gaining weight when they are spitting up half of everything that they ate? Thursday we go back in to see if he has put on any weight. If he does, we can increase the rate of dosage so that he can slowly get a few hours off of the pump. In the meantime, we are also working on eating solids and relearning how to suck and swallow. Our one burp cloth for the day was mostly sweet potatoes.

Throughout all of this, he remains a champ. He is truly a content (most of the time) and happy baby that we love to pieces. Yet, one of my new favorite pictures of him (see previous post) is when he is screaming. :) That is one tired, don't-you-dare-put-me-back-in-the-carseat little boy...

Trip West

While my parents were in town this past week, we took a trip out to the Black Hills to see some sights and visit my in-laws. We had a great time driving through the badlands, visiting Mount Rushmore, and stopping in Spearfish.

By the end though, Timothy I think was happy to be home. :)

Small Town Fourth of July

So, I have been busy lately. Since the last post, Jared graduated, we moved from St. Louis to Gregory, SD, we have unpacked, visited Spearfish over Memorial Day weekend, Jared was ordained and installed, painted, weeded, decorated, explored, played, and had my family in from Michigan. I refuse to apologize for the lack of updates...besides, I have been loading pictures faithfully onto picasa, so if you have been checking, you are up-to-date. Now on to 4th of July...

It is a big deal around here. A really big deal. The town of Gregory puts on a whole host of activities which include a carnival, parade, run/walk, geocache event, golf tournament, kids' tractor pull, greased pig wrestling, sack races, turtle racing, car show and a baseball game with the neighboring town. (I am sure that I am missing half of the events, but you get the idea) With my parents and Mindy in town, we had a blast taking in many of the events and throughly enjoyed watching the parade that went right by our front door.

going down to the carnival

waiting for the parade

one of the floats in the parade (theme was "America's Unsung Heroes") :)