I am grinning from ear to ear tonight. Only a few days ago, I watched as Sol ate a few drops of milk from a syringe, thinking it might be a while until we’d be able to move to a bottle, if ever. Today, he gobbled up 10ml of milk from a bottle – and when he finished, he looked for more.

The doctors are now allowing us to feed Sol two 10ml bottles during each 12 hour shift and, if the first 24 hours goes well, we can talk about increasing that amount. Sol is getting a total of 60ml of milk every 3 hours, so we still have a good amount to go before we are completely off the feeding tube, but he seems ready for the challenge now. I’m so in awe of this little man! Now the hurdle for me is to get through each feeding NOT overthinking every little thing. After getting the sense that he wouldn’t be able to drink from a bottle and learning baby stress cues, I seem to think there is doom and gloom behind every pause, cough, hiccup, or eye raise. During today’s feeding, one pause ended up just being (major) gas, which gave me and Mom (Nana!) a much needed laugh.

Mike and I also gave Sol a bath during tonight’s visit – a first for us! The nurse patiently walked us through it and Sol actually seemed to like getting clean, after only one or two initial cries. Good man!

Unfortunately, I didn’t take very many photos today. Mike and Mom did, so I will post those tomorrow after I get my hands on them. In the meantime, here’s a photo and video of Sol in the rockaRoo, his new favorite thing: