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Emmy has a cousin, and his name is Logan. Logan is one crazy kid, and while they were here visiting us during Christmas, some of that silliness rubbed off on little Emeline. You can see here that Logan is definitely the instigator of this silliness. Now that Logan has gone back to Chicago, little Emmy misses Logan, but she’s still silly once in a while, especially when she’s eating bananas.

Emmy’s learning new things all the time, and with those new things she’s a lot more fun to play with every day. She’s communicating better, she’s playing better on her own, and she’s growing! Here are three specific things that she’s been doing more of lately, and they make her more fun every day. She loves to play on her mat of toys, especially if you attach different things to the large plastic hooks that hang above her head. As I type this he’s sucking on a plastic watch we got from Emmy’s Grandma Baker’s house over Christmas. She also loves playing with her frog and the lion that makes noise when you pull down on him. So without further ado, here are three new things that make being with Emmy better every day:

First, she has started to do blow raspberries, except she likes to get her tongue in there, too. She’ll even do it back to you (for all you previous nonbelievers, we now have it on video, so you have to believe us). If you do it to her, she’ll do it back, and when she does, she gets a huge grin on her face.

Second, she has started to ROLL OVER! It was just in the past couple of days that she’s started this. The first time she did it, she was on her back and then rolled over to her stomach, but we were lacking witnesses because she wanted to practice while mommy got the door. The second time was just yesterday, and we have that one on video as well. She rolls over from her stomach to her back on that one, so it’s not quite as difficult as the other way, but it’s still very good.

Her third new thing is that she doesn’t like to sleep through the night much more. I know this is sort of a step in the wrong direction, so how could I say that she gets cuter and more fun as she does it? I think you have to see little Emmy’s face when you rescue her from the crib to understand that one. This might be just because she’s getting a little sick (we’ve all had it, so it would be hard for her not to). Hopefully she feels all the way better soon, because we’ve really learned to appreciate when she does sleep through the night. Since we can appreciate that now, that means we’ve learned our lesson, right?

Hi! This is Alex, Emmy’s dad here. Emmy’s been having lots of fun adventures, and she’s all ready to go trick-or-treating to grandparents’ and friends’ houses tonight in her little chili pepper costume. She’s adorable! Little Emmy had a fun trip to Albuquerque with us last week to shop for furniture for our apartment (We’re moving down the street in January). She got to go to all kinds of fun stores where we were able to measure the quality of the store to the reaction of the salespeople to Emmy. The store where they thought she was cutest was the store that got our business! She did great, and even had a fun time staying in a hotel, although it was a bit harder to walk her around in such a small space.

Little Emmy had us a bit worried at the beginning of last week because she stopped being her cheerful self as much as she had been. Even after we walked her around and stopped to look at lights and chandeliers she didn’t cheer up, so after the screaming became too much she and mommy went to the hospital and found out she had an ear infection. Luckily, it was caught quite quickly and so she’s back to her happy self now, but little Emmy has no problem expressing her disgust at driving around Albuquerque. One of us had to sit in the back seat with her to sing to her everywhere we went, so we’re glad the trips around Los Alamos are much shorter!

So Emmy was a little sick, but now she’s all better again and loves her amoxicillin! The doctors think she’s growing great, and she was up to 10 lbs. 3 oz. last Wednesday. Now that she’s all smiles again, we’ll be sure to take plenty of pictures, especially as she has her first Halloween experience tonight as a little red chili pepper.

I finally was able to watch a video clip of Emmy’s cousin Logan where he points to his cousin and says “Emmy”. He’s one silly kid! I guess Emmy is a lot easier to say than “Uncle Alex”, but come on…

Logan is Emmy’s only cousin, but he is silly enough for two or three. We’re excited to see him and his parents again (and to see Logan meet Emmy, because you know that is going to be good). We’ll make sure that Emmy sees more pictures of you, Logan! Emmy and Logan will have to wait until Christmastime to meet in person.

In the meantime, Emmy is doing great. Her oxygen levels are still high, and she should be off her oxygen within a week or so, which will make changing her, feeding her, and anything else we do with her a lot easier. She’s been a pretty good baby, and she’s definitely developing her cry a little more!

Emmy came home yesterday!!! Julia and I are both very glad that she came home, even if it means much less sleep for us. It’s kind of crazy, because I’m starting to feel a bit more like a dad – I’ve changed diapers without any help in the middle of the night, and I’m becoming an expert blanket-swaddler. I don’t think that even compares to what Julia’s done for her, though, which includes (among countless other things) sleeping (well, mostly fretting about being totally in charge of a NICU baby) in a very uncomfortable and undecorated room at the hospital. I’d gladly give up sleep for our beautiful baby!

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The doctors say she should be off her oxygen and medication within about two weeks, but in the meantime she’s doing great and looking cuter every day.

More pictures are coming, I promise!

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Emmy’s had an exciting week, which has left us pretty tired. She’s doing a lot better now, though, so she’s got great news! Emmy’s had visits this week from her Grandpa and Grandma Baker, Uncle Ray and Aunt Laura, Aunt Annah, and now her Grandma Layman is there as well.

This week Emmy moved rooms twice (and is now in the room that she’ll go home from- yeah!), was in and out of an isolette to help her regulate her temperature, and has had her oxygen flow reduced by quite a bit. Even after all this, she’s doing great! She’s sleeping much more regularly now and is getting more and more of her feedings from her mommy. In fact, if she keeps it up like this, she’ll probably be home by the end of the week! Keep praying for her, and she’ll do great! So the only thing left is that Emmy can get most (if not all) of her feedings for two days. We love you, Emmy!