Recap of May!

April 30th, I celebrated 1 month down with my neighbor, Hilary, and our friend Jen and her son, Jackson!  We had veggie pizza that Jen made and funfetti cake and cookies! 

I also bought our (Nolan and I's) first bottle of wine... I am buying one for each month that Nolan is deployed, so that when he gets home we will have at least 10 (hopefully less and definitely not more - I hope and pray) different bottles of wine to try! :-)  

May, much like April, seemed to FLY by!

On the 1st, Liam rolled over from his back to his front... so that was exciting!  He must not have cared too much about it, because he didn't really roll over much for quite a while after that! haha I was still very proud!

We started 24 calories/ounce formula... to try to help Liam get some extra calories each day, since he doesn't each near the amount that a typical baby his age would eat in a day...

Liam woke up with pink eye in his right eye; we were able to get in to the doctor the same day and get medicine... and two days later both of his eyes looked even WORSE! I washed off the medicine, erythromycin, and pretty much instantly his eyes started to look a lot better... I suppose he had a negative reaction to the medicine... :-/  His pink eye did seem to go away even without more than 2 days of medicine... 

 

Liam started pushing himself up!
The box under his jumper (in the background - right) is full of military flat rate boxes...
As I mail packages to Nolan, the box of boxes decreases in height, which is perfect for Liam's growing legs! :-) 

At the end of the first week, I mailed the squadron's morale calendar, which started in June... for Nolan to hang in the ready room (where he briefs for flights and such).  I had volunteered to collect the squares each month, which I will continue to do, throughout the deployment.  It has been a blessing in disguise to have this "job," as many people are stopping by the house, to drop off their square, so in a sense I am getting lots of visitors to keep me company! :-)  

 

The calendar...
each square is 5 in x 5 in

 

The squares I made for Nolan... Another couple in the squadron share our wedding  anniversary, so I offered for the other wife to take the 10th and I took the 9th!  

 

No one chose Father's Day, so I took it and made an extra square... I used one of the pictures from our newborn photo shoot and made this...
I love how it turned out! :-) 

I also made a square for George, Nolan's good friend from flight school, who is single, so otherwise, he wouldn't get a calendar square... It was day 27, if you look at the picture of the calendar above... I had had George send me a few pictures of he and his family before the guys deployed.

For Mother's Day, the Chapel gave carnations to all of the moms and our squadron had a nice lunch at the Lejeune O'club and gave roses, so that was nice!  

The following weekend, I attended a Christian-based Military Wives Conference on Saturday, where I was brave and put Liam in childcare for the first time... for 5 hours! They never paged me to come calm him down and he was smiling when I went back to get him, so I would say it was a positive experience for both of us!  AND a highlight to the day was that Nolan called (from his cell phone) for the first time since he had left 6 weeks prior!  He had flown the Osprey to NAS Sigonella, Italy and we were able to talk for 11 minutes! :-)

The following day, we played hookey from church, and went to the airshow here on base for the sole purpose of catching a ride in a Huey... well for me to, not Liam... I convinced my neighbor, Hilary, whose husband, Adam, is on the boat with Nolan, to go with me to stroll Liam around while I went for a 10 minute flight and she wound up going too! Fun times!  It was so much fun that I went TWICE! 

  

Yes, I am expensive.. $50 for each flight, so $100 later, I had flown around Jacksonville for 20 minutes! haha  I videoed it as well and can't wait to show Nolan were we flew too.. it was so very cool!  And at the end of the second flight, it started to down pour, so we got wet (in the aircraft) because the doors were open!

FIRST time to Skype...
Family Photo
May 17

Happy 5 months Liam! :-)
(May 19)

The middle of May brought a new addition... Nolan's sister, Emily, had Keenan Michael on May 20th!  Yay - Liam has another cousin! :-) 

Toward the end of May, our referral for Liam's right shoulder/arm/neck, finally came through and we were able to go to his evaluation appointment.  In April I had taken Liam in to ask his doctor about it and she agreed with me that Liam was using his right arm a lot less and that because of his unique birth experience; too much fluid, coming down sideways and getting stuck, having to be suctioned out via c-section, she felt like he had a mild case of brachial plexus... 

After an hour and a half evaluation of Liam, the occupational therapist agreed that Liam's strength on his right side (truck and arm) was less than that of his left.  (for babies, the standard is for the left to match the right and vis a vis I was told) The evaluator, Megan, agreed, he did seem to be making progress, but that she believed he would benefit from OT twice a week (to continue rapid improvement) and eventually once a week, for the next 6 months, to ensure that he meets physical milestones... He was also less able to turn his head, completely, to the left side... unlike his right. 

We also discussed his 4 oz bottle/feeding intake, which for a 5 month old is not exactly the usual... she mentioned he may be silent refluxing and to maybe try Zantac again...
Liam's doctor disagreed with the reflux thought, although begrudgingly wrote a one month script for Zantac, although I haven't started him back on it yet... I might, because he has been coughing before and after he eats (a possible sign).

The last Thursday night in May was the Deployed Spouses Dinner at the base chapel, where Nolan and I have been attending services since we moved here almost 2 years ago.  There was a huge crowd - our squadron, in particular, really participates in things; so much so that they changed it back to monthly! (it had been changed to quarterly because no one was coming)
I love that it is at our church home and to see so many ladies come out and have a free meal and let their kids run around outside in the yard!  Liam never has any trouble finding someone to hang out with; someone always wants to hold him for me! :-) haha

TWO teeth!
May 23 
I am too cute in my bath tub! :-)

The last weekend of May brought Nolan's first port call to Palermo, which was amazingly wonderful for so many reasons!  First of all, Nolan got off of the boat, for an extended period of time, which meant that we were able to talk on the phone daily (FRI, SAT, SUN and MON) and we were able to skype on 3 of the 4 days... some days we skyped twice!  It was so wonderful to see him and for him to see Liam! :-)  There was a tiny piece of normalcy that returned in that I was able to call and text Nolan, just as I would if he was here in the states.... so wonderful! :-) 

Memorial Day with Hannah and Lucy!
Hannah's Dad, Rob, lives with Nolan on the ship

May 30
2 months down = wine night!
One sip for Liam and he passed out! ;-)
totally kidding... he had had a LONG Memorial Day!

Jen and Hilary recommended that the 2nd bottle of wine (for 2 months down) be a Prosecco, so the following day I got some!