Goodbye, Sweet Kitty

Tim and I have had a very sad couple of days. We had to make the very hard decision to end Junebug's suffering and put him to sleep. It just didn't seem like he was going to recover and he was slowly wasting away - not the kind of death he deserved.

Over the past few weeks Junebug had become a bit of a different cat. He didn't seem like his normal, happy self. We wrote it off as his not adjusting well to the baby and being jealous. I feel badly now that we didn't investigate further. Instead, we tried to let him outside more (hard to do when you live in a subdivision) and gave him more attention. Then, last week we noticed that he had stopped eating. He was also acting like he just plain didn't feel well.

Ellie and I took him to the vet and they did blood work. We found out on Saturday that he had kidney failure that was starting to cause his other organs to slowly shut down. The vet felt that if we could get him rehydrated and eating again he might be able to continue living for a few more months, possibly longer. She said that he would probably just sleep all the time because he would be nauseous and generally feeling unwell. We weren't sure what to think about him living that way - his quality of life would be so poor. But we tried anyway for a few days.

Junebug began eating a little over the weekend, but then stopped eating completely by Tuesday. Wednesday morning he began having trouble walking and we decided it was time. The vet examined him one last time and said that it looked as if he was developing multiple organ failure and that the circulation to his back legs was compromised. She worried that he could develop a blood clot in his legs that could ultimately cause a stroke. She agreed that the time had come.

I held Bug while she administered the drug to put him to sleep. As I stroked his fur I thought of all the good times we had had during his life. He brought so much comfort to Tim when he first moved to Idaho, not knowing anyone. The first time that Tim and I held hands it was while we were both petting Junebug. Junebug has gone from living with just Tim to having me, another cat and two dogs to share his home with. And then we went and added a baby! He has really seen it all.

We will miss him so much.

Quick Picture Update

Here are a few pictures from the last few days. I didn't take the time to edit any of the colors in the photo program, so if you want better copies of any of these let me know and I will email you the color-corrected files in a few days.

Ellie in the jumper in the new dress from Grandma B.

Hanging out in the red recliner. I think she looks a lot like me as a baby in this one. Do you agree, Mom?

Outside on the lawn.

All ready for the carpet cleaners to come. Ellie is in the entertainment center - she's all the entertainment we need!

With Daddy in the entertainment center.

Grandma Cheryl and Grandpa Bob came to visit this last weekend.

What is Grandpa Bob doing to me? Whatever it is, I like it!

With Mommy and Junebug kitty in the yard. Junebug has been sick lately. More on that in another post.

Is It a Pattern?

Well, Ellie slept through the night Sunday night/Monday morning, then woke up once the next night (at midnight) and last night slept through the night again (after finally staying down to sleep at 10:30pm). Each morning she got up between 5:00am and 5:30am, but not too bad overall. It is especially not bad when you consider that Tim is on duty at 5am and I get to sleep until 8am if I want to. We'll see how tonight goes. I would like her to sleep later than 5am, but I am not going to do anything to spoil the sleeping through the night part!

New Trick

Check out Ellie's new trick. She can't pull herself up on her own yet, but once she is up on her feet she can hold on and stand by herself. I guess we'll be lowering the crib mattress...




I haven't posted a picture of Ellie on her changing table in awhile. I thought you might like to see how long she is getting:

We bought Ellie a small inflatable pool. Here she is enjoying it:

SHE DID IT!!!!

Last night Ellie slept through the night for the first time! We were so excited (after dashing into her room at 5 a.m., when we woke up, to make sure she was okay).

A New Picture

Ellie had a lot of fun trying to crawl across our bed this morning. Here she is with Daddy:

When Did You Learn To Do That?

We have moved Ellie's little bathtub from the sink into our regular bathtub. She still sits in one of these, but now the splashing is contained in our tub rather than all over the kitchen counter. Two nights ago (and again last night, but now we know to be ready!) while I was washing Ellie's hair she reached forward, grabbed the edges of her tub, and stood up! All on her own! It would have better had she not been in a slippery tub, since she immediately fell forward, but it was exciting none the less.

Sorry there haven't been any new pictures this week. The camera battery has been dead. First I couldn't find the charger, then Tim had moved the camera and I couldn't find it. Now the charger and camera are both together again, so look for new pictures in the next few days!

What Is This Fuzzy Stuff?

Ever since Ellie was first born I have run my fingers through her hair (what little there is of it) while I nursed her. Now when Ellie is sleepy she will rub her head with her hands. This morning as she was rubbing her head, she discovered that she has hair. She began grabbing onto it and pulling. Now she is fascinated with it. Hopefully she won't pull it all out... she's worked so hard to get the small amount of hair she has!

What a Funny Girl!

Ellie learned how to blow raspberries during dinner last night. At first she did it accidentally, then it happened again, and after that she had it figured out! Each time she blew a raspberry, the food would fly out of her mouth (she was eating sweet peas, her new favorite). She thought it was very funny!

Over the weekend Ellie decided that the cats and dogs were pretty silly. She has been noticing them for months now, but it was like she really looked at them for the first time on Saturday. She apparently decided that they look (and sound) funny, because she would glance over at them and then laugh and laugh. When the cat would meow or the dog would bark/whine she would just start giggling, and then look at us like, "Do you guys realize how hilarious these creatures are?!" We never thought anyone would find Kip's whining so entertaining!

Five Months Old

This past month seems to have gone by much more quickly than any other since Ellie was born. It seems like every day she does something new - though the "new things" still don't include sleeping through the night. Maybe I'll be able to include that one on her six month update!

How Ellie has changed in the past month:

• The biggest change is that she is sitting on her own now.
• She has finally developed a pretty regular sleep routine. She goes to bed between 7:30-8pm (then wakes up a zillion times); gets up for the day between 6-6:30am; first nap from 9-10:30am; afternoon nap from 1-2:30pm and maybe an evening snooze on our walk for half an hour or so.
• She hates her pacifier, unless she puts it in on her own terms.
• She figured out how to bounce in the jumper.
• She can rotate her body about 90 degrees when she's on her tummy.
• She actually enjoys tummy time.
• She has become very vocal in letting us know what she does or does not want to do.
• She seems to be figuring out how to drop things from her highchair to the floor on purpose.
• She loves petting the dogs. In fact, we have to watch carefully because she tries to hold both sides of Kip's face and pull his nose into her mouth. Yuk! She hasn't succeeded yet, but we have intervened just in the nick of time! (Kip is very willing to let this happen, by the way.)
• We sit out in the grass with the neighbors and their kids in the evening; she loves to watch the kids playing.
• Ellie "drinks" out of our cups. She became very interested in them one day and we made the mistake of letting her stick her tongue in - now all she does when we are trying to eat is reach out for our cups.
• She has figured out how to pull my glasses off of my face. She really enjoys this!
• She sucks on her toes.

Events of the last month:

• Ellie started on solid foods (if you can call them solid!) She really likes her rice cereal, bananas, and pears. She also seems to be developing a taste for prunes. She's not quite sure about avocados or applesauce yet.

New Pictures

Here are a couple of new pictures of Ellie taken this past weekend:

Sitting for the first time.

With Grandpa P.

Pretty girl.

Sucking on her lower lip.

Playing with her feet.

Silly Girl

Ellie has found her bottom lip. She constantly has it pulled into her mouth, sucking on it. It is pretty funny! She has very little interest in pacifiers these days. I'm not sure if that is a good thing or not. On one hand, I am glad she is weaning herself from them so that we don't have to later; but on the other hand it was nice to have something that always comforted her when she was upset. Now when we offer her a pacifier she purses her lips and turns her head away.

Ellie sat on her own for the first time on Saturday. Today she was able to stay sitting up for about 10 minutes in the neighbor's grass while I chatted with the ladies that live on our alley. We have seven families and lots of kids living on our alley. It looks like we will be having a "block party" on the 4th of July. Even though Ellie can't really play with the other kids yet, she really enjoys watching them.

I will try to post pictures later this afternoon.