The Hatch's: Three Weeks

It has been a busy couple of weeks. Alyvia has continued to do well. Her breathing is excellent. She does occasionally have a little bit of mild apnea that she resolves on her own, which is totally normal for where she is developmentally and will improve when she gets closer to her due date.
Our biggest challenge at the moment is her feeds. She still recieves all of her food by a tube. What she doesn't get that way she recieves through her IV. We were going strong and had her eating almost a half ounce every three hours which is almost a full feed for her, but then her stomach bloated up and they were worried about her bowels, so we had to stop.
It has been an on again, off again process over the past two weeks. They put a tube down her stomach both times we had to stop which really made her mad. The first time they put in the tube, she had a royal fit for almost and hour and a half. She finally calmed down and slept the rest of the day. She pulled the tube out later that night. The second time she wasn't as mad about the tube because they taped it to her mouth on the side, but she was without oral feedings for four days. She was ok with it the first day or so, but by the end she was pretty hungry and was practically attacking her binkie. We restarted feeds again two days ago, and they are very slowly increasing the amount and watching her very closely. Everything looks good so far, but she has a ways to go.
One of the things that has kept us so positive is her feisty personality. She is so strong and skinny that she can push herself all over her bed. She also smiles a lot. I know some people say it is gas, but I don't buy that. She smiles when we are holding her, when we sing or hum to her, or when I give her little kisses on her tiny little cheeks. She loves to be held and is super cuddly. We hold her skin to skin because it helps to keep her warm. Only Kevin and I are allowed to hold her, and Sarah is not so happy about that. Talking to her and touching her was ok for a day or two, but she eventually got bored with that.
We had a meeting with the doctor last Friday. They were very happy with her progress and say that she is very rigorous which is a very good sign. They also told us that because she has needed so little breathing support, that her chances of having some of the complications of prematurity are significantly reduced. She will have a few tests in about a week that will check for some of those potential problems, but the doctor was very optimistic that she will most likely not have those problems.
In order to come home she needs to be able to eat on her own and maintain her own body temperature while still gaining weight. Right now she weighs about 2 lbs 3 oz. Her weight has sort of bounced up and down with the changes in feeding. That should change once she is tolerating her feeds better and she is not relying on the IV so much.

Here are some pictures of the past week or so.