Fun Day with Family!

Today was a fun day with family.  Their great Aunt and Uncle, as well as cousins came over for the afternoon.  It was great to see everyone and for the kids to get to spend some time with family!

We showed off our jumperoo skills!

And our favorite Ipad apps:)

We hung out with our great Aunt Anne

And then welcomed our cousins by pulling their hair!

We laughed!

Ate like big girls and boys!

And showed them how we play nicely together!

We love (and are fascinated by!) our family!

And say "come back soon!"

Even though we're exhausted and fell asleep during dinner after they left:)

Thanks for coming to see us!

9 Months!

Paige and Andrew were 9 months on the 22nd! So hard to believe!  How did we celebrate? With doctor's appointments and shots:) 

9 Months Already!

 Stats:  Andrew is 18 pounds, 6 ounces and is 26.5 inches long.  Paige is 16 pounds, 6 ounces and is 26.5 inches long.  On the adjusted curve, Paige is right around the 50th percentile for both height and weight.  Andrew is around the 50th for weight (remember boy and girl charts are different) and around the 20th for height.  He has never been as long as his sister before though, so we are impressed with his catch up growth!

We've made great progress with development and both the pediatrician and neonatologist were impressed with that.  Andrew is above his adjusted age and they think he's around 8 months.  Paige is a little more behind and we are still diligently working on her strengthening exercises.  She has made good progress too though, and is sitting perfectly, starting to weight bear a little on her legs and feet and is now rolling all over the place to get where she wants, as well.  She continues to have PT every other week.  Andrew has it monthly mostly to continue to work on his head tilt.

Andrew is still struggling quite a bit with his reflux.  He is vomiting more and is waking up multiple times during the nighttime and naps with high pitched screams.  His eyes won't be open, he's still very tired and he just seems to be in pain.  The neonatologist who saw today adjusted his prevacid (reflux med) for weight gain and switched him from an oral suspension (which he hates!) to a solutab that can dissolve her his mouth. I'm hoping this will help.  We'll know in the next couple days if his reflux is truly our culprit for his sleeping difficulties.  The hope is that he'll outgrow all of his reflux symptoms by 18 months.  I guess we're halfway there!

Meals are becoming a bit easier, as they both want to eat EVERYTHING we are eating! As soon as we put anything in our mouths, they want to try it.  They sit in their highchairs and are starting to try a little of our food or eat puffs, rice cookies, or little pieces of fruit. As far as pureed food, they've tried most fruit and veggies and do quite a bit of oatmeal.  Its fun to finally sit as a family and have meals!

Time is flying and they are getting SO big SO fast!

Baby Proofing!

Last weekend, we spent a good deal of time baby proofing our house!

Lots of gates were installed! Here are the basement stairs.

And the second floor staircase

Outlets were covered

And this glass, open TV stand in the rec room was replaced with...

This secure, sturdy, enclosed stand!

We still have some more to do, but I feel like we got a good start!  And none too soon, as you know who is scooting right across the room and is SO close to crawling!

We managed to sneak in some fun time in the pool, as well.  This was MUCH more enjoyable for all this time around, as they are sitting steadily and don't have to be held upright!

Loving the pool!

Drinking all the water!

And surprised to get sprayed by Daddy!

The current favorite thing though is rice cookies!  We are obsessed.  Paige knows the packaging and starts screaming as soon as I pull a pack out. 

Is my cookie coming?!?!

Taking a big bite!

Yummy!

We're entertained for at least a few minutes!

We had a babysitter on Monday and told her that if all else fails, just hand them both a cookie and they'll be your best friend:)

Quick Update

Not too much to report.  Life remains crazy but we are enjoying our little ones more and more each day as their personalities are really beginning to develop.  Paige laughs out loud ALL the time:)  She finds everything hysterical and is constantly smiling, screaming and giggling.  Andrew is into EVERYTHING! He is on all fours, rocking, and ready to crawl very soon.  Our PT who came last week predicted he'd be mobile by the time she comes back next week.  God help us all!  Mom and Dad have some major baby proofing to get done this weekend!

Last Friday was Daddy's birthday and we had lots of fun last weekend.  Friday, we celebrated with our family and had takeout with the kids, cake and opened presents.  Saturday, we went to the Old Town Farmer's Market in the morning and ended up having breakfast in one of the bagel shops.

Enjoying our first ever bagels!

Hangin' with Daddy in the bagel shop

Saturday night, we went out with Grandma and Grandpa to celebrate sans kids.  Andrew's Godmother, Katie, and her fiance Steve offered to come babysit.  It was SO nice of them and really made our night out comfortable and easy since they know the kids so well!

This week we had a gastrointestinal clinic doctor's appt at Children's to discuss their constipation.  As preemies with delayed meconium passage (first stool) and difficulty stooling, they are at risk for a couple of GI diseases.  We wanted a formal consult to see if we needed a workup for any of those and to get some advice on managing their stooling patterns.  Good news is that their exams were unremarkable and our problems aren't severe enough to warrant any invasive testing.  We will continue on two medications to help with stooling and now have an action plan for when things begin to "back up."  Really, most of their constipation can be related to their decreased muscle tone as preemies (especially Paige) and will take time to improve.

Our physical therapist came last week again and was pleased with Paige's progress.  They are both sitting beautifully and Paige may even be more stable than Andrew at this point!

Sitting and playing nicely together!

And having quite the conversation in Andrew's crib!

We do still need to work a lot on Paige's muscle tone and strength, especially in her legs, which she does not like to put any weight on. She also will not prop up on her arms much when on her belly.  I'm hoping that Andrew's crawling will motivate her to want to be active, too! But have you noticed from her pictures that her tongue protrusion is basically gone?!?!? I think she's just too busy smiling all the time for her tongue to be out!

Always our happy girl:)

Janice (our PT) will come again next week to work with just Paige.  We also have our 9 month pediatrician check-up next Friday.  Can you believe they are almost 9 months old?!?!

Fourth of July Weekend

We had a wonderful long 4th of July weekend.  We had lots on the to-do list that didn't get done....BUT we had lots of fun:)

Saturday, we went to a new farmers market and bought lots of yummy fresh fruit and veggies! We then spent the afternoon at home as Andrew was not a happy guy.  We screamed for several hours that afternoon and we weren't entirely sure why.  He broke his first tooth through last week (!) and we thought it could be another tooth but tylenol and his teething chillers didn't touch him.  We discovered it was definitely due to teething when we found his SECOND bottom front tooth Sunday afternoon!  Paige also got her first bottom tooth about two weeks ago - she beat him on this one! She may even have a second one...but its a little hard to confirm since she won't let you near her mouth! Saturday night we had a fun dinner with Andrew's Godmother, Katie, and her fiance Steve. The kids cooperated beautifully and went to bed by 8 so we could enjoy our adult night!

Sunday was Andrew & Paige's first 4th of July BBQ!  Alisa and Brian hosted a great party with SO much AMAZING food.  The babies were reasonably well behaved and lasted almost 5 hours there. When they both start to melt down, we've mastered a pretty quick exit strategy:) 

Very interested in EVERYTHING!

Matching t-shirts!

Cuddling back at home

And getting very annoyed at Mommy's pictures. Haha!

Monday was a day of relaxation at home.  Fireworks were not on the agenda for our 8 month olds:)  But we had a nice day as a family.  We tried our first "Stage 2" food today and we've both definitely mastered sitting without support.  Even Paige! Although she's still a little more likely to topple over on you. Our physical therapist, Janice, will be so proud on Thursday when she comes!

Happy 4th of July!

Andrew saluting with the kitchen brush. Haha!

Paige posing pretty, as always:)

Happy Fourth of July!