11 Months!

How is this possible?  It's funny how in some ways the last year has dragged and in others it seems like we blinked and it was over! Looking back at earlier pictures, its amazing to think how far we've come.  We are planning a first birthday party now!  I cannot believe one year is almost here...

Paige has developed the BEST personality.  She is the happiest baby I've ever seen - not that I'm biased or anything;) She smiles all the time, has a fake laugh that she constantly does, makes funny faces, and is always babbling.  She is really starting to make some progress with her motor development, too.  Paige has started to crawl! Military style, yes.  But she is getting where she wants to go.  She has also figured out how to get from her belly or all fours to sitting.  She's much less frustrated then she was before when her brother left her in his dust!

Funny face:)

Happy girl!

Our old Andrew seems to be back!!! He has had such a hard time for the past six weeks - reflux, cold, teething, and his leg issue.  I think we have most things under control.  The cold has cleared, reflux is a little better managed (although I took him off one med I thought was doing more harm than good), and BOTH top front teeth have come through!  His leg seems fine now, too. So odd. But over the last week or so we have a happy, smiling, laughing boy.  I cannot tell you how good it is to have him back.  And he is EVERYWHERE!  He keeps us all running.  He is pulling to stand, taking steps holding on to things and is crawling faster than we can keep up with.  When he knows he's not supposed to do something and is in trouble, he starts crawling as fast as he can away from you hysterically laughing.  Its hard not to laugh back:)

Our cutie:)

SO big!

Our happy guy:)

Only 29 days until their birthday! Can you tell we're a little excited?!?:)

Happy birthday, Papa!

Celebrating with Papa

Not too sure about our party hats...

A mix between crying and laughing:)

Happy birthday, Papa! We love you!

Andrew

So we've had a rather stressful week with Andrew.  On Tuesday, Jack stayed home with the kids (Nana was at the beach), and noticed that Andrew seemed to be favoring his right leg.  When I got home from work that night, I manipulated the leg pretty aggressively and could not reproduce any discomfort.  We chalked it up to a cramp and moved on. On Wednesday, my mom had the kids again and she mentioned to me that Andrew's right leg seemed to be hurting (independent of Jack's observation).  I again got home and could not get him to show any sign that it hurt.  When he was crying and retracting his leg on Thursday, I called his physical therapist and she came right over to see him (have I mentioned that she is fabulous?!?).  She thoroughly examined him and could not find anything wrong.  Clearly, the pain was intermittent and he was still having no problem crawling, standing, or moving around.  We decided to just keep an eye on things.

Friday morning, Andrew woke up hysterical, wouldn't straighten his leg and didn't want anyone to touch it.  Jack took him in the pediatrician and she sent him over to Children's to get some xrays.  She felt the pain seemed to be either with his calf or ankle.  We also ordered belly films, as we were wondering if he was retracting his leg to protect his abdomen.  I spoke with Dr. Arnold on the phone for a bit and we discussed the fact that Andrew has not been himself in about a month.  He has not been able to sleep for more than 2 or 3 hours at a time (cries out with eyes closed and seems uncomfortable), has been incredibly cranky and rarely has happy periods, and his eating has dropped quite a bit.  The kid will rarely eat anything off a spoon and eats about 1/3 of other solids we give him.  We have been attributed most of his issues to reflux. Then his recent cold.  But are we missing something bigger?

Xrays on Friday were negative.  We've been watching all weekend to see if we could find patterns and figure out what was going on.  We have figured out that it is right ankle that is bothering him. Sometimes its bad and sometimes its not. We can't figure out what the triggers are.  His personality has returned for brief periods this weekend, but his happy moments are definitely limited.  After playing for a few minutes, he climbs into your lap and starts to cry.  There's got to be something going on, but what is it? 

It is incredibly frustrating to see him so unhappy and in pain.  We are just hopeful that we either figure it out or it goes away as quickly as it appeared.  The pediatrician mentioned the possibly of a bone scan this week. We aren't sure that we are there yet (as its a much bigger test), but we'll call her office tomorrow and talk about what our next step will be. 

On a happier note, here are a couple cute pics from today - you can see our happy guy in these:)

Sunday with Daddy!

Waiting for the game to start

Quite the duo:)

Hail to the Redskins!

Hooray for Paige!

After my last post, I feel like I need some fun pics and good news!  We had a nice long weekend - something we all needed!  And even got some smiles out of grouchy Andrew:)

Attempting to feed myself...

But still much better with finger foods:)

Paige's first yogurt experience - YUM!

Loving our new walker but getting into trouble already!

Showing a little of old Andrew but the start of my cold:(

And wearing Paige out:)

It was great to see our happy guy a little bit this weekend, although Poor Andrew seems to have caught a cold and is pretty miserable again.  Now its just hard to tell what is what.  He is not sleeping AT ALL but its hard to blame him because he is having a hard time breathing with all his congestion.  At first, Paige seemed to be in the clear but now she has quite the runny nose. I guess we can't complain too much though - we went 10 months without ANY illness.  Not too shabby.

We have been working really hard on Paige's leg strengthening exercises though...

AND CHECK OUT OUR GIRL!

Paige is actually standing unsupported for up to a minute.  This is huge for her!  Daddy did daycare today since Nana was at the beach at he sent me this picture at work.  I almost cried I was so happy for her!  She has been so frustrated that she can't play with this toy like Andrew.  I guess jealousy is good motivation:)  So proud of her!

Hoping for colds to go away, happy babies to return, continued leg strengthening, and most importantly -  a couple good nights of sleep!