Wednesday, September 30, 2009

Ava Katherine



















Monday, September 28, 2009

Happy Monday

Colin and Mom, post-walk/run...







Note other baby... tired from running!


Saturday, September 26, 2009

10 Months


Colin, you guys are 10 months old today!


"WHAAAAAAT?!?!?!"


"Whatever, she has a pinwheel..."


"May I please...?"


"eh, you can have it back"


"Sigh... he's incorrigible..."

Friday, September 25, 2009

Big Head Colin and his Plagiocephaly Helmet Progress



Oh, Colin - you just have a big head, that's all! You'll grow into it!

We went for an ultrasound on Monday at Childrens Hospital and everything turned out fine... nothing to worry about. What I was worried about was that my son would hate me following the procedure. If you really don't have to ultrasound your kid's head -- don't. They have to put the probe right on the open anterior fontanelle, and your child needs to be perfectly still for the tech to get pictures to then show to a specialist.

As some of you may know, Colin is not a fan of anyone touching his head, covering his head, etc. I have never seen his face turn that shade of red, he was crying so hard and he was all sweaty and slippery making it near impossible for me to hold his hands and head still. I was mortified - but mostly sad for him and his obvious terror. The tech said this is normal and that they sometimes need a third person in there to hold the child down. Ugh. I thought he'd hurl from all the crying and mucus he had swallowed. I thought he'd never forgive me. I tried to sing to him, we shook toys, blew on pinwheels, tried to adminster his paci. Nothing helped. After 15 minutes of sheer agony, it was over. It took a full 5 minutes of me rocking him for all the residual sadness to abate. In other words, I don't recommend it.

So no hydrocephalus, no growths... just a big noggin. Nothing to worry about.

As far as his plagiocephaly progress...his helmet is working WONDERS!! Last week, after only 3 weeks of wearing his "hat", his flat spot has already filled in by half!

Before and After:


His left side flattening was depressed 15mm in comparison to his right side. It's already filled in 7-8mm! We can tell just by looking at him, too. Hopefully, he wont' have to wear it the full 3 months, but he is pretty cute in it!

Wednesday, September 23, 2009

Play Pics

Random pics while Mom works on a helmet update post...


Playing together - we like to share toys (take them away from one another).


Well at least SOMEone is happy back there!


And someone seems to be annoyed with your staring...


She doesn't mind the pictures.


I think she thinks we think she's cute.


She's right.

Sunday, September 20, 2009

Singing in the Shower

Splashing is hilarious!



We've moved bathtime to an inflatable tub in the guest shower... the intermediary step between infant-tub-in-kitchen-sink and bathing in our big tub. They love the inflatable, it affords them more movement than the infant tub and it is more comfortable due to it not being hard plastic!

Why do I get the feeling Colin will find his OWN splashing even more hilarious...?

Thursday, September 17, 2009

Ava Standing (or Leaning)

She doesn't yet crawl... but she likes to stand!

Or, lean...

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

FOUND! Cat

UPDATE: After 4 nights on the streets of Boston, our cat decided to show up this morning! YAYYYY! You're never going out again!!!

Pretty sad over our missing cat... went out 2 nights ago and never came back.





Holding out hope that he decides to find his way home...



He was older (13 years) and was never an outdoor cat. We just started letting him out this summer and he'd always come back after a short period of time.



His "brother" is worried, too.



Sunday, September 13, 2009

Nine Month Stats



I'm a bit late posting the twins' 9 month stats, but their "well baby" visit was also 2 weeks late, as usual!

The babies are thriving and doing quite well. They both can sit unassisted, they can "stand" unassisted for a couple milliseconds at a time (although Colin has trouble with this since he'd rather be bouncing!) They don't crawl at all and if we skipped crawling and went straight to standing/walking that would be fine with us (which we hear does happen).

Colin babbles all the time and has become quite good with consonant sounds and mimicks us a bit. He goes "da da da ta taaaaa". Oh, and he likes to scream for no reason! Great! Ava is a bit behind him, but we are hopeful that she'll soon follow her big brother's lead with consonants. For now, she mostly grunts and groans and goes "HMMMMMMMMMMmmmmmmmmmm!"

They're asleep by 7pm and wake up around 7am. Ava isn't much of a napper -- she usually does two 45 minute ones. Colin usually does a short 45 minute one and a longer 1.5 hour one. They are pretty good at their pincer grasp and although they can pick up Puffs, they only make it to their mouths 5% of the time (they seem to get jammed in their palms and can't make it into their mouths)!

We're still doing 4 bottles/day with 6oz in each for Ava; and Colin gets 6oz in his first bottle followed by 8 ouncers. Ava is a nut for solid food which we only offer after bottles, but I know she'd rather have that. I'm still making all their solid baby food with only an occasional Gerber Organic thrown in in a pinch. For finger foods, they eat Puffs, wagon wheels, barley teething biscuits, bagels, small pieces of peaches and banana, and watermelon in mesh feeders.

And now for their stats:

  • Ava weighs in at 15lbs 6.5oz, still in the 5th %-ile.
  • She is 26.5" long, still in the 25th %-ile.
  • And her head is 42.5cm around up to the 10th from the 5th %-ile at her 6 month.
She's gaining weight just fine, but she started out pretty small so she'll have to stay on the higher calorie Neosure formula for now.

  • Colin weighs in at 18lbs 9oz, still in the 10th %-ile.
  • He is 28.5" long which now puts him in the 25th %-ile, up from 8% at his 6 month.
  • His noggin is 47cm around putting him in the 90-95th range up from the 50th at his 6 month.

Now this increase gave me pause. This is a HUGE jump. Boy, this kid has head problems! First his strawberry hemangioma, then his plagiocephaly (hence the helmet), and now his head is growing pretty fast.

Now unless you have the same person taking measurements each time, it could be off. And maybe the helmet is working so his flat spot is filling in causing the big jump. What I don't like is that our Pedi left the practice, and the new docs have yet to arrive, so we are in limbo only getting to see an NP (who I didn't care for). I made her set up an appt for an ultrasound of his head to make sure it's not hydrocephaly or a growth - despite her telling me there is nothing to worry about. Hey, I worry, but I'm a Mom so this gives me license to do so. I'm not super worried, but I don't want to fail my son, so there you go.

The NP did say Colin doesn't need the high calorie formula anymore, so we are slowly transitioning him to Similac Advance. It's a pain to make up two batches of formula, but b/c the Advance is sold in bigger containers and b/c it's not high cal, it costs us only 14 cents/oz down from nearly 20 cents/oz for the Neosure.

Ok, Ava says: seriousness over for now! Let's have fun!

Friday, September 11, 2009

Loungewear


Colin sporting the latest autumn lounge styles...


His "serious" look - blue steel.


Chillin'...


Mom your hand is cold!

Wednesday, September 9, 2009

What We Did On Our Short and Sweet Labor Day Weekend Vacation...



We headed 400 miles north (that's a 7-hour car ride each way, folks) to Caribou, Maine this past weekend for a mini "vacation" at the Grandparents' place!

Let's see, what did we do?

We hung out with our Grandparents in the beautiful late-summer weather.


We saw other family, too, see previous post...


We were baptized Catholic! We reject Satan! AND all his works!


First up, Colin.


Then Ava... they did really well. They loved looking at and listening to Father Aaron, and then Ava puked all over Pepere (Grandpa)!


Mom and Dad got to do some fishing...


Mostly Dad.


We safely release 99% of our catches with the most care, but once a year we'll keep a delicious brook trout for ourselves!


Colin got to try out this great car at Aunt Arlene's!


Checking his blind spots...


(shhh... his helmet was off for the baptism)


Ava waited patiently for her turn to try the car. Colin was hogging it.


And then we drove back home! It was exhausting but we had a lot of fun and the weather was gorgeous! See you at Christmas!