15 Months Old posted late

Stella,

Another month has passed and you're another month older. I can't believe what a big girl you are now. You're a little better at listening this month than last, but are still a little wild woman. You are following simple directions more consistently and respond better when we tell you "no". You're repeating a lot but so much is jibber jabber that it's hard to decipher the real words in there. I need to get a video of your "talking" because it's so cute and nearly constant. You have a LOT to say! Your sleeping hasn't improved a ton this month although you had ONE night where you slept all night long and I even had to wake you to nurse before I had to leave that morning. You generally are up once a night, but some nights are worse than others. I was convinced you were cutting your canines on the top earlier this month and then they went away and your crankiness improved, without any new teeth. My new thing is worrying about your bottom tooth. You have 3/4 of your bottom teeth and I recently learned your Aunt Charlotte also doesn't have that tooth. So now I'll worry until it appears...or not. You are going through a huge mama phase and cry a lot of the times I pass you off to others, even Daddy. I had to stop dropping you in the childcare area at the YMCA because they would come get me since you were crying so much. It's a bummer, but I'm hoping a little time will solve that problem and we can try again. Your eating is hit or miss and you still love meat. You love dairy although it definitely makes your reflux worse. With your cold we actually had to increase your reflux meds this month because you seemed uncomfortable a lot and weren't eating as well. You are down to one nap a day and usually nap at the same time as your sisters. You nap anywhere from 2-3 hours most days and I love that down time when everyone is sleeping. It's so nice when the house is so quiet, although it never seems to last long enough. You have such a big personality and add so much to our family. I just love you little Stella.

crazy girl

Looking at the trees at the tree farm

The only Santa she would go near

Not so sure about him...

Accidental twinning with Mama

Christmas Eve 

She wanted to carry her stocking just like her sisters did. 

More twinning 

I'll jump on any breastfeeding bandwagon. These pics were going around social media so I made one for us too. 

Stella 8 Months

I can't believe my baby is 8 months old already (well, 8 1/2 practically at this point, but oh well).

Stella,

You are such an excited, adorable, and exuberant little girl. You want to do everything your sisters do and giggle like crazy when they play with you. You're rolling all over the place and scooting backwards so never are in the same place I left you. You LOVE food and will eat anything we offer you. There are nights where I swear you eat more than your sisters. We are doing mainly baby led weaning with some purees. You just love it all! Initially you had a hard time with pureed foods, but you've definitely got it down now. You are still nursing 4-5 times a day and a couple times a night. You cut your first tooth and sleep went seriously down hill. We need to get your daddy on board for some self-soothing before you forget how to sleep without my boob in your mouth. You're still a little peanut at about 13.6 pounds but are wearing mostly 6-12 month clothes now. You have a really close relationship with your sister Lucy and I can tell how much you look up to her already. A lot of your mannerisms are like hers already. You also do the "butt bumping" as we called it for Lucy and flap and flail your arms and hands like a wild woman. I can tell how much you love your sisters company as when you're alone you're so much fussier. You really miss them when you have to go places with just mommy, especially in the car. This month you finally starting babbling some other sounds like "mamama". It's usually only when you're upset or sad, but at least it's not "dadadada" all the time anymore. You love your bath and splash and kick like crazy. This month brought your first ear infection and I'm amazed it took so long with fluid just sitting in your ears. I'm so excited for you to get tubes and to be able to hear well (hopefully). Life is so amazing with you in it! I just love you so much!

L & C Update

Lucy and Clara are now 28 months old. For the first two years I was great about doing monthly updates. Once Stella arrived that became more difficult. The thing is, they're still growing and changing so much and I don't want to forget what they were like during this time. 

•Clara has really exploded with her language in the past month or so. She's finally using her words more than gestures or whining and it's wonderful. Everyone is so much happier and less frustrated. She tends to be hard to understand at times. 

•Lucy is also talking more and is regularly coming up with 4 and 5 word sentences on her own. She's pretty easy to understand. 

•The only way to get the girls to go up and down our stairs at home without holding a hand or complaining is to have them pretend to be monkeys. They make loud monkey sounds the entire time. 

•The girls drink so well from open cups now so that's all we use. We also switched to booster seats and we are all eating at the dining room table instead of the kitchen. I'd like to say we don't need bibs anymore, but Clara does. She such a messy eater and often has full sensory experiences with her meals prior to eating them.  

•Lucy is totally potty trained and only wears diapers overnight. Even though she's dry every morning she still prefers to wear one at night. Clara pees on the potty every time but has had a few poop accidents. Not fun :(

•Lucy is very insistent on doing things by herself. She often has to redo something I've just done if she didn't do it independently. It takes her forever to do some things! 

•I feel like a referee quite regularly as the girls fight like good sisters as I like to say. If we get two of something that's the same, they'll find a way to fight over them. If we only get one, they fight. If we get two that are different, they'll fight. You probably get the point. The sweet moments are there, but some days they seem quite few and far between all the fighting. 

•Lucy hasn't been very good in the car since we went to Albany over New Year's Eve. She always has something to complain about and it's not very fun. 

•Clara still loves books and monkeys. She's accumulated at least five different monkey stuffed animals in the past few months. 

•The girls love the baby and anything new we get for her. We recently borrowed a bumbo seat and they're constantly trying to sit in it. They really love the baby so much and will talk to her and make her smile or talk. 

•We finally weaned both girls off of Prevacid for acid reflux. It seemed like it a took a little adjusting, but they're fine. 

•Lucy has both of her two year molars on the bottom and Clara has a half of one on the bottom. My girls  are always slow to get teeth, so of course these will be slow too. 

•Clara has finally figured out how to jump. It took her quite a while and my mom got them a trampoline for Christmas. Lucy would coach her and say, "Two feet Claka, two feet", or "bend knees Claka". It  was so cute and funny. 

•The girls do gymnastics on Tuesdays, music on Wednesdays, and swimming on Fridays. We usually got to the library or story time at least once a week as well. I'm also hoping to check out a MOPS group this week.

•The baby dolls are still by far the favorite toys. They're starting to get into the Duplo blocks they got for Christmas and Lucy is getting pretty good at 24 piece puzzles. They both love doing puzzles. 

•I have no idea where they got it, but all of a sudden they would say, "Two daddy, two daddy" and each say that a few times taking turns going back and forth and then eventually correct to saying "One daddy" a few times. I teased W about what he was telling them when I wasn't around. They've been obsessed with the number two for a while. 

Well, that's the quick and easy summary of what my girls are up to. Does this sound like your two year old?

Lucky Friday the 13th

We left Thursday night around Lucy and Clara's bedtime for our trip to Long Island for my first ultrasound appointment. We had booked a hotel room that was about 5 minutes from Dr. Braverman's office so that we could drive down the night before and be close in the morning. The drive went pretty well despite hitting some snowy roads for about an hour in Pennslvania. My mom came along to help with the girls and to be able to watch them at the hotel during my appointment. 

We arrived at about 11:45 pm and W checked in while I waited in the car with my mom and the girls. We pulled around close to the room and waited while W unloaded the car (we didn't bring much because it was just overnight). He set up the pack and plays and then came down to get us. Lucy had first opened her eyes when W checked in. I asked my mom not to talk to her but she didn't really listen and was still making eye contact with her and smiling. 

We got up into the room and tried putting both girls right into the pack and plays. They both immediately started crying. So, we pulled them into our bed and laid down with them. Clara went back to sleep pretty quickly and was easily put back into her pack and play. Lucy, on the other hand, didn't go back to sleep until close to 4 am. We tried giving her Tylenol because I knew she was cutting a big molar, but that didn't seem to help. We tried putting her back into the pack and play multiple times and she would just cry. You can't really let your kid cry in a hotel room.   

The hotel had a free breakfast so we went down in the morning. There we met a couple that said they were pregnant with twin girls. When they asked us if we had any other children we said no and then asked them the same question. They said they had three others...triplet boys! Can you imagine?!

I was so nervous I barely ate. We put the girls down and left around 9:20 for my 9:45 appointment. When I checked in they gave me a cup for a urine sample. I tried my best but was only able to give them a super small amount of urine. There wasn't anyone in the waiting room and they called us back fairly quickly. The nurse was one I remembered from last time. She took my blood pressure and it was surprisingly good despite how nervous I felt. She left the room and we waited for Dr. B. 

He came in after a few minutes. He again said that if he didn't say anything right away it didn't mean anything, he just wanted to get a good look first.  

We saw a beautiful little baby that measured 6w6d and on par with when I thought I ovulated. My due date is 10/3/15. We heard an amazing heartbeat at 141 beats per minute. I asked Dr. B to check which ovary I ovulated from and he joked it was so I could tell my child when they someday ask. Sure enough, it was the one without a tube. When I said that he said the tubes actually lie overlapping on each other. I guess I didn't realize how close in proximity they were. 

He checked the doppler blood flow and it was pretty uncomfortable. He made more jokes as he seems to do and said the blood flow to my uterus was slightly constricted but that the blood flow from my uterus to the baby was great. He didn't think there was any need to change any of the medications at this time. He asked about the immune panel and I said it was pending. I asked about Neupogen and told him it was denied by my insurance. He said once the insurance company denies it there's no point in appealing it. I asked about donated meds and he said he would check if there were any. He then asked,"See you again next week?" I then reminded him that we lived almost 5 hours away, so he said he wanted me to get another ultrasound next week locally. He said he'd like to see me again around 10 weeks and we said we'd be able to make that work. 

I then asked him if he allowed children in the office. He said he didn't have any problems with it but knew the infertility patients sometimes complained about it. He liked to see it as what could be for those patients and said it would be great if we brought the girls in for some pictures. 

When I went to check out the nurse said my urine sample was going to be enough and that I didn't need to try again. I asked her about Neupogen and she said she'd check. It took her a little while but she came back with 4 vials! I was so happy and grateful as they are each $360 OOP and one of them lasts about 3 1/2 days. 

Since the appointment was so quick I texted my mom to see if the girls were sleeping. We didn't hear back from her so we went to a plaza nearby the office we've been to before. We went into a few stores and grabbed me a coffee before heading back to the room. 

The girls woke up when we got back and we packed everything up. We headed back to Dr. B's office for them to see the girls. There was another child and another couple waiting in the room. The other child was around the same age and we were talking some with the mom. I could tell the other couple wasn't pleased to see all the kids in the office. After a bit Dr. B came out and we got some pics of the four of us with him and then passed the girls off. They immediately started crying (as I suspected they would) and we got some funny pics. Dr. B was a good sport to smile while holding two crying babies. He told them, "Last time I saw you two you were just circles." I guess they didn't think he was too funny. 

From there we headed into Manhattan. My mom fed the girls snacks as we drove. We parked in a garage about 7 blocks from a restaurant and Children's museum I had scoped out. We walked to the restaurant and had an amazing lunch of dosas. The girls ate them and also loved trying something new. We were both impressed when Clara was gladly eating chicken curry. 

We then walked around the corner to the Children's Museum of Manhattan. This museum was a bit pricey as we had to also pay for the girls (most museums around here don't charge for children their age). It was so worth it though! The girls had such a great time. They were both walking all over the place and loved all the slides everywhere. Every time we moved on from one thing to the next they were sad. It was 5 floors that were all so much fun! There was a lot for kids their age and they had a ton of fun playing and watching the other kids. We stayed for a few hours and then headed out from there. It being their nap time we expected them to sleep for quite a while. 

Lucy had other plans. The ride home wasn't fun with her even with the DVD players we bought. They helped some, but she was teething and exhausted, so didn't want to be in her carseat. I ended up in the backseat with them for most of the ride home. We stopped at a rest area for dinner (soup dumplings that we had picked up in the city before heading out) but unfortunately there weren't any tables there apart from the ones outdoors and buried under a least a foot of snow. We improvised and made it work on a bench and then let the girls walk around and tire themselves out. 

For the rest of the trip Lucy mostly slept but would wake up crying about every 15-20 minutes. It wasn't a fun 3 remaining hours to say the least. With traffic and stops our ride home took 7 hours. Luckily both girls went down in their cribs and slept the rest of the night once we got home. 

I'm feeling so much better about things having seen and heard that little heartbeat. It's so amazing to think there's another little baby growing inside me. Next week I'll probably end up at the local fertility clinic for my ultrasound unless I'm able to get in at my ob's office. I'm hoping things continue to go well and stay uneventful.