First Year - Check!

Today is the babies' first birthday!  I'm excited to help them celebrate (pics to come), but mostly, I am just happy that we all survived this first year.  I've made it pretty clear that I wasn't a fan of the baby stage, so I don't miss those days and have no desire to re-live them. Their current age is pretty awesome though - watching them learn something new every day, the way their faces light up when they see me in the morning or when I get home from work, being able to make them giggle just by sticking out my tongue... I can definitely imagine missing this stage. So I am trying to enjoy every minute of it.

Milo is a near-pro walker now. He can stop, pick up a toy, and keep on going. Serena is still timid, but she's able to take a handful of steps at a time. She just has to be motivated to do so.

Here's a recent family photo where Serena is telling everyone how old she's going to be:

Birthday and holiday photos to come!

Serena's Progress & Halloween

My last post was somewhat brief, so I wanted to go into a little more detail about Serena's surgery and next steps. As I mentioned, the surgery wasn't as successful as we had hoped bc the hemangioma is a bit more complex than our dr. originally thought.  Instead of having it removed, we have to give her strong laser treatments to lighten the color, and then when she is a bit older and has lost some of the babyfat in her face, the dr. will operate and remove the excess skin.

We are still very optimistic that she will only be left with a small scar by the time she starts pre-school.  I hardly notice her birthmark, but whenever we are out in public, I see people staring at her and kids often point and seem to be scared of her. I know they don't understand so it doesn't bother me, but I just don't want her to have to deal with that when she is in school.

Anyway, this is baby girl right after her surgery:

We then took her back to NYC the following week to have her stitches removed and to have a laser treatment. After the treatment, she was EXTREMELY puffy. It was scary:

The dr. assured us that the swelling would go down in a couple of days, and she didn't seem to be in any pain - she was eating and playing like normal.  It's now gone down and faded a bit (ignore the fruit on her face!):

 

So, the journey continues. She'll have another laser treatment next week.

In the meantime, we enjoyed the babies' first Halloween with some silly (and apparently not very comfortable) costumes:

In other news, Milo is now able to take a couple of steps, and Serena isn't far behind. They both have more teeth coming in (#5 for Milo and #6 for Serena), and are getting much better at feeding themselves. As long as they keep STTN, I will be a happy mom!

This is a really fun age in general. I was not a big fan of the baby stage; honestly, the first few months were grueling. But now they are so fun to play with, and it is so exciting to watch them learn something new every day. The little smiles that greet me when I come home from work each day are the best!

Serena's Surgery and other fun fall activities

Oh man, I was doing so well with posting often, and then things got crazy. The babies both got their first colds, which turned into an ear infection for Serena, which turned into many sleepless nights. Andy and I were walking zombies for about a week and a half. Finally, we had to re-sleep train them by letting them cry it out, and thankfully everyone is sleeping well again. They will be 10 months old tomorrow.

Serena finally had her surgery this past Tuesday. We took the train up to NYC on Monday afternoon.

We had to be at the hospital at 6am. She was a bit confused why we woke her up so early...

This is her right before they took her back, wearing the huge scrubs.



The surgery lasted about an hour and a half. Serena did great, and recovered well. Unfortunately the surgeon wasn't able to remove very much of the hemangioma, due to the skin around her mouth being pulled (he wanted to make sure her lip would not curl up) and also the ulcerated area causing issues. He is confident that the outcome will still be just a small scar, but it's just going to take a bit more time. She'll be having monthly laser procedures for the next four months, and possibly another small touch-up surgery next year.

This is Serena right after surgery, still groggy from the anesthesia.

In other news, both babies are very close to walking! Serena can stand on her own for about 10 seconds. I am definitely not ready for them to be even more mobile. They are also doing much better with solid foods, and starting to pick up little pieces and feed themselves.

We also went to a pumpkin patch to get the obligatory "babies with pumpkins" photos. But there weren't very many pumpkins!

Anyway, next post I will hopefully have some cute Halloween photos to share!

Ch-Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes

The babies are now over 8 months old. They're pros at crawling (in their own ways - still not on their hands and knees yet), Milo can get acorss the room in a flash doing his fishflop, and Serena could win an army crawl race. They love it when we let them out of baby jail AKA the playyard and let them crawl across the floor and chase the cats. They're also very attracted to wires and basically anything else at their leve. I guess we need to get to babyproofing asap.

We also had to lower both of their cribs all the way down because they can (and do) pull themselves up on just about anything these days, including their crib slats.

I haven't seen any new tooth, but they MUST be getting them. They've both been teething like mad and drooling like a saint bernard. Milo in particular is super-drooly and I've started calling him Slimer because anytime his mouth comes in contact with you it's like you were slimed ala ghostbusters.

We signed the babes up for swim lessons starting in September, just as something to do and to get them used to the water. I'm sure I'll post pictures from that experience later on.

We also had a little photo shoot right around their 8 month birthday.  A woman in our neighborhood is doing a Twins 52 project and we got to be one of the families for her project (it's called TwinBug Photography on facebook if you want to check it out). Some of the highlights are below.  Also, this woman has TWO sets of twins - 4 years apart. I just.. cannot fathom...

 My boys!

 

 Milo's pout

 

 Love their expressions in this one.

 

 My arms were shaking!

 

 Milo conspiring something.

 

Family shot.

 

 

Lastly, we've been weaning Serena off of the medication she's been on for her hemangioma (propanolol).  She's now completely off it and we're going to monitor her for a few weeks to make sure the H doesn't start growing again/get darker. If it seems stabilized, then we'll go ahead and schedule surgery for this fall. While I'll be glad to get it over with, I am pretty nervous about it. Better now than when she is older though.

 

 

I'll be leaving the babies behind this weekend as I head to Vegas for my friend's fake bachelorette party (see: http://imtyingthenot.blogspot.com). I am soooo excited to see my friend and to get away, but I also know it is going to be really hard being away from my family.  I wish I had taken a trip when they were younger and wouldnt have been so aware of my absence! Oh well, I guess I will just have to drown my sorrows in a beverage...by the pool....with my book in hand...

Where does the time go?

OK, I'll admit, those first few months, when people told me to cherish every moment because time will fly by, I thought they were nuts. The first 3 months felt like decades. But now, oh my gosh, I can't even believe how quickly the babies are growing and changing! I feel like every day they've learned something new, sprouted a new tooth, or grown more hair.

They are now 7 and a half months old. They are both doing a version of crawling - Milo pulls himself forward on his arms and then flops down. Serena is army crawling on her elbows. They can both sit up for long periods of time, and are getting close to being able to pull themselves up.

Serena now has 2 teeth. Milo has one but another is coming through now. Serena has started babbling alot and mama has slipped out a few times, though not intentionally. Milo still mostly just grunts.

I don't like getting teeth!

I love my jumper!

The big challenge these days is getting them to eat more food, less formula. Neither of them are too keen on the food thing yet, but Serena in particular really hates it. We've tried a wide variety of stuff too.  Typically for breakfast they'll have oatmeal mixed with either banana or mango, and then a veggie for lunch like sweet potatoes. We have to sneak in spoonfuls between sips of their bottle or they wont even open their mouths. Serena still gags alot and just hasn't figured out how to swallow without the bottle to wash it down. I keep joking that I'm going to have to puree her lunches and put them in a bottle when she starts school :)

Other than that, things are going really well. We've moved up their bedtime, and amazingly they seem to sleep so much better (and longer) now! They go down around 7:45 and usually sleep til about 7am.  We've started a new tradition of bringing the babies into our bed on weekend mornings to watch Sesame Street with us (buying us a few more minutes to rest):

Holding hands watching Elmo :)



6 months!

The kiddos turned 6 months old last week. I never thought this day would come! I know alot of people are always saying to enjoy the baby phase because it goes by so quickly, and that they would love to slow down time, but not me! I am thrilled the newborn stage is behind us - it was awful! They are so much more fun now, but I am still anxious for them to start walking and talking and expressing what they want. Yes, I may regret that later ;)

Milo weighs 17 lbs now and Serena is close behind at 15 lbs. They're both between the 10th and 25th percentiles. They are little roly polys, and even though they aren't crawling yet, they can get to wherever they want to go by pivoting and rolling. Especially Milo, who will end up across the room in the blink of an eye!

We're still feeding them a bottle every 3 hours during the day, and then go from 8pm to 8am between feedings. Serena sleeps like a champ (once she finally falls asleep - she is very stubborn and fights it off as long as possible), but Milo wakes up a couple of times during the night. Luckily I usually just have to re-pacify him and he drifts back off.

Serena has now had 3 laser treatments, and won't have any more until after her surgery this fall. We have yet to schedule the actual surgery but it will likely be sometime in September.

They're starting to get a little better with their solids. We're only feeding them a few spoonfuls a day right now, but we're going to start increasing that soon. I'm looking forward to giving them more interesting foods than the bland stuff they have been eating so far. How old do they have to be to have ice cream? :)

Here are a couple of photos from their actual half birthday. It is impossible to get them to sit still these days...

Father's Day

Just a quick post on hubby's first father's day yesterday. We all went out to brunch, and the babies actually behaved! I guess that was their gift :)

We took a few photos later in the day; hopefully this will become a mother's/father's day tradition.

Milo really does have different clothing, but he always seems to end up wearing this ducky outfit. It's the backup outfit I keep downstairs in case one of them has a blow-out, and well, Milo did just that. At least they match...

Earlier in the day we also went to see hubby's father, who passed away about 20 years ago. Milo is named after him (his middle name). You can see the original outfit here pre-blowout.

Later in the evening, we took the babies on a walk in their new stroller (duallie BOB - awesome!!) and went to a nearby park (I love that we have so many playgrounds/parks in walking distance). We put both the babies in one bucket swing and they loved it. So cute!

Mother's Day

I had a great first Mother's Day, not only with my babies, but also with my own mom and MIL. My husband decided to take a bunch of photos so that he could get them framed as gifts for me and the grandmas. Here are some highlights:

 With the Grandmothers

 Me and the babies

The munchkins with their favorite toy.

Seriously, they love that Elmo doll. Serena will squeal with delight whenever she sees him. I don't know if it's the big eyes or what, but Elmo has saved us from some major fits.

In other news, Serena has now joined her brother in rolling over. She doesn't roll as much as him (he's like a rolling pin and will end up all the way across the floor), but she's good enough that she'll now flip over and sleep on her tummy. So, while it worries me that they are both now tummy sleepers, I am happy to say they are sleeping alot better! Luckily we have the Snuza monitors on them so I'm not too worried about them not being on their backs.  I think Milo is very close to being able to crawl, which is terrifying! We have alot of babyproofing to do before they are mobile!

Regression

So, I thought we were really lucky for awhile. We'd feed the babies at 9pm, but them to bed, and they would mostly sleep til about 8am the next morning, and only cry out once or twice for re-pacifying. We decided to move them into their nursery, and even started the process of un-swaddling them. Well, I'm not sure if that was too much change at once, or they've started teething, or it is just natural regression, but for the past couple of weeks we have been up every 30 minutes to an hour with a crying baby.  Luckily they are still easy to soothe back to sleep, but then they cry out again in another 30 minutes or so. Milo has learned how to roll so he is always in a different position when we find him, and sometimes cries out when he wakes up on his tummy. We moved them into separate cribs because he was rolling into his sister's territory.

We've started swaddling Serena again and she is sleeping better. Milo is doing a little better too so maybe (hopefully) it was just a phase. Mommy and Daddy were VERY cranky for a few days and it's hard not to take it out on each other when you're woken up throughout the night!  It is a really good thing that they are cute...

Since my last post we also took a roadtrip to my hometown with the babies, and they did really well. We're taking them to the Outer Banks in a couple of weeks and I just hope they do as well for that trip.

Serena also had her first laser treatment in late April. She did really well, didn't cry at all! You can't really tell in these photos, but her hemangioma is definitely starting to lighten up. She has another laser treatment in a couple of weeks.

Lately they always hold hands whenever they're next to each other. I tried to get a video of it:

Next up - that whole feeding thing, and beach trip!

Playing dress-up

Even though we don't really celebrate Easter or Passover, I wasn't about to miss an opportunity to dress the kiddos up! I found the most adorable dress (at Target!) and we ended up going over to DH's mother's house so her friends could all see the babies. Perfect opportunity to doll them up :)

This was the face Serena made as I was putting this ridiculous get-up on her.

It's like she's saying "What are you doing to me, Mommy?"

But it was worth it, she looked adorable :)

With her proud grandma (aka Gma)

And here they are together:



Milo's not so sure about all of this, but Serena obviously loves the attention. Good thing, since I plan to dress her up as much as I can before she starts to fight it!

In other news, the babies are 4 months old today. They had their 4 month check-up and vaccines this AM.  Milo weighs 13.3 lbs and Serena is not far behind at 12lbs. They are still tiny (10th percentile for weight), but they are growing and that's what matters.  Pedi said we can introduce baby food/cereal in the next month or so. Scary! Any suggestions on what their first food should be?