16 Months - 8 Weeks

Kyra and Paige are now 16 months and 8 weeks respectively and it's just amazing how fast they're both growing and changing! (Well, they're both changing but Paige is definitely doing more aggressive growing at this point.) Kyra is still very much in love with her little sister and loves when we let her "hold" Paige (with some grown up help of course.) Paige gets more kisses and cuddles than she'd probably like, but we're just happy that Kyra doesn't show any signs of being jealous of little sister.
Kyra's language skills are growing by leaps and bounds. She still doesn't have a huge amount of spoken words but she's on par for normal. She says Dog, Dad, Food (Boof), Mama, No, Up, Echo, Duck, Papa, More, Done and Go. She makes cat, dog, elephant, cow, duck and car noises too. Her signs though are what are really expanding her vocabulary. She's constantly wanting the signs for new words and she's using them to communicate with us. She does please, help, up, baby, thank you, milk, more, drink and done and is working on some new ones and she'll string together two and three signs in a row to get her point across (like Help, Please, Milk.) She doesn't have any new teeth yet beyond the front eight, but we can feel the bumps where she's working on her premolars and I would guess that when those do start coming through they're going to come fast and furious! She had her first haircut yesterday and did VERY well for a 16-month-old (from what I know of children's haircuts at least.) Her hair was just so much longer on the sides than the back and so many different lengths that it was getting tangled too easily and taking too long to fix in the morning (20-30 minutes a lot of days and that usually wore on my patience before hers even.) We went to a place called "Little Clippers" on the advice of a friend who gets her little girl's hair cut there and it was great! They cater specifically to kids and most of the "chairs" are actually little cars on hydraulic lifts. Kyra was a little too nervous to do a car by herself so she sat in an adult chair (they have one or two) on Dad's lap for the cut. Julie who cut her hair was very nice and Kyra watched a movie and played with a basket of toys while it was being done. She did NOT like the blowdrier so we stayed and played on the climbing toys for a few mintutes after the cut so her hair could dry and Julie could trim the little straggles that were left afterwards. They gave her a certificate for her first haircut with a lock of her hair attatched and a balloon which she didn't find all that exciting until we got home. Now she has a very cute little bob and just looks so grown-up! If you live in the Portland area I HIGHLY reccomend checking out Little Clippers for your little guy's haircuts. They have one in Clackamas where we went and another in Lake Oswego and are very reasonable price-wise too.
Paige is changing every day too. In the last week her personality is just blossoming and she's smiling, cooing and laughing a lot. She really loves riding in her stroller, especially if Dad is pushing. She looks up and grins and makes faces at him. She's going to be rolling over before we know it, she's already close and can go from side to front/back or from back/front to her side but can't quite get all the way over. She's discovered her teddy bear and decided that he's a pretty interesting fellow. He doesn't have a name yet. Since Kyra's bear is just "Bear, or Bear Bear" we should probably get a little more creative on this one. She's going to outgrow most of her 0-3 months clothes here pretty soon and she hasn't even worn them all yet since we've had so many nice days and there were quite a few warm outfits in her hand-me-downs. She's wearing her first 3-6 month outfit today and it's not even that big on her!

Something Odd...

Anyone notice something funny about the new pictures?

Mum's Day

On Sunday, Phil took us up to the zoo! It was BUSY, much more so than last year on Mother's Day. So busy in fact that, since the parking lot was full, they were shuttling people from extra parking to the zoo on buses. That was sure fun with the double stroller, but it worked. :) We had lots of fun seeing the animals but didn't quite get to all of them because Kyra was wearing out. Both girls conked out in the car on the way home so we skipped lunch out so they could have their nap.
On Monday, Paige was officially 6 weeks old!! She had her first ever bottle of expressed milk and did great with it, gulped down all 3 1/2 ounces! Now if we can just get her to KEEP taking an occasional bottle, maybe we can leave her for more than half an hour before she's 8 months old! She's just changing so much already. She's SO strong and has great head control, maybe even better than Kyra did at this age. She loves watching the butterflies on the swing and riding in the MeiTai. She's so alert and is always watching everything around her. She has the prettiest eyes and they're always busy.
We were at the grocery store today and one of Phil's co-workers recognized Kyra and I and stopped to see the new baby. She said Paige looks just like Phil! I think it's extrememly funny that I said Kyra looked just like Phil and everybody said no, she didn't. However, Paige looks just like Kyra did as a newborn (if you don't believe me I can show you pics side by side) just with less hair and everyone swears that Paige is just the spitting image of Phil! I see a lot of their Dad and a little of me in both of them. :)

Grocery Store Survival With Two Under Two

The concept of "running to the store" no longer exists for me so it's a good thing Phil works there because otherwise I'm sure we'd end up with some pretty interesting dinners when a necessary ingredient was left out because it just wasn't worth the trip to the store. (Like the other day when I was debating about what I could use to frost Paige's 1 month birthday cake that didn't contain any butter.) If we don't need milk or diapers, I don't go to the store until we have a decent sized list going. I thought I'd share just WHY that's the case when dealing with our two little angels by telling about our shopping experience yesterday (the first one out with both girls since the grandparents left.) This was a GREAT shopping trip mind you, about the best I could hope for. We go shopping in the afternoon after nap and lunch are out of the way normally. We try to shoot for being done shopping right around four when Phil gets off work so he can help us get stuff into the car and then into the house without having to hang out there too long after he's done working. I started getting the girls ready to go at 1:00p.m., shooting for leaving at 3:00 since we didn't have too long of a list today. We pulled out of the driveway at 3:40. Other than being late however, we were in pretty good shape. Both girls had been changed, the baby had been nursed and Kyra had a snack. The grocery list was totally written and I made sure I had my wallet and crackers in the diaper bag in case Kyra got the munchies. The strategy for getting out the door is to put Paige in the meitai, grab the diaper bag, pick up Kyra and check to be sure she's still wearing two shoes and then grab the keys with whatever spare fingers I can find to lock the door before getting them each buckled in their seats while Kyra is reaching over trying to tickle Paige. Upon arriving at the store (right next door mind you) I have learned to park beside a cart return that has carts in it. Then I get out, grab a cart and after checking to be sure it has BOTH ends of the seatbelt buckle intact and no bent or stuck wheels throw the diaper bag in and put the buggy-cover on before getting Kyra out and buckling her in before getting Paige out to buckle her in the meitai. Once in the store, departments are hit by priority and temperature. If there are diapers on the list, that's first, otherwise it's just a matter of getting through everything as fast as possible in hopes of finishing before anyone melts down. Then there's the "mommy moments" that I still haven't gotten over yet. According to my mother, my memory and better reasoning skills are never coming back. For example, yesterday I found myself standing in the popcorn aisle staring at two kinds of microwave popcorn and wondering which had less calories, the kettle corn 100 calorie mini bags or the buttery 100 calorie mini bags... Thoughts like this make shopping interesting to say the least. Then at some point Kyra will see Phil down an aisle usually (she's always looking for him at the store, even if he comes with us) and will spend the rest of the trip going "Dad? Dad! Dad, Dad, Dad.." until locating him again. Also, when shopping with two under two, at least, with OUR two under two, every third person in the store stops to chat. They ask how old the girls are, comment on how cute they are or, and this is my VERY favorite (sarcasm implied) say "Boy, you've really got your hands full!!" As if I didn't know. Kyra's newest shopping trick is to wait until someone who's had the audacity to pass by us without stopping to wave or comment and then suddenly SHOUT at the top of her lungs, just to see them jump. So once we've finally knocked out all the room temperature groceries on our list and gotten the last of the cold items in the cart, there are usually one or two things I'll notice we've forgotten and have to run back for as fast as possible while Kyra is turning around and banging on whatever frozen items she can reach and thereby thawing them out that much faster. By that time Phil is almost always off work (since we never make it to the store as early as we're hoping) and he entertains Kyra while we finish up and check out. Checking out usually takes a while too because the cashier feels compelled to visit with Kyra, ask how old the girls are and of course let us know that "You guys really have yoru hands full!" Once we have made it back out to where the car is, I unload and strap in the girls, starting with whoever is the LEAST cranky (they were both actually pretty good yesterday) while Phil gets the groceries in. At home, I UNload the girls while he starts bringing in the stuff and then I work on getting the frozen stuff put away first and then the cold stuff while the girls fuss and then hand Kyra a snack and a drink in her superyard before grabbing the baby to feed. I'm lucky if I get the room temp. stuff put away by bedtime and about the time the last things are in the cupboard is when I'll realize that I've forgotten at least ONE thing that was on the list. Yesterday it was potatoes. Guess we won't be having potatoes again until NEXT week. :)

Both Ends of the Chart

The girls both had appointments with Dr. Byrne (their PCP) today. Kyra's was a 15 month well-check to check on how her weight/growth rate was doing and she had a couple vaccines due since she's on a little more spread out than normal vaccine schedule. She weighed 20lbs 4oz, is now 30 inches tall and has an 18 inch head which puts her between the 5th and 10th percentile for weight (back up in the "normal" range) and between 25th and 50th for the other two. Paige weighs 11lbs 7oz (exactly two lbs more than at birth but she did have a SLIGHTLY wet diaper so we'll see what they say about weight at her appt. tomorrow), is 22 inches long and has a 15 inch head which puts her at about the 95th percentile for weight, between 50th and 75th for length and right smack dab at 50 for her headsize. I just find it funny that one of our girls is just barely hanging on at the bottom of the normal range on the weight chart and the other is almost falling off the top! They did both have very nice, healthy looking growth curves today though. :) Dr. Byrne is still feeling a small click in Paige's hip so she'll be having an ultrasound for that and at the same time they'll check her renal system as renal problems are sometimes associated with aural microtia (the official diagnosis on her ear.) She is also now officially referred to go see a geneticist regarding possible causes/complications related to the microtia and to see the ENT that the pediatric audiologist suggested who will also want to schedule her for a CT scan on her ear. Once you add in to that the early childhood intervention appointment we're waiting on a call about and her regular well-baby/vaccine appointments, that poor girl is going to be booked up for months to come!