Reverting back

 When the girls had hit their three-month mark, I was ecstatic because they were, at that point, sleeping up to 9, sometimes 10 hours at night - straight! That meant that mommy would be able to sleep for around 8 hours straight again, in between giving the girls their last bottle at midnight, cleaning up afterwards (including dinner dishes and the girls' bottles) and then getting ready for bed myself, sometimes including my shower for the day, and before waking up to warm up their bottles to feed the girls at around 9 or 9:30 the next morning. Sometimes I would get up as the hubster left for work to wash up for the day and have some toast for breakfast before the girls would wake up.

It was nice.

And then... somehow I suddenly find myself waking up at 6 again. What is going on? Have the girls gone backwards? Is this the new stage, at month four, when suddenly they are awake longer, and rather than making all the new awake hours during the day, they want to start really early?

Not so nice.

I'm still giving the girls their last bottle at around 11:30pm or midnight and putting them to bed. Except now instead of sleeping STRAIGHT through until 9, they are waking up earlier. For some reason, it's usually Charlie first. She'll wake up at around 6 or 7 and start her baby talking and gurgling. It would be cute if mama had been sleeping for more than 5 hours. I'll get up and give her her pacifier and she'll lay all still and quiet as if she was drifting back to sleep. I don't know if she does because by then I've already crawled back into bed and passed out because I was only half awake before. About 15 to 30 minutes later, repeat, except this time I'll re-wrap her in her blanket. Some time will pass... could be as little as 5 minutes or as long as another 30 or so. And then this time she'll yap and babble on and on and wake up her sister and 1) either they'll both start yapping away, or 2) her sister will be so irritated at being woken up that she'll start crying. I usually try to keep them in their crib until at least 8am. Sometimes they'll both fall back asleep until I wake them at around 8:30 or 8:45 (which is when I prefer to feed them) and sometimes they won't go so quietly.

As hard as people say having a baby is, it's not that bad. Unless you have more than one. Which I do. And then I say, gosh if I only had one, how easy that would be!

But then I can't imagine not having both of these girls.

Even if I'm super tired.

Official new phase

 We have officially moved the girls to their next big phase in life: solid foods. Well, it's not exactly "solid" but you know. Oatmeal. For babies. Completely watered down with formula. And so...

It was a fail. Both made faces and spit it out, repeatedly. Oh wells, it was expected, but I've got to admit, I was almost sure that at least Charlie would take it well the first time. We'll try again later, but for now, the girls eagerly grabbed their bottles and drank away.

Milestone: 4 months

 We've hit that next milestone in my new life: the girls are now FOUR MONTHS old! I'm a proud mama.

Things I looked forward when reaching 4 months: we are hopefully out of the colic field, in case the girls were to develop it (or if they did, they are well over it by now). Also at 4 months, their tiny little bodies can now digest things other than milk/formula, like water. So we can give them tiny amounts of chamomile tea to calm them in case they get a bit too fussy... :)

New developments that I am so happy to witness include the smiling (although that occurred at 6-8 weeks) and the laughing (a couple of weeks ago), the baby talking and cooing (at about 2 months), the sleeping through the night (at 3 months), sucking on their thumb - or index finger - to self-sooth (3 months), the trying to hold their own bottles (a couple of weeks ago), and as of a couple of days ago, the girls... Well, particularly Lily, not only tries to hold her bottle, but if it gets taken out of her mouth, she'll try to put the bottle back in her mouth - which she actually did a couple of nights ago.

photo courtesy of Sam

Just yesterday as I was feeding Lily on the bed, Charlie started getting fussy (who had first feeding) so I held Lily's bottle in place with my chin while I leaned over to try to put Charlie's pacifier into her mouth. In the process of doing so, the Lily's bottle slipped and fell, upright, onto her lap. Seeing that it wasn't going to topple over and start dribbling all over the bed, I continued to get Charlie to latch onto her pacifier when out of the corner of my eye, I saw the bottle moving. I looked down, and saw that Lily had one hand under the bottle, one hand on the side of the bottle, and was trying to lift it up back into her mouth. Mama is so proud!

I've also been noticing that it seems like the girls are more aware that there is another baby next to them. Before, I don't think either one was fully aware that they had a twin (although fraternal) sister always by their side, until now. I notice the girls looking at each other and sometimes it seems like they're chatting away together in their cute little baby gurgle. Sometimes they'll turn and see the other one, and smile. 

Recently, I've also been seeing the girls really aware of their surroundings and wanting to reach out and purposely grab something like their toys. They girls had always grabbed onto their blankets and towels - I think because it was there and something to hold onto (although Charlie likes to grab her blanket and pull it up over her face), but now it seems like they grab with intent. Toys, they always just pushed around because it was an object, but now it seems like they know it's a toy. I love these "realization" moments.

Also for their 4-month milestone... the girls went in for their 4-month Well Baby exam which included measurements of length, weight, head circumference and their second round of vaccines.

Getting ready to go to the doctor

Lily: 23" long (11%) and 11 lbs 0.2 oz (6%)

Charlie: 24.5" long (64%) and 12 lbs 7.3 oz (26%)

My girls are growing! Charlie is nearing the average size for a baby her age, and Lily has made it onto the percentile chart! What a relief.

The girls' pediatrician, Dr. Lowe (whom I really like, which is important) said that since the girls have hit 4 months now, they can start to be introduced to solids: slowly we can begin giving them rice cereal, then pureed stuff like veggies and fruits and the other baby food stuff. I'm excited that the girls are at this stage yet freaked out at the same time because... I wonder how hard and how long it will be to try to feed two babies food not just in a bottle? But I guess one thing at a time. Dr. Lowe said that the girls can be strictly formula for up to 6 months of age. I won't wait that long. I'll give it a try. I wonder when the girls will start teething? They've been drooling a lot, but who knows - little nephew Darren has been drooling forever and at 13 months old now, he still hasn't cut his first tooth!

And then the doctor appointment concluded with the impending needles. Each of the girls got one vaccine orally and three shots into the thigh. They were regular-sized needles, not baby needles. They looked giant being stabbed into my sweet little 11-pound baby's leg.

The nurse administering a shot while daddy holds Lily's legs

Charlie's sad sleepy post-vaccine face

The last vaccine at 2 months left Charlie slightly feverish while Lily was fine, but this time around, Charlie was fine and Lily had a fever of 101F as of 1am. We gave her some baby Tylenol and a cool wash cloth for her forehead. She woke up a few more this in the middle of the night but she seems to be getting better; the last temperature check was 99.9F. A good sign! And she's eating again.

Happy four months, girls! 

Next milestone: 5 months? 6 months? Their next Well Baby doctor visit is 6 months so maybe I'll set that as the next milestone.

Lily laughs

Lately it seems as if the girls have been trying to laugh. Last night as I was walking by the mirrored closet doors, I stopped to let Lily look at herself and get her to smile as she always does. She had such a big grin that I started bouncing her up and down and saying, "Who's a happy baby?" because she truly looked like she was in a candy store or something. And then she started laughing. After a couple of times, I finally remembered to go and grab my phone to try to capture her laughing. She kind of did it a little bit more - not too much, but enough to get the gist of it.

Meanwhile Charlie has started developing this whine. Not quite crying and not quite baby-talking, but more like a whine. A grunting whine. Not very pleasant...

And still they grow

Sometime last week as I was feeding Charlie, her eager hand rose and she placed it against the bottle as usual, except this time, I let go. My baby girl was holding her own bottle by herself. I love these moments.

The Beginning

 

It all started on a cool Saturday evening in May 1996. We were sophomores in high school and were attending the Spanish Club bonfire, which was strange because I wasn't in Spanish Club - I wasn't even taking Spanish. But most of my friends were so oh well.

Fast forward 11 years - yes, 11 years - to April 2007 to a very lovely (I may be biased on the "very" part) Saturday evening... it had been an overcast day but at least it didn't rain, considering the evening was spent outdoors!

And then... fast forward 4 years after that to a Tuesday morning in June 2011... the last time it would be just us 2-1/2 (or should our German Shepherd be a full count?) and would forever be us 4-1/2 (or 5).

There are TWO babies in there!

So that's where I'm at. Started dating my now hubster, Kyle, at the age of 16, got married at age 27 and had twin baby girls at age 31. Sounds all very planned and "on track", but it all came as a surprise nonetheless. I went from thinking only of academics and a career as an architect to now being a stay-at-home mom... what do I do now?Taking it one day at a time...

- Posted mobily (please excuse the typos)