Sunday Sunday Sunday

Jake had a meeting after Church on Sunday so the girls and I hung out in the gym.  Scarlett saw a teenager playing with a ping pong ball.  She went over to her and asked "can I play with you?"  While they were playing I heard Scarlett telling her "great toss" "nice catch" "can you throw it high?" "amazing!"  haha!  She thought she was so grown up!  She even turned around to show the big girls her pig tails!  :-)

The twins are getting easier.  Especially now that they can sit and play (and eat) during church.  We've been using those baby food on the go packet things for church - they are awesome!  And since we do bottles, I don't have to take them to the nursing room.  In fact, Jake's been taking them for the last two hours.  I've actually listened to several lessons and felt the spirit!  :-)

Blood in Ear, Helmet Check Up, & lots of stories

The twins are starting to roll around with their heavy helmets and maneuver to get toys, and occasionally getting stuck under chairs... oh, and I noticed Jaide's top right canine is coming in.  Poor girls are cutting teeth all the time now!

Scarlett and I play "I Spy" during lunch most days (the babies are usually sleeping).  It makes me think of James every time!  ;-)  When it's my turn I'll start: "I spy with my little eye something that has a sun on it." "Where is it?" "Look in the kitchen."  "There it is!" but when it's Scarlett's turn it goes like this: "I spy with my little eye something that is a banana.  There it is! (pointing) I win!"  I don't stand a chance...

Scarlett and her BFF Kaylie...

Scarlett's favorite color is blue.  Right now loves blue play-doh, crayons, spoons, basically anything blue.  She asked us what our favorite colors are.  I said pink and Jake said blue too.  Well, she doesn't like the fact that he also likes blue.  She will often say "Scarlett loves blue.  Blue's my favorite.  Mommy loves pink.  and Daddy loves red.  Daddy doesn't love blue, Scarlett loves blue."  haha!  Apparently he was wrong about his favorite color!

Jake and Scarlett turned her bed into a tent...

This morning I was laying on the floor with the babies.  Scarlett when to the potty then came over to play with the twins and put her extra lotion on my arms (sometimes when she gets too much I will catch her wiping it off on the carpet.)  She was kneeling behind me and lotioning my arm.  Then she came around and bent down to pick up a toy.  The next thing I knew I had an entire face full of naked toddler bum!!!!!!  I guess she forgot to put her panties back on.  I guess the weather was calling for a full moon!!!

Her new shoes make her "run real fast" and "jump high high high"!  Right now Scarlett really loves her fishy shirt (thanks Aunt Christy!)

I took Scarlett to the doctor cause I noticed dried blood in her ear and she cried hysterically each time I tried to touch it.  I was worried that the ear drum might have ruptured.  The doctor said there was a lot of blood  in there but it looks like she just cut the inside of her ear canal somehow.  She gave me ear drops to help avoid infection as it healed.  Scarlett was soooo brave.  She only cried when the doctor looked in her ear.  We went to CVS after to get her medicine and so she could pick out a special treat to eat after I put in her ear drops.  She picked chocolate covered donuts and a blue Gatorade (all that formative time spent with Aunt Jami is apparent!)  The babies were home sleeping (thank you Laura Lowder for watching them!)  While we were waiting for the RX to be filled, Scarlett made a train with the baskets.  Then she used the handles as wings and flapped them like crazy - it was a flying train.  And yes, I ended up standing in one of the baskets during her flight "all aboard!"  Luckily the pharmacy staff thought she was darling and didn't mind that we were blocking their entrance.

The babies were crying last night and Scarlett turned to them and lovingly said "use your words."  So sweet!  At least we know she's listening to what we're teaching her (even if it doesn't always feel like it).  She also told me she was "too busy" to help clean up again and "too tired" to say the dinner prayer.  But we'll try and hold on to the little victories when we get them.

Scarlett asked me to give her a bottle occasionally.  She likes me to snuggle her like a baby.  The twins are really loving their new food routine.  I think that the formula fills them up a lot more than nursing.  Plus I can keep track of how much they've eaten.  Do you remember the pony tail holders I used on my wrists to keep track of which baby nursed on what side?  Well, they are coming in handy again!  I use them on the bottom of the bottles to keep track of who's bottle is who's (I'm not really concerned about germs, but I like to keep track of how much each girl ate).  We ended up biting the bullet and getting 10 of these Playtex bottles.  They were the best and even the twins would object when we used other brands/types.  Plus it's nice to have clean bottles if we forgot to run the dishwasher.  Also, Jaide no longer seems affected by the slimy foods.  YAY!!!  She dives right in to bananas and avocados with Siena.  I guess she was tired of waiting for me to feed her.  Whatever works!  :-)

  

The twins went in for their helmet check up this week.  They haven't grown at all.  Molly said she usually sees a lull in growth around this age.  I wasn't surprised cause they were the same size at their 9 month check up.  So we'll keep them on and hopefully they'll grow in the next few weeks.  She said that usually parents will stop the helmet therapy between 12-18 months because the head stops growing rapidly.  At this point they're heads probably won't get worse if we stopped, but there's still room for improvement.  I'm guessing we'll have the helmets for at least another 3 months.  So all you Utah folks will get to see their sweaty helmet hair!

And finally, we caught some baby giggles on camera a few nights ago...

We like tramps!

Trampolines, that is...

Jake and I have been eyeing this little gem at Sam's Club for a few weeks now.  After reading lots of great reviews and deciding that we were going stir crazy from the snow we decided to make the plunge.  Scarlett helped Jake put it together on Saturday and she's been jumping ever since!  The first night she told him, "my legs hurt."  I bet they do!  I'm excited cause now she'll have something physical to do while I run.  I taught her crack the egg and I've had way more fun on it then I thought I would.  

Jake in U.P. and Dad S. Visit

This last week Jake had a business trip up in the U.P. (aka Upper Peninsula of Michigan)  (aka basically Canada).  The last time Jake had been in the U.P. was during his mission, but this time was completely different.  There were about 25 people from the Ford Brake Engineering group that met up at a Continental (a supplier)'s winter test facility.  This is Jake's summary...

We drove up on Wednesday and arrived in Sault St. Marie around 2:30pm. The 4-5 hour drive wasn't too bad since we were rocking a company Lincoln - which included seat massagers! I dropped off my buddy and went searching for my hotel. Unfortunately, our car’s navigation was turned off and I had no cell service to look up the address on my phone. Fortunately, it was a very small town, so after a half hour of driving around I came upon the Holiday Inn Express where I had booked a reservation. I got up to my room and realized they gave me the honeymoon suite! In addition to the regular tub in the bathroom I had a Jacuzzi next to my king size bed. It was awesome and that night after dinner and watching my coworkers play hockey at the local ice rink I went home and watched some TV while soaking in the hot tub.

The next day we drove about 15 miles out of town to Continental’s test grounds. We were testing their ABS, Traction Control, Roll Stability Control, Electronic Stability Control. Basically, this meant jumping in a lot of different cars and driving them on different surfaces. To test their Traction Control I took each vehicle to a hill with a 20% grade. The left side of the hill was covered in smooth ice and the right side was bare concrete. I drove up the hill with my left tires on the ice and my right tires on the concrete. Then I stopped the car completely and started again to proceed up the hill. The traction control applies brakes to the wheels on the ice, which transfers engine power to the tires with grip. It was neat to see how well it worked.

They also had huge fields of ice where I was able to see how well the systems worked compared to when they’re turned off. Some vehicle did better than others and it really came down to the quality of tires they used. Next to the ice fields they had a big field of packed snow. I was told to get the vehicle up to ~60 mph and try to spin it out. With the stability control on I couldn't get it out of control. With the system off any little change in steering would cause the vehicle to go spinning in 360 degrees, which was kind of scary.  And fun!

The best part of the testing was when I got to take the cars out on their handling track. It was a 1 mile track with lots of twists and turns that was completely covered in snow. I was told to floor the throttle and not touch the brakes as I went through the course. All the systems working together would detect when I was about to crash and work the brakes and accelerator automatically to the best positions according to where I aimed the wheel to get me where I wanted to go. I really couldn't believe how well it worked! 

We drove home Friday morning. We were really worried about getting trapped in the U.P., because there was a big, impending storm heading our way. Luckily we got past the Mackinac Bridge before they closed it down for winds. (The Mackinac Bridge is the longest suspension bridge in the Western Hemisphere and a few years back the winds were so bad that an unlucky guy in a Yugo got blown right off!) The storm still hit us pretty hard. Some places had whiteout conditions and the road had plenty of ice. Luckily my buddy was driving cause he used to do all sorts of ice and rally racing. We almost ended up in the median once, but he saved the car and went home without incident.

A few weeks ago I casually mentioned to my folks that I was going to be alone with the girls for a few days (in my most pathetic voice) and my dad came to my rescue!  He flew in on Sunday then drove to Canada on Monday for a few days of work.  But he came back to our house on Wednesday, a few hours after Jake left, and stayed til Friday.  It was so fun just to hang out with my dad!  We went to the mall, to Sam's club, got snowed in, relaxed on the couch, watched Sherlock, ate out, and played with babies.  He took such good care of me.  I was taking large amounts of Benadryl (for my hives) so I was groggy and tired.  He woke up with the girls in the morning, changed them, fed them, and played with them so I could sleep in!!!  AMAZING!  Thanks for coming to my rescue daddy!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Allergies, again

So my hives are acting up, again.  I know it's only been a few days since the last hive post but they are seriously plotting against me.

They have been spreading all over my body.  All over.  Last Friday I woke up with the itchy little bumps on my arms, legs, torso, face, etc...  There are some places that are just too unsavory to scratch in public.  I called the allergist and they got me in that day.  I borrowed another lady in my ward (Sis Lewis) to help me with the girls at the appointment (it's a weird building and I wasn't sure how I would be driving while all "Jenadryl".)  The allergist said she really thinks that it's triggered by something inside my body.  She said she really doesn't know what's going on.  I am getting my blood tested to look at a few different things to see if we can learn more.  She gave me another round of Prednisone to help with this current break out.  Ugh.  She also gave me an anti-itch pill that knocked me out cold for like 12 hours (poor Jake!)  She said that it's not really advised to use it while breastfeeding.  Since we think that the hormones from breastfeeding could be the culprit, Jake finally convinced me to pull the plug (so to speak) and call it quits for good.  I know I've been weaning them for this exact reason, but it was so sad to put them to bed Saturday night without our little routine.  They seemed fine and it really wasn't a big deal.  But inside I was tore up.  But after lots of hugs from Jake and a long talk with Jami I felt much better (emotionally).

Physically though, the past few days have been reeeeaaaaalllllly uncomfortable.  Oh my!  Even deep breaths hurt my super engorged lady glands.  I've been using ice packs, Tylenol and when I just can't stand it I will even hand express some milk into the sink.  I have been so tempted to pump and dump, but I just know that will drag out the whole process.  Hopefully this won't take much longer... because ouch!!!

Right now I'm taking 8-12 extra pills per day just for the hives!  I've been on the Prednisone for just 3 days and the itchiness and swelling is already significantly better.  She put me on a longer dose this time (ugh) but hopefully my body will have a chance to recover after my milk dries up before I go off of them.  Stupid little bumps!

Yummy in my Tum Tum Tummy

A few weeks ago we had the missionaries over for dinner.  I was over by the sink when Scarlett said the prayer, but she made Jake and the Elders all hold hands in a circle!  Then she prayed "thank you for the mishernaries".  She was so cute and performed all her little tricks perfectly that night!  But when we were eating dinner (aka breakfast) she spit out her chewed-up bacon on one of the Elder's plates.  He said "do you want your bacon back."  "no, it's for you!"  We also had cinnamon rolls which she exclaimed were "yummy in my tum tum tummy!!!"

Jake came home from work to this:

I love this picture of Jaide relaxin' with her dad!  (yes, Scarlett hates to wear clothes... they are too difficult for her when she goes potty.  I'm just glad she's just wearing something!)

Scarlett told me, "I don't want my cereal.  It's too fluffy now."

Scarlett asks "are we going exercising mommy?"  This is what she means by "exercising."  Then she'll look over at me on the treadmill "mommy, go faster!"

I asked Scarlett to hand me a burp cloth, she told me "I can't.  I'm too busy right now."  Ouch.  I think that I might tell her that a little too often.

Scarlett loves to play with her friends.  She often will take them to her room and read them stories.

Scarlett caught me taking a picture of her and her train.  She ran over and made her fish face and silly face for the camera.

I caught Scarlett nursing her doll!!!

We had a child door knob lock on the inside of Scarlett's door so she couldn't get out of her room.  We finally decided that if she got out in the middle of the night she wouldn't get into trouble (ie: fall down the stairs or in a toilet or something) so we took off her lock.  The next morning I woke up to Scarlett standing next to me (freaky!) with ALL her stuffed animals with her.  Since then she's started getting out of bed at 7:30 (instead of 9am).  She's been eating breakfast with Jake and playing with him before work.  I'll hear her cry "don't go to work daddy!" when he has to leave.  Another morning I was really groggy due to late night Benadryl.  She turned on my light, came and pulled my covers off, and said "Mommy, don't close your eyes.  The sun is up, it's morning time.  You need to go feed the babies cause they're crying."  When did he she become the mom!?!?!?!?  Another night she turned our light on at 1am.  We both woke up abruptly and very confused.  I'm hoping that all these late night visits or early morning wakings are just due to the novelty of the situation.  Otherwise the lock is going back on her door!  (just kidding, but not really, but seriously...)

A cute video of the babies loving Scarlett.  They always seem to stop performing when I get my camera out, but I still thought they were cute.  Sorry my videos are super long.  

Whenever Scarlett coughs she turns to me and says, "I got the coughs."

Scarlett and I have been doing experiments.  She often asks me how things work.  I try to help her figure it out on her own whenever I can.  In this video she explains what she's learned.  (also, don't think I'm like a super star mom or anything, I just really want her to like science and math.  If she asks me any questions about history or politics she'll just get a blank stare).

Bottling Up My Emotion

I usually drink a Diet Pepsi Wild Cherry every day for lunch (for the antioxidants...) but for the last few weeks I've been drinking 3/day!  I realized that this increase in caffeine correlated with my increased dose of antihistamines.  They are supposedly "non-drowsy" but when you are taking a high dose they can make you fatigued.  Great.  As you may remember these drugs were supposed to help my hives calm down.  For the most part they've helped the itchiness be more tolerable.  Until last week.  I started waking up with red scratch marks all over and a few days ago I broke out all over my face/neck.  Yuck.  It hurts so bad and my eyes get so swollen.  This picture wasn't even the worst of it!  (and the shininess is from layers of Bag Balm).  Needless to say I've been taking it easy at home with lots of Benadryl, Pepsi, cortisone cream, and baggy t-shirts.

It was during this vicious break out that I had an epiphany: if the babies aren't growing on my breast milk and my body is really freaking out... then why am I still breastfeeding?  I LOVE nursing and I'm so grateful that I was able to nurse the twins for this long.  I know lots of twin moms who aren't able to feed two babies at all, let alone 9 months.  I think the girls have gotten the main benefit from the breast milk.  Plus, all the medicine and Pepsi probably isn't the best for their little bodies anyways.  So I've started weaning them.  I was planning on taking a month to reduce the feedings, but this painful rash has encouraged me to work at a faster pace.

The first few bottles I gave them I felt so sad, like I was giving up or letting them down.  But after seeing them adjust to the bottles and formula just fine, I've started to feel better about the whole process.  I still have some breast milk in the deep freezer that I need to use up, but I wanted to try formula first just in case they had a reaction then I could go back to the pumped milk until I figured it out.  But they seem to be fine with it.  Jaide sometimes takes a few minutes to start drinking.  Siena has no problem at all (surprise surprise *sarcasm*).  

I'm grateful that this transition is going smoothly thus far.  I'm down to only two feedings a day now (wake up, go to bed).  And you know what?  I'm liking the freedom.  We still have to figure out the little details but that's just trial and error.

I've also been feeding them more solids to help pack in the calories (plus they like eating!)  Bananas, bread, avocado, noodles, sweet potatoes, etc.  Jaide is hilarious.  She hates touching the sticky food - like bananas.  So I have to sit there and spoon feed it to her.  If I put bread and bananas on her tray, she will sit there and pick out the bread pieces and not touch a single banana!  Siena on the other hand just dives right in with both hands!

They are still sleeping for 12 hours every night (knock on wood) and 2-4 hours for their main nap every day.  Hopefully that means they're burning all these calories on growing nice and chunky! :-)

I just love these little boots!  Thanks Aunt Jami!!!  (yes I was taking a picture during church, don't judge!)

Quirky Girl

I've decided that Scarlett is our quirky girl.  I totally mean that as a compliment to her.  She is hilarious, creative, and a total goof ball!  She is always making us laugh!!!

She is really helpful with the babies.  The other day she wanted me to get her a snack.  I was sitting behind the babies so they wouldn't tip over (they are still a little unstable) and told her she would have to wait til I got up.  She then offered to hold them while I got her snack.  What a problem solver!!!

Jake has taught her how to help pop his back.  An enjoyable activity for both of them.

 We were at play group and I found the kids like this...

Every morning she asks me "where's Dad."  Every.  Morning.  I usually ask her "where do you think he is."  "at work"  or sometimes she replies "at scouts".  The other day she asked me "what's he doing at work?"  I said "what do you think he's doing at work?"  "umm... eating a pear."  haha!  Too true!  She watched him pack his lunch.  She's probably thinking that work is this awesome place where you go and eat all the snacks you put in your lunchbox!  

This is Scarlett dipping her pear in ketchup.  Gross.

She wanted a slice of bread.  I found her like this, she was "shopping."

Usually during bath time I run around and get things set up (pjs, water, clean up rooms, etc) while Jake bathes the girls.  He was finishing up when I heard Scarlett yell "we're ready for ya Jen!" haha!  That's what he always says!  

She's really into wearing my socks these days...

 Scarlett walked into the room dressed like this... "I'm a flower!"

When washing her hands the other day she told me there is a "big tank of water in the garage and it goes through the pipe to the sink."  Smart girl!  Not too far from the right answer.

She's pretty good at doing puzzles on her own.  I like to take them to church cause they are a quiet activity.

One day she told me "mom, the toilet paper's not going down the toilet.  It's stuck."  I went to see what was going on, she had unraveled and flushed an entire roll of tp.  An entire roll!!!  At first I was upset until I realized that she had gone #2 and probably was just trying to wipe herself.  Thoroughly.  After I cleaned up and changed her into some new panties we had a discussion about how we call for mommy when we make brown poop in the potty and mommy will come and wipe you.

So glad we have Marshall on a leash so he doesn't run all over the house.

Scarlett is very particular about her nighttime routine.  She likes to sleep between her lion and her teddy bear with Marshall hanging on the bed.  I have no idea why she likes him watching her all night, it creeps me out!

"umi-goggles on!"

"mommy, I'm takin a nap in my nest."

I found her doing this the other day...

Courtney reminded me that I should get some video of Scarlett singing her favorite songs.  Unfortunatly this was right when we got home from church so she's pretty tired (especially since she got a huge goose egg from a train thrown at her in nursery from the same kid who clobbers her each week.... ugh).