The "medium car"

Kevin's car is in the shop this week for some minor repairs so he's got a loaner car in the meantime.  The loaner is a Toyota Camry which, being neither too big nor too small, Daniel has dubbed the "medium car."  He's very excited about the medium car and looks forward to being driven to school in it in the morning and to play in it in the garage in the evening.  Who knew something so minor would be so exciting to a preschooler?  Alas for him, the repairs probably won't take more than a few more days.  I suspect there will be many tears when we bid the medium car adieu and bring Kevin's car back home.  Till then, the medium car is being thoroughly enjoyed at this house!

Rebecca: 11 months "Not yet...but almost"

Hard as it is for me to believe my baby is less than a month from her first birthday.  Is she a year old yet?  As Daniel would say "not yet, but almost."

She's still enjoying crawling around the house and pulls up to standing.  She isn't really cruising yet but I've seen her stand unsupported a few times.  Walking is coming soon, but whether "soon" is next week or in 3 months I don't know.  It'll happen in due time.

One interesting difference I see between her and Daniel is that as he'd reach a few mobility milestone he'd take advantage of the ability to explore the house, while Rebecca uses it primarily to reach me.  She does explore too but it isn't her primary motivation.  She does however enjoy "dancing" to music:

And climbing the stairs:

She also likes to walk by pushing her dino toy.  Daniel loved it when he was that age too.  When he got bigger we turned it into a scooter and between his use and hers it's lived in our living room for the past 2 1/2 years.

All that moving around gives her quite an appetite.  She nurses 3-4 times a day and gobbles up plates full of solid food.  Sweet potatoes and peas are still favorites but over the past week she has enthusiastically eaten ravioli, roasted radishes, rutabaga fries, Brussels sprouts, pineapple, salmon, and pinto beans.  Dinner time is easy-I just make a plate for her of whatever we're eating and cut it up into smaller bites.

We had a 2-day nursing strike recently that worried me but fortunately was short-lived.  I think teething was to blame.  Whatever it was about, it's over now and all is once again well.  Between that and her waking at night for 2 nights in a room it was an unusually difficult week for her.  Before that I literally can't recall the last time she had woken up during the night.  Fortunately it wasn't the start of a trend.

In general she's still an excellent sleeper.  She usually sleeps from around 8:30PM-8:30AM and takes 2 naps a day.  Her first is usually late morning/early afternoon for about 2 hours and the second if it happens is around an hour-90 minutes in the late afternoon/early evening.  I suspect in the next few months we'll drop the later nap but we'll do that on her schedule.

She was a little clingy to me the past few weeks, probably because Kevin was unavailable for about a week between having the flu (and thus being quarantined away from the rest of us by me) and then traveling for a few days.  It's possible the nursing strike and night waking were related to that as well.  But then, I'm sure her newfound mobility is both exciting and scary too so it could well be related to that.

She hasn't been weighed since her 9 month checkup but it's safe to assume she's still on the light end of the growth chart.  She still fits 9 month clothes pretty well.  She's got 6 teeth now-2 bottom, 4 top, and just cut a 3rd on the bottom too.

She looks a lot like Daniel did at this age.  I thought she had a little more hair than he did at that point but on closer look maybe it's just that hers is a little redder and his was more blonde.  Here's her latest car seat picture:

And here she is in her Christmas outfit:

It's been a fun first 11 months with her.  I can't believe that by the time we unpack our Christmas decorations again we'll have a 4 1/2 year old and an almost 2 year old.  Time to start putting bricks on their heads to keep them from growing up ;)

"We match!'

Daniel says and does all these funny things and I need to be better about capturing them before the phase passes and I forget.

Lately Daniel likes to find something he has in common with Kevin or me.  For example: "I'm brushing my teeth and you're brushing your teeth.  We match!"  He notices "matches" on hair and eye color, food we're eating, even the position our feet are in.  It's cute how proud he is to notice things like that.

Here he is on a recent Friday when everything was closed down because of the ice storm, aka "Icepocalypse."  I knew he'd be home from school that day and that Kevin might be at work so I woke up early to get a little time-sensitive work done before the kids woke up.  Alas, Daniel bounded downstairs right after I turned on my computer, so he grabbed his "laptop" and sat down next to me so we could match!

Rebecca: 9 months

This last month has been an eventful one for Rebecca.  It occurred to me recently that she's now at least 41 weeks old so I've known her longer on the outside than the inside.

She's graduated from the scooting "army-crawl" she was doing last month to the faster hands-and-knees crawling.  She's pretty proficient at it but unlike Daniel, she isn't really eager to use her newfound mobility to explore.  She crawls to get to a toy, book, or person that catches her attention but doesn't often crawl just to check out her surroundings.  She's just as curious as he was but expresses it by being a careful observer of the people around her.  She really studies faces closely and is especially interested in people who wear glasses.

Shortly after she started crawling on hands and knees she also started pulling up to standing.  I first saw her do it at the kitchen toy she and Daniel play so often with.  It's perfect for that-heavy and low to the ground, so it can easily support her weight and keep her balance.  She also started doing it in her crib, leading us to adjust her mattress height to the lowest setting.  She's not really cruising yet but she keeps herself balanced well on two legs.

Speaking of the crib, she's still a great sleeper and napper.  Sometimes getting to sleep takes a back seat to testing out her newfound crawling and standing skills though!

She loves to eat too.  She still nurses 3-4 times a day and also eats about 3 solid meals a day.  She's a bottomless pit of hunger and enthusiastically enjoys sweet potatoes, fish, pureed spinach, turkey, and oatmeal.  

And as we discovered thanks to Daniel's eagerness to help, she also eats Goldfish.  I had just given him a cup of Goldfish then when I turned around he was standing by Rebecca saying "here you go!"  I went to help thinking she might choke on it but to my surprise she was happily chomping away.  (Though I did warn him to ask Mommy and Daddy before feeding her anything else!)

She's got 2 new little top teeth to do that eating with now.  As with the bottom teeth, these broke through fairly uneventfully.  She was fussier than usual but still pretty mellow and amazingly, no drooling.  Daniel was such a drooler I feel like he had to wear a bib almost constantly through the second half of his baby year but Rebecca has never needed one.  If you didn't know how easy she usually is I don't even think you'd pick up on the fussiness.

You'd think all that food would be plumping her up but she weighed in at a light 13lb 3oz at her 9 month check-up and is still firmly anchoring the low end of the growth chart.  Her pediatrician is satisfied though, as I am, that Rebecca is a healthy size for her.  She eats well and is perfectly healthy and it seems that small babies just run in our family.  Fine by me, as it means they're lighter to carry around ;)

She's not super chatty, preferring to observe rather than talk, but she does babble a fair bit.  She also likes to communicate by happy little squawks and enjoys making a game out of taking turns doing it.  She'll play with me but her favorite playmate for that game (and just about anything else) is Daniel.  She adores her brother and watches him with fascination.  For the most part the feeling is mutual and he seems happy to have an increasingly interactive playmate, though he isn't always eager to share his toys.

9 months in our sweet baby girl is such a fun, easygoing little personality.  We love our "Baby Rebecca" and the joy she brings to our house!

"My hugger and kisser are broken"

Whenever something doesn't work Daniel says it's because it needs new batteries.  Even if the thing in question doesn't even use batteries, like a toilet or the garage door.  And after bathtime one of his favorite games to play is for Daddy to lay on him like he's a pillow then act surprised when the pillow starts wriggling around.  The broken pillow then needs new batteries so Kevin makes a big show of "unscrewing" the battery cover on Daniel's hip and putting new batteries in.

A few weeks ago I asked him to give me a goodnight hug and kiss and he said he couldn't because his hugger and kisser were broken and needed new batteries.  So now every night we have to put new batteries in him before we get our hugs and kisses.  Also needing batteries in order to function: his "good morning" and "goodnight."

I have to write these little funny things down to capture them so I don't forget them as he gets older.  Daniel is such a clever, entertaining little guy.  It's hard to imagine our little Energizer bunny needing batteries though!

And, a few bonus pictures:

Dressed as Woody the cowboy for Halloween

I think this is what the kids call a "selfie":

Daniel's surgery

Blogger ate my earlier draft so here's take 2:

At his 3 year well check-up Daniel's pediatrician noted that he had very large tonsils and referred us to a pediatric ENT doctor.  The ENT recommended removal of the tonsils and adenoids to help Daniel's breathing and sleeping.  

We debated about it for a few months.  On the one hand, he wasn't visibly suffering.  He doesn't really get sick much and other than snoring and heavy breathing the large tonsils didn't seem to bother him, so why put him under general anesthesia for elective surgery?  On the other hand, we know how essential restful sleep is for a growing child so knowing that he was snoring and possibly even suffering from sleep apnea concerned us.  His teachers had commented on his heavy breathing as well.  And our friends whose kids had had their tonsils removed all said their kids had had dramatic improvements in their sleep, breathing, and energy after their surgery, but the older the kids were when they had the surgery the harder and longer the recovery, so we could see that if we were going to do it it was better to do it sooner than later.

Finally we decided to do it.  We scheduled the surgery for October 11.  My mom came up from Austin to help watch Rebecca so we could focus on Daniel.  He was excited to have her here and the night before the surgery she got to watch his swim lesson.

Daniel couldn't eat the day of the surgery so we did our best to stuff him full of food the night before with a Fuzzy's quesadilla and some treats afterward.  We worried he'd wake up too late to early but early enough to have time to kill before the surgery but luckily he woke up with just enough time to get up and get in the car.  We let him wear him pajamas so he'd be comfortable.

We got to the hospital, which specializes in pediatric day surgeries, and waited to be called back to the pre-op room.  Daniel was given some "silly juice" to mildly sedate him.  It made him pretty wobbly and he couldn't stand up without support.

After the silly juice had worked its magic a nurse came and took him to the back where he was put under general anesthesia and taken into surgery.  Our wait between leaving him and getting to see him again post-surgery was probably less than an hour but it felt longer.  After it was over the doctor met us to confirm that the surgery had gone well.  He noted that Daniel had a lot of blockage in his airway and that he expected Daniel to breathe much better afterward.  A little later we were called back to see Daniel in recovery.  He was pretty tired and obviously still feeling the effects of the anesthesia.

After some popsicles and juice in the recovery bay it was time to go home.  For the next few days he ran a fever on and off, an expected side effect.  We had him on Motrin round the clock to help with the fever and inflammation.  He didn't complain much during the day but he was pretty listless for the most part.  He was tired and didn't have much of an appetite.  At night he woke up screaming several times a night and had to be comforted.  The fever ran its course within about 5 days but the listlessness and lack of appetite persisted for over a week.  I think it was partly that his throat was hurting but also an unfortunate vicious cycle of not eating so not having any appetite and so not having the energy to eat.

He wanted to be held a lot which is definitely unusual for him.  He napped in our laps for hours at a time.

But sometimes he'd want to play and show no signs that it was bothering him.

We kept him home for the most part that first week.  He tried school for a few days but didn't stay long either day.  He even had to miss his school's field trip to the pumpkin patch which he had been looking forward to.  But his teacher got him a pumpkin anyway and he enjoyed decorating it.

We had been told to expect the recovery to take 10-14 days and it definitely took until then for Daniel to get back to his normal self.  Since then we can definitely tell he is breathing more easily and not snoring anymore at night.  As time passes we may see improvements beyond that; it's too soon to know right now.  He had his follow-up checkup yesterday and the doctor said his tonsils have healed well and everything looks good.  We're glad it all went well and hopeful that the improved breathing and sleep will bring further improvement.

Rebecca at 8 months

What a busy month this has been for Rebecca!  Several noteworthy developments to report.

First, she seems to be going through a growth spurt of late.  She nurses as often as she gets the chance and has decided her favorite place to nurse is in the tub during her evening bath (I sit in the tub with her).  And she has quite an appetite for solid food too.  Sweet potatoes and oatmeal are the favorites so far but she also likes bananas, eggs, and yogurt.  She seems to have 3 stomachs: one for milk, one for sweet potatoes, and one for anything else.  Even when she's full she can find room for sweet potatoes or to nurse a little more.  She seldom takes a bottle, since I'm usually home to nurse her, but she'll take one well when it's offered.

She's still got just the 2 teeth so far but she may be working on some new ones.  I can't feel anything cutting throught right now but I think she's got a top tooth or 2 coming along.

The second big development came just in the last few days.  She has learned how to army-crawl scoot her way along the floor to reach a desired person or toy.  She's not particularly fast yet but I suspect once she realizes that her new skill lets her explore her world she'll get better and faster at it.  She seems quite proud of herself in the meantime.

She continues to be the mellow, agreeable, happy baby she's always been.  The very first night after she was born she woke up once in the night and after nursing fell asleep in my arms and slept there comfortably for hours.  A little food, a little cuddle, and she was content.  That first impression proved to be a very good predictor of her personality!

She babbles now too-not a lot, but she likes to say "babababa".  And she likes to make this smacking noise with her tongue too.  Very cute!  She's generally a quiet baby, content to observe rather than talk.  She's got a sweet little laugh, which Daniel is adept at drawing out of her.  

She adores him and loves when he plays with her.  He also likes to help feed her and while I'm not sure much of the food actually makes it to her, she loves the attention.

Playing together:

She's also fond of our cat Todd and will always turn to watch him if he's in the room.  Here she is yesterday morning when she heard the jingle of his collar when I went to get her from her bed.

Here's her 8 month car seat picture:

And in her Mickey and Minnie Mouse outfit: