A little late but here is Morgan's seven month photo:
She is saying "mom" and "dada" now and scooting/rolling/backwards crawling all over the place. She can't Pampers commercial crawl yet but she is trying sooo hard. I call it "rev the engine" when they rock back and forth and try to will their body to move forward. She is such a sweet baby. Knock on wood, but she's slept till at least 5:30-6:45 the past week or two. Not having to get up at 4 a.m. is a game changer. I am feeling so much better!
At the well child check up, we learned that they are still little squirts. Brooklyn is 14th percentile for weight (25 lbs 8 oz) and Bailey was in the 18th percentile (26 lbs). Height was a little up in the air as its rather difficult to measure toddlers. They actually shrunk according to the last appointment so my guess is that's not very accurate but it places them under the tenth percentile for height. Consider Morgan's been in the 90th, she is going to pass them up for sure! She was 18 lbs at six months so they aren't even that far apart in weight.
I feel like we are all settling into a routine now that Morgan is sleeping through the night (most nights) and I've been back to work for three months. Our routine is based on total chaos but it's manageable. And crazy. But wonderful.
We try to really take advantage of the weekends and week nights and do fun outdoor things while the weather lets us and it's still light before bedtime. For the most part, it hasn't been a problem. I always wear Morgan in the baby bjorn and as long as she's fed, she is a happy little girl. I stopped breastfeeding a few weeks and am now loving the freedom that comes with formula. I feel good about the time I put in, but I simply couldn't do it any longer. Mamas that make it the full year, I salute you.
So to successfully do any outing (anything more than just a walk or quick park visit), there is so much prep that goes into it. I have to make sure we have the fully loaded diaper bag with snacks and sippy cups, spare clothes, wipes, diapers, a thermos with hot water (Morgan will NOT drink room temp formula), bottles, formula, a cup to pour the water into to heat the bottle, diaper rash cream, etc. And then you get all the coats/sweatshirts and boots/shoes and socks and hats ready. Don't forget the chew toys for the baby and the princess movie DVD for the toddlers. Etc. Etc. Etc. Writing this I feel like it probably doesn't sound like much to pack. But I swear it takes like an hour to get everyone ready and everything packed and out the door. I guess when you factor in keeping three kids alive while packing everything you can see where it gets more complicated. But we've done a lot of fun things this fall so it's all been worth it!
Here's a few things we've done recently:
Took Morgan swimming! And of course, comparison photos for your enjoyment. B&B were probably just a little younger the first time we took them swimming. Morgan lasted about two minutes before she started shivering. She sat with my sister in dry clothes while we played with the older girls. But look at how cute they all are! (Brooklyn in pink, Bailey in R,W &B, and Morgan in the yellow and blue.)
Darren teaches guitar to his girls.
Morgan falling asleep in the Baby Bjorn. Isn't she just perfect?
Had a night out with my sister at GARTH BROOKS. It was amazing.
Twin group outing at Patterson's farm!
All three girls at the pool.
I love this picture
Boo at the zoo. Look at those happy faces!!! ahahaha
Basic toddlers!
Watching Frozen for the first 500th time.
MetroParks
Pajama Saturday
Twins in a corn maze
Mapleside
I cannot do justice to how excited B&B were when we put Morgan in this doorway jumper. Every time Morgan does something new or uses a new baby contraption, B&B lose their mind. They are obsessed with their baby sister.
Apparently Mapleside has the longest slide in America. Darren liked it! B&B were stunned.
Just so cute
Sorry, Bailey. Mommy is such a Harry Potter nerd, especially after i reread the books on maternity leave. Sent this to my sister when she wasn't responding to my messages. The unforgivable curse for you Aunt Katie!
Morgan is 17 lbs 6oz (70th percentile) and 27.25 inches (92nd percentile). At six months Brooklyn was 14 lbs 15 oz, 24.75 inches and 15lbs 6 oz and 25 inches for Bailey.
She had her shots today (4 total including the flu shot) and she is not a fan of shots poor thing (who is?). We took B&B in to get the flu shot too. If you've ever take three kids under age three in for a shots, you may feel my pain.
Morgan is such a strong baby. It's interesting to see her hitting all the milestones so early after having preemies. She is already sitting up for a couple minutes without any support. She is always rolling and scooting and is this close to crawling. She is crawling backwards a little too. But by Christmas for sure.
She is finally sleeping through the night most night. Generally from 8 to 6:30, though she usually does have the random cry wake up in the middle of the night (the kind where I wake up, hesitate, debate on getting out of bed, and she stop just as I pull the covers back. Every time!). She still has some random nights where she doesn't sleep great (like last night for example) but overall I feel human and not exhausted every day. I mean, I'm still guzzling coffee. (Side note - graham latte from Starbucks is a tiny piece of heaven.)
Morgan's been eating solids for about a month. So far she's had squash, sweet potatoes, apples, carrots and cauliflower. Going to try eggplant and peaches next. We are only at once a day (she's still spitting up a lot and hit or miss with the feedings).
She is the most mellow happy baby ever I think. What a sweet baby girl.
We started her on baby food. Mixed up some butternut squash that I cooked in the crockpot (thank you Pinterest) in the baby bullet (yeah I'm THAT mom that makes all the baby food). Morgan wasn't feeling it though. Might be a little too early. She only just turned five months. I tried it a second time but she still wasn't that into it so I'll try again in a couple weeks.
Brookly and Bailey, however, lost their shit. Their little toddler minds EXPLODED with excitement. They went crazy wanting to feed Morgan (which we let them. Poor Morgan got a little bit force fed by over eager toddlers) and it was an adorable sister moment. Brooklyn was DEVASTATED when it was time to stop feeding Morgan. We had to show her that she could pretend feed her baby doll. I have never seen B&B so engrossed in an activity before. They were hyper focused on feeding their babies for a half hour straight and would have kept going if we didn't have to finally put them to bed. Very cute moment though.
I am actually still breastfeeding but I've cut down a lot. It was just too hard to pump at work. I started pumping just once a day at four months (supplementing with formula for the rest of the feeds) and dropped all day time pumping at five months. So I'm only BFing at night and in the morning. Morgan was STILL NOT SLEEPING THROUGH THE NIGHT which was making me pretty tired, but she's actually (knock on wood) had an awesome streak of a week and a half where she's gone from 11 to 6 am, and some of those nights she's even gone 8 p.m. to 7 a.m. when I wake her up for daycare. So if she could keep this up, it would make me very happy!
We also let Morgan try out the baby swing at the park. I made up my mind at work that I would put her into it and then Googled it to see if I was a horrible parents. Seems like baby swings are made for 6 months plus but a lot of people put their babies in starting at four months. So we did it. Morgan seemed to really like it!
There is a beautiful sunflower field (prayers for Maria) created as a tribute/fundraiser for a little girl who died of cancer. It's free and open to the public (with donations welcomed).
We took all three kids there and had a really nice visit. Pictures and videos below. Warming that they are melt your heart adorable. Brooklyn and Bailey were running through the sunflowers holding hands and giggling like crazy. Enjoy!
The girls just started climbing into each other's cribs. This is how we are finding them sleeping in the morning:
They haven't gone over the side yet but it's been a close call. I bought big girl bedding and know we need to convert the cribs soon but I'm trying to buy us a little more time. Not ready for my babies to be growing up! (Okay, I'm really not ready for my babies to change their now smooth bed time routine. Mommy desperately needs that!)
Watch these crazy 2 year olds climb back and forth in their cribs:
Morgan is strongest baby ever. She rolled over tummy to back at 4 weeks and back to tummy at 3.5 months. She is also starting to sit up (with the boppy). What a contrast to my preemies!
It's been a busy August. Being a full time working mommy with three little ones at home leaves little time for much of anything so project blog hasn't been updated in some time.
Anyway we've had a few recent big adventures!
First, my sister got married! Brooklyn and Bailey were flower girls. They did really well for only being two. Did they make it down the aisle? Yes, with assistance. I carried Bailey and Darren held Brooklyn's hand. They were so freaking adorable. We handed off all three kids to Darren's parents after the ceremony and had a much needed adults only, open bar celebration with a hotel room to our very own. It was my second favorite wedding I've ever been to (I am biased with my own wedding as the best!). Congrats to my sister Katie and new brother Tim!
Twin survival get together, Twinsburg Twins Day and camping: We had another twin survival get together with our twin parent friends (pic below). It is such a great group. We also made it out to Twinsburg for the second year in a row and camped with our a couple and their kids from our twin group. It was so fun. We left Morgan overnight with my parents (this was my first night away from here, followed closely by my second night for my sister's wedding) and it was really nice for B&B to get our full attention. I think I had the most fun playing with them in the campsite pool that I have in a long time. Also, setting up tents with four toddlers running around was interesting. It was definitely a little more challenging (but also more fun) than last year.
Went back to work on Monday. 12 weeks seems way to little to leave a baby but what can you do? I know she will be in good hands with her sisters at daycare but I would feel much better about it if she were a little older. I cried on my drive into work but I really did miss my coworkers, adult conversations and my work. So it's nice to be back to work, though I wish I could be home at the same time if that makes sense.
We had some trouble getting Morgan to take a bottle at first. I waited till 7 weeks to give her one and she really didn't like it at first. I've been giving her an occasional bottle at home and mixing in a little formula here and there with the hope of her sleeping a little better. I guess she's been taking her bottle with the sitter okay. She's drinking only 2-3 oz at a time every couple hours, which is probably about how she was feeding at home. I probably started a bad habit of feeding her when she woke up (eat, play, sleep cycle) but also feeding her again to get her to fall asleep.
I've been debating stopping breastfeeding but am keeping up with it for now. My goal was to make it through maternity leave and now that I've passed that I can't decide. Sometimes I think it would be a lot easier if I could have her on formula. It's hard to nurse a baby when you have two toddlers that need you too! So I'll see how that goes. For now I am nursing when she wakes up, pumping three times at work (which may be an issue once I am ramped up back on my accounts and super busy), nursing at home at night and topping her off with a little formula before bed and then doing one last pump around 10:30. I have plenty of milk stored up in the freezer and I am pumping 13-15 oz during the day at work which I sending with her to daycare. After having horrible supply issues last time around this is a nice change. I pumped 7 oz at 9 am this morning which is my personal best even with twins. I feel ridiculously proud of this, ha. Motherhood changes you!
Morgan is sleeping pretty well but unpredictable. She goes to sleep around 8 or 8:30 and wakes up anywhere between 3 and 7. Luckily when she does wake up super early, she'll go right back to bed after a feed. So by text book definition she is sleeping through the night (defined as only 7 to 8 hours) but waking up at 4:30 a.m. to feed her on my first day back at work hardly felt like sleeping through the night to me! Thankfully the past two nights she has slept till 6:45 when I had to wake her up for daycare. I am so beyond tired. I would love to just sleep for a week straight. I know it won't always be like this (and someday I will miss it) but I am dragging right now. Coffee is my best friend.
Morgan is such a sweet baby girl. She is already laughing out loud. I am amazed at how big and strong she is compared to her preemie sisters. At this rate she'll be walking next month!
