Thursday, June 25, 2009

Holly, Liam, and Megan Update

Holly, Liam and Megan visited the pediatrician today for their 6 month well visit. All are doing fantastic.

Holly: Perfect! Still the peanut of the group. She's weighs exactly 2 lbs. less than Megan. Doc said that she has the red bumps on her lower gum line where her first teeth will be making an appearance within the next month or two.

The exciting news with Holly is that she is now getting up on her hands and knees and rocking back and forth, just ready to go. It won't be long before she's crawling. If her favorite Kangaroo toy is across the room and she wants it, she'll find a way to get to it in no time at all. She has mastered rolling, pivoting, STRETCHING out her long arms and scooting to navigate the floor.

Liam: Doing great! Megan surpassed him once again in weight, but that was no surprise. The growth of his head is well within normal range and is following the growth curve appropriately. Liam is still not bearing his weight on his legs yet, but the doctor wasn't very concerned at this point. The doctor lifted him up, and Liam is doing a stepping motion, which is good. I guess if he didn't do that, then the doc would be more concerned. For now, we're just supposed to keep an eye on his progress. His muscle tone in his legs is not as defined? developed? as his sisters, but still falls within the normal range. You can also see his two bottom front teeth just below the gum. Shouldn't be long before those teeth pop right out!

The exciting news with Liam is that he has begun to show his first baby sign: milk. At first I thought it was a coincidence, or that he was just scratching at his shirt or bib, but now I'm pretty convinced that he is trying to communicate with us. He will sign milk when the bottle is in his mouth. He has also signed milk when I was feeding him peas and he wanted his bottle. He looked right at the bottle, and did the sign for milk. It's absolutely amazing that someone so small can already begin to communicate! I'm a BIG fan of baby sign language, and have been extremely pleased with how signing worked with Bridget, and now with the triplets. BTW, there's a video of Liam signing "milk" on my Mobile Me Gallery, the link is at the right.

Megan: Wonderful! Megan is the heaviest of the bunch, but we knew that would happen. She usually eats the most at each meal, and she wiggles around the least. When she's put on the floor, she will maybe roll to the left, back to center and roll to the right, but that's about it. She's content to just watch Holly and Liam play. When we were in the waiting room, I noticed that Megan's right foot seemed a bit odd looking. There seemed to be a bump on her arch. We showed the doctor and he said that the bump was actually a muscle, and that her muscle was really developed probably because she curls her toes tightly. Pair that with her crazy double-jointed right elbow, and the doc said she seems to be favoring her right side. Again, nothing to worry about, just something to keep an eye on over the next couple of months. We never noticed that Megan favors the right side, but then again, we weren't looking out for it either. During the rest of our stay in the office, she definitely looks to the right more than to the left, but I doubt there's a problem. She turned to the left when I called her. She watched Bridget when B was on her left side. The doc also said Megan's probably not moving around as much as the other two because her muscles aren't as developed enough to carry her weight around. (Poor Meggie...our little fatty!) Again, he said she's fine and there's nothing to be concerned about. In fact, he said they've thinned out quite nicely since their 4 month visit. Megan also has the swollen gums, and doc said she'll probably have 2-4 teeth before her 9 month visit.

Overall, I'm really trying NOT to compare the babies. It's pretty hard though. I think it's instinct: when one baby rolls you work a bit harder to get the other two to roll. Or when one baby signs, you work a bit harder to get the other two signing. On the other hand, it's fascinating to watch three babies who are growing up in the exact same environment develop at different rates. Nature vs. nurture at its finest.

It's getting rather fun around our house now. The babies are moving around and interacting with everyone. Bridget is playing with the babies. Shawn and I are in a routine and more is getting done. Life is good.

Sunday, June 21, 2009

HAPPY FATHER'S DAY!

Happy Father's Day to all the fathers out there!

If you would like to see the videos that I made for Shawn check out:

http://www.me.com/gallery/#100355 for Bridget's video and

http://www.me.com/gallery/#100349 for Holly, Liam and Megan's video.


Also, poor little Scout has been recalled already. Nothing major...there's stickers on his paws that they're going to replace with embroidered paws. So I guess Liam's getting a brand new Scout in August. I'm guessing Violet's release is going to be delayed as well.


Saturday, June 13, 2009

Best Toy Ever

So, I'm on the LeapFrog mailing list because Bridget's Tag Reader connects to the internet to track her progress. Anyway I got an email awhile back announcing their new toys Scout and Violet. So I checked out their website, and fell for these cute little puppy toys! Check out the link and watch the video or play the music.

Then a little while later I came across a coupon for $3 off a LeapFrog toy, and you know how much I love coupons! One day I ended up in Toys R Us, and there was Scout on the shelf calling out my name. So I bought him right up!

The cool thing about Scout (Violet hasn't shipped to the stores yet) is that you can personalize it with your baby's name, favorite color, favorite animal, and favorite food. There's tons of items to choose from. I kid you not, edamame, bibimbap (what the heck is that?!), Yakisoba, and quiche are favorite food choices. As well as everybody's favorite animals: alpacas, bugs, earthworms, loons and sloths. So I chose: Liam, blue, moose and sweet potatoes as Liam's favorite things. Moose won because that's his favorite toy. Now Scout sings about all of Liam's favorites. He also spells out his name in a song. Pretty cool! You can change your selections anytime. The puppy hooks up to the computer with a USB cable.

Now, previously I've been a big fan of Baby Tad, because it will play up to 6 minutes of bedtime music. My babies have learned to fall asleep within 6 minutes (sometimes 12 minutes) of being put down thanks to Baby Tad. Scout tops Tad. You can select 5 of 30 daytime songs and 5 of 30 nighttime songs to load onto the doll. And you can change the songs anytime. At bedtime, you have the option of playing 2, 5 or 10 minutes of music. Now the triplets are drifting off to sleep with 10 minutes of peaceful LeapFrog bedtime melodies. Ahh! Sweet!

Oh yah, my Baby Tad link isn't a bad link. It looks like LeapFrog only sells the Spanish version of the toy now. I meant to link that.

Now if anyone wants to get Megan and Holly their own Violet I'm sure they'll love it! I heard she arrives on June 17th.

Monday, June 1, 2009

Strollerbago Walk to Walgreens

We had Kaitlyn and Ann spend the night last night because Tina and Dave were in Hawaii for business. Well, I guess Dave was there on business...Tina got to relax! Anyway, Sandy, Kurt and Morgan brought the girls over at about 5 pm last night and we all had dinner. Shawn and I caught a glimpse of what daily dinners were going to be like in a year or two. Boy was it LOUD! Kaitlyn, Bridget, Morgan and Ann were all talking, yelling, singing and copying each other. I'm sure they were all excited to see each other, but darn it if they can't burst your ear drum! 

After dinner they needed some outside play time. So Kurt and I supervised KBAM while Sandy and Shawn stayed in and supervised HLM. I had fun watching the girls play. They rode vehicles: bikes, trikes, caterpillars, scooters, cars and trucks. They drew with chalk. They tried to hit the wiffle ball. They played on the slide. They had running races pretending to be all sorts of different animals. Twas nice. 

This morning, Holly was up at 5 am wanting milk. She's usually the late sleeper, so I was kind of bummed. I stayed up late, and was dragging at 5 am. Good thing she's a fast eater, b/c we were both back asleep by 5:20. The 5 other kids all woke up at about 7:30. I managed to get KBA fed and dressed before Tina and Dave came to pick them up at 8:30. 

Shawn is in Washington DC today and he took the van to the airport, so I'm sorta stranded at home. I decided it looked pretty nice outside and figured I'd take the kids for a walk to Walgreens. It's not that far from our house, and the weatherman said it was supposed to rain all day, but there wasn't a cloud in the sky right now. SO...it takes me maybe 20 minutes to change diapers, and load everyone into the stroller. Still not a cloud in the sky. We get going, and all the babies seem content. Bridget is having fun finding things of every color of the rainbow. All's well. I get to the Walgreens parking lot and remembered that I didn't bring my debit card! The only way to rent a movie is with a credit/debit card, and I just grabbed a handful of cash as I left the house! No rental for me today! Bummer!

Oh well! Let's make the best of this! We'll go see what Walgreens has to offer inside the store. Uh, wait, the stroller's not making it through the door! At least I'm not holding anyone up. Ok, let's back up and try this again. It looks like I SHOULD fit through the door. Yep! Sure can, but it's a tight squeeze. Those wheels have to be perfectly aligned to fit through the door.  Once inside, everyone's checking out the  huge blue stroller gang roaming the aisles of Walgreens. Some were brave enough to make a comment too. "You sure are busy, aren't you?" "Wow, that's a lot of kids." Ok, I'm getting used to the comments now, and I'm getting used to ignoring them too!

So what did we end up getting? A 30 pack of black/blue/red pens was on clearance for $1.52 (I think).  I bought a pack of these pens when they were $3 and I thought that was a steal. Shawn thought they'd be really crappy pens, but they're not. They write really smoothly! I also picked up a 30 pack of mechanical pencils for $3. We'll see if they're as good as the pens. I got a wrist teether thingy for one of the babies. Then I needed a drink, and I got B a pack of Skittles since she had been behaving most of the morning. 

When we leave the store, I notice a huge patch of black clouds to the west of us. OH NO! Wonder if I can walk faster than the weather will travel?!?! Bridget wants to walk instead of ride, and I'm ok with that since I want to tire her out, but she does slow us down a bit. After just a short amount of time, B decides she wants in the stroller because she can't seem to walk and eat Skittles simultaneously. Yeay, that works out well, since off in the distance B and I both hear the thunder rolling. So now that everyone's in the stroller, I really start to power walk. The thunder is getting louder and louder, and I haven't even reached the entrance to our subdivision. Let me tell you, pushing that stroller with 60+ lbs. of babies in it is quite a workout!

When we get to our block, we begin to see flashes of lightning. It looks like we'll make it though before the rain comes down. I get to the garage, and now I have to unload everyone. Holly first because she's beginning to fuss. B stays in the garage watching the other two. I put Holly in her crib, and grab Liam next. He's a happy boy as usual. He LOVED the walk. Got him in fine. As I'm coming down the stairs to get Megan, I feel the first raindrop. I tell B to make her way to the house as more rain starts falling. She's a bit reluctant b/c of the rain, but I tell her, "I'm carrying Megan in, you have to go up the stairs by yourself." So she does. And Megan and I only get a bit wet on our way inside. But no more than a minute later and it really starts to downpour. Really big drops too! I thought it was hail at first, but it was just really big drops. 

Whew! We made it! Everyone's down for a nap. Holly's still fussing, I can hear her playing with her kangaroo toy. Bridget's laying in her bed watching the Jungle Book on my iPhone. I hate using the TV to babysit her, but sometimes Mama just needs a nap too! I'm glad Shawn's only gone for 2 days, because I'm exhausted already!

Free First Monday of the Month Redbox Rental!

Use the code FM63H7 to get a free Redbox rental today, June 1st. Movie is due back by 9 pm tomorrow night. You can rent and return from ANY Redbox---you don't have to return to the same Redbox that you rented from. Very convenient! The code is good only once per credit/debit card. 

As always, leave a comment if you do rent a movie. Tell us all what you rented and if it was any good.