Things You Did Today 2

The babies were safely in their high chairs, so I turned back to the stove to whisk our cream of wheat.

honk

The neighbor must be locking her car.

honk...........honk. honk....honk.... honk.honk.honk.....honk

Slightly annoyed, I opened the door to find the source of the noise. Nothing. Back to the kitchen.

honk....honk...honk..honk......honk. honk.....honk

At this point, I was thoroughly annoyed.

honk....honk..honk..honk

Imagining this going on for the rest of the morning (and the dog barking at the noise the enire morning), I started to consider calling the police to complain.

honk...honk....honk...honk

ARGH!

honk..honk

I turned to look at the babies and noticed.... hey, Veda is holding my keys.

And pushing the buttons.

21 Months Weigh-In

This week Veda and Linus went back to the pediatrician to get an official 21 months weight on the books. (A 21 months appointment is not part of the typical pediatric protocol, but our pediatrician requested that we make one. So no, you didn't forget to schedule one, winky face.)

The results?

Mr. Linus is up to 23 pounds. The nurse didn't do a length measurement, but according to our growth chart, he's at 32.75 inches. No concerns about Linus. His weight is in the 3rd percentile, but being that that's still within the range of normal and he's maintained his approximate position on the curve for a while, no big deal.

Veda was up to 18 pounds, 13 ounces. I was feeling pretty good about it while we waited to speak to the pediatrician. But then here's an overview of how that conversation went:

Dr. B: (same practice we usually go to, but not the ped. we see most of the time)  Hi, I'm the third pediatrician out of the last three pediatricians you've seen who are worried about Veda's failure to thrive.

(insert boring conversation about Pediasure/Pediasmart here)

Me: I'm all for addressing something that's a reasonable concern, but is it possible that she's just small? I didn't crack 100 pounds until I was in college.

Dr. B: It isn't just that Veda isn't on the chart, it's that she's so far below the chart and so far below the curve she was on when she was an infant. I want to send her to a gastroenterologist to run some tests. I'm concerned that she may have malabsorption issues.

Me: How invasive is this testing going to be?

Dr. B: I think they'll start with some bloodwork. If she tests positive for celiac disease, they'll want to do a biopsy through a colonoscopy.

Me: When you say malabsorption, what exactly are we talking about?

Dr. B: There's a wide range....

At this point he suggested cystic fibrosis, which he also benignly suggested as a condition that would require treatment for the rest of her life. Well, uh, yeah. FORTUNATELY, I'm not having a big 'ol freak out about that one because *phew* one of the many, many, many tests that were part of the IVF process was testing to see if either the husband or I are carriers. WE ARE NOT. I like this doctor, and I think he's a good doctor. But I do think that was pretty insensitive to suggest. He's human, though, and I guess everybody has verbal missteps sometimes.

So we're going to see a pediatric GI specialist for testing. Dr. B got me to agree to it with the dangly carrot of seeing a dietition while we're there. I like the idea of seeing a dietician because it checks something else off the list of BUT WE'VE DONE ALL OF THIS STUFF TO ADDRESS THE PROBLEM, and between the anemia and failure to thrive, my confidence in my ability to meet my children's nutritional needs is a little on the sorta shakey side.

Future Veda, when you read this, I want you to know that I'm really, really sorry to be putting you through all of this poking and prodding. It just kills me to see the puckered look you give me when you get stuck - the look that says, "Why are you letting this happen? I trust you." We're doing this because we need to be sure. It would be awful, terrible, horrible to get years down the road and find out that you had some untreated condition that affected your development.

You should also know that you are getting to eat lots and lots of ice cream.

Things You Did Today

This morning while I was getting Linus dressed, Veda discovered the small box of doughnuts the husband had left on the back of the couch when he went to bed. I found her with two doughnuts in her lap, exactly one bite out of each one. She was savoring a piece of glaze left on her lip, her expression tied up in the way pretentious people do when talking about wine. The best part is that as I approached, she actually picked up the doughnuts and handed them to me.

A Portrait of the Artists at 20 Months

As of last week, the husband has finally arrived home from The Year in New Mexico. To celebrate, we took a little trip to the beach and stayed at a resort with an indoor water park. Let me tell ya, for people with small children, it's pretty much the best thing ever. An added bonus: I think Veda may now be over her fear of all bodies of water that aren't her own bathtub.




It's Veda with me IN A SWIMSUIT. Am I the bravest woman in the world, or what? (Never mind that it's from the back and I'm wearing a skirt.)




Linus building a sandcastle with Daddy


The last couple of months have been, true to what all of the experts say, a language explosion. They say lots and lots and lots of things now, and their signing has also picked up. Not only are they saying more in general, they're also talking to me more about things that aren't going on in the immediate present (Linus especially), so it's fun to get to hear what they're thinking about. By the way, what they're thinking about is often a train. Choo choo!

Most of their speech is still limited to single words, but every now and then a short phrase will come out. When the husband got home and handed a new toy to Linus, Linus said, "That's cool!". He's been saying it ever since, and according to Linus, just about everything at the beach is cool.

Back to the signing - I am more and more glad that I decided to do ASL with them. How amazing is it that at not even two years old, they're already bilingual (more or less - they know the signs for most of the words they speak)? Being a bit of a language enthusiast myself, I've gotten hooked on learning ASL since we had such a positive experience with the baby basics. I'm looking forward to using finger spelling as they begin recognizing letters and learning to read since it will reinforce and enhance their learning.

Books are still a favorite activity, but their interests in that area have changed a bit. They're now less interested in books with stories (though they do still have stories they love to hear again and again) and more interested in books with word labels and "Can you find the ________?"-type books. They love sitting in my lap and finding all of the bananas or airplanes or cows on a page.

They're also art enthusiasts now... crayon and play-doh media mostly. Every morning we crank up our kiddie music station on Pandora and get down to the important work of dancing, coloring, and sculpting balls and snakes. Things often go downhill after they decide to do a play-doh tasting. They know they aren't supposed to eat the stuff, so they'll start out by sniffing it. Then when they think I'm convinced they're just smelling, they'll do tentative licks. This quickly advances to full-out bites. I'm pretty sure that most kids taste it once and decide that it's horrible. Nah, not mine. They'd eat the whole jar if I'd let them.

Veda is on her way to being ready to potty train. I'm still reading up and deciding what strategy I want to use. As a first-timer, I'm extremely intimidated by potty training. I'm sure than in retrospect, I'll laugh at myself for how worried I am about getting it right. In the meantime, though, I feel like I need to have a thorough plan since I'm doing this with two of 'em. As much as it freaks me out to think about both of them potty training at the same time (which I think is entirely possible since they do EVERYTHING at the same time, by their choice), I know that Linus hasn't shown many signs of readiness, and it hurts me to think that he's going to feel left out. With all of that said, it may still be a couple of months before we officially start with Veda. I just know that when I little lady starts telling you what's in her diaper, she's close.

Good News

All of Veda's tests came back within normal limits, so HOORAY! The pediatrician is satisfied for now, but wants to reevaluate at 21 months. In the meantime, I've got orders to give her Pediasure. Since I'm me, though, I searched out an organic alternative - Pediasmart (which he approved). Drink as directed? Ha! Not our little Veda. But she's very polite about it. She'll take the sippy from me, taste it, and then "absent-mindedly" leave it somewhere around the house. I don't think it's because the stuff tastes bad - she's just never liked ANYTHING except for human milk and water. Seriously, I have the only kids on the planet who spit out juice. Next up, I'll try a smoothie with strawberries and bananas. That goes with chocolate, right?

Several people have asked me what failure to thrive is. Dr. Google has plenty to say about it, most of it scary, of course - that is his way, after all. As our pediatrician put it, it just means that she isn't growing like we would expect her to. And bless the man for telling me that it's no reflection of my parenting. Even though I know that in my head, it still feels good to hear it.

18 (19) Months Well Appointment

First, the stats:

Linus: Weight - 21 lbs., 10 oz. (5th percentile)
          Length - 32 in. (25th percentile)

Veda: Weight - 17 lbs., 10 oz. (Not on chart)
           Length - 29 3/4 in. (5th percentile)

Both babies are meeting all of their developmental milestones on or ahead of time, for which I'm very grateful. Let me say that again - I'm VERY grateful. We got lucky with these two, I tell ya.

Physically, well, we're still deep in Failure to Thrive territory. I think that if you'd never seen another 19 month old, you'd look at Veda and think she's the pinnacle of health. She's energetic and clever as can be. But... she's so tiny. I suspected that at today's visit we'd get some orders for testing, and *sigh*, I was right. As much as I hate to put her through it, I know that it needs to be done. Today she gave a urine specimen at the pediatrician's office. Perhaps you are wondering how such a specimen is obtained from a little one, and the answer is URINE BAG. The nurses strategically tape a bag around her girly bits... and then we wait. And in our case, we waited... and waited... AND waited. Veda was extremely curious about what THAT thing was, but she did NOT have to pee, by golly. We pushed her sippy, washed her hands, and even stood her up in the sink with water running around her legs, but still NOTHING. What finally worked? The been-there-done-that nurse on staff put a warm bag of something (?) next to her bladder under her diaper. Ta-da! I've never been so glad to see a bag of piping hot urine.

The urine sample showed traces of white and red blood cells. That could mean that she has a chronic UTI (which can be a cause of Failure to Thrive), or it could just be some irritation due to the method of collection. The lab is going to do some further testing to decide which one.

We've also got orders to do some lab work at Children's to test for a whole slew of stuff.

75% of me (the calm, rational part of me) thinks that she's just an itty bitty thing, and that's just how she's meant to be. I mean, have you seen me? I'm not exactly robust.

25% of me (the crazy mama bear part of me) is scared. I'll leave it at that.

As for Linus, the pediatrician is slightly concerned that he's dropped fairly significantly in weight from his curve on the chart. I think it's just because he's an a-mile-a-minute toddler. Nonetheless, he shall also be tested for anything that Veda tests positive for, just in case.

Sorry that there aren't any pictures with this post. Alas, my camera is still with the Mr. in Albuquerque. I shall definitely make up for the last month's lack of photos when it returns.Bwahahaha!

A Portrait of the Artists At Seventeen Months

A few things:

The pacifier only comes out at nap time and bedtime now, but when one of the babies is upset now, the other will search out a paci and put it in the crying twin's mouth. How sweet is that?!

Remember Linus telling the dog to shut up? That still happens sometimes, but now they're both shushing her. Veda even leans down to do it. It's incredibly cute.

A few weeks ago, they became little furniture-climbing monkeys. This means that all of my out-of-their-reach safe spots are now not-so-safe. Other parents of twins used to tell me this got easier. They were lying liars who tell lies.

I've said before that we're immobilized by their mobility. It's so hard to go anywhere, because all they want to do is run away. If there was only one of them, it would be manageable, but with two running in two different directions, it's dangerous and exhausting. I'm looking forward to them figuring out that they need to stay with me.

A few weeks ago I brought the basketball pump inside so that I could add air to their inflatable bouncy pony. Turns out that it's the greatest toy ever. It now lives in the toy basket.

Linus is such a smart little guy. Every day he takes on these little projects with objectives that aren't clear to anyone but him. He'll grab a couple of objects and work on fitting them together, tapping them... it's a process that takes a while, and if there's an interruption in his work, a tantrum ensues.

The Little Engine That Could has finally been overthrown as official favorite book. The new reigning favorite? Olivia goes to Venice. Veda brings it to me approximately once every fifteen minutes. I'm not sure that they're old enough to get the dry humor of the Olivia series, so it must be the artwork. And they also enjoy the "bong bong" sound effect near the end.

Speaking of humor, Veda now laughs in all of the right places in Blue Hat, Green Hat. If we're reading it at bedtime, she'll take the paci out of her mouth, laugh, and reinsert it. Ha!

Linus's kisses used to be bites. Now they're licks. Eh, at least they don't hurt anymore.

They're more into dancing lately. The dancing involves a combination of wiggling and spinning. Yeah, it's pretty cute.

Both babies have become more interested in "helping" me, Veda more so. They love putting their toys in the toy hammock at the conclusion of bath time, and I always get lots of help when it's time to transfer the laundry from the washing machine to the dryer. Veda brings me a kleenex if I tell her I need to blow my nose. This is actually quite helpful, as my nose runs like a spigot in the morning thanks to all of the allergens out here, and inevitably I'm nursing Linus when it happens.

It's hard to believe that they're seventeen months old - that's almost and year and a half! I hate that this is all going by so fast, but I'm also looking forward to the eighteen month mark, when apparently a whole new world of stuff will happen.