9 month update

I’m going to keep this post photo-heavy and light on words. I’m already over a week late posting this and the 10 month update will be here before we know it!!

9 months – they’ve flown by in the blink of an eye!

And this has been quite an eventful month! We drove back to Austin for my little sisters’ wedding the last week of March. It was so fun to have time with family and get to spend Easter together (first time in 6 years!!) We also got to have the babies take bluebonnet photos – again, its been 6 years since we’ve been in Texas during bluebonnet season in the Spring (usually we go for visits during summer and winter). Check out the photos!

Easter:

All time favorite photo!!! Sooooo adorable!

Playing with toys from their Easter basket – little bunny rubber-duckies

Girls with their baskets from Mom and Dad (they also got baskets from their Grandma and their Mamaw – Chris’ mom & my mom – spoiled little girlies!)

Tasting the Easter egg! We filled various eggs with rice, dried beans, raw nuts, etc. (anything to make noise), then supervised as the girls used them as rattles – shaking them to make noise. I like the idea of giving the girls toys and books, etc., rather than candy for Easter. This year they’re too young to eat candy anyway, but I think I’d like to keep this tradition. It makes easter-egg hunts interesting (what am I going to put in the eggs when they get older??), but I definitely want to try to raise the girls with a healthier outlook on Easter than what is “traditional.”

Bluebonnets:

First, some disasterous photos that I had to share because they were too funny! I had this idea in my mind – I wanted to have little naked flower-fairy photos. I got the girls these red sparkly wings and skirts. I had white bloomers to cover their diapers, and I thought about draping long pearls around their necks.

Well…. then this happened:

haha! Chris had packed the bloomers elsewhere so we couldn’t find them for the photos, we had no pearls, and the girls were NOT happy about the whole ordeal. We thought maybe they’d do better with Chris and me holding them. Ummmm….then their wings just blended into our shirts and it was still a pretty terrible photo…

First family bluebonnet photo – March 2013

Luckily, we were able to get a couple precious photos of them in the bluebonnets in their pretty Easter dresses – a MUCH better option compared to the naked flower fairy photos, lol!

Brooke on left, Bailey on right. If you notice the red mark on Bailey’s forehead, its from her helmet (which we removed for photo purposes, but was replaced promptly afterwards).

Bluebonnet photos – March 2013

And now to the meat of the post:

Baby Stats:

• Weight: The girls just had their check-up today where they were weighed so this should be accurate! Brooke =  14 lb. 4 oz. Bailey = 14 lb. 12 oz.
• Height: Brooke & Bailey =  26.5 inches (both the same)
• Clothing Size: Although the girls can still fit into some 6 month clothes, we’ve been transitioning into all 9-12 month stuff. Some of it is still a  little big, but they can grow into it. We got so many new clothes when we were back in Austin (Thanks Monica and Mom!) that its time to clear out some of the old stuff to make room for the new. Their drawers are overflowing right now!
• Diaper Size: They can technically still fit into size 2 diapers (according to the weight recommendations), but they’re getting a little small (TMI alert!!! The way I can tell when its time for a larger diaper size is that every time they poop it ends up as a blowout. every.time!) We just bought our first pack of size 3 diapers and plan to finish up using the size 2 ones that we’ve got, then making the switch to size 3.
• Nighttime Sleep: Sleep, sleep, sleep. I remember hearing from Mom friends that they hadn’t slept through the night in 9 months and I thought I might die if I were in their situation. Well, lookey there! Here we are! Really though, sleep has been up and down. This past month its been a bit better since we haven’t been dealing with illness, but I think in the last 30 days the girls have slept through the night maybe 1 or 2 times total. Luckily, the wake-ups are generally brief (just need a little soothing) so its no longer a 3 hour ordeal to get them back to sleep. LOTS of people have been saying I should just let them cry it out (their pediatrician, included!). Its hard with 2 babies though because one will wake up the other and then its a nightmare. Right now, its working better for me to just get up, soothe a baby for 5 minutes, and go back to bed. We’ll see about the future…
• Naps: The girls are still generally taking 2 naps a day (morning and afternoon). The length varies so I just listen to their cues. Short naps are about an hour and on rare occasion they’ll take a long nap of 3 hours. Average length is about 90 minutes.
• Food: Having the girls eat solids has become soooooo much easier now that they have high chairs and are able to start eating foods with more texture (as opposed to completely pureed mush). They’re eating 2-3 meals of “solids” a day in addition to 4 8-oz bottles. Their favorite foods are anything sweet (sweet corn, fruit, etc.) and the’ve even started sharing foods with me! It makes my life a million times easier to be able to just feed them off my plate, and I’m so excited for them to start eating “grown-up” foods. A sampling of my foods that they’ve tried includes:  pancakes (no syrup – one of their favorites!), bread/rolls (love their carbs), meat from pork ribs, smoked turkey, & chicken and veggies like broccoli and smashed-up peas. I’ll just take whatever I’m eating (already cooked, of course), and either rip/cut it/smash it into the tiniest pieces ever. Then I’ll put it on their high-chair tables and let them feed themselves. It always turns into a total mess, but I don’t mind because (a) they’re adorable with broccoli smeared all over their faces, and (b) I’m excited about them learning to feed themselves (also – Rocky helps with clean up, so that’s nice too!)
• New Skills: Well if you hadn’t noticed from the photos, the girls are officially sitting up on their own for extended periods of time now! Woohooo! They’ve also mastered the pincer grasp (thumb and forefinger), which helps with feeding themselves small foods. They still aren’t crawling, but I think we’re getting close. They show a real frustration with their lack of mobility and will frequently lunge at toys, food, or anything they want, but they can’t sustain the forward motion yet. Because of their motivation to be mobile I think it will happen sooner rather than later. Only time will tell! And we’ve been working with them on holding their own bottles. They’ve got the concept down, but they don’t do it without prompting, and they won’t hold the bottle in place without guidance. I think we’ve still got awhile before they master that skill.

I can’t believe the girls have been with us for 3 quarters of a year! It’s been a roller-coaster and I definitely would not recommend anyone to have twins while they’re in their last year of finishing up their dissertation (or….really anytime during grad school would be difficult). But we are very blessed to have them with us – they enrich our lives in many ways. Life now is totally different than it was a year ago (it was the end of March last year that we found out we were having twins!!!) We’ve had to make some sacrifices, but the changes have all been for the better. We love our little ladies and are soaking up every precious second. I know the time will pass far too quickly and I try to sneak in all the cuddles I possibly can before the girls get old enough to start pushing me away. : )