BFFs

ahh...nice scalp massage during the nightly baba..

um, wait...WHAT'S in my hair?

hee hee! Sissy did it!

A quick update here- the babies are feeling much better! I finally took them to the pediatrician on Thursday - BY MYSELF!! YAY mommy!- and they were both diagnosed with ear infections. POOR babies!!! Anyhow, they were actually very good at the appointment (mostly due to the ridiculous bag o' treats I brought with me; by the time the doctor came into the room, the floor was covered in play dough, cheese curls and the contents of my purse). The hard part was letting the doctor look into their ears, nose and mouth. Here's where the BFF (best friends forever) part comes in.
First, I held Violet while the pedi looked at her ears; Oliver stood watching her sob her little heart out, as if the doctor was removing her ears instead of examining them. Then, I consoled her with more cheese puffs and the special yogurt drink I brought for post- exam. She calmed down, and I held Ollie while he was examined. He, of course, immediately cried hysterically as well. Violet dropped her hard-earned sippy cup, started crying again and reached both hands out to Oliver on my lap, trying to hug and help him! He grabbed her hands, as if aiding her to get him down!
UNREAL!!
The doctor (who has triplets!) and I were both struck by the cuteness. And really, she has no idea of Violet's usual demeanor of nonchalance. So, even with two wailing, ear-infected babies, my heart was bursting with love for them and their beautiful sibling bond. So, so lucky!!

love this baby girl!!

a little chat over a nice picnic dinner!

It's been a tough week here. A lot of random things adding up to very little sleep and lots of stress! Oliver got a fever over the weekend- poor baby. Ben immediately feared the Swine Flu and called the pediatrician. Luckily, as there were no other symptoms at all, Ollie was cleared.... His fever seemed better by Monday, but then Violet awoke with a horrible cough and runny nose. She was very under the weather, and as is usual for her when she has a cold, she vomited as well. I think it's just a case of too much mucus and a touch of her past reflux...makes for a huge mess, though!
Tuesday, Grammy came to watch the ill Peanut while Oliver and I did music class by ourselves. He had a great time, running around like crazy, dancing, playing the drums like you wouldn't believe...thought we were in the clear. Leaving class, I did *something* to my back- this has never been an issue for me before, but it was awful! It kept me up all night, along with both Violet and her cough and Oliver beginning to vomit at 4am. Ugh. His fever had spiked high again, he vomited twice before I could get some Tylenol in him.
Wednesday, everyone was off. My back was still killing me, Oliver had finally stopped vomiting, but refused to drink anything. Violet was still running from every orifice! I dug out my Percocet from my C-section (um, 23 months ago...). Of course it had expired, but I figured it couldn't hurt. It was AWESOME. Helped SO much!
Another long night last night, although not nearly as bad as the others. Ollie was up at midnight, crying and sad, but no fever. He had begun to cough- that same "bark" as his sister, and his nose was running. No more vomiting though, and he's eating better today! Violet seems on the road to wellness- still a bit of a cold, but seems to have her energy back!
Whew! More soon!

who needs food when you have brilliant dinner conversation?

Happy July! Just sitting up here, trying to let both babies fuss/talk themselves down to sleep. We started sleep training AGAIN after the twins had colds (and yes, we caved), and a busy birthday week. It's very, very hard; exhausting without Ben here! I've resigned myself to not leaving house until everyone has actually slept for a nap. This could be a long week!
I'm adding some new videos at the bottom here. The first is the babies new water toy. They LOVE it. Actually, they loved it even before I added any water, so now, they REALLY LOVE it. The second is last night's dinner, and the clip that the title refers to. V and O are interacting SO much now! They each think the other is very funny and interesting, thank goodness.

June!

a friendly chat over the new toy...


belt? check. hair barrette? check. bracelet? check. Ooh...bracelet! Yummy...


a quick saltine cracker helps ease Oliver's fear of the blender sounds


nothing like a little tv-watching in the buff...



Wow...what an exhausting week. I wish I could say "TGIF", but it's all the same here! F or S or M...
Lots of vomit this week, for some reason, which is, in itself, tiring. I'm to the point where if I sense impending puke, I aim the gagging baby at myself. Not long ago, this would have disgusted me, but I realized quickly that I am so much easier to clean than our white carpet (possibly our dumbest decision ever), oriental rugs or the crib sheet (shockingly difficult and annoying to even remove). Today the sick one is Ollie. Every orifice is running and he just vomited everywhere (crib sheet, rug AND mommy). We took a quick bath together and then, sadly, I had to put him back down in the mopped up crib, since he'd been awake since 4am, and just needed to sleep, stinky crib or no. So much guilt in parenting!
My second nomination for Bad Mommy Award comes with the video below. Sometimes you see these clips on America's Funniest Home Videos, and I always berate the parents who taken them, wondering how on earth they could have let their children get so overtired. Alas, I now join the club. Violet just couldn't and wouldn't sleep the other day, so I needed to keep her on track with her brother, and push her a bit. The video is from dinner, where Grammy is trying desperately to get some pears into Violet so she might have a chance to sleep through the night. Poor baby girl. {note: it's on the long side! also, turn up your volume to hear Oliver's new specialty noise: "monster sounds"!}



Lastly, today is Daddy/Ben's birthday! Hooray! Unfortunately, it has not had the best start for him with our very difficult night. I'm hoping to make it up to him with a meal of wings and pizza, mint-chocolate chip ice cream in lieu of birthday cake and and a very cool Harry Potter anthology, chosen by O and V, of course!

exhaustion

While we will never, ever be as tired as we were during the babies' first three months of life (having to set the alarm to wake up to feed every three hours, getting two hours of sleep at a time, watching muted reruns of "Cosby Show" just to stay awake during a 2am feeding, falling asleep while pumping, etc.), we are getting a little too close for comfort. Oliver and Violet have started waking again at night. It started the night before my first rehearsal for the opera. Did they sense the impending change? Who knows. Anyhow, since then, both babies have had trouble falling asleep and even more trouble staying asleep. After four nights of this, I called the pediatrician who told us her best guess was teething. Ollie is getting one of his top chompers in, and Violet must be (finally) getting her first tooth. It is really, really difficult.

As I was driving home from rehearsal last night, my eyes felt so, so heavy. I kept thinking about the old Bugs Bunny cartoon where Bugs was so tired that he put toothpicks on each of his eyes to pry them open. I think he may have been on to something.

On a more pleasant note, Oliver has quickly caught up to his sister, with a steady stream of "Mama"s and "Baba"s. Violet is now saying both "Dada" and "Gaga", which you can see on the video above. They are so sweet and funny.

Oh, and for those of you keeping score:

Mice seen: 6
Mice caught: 0

Grrrr....

poor Ollie

Oliver has an ear infection. So, so sad! The worst part is that his horrible mommy was so convinced it was his teeth (that's right, teeth, as in plural! TWO on the bottom!), that she took two days to get him to the doctor's office. Poor, sweet boy. We knew for sure it was something more when he lost his appetite! The pediatrician knew right away that it was his ear, and gave us our first round of antibiotics, ever. Ugh. Oliver was crying so hard that our wonderful doctor walked us out to the car, so I could carry Ollie the whole way- she is amazing. So far, we have had a tough time getting Oliver to keep his medicine and the Motrin down (think projectile vomiting), so at 2 am, Ben and I are up trying to come up with new ways of dosing it to him. Finally, we put a mixture of formula and Motrin in his dropper and while Ben made the stuffed sun toy "dance" and sang "Mr. Golden Sun" over and over, I dropped the concoction in slowly and then blew on his face to get him to swallow. Can you envision this in your head?
Anyhow, we see a slight improvement today, thank goodness. We're posting some fun pictures of the babies, with Daddy and with Grammy.

update on Violet's belly...

Beautiful girl! Happy even after her tough day.

Cute boy Ollie rocks the madras pants...

Asleep in the swing. (Note the propped up sockless foot!)

Our little Button had a difficult day yesterday. She had to have an Upper G.I. done to look at her reflux problems. She was very brave! She had to drink a bottle of barium so the doctors could x-ray her tummy and see why she is having so much trouble eating. She started out well, but finally so was fed up she held the barium in her mouth and spat it out at the doctors! Luckily, they laughed, saying that was a first for a (nearly) three-month-old, and we were secretly impressed with our little spitfire (pun intended). We are now giving Violet the medicine Prilosec twice a day- please keep your fingers crossed that it will work and she will be feeling better! Meanwhile, Oliver is continuing to be happier, and sharing his smiles more and more. Last night we nabbed an all around high of SIX hours of sleep for both babies!! Hooray for all of us!

Oliver's first scrap..with himself.

Our little Houdini! Violet escaping from the swaddle (and her jammies) during the night...