I spoke too soon

My last post was about how things were getting easier.  At that point, I was getting sleep and I felt like a brand new person.  I felt like I could tackle the world.  Since then, Davin has become a monster at night and I'm about to snap.  I just need sleep (although, finally last night was a little bit better).

Mara, on the other hand, has slept through the night for four nights.  No bottles and no soother!!!!  If there was ever a favourite, it's Mara right now.

While Davin's going through this brutal stage, I kept saying to Derrick that we have great babies (who aren't really little babies anymore), well that meant that they had to prove me wrong the last few days.  Usually, during the day they are happy as can be, but the last few days, not so much.  Not nearly enough sleep, paired with fussy kids during the day = one grumpy mom.

At one point, Jayna peed her pants on the stairs on her way up to the bathroom and I snapped.  I proceeded to yell, "What did I ever do to deserve this?"  As soon as the words came out of my mouth, I felt horrible.  Derrick and I are so fortunate to have three healthy and pretty happy children.

I know that I'm in a bit of a "funk" right now and it will pass.  I haven't felt like doing anything around the house lately, which in turn just makes things worse because there's so much to do.  I haven't been overly nice to Derrick, but I keep telling him we'll get through this and things will get better.  We have survived the craziest six months of our lives, I know we can make it through anything.

Last week didn't help all this as Derrick was in the emergency room on father's day and we found out he has a Hiatus Hernia.  Everything's fine, it just means there are some follow up appointments, medication, and trying to figure out how to control it so that his throat doesn't swell up again.  We also found out that Davin needs surgery in December.  He has what's called Hypospadius.  This means that what should be the urethral opening is actually just a pit and he actually has another hole a little lower down, which is functional.  I once again felt like a great mother when I found out that he had another hole that we didn't know about.  It's very small, but now it's glaringly obvious.  It's a common procedure, but no mother likes to have their child have surgery.  We will tackle that in December.

On a happy note, another milestone has happened.....the babies are officially sitters!!!  Here are a couple of pictures of them sitting in restaurant high chairs for the first time yesterday

I'm feeling like today will be a better day and maybe it's the end of the funk.  Hopefully Davin allows me to sleep a bit more and that will help.  Right now, Mara and Davin are being super cute in their high chairs right now....looking all lovingly at each other and holding hands!

Getting easier!

I have been saying now for the last week that things have been getting easier.

The twins have settled into more of a routine.  They eat at 8, 12, 4 and then 630, before bed.  They don't nap at exactly the same time every day, but I have a general idea of when they go down and I know what signs to watch for.

We have been quite frustrated with the twins' sleeping habits for the last few months.  I wasn't sure how much longer I could handle being up 4-10 times a night sticking soothers in and doing one feeding.  I'm happy to say that they are by no means perfect, but we took away the "dream feed" bottle, and they now sleep till about 1:30, get fed and then sleep till between 7 & 8.  They still fuss a couple of times a night some nights, but I think that may be due to teeth trying to make their way through.  I feel like a totally different person now that they are sleeping better.  I think that that's why this week has seemed so easy as well.  It's amazing what sleep can do for a person!

Davin and Mara are getting to be so much fun now.  They are happy babies and love watching what's going on.  We are now hitting a more challenging stage with Jayna as she thinks every toy in the house belongs to her.  I'm thinking that if this keeps up, I'm just going to take all the toys and put them in the twin's room and then Jayna can have no toys she can't share.  Jayna also loves playing with her brother and sister and she gets really close to them and they get excited, which means they kick their feet and pull her hair and she loses her mind.  "No Mara!!!  No Davin!!!"  are regularly yelled in our house now.

On another note of craziness.  I had someone over to talk about business this morning and while she was here, Jayna managed to miss the toilet somehow and pee all over the bathroom floor.  Later, she went to the bathroom in the big toilet.  She needs to use the stool to get up to the toilet.  Somehow, she managed to get some poop on the stool.  Of course, things tend to be a lot more normal when there isn't actually anyone here!

I took all three kids swimming this morning.  This was Mara and Davin's first time at the pool and they were awesome.  Thanks to a couple of friends for their help!!  I wouldn't have been able to do it otherwise.  Here's a picture of them after their swim.

Davin was tuckered out and fell asleep drinking his lunch time bottle in his high chair.  I went downstairs to do something quickly and came up to see him like this:

Hopefully the weather will cooperate and we will have a great weekend outside.

6 months already....really??

The saying, "the days are long, but the years are short" is never more true until you have children.  There are many days when I am just struggling to get through the day so that I can say I've survived another one.  Meanwhile, Derrick and I can now say we've survived six months!!!!!

I remember when Jayna hit the six month mark.  In the past, I had never noticed how quickly six months goes by.  You never really take note of a half year mark unless you have a child, or you're in junior high and you've managed to keep a girlfriend or boyfriend that long (in which case, it seems like 6 months has been an eternity).

It was six months ago yesterday when we got the call that would change our lives and make it more chaotic than we could ever imagine.  I had barely gotten off the phone with the nurse who was telling me to come in to get induced, and Derrick was already in the van and ready to leave without me.  I was taking my time because I knew that this was the end of our lives as we knew it.  I also had no idea what labour had in store for me and I was terrified about having an epidural and needing a C-section.  In the end, I can't complain about the labour and I didn't have a C-section!

Happy half year birthday my little man!

Happy half year birthday Mara Bean!

                                       


And of course, at 4:19 am on Monday December 5th, 2011, Mara Jade made her appearance in the world.  Davin Frederick just couldn't wait and he snuck in at 4:23 am.  We were very fortunate that they were both perfectly healthy and never had to go to the NICU.  At six months now, Mara is 28.25 inches long and 18 lbs 12 oz and Davin is 29 inches long and 20 lbs 11 oz.  They are working on learning new things every day.  Both babies are close to sitting up on their own, they both roll back to front (Davin more than Mara) and Mara popped her first tooth last Monday! They are both working on learning to grab food and actually get it to their mouth, as well as practicing drinking from sippy cups.  

Life is still crazy and I'm sure it always will be, just in an ever changing way.  I wouldn't change it for the world.  It is a bit easier now that the babies have a regular eating schedule and a somewhat regular nap schedule as well.

I love my babies and I'm enjoying watching them grow and seeing them develop their personalities, which are quite different.  I can only imagine how interesting the next six months will be.