It's a "G" thing

Here's a video of Maya having a conversation with me this morning. This is very typical Maya - she loves the letter "G". Who needs any other consonants when the letter "G" is around?

Happy Four Month Birthday!

Today was Kate and Maya's four month birthday and we celebrated by going to the pediatrician for their checkup and vaccines. They did awesome - they smiled and cooed at the nurses and the doctor and were their normal happy, winsome selves. Maya is now 13 lbs and Kate is 12lb6oz and I think both babies were 23.5" long. They are right around the 20th percentile for their actual age, so have moved up from not being on the chart at all when they were first born and on the 5th percentile at 2 months.

Kate and Maya did great with their shots today. They, of course, screamed at the top of their lungs while they were getting the shots (three of them today), but calmed down very quickly and then feel straight asleep as soon as they went into their carseats. When they woke up, they were happy and mellow. Kate spent a good part of the evening snoozing in my friend Claire's arms and Maya played quietly in the jungle gym and in her bouncy seat. They were so mellow that Claire and I even got to watch a movie.

I can't believe that Kate and Maya have only been in the world for four months. I really can't imagine my life without them now. Even though I sometimes have "those" moments when I'm overwhelmed or stressed, I am thankful and happy every day that I have the opportunity to be the mother to these wonderful little people. I feel so lucky, too, that we have so many people in our lives who love and care for the babies - and are willing and happy to help. We are truly blessed!

Grandma's rule!

Josh has been in the bay area a few days this week, so Grandma is staying here and helping out. Kate, Maya and I are so lucky to have her - it makes life much less stressful and more pleasant. Last night, Grandma even did the 1 AM feeding and then got up again at 6:30 and fed both babies. How lucky am I?

Here's Grandma with both babies. Note Rosie sneaking in a lick of Maya's little toes.

Kate video clips

Kate seems to finally have figured out how to roll over deliberately. She has rolled over before, but today was the first time she rolled over and over and over again - 10 times in a row. Every time I put her on her stomach today she rolled over. And, I even captured it on video!


And here's a video of Kate sitting in her bouncy chair and practicing using her hands.

Kate and Maya's grand video debut

I've been doing my part to support the US economy by doing a lot of online shopping (you're welcome, America). My latest toy is a Flip MiniHD camcorder. It's really cool - about as small as an Ipod and takes pretty high quality video. I'm still getting the hang of taking videos with it and Kate and Maya aren't too certain of what to make of it. Whenever I brought it out today they kind of stopped what they were doing and just stared blankly at the camera.

In any case, here's Kate and Maya's first video...
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Saturday nap

Things have been much better since the last posting. We had a very pleasant day on Friday and today. The girls (and I) are much happier when Dad is around at least part of the day.

Even though the girls are sleeping great at night, we still haven't quite gotten the napping thing down yet. I got Maya to sleep about 10 minutes in her crib this morning after 30 minutes of fussing and crying and Kate slept about 40 minutes. Actually, Maya's fussing seems to lull Kate to sleep somehow.

So, for the afternoon nap, I decided to just take a nap with them. It is very cozy and cuddly to nap with two babies and we slept for about 2 hours. Josh snuck in a picture when we weren't looking...

Double the guilt

It's been a rough few days. Thank goodness for grandparents is all Kate and Maya probably have to say (well, Maya probably says "ah gee gee" and Kate probably says "Hey!", but that's another story). Today my parents babysat all day and I went skiing for most of the day with Alice. It was a beautiful day to be on the slopes and the snow was great.

It's been rough, though, since Josh has been working 13+ hour days - mostly on site. So, when my parents aren't around, I am the only one taking care of the babies all day. During the day it's okay most of the time, but come around 5:30 or 6 PM, it gets really difficult.

I've been trying to feed the babies individually one at a time so each one gets their own special cuddling/feeding time, but it can get really hairy if one gets fussy/screamy while the other one is eating. This evening I fed Maya first while Kate was trying to be patient hanging out underneath her jungle gym. Then, I put Maya down and tried to feed Kate. Kate was blissed out eating her bottle and staring at me when Maya went totally ballistic. I tried bouncing Maya in her chair and giving her a binky, but the only thing she wanted was to be held. I don't blame her - babies should be able to have a nice leisurely meal and then get cuddled, not fed and then quickly burped and immediately put down. So, I had to stop feeding Kate in order to pick up Maya and put her on my shoulder and then try to resume feeding Kate. Of course, poor Kate lost it because her mealtime was interrupted and started screaming hysterically, too. We all ended up crying together - Maya and Kate (I guess) out of frustration, and me out of the guilt for not being able to give them what they need and deserve. I don't want to go back to tandem feeding because that was really stressful and didn't always work, either - so, I'm not sure what to do with feedings. Occassionally I'll give one a Poodee while cuddle the other one, but this seems so far from how I think (and what the experts say) babies should be feed.

Oh well. In any case, here's Alice with an apres-ski baby cuddle.