Small Strides Toward Crawling

Well, Vivienne is making small strides toward crawling.  Since her brother started crawling all over the place, she has become more interested in learning how to move around herself.  So she has been spending more time on her belly trying to crawl (and looking more like she's swimming - maybe she takes after her daddy).  Just over the past 3 days, she has started pushing back up into a sitting position from her belly.  I know this seems like a small development, but I think she really likes being able to move her body around more easily.  I'm hopeful that she'll be crawling in the next couple of weeks.  We'll see!

Miles' First Tooth

Miles got her first tooth a few weeks ago, and it's still pretty small, but it's there.  I finally got a picture of it yesterday.  Vivienne only has her 2 bottom teeth, and Miles just has this one tooth on the bottom.  I can't believe that they only have 3 teeth between them and they are almost a year old!

Lowering the Cribs

Well, today we finally did it.  We lowered the babies' cribs down.  They are just beginning to pull up on things, and we want to get the mattresses lowered before they pull up on the sides of the cribs.  I realize that our babies are pulling up and crawling much later than most babies, but we keep telling ourselves that it is because they are gifted.  They are probably too busy solving differential equations in their little heads. 

Crawling!

I just saw Miles take two proper forward-direction crawls!  He was trying to get to Noah, our cat, who happened to be sitting beside all the books (which are Miles' favorite things).  When Miles reached the books, he plopped down on his stomach to taste test them.  I'm so proud of him!  Go, buddy, go!!

Somebody's Crawling Backwards

Miles is moving around like crazy now.  He's rolling over, scooting around, belly flopping, and sitting up, but the poor little guy just can't manage to actually crawl forward.  I keep leaving the room for a couple minutes to come back and find him in a position like this:

"I'm stuck under the entertainment center, Mommy!"

Miles backs himself up to the couch, to the chair, to the corner of the room, to the entertainment center.  You name it, he can back himself up into it.  Unfortunately, this often ends in him getting very frustrated because he's continually moving away from whatever he's trying to move toward.  Also, he frequently gets stuck so that he can't back up anymore and he can't sit up.

You'll be crawling forward before you know it, sweetie pie!

Miles Has a Tooth!

Miles is finally teething!  He has a little tooth breaking through on the bottom left-hand side.  You can barely see it, but it is definitely there.  Soon enough, we'll have 2 toothy smiles in our house.  =)  He seemed more fussy than usual today, but it wasn't that bad.  We're keeping our fingers crossed that it's not too painful for him.

Vivienne's First Tooth

Vivienne officially has her first tooth.  It's extremely difficult to get a good picture of it, but at least you can somewhat see it in these photos.  Look at the lower right-hand side.  (It's her bottom left tooth.)  You probably have to click on the pictures to see them zoomed in.  Jason thinks I'm ridiculous for posting these now.  I have a feeling that we'll have much better tooth pictures in a week or so.

First Teething: Vivienne Has a Tooth!

It's official!  We have our first tooth!  Vivienne has a tooth poking through on the bottom left-hand side.  It's just barely poking through, but there's no more "Is that a tooth?"  It's definitely a tooth.  We can feel it with our fingers, but it's not sticking up enough to get a good picture just yet.  We'll have some toothy grin pictures up soon, though.  I promise!

Miles Rolls from Back to Tummy!

I'm fairly sure that he has done this before, but today we saw Miles roll from him back to his tummy for the first time.  He started completely rolling over (360 degree rolls) to move himself from one location to another.  Jason would put his blocks a few feet away, and he rolled over to them. 

I have noticed him rolling onto his side a lot in his crib during his naptimes.  I suspect that he may also be rolling onto his tummy as well, but he always sleeps on his back. 

I think we may have a crawler in our near future!  He is learning fast!

Miles Slept Through the Night!!

For the first time last night, Vivienne and Miles slept through the entire night - 13 hours of sleep!  It was WONDERFUL.  Vivienne has been able to do this since she was probably about 3 or 4 months old.  Miles, however, would wake us up around 3 or 4 am every single night for a feeding. 

The babies went to sleep around 7 last night.  Early this morning, I woke up engorged and needed to pump.  I figured it was about 3 am.  I looked at the clock and realized it was 5:30!  Awesome!!  So I went ahead and pumped.  Shortly after that, Miles woke up, but he only cried for about a minute or two and then fell back asleep.  Then we all slept until just after 7 am.

I suppose I shouldn't get too excited about this, because it may be an anomaly.  But here's to hoping that it happens again really, really soon.

They May Never Crawl

We are starting to wonder how Miles and Vivienne will ever learn to crawl.  (I'm sure someday I'll look back at this and laugh... or cry.)  They don't spend any time on their tummies.  We put them down on their bellies, but as soon as their tummies touch the floor, they immediately flip over.  They have never taken a nap or slept at night on their tummies, either.  It seems like most mommies that I've talked to say that their kids started doing a swim-like motion on their bellies before they figured out how to transition it to crawling.  Well, at this pace, we might just have to wait for our babies to stand up and walk.  =)  I don't mind, though.  It's nice to know that I can walk away for a couple minutes and they will be right where I left them when I return.

Razzing, Face Exploration and Starting to Sit Up

The babies are starting to do more new things each day.  As I mentioned previously, Vivienne has now proven that she can roll over (hoorah!!).  Miles has been making razzing sounds for the past couple weeks, and Vivienne has really picked up on it this week.  It's really cute to watch them do that. 

One of Vivienne's new favorite things is to explore our faces with her hands when we hold her.  She'll look right into your face (from about 2 inches away) and start feeling all over it with her hands, pulling on our lips and noses, pulling our hair.  She just smiles ear to ear and explores our facial features.  It's really sweet, though sometimes she can get overly excited and actually hurt us a little bit.

Miles and Vivienne are just starting to sit up.  Miles was sitting up very well on our bed last night just before his bath.  His core muscles are clearly getting stronger, because he can sit up from the beginner "tripod" position for a few seconds before falling over.  Vivienne still really only does the "tripod" position, but she's getting stronger every day, too.  Both babies will "stand" and support all of their weight on their legs if we hold their wastes to balance them.  They can only do this for a short time before their little legs get tired, though.

Baths with Grandma and Vivienne Rolls!!

Grandma (Leslie's mom) came into town today to visit the grandbabies.  They are really enjoying playing with her and showing her all their new tricks.  Mommy is really enjoying an extra set of hands around the house.  =)

Grandma gave them each a nice, relaxing bath tonight before bedtime.  We have squeaky clean and very happy babies.

On a side note, Vivienne rolled from her stomach to her back for the FIRST TIME tonight!!  Miles did this 3 months ago.  It was so fun to finally see her learn to flip herself over.  Go, Vivienne!

We love Grandma!

Enjoying the spa treatment.  (And apparently thinking "Oh... my... gosh...")

Vivienne looks cute in her pink diaper cover.  Congratulations on your first roll, big girl!

Definitely my favorite picture of the night.  I'm in love with this baby.  =)

First Solid Foods

Today, Miles and Vivienne tried their first "solid" food.  Well, it wasn't exactly solid, but it was definitely the only non-breast milk food they've ever eaten (besides vitamin drops).

Unfortunately, our timing wasn't great.  While I was mixing the sweet potatoes that I made last night with some breast milk, Miles started fussing.  He was getting tired and cranky earlier than we expected.  So, we went into this little experiment with a fussy baby - not a great idea.  But we were too excited to back out at that point, so we decided to plow ahead and see if he would get with the program.

Of course, he did not.  He was wondering why we weren't getting with his program.  But we had a blast watching them eat their first "solids" anyway.

My Little Sweet Potato Wearing Her Sweet Potatoes

I like this stuff, Daddy!

I hope sweet potatoes are good for my complexion!

Up until about a year old, the majority of their calories will still come from my breast milk.  The baby food that they eat is more like a treat or condiment to the main course, which will still be my milk.  It's fun to see them eat, but I'm a little sad that this is another step away from them needing me.  Oh, the ever continuing process of letting go... 

We'll continue with the sweet potatoes once a day for at least the next 4 days before trying something else.  We think we'll try a green vegetable next.

Giggling, Rolling and More Raspberries (Video)

If you haven't had enough... at least we got some really good Miles giggles in this one.

Miles' First Time in a High Chair

Wednesdays are one of my favorite days of the week.  Our highlight on Wednesdays is that we get to have lunch with some of our favorite people, Kristi and her awesome kids, Kylie, Caleb and Darcy.  We usually meet at Chick-fil-A or some other fast food place with a playground where the kids can burn off some energy while we chat.

Today, Miles sat in a high chair at a restaurant for the first time.  He only lasted about 5 minutes, but it was still neat to see him in it.  He's not yet big or strong enough to really sit in a high chair well.  Someday, this will be his regular seat during meals.  Hard to imagine!

Not a great picture, but at least I got something.  =)

Sleeping and Feeding Update

Luckily, the babies have been sleeping much better lately.  They are finally starting to get over their colds, though they do have coughing fits every now and then.  The coughing has been really hard, because it wakes them up - both during the night and during their daytime naps. 

Now, they are back to their routine.  They generally go to bed around 6:30.  Then they eat again around midnight.  Sometimes they have a 4 or 5 am feeding, and then they sleep until about 8 am.  This is a huge step forward from a couple weeks ago where they were waking up every 3 hours all night.  We take them to our life group every Monday night, and we can usually just set their infant carriers up in one of the spare bedrooms (with the babies awake), and they will fall asleep and sleep until we get home.  I never would have dreamed of this even a month ago. 

I've gotten much bolder about taking them out and about.  We go out almost every single day, often running errands and sometimes going to play dates or getting together with friends.  Miles has toned down his crying a lot.  When he was in his younger months, he would frequently have crying fits.  They don't occur nearly as often now.  This is a great relief to me, because it was hard to watch him get so frequently upset (and often for no apparent reason). 

The babies are also going for longer stretches in between their feedings.  They still eat about every 2.5 to 3 hours, but sometimes they go for stretches greater than 4 hours.  I very rarely feed them in public (and never feed them in tandem in public, in case you were wondering!).  I usually try to schedule things so that I can be home to feed them.

Physically, they have changed so much.  Miles is still rolling from his tummy to his back, but he doesn't roll the other way.  Vivienne is not a roller yet.  They both have excellent head control and can sit up with assistance, making it easy for us to have them at the dinner table with us or tote them around the house without worrying so much about their little necks and heads.

Their eyes are still very blue.  They could still change to another color, but we very well may have two blue-eyed babies (which is not very likely with 2 parents with brown eyes and both sets of grandparents with brown eyes).  Jason's sister and my niece have blue eyes, so we do know that each family has some "little b's" hidden in their genes.

Miles and Vivienne really talk up a storm now.  They make more consonant sounds every day.  Sometimes they will look at each other and start babbling to each other, which is ridiculously cute.  We love tickling them and hearing their precious little giggles.

When they're eating at the same time, they always hold each other's hands.  I wish I could post a picture of this.  It is so incredibly sweet.

Sleep, Glorious Sleep!!

I probably shouldn't jinx it by writing about this, but for the past three or four nights, Miles and Vivienne have been going to bed around 6 or 7.  Then they eat once around 11 PM, and they sleep through until 7 or 8 AM.  Yesterday, they slept until 8:45 (Vivienne) and 9:30 (Miles).  I am a new woman!!  Of course, I shouldn't get used to this, because I'm sure as soon as we adapt to this, they will mix it up again and start waking up 3 times a night.  ;-)

They used to start in bed like this.

And we find them like this in the morning.

Wednesday night, we put them in separate cribs for the first time.  It makes me a little sad that they are too big for the same crib anymore, but it is neat to see them each in their own crib now.  We have the cribs beside each other in an L shape so that they can still see each other through the rails.

Miles Rolls Over!

This morning, when I laid Miles down on his tummy, he instantly rolled onto his side.  Then I started yelling (we call it "hollering" here in the South) for Jason to come look, because he was upstairs.  He got there just in time to see the little guy roll over onto his back!  I couldn't believe it!  Miles did it a couple more times, and then we got the camera out to catch it on video.  Here you go:

First Night in Their Room

The first night in the babies' room went really well.  They stayed on their typical sleeping pattern - eating about every 3 hours.  I'll be glad when they go a little longer between feedings on a more regular basis.  Until then, we'll be waking up every 3 hours to feed them.

Jason sleeps in our bedroom with me.  When the babies are ready to eat, he gets them and brings them to me while I set up my breastfeeding pillow.  Then, when they are done eating, he'll change their diapers, burp them and put them back down.  Luckily, we don't have to spend any time consoling them at night.  We just lay them back down, and they drift off to sleep on their own.

It was nice to have them in their own room.  I think I slept better without all the baby noises.  We did have the baby monitor on all night, though. I think we'll eventually turn it off because the nursery is directly next door to our bedroom.