nutrition

Today Rhys's nutritionist came for her every-other-month visit. She's actually been helping us more with Zoe lately by giving us food ideas/timing, because while Rhys's ability to eat has increased his willingness has not. So, it's a waiting game with him and she's mainly tracking his weight to make sure he's staying on target. We can weigh and measure Rhys, but we don't really know what his target is to stay on his curve. Just a couple months back she pointed out he had not grown at all, nor gained any weight, in two months. At that point we had to start supplementing with a calorie additive and today he was back to his normal growth curve. He's 26lb 12oz (~50%) and is 34.25" tall (short side of the scale). We aren't worried about him being plump and chubby, because to be honest that's not his body type. We're just trying to make sure we keep him growing as much as is in our control because kids who don't stand and/or walk don't typically grown as well as those who do. Something to do with weight bearing and the bones and some other stuff I can't accurately explain. Anyway, eating has always been a huge concern with Rhys, and probably will continue to be for quite some time. Oh for the day he wants pizza, or a hamburger or holy cow a bag of M&Ms.

Zoe is 28" tall (~50%) and 22lb 10oz (ahem, 90%). She's continued to gain since beginning to crawl (which she incidentally will do on arms and knees about half the time now) but not at quite the same rate. She loves cheese, toast, cereal bars and surprisingly eats meat just as well as anything else. She's still trying to figure out how to pull herself up to stand, but she's finally making it to her knees easily so getting the feet beneath her isn't far off. I love watching her on the magna doodle and how she only wants to write with her left hand.

Have I mentioned that I hate Blogger? More times than not all my text does random things and has stupid formatting quirks. My favorite? When you insert a line separating paragraphs only to publish the post and see no space! Tonight was a first for me, I inserted a picture and it only allowed my existing text to be centered. Look back through all my posts and not a single stinking post is centered. Normally I'd retype it because it bothers me that much, but tonight I'm too lazy. Yes, I'm a little anal that way. Oh and spell check isn't working either tonight so please excuse any misspelled words.

teeth!

It seems as though I was wrong about Zoe's teeth. No sooner had I posted she had nothing about to pop through and here comes tooth number one! The bottom left tooth is in, with the right one on its way. We'd been checking her gums frequently, but this one snuck up on us. She had hardly any signs at all. A diaper rash (our first ever by the way) that had me suspecting, but Rhys had such a h.o.r.r.i.b.l.e experience with his first two teeth I guess I was looking for something more pronounced. So, the first tooth with no problems, but the second tooth is making her a bear. She's rather clingy and fussy (though I think part of that is just her age), she had a low grade temp this morning and threw up in her crib at midnight last night. Now that is what I was expecting to accompany the teeth, though it is still no where close to Rhys's ordeal.

And, Zoe isn't the only one with new teeth. Rhys is getting his two year molars. Holy moly that kid can be a grump. And speaking of teeth, Rhys's got stained from his antibiotics a few months ago. I'm pretty upset his teeth are no longer pearly white, but the staining has faded somewhat already so I'm hoping it continues.

Rhys and Zoe

Rhys...

Will be two-and-a-half years old next week!

Finally received his equipment! On December 31, with literally only hours to spare, it was delivered by the MIA sales rep and a service technician. Everything was perfect, except we still don't have the tray for his chair. A template was drawn to cut it to size, and the sales rep promised to bring it by last Tuesday, but surprise surprise we never saw or heard from her. I wrote a letter to mail to the company detailing our horrible experience and had decided against sending it, but this changed my mind. As soon as the tray is in our possession and it is processed through insurance, that bad boy is going into the mail with carbon copies to as many executives as I can find addresses for.

Is still army crawling and getting into absolutely everything. I chase him all day long. We recently converted our office into a playroom (I'll post pics later), so that is a baby prison of sorts. It also gets all most of the toys out of our living room. Score!

Seems to be gaining weight. I think he may be 27 pounds finally. I say think because I typically put him on the scale right before his bath, so that isn't the most accurate time for a weight check. He is still beyond stubborn with eating, but his ability to eat is better. That is not to be confused with his willingness to eat.

Seems to be gaining more movement/use in his legs. I think he actually has more range of movement than he uses on a daily basis but I occasionally see glimpses of said movement and get really excited about it.

Has had a twin size bed for a couple months now. One long side is against a wall, with the other "open" side having bed rail. They unfortunately do not make rails that I can find that extend the entire length of the bed. I try to block those gaps as best I can, but a couple times now I have found Rhys wedged between one of the gaps, very close to toppling out of bed and on his head. I believe it is intentional and am worried he's going to succeed one of these days and hurt himself!


Zoe...

Will be 10 months old next week!

Started clapping and pulling herself into a sitting position on Christmas day.

Shakes her head "no" all the time, though she doesn't understand what "no" is.

Is army crawling! Just like Rhys. She doesn't quite understand crawling on hands and knees, but she is close to figuring it out.

Is trying to pull herself up to a standing position. But again, she doesn't quite get the leg part of it. But she's trying!

Has been feeding herself bottles for the last few weeks. We have to prop her on the Boppy because she can't lift the full bottle while in a sitting position, but she's hand's free feeding for the most part.

Is still a great eater, though she is increasingly wanting to do it all herself instead of having us spoon feed her. I have made nearly all Zoe's baby food from day one, so we've more or less increased the texture of that food until it is bite sized pieces for her to grab herself. It is more of a challenge to come up with healthy "finger foods" for a baby her age than I thought it would be.

Is very good at independent play and is using many toys appropriately. I've said it before, but we are constantly amazed at how a child's learning process works. Rhys does everything so out of order that we've never had "average" in this house.

Thinks screaming (and I mean screaming!) is the way to get what she wants. Despite having used basic signs with her for months, she doesn't yet use any of them in return. Except for maybe milk, I think she does use that one sometimes.

Still has no teeth and none that I can see are about to pop through.