The boys had their 12-month pediatrician appointment today. (Why, yes, it's actually more of a 13-month appointment, but that's when they could get us in!)
Their blood pressures looked good (88 systolic for James and 100 for Mattie), their head measurements looked good, and we get to stop giving them vitamins (yay!). James is a pound or two below where they'd like to see him on the growth curve; he's at 15 lbs, 12 oz. But his length looks good, so the doctor doesn't think there's a big underlying problem; we'll just try to get as many calories into him as we can. Mattie's weight was fine (his length had fallen off his curve a little bit), but the doc thinks he still may have some catching up to do.
Of course, we're not quite sure what Matthew's weight really is -- he strongly objected to being put on the scale. When we tried to lie him down he flipped over and tried to crawl off; when we sat him down he stood up and grabbed for me. The first weight was 20 lbs, 5 oz, and the second one was 21 lbs, 8 oz, so you can see there's a substantial margin of error!
They did a couple of vaccinations (Prevnar and Hep A; they're waiting on the others until the 15-month appointment, since we may be traveling soon) and had to take some blood for lead testing. Matthew was very upset by the whole thing and seemed completely wiped out afterwards. Poor baby! James cried and was bright red when we came back in to get him, but he calmed down pretty quickly.
On a more positive note, Mattie also had his first bites of macaroni and cheese today. I bet they won't be the last!
James's Early Intervention coordinator and his developmental therapist came yesterday. They both think he's doing well and is pretty much on track for his adjusted age (10 months). Hooray for James! After his appointment at the Special Infant Care Clinic tomorrow, we'll reassess how frequently the developmental therapist will come. (My sense is that right now the main issue will be getting him caught up with his language skills, but now that his hearing aids are fitting properly, my guess is that he'll start moving ahead more quickly in that area. When the EI coordinator was here, she noticed him imitating sounds and responding to "yay" by clapping, so those are both good things.)
We think James knows the sign for milk. I had the Baby Signing Time video on yesterday, and James was standing up holding on to one of his toys. He turned around toward me and made the sign for milk. I said "milk" and did the sign back to him, and he did it again -- so I brought him his milk, and he happily drank it! Mike said he did the sign again this morning on the changing table. I'm pleased and a bit surprised -- we haven't been very good about doing any signing, so I'd be impressed if he picked it up just from the video or our occasional times doing it. We'll see if it keeps up!
We also seem to have gotten the diaper rash under control, at least for the moment -- the last couple days of it's been mostly gone. What a relief! We definitely have to still keep doing preventative measures, but diaper changes are now a much less painful experience for all concerned.
Our trip turned out to be even shorter than our most conservative estimates -- we're not even going to make it to D.C., much less Vermont. The last couple of days, Baby James has been throwing up a lot. He'd been a bit unhappy on Wednesday and threw up a few times that day, so Thursday morning I called the surgery clinic. They thought it was probably either that the new formula wasn't agreeing with him, or that he had some kind of stomach bug -- I was worried that it might be some more serious complication, but they thought that was unlikely.
by it -- I think the diaper kept it away from his skin.) He was in good spirits when we arrived here in Richmond and had fun exploring and playing with Cousin Daniel's toys, but then had a miserable night and a miserable most of the day on Friday. By the afternoon he'd had some Pedialyte and was keeping some small amounts of formula down. He had a good nap and was feeling better enough by late afternoon to play with his brother and cousin on the water table. And he slept well last night, so we're hoping that means he's on the mend. But we decided it was best not to travel any further, just in case he's still having trouble. We're very sad to miss out on the visits we'd planned with friends and relatives, but we knew that it was unpredictable to travel with the boys this young. (They were great in the car ride up, by the way!)
We're off on a road trip to visit family. Our original goal was to make to to Vermont for my grandmother's 95th birthday celebration (with a visit to my sister and some friends on the way), but we'll see how the boys do -- we're guessing that between them wanting to move around (rather than being stuck in carseats) and the nighttime wake-ups we've been having, we're going to call it quits before we get that far north! Oh, and did I mention that James seems to be starting the separation/stranger anxiety phase? He's still happy to see and wave to other people, but he doesn't want them to hold him.
Over the weekend, James didn't want to eat baby food; he closed his mouth and turned away every time the spoon came near. This had Mike a little concerned, but then yesterday James came back around -- our wonderful babysitter discovered that sitting him next to Matthew and feeding Matthew while ignoring James made James decide that he wanted some food, too. :)
:)
James's appointment at the Special Infant Care clinic went well. As we expected, the two main areas that we need to work on are his expressive language (making sounds, speaking) and eating (more solids). His receptive language (understanding) was in the normal range, which was nice to hear (no pun intended), and they were happy with his progress on motor skills.
recall the period of time in the NICU when they thought James might have a functional motility problem (that is, that his intestines might not be able to move food through well or quickly enough). There are not good treatments for those conditions, so the worst case scenario there was that he would never have been able to come off IV nutrition (with the high risk of early death from liver failure or central line infections). I vividly remember the world-famous neonatologist standing next to me at James's bedside, with eyes full of sympathy, saying, "We all hope the surgery will help, but it may be that his intestines will just never work right." We're sure glad that James exceeded expectations there! :)
Of course, we're not quite sure what Matthew's weight really is -- he strongly objected to being put on the scale. When we tried to lie him down he flipped over and tried to crawl off; when we sat him down he stood up and grabbed for me. The first weight was 20 lbs, 5 oz, and the second one was 21 lbs, 8 oz, so you can see there's a substantial margin of error!
Matthew was inspired by his doggie outfit the other day -- he decided to check out the dog door. (Actually, we normally have it closed off by the baby gate, but since we were going outside he had a rare opportunity.) We didn't let him crawl through, though; there's concrete on the other side which probably wouldn't be good for baby knees or heads!
This weekend, the boys had their first "swim" in the pool that Auntie Nora and Uncle Adrian got them for their birthday. Mike plunked James in first when the water was too cold, and he was not amused. But once we added some warmer water, both of the boys had a great time. (Mike and I experienced some of the water, too, as Matthew is a champion splasher!)
Happy Father's Day to our fathers, the best anyone could ever want. Thank you for all of your love, support, patience, and wisdom over the years. We love you!
James (and Matthew) say Happy Birthday to Auntie Nora, Uncle Isaac, and Auntie Erin!! (No, they're not triplets.) We hope you all had a wonderful day!
Matthew's new goal in life is to figure out how to open (or scale) the baby gate. He knows that there's a button on the top involved, but unfortunately for him (and fortunately for us), there's also a bottom latch that requires lifting up to open.
the baby-safe electrical outlet cover?
