Audrey's 8 month swallow study report

Paul took Audrey to her swallow study follow-up on Tuesday.  She did great with the foods-- took nice, big bites, swallowed correctly, did not aspirate.  So that was great!  So glad that she can continue with solids, even though we thicken all her solids with either rice or oatmeal (more of a mess-reducer than a necessity for safe swallowing, lol). 

Then they began trying liquids.  She aspirated on the plain formula, 1:1 liquid, and formula mixed with rice.  She swallowed correctly when it was thickened to Nectar Thick, which is the current thickness (viscosity, if you wanna get real fancy) that we were already using.  So essentially, since her diagnosis, there's been no change for better or worse. 

Which is really fine.  We've gotten it worked out now to where we know exactly how much water/formula/thickener we need to use to make her food for the day.  We have a great system with Miss Jamey that lets us send her daily food over there and then we refill at night.  In fact, now that all the expressed breastmilk is gone (*tear), it's actually a little easier since sometimes there was some variation in the amounts in the bags.  We would be lying if we said that we hadn't wanted to see some progress, but it's ok.  Her adjusted age is only 7 months, so we are still ages away from "around a year" which is when they said she MIGHT start to outgrow it.

In the meantime, we'll thicken the same way we've been doing it.  (If you're curious, it's 20oz of water, plus 10 scoops of formula...then hand blend.  Then 6 squirts of Simply Thick, then hand blend again and transfer to bottles/ Miss Jamey's container and refrigerate). It's also made her very low- maintenance- she doesn't care at all if her bottle is straight from the fridge, which is nice since we don't have to take time to warm it up.

Besides...who could be disappointed in someone who looks this precious?

Audrey is 8 Months Old!

I cannot believe that 8 months ago we gave birth to our sweet Audrey Grace.  She is seriously the most adorable baby I have ever  seen since Emily was a baby. :) She is precious and excited and bubbly and loving and smart as a whip.  We just love her so much!  Here's what she's doing right now:

- She can sit completely independently for an extended period of time.  I usually put a Boppy around her just in case (especially if we're on a hard floor), but she never falls over anymore.  Sometimes she'll lean back enough to fall but she has super strong abs and just goes down gently. 

- After leaning herself back, she will roll ALL over the floor.  I'm serious- you can turn your back for a second and she'll be across the room, stuck under some piece of furniture or chewing on one of Emily's toys.  It's crazy!  Reminds me a WHOLE lot of this little girl:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Emily, 8 months

Audrey, almost 8 months

- She has now tried all the vegetables and all fruits except pears, which we're doing this week.  She loves everything but peas.  Can you blame her? :)

- She moved up to 6oz bottle this month.

- She wears size 3 diapers.

- She has starting doing a lot of pre-crawling movements like pushing herself WAY up on her hands, inching forward, pushing with her toes/feet, humping the floor, etc.  I even caught her today with her knees under her body!  Won't be long now...

- She can transfer items to each hand and when she loses her pacifier, she either gives up on it and uses her thumb...OR, she can now pick it up, turn it the correct way, and put it back in.  So helpful!

- She has begun to babble a little bit- says ah-goo a little and used some new consonant sounds this month.

- She likes to use toys sitting up now- we need to get out some more toys for her to play with in this position.  We're trying not to clutter up the house (with boxes and things out it's a hard task) but she needs some new things!

- She loves to be tickled and when you make "I'm gonna get you" hands at her she breaks into peals of laughter- it's adorable!

- She goes on Tuesday of this week for her follow-up swallowing study.  Paul will be taking her to the appointment.  We are so hopeful that she's made some progress and maybe her foods won't have to be thickened as much anymore.  We also need the go-ahead to try other fluids besides formula (we want to try a little water or juice in a sippy cup and let her practice with that).  I'll post an update after we get the results of the study. 

That's all the news we have on our sweet little girl right now.  Thanks for checking in and following our family!

Pretty Little Sunday/ "Peeling Corn"

Today was gorgeous and we spent it together as a family...making it double-y good!  We decided to have a nice, relaxing day cleaning the house (sort of), packing some odds and ends, and playing with the girls.  Fun! 

Emily told us that she wanted "long corn" (aka, corn on the cob) for dinner...so I made sure to buy some this morning at the store.  I thought she was probably old enough to learn to shuck it, so I set about teaching her.  She LOVED "peeling corn" with me!  It was so cute.  She was so proud to eat the corn she had "peeled" tonight at dinner.  Look at these precious pics:

Our corn, pre-peeling.

I'll leave you with a shot of one of our beautiful roses.  At each home we've owned (we're on number 4 now, if you count the new one!), Paul and I have planted those $6 roses that are sold at Sam's....and each time, we've been amazed at how many blooms we have gotten!  I am not kidding you when I say that there are currently 10 roses in my kitchen in a vase and another TWENTY SIX outside on the bushes!  They are gorgeous and I will really miss them! 

Emily is 3 and a half!

Our big girl hit a major milestone- 3 and half years old!  She is growing so much and is such a delight right now- this is a wonderful age!  Here's what life is like right now:

- She loves to play pretend games.  Anything- teacher and students, princesses and princes, dress up, doll house, animals... you name it, she'll play it!  So much fun and she has SUCH an amazing imagination already. Super fun!

- She can now write her name by herself- with no help (like she doesn't need someone to say the letters for her).  She is so proud of this!

- She moved to a new classroom- now she's with other kids who are 3.5-4 years old.  It's nice for her to be the youngest because it gives her some new friends to play with and she can learn something from them and be a bit more of a follower instead of a leader...er, a boss. 

- Speaking of being the boss, she'll gladly tell you that she IS the boss.  As her last teacher put it, Emily has "Leadership Qualities"....hahahaha!  That is TOTALLY Teacher Speak for "your child is bossing around all the other kids".  I always knew Paul and I would make a bossy kid- look at us!!! :)

- She loves to play outside but is terrified of bugs.  I definitely never use that to my benefit to get her out of flower beds, etc....never!

- Emily loves to sing and now is singing all kinds of hilarious songs that sound like this:
...she's a girl, yes she's a girl...
and she is a PRIN-cess, and she is a girl.
and she has a dog named Malalalshaya and she has a mommy
and a daddy and a SISter and she likes to PLAAAAAAAY and she
is a princess and I like to go outside and I am a girl
and I like to sing a song
sing a song 
sing a SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONG
and I am laughing and
and
and
and
 I 
I 
I am a girl and I am Rapunzel's Mooooooooooooother...

it is HILARIOUS to eavesdrop when she starts singing!

- She ate lunch in WV last weekend and was an absolute ANGEL- never got up out of her booster seat, never spoke too loudly, ate her lunch and listened so quietly.  It was AMAZING!

- She plays well with Audrey but gets very upset when Audrey puts Em's toys in her mouth.  Then she comes and tells me to please wash her toys since Audrey has made them "sooooooo dirty". Haha!

- She's getting super excited for the new house/ the move.  We spent last weekend there and she LOVES her new house, the river, etc. and is kind of over living between 2 places.  Not much longer now!

I'm sure there's more but that's what I can think of right now.  She is so much fun and we're so proud of her!  

Baby Audrey's 1st Tooth!

It's true- our sweet baby girl has a tooth!  The bottom right broke through the gums today.  Fantastic!  She's been miserable for a few days so we figured it might be soon.  Now if she goes to gnaw on your finger you better watch out- that little guy is SHARP! :)

ZOO Trip!

Yesterday we packed up the girls and headed to the NC Zoo for a little family time.  It was so much fun, despite the weather report (which I dutifully check twice before we left....they really, really blew it!) It was supposed to be 70 degrees and sunny by 10am...instead it was a misty, dreary, cold 58 outside until about 1:30...but whatever.  We covered the (improperly dressed!) girls and went on our way. 

Emily was SO excited about the animals and loved getting to get in and out of the stroller over and over again to see them up close.  I wish the NC Zoo was a little more interactive and maybe had a section of animals you could pet or something.  She would really love that! 

She made me SO proud when we saw the buffalo-- she immediately yelled, "GO HERD!"  My love for Marshall is definitely rubbing off on her!  It was such a cute moment!

The highlight of her day was getting to ride the bus back from the one end of the zoo to the other end.  No, I'm not joking!  She was literally grinning from ear to ear on the bus and kept telling me, "Mommy- we're on a bus!" It never really dawned on me that she had never ridden a bus before!

Audrey was an absolute ANGEL-- no crying, fussing, etc.  She even napped in the stroller in the afternoon!  I had packed the Baby Bjorn-type thing we have but we never even got it out.  She was so great.

Here's some pictures of our fun day- more are uploaded in the Picasa albums. 

Looking for gators

.

At the sea lions- we stayed here for a long time!

Poison dart frogs.

Mommy's getting better with the camera!

 

Happiest baby on the block.

My favorite animal ever.

Audrey is 7 Months Old!

It's hard to believe that our sweet girl was born 7 months ago today!  She is growing like crazy and constantly doing new things.  This is a glimpse into life with that sweet baby Right. Now.

- She loves her feet!! She found them this month and constantly is pulling off her socks, sucking on her toes, etc. etc.  It's like she got a whole new set of playthings!

- She worked her way through all the vegetables in the Gerber Stage 1 line this month.  She loooooves sweet potatoes, squash, and carrots.  The green beans were just ok.  The peas were NOT. HAPPENING.  Seriously....if you give that girl some peas she is literally going to blow it right back out of her mouth at you.  The peas are a no-go.

- She is LOUD!  Like, super loud!  Yelling, screeching, blowing raspberries...you name it, she's doing it.  We've not heard any babbling yet but it has to be soon.  She is so noisy all of a sudden!

- She got her Big Girl carseat and we used it on the trip back to the new house last weekend...Big Mistake.  Major Mistake!  This carseat (the Britax Marathon 70 in cowmooflage print) doesn't have an insert for babies-- but it is labeled for kids from 5-70lbs.  I thought for sure we were in the clear since she is now over 14lbs...but she wasn't!  She kept falling asleep and her head would droop to one side. Then when she woke up, her neck would be hurting like crazy and she would cry cry cry cry cry cry cry cry for what seemed like an eternity (ok, it was a 5 hour car ride so it definitely was made much more stressful by her fussing). We took it back out of my car and will try again in a few weeks.  Poor girl!  (fyi...yes, I tried rolling up a blanket to make a head support/halo type thing...no dice.)

- She rolls all over the place and has recently started reeeeally pushing up high on her arms.  Big girl!

- She began fruits tonight...so far bananas are a hit!  We will slowly work through all the fruits in the Gerber Stage 1 lineup, and then will probably do a fruit and a vegetable each day.  I remember this age with Emily so well...we were getting ready to move here and it felt like all I did was pack and feed her.  It seems like babies this age just eat all day long! 

- She visited her new house (we all did, she wasn't alone :) ) and she celebrated by sleeping 13.5 hours straight!  CRAZY!  Don't worry...she's made up for it this week. ;)  She also got to spend some time with my mom, dad, and sister, so that was great too.  She really likes her new house...she told me so.

- She is doing better with sitting up.  She is getting so strong!  I am so proud of her working so hard.

- She got her first ear infection this month.  She's also teething like nobody's business and her mouth feels so bumpy when I put the numbing gel on her gums.  Poor girl...I hope they break through soon!


So that's life for us right now.  Just moving right along until we really move right along, back to our previous area, in June.  We couldn't be more excited!  Thanks for checking in on us and loving our girls! :)