Pastimes

Saturday mornings mean one thing in our house. No, not cleaning. Certainly not showering. But homemade breakfast! Every Saturday, done by myself. I am a baker at heart. Today was chocolate chip pancakes. Always from scratch. A few weeks ago were cinnamon rolls. My friend gave me a recipe for "The Perfect Cinnamon Rolls," and they really are perfect.

I think they were gone by the afternoon. So sweet that I didn't even bother to make icing.

Caleb's been wanting to learn to read. So today we were working on it. His first word he read by himself was "cat." Then he wanted to spell.

Caleb: "Mom, how do you spell 'poop'?"

Me: "Pp--ooo--ooo--pp"

And then he spelled poop.

How different it will be to teach a girl to read and write!

Jared's grandpa passed away this week. It was sad to hear the news, but we were so glad that we got to say our goodbye's in December to him. He had his whole funeral planned out and things went smoothly and were very beautiful. He will be missed very much.

When we were in Idaho for the funeral, Brooke had her second seizure-like episode. Her last one was a few weeks ago. She will be seeing her doctor on Monday.

We got an anonymous card in the mail this week that was really sweet. It was one of our neighbors that we go to church with wanting to tell us how great they think we are. I had to laugh initially because last Sunday the babies and I were 45 minutes late to church, and then we get a card praising us for doing such a wonderful job with the twins. Wow, my neighbors are too nice. Not to mention they also included a gift card for us to go out to eat. Now if only I knew who they were so I could thank them.... Anyway, just one of the many nice things our friends and neighbors have done for us because we had twins.

Perhaps it was because we needed some new furniture. Or maybe it's because Jared's going on a work-trip to China this month and felt sorry for me. Either way, he picked up these gray chairs that I really wanted at Costco one day. And the beautiful ottoman I picked out from Costco.com. My house is slowly starting to look better, just little bits at a time. Anyway, I managed to squeeze some lovely linen curtains from Ikea out of him before his guilt-trip for leaving me with two babies ended. But it was fun while it lasted!

Seth and Adam, best buddies

Seth pulling Adam on his sled. Adam learned quick how to hold the handles!

Adam always sleeps with his arms stretched out.

Caleb got this awkward bruise under his lip at Kangaroo Zoo. It was way funny-looking. Poor kid. But he had tons of fun in the process.

And here are my babies on their bouncers on sleds being pulled by the boys! This is what we do when it is cold outside... random acts of craziness.

Life Happenings

Little Brookie, as we like to call her, fell asleep on her play mat the other day. I wrapped her up and she took a good nap down there.

Jared helped Caleb complete a 100-piece puzzle. Caleb really loves puzzles and spends a lot of his time working on them. He can do a 48-piece puzzle by himself. As you see, Brooke is in her daddy's lap, which is her favorite place to be in the evenings.

Jared with Adam and Brooke. Side note, one day I was out and an acquaintance of Jared's looked at Brooke in all her pink and said that she was a "cute boy" and "looks like Jared." Oh my.

Yesterday morning the boys had Fruit Loops for breakfast. Afterwards they asked me to cut some game pieces out of the cereal box, and then they proceeded to play with the remnants of the box for the next two and a half hours by themselves. They kept busying taping cars to the cardboard pieces and making race tracks. It was a glorious morning for me and them.

Along with puzzles, Caleb also enjoys Lego sets and putting together the train track. We gave him a map of the track and he put it together by himself. I am really enjoying this 5-year-old age.

Adam, in all his cuteness. We got this cute exercise saucer from my friend who has twin girls.

Number 5

Jared just hit five years at work. He's pretty excited about it. He loves his job and no doubt he will be at it for another five years. The fine company of A*dobe let him pick a gift (he chose a camcorder) and is giving him a 4-week paid sabbatical. I've been asking him what he wants to spend his four weeks doing. First off, he has 2 years to take the sabbatical until it expires. My ideas for his time range from installing a sprinkler system in the back yard to assembling a large playground, maybe with a few babysit-the-kids-so-I-can-go-shopping days. For some really strange reason none of these things sound interesting to him. Something about the sabbatical being a break from work? I can't be sure. I suppose that we could go on a vacation somewhere, but wouldn't that be insane considering we have four young kids. I don't think someone could pay me to go on a vacation right now.

The funny thing about Jared's job is that he partially took it for the health insurance, considering I was 7+ months pregnant with Caleb at the time and it was his first job offer before graduation. Look how well it turned out!

Our Weekend + Caleb Turns 5!

Caleb turned five! He had a Cars 2 pizza party and pinata with his best friends!

Caleb is growing and learning so much... we are excited to see how he develops this year! He loves crafts, puzzles, Play-doh, story-time, biking, friends, and life in general.

Somebody loves my kids enough to make them little

matching outfits... thanks Aunt Carla!

Chub-chub!! Look at those cute cheeks.

Grandma Bellows gave the babies these cute little monkeys for Christmas. The babies love to chew the monkey limbs! Adam especially gets very excited when he sees his monkey.

Every morning Seth wakes up early to play with the babies in our bed. He often says things like, "Adam is my best friend" and "Brooke looks like a little princess." The babies endure his enthusiasm quite well.

The past couple months have been challenging for and with Seth. He feels a desire to be grown-up like his brother, he has been officially displaced as the baby of the family, he was emotionally challenged while he potty trained himself, and he struggles to find his niche in our family. Basically he is suffering through the middle-child syndrome. He is so full of emotion and love for the babies that he often ends up hurting them while trying to play. He falls on the floor and cries 10+ times a day and never goes a night without coming to our bed. So we are working on things.

4-Month Checkups

Today I took the babies in for their four month checkups. Jared is on day 9 of 12 for his vacation so he was able to stay home with the boys. Good thing too because 4 kids + 1 parent + 9 am appointment = disaster!

The babies are healthy and doing well. The results of Adam's CT scan earlier in the month were great. He does have scaphocepaly (long and narrow head), but his skull sutures/joints are still open and are allowing the skull to grow. So he doesn't need surgery :) His head is actually rounding out a little bit and looking better now too. Scaphocephaly presents almost exclusively with synostosis (closed joints), so we were literally preparing for the surgery and were surprised to find out that he doesn't need it. Our pediatrician has actually never seen a case of scaphocephaly that didn't included synostosis, so we are very blessed in this matter.

Our pediatrician also confirmed that Brooke has torticollis (abnormal neck twisting) and has developed a bit of plagiocephaly (flat head on her left side), but she also is improving in head shape.

Brooke's Stats

Weight: 13 lbs 9 oz ~ 52nd percentile

Length: 23.5 inches ~ 23rd percentile

Head Circumference: 16 inches ~ 42nd percentile

Adam's Stats

Weight: 12 lbs 5 oz ~ 8th percentile

Length: 23.5 inches ~ 7th percentile

Head Circumference: 16 inches ~ 14th percentile

They are the same length and have the same head circumference but are different percentiles because they are different genders. The doctor always refers to Adam as the runt, but I think he is just perfect as he is.

The babies are still nursing and they have established quite a sleep schedule. They eat around 7:30 pm or so, sleep 8 hours, eat, then sleep a few more. Occasionally someone will also get up at 1 am to eat, but overall we are very satisfied with their night schedule. They have come a long way the past two months! Their naps are still sporadic but in the next couple of months I imagine they will establish a pattern in that as well.

Babies resting at home after getting their immunizations.

Merry Christmas...

Merry Christmas from our family to yours!

Adam's Appointment

On Wednesday we took Adam to the Utah Valley Regional Medical Center to see Dr. Morales. He is a plastic surgeon at Primary Children's in Salt Lake City. We took Adam in because his pediatrician thought he might have craniosynostosis of the sagittal suture. Since birth Adam has had a long and narrow head shape and a small fontanel (soft spot).

At the appointment the doctor gave the good news that Adam's fontanel is still open and he is lacking the classic skull ridge that is found when the sagittal suture (mid skull joint) is closed. Though he does has scaphocephaly (long and narrow head shape), which rarely presents outside of craniosynostosis. So he ordered a CT head scan just to confirm that his physical examination was correct.

Adam did very well with his CT scan. There was no wait, so I nursed him to make him sleepy, then I nursed Brooke while Jared got Adam to sleep in the stroller. He slept through the procedure so he didn't need to be sedated. And everything was covered in full by our insurance since we paid the maximum out of pocket for the delivery--another plus! We need to wait a few days to get the CT results.