Bathtub Painting

We made pink, blue, purple, and green!

I found on pinterest the other night on how to make bathtub paints. All it involves is combining baby wash, cornstarch, and food coloring. We made a batch for Macyn and she LOVES it. She will spend an hour in the tub and we will often have to add more hot water since the water gets so cold. She is proud for her painting creations and it is easy to clean up – just use water. She also paints herself and it doesn't stain at all.

3 Years 4 Months

Macyn on her new twin bed

 I know it has been  quite some time since I did an update on Macyn, but we have been busy with other projects. She continues to grow and develop each day. She can now draw "people" and you can tell what they are supposed to be. She spends most of her night coloring, playing with little people and barbies,  and role playing. She likes to be the mom, sometimes the baby. She also likes to play duck, duck, goose and hide and seek. She can now sit down and do a 25 piece puzzle by herself. She is also really into arts and crafts. We bought her a pair of scissors and will often color with crayons and markers, then cut out some pieces, and even asks for glue sometimes. One night we just spent time gluing marshmallows to paper and she was completely content with that. As a result of all these projects we end up with LOTS of coloring and other papers from home and daycare. The other day DH was going to throw some of them and she found the trash bag and says very angrily, "Why are all my pretty pictures in here, DAD?" I swear she doesn't miss anything!

We have had some issues lately of her acting out, but we have tried to nip them in the bud. After having some issues at daycare of not listening, yelling and kicking teachers, we tried to encourage her to have good behavior instead of disciplining her for every.little.thing. We have now made a listening chart and she gets a sticker every time she listens or does something the first time she is told. She has been doing really well with this and I hope she keeps up.

We are still working on not wetting the bed, and I am kinda wondering if it is something she will grow out of. The problem is, when she wets the bed it doesn't wake her up. She will just lay in it all night. We practice getting out of bed and going potty, but she has yet to do it. She just holds it all night for the most part.

Her favorite TV shows include, Curious George, Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood, Martha Speaks, Princess Sofia, Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, and most recently Strawberry Shortcake.

 

She has been fairly healthy, but has had a couple bouts of strep throat, ear infections, and a very short 24 hour flu. She may need another set of ear tubes and her adenoids taken out next week. Not looking forward to that, but next week we will know more.

She continues to grow so fast - hard to believe she is almost 3.5 already!

First Birthday Party

Macyn attended her first birthday tea party with friends and had a great time. She came home with some flowers in a vase, a goodie bag, and a necklace she made. Kudos to the mom who put the party on – having about 15 three & 4 year olds for two hours on a Saturday morning takes a lot of bravery! However, now Macyn is always asking if her friends can come over to her house and play. We haven't crossed that bridge yet, but I'm sure it will be soon.

We picked out an outfit for her and she was super excited to get all dolled up. She is starting to look more and more grown up all the time!

Valentine's Day

We gave Macyn a small gift on Valentine's day and she was quite excited to get a new high chair for her baby dolls. She even complimented our assembly skills and saying, "you are good at building, Daddy!"

 

DH and I had a pre-Valentine's date a couple of nights earlier. We figured it wouldn't be so busy. We went out and ate at a restaurant and I had a giant $6 piece of cheesecake for dessert. Totally worth it. And since I am eating for three, I did not feel one bit guilty!

22 Weeks

As you can see in my 22 week picture, I am beginning to get large. And I am feeling large too. I looked back at pictures while pregnant with Macyn and I am about the same size as I was at 28-30 weeks with her.

My belly is starting to feel heavy when I stand up after sitting for a while, and I still have lots of aches and pains when I try getting up or walking around. Its hard to get comfortable to sleep and my belly already needs it's very own pillow. I get really tired doing simple tasks like laundry, grocery shopping, pretty much anything that involves me on my feet. I take lots of breaks and continue to ice my back daily. Anyways, we had our 22 week check up yesterday and boy have the babies grown!

Baby A: 1lb 3oz
Baby B: 1lb 4oz

Holy cows - two weeks ago they didn't even weigh a pound each. Now I'm carrying around 2.5 lbs of babies! No wonder why my belly is starting to get heavy! I don't remember their heart rates, but they were only about 4 BPM apart. Both babies are still breech. I will continue to have my 2 week checkups to check for TTTS, but things are still going smoothly for now! We also confirmed that the babies will be here sometime between May 12 and May 19. My doctor said with identicals the mortality rate goes up if you deliver past 37 weeks. So the 36 week mark is our goal. Here are some pictures of the peanuts!

Looking at each other!

 DH and I discussed some names for the babies on the way up to the doctor. We have two names we like, but haven't made the names "official" yet..

I will be trying to update with Macyn too, but we have been super busy! Its a lot of work making sure to keep everyone updated with the twins every two weeks :)

New Haircut

Before and After

After about 4 months without a trim, we decided to have Macyn get a new haircut. I had the stylist cut off about 3" so her bangs would be the same length as the rest of her hair. Macyn was very specific that she wanted curls. The hair stylist just curled it under really nice and then asked Macyn if she liked it. Her response? "No, I want it to have curls." So she ended up curling it and from here on out she lets me know that when I curl her hair its not as good as the hair dresser :) But, she likes it nonetheless!

20 Week Update

First off, I forgot to take a 20 week bump picture....so I guess we will just skip that this time.

We had another big ultrasound yesterday as they did echoes on both babies' hearts. Here are some updates as what we found out:

• Baby A is weighing in at 13 oz, heart rate at 147 BPM, and she is now in breech position. 2 weeks ago she was head down. Crazy how she turned completely around!
• Baby B is weighing in at 15 oz, heart rate of 139 BPM, and she is still breech. 
• Babies are both measuring about a week ahead - about 21 weeks based on all their measurements
• Babies are confirmed once again, that they are girls!
• Baby A is the "ornery" one. She didn't like to stay in one spot while they were doing the echoes. Baby B laid there ever so nicely!
• Our doctor came in and said he looked at all the pictures and that the reason they do all these extra things is because these babies are at high risk of birth defects. He stated that after looking at all images of the heart, and other parts, he sees no indications of abnormalities/deformities! We were so relieved to hear this - its hard to be told that these babies are "high risk" and worry that everything will be okay. This put us a little more at peace and a little more calm.
• The babies will now be delivered for sure by 37 weeks now instead of 36. In fact, I could have penciled in my c-section, but we chose to hold off for a little bit.
• I asked about Twin To Twin Transfusion Syndrome (TTTS), because they look for this every two weeks. He said the most severe cases happen before 20 weeks, but it can begin any time between 20 - 30 weeks. So the good news is, I am out of the "severe cases" stage. He said it can really start anytime and has had patients where the babies were growing normally and within two weeks one quit growing as fast. So this is the reason for two week ultrasounds.
• The babies each grew 4 oz in the past two weeks, so I have almost 2lbs of babies already!
• The babies are both facing towards my back. We got a really cute picture of the back of their heads together:

I have noticed a lot of questions we get asked pretty often, so here are a couple of FAQ's:
• How are you feeling?
I tell most people I feel well, just so I don't  have to explain how I'm really feeling. In reality, I have quite a bit of lower back pain and lots of aches. I have been to the chiropracter at least 3 times in the past month and I ice daily. It doesn't really hurt sitting in a chair or anything, but it hurts if I lounge around a lot. I can't complain, though. And yes, I am sure it will get worse the farther I go. I get really bad heartburn, but I have noticed if I eat a yogurt before bed, this seems to curb it a little bit, and keeps me full for the most part through the night.
• Do you feel the babies move?
Yes! I wasn't quite sure the past couple of weeks, but its obvious now. DH even felt one move/kick/punch last week Friday. I feel movement mostly up high, about rib level. Once in a while I will feel one down low, and I mostly feel movements in the middle - right side.
• Are you going to dress them the same?
Well, since they are identical I don't think so - we need to have some way to tell them apart! We have thrown around the idea of sharpie marker on their heads (DH's idea) or keep one baby in pink and one in purple, etc. We aren't quite sure how to approach this one!