Munchkin Update: 2 Years, 9 Months

Posted on March 6, 2014 by justeeni

Lydia has been in school mode all month, probably because Mom is so busy researching homeschooling. She’ll often grab a book, some stickers, and a pen and say “I’m doing school!”. One of our recent learning activities was a finger game about a little mouse:

I have a little mouse. (the thumb is her mouse)
He’s hiding in a hole! (that’s the fist)

He will come out if we talk soft and slow.
Open a window (pinky finger) and another (ring finger) and another (middle finger)…
Look! There’s the mouse hiding in the covers!

She loves showing us her “little mouse”.

Lydia and I have also been enjoying Bible times together. We’ll read from the Bible, a Bible story book of Lydia’s, pray together, and sing some of the songs from the most recent church service. Last week she became hooked on “10,000 Reasons”. She’ll sing it every day as she dances and spins in the living room.

Bless the Lord oh my soul, oh my soul
Worship His holy name.
Sing like never before, oh my soul
I’ll worship Your holy name.

This month Lydia started flossing her teeth, sitting in a “big girl” chair during breakfast, and successfully jumping off the ground with both feet. She can count to 20 but sometimes says “eleventeen” instead of “seventeen”. She started calling pajamas jahmiahs (like Jeremiah without the “re” in the middle). We’re working on negatives as she likes to say “I no like it” instead of “I don’t like it”. And when she wants to do something after we tell her it’s time to be done she responds with an insistent “one more time”.

Abby Update: 5 Months Old

Posted on February 10, 2014 by justeeni

Weight: 10 pounds, 2 ounces

Eat, sleep, and smile have been Abby’s main activities this month. She often sleeps eight hours at night, but she makes up for that by eating every one and a half to two hours during the day. One night in January Abby suddenly stopped having her evening fussy time (from 7ish to 10 every night) and she hasn’t gone back. She also outgrew her newborn hold-me-all-the-time desires and sometimes she’ll even squirm and cry until you put her down.

Abby spends a lot of time in her bouncy seat. She hates being on her tummy. Recently, while laying in her jungle, she learned that she can make the hanging toys rattle by swinging her arms at them, so that’s been an exciting development for her. She also loves bath time. Her whale-of-a-tale bathtub came with a goldfish “strainer” toy that we use to drizzle water on her and that always gets her to smile. Lately Abby has been trying to fit her whole fist into her mouth. She hasn’t been able to succeed, so she usually gets pretty frustrated.

More than anything, Abby loves to bounce. When she’s tired and won’t fall asleep, she needs to be bounced lightly. Whether it’s in her bouncy seat, or in Mommy or Daddy’s arms, Abby just loves bouncing. We’ve dubbed this BBS for bouncing baby syndrome, because it always gets her to fall into a contented sleep.

Abby’s nicknames continue to be numerous, but the most commonly used ones are: Abby, Abs, and Abster. We don’t really think about it when we use them, but then it’s adorable to hear Lydia tell Abby goodnight, “I love you Abs!”.

Abby Update: 4 Months

Posted on January 10, 2014 by justeeni

Weight: 8 pounds, 9 ounces

Tomorrow Abby will be four months old. In the 82 days she spent in the NICU, she gained a total of 2 pounds, 13 ounces. In the 41 days she has spent at home she has gained 2 pounds, 13 ounces, exactly the same amount of weight in half the time. I thought that was pretty cool.

Abby is doing great. She eats about every three hours, but recently started sleeping about 5-6 hours at night. In the mornings she likes to sit with Dan as he works for an hour or two from home before going in to work (to avoid traffic).

During the day Abby mostly just sleeps. She started smiling a couple of weeks ago and is her smiliest early in the morning. During the evening she has another “awake time” but that one is usually not a very smiley time for her. She loves to be held as much as possible and worn in a wrap with Mommy during the day.

We have come up with a lot of nicknames for Abby. Aborigine, Aboriginal, Abbs, Munchkin 2, and the most recent: Abigus. Abigus originated when Dan put her swaddle on like toga one morning. Super cute.

See? Abby’s favorite way to play is when we poke her in the nose. Dan figured that one out, but I’m not sure how. If Abby’s in a decent mood, that’s the best way to get a smile out of her.

Munchkin Update: 2 Years, 7 Months

Posted on January 3, 2014 by justeeni

Many times when Lydia was a baby, I prayed that she might grow to be a good helper to me, and lately I have seen the effects of that prayer. Lydia loves to help! One of her most common phrases is, “Help me?”, which really means “help you?” but we’re still getting the pronouns all figured out. Her very favorite way to help is when I wash dishes. She sits on the edge of the sink with her feet in the water and takes a sponge and washes away. The only unhelpful thing about it is that she doesn’t every want to stop! Even when there are no dishes to be done, she still asks, “help dishes?”.

Lydia also helps me unload the dishwasher (she hands me the silverware, one piece at a time as I put it away), fold laundry (she’s learning how to fold wash cloths), and vacuum (she pushes the on/off switch). She likes to hold Abby and run to get her clean clothes or put dirty clothes in the hamper after Abby spits up. When we tuck her in to her new “big girl bed” at night she often yells out the door as we leave, “help me Mommy?”.

Whatever Lydia does, she does it with all her heart. Often while she is playing alone I will hear loud yelling from her room. I rush in only to find her holding a book out in front of her and singing at the top of her lungs. She makes up her own songs, sings some that she knows, and mixes up the words of others. Some of our favorites are:

YES! Jesus loves me, the Bible made me so

and

Jesus, Jesus PRECIOUS Jesus, oh for God so loved the world

While it was on the radio, Lydia would ask for Christmas music every bed and nap time. Now that there’s no more Christmas music, we play a cd of children singing hymns and Bible songs. She knows each song from the beginning and will frequently burst into song at the dinner table or in the car.

When she’s playing, Lydia often gets so absorbed in whatever she’s doing that she doesn’t hear when we talk to her. She’ll come out of her room decked out with a toy tutu, purse, sunglasses, and toy keys and say “bye! see ya later! love you!”. She is all girl and loves accessories and sparkly things. She has two pretty Christmas dresses from Nana and wants to wear them every single day with her silver sparkly shoes. Because she loves to be pretty, Dan and I have been teaching her the two things that make her the most beautiful: to obey, and to smile.

Lately Lydia will occupy herself by removing every single tupperware container from the cupboard. Then she’ll climbs in the cupboard and yell “HIDING!”. If I am ever looking for something and I ask Lydia if she knows where it is, she either says, “hiding”, “all gone”, or “in the closet”.

Lydia keeps us smiling and laughing. Even when she gets in trouble it’s impossible to stay mad at her when she gives us a smile and a hug. Some of our very favorite things she’s been saying lately include “swabagee salsa” (spaghetti sauce), and “silly goose!”.

Every night as we tuck Lydia in to bed, she asks Mommy, Daddy, and Abigail for a hug and a kiss. Occasionally throughout the day she’ll run up to one of us, grab our legs and say, “I love you Mommy/Daddy!”. She is getting better at sitting quietly for Bible time and often repeats phrases that catch her attention after Dan says them. After doing this for a while she started to perk up every time she heard us say “Jesus Christ”. Then, one Sunday she caught our Pastor say “Jesus Christ” and she burst out, “Jesus Christ?!?” with excitement. It was as if she was thinking, “Hey, Pastor Paul talks about Jesus too!” Lydia also likes to answer his rhetorical questions loudly enough for the people around us (and sometimes the whole church) to hear. Perhaps we should teach her to say “Amen” whenever she gets excited so she’d be less distracting!

Abby Update: 2 Weeks Old

Posted on September 25, 2013 by justeeni

Weight: 2 pounds, 13 ½ ounces
Feedings: 23 mililiters fortified to 22 cal every 3 hours given over the course of 1 hour

Abby keeps on cruising along. Preemies are given lipids and TPN through a PICC line. The lipids are basically fat. The TPN is basically food. As Abby has increased her feeding amounts each day, she has needed less and less of the lipids and TPN. On Sunday the doctor gave orders to stop lipids and on Monday her TPN was replaced with clear fluid. Yesterday they took out her PICC line! So now little Abby only has a feeding tube and the leads that monitor her breathing, heart rate, and oxygen level.

Yesterday the nurses started to feed Abby by connecting her food syringe to a pump that slowly gives her the food over the course of half and hour. Today they slowed it to one hour. Previously the food was just “plunged” in the syringe and given to her by gravity. However, research seems to show that babies do better with the slower, consistent rate of food being given using the pump. We’re hoping this helps reduce the amount of milk Abby is spitting up. Preemies often develop reflux, so it’s not terrible if she does too, but we’re hoping to pump will help.

Now that Abby has reached her “full feed” amount of milk, she has started receiving fortified milk. This means that formula is added to the milk to give it extra calories and is pretty typical for every preemie. We’ll wait and see over the next few days to find out how much weight she starts to gain with full feeds and fortified milk.

As for the rest of us, thank you all for your prayers! Yesterday as I held Abby I was so filled with thankfulness and peace as I reflected on God’s leading in all of this. What a change that was from a few nights ago! I am encouraged to think that “the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that will be revealed” and also that our trials and suffering produce perseverance, character, and hope. I have also been thinking about how God definitely does give us more than we can handle on our own, but never more than we can handle with His help. God has been helping us and the past couple of days have been so much better. We are so thankful.

On Monday night, a couple from church came over to babysit while Lydia slept and Dan and I got to spend some nice time alone with Abby. Dan also started going in to work for a few hours on Monday and Lydia and I have been surviving alright without him. Since I’m not able to lift Lydia for two more weeks, I’ve been building “stairs” up to her high chair and crib for lunch and nap times. The first day was rough at nap time, but she’s figuring things out and cooperating very sweetly.

We are growing more and more certain that Dan’s nausea was due to stress, lack of sleep, and irregular meals. As we continue to adjust and figure out a routine all of those things have been starting to improve. I am enjoying our new apartment a lot already, even without having unpacked anything yet, and Lydia loves it here now that Dan has started taking her to the pond to feed the ducks every day or so. Since we expect to spend another 6-10 weeks in the NICU and then have a newborn at home, we know that we’ll be sleep deprived for quite a while (though I, at least, get a nap a day when Lydia naps) so if anyone has any tips for keeping our energy up besides drinking caffeine, we’re all ears!

Praise the Lord
We are thanking God for:
-Abby’s continued progress, that she is off her PICC line and continuing to breath well
-a new normal, settling into some sort of structure and no longer feeling quite like chickens running around with our heads cut off
-an apartment that is already feeling like home (to me) and doesn’t appear to be the cause of Dan’s illness
-that our first little munchkin has done so well with an irregular schedule, lots of different babysitters, late bed times, and less play time with Mommy and Daddy
-generous friends who have offered help in so many ways: watching Lydia, providing healthy food and gift cards, and so many who are praying

Please Pray
-that Abby would gain weight quickly, continue to breath and digest well, and not have problems with reflux
-for a more consistent routine for us
-for strength as we are both (Dan and I) very tired

Abby and her Quilt Updates

Posted on September 17, 2013 by justeeni

Weight: 2 pounds, 7 ounces

Today we said goodbye to my parents who have been helping us out since Saturday. Their visit allowed us to formulate a rough idea of what the coming weeks will look like, rest and recover as they chased around Lydia, and spend time alone with Abigail. They also helped out with cooking, cleaning and laundry. I don’t know what we would have done without them!

Abigail is continuing to do well. Within the past couple of days, she has begun to digest her milk! She is breathing very well on a high flow nasal canula, although she doesn’t like it and often gets caught trying to pull it out, and her feeding tube as well. Until today, Abby was kept in an isolette with humidity, to protect her skin. Today, our nurse informed us that her skin looks great (and has since birth) and they turned off the humidity. The only slightly unhappy news is that Abby was back on the bilirubin light, although we were warned that she would be. Her levels have climbed over the past day and she still has bruises from the labor and delivery. Both the bilirubin and bruises will go away as her liver continues to do its job.

Dan and I are pretty worn out from all the running around. My parents helped us make a massive grocery trip, stocking up on nonperishables for the next month so we won’t have to go out again. Today was also nonstop as Dan and I signed our lease for the apartment we are scheduled to move into this Friday. However, I have been able to hold Abby on three different days and Dan has gotten to hold her once. Those times are very special, although a little scary as she is so tiny and is connected to so many wires.

Praise the Lord
We are thanking God for:
-My parents visit and all of their help
-A plan that is starting to come together
-Special times alone with Abigail
-Abby’s improved digestion and that she’s off humidity

Please Pray:
-that Abby will gain weight
-that her bilirubin levels would drop as her liver improves
-for continued healing for me as we are often on the go
-that Abby’s ultrasound tomorrow would show no bleeding in her brain

The rest of this post is actually a post I wrote the day before Abby was born, intending to post on September 11, which turned out to be her birth day. Rather than take the time to change it, I am posting it as written, even though Abby is obviously here now. (Time is a scarce resource around here these days)

Thanks to all who gave feedback on my quilt color dilemma a couple of weeks ago! I so appreciated all of your creative and girly ideas. Now it would only be fair for me to share my revisions and update you all on the quilt’s status. As a refresher, this was my initial design:

But it was too green and not very girly. I had played around with the colors but was just stuck. My Mom and sister, Christina, sent me these color revision ideas:

And many others made suggestions as well: make the sheep pink, lighten up the colors, use patterned fabric for the hills…I liked a lot of the ideas, but couldn’t incorporate them all. Here are some of the ideas that I had to give up on:

1. I actually had this idea from the start, to put Baby’s name right there on the quilt. However, I also thought that maybe Baby would want to use this for her own kids someday (one could only hope), and so I decided to leave her name off of it just in case.

2. I think the quilt could have looked really cool with some patterned fabrics. However, I am new to this whole quilting thing and not extremely artsy myself. Just walking through the aisles of fabrics at the store was overwhelming. On top of that, I think it would have taken me ages to find fabrics that all went well together and I had an impatient toddler and eager-to-leave husband wandering around the store while I made my decisions. In the end, it took long enough just to find solid fabrics that went well together!

3. I think this picture with the bow on the lamb’s ear is very cute, and meets that girly need. But, what I don’t have shown in the picture, is that the sheep and sun are going to have “rag quilt” seams. I’m already nervous about sewing some curves and a friend a church suggested using the frilly external seam to make these curves less bothersome. So, the sheep and sun will have different textures and 3-D-ness already, and I didn’t think I could fit a bow in on top of that without things getting too busy.

4. I love the way this ruffle edge looks on the quilt, and I may still end up using it. However, with all of the embroidery, hand-quilting and stitching, and curves to navigate, I think this project is going to take me ages as is. So, while I may change my mind, for now I’m going to stick to the traditional binding.

So what am I going to do?

1. First I took the collective advice to lighten up the greens. I’m actually not a fan of pastel colors, and was hoping to keep the blanket bright. However, I realized it didn’t take much adjusting to make the greens look more girly and to make them more compatible with other girly colors.

2. The second thing I did, that made a huge difference, was take out the orange and lighten up the sun. The orange was clashing with almost everything I had tried.

3. Next, I lightened up the black on the sheep to a grey. I had never thought to do this and it also made a big difference. I decided to play around with the colors on the border a little more as well.

4. Once I picked out new colors for the quilt borders, I added in some embroidered flowers using the same colors. This brought the pinks from the border into the quilt and seemed to tie things together.

So, here is:

On the left you see the original design. On the right is the new and improved color-scheme. (The flowers on the real quilt will not look like a four year old drew them) The writing around the border will match the darker pink, and the writing on the hill will remain a dark green.

After I came up with a design that Dan and I both liked, we took a trip to Jo Ann’s and bought some of the first supplies. However, I realized, in the process, that it’s not always so simple to match fabric colors that are available in the store with a picture on a computer! So, I did my best, wrote down the fabrics I liked, but only bought the light pink and embroidery materials. I know embroidering that passage is going to take a very long time, so I’m going to wait before buying everything else. Only time will tell how the quilt will turn out in the end, but I’ll keep you updated as I make progress.

AND to go along with an update on the quilt, I thought I might give a Baby update as well. I am now just past 28 weeks! Reaching 28 weeks is a big deal because 90-95% of babies born after 28 weeks survive. However, a recent prenatal appointment gave us a heads up that Baby just might want to come early after all. So we’re taking extra precautions, making preparations for Baby to come early, and I’m handing over my “standing” responsibilities to Dan and Lydia while I keep off my feet as much as possible. It makes things a bit more chaotic than they were before, but we’re adjusting ok. Dan’s already taking over so much (laundry, dishes, cooking, Lydia’s baths, cleaning…) so I was mentally preparing myself for a slightly messier house, toys always all over the living room, and an unmade bed each day. It was to my own pleasant surprise Monday morning when I walked into our bedroom after Dan left for work and the bed was made. It’s the little things.

Muchkin Update: 2 Years, 3 Months

Posted on September 6, 2013 by justeeni

When Lydia wasn’t yet two years old, I started writing down monthly “reports” describing the latest things she was learning, saying, or doing. I thought it would be fun to keep a record of how she was growing and changing, and to be able to look back with her later and show her how much we enjoyed her and all the precious things she brought into our lives.

Lydia has made some huge strides in the past month, language-wise! Some of our favorites include her pronunciation of “All finished” when she’s done eating (sounds like “All fiscious!”, and her latest expression of independence, “I do it!”. She also asks me every morning, “Odyssey? Blankey? At Stef?”, which translated means, “Are we going to listen to Adventures in Odyssey while I sit on the blanket and then watch an Aunt Steph vlog?”. The answer, on most days, is “yes”. Whenever we listen to music in the car and the cd gets to the silent gap in between tracks, Lydia almost always asks, “More?”

Lydia is back to loving her books. She often asks us to read to her (“Book?”) and can even identify some of the books with a name. A favorite is called Grandma’s Are for Giving Tickles, which she just calls, “Gramma”. It has flaps, and she is starting to memorize, not only what picture is under each flap, but the writing under the flaps as well. So, when I open the hop scotch flap, she says, “No cheating!” When I open the flap that shows a fireplace scene with hot cocoa, she says, “Cocoa”. And when I open the flap where Grandma is sending grandson out to play in the snow, she says, “Have fun!” She also enjoys reading her First Words book and identifying an impressive number of the pictures inside. She has another book with flaps, but it also has buttons that make sounds. For each flap there is a picture that matches a picture on a button, and Lydia can successfully match every flap to the corresponding button without help.

Lydia loves the playground. We are sad to think that, once we move, we will no longer be within walking distance of a playground. So I’ve been trying to take Lydia there extra to get some time in. She just recently started going down the tunnel-slide by herself, and has even done one of the bigger twirly slides. Recently Lydia went down the tunnel-slide 13 times in a row! I noticed that she followed the exact same routine every time.

Lydia sits down on the slide, on her knees.
Lydia: Sit down!
Tries to pull her feet out in front of her.
Lydia: Feet first!
Gets stuck.
Lydia: Stuck!
Gets unstuck
Lydia: Ready?!
Goes down slide. Gets up. Looks up the slide.
Lydia: Me?
Dan: You want me to come down?
Lydia: Yeah
Dan comes down slide.
Lydia runs back around to the spot where Dan lifts her up to the top.
Lydia: Again!

I don’t know if it’s an age-thing, a phase-thing, or a personality-thing, but Lydia really likes repetition and routine. (Maybe she takes after me!) It will be fun to see if she grows out of it or if it sticks with her.

As always, Lydia is super sweet. Yes, independent, feisty, stubborn, but super sweet. She’s almost always smiley and giggly, doesn’t get down even if others around her are, and loves meeting and watching other kids at the park. Sometimes, without a nap for a couple of busy days, she’ll get emotional and whiney. But as soon as she gets her rest, she’s her perky, happy, giggly self. She loves playing games, being tickled, pretending, helping, cuddling when she’s sleepy, and watching baseball. At the end of her Grandma book, the last page talks about giving Grandma a big hug and Lydia will say “Big Hug!” then turn and give the reader a big hug (and anyone else nearby). And this week, for the first time, when I tucked her in for a nap and said “I love you”, she shouted back “I luff oo!”.

Munchkin Update: 2 Years, 2 Months

Posted on August 9, 2013 by justeeni

Just like those early days in the NICU, Lydia is continuing to display her feisty spirit. She is very stubborn, very strong willed, and more and more, she knows what she wants. We’ve been working, though, on sitting still. Each morning we listen to Adventures in Odyssey online and Lydia loves to sit in my lap and listen. Recently I started putting her on her blanket for Odyssey each day, which is much harder for her. She usually cries and says, “Mommy, lap?” over and over for a while before finally getting distracted and playing with a toy or lying down and sucking her thumb. So, I have been rewarding her for blanket time with some time on my lap! When Aunt Steph has new videos up on her vlog, we’ll watch one of those as the reward. Often Lydia will wander over to me and ask, “At Steph?” She’s also been sitting in my lap when I do my German practice on duolingo, and when it gets to be that time (just after lunch), she’ll ask “Guh-man?”

Lydia loves raisins (which she pronounces “Reeses”) and peanuts (which she calls “cookies”) and watermelon (which she calls “gamma”). It’s a good thing we don’t have other people feeding and watching her or she’d be eating peanut butter cups and cookies and no one would know what to do for “gamma”!

Lydia also loves having Daddy home. (I don’t blame her!) She’ll often say to me during the day, “Daddy at wuhk?” When I answer in the affirmative she sometimes asks “home?” When Daddy is home, Lydia loves to play outside with him at the playground (where he often challenges her to hang from the rings all by herself) and exercise. She’ll copy him as he does push-ups or sit-ups and sometimes she sits on his back to help him get more of a workout.

Despite some battles we have to fight with her stubbornness, Lydia is still so sweet. When we ask her to, she can go get her hair brush from the bathroom drawer and put it away, throw away diapers in the trash, and fetch people their shoes (which she does on her own when she wants to go outside). When she gets hurt she will point to the painful area and say “it huhts” or, better yet, “it huhtses”. When I lay her down for a nap, she rarely goes to sleep without a little crying first. But even through the tears, she’ll give me a kiss and say “Bye” as she waves. She has started saying “See ya!” to Dan when he leaves for work, and also waves and says “bye” when we tuck her in at night. She’s picked up on some of the things I say to her. For example, when I have to quickly leave the room to do something I will point to her and say “I’ll be right back.” It’s pretty adorable to see her point at me and say confidently “All back!” before leaving the room.

MI Taylor Family

We live in Michigan.

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