With extra butter

A couple weeks ago, Timothy had his one-year check up. Turns out he's on the small side. Never would have guessed that one. Oh wait...we already knew that. At his 9-month appointment, he didn't make as much progress as he had at his 6-month check-up and had even fallen off the curve completely. At the time, the doctor wasn't worried; he just said that this was about the time genetics kicked in, and looking at Lily, he wasn't too concerned. But at the12-month weigh-in, he'd fallen even further off the curve and was actually starting to flat line. Now he felt we had reason to worry a little since it was starting to affect his length, too. So he recommended we see a dietitian to get her insight.

The next week, we headed to the dietitian's office where we got to tell her what Timothy eats and how much. I know she was there to help, but as we tried to capture a typical day for Mr. Bubs, I've never felt so judged! Such a silly thing to worry about, I guess, but I was so sure her response was going to be, "You're terrible parents. No wonder he's not growing!" despite the fact that I try to give him a fairly balanced, healthy diet...with the occasional french fry or popsicle.  Of course that's not what she said; she actually said we were doing pretty well, except for his bottle usage (will NOT take a sippy to save his life!). So her solution was to "power pack" what we are giving him. Basically, we have to increase his fat and calories without adding much to the actual volume of what he's eating. This means adding butter or cream to just about everything and being given free reign to make him a milkshake (with the tip to look for the ice cream with the highest calorie count) for a snack.

Oh...and make sure he drinks at least 24 oz of formula a day and try to get him off a bottle within 2 months. The thing about that is, I'm not sure he was drinking 24 oz a day when he was on a straight liquid diet. That's probably not entirely true, but for the last few months, we've been lucky to get him to drink maybe 10 or 12 oz of formula a day. And as soon as we started the whole power packing thing, he hasn't even wanted that. He's now refusing a bottle in addition to the sippy cup.

When she was explaining what she wanted us to do, I mentioned that I didn't want to bulk him up just for the sake of bulking him up. But from the information she gave us, it says adding extra fat at this point shouldn't have any last effects as he gets older. But I have to admit, every time I add extra butter to his mac and cheese or cream to his apple sauce, I hope it will bulk him up enough that the concern will go away and we can go back to normal meals. Obviously I want him to grow and be healthy, but the kid never stops moving. I don't think I ever chased Lily around this much. He makes a beeline for the dog's water dish so I move him and he beelines for whatever Lily doesn't want him playing with. From there, it's straight to the fridge to laugh at his reflection and then to the other side of the house to cuddle his blanket for .2 seconds before he's off again to find a bead Lily forgot to pick up or a penny I missed with the broom. I think he just has the metabolism of a hummingbird.

So we'll keep up the extra butter at least until mid-July when we have to get a weight check and see if it's helping. In the mean time, we'll just enjoy his energy and his cute ways. Like this video. Whenever I put something on his head, he'll try to put it back after it falls off. Never fails. He's about as adorable as possible!

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Lily's View on Bugs

While heading over to our garden the other day, Lily noticed a bug crawling on the sidewalk. It wasn't a big bug...actually, it was pretty small and I'm amazed she saw it at all. But as soon as she noticed it, she went back to step on it. Now, I don't like bugs all that much either, but unless there is an eminent threat of it crawling on me or biting me or continuing to buzz in my ear, I leave them alone. It's a karma thing. (Ok...not really, but that sounded good, right?) So when she squished the bug, I told her that she doesn't have to step on every bug she sees. Our conversation went like this:

Me: Lily, you don't need to step on every bug. It they aren't bothering you, just leave them alone.
Lily: But I don't like bugs.
Me: I know, but some bugs are nice.
Lily: Was that bug nice?
Me: Probably. Now we'll never know because you squished him.
Lily: He was a mean bug, Mama. Just trust me, ok?

And that was the final word, apparently; how could I argue with that? So we continued our walk to our garden to see if Lily's carrot and radish seeds had sprouted yet. When we got there, I pulled a weed, and just as I pulled it out of the ground, a worm poked what I assume was its head out of the hole and wiggled on out. I pointed it out to Lily, and she asked if we could take it home. Uh....no. I explained that worms help our plants grow so he needed to stay in the garden. Then she poked him a few times, which she thought was fantastic, and we finished looking at our plants. Just as we were getting ready to leave, she asked one more time if we could take the worm home. After I told her no, she said:

I'm going to miss that little worm...

Moral of the story: Bugs bad. Worms cute and pet-worthy.

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One Year Old

On Sunday, Timothy turned one. Can you believe it? One already. We had a little party for him on Friday, and I attempted to make the cake myself. It was first time working with fondant, but it turned out pretty cute...although fondant is definitely not for eating. It looks fantastic, but I'd much rather eat good old fashioned buttercream.

He's cutting his top two teeth, so he's been a bit grumpy lately. This means that he wouldn't let anyone else hold him. He's such a mama's boy. I have to admit, though, it's kind of nice. Lily was never clingy; she's never had a problem settling in with someone other than us. And I think that's great, especially now that she's starting to be a little shy around people she's not familiar with. (Crossing our fingers that this means we can stop worrying that if a stranger offers her some candy out of his van, she won't say, "Cool!!!" and hop in.) Hopefully this means she'll avoid my extreme shyness  but not be quite so shameless as Erik. (:-P) At any rate, I kind of enjoy when Timothy snuggles in when he sees someone reaching for him. (It's nice to be wanted, after all.) But the other side of that, of course, is that it's hard to pass him on to someone else when I have other things to do. But I still enjoy it just a little because I know the day will come (sooner than I'd like, I'm sure) when he won't want to be held by mommy at all.

But I think he still had a fun time, even if he didn't want me to let him go. We got him his own little cake with traditional icing and let him go to town. It did take a finger-full of frosting from Grandma Nancy, though, to convince him it was delicious and that he really was going to enjoy being put in the booster to have his way with it.

It's been a pretty good year. Lily loves her Timothy even if he does mess with her stuff when she doesn't want him to. (Just wait, right?) It's amazing how his little personality is already coming out. Sometimes, when she tells him to leave her stuff alone, he takes a deep breath and lets her know how he feels about it. He always giggles when he sees his blanket, and then he crawls as fast as he can to get to it so he can dive head first into it. He knows when he has something he shouldn't and will hand it to us without our even asking. Usually after taking a lick first to make sure it's not something tasty. He loves feeding himself, but if I'm feeding him, he's usually placated by holding a spoon of his own, even if he's not using it for anything. We're working on moving to a sippy cup, but he's been very vocal about that change and will throw the cup to make sure we really get his point. One of his favorite pastimes is splashing in Laddie's water bowl and then turning to make sure we see him doing it. He likes to bear crawl and crawls normally as fast as he can but shows no in interest in pulling himself up to standing or walking. And that's fine by me. I remember how excited we were for Lily to start walking and then when it happened, it just doubled the chasing we had to do.

It's been a year with some adjustments, of course. I wouldn't say having two kids is harder than having one, but it definitely presents its own set of challenges. Especially on nights when Erik is working, I think Lily feels a little neglected on nights when Timothy seems to need a little more attention. I'll admit, I'm not great and giving them both the attention they need at the same time. I can multi-task lots of things, but apparently, that isn't one of them. So I have to make sure once he's in bed, Lily and I can sit just one on one and read some stories or color some pictures. Or even play her version of house, for which my attention span is extremely short. Now that Timothy is more willing to just cruise around and check things out, this is getting easier, and I hope it will keep going that direction.

Even with the adjustments, the lack of sleep, the frustrations, and all that other stuff, this has been a great year with some great memories. In just one year, I find it hard to remember what it was like before Timothy...it just feels like he's always been here somehow. And I love the addition he's been to our family.

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It's hard being 4...

Yesterday in the car on the way home from dinner, Lily was telling us all about her internship with the mail lady (she helped her put all the mail in the boxes and then brought our mail in for us), and she declared she wants to be a mail carrier when she grows up. (Where she got the term "mail carrier," I don't know since I don't think I've ever said that in my life. How un-PC of me, I know, but knowing we have a female postal person, I've always just called her the Mail Lady. Anyway...) After she finished her story, she got quiet for a minute and then said this:

"When I grow up, everything will be so much easier."

Erik and I just looked at each other for a second, trying not to laugh - of course - since we know how un-easier life really is when you get older, and then Erik mentioned to Lily that, actually, she has it pretty easy now. "No I don't!" she protested. So I asked what's hard now.

The monkey bars! The pole! Lots of stuff!

So there you have it. Be thankful you're older. It's so much easier than being four.

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Memorial Day Weekend

Every once in a great while, the planets align just right and Erik ends up with an honest to goodness long weekend like a normal person. It just so happens the planets were kind to us for Memorial Day this year. So we packed up the kids and headed down to St. George with some friends.

We weren't sure how the kids would do on a six-hour drive, but they were both actually really good. Lily only asked, "Are we there yet?" about 5 times, and it could have been sooooo many more. I think by the end, they were both ready to get out, and so were we, but they were definitely troopers.

Once we'd made the official arrangements to go, we told Lily we would be taking a vacation, which would mean staying in a hotel - where you can jump on the beds! Apparently, this is what Erik remembers most about vacations. So the first thing Lily had to do when we arrived was...

That night, we took a dip in the pool. Timothy had never been swimming before, but he seemed to enjoy it...without a single tear being shed until we pulled him out and he was cold.

Getting everyone to bed that night was a little rougher than usual since Timothy could still hear us milling around while he was in the travel crib. But it wasn't too long before he dozed off. Even though we played up the advantage of having a great big bed all to herself, Lily decided she wanted someone to sleep with her, so for the first two nights, Erik had the privilege. I was nice and took the last night.

On Saturday, we headed into Vegas. The last couple times we've been down there, we've talked about going to the shark reef at Mandalay Bay. We decided it was time we finally did it...plus, Lily would LOVE it. And she totally did. They had some huge, beautiful fish and two tunnel aquariums you could walk through. She was severely tempted to touch the stingrays, but she couldn't quite reach and I don't think she really wanted to anyway.

After the aquarium, we headed to the M&Ms store...our must see in Vegas. Lily was grabbing things left and right, and although we planned on buying her something, we were sure we would have a major melt down when we made her narrow it down to one. As we were getting ready to go, we helped her pick out a star-shaped box of M&Ms. Then she remembered the wall of candy dispensers. She wanted some in a bag, too. We helped her get them, and then said we'd get a smaller box instead of the star one. Then she surprised us completely and said she just wanted the bag. Since they're sold by the pound, we managed to get out of there for about 2 bucks. Sometimes, she amazes me. (I just wish I could predict when she's going to be easy going and when I should brace myself for a fight. I never seem to get it right.)

We rounded out the evening with some shopping in St. George and some pizza for dinner. A great day, really.

On Sunday, we drove the little ways out to Snow Canyon. We stopped at the dunes for a bit, but it was pretty windy, and sand and wind are not a great combination. So we headed to a trail a little further in to climb on some of the great red rocks. So gorgeous!

For our first real family vacation, I think we can call it success. The kids behaved themselves for the most part. We had some fun. We got some great pictures. There wasn't any fighting. No one got hurt, at least not majorly. (Timothy did fall off the bed and get a rug burn on his nose, but that's a completely different story.) And Lily got to jump on some beds.

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