Addison and Riley's Post!

Mommy and Daddy have been very busy lately because we have been moving into a new house! We needed more room to play and to put all the toys Mommy and Daddy are buying us!

While Mommy, Daddy, and Grandma were moving everything, we got to spend two days with Nana and Grandpa. This was their first time babysitting us all by themselves, so we were good little girls!

"I like to wave at Grandpa!" - Addison
"We always have lots of toys to play with!" - Riley

"We're comfortable at Nana and Grandpa's house." - Addison
"We ate lunch!" - Riley

We played with all the toys Nana and Grandpa have at their house for us. We ate lunch and took naps. We also went to go visit Great Grandma Jean where she volunteers at the thrift store so she could show us off to all her friends.


We didn't stay overnight but Nana and Grandpa said we could do that real soon and Mommy and Daddy seemed VERY excited about that idea!

Quick Update with more to come

I know it is been over 2 weeks since I last blogged. Things have been very hectic leading up to the holidays and our move. We moved into our beautiful 2600 square foot house last weekend and we all love it. Our old house sold and we sign over the house this coming Friday.

We had a fabulous Thanksgiving entertaining at our new house. I will post pictures very soon.

Lastly, the girls are now 19 months old. I feel like I will be blogging about them turning 19 years old before I know it. Happy 19 months girls.

I will post a few more updates with pictures very soon. I apologize for being MIA and I hope to be more active posting here again soon.

Preemie Onesie Drive - Need your Help

As a mother of preemies, I know how difficult the NICU journey can be. Many parents don't anticipate that their child or children will need to spend time in the hospital before being able to come home with mom and dad. These parents usually don't have clothes prepared for such small babies. Most of these parents are spending as much time up at the hospital and don't have the time to go out shopping so their baby can have some clothes to wear. Having a child in the NICU can also be a financial strain on the parents. For me, being able to put clothes on my girls made taking care of my girls a more normal experience rather than focusing on trials of having your baby hospitalized.

I would like to celebrate the lives of the babies that are going to be spending December in the NICU this year by giving these parents an outfit to put on their baby. I did find shopping for preemie clothes to be a little bit of a challenge when my girls were so small. The best places to find preemie clothes were Babies R Us, The Carter's store, and Walmart.

I'm urging all my friends and family to help me out on quest to donate at least one article of clothing to each preemie baby staying in the NICU. The NICU normally holds around 60-70 babies at a time. Please help me by purchasing onesies or sending a donation to help me purchase as many onesies as possible. Any donation would be greatly appreciated. I would like to make the donation by December 19th just in time for Christmas. Please contact me and send me an email at ahaasis@yahoo.com to let me know if you can help us out in our goal.

We did not have clothing ready to put on our girls and we received a few donations while Addison and Riley were growing and learning to eat in the NICU. The first onesie that Riley got to wear was a donation. Here is a picture of our beautiful girl with her very first outfit that the NICU donated to us:


And Addison's Pretty Outfit after hitting her 5 pound milestone:


I have also been blessed to have friends that have gone through a similar journey as us. The Hickey Family over at The Daily life with Quads were blessed with 4 happy healthy preemie babies and they all have done so well. We all rallied to help this family and make sure they were the best dressed set of multiples in the NICU. Something as simple as dressing your baby(s) while they have to live in the NICU can bring so much joy to a parent struggling in the new and different stages of preemie parenthood. Take a look at a few of her bundles of joy:






If you have made it this far, thanks for reading and thanks for considering this cause. Please email me at ahaasis@yahoo.com to make a donation and have a blessed Holiday season.

Getting Bigger....

The girls had their 18 month well visit a week late. Now I am late getting up their stats. The girls have graduated into big girls at the pediatrician. They no longer have to take off all of their clothes and sit on the baby scale. They get to stand on the big girl scale and keep their clothes on. Riley was a pro at being a good patient while Addison hates anything to do with the Doctor. She doesn't like laying on the crinkle paper having the doctor inspect her ears and mouth. The good news is that both girls checked out great and they are growing beautifully.

Their stats:

Addison:
Weight: 23 lbs even
Height: 31 1/4 inches
Head Circ: 19 inches

Riley:
Weight: 23lbs 3oz
Height: 31 1/4 inches
Head Circ: 19 inches

It just amazes me that both girls are so close to each other in each statistic. They are such TWINS!!!!

The doctor was a little upset to hear that the girls are still using bottles for milk at night and in the morning. The girls do fantastic with sippy cups for their juice and water but they wanted nothing to do with drinking milk through a sippy. The doctor said it was time to take the bottles away so we complied. The girls have done pretty well transitioning. They are big girls now and we even decided to take away their highchairs. They are eating up at the table with the rest of the family with their booster seats and loving the ability to feed themselves at the table.

Here are pictures of the girls eating dinner at the big table and drinking out of their sippy cups:







And just for fun...here are a few pictures of Addie hanging out with mommy giving us her very un-photogenic looks at the camera:





And a big kiss for mama:

More Picture Fun

With all of the things I have had on my plate lately, I have been neglecting the blog. I take pictures of the girls all the time but it takes time to upload the photos and add them to the blog. Now that I am not teaching gymnastics anymore, I do have a little more time to get blog posts out. Here is a picture post of the last month. Aunt Sara took the pictures at the park last week. You can really see why I got the girls hair cut after seeing some of these pictures.

Both girls sitting on the Kitchen counter playing with groceries I just bought:



Riley:

Addison, giving us a really homely look, That girl is not very photogenic sometimes:

Park Time:

Addie:

Riley:

Addie:



Riley:

Addie:

Riley wearing Aunt Sara's hat

So cute!

Halloween 2010

Halloween was a lot of fun. The girls enjoyed wearing their costumes and sporting their new haircuts. Riley had fun twirling around in her outfit and Addison had fun curtsying and sitting pretty in her dress.

We took them to a few of the neighbors and the girls were able to pick out some candy. One of our neighbors gave them some glow lights to play with and they were more interested in the glow lights then the candy. Another neighbor gave them some toy skeletons and they were happy and content to pass out candy. They loved seeing all the other kids with their cute and scary costumes.

Here are the pictures from their fun:

 

This is what happens when you try to get a picture of them standing together. By the time you snap the photo, it turns out like this:


And at the end of all the fun, two tired girls:

1st Haircuts

What a milestone. Our girls have had the strangest hair growth pattern since their hair finally starting coming in. They were growing that cute little mullet style and daddy was fed up. He almost attempted to cut their hair himself but luckily I stopped him.

I finally took the girls in on Halloween day to get their hair cut and reshaped.I took them to a kids hair cut place in hopes of them having a little fun with the new experience. I was a bad mom and totally forgot the camera so I had to catch everything on my camera phone.
Addison was not very happy with the whole thing and screamed as soon as we got her belted into the seat.


And when she wasn't screaming, she was giving us this sad, sad face.

Poor baby girl did not like it but the hairstylist was quick and was able to do a nice job. Here is the finished result after she was safe in grandma's arms:

Riley did much better. She got a few weird faces but she did rather well during the whole experience.


Here was her one weird face:


It was a bittersweet milestone. It makes me realize how fast the girls are growing. I got their little pieces of hair to put in their memory cans.

I will also be posting later about all the fun we had on Halloween. The girls had a blast and look so very cute!