First Airplane Trip-Home for the Holidays

The boys earned their wings on Southwest... Literally, the flight attendants gave them wings. Those will be added to the baby books!

After tons of planning, shipping and worrying, we survived our first plane trip and it really wasn't too bad. The boys did great! Matter of fact, Jeremy slept the whole way both ways! I'm thinking that he's tricking us into traveling more :-)

We headed to LA at 6pm on Xmas eve. Turned out to be a good time to travel for the boys since they usually go to sleep around then anyway. We bought 3 seats to guarantee that we'd have a whole row and paid an extra $10 to guarantee early boarding. Both investments turned out to be a great idea since every seat on the plane was booked.

We landed in LA and Grandpa greeted us with the SUV and car seats already installed. We rented 2 car seats and had them delivered to PV so we'd have less to carry and check-in. Turned out to also be a great investment.

The next morning (Xmas), we headed over to Uncle Brian & Auntie Cara's house. Cousins Cameron and Hayden were losing their minds with all the gifts under the tree. We spent hours going through all the gifts and Jeremy even joined in with his older cousins and tried to play with the big boy toys. We had a fun and exhausting day and evening.


Brian, Cara, Mark and I managed to break away for a couple hours to check out the new Terranea hotel in PV. We had a drink and hung out for the sunset. Beautiful!


On Sunday, Mark and I managed to take a quick getaway to Santa Barbara. The grand parents graciously watched the boys OVER NIGHT, so we could get away. It was so nice having a little break and checking out the town. We even managed to sneak in a quick bite at In-and-Out.


Back in PV, we even managed to take the kids for a quick stroller ride in Hermosa Beach. First time seeing the ocean... not sure they were too impressed :-)

1st Hanukkah!

Well they can't spin the dreidel yet, but they seem to enjoy us lighting the Hanukkah candles!

Milestones!

The boys are 10 months now and there are some milestones to report:

Nathan:
- 2 teeth! His 2 bottom front teeth are coming in. He teething and drooling more, but seems to be handling it well
- Finger foods! Nathan is picking up food and aiming it for his mouth. He takes a couple tries, but he eventually finds his mout
- Army crawl! He's getting around, but very slowly. It's definitely the beginnings of crawling
- Holding his own bottle! So cute... Nathan grabs for his bottle and pretty much holds it himself

Jeremy:
- 1 tooth! Jeremy is getting one of his bottom front teeth. It doesn't seem to be bothering him too much
- Finger foods! Jeremy isn't doing quite as well as Nathan with the finger foods, but he can definitely pick them up. He hasn't shown any interest in putting food in his mouth, but he is very interested in putting food in Clementine's mouth!
- Crawling like a maniac! Jeremy is all over the place. He follows us around like a puppy. Time to baby proof!

Chessler Visit

Mom Mom, Pop Pop, Uncle Mike & Aunt Amy come to Boulder!

It was a quick visit, but we managed to pack a lot of visiting time in. We even managed to fit in a hike with the babies too!

Check out these fun photos from the visit:

9 Month Check-up

The boys went in for their 9 month check yesterday so we have new stats to report. In general, the doc thought that both kids looked great. Jeremy took a big jump in weight which was not surprising considering how heavy he feels. Nathan is progressing, but on his own curve... doing it his own way I guess. She suggested that we up the formula to water ratio to get him a few more calories per meal.

Jeremy
Height - 27 5/8" (45th percentile)
Weight - 20 lbs (50th percentile)
Head - 17 7/8" (55th percentile)

Nathan
Height - 25 1/2" (<3 percentile)
Weight - 14lb, 11.5 oz (<3 percentile)
Head - 17 5/8" (45th percentile)

No shots this visit which was a relief. Just a blood draw to check iron and lead levels. Both boys did fantastic with that test. Next appointment will be their 1 year!

1st Thanksgiving

We managed to host 14 adults and 5 little ones for the boys 1st Thanksgiving. We couldn't have pulled it off if grandma and grandpa weren't here to help. The extra set of hands was a must! We had one newly engaged couple (Gittes & Cyndi!), one family about to pop with a baby due a mere 48 hours after dinner (the Diehls & sister Katie), a family with a toddler and a 6 week old (The McDonalds) and friends from Denver (Susan & Becker)

It was a wonderful night, the food was amazing and the kids did great! Enjoy the photos!

Milestone Alert!

Jeremy is officially on-the-move!

Jeremy figured out how to crawl last night. Good news for him... bad news for us. Looks like it's time to baby proof!

Here's how it went down.

There was a Staff Appreciation Dinner at their daycare last night. All the parents were sitting in a circle on the floor eating their dinners while the kids rolled around and played in the center. For some reason, Jeremy decided that he was fascinated with a can of soda that one of the parents had. With a lot of determination, Jeremy managed to crawl over to that can.

Now, just to make sure it wasn't a fluke, I put my can of soda out of reach to see if he'd crawl again. Sure enough, he made a bee line straight for my can.

2nd milestone alert... first injury requiring a band aid.

Yes, Jeremy was able to crawl to the can. Unfortunately, he popped his thumb in the opening and got his first cut. He didn't even notice, but I happened to see the blood. He could care less about the cut, but he cried bloody murder when I tried to put a band aid on him.

Crazy kid!

The Baby Chef

I guess that's me! I'm officially cooking my own baby food.

My good friend, Eve, bought me the most resourceful gift for my baby shower... a visit with the Baby Chef. I finally cashed in that gift certificate and made an appointment.

The Baby Chef, Chelsea, arrived at our house with a suitcase that could fit a human being. She unloaded a food processor, steamer and groceries and got to work. She was at our house for about 3 hours and the end result was enough baby food for 1-2 months and I now have all the knowledge I need to do it myself.

The kids are so lucky to be able to have such yummy food. We made:

• chicken, apples and carrots
• turkey, squash and brown rice
• green beans and sweet potatoes
• spinach and carrots

And... I even tried my hand all by myself tonight and whipped up some carrots and turkey, carrots and sweet potatoes.

Next up...

• squash and apples
• pears

What are those THINGS?

Happy belated Halloween!

We didn't get to do much trick-or-treating, but of course we had to put the boys in their first Halloween costumes! We ended up having a few friends and their kids over for a Greene family tradition - a big pot of spaghetti before trick-or-treating. We popped the kids in a stroller and went as a group to a few house. The kids seemed a bit confused by their fuzzy heads, but I think they liked all the attention. Enjoy these fun photos!

Vegas Baby!

We did it! We got away for our first weekend without the kids and headed to Vegas. Mom and Dad graciously agreed to baby sit for a weekend while we celebrated Mark's 40th bday Vegas style.

We had a great time and it was easy since we knew that the kids were in great hands. As you can see, they definitely got that hang of this twins thing and even managed to venture around the neighborhood and the supermarket. Very adventurous!

8 Months Old!

You blink, and then the boys are 8 months old! How did that happen?

So it's been awhile since I've posted, but a lot has been happening over here. The boys are doing great! They are at a really fun stage where they small a lot, play with their toys, roll around, giggle when tickled and even seem to be a bit playful with each other.

Major milestones to report:
- Sleeping through the night! This week 5 out of 6 nights both boy slept through the night. We are ecstatic! It's amazing what a full night sleep can do for you. We're hoping this isn't a fluke and they really are going to continue sleeping this long, but who knows?
- Solid foods! Both boys are on solid foods now. Jeremy is a bit more ahead of Nathan. He has tried most stage 1 foods and loves them all. He seems to really enjoy eating and opens his mouth big and wide for each bite. We've worked up to 2 solid meals a day now.

Nathan had a slower start. He was a bit gassy after trying rice cereal so we took a break and just now got him started on oatmeal which seems to agree with him much better. I also tried him on applesauce today which was messy, but successful.
- Rolling! Both boys are rolling now. Jeremy in particular is quite adept at getting where he wants to go by rolling. Nathan just recently discovered his rolling abilities and is having a blast rolling around and playing with his toys. We are keeping a close eye on them for signs of crawling. We're excited to see this next stage, but frankly a bit scared too. Mark is convinced that Jeremy is going to skip crawling and just start walking.
- 1st colds :-( Sadly both boys came down with their first colds. We knew it would happen eventually, but you sure hate to see it. Jeremy was first spiking a high temperature (104!) and clearly staying home from daycare for a few days. He didn't have any other major symptoms, but he can't go back to daycare until he's gone 24 hours without a fever without the help of Tylenol.

Finally, both boys made it back into daycare and wouldn't you know it, but 2 days later I got the call to pick up Nathan. He was running a low-grade fever so he had to stay home until it passed. And, unfortunately, this all happened about 15 minutes after Mark left for the airport for his football weekend away. I was on my own with a sick baby for the weekend. It was pretty miserable as the poor guy didn't sleep much at all and wanted to be help constantly. Let's just say we're not looking forward to cold #2.

No updates on weights... we'll have a weigh-in at the next well visit in mid November. Now for some photos...

Fun at 6 months

We're getting the hang of this parenting thing! At 6 months we bravely get out and about and are really enjoying the kids. Here are a few photos of some fun we've had this past month:

Estes Park:











Walking around the hood:



Steamboat: