September/October Updates

Here are some photos I've taken over the past couple of weeks:

This angle makes Ryan look like he has huge feet! Actually, he does have long, skinny feet just like Andrea's.

I was trying to get a side-by-side comparison of the brothers' looks, since everyone tells me they look alike. They look very similar in this picture, but not so much in other pictures I've taken.

Andrea wanted her picture taken with Ryan, too. Putting them side-by-side, I see a lot of similarities between them, too.

I was going to take Ryan for a walk on a crisp morning, so it was a good opportunity for him to try out the sweaters Mary, a secretary at my school, made for him. They fit perfectly, and he looks adorable in them!

Aww, even with his poor little buzzed head, he looks so sweet. What a great smile!


Adventures in Food

Ryan is loving trying new flavours, but not new textures. He loves his baby foods, and prefers them over plain cereal, but anything remotely lumpy still makes him gag. Lately, he's been showing an interest in his bowl and utensils. It makes for a big mess, so I've started giving him his own spoon to play with while I feed him.

"Oh, what is this thing?"

"Does it go here?"

"Hahahaha, I am such a comedian!"

One day, I asked Andrea if she wanted to help me feed Ryan his fruits and veggies. I gave her a few pointers, and she took over with ease. Ryan thought it was fantastic because he still thinks Andrea's the best thing ever, and Andrea was happy because she likes making Ryan happy.

Andrea was saying, "Ahhhhhhhh" to get Ryan to open his mouth, and he was laughing at her. However, her strategy worked. It got him to open nice and wide!

Ryan and Children First

Ryan seems to be following the developmental path of his brother and sister in terms of muscle tone and motor skills. At eight months, he is barely rolling over. He sits up briefly, but topples over easily. He cannot lift his chest/stomach off the floor when he's on his belly. He just started putting weight on his legs this week. Since he can't lift his upper body, he's not crawling or wriggling yet. It looks like he has the same problem as Kevin: low muscle tone (especially in the core/upper body).

Thanks to the new early assessment pilot program at Children First, for infant siblings of children currently receiving services, Ryan has already been referred and been officially accepted for physiotherapy intervention. He will have the same physiotherapist who is still working with Kevin, which is nice, because she knows our family and history well by now. The PT is coming out tomorrow for her first official home visit with Ryan. We are all hoping to make progress with Ryan before he starts daycare in January. Plus, they'll be able to continue working with him at daycare as soon as he starts there.

I'm glad Ryan has started putting weight on his legs this week. He seems a bit stronger every day, in that respect. However, his upper half is still absolutely floppy. When I hold him up on his legs, he stands on them well, but he leans over and puts all the weight of his upper body on my arms. Also, he can't get into crawling position, and even though he can put weight on his legs when he's upright, he can't pull into upright position by himself. Oh, well. It's not like we haven't been through this with our kids before.

Ryan's Sleep

Ryan is still my baby without a schedule. His naps are irregular, and he's still up one or two times most nights. He usually wakes up in the early morning hours for a bottle, then again a few hours later, just to play. When he wants to play, we put him in the swing and put kids' shows on the TV. He's usually fine with that, and often falls asleep after a while. Still, he's a pretty content baby. I am just looking forward to an uninterrupted night's sleep.

Ryan's Teeth

The official number is six: four on top, and two on the bottom. It's been that way for a few weeks. Now, he is starting to cut at least two more, on the top. They seem to come in bunches!

Kevin

. . . is driving me crazy.

Potty training went well for about a week. Now he is back in diapers, and shows no desire to make progress.

He still screams when he's frustrated, and throws his toys when he's upset, even though his speech has improved greatly.

His latest thing is DADDY. Daddy has to do everything for him. If I try to help him do something, he screams and runs away. I can't hold his hand, change his diaper, bathe him, dress him, get him to eat at the table, put him to bed, etc. Daddy HAS to do it. Well, Daddy is often busy or unavailable, so that makes it tough for Mommy.

Kevin has his funny moments, though. He loves to sing, and is starting to make up his own songs to familiar tunes. This one, completely random (and hilariously inappropriate), appeared a few nights ago, to the tune of the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse theme song ("M-I-C-K-E-Y, M-O-U-S-E"): "Penis-penis-penis, what-does-that-word-mean?" His songs are usually not so, um, anatomical in nature!

As previously mentioned, Kevin is still receiving services from Children First. We are currently working with physio to continue building his core strength, and we're also working on running (which he does, but awkwardly) and jumping. In occupational therapy, we are working on self-help skills, like dressing and undressing. He is doing well in speech, and is pretty much discharged from that program.

Oh, and some great news for Kevin: he has NO allergies! He was tested last week, for peanuts and some environmental allergies, and his test was completely negative. I'm sorry we had to put him through the poke test, but it's a big relief to know he's allergy-free. He could develop allergies later in life, but for now, things look good.

Andrea

Andrea is doing great in her all-day SK program. She is in a split class with JKs, and according to her teacher, is a great helper. The teacher says she has adjusted fine to SK (not that we had any concerns, but still good to hear).

Andrea has her own little group of friends. Among them is a Chinese girl who speaks very little English. I think the teacher paired them up, recognizing Andrea as outgoing and eager to help. At first, Andrea wasn't too sure how this little girl fit into her circle of friends, but now she names her among her best friends. Andrea is very proud of the new words and small phrases she is teaching her Chinese friend. I like hearing her childish perspective on this experience, especially since I'm taking the ESL (Teaching English as a Second Language) Part I online course right now.

Andrea's main interests right now are Barbies and the Internet game site called "Garden Party." The child is seriously addicted to "Garden Party." The problem is, the game is designed for slightly older kids, so we have to do a lot of reading for her, which means constant interruptions during our day: "Mommy, I need help! Tell me what this says! Do I have enough points to get this? Look what Daisy05 (her character) is doing!" We actually caved and got her a VIP membership so she could have access to all elements of the game. It is a cute game, where she has her own tree house and garden and pets, but she spends WAY too much time on the computer now. It's become an obsession! I hope the excitement will wear off in a month or two, when something new comes along. :)

Ryan's First Haircut

Before . . .

We took Ryan to get his first haircut yesterday afternoon. He was starting to have a lot of bad hair days, so I decided it was time to tame the mop. I tried to get some before pictures to show justification for his first haircut, but his hair was actually good the day we got it cut!

From the side, you can kind of see how it was sticking up at the top and the back.

From the front, you can see how his hair was sticking out over his ears, and a bit uneven on the forehead. (By the way, isn't that a great smile? You can really see his teeth!)

After . . .

We took Ryan to the Fantastic Sam's where Daddy and the kids get their hair cut. Ryan sat on my lap while the lady cut his hair. I had a hard time knowing what to ask for, since this was his first haircut, so she ended up buzzing him like Kevin!

The ladies there know us well, so they were very excited to do Ryan's first haircut. They even gave him a special certificate. He did extremely well! He was all smiles and curiosity at first, and then he only fussed a little when we had to hold his head still so she could trim around his ears with the scissors.

"I'm getting used to it."

(Mommy's getting used to it, too. He looks so different! I think I won't let them do it quite so short next time.)

"Yay! I got my first big-boy haircut!"

I could see Ryan adjusting to the new hairdo last night. One of the sleepy-habits he has is reaching up and running his fingers through his hair. I could see his confusion when he tried to do this, but couldn't get a handful. ;)

My Boys are Silly!

Ryan has the cheesiest grins sometimes. They are too funny! In this picture, I was getting him to show off his first pair of jeans (fall weather is here!).

Here's Ryan laughing again. This time he was wiggling around on the floor to play with some balloons, but he kept pulling up his shirt to show off his belly! (Actually, it was more like he was trying to chew on his shirt--teething, you know.)

Ryan has also developed a funny way of soothing himself to sleep. He used to do this little head roll from side to side, once in a while, as he was falling asleep. Now, he does it for minutes at a time--quite vigorously--anytime and anywhere he's trying to fall asleep! He does it in his crib, in the swing, and even in our arms! The best was the other night when he started smiling as he did the sleepy head roll--very silly!

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You know, Kevin never played with his Diego doll/pillow too much until recently. Actually, he kept trying to take Andrea's Dora one, but she wouldn't let him have it, and kept reminding him he has a Diego for himself. Finally, Kevin reluctantly gave up and started using his Diego. Now, Diego is frequently Kevin's companion when it's time to relax on the couch. He even shares his blankie with Diego! The other day, he was sharing his "picnic" with Diego, too.

Right now, my kids are fascinated with the large cardboard boxes that I receive my Nutrisystem food in each month. They use them for decoration, toy storage, vehicles, hideouts, etc. This month, I turned their boxes into little houses with "roofs" and "doors". Kevin made me laugh by suddenly popping out of his roof with a rendition of "Pop Goes the Weasel"! (When I laughed the first time, he did it about 20 more times in a row, of course.)

Papa's Birthday 2010

We went to Papa and Gram's house for dinner, to celebrate Papa's birthday. Ryan was the first to wish him a Happy Birthday!

The kids quickly made themselves at home, and pulled out the various toys they know are available for them at Gram and Papa's. Kevin likes this talking garbage truck.

Here, Kevin arranged the Dora chairs like rows on a bus. (He and Andrea like to play this game at home, too.)
After a delicious roast beef dinner, it was cake time! The older girls helped put the candles on the cake, and the kids joined Papa to help blow out the candles (but Ryan was busy eating his dinner).


Andrea wanted to give Papa his gift from our family.

After dessert, we decided to take some group photos of the kids because they all looked so cute.

Hannah (20 months), Kevin (3), Isabelle (4), Ryan (7 months), and Andrea (5)

My Babies

Andrea using Izzy as a pillow!

Kevin pulled down some of the birthday decorations. It looks like the punishment fits the crime! The garland worked as an effective Kevin restraint . . . for about 10 seconds.
Izzy and Andrea had a princess dress-up dance party in the kitchen.

Kevin was playing by the TV stand and bumped his head. He was okay, but he wanted a bandage. Little Nurse Isabelle wanted to help him feel better, so while Papa cuddled Kevin, Izzy gave him some "medicine" (candies from the party). We thought she looked like a mini Florence Nightingale in her dress-up costume!

Lucky Kevin and Hannah also got to have their special sleep-over night with Gram and Papa that night, so they got to stay all night!

Chatty Ryan

Ryan can get really chatty when he's in the mood. He'll babble away about nothing in particular, practicing different sounds and little words, and testing his vocal range. For the past few weeks, there were lots of "mama" sounds, but Daddy will be happy to hear that "dada" has become the predominant sound this week. Ryan also likes to say "baba" and "wawa" and "rara."

He comes out with the occasional "boo," "didi," or "aja" (which Andrea insists is Ryan trying to say her name!), too.

Random Ryan Photos--from August

I realized there are a bunch of photos of Ryan from this month that I may have posted elsewhere, but not on the blog . . . so, here they are!

This picture makes me laugh because they look so shocked, but I simply caught them unaware.

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Ryan LOVES balloons. Any time we have some, he gets very excited. He loves to hold them, and also to watch them float overhead.

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Ryan was sleepy after a morning visiting with Gram and Papa. Notice that Gram spiked his hair!

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Ryan has been tyring to sit on his own for a while. He does pretty well for a few seconds, but then he starts to tip over! Poor little guy, I think he has inherited his siblings' low muscle tone. His progress in the next few months will tell us for sure.

"Mama, you're gonna catch me, right?"

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Ryan's face after trying a new food

Ryan's "Munchkin Face" that he makes when Mama is silly

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getting him started early?

Nah, just a fun photo for my work colleagues.

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Ryan is trying to grab the fish on the swing's mobile (and he did succeed). Each of my kids have done this at about 6-7 months old. (see here)

Andrea Loses her First Tooth!

On Friday, Andrea came home from daycare with exciting news: she lost her first tooth!

She told us that it fell out at lunch time, while she was eating some potatoes! Her teachers put it in a little envelope for her to bring it home, and gave her a special certificate to celebrate her losing her first tooth at daycare.

We asked Andrea if she had noticed it was lose, and she said no. When we looked in her mouth, we discovered two interesting things: 1.) the tooth next to the one that fell out is also very loose and 2.) her two adult teeth are already coming in behind the the loose ones. It looks really odd, since she has the two teeth coming in behind the row that's already there. I said it reminded me of the rows of a shark's teeth! (Of course, I didn't tell HER that. She'd be insulted.) Daddy looked it up online, and this is a bit unusual, but shouldn't be a problem since the teeth in front are already out/almost out. They even call it "shark's teeth," just like I said.

Andrea was so excited about the tooth fairy coming. We played "tooth fairy" all evening, and she was anxious for bedtime. I pulled out a little tooth holder that someone had given me as a gift for Andrea when she was a baby, and we put her tooth in there, next to her bed. The Tooth Fairy brought her $5 (apparently that's the going rate) and Daddy took her to Dollarama for a shopping spree the next day. :) She is growing up too quickly!

More Andrea Fun . . .

Right now, she likes drawing stories. I usually write out the words for her, but she creates it all and illustrates it herself. This is a sample of Andrea's work:

THE END

The other thing Andrea is great at is entertaining Ryan. If he's lonely, or fussy, Andrea can make him laugh, anytime. He just adores her. She makes him laugh every time; they are so cute together. Andrea is very proud of her ability to make Ryan happy. :)

Kevin's Eye Appointment

We went back to see Dr. Moussa, the eye specialist, about how Kevin's left eye tends to wander sometimes, and has done this since he was a baby. We noticed that it gets worse when he's tired or upset.

Dr. Moussa's assistant did a basic vision test, and the result is that Kevin's sight is normal. They used an eye chart that had little symbols instead of letters, so it was easier for Kevin. They also did some colour and depth perception tests. His depth perception was a little off, but everything else was normal.

Then, Dr. Moussa himself did some tests in the exam room, just like he had done for Ryan a few weeks ago. After a while, Kevin's left eye started to wander a bit, and he definitely noticed it.

Here's Dr. Moussa's conclusions: Kevin has a problem called convergence insufficiency. It's not that uncommon, but is often misdiagnosed--especially in small children. Basically, it's the inability of the eyes to focus well/work well together on one thing (you can click the link above for more information, if interested). It affects depth perception a bit, so the doctor warned us that Kevin may be clumsy (duh, really? Kevin? clumsy?), and not to stress him out by trying to teach him to catch a ball! He said it will make reading difficult in the future, so it's good we caught it early. This way, we can start treatment when he's a little more mature (in about six months or so), but before reading becomes a big deal at school. Treatment will be eye exercises to improve his convergence and strengthen the eye muscles. When he mentioned that it is a developmental issue and may be related to other muscle issues, I mentioned Kevin's history of physio, speech, and occupational therapy needs. The doctor said yes, that's all linked.

So, we'll see Dr. Moussa in six months, and hopefully Kevin will be mature enough to start some in-office and at-home exercises to help his condition. :)