Month 8, Week 3.5

I'm not sure what to call this week.  It's not week 4, but it's not week 3, either.  I guess when there isn't exactly 4 weeks to every month, you get hiccups like this.

On Monday we took a day trip to Ikea in Charlotte.  Our friends J and Anna went with us.  J is a stay-at-home-mom and Anna is a crazy cute 6mo old with tons of curly brown hair.  We all piled in our van for the adventure.  We arrived around 11am and proceeded to directly to the restaurant.  The boys were hungry and had peas for lunch, with some puffs for dessert.

Surprisingly we made it out of the store with only a few items - pot racks, popsicle holders, and a hippo rattle.  While we were there, we got to test out Anna's cart cover thing.  The boys seemed to like it pretty well.  It was definitely a bigger hit than the car seats ever have been.

Tuesday was my Mothers of Multiples meeting.  Jim decided to watch the boys by himself.  He got home around 5pm.  Around 6:30pm he fed them dinner and then got them ready for bed.  Since he's not so good at the breast feeding and they won't take bottles, that pretty much left him with some hugs and putting them in their cribs.  There was a lot of crying, but in the end they slept better than they have in a long while.  I think they only got up to eat maybe three times.

On Wednesday we finally made it to a music class.  The boys had a pretty good time.  I took a quilt for us to sit on and Zach didn't fall over once.  They really liked the jingle bells on sticks.  We sang songs and did some dancing (sort of).  While we were at Earth Fare I picked up some apples and veggie puffs for the boys.

Thursday we had a playdate with D and her two boys, who are 7 days older than Zach and Alex.  One of her boys is already crawling, while the other has been rocking back and forth.  I don't really see either of ours doing much like that, but I'm not too worried about it.  Once they start crawling, my life is going to get a million times harder.  I like how they stay put right now.

Friday was the boys' 9 month check-up.  Both boys weighed an even 20lb, putting them in the 45th percentile.  Alex is 28.5in (65th%) and Zach is 28in (47th%).  Both boys got a couple of booster shots and a clean bill of health.

Their infant car seats only go to 29in and 22lb.  So...  We went to Babies R Us and bought them convertible seats.  I did a bunch of research and ended up going with the Safety 1st Air Protect.  They were on sale and we ended up getting a really good deal.

So my babies are growing up.  No more car seat carrying.  No more Double Snap 'N Go stroller.  We picked up a little umbrella stroller so I can transport them around for short trips.  Otherwise it's just us and the Bob now.

The boys tried out some egg yolk this week.  I think the jury is still out on whether they like them or not. They've also been experimenting with drinking water from a straw.  Alex is really into the water and yells if I'm letting Zach have a turn.  They both like the veggie puffs, more so than the fruit ones.  Zach would probably prefer to eat them instead of anything else.

The boys had their hematologist appointment today.  Rather than the finger and heel pricks like at the pediatrician, they had to do the intravenous kind with a needle and vials.  Alex was a real trooper.  He cried initially when the tech put the rubber band thing on his arm but didn't even let out a peep when she stuck him with the needle.  Zach started screaming when she put on the arm band.  Unfortunately the tech had a hard time finding the vein.  It was sickening, watching her dig around in his arm with the needle.  I know it had to hurt because he started fighting her.  She had to call another tech over to help hold his arm.  In the end she did find the vein and fill the vials, but it was pretty terrible.  I hugged and hugged him.  Within about 5min, though, he didn't seem to care at all and just wanted to look around.

The initial diagnosis is iron deficiency anemia with underlying Beta Thalassemia Minor.  What this means is the boys did have low hemoglobin counts due to low amounts of iron, but they also have a hereditary condition where their red blood cells are smaller than normal.  According to the tests, their iron levels are right where they should be, but because of the Thalassemia, their hemoglobin levels will never go much above 10.5 (normal adult is 13-15).  This isn't a big deal.  There are no symptoms and there's no treatment.  In fact, since it's genetic Jim or I must also have the same condition.

Since their iron levels are where they need to be, the doctor reduced the supplement dosage down to 2.5ml.  We'll go back for a follow-up visit with the hematologist in June.  One thing that was funny was how many of the staff stopped by to see the boys while we were waiting.  Apparently word had spread about their cuteness.  hehe