The little one gets smaller

Edith is doing well now that she is off her steroids.  She is happy and sleeping better, and crawling and pulling up on everything in sight.  Her appetite has been down ever since she finished the steroids September 7th.  We couldn't get her to drink more than 1/2 ounce at every feeding for several days.  Now she is doing a little better and probably eats less than 10 ounces of milk and no food in a day.  The doctors think she is not hungry because she is carrying extra weight and once she is down to normal she will start eating normal amounts again.

Cousin Sadie loves Edith.  And Edith loves her big cousins!  Baby in a swing.  A 9 month old baby that still sleeps in a swing?  That's Edith!  This swing will have to be bronzed after Edith is done with it.  Alena, Nora, and Alice have all used it.  We made a good decision when we registered for a swing with an electrical plug in! 

Edith is practicing for Halloween.  She doesn't seem to notice when we put the kitty ears on her and will go about her business.  She did notice when we put this silly flower costume on her, however! 

Jumping away!  Look how nicely her brown hair is coming in.  Eye color still TBD, currently hazel.

Alena and my trip to the nature center

Alena and I headed to Indian Creek's new nature center on Sunday.  We were driving down Otis Road when we saw giant bubbles floating through the air.  We knew we would be in for a good time.  There is something irresistible about popping bubbles, and giant bubbles are even more fun.  The bubble man was a good sport about it.  Alena then got to put on bee keeper clothes and learn about bees at the hives behind the building.  The highlight was wading through Bena Brook, a sand bottomed stream that didn't go past our ankles.  I collected big sticks and Alena helped arrange them into a dam.  She then put mud, moss, and mushrooms on the dam.  She can't wait to go back and show Nora and Daddy!

Plum picking

I wanted to go to Brucemore to pick some plums to try to make them into prunes.  We stopped by our former neighbor Pat's house on the way so she could see the girls.  It had been a long time since we walked from our old house to Brucemore.  The plums were all picked closer to the ground so Ben lifted Alena up into the tree so she could hand them down.  We had a little snack in the grape arbor.  Edith even tried a peeled grape.  She spit it out several times, but then before I realized, she swallowed some seeds.  They were really tiny seeds, and we don't think a grape vine will grow out of her ears.

Three butterflies emerged this weekend.  We are up to six for the season, with more caterpillars eating away on the dining room table.

Around the house

 Nora is teaching Edith to walk.  The girls think they are ready to babysit for Edith by themselves.  While we would appreciate a night out alone, we might have to wait a few years before really doing that.  After all, their babysitting techniques are a little controversial.  They put Edith on the couch and piled pillows underneath.  She would crawl over the edge and fall headfirst into the pillows.  She did seem to think it was fun.  The girls love their little sis and are always trying to hug her, even when Edith is trying to crawl away.

Alena and Nora are also smashing purple berries they have found growing behind our bushes.  They have been smashing them for days!  It has made for some laundry stain removal, but they are having so much fun I will allow it.  Alena has also been helping outside.  She helped Daddy wash the siding and gathered flower seeds and made packets to store them in so we can save them for next spring.

Our neighbor Jody wondered if the girls would be interested in beads left over from her daughter, Emma.  They immediately began sorting.  What a nice gift to receive!  There was a neighborhood party Friday night.  There are a lot of nice people on our block, just no other girls under 10.  Oh well.  Alena and Nora like playing together.

Alena goes golfing

Grandma Dee offered to watch the girls so Ben and I could go do something so we decided to go golfing.  I hadn't been in many years.  Alena begged so much to go that we caved in and let her come along--we needed to have some time with just our big girl anyway!  We got a cart and she played 5 holes before sitting the final 4 out.  We had a fun time on Alena's first golf outing. Her favorite parts were riding in the cart, waving the pin in the air before replacing it, and washing everyone's balls.  A little actual golfing happened, too!  She did a great job of listening to direction and had some solid hits.  I even had a few solid hits.

First day of kindergarten and second grade

It is hard to believe that school has started already, and now we have a kindergartener and a second grader!  Nora is in Mrs. Ward's class.  After two weeks, she seems to be making friends and enjoying school.  We just drop her off at the circle drive and she walks right in.  Alena is in Mrs. Kratavil's class.  So far she said she likes second grade better than first because they don't have to work as hard.  We will see if that changes as they get more into the swing of things!  The girls run into each other on the playground occasionally.  They like being at the same school and so do we!

Nine months old

Edith has become such a great baby!  The past week she has not screamed at all and is only waking up once or twice in the night.  Edith's main goal in life is to stand.  She crawls over to a chair, a wall, a box, or anything she can find to pull up on.  Then she holds on with one hand like a hot shot. Her crawling is slow and she doesn't go far, but she gets where she wants to go.  It is actually great for us because we don't have to worry about her getting into quite so much trouble yet.  She even plays slow, but she is really getting interested in her toys.  She is no longer interested in eating.  Her bottle consumption is half of where it was at peak.  We think she has lost a little weight because her bib now fits all the way around her neck.  Edith remains pretty straight faced while crawling and playing, but she will give a great smile if someone sings her a song.  All of that tight lipped playing makes it hard to see her 5 little teeth.  We assume that is all she has; we wouldn't dare to look too hard.

She ejected this puff.  Edith is down to just a few pureed fruits that she finds to be tolerable.

Clean bill of health!

Edith had her last scheduled neurology appointment on Monday and her EEG looked normal!  The doctor said that she shouldn't have to have any more EEGs as long as everything continues to go well.  What a relief for everyone!

What else has this little one been up to?

Steroid: When Edith got down to 6 mg of steroid from a fast wean from 60 mg she became very unhappy.  She was screaming all day for 2 days and refused to eat.  We were worried we would have to take her to the hospital to get IV fluids but we adjusted her steroid dose back up to 9 mg and she gradually improved.  It was a stressful couple of days with several doctor appointments and unhelpful calls to the University (her doctor just happened to be on vacation last week).  We now plan on taking her steroid wean very slowly at a little over 1 mg every 3 days.  She still should be done in two weeks as long as everything goes well.  As her doctor said, there is no expert on steroids.  Different people react differently.

Sleep: Nope!  She has been taking better naps, but many nights has trouble sleeping past midnight in her electric swing in her bedroom.  We take turns laying on the floor on a mattress in the basement pushing her in her carseat swing while the cats meow and sniff our faces.  Even Grandma Dee has pulled a couple of shifts.

Eating: Normal food consumption!  She has dropped from 5 oz every hour to 3-4 every 3 hours.  She is no longer screaming with hunger and is slowly losing weight.  It could be several months before her cheeks go back to normal we were told.  When she was eating so much we switched mostly to bottles.  My breastfeeding career is coming to an end.

Crawling: Yes!  She just learned to really crawl at the end of last week at 8.5 months.  She doesn't go very far yet, just a couple of feet at a time, but she has a lot of steroid induced weight to haul around.

Pulling up: Yes again!  She can pull up to standing on chairs, couches, and ottomans.  This is her favorite activity.

Playing: Yes! She is finally happy enough to sit on the floor and play with toys.  Her favorite toy is a witch lantern for some reason.  She also likes playing with a little ball and Sophie the giraffe.

Teeth: 3 new teeth last week!  All of them on the top, so now she is up to 5 total.  She likes to grind the top and bottom while eating baby food. 

Smiling: Yes, finally!  She is turning into a happy baby.  When I enter the room she gives me a whole body smile where she does a little head tilt while smiling.  It is very sweet.  She laughed in the car on the way to the doctor.  We hadn't heard that in months. 

Edith with her favorite toy, the witch lantern and her blanket.  Still with glue in her hair, the two infantile spasm survivors!

Daddy picture shoot

Daddy bought some new outfits for the girls and took their pictures as a surprise for me.  They turned out so cute!

Family vacation

Tuesday we made a day trip to Adventureland with the Cahalans and Grandma and Grandpa Jensen.  The girls all had a great time!  Alena was feeling very brave this year and decided her favorite ride was the Galleon.  She also enjoyed the Falling Star multiple times and even rode the Tornado 2 times with Daddy.  She was laughing with excitement the whole time she was on the Falling Star!  Now that she can sneak on as 48" she can ride almost anything. Nora thought the Galleon was a little too much but loved the Underground.  The Carousel was another of her favorites.  Everyone had fun on the Raging River except for Aunt Melissa and Sadie, who was brave enough but too short to ride.  Daddy got soaked on each turn!  All of the adults other than Grandma rode the new roller coaster the Monster.  It was very scary and they take a picture of you going down the first hill so everyone could laugh at your terrified face at the end of the ride.  My old friend Ben Ulin was the magical act as always, and all of the big kids got to watch it from the front row.  At 7 we had experienced enough fun for one day, so we headed home to rescue Grandma Dee from a day with Edith (she was a good girl for Grandma.)

 A couple of kids wanted to ride Infant Ocean.  Alena declared it was lame.  Well, it is called Infant Ocean!

You would think the kids would be exhausted from a whole day at Adventureland, but that was not the case.  Wednesday morning we took Edith to Connie's and headed to Monticello for a canoe trip down the Maquoketa River.  We got a canoe and tied a kid kayak to the back.  It was a really fun float and very pretty.  The girls took turns on the kayak, though neither one really wanted to paddle.  Part of the time they both rode on it together and named dragonflies.  They were all named "Canoe."  Their favorite part of the trip was floating in the river with their life jackets and playing in the sand.  A lot of the river is sand bottom and most isn't more than 2 feet deep.  We found a lot of clams and caught a crayfish.  We were on the water for 5 hours and packed a picnic lunch.  And the girls still were not tired!

The Beanie Boo collection is increasing thanks to Grandma Dee bringing two new ones on Monday, a blue leopard for Alena and a pink koala for Nora.  Every second we haven't been on a trip the girls have been playing with them.

Still getting bigger!

Edith is eating less now that her steroid dose is decreasing.  Now when she is hungry she doesn't scream as terribly and a lot of time eats less than 4 oz.  Her steroid dose decreases by 6 mg every three days.  She is also smiling more and really working on her crawling.  We think she is just having trouble moving all of her extra weight around.  She was 20 lbs, 15 oz at her check up yesterday and is 8 months old.  She is officially bigger than Jones!  Her blood pressure was elevated two weeks ago but now is pretty steady around 116/60 which is "acceptably high."

Edith loves when Alena kisses her cheeks.  She squeals and usually pulls some of Alena's hair out.  Alena is a good big sister and lets her get away with it.

Teaching little cousin Miles how to sit

Nora is trying to teach Edith how to hold her own bottle...

...and was so proud of her for holding the remote control.  Edith is strangely not very interested in the remote, the first baby I have ever seen that isn't.  The only toys she really likes are Sophie the giraffe, furry stuffed animals, and of course her blanket.  She also loves grabbing and squeezing my skin, rather painfully for me!

Palisades resort

We went back to the sandbar at Palisades.  Edith was not in a great mood but eventually fell asleep in her carseat under our beach umbrella while Alena dug a hole in the mud.  I was exclaiming how great our beach umbrella was and minutes later it blew inside out.

Little smiler

Edith has been having more and more time where she doesn't seem like she is in a fog.  Last week she finally started smiling again at us on a more regular basis.  Daddy has been taking her for a jog after the big girls go to bed.  Every time he stopped the other night he said that she would smile at him.  Her smile doesn't look quite the same as it used to because her cheeks have squeezed her lips together so tightly, but it is still cute and we had missed seeing her happy!  Sleeping has been getting harder for her at night, but she has been playing on the floor during the day much more contentedly.  Her favorite activity is still trying to stand up on someone's lap or staring at her hand.  She is also getting more adventuresome at moving.  Alena said she saw Edith crawl two knees forward and she is also lunging at her blanket.