Almost ONE YEAR OLD!!

Our little bitty baby boys will be one year old on Sunday May 3rd, 2009. Only 5 days until their birthday. Life was so very different one short year ago.

On Sunday we’ll be having a party at our house with family and friends. We are having a small gathering of about 20-25 people. We have set ourselves a challenge to serve low allergy party food. We’ve found some great recipes, we are just hoping it’s edible on the day! We’ll post stories and pictures after the big day!

Our little babies, are slowly and surely becoming cheeky, adventurous, inquisitive toddlers. Both boys are exploring the world around them in new and different ways. They have been inquisitive about things for months, but lately you can see they are thinking and learning in different ways. Its hard to explain – you just have to trust me on this one!

Apparently the latest greatest idea is to climb on anything and everything you can. Both boys love the climb on the coffee table. Ben is a little more adventurous and will climb on his toys and toy boxes too.

Ben on the toy chest. He fell off about one second after this picture was taken.

Ethan on the coffee table.

Ben sitting on the toy chest. Ethan standing watching (and chewing on a toothbrush) Ben again – climbing! Ben climbing on the toy tables. Ben (in red) and Ethan (in blue) lying on the coffee table.

Like I said, it’s getting close to the boys birthday. The other day they got their first birthday present. A package that came all the way from Texas!! The boys LOVED their presents.

THANK YOU to Monica, Deona and Everett!
We decided to let them open it. We thought it would be more special this way. If we waited until their birthday it would get lost in all the other presents and they would not enjoy the experience quite as much. They had a lovely time unwrapping their first birthday present, and playing with the tissue paper.

Ethan opening his present. Can you see he had a huge smile on his face!??!!?

First a handsome pair of shorts. Ethan loves the button (Ethan loves all buttons!!)

And a handsome t-shirt. Again, Ethan is inspecting the buttons.

AND…. a CD. What a lucky boy.

Ben, curious about what’s in the box

Here’s Ben with his handsome orange shorts – apparently he’s interested in something else at the moment!

Ben with his handsome t-shirt. Ben likes the tag…… typical for Ben – he always likes the tag!!

Ben getting his CD. He was very excited about the CD!

Ben stole Ethan’s CD….. He was funny, he kept showing us his CD’s!

....... and of course the FANSTASTIC tissue paper.

...... still having a great time with the tissue paper......

...... and some more tissue paper!

Benjamin really likes to be thrown around in play. He likes to be lifted up high and turned upside down and all those fun things. Both boys like to be held in the regular position, sitting on your hip. We then count…..1….2….3… then JUMP in the air. Both boys think this is very funny!

Below is Benny, upside down and having a great time.Ben in the ball pit. Ben Ethan Tired boys ready for bed

Developmental Update

GROSS MOTOR SKILLS
The boys gross motor skills are doing well. Ben stood unaided for about 30seconds the other day. I think he could stand longer, but he gets bored as he hasn't worked out he can walk anywhere yet, and just prefers to sit down and crawl away. Ben is crawling properly, and has been for a while. He walks all around the room holding onto all the furniture and can even climb up onto the 2 step stool near the window to look outside.
Ethan is also very good at walking around the room holding onto the furniture. Ethan has worked out he's bigger and stronger than Ben and he walks into him and pushes him out of the way if Ben is standing where he wants to walk. Ethan can crawl properly, but chooses to commando crawl most of the time. He crawls properly outside on the grass, and sometimes inside. In the last few days, he's crawling properly more and more.

FINE MOTOR SKILLS
Both boys are getting very good. The boys can pick up quite small objects these days. They are getting better at playing with different toys that require more fine motor skills. They also like to try to turn on lights. Ethan still loves to spin things. Today the boys got their first matchbox cars (Easter present from grandma). Ethan spent ages spinning the tiny wheels with his finger tip. Ethan also loves buttons and will carefully touch buttons with the very tip of his finger and feel the thread and the holes.

EATING
The boys are getting good at feeding them selves finger foods. They enjoy steamed veges and tender meats. They prefer to feed them selves rather than being fed by us, but we are still feeding them at times. They are still on their low allergy diet. We recently tested them on dairy. We've only tried yogurt. Ethan loves it, and doesn't seem to have a problem. Ben doesn't like it very much, but he managed to eat about 2 teaspoons a day for 3 days and then broke out in a rash all over his face. It was just like the one he had when he was a baby before we got him on the special formula. No more dairy for Ben for a while. We will continue to give Ethan yogurt. In the next few weeks will will slowly introduce some different 'moderate allergy' foods and see what happens. Our next appointment with the dietitian is in about one month. Ben is still having some trouble chewing and swallowing, but he's improved a lot lately.

TALKING
Ethan is our quiet boy. Most of the time he's quiet, occasionally he'll say 'mum' or 'yayayaya'. Ben on the other hand is a real chatterbox. He says 'hi' 'hello' 'yeah' 'no' 'dai dai dia' 'dad' 'dadda' 'daddy' 'dud' and 'kitty'. He used to say 'mum', but hasn't said it in months. Yesterday morning the cat walked into the room. Ben looked at her and said 'hello kitty'. Today when the cat was in the room he said 'kitty' about 5times. I don't think he knows what the other words mean, he says the randomly, but I'm sure he knows what kitty means. Both boys love the cats.
Recently, Ben has crawled up to Sal and looked at her and said 'dud'. He's done this a few times..... Tracie thinks it's funny that Ben calls Sal 'dud'. Sal doesn't think so!

UNDERSTANDING SPEECH
Both boys are getting good at understanding what we are saying, and responding appropriately. If we open the gate and call the boys into the kitchen for lunch/dinner they will crawl into the kitchen. If we ask Ben 'Where's the light?' he will look up at the light on the roof. Both boys will look for the kitty if you talk to them about the kitty. If it's time for a bottle and the boys are hungry, and we ask them 'would you like your bottle?' they will start whinging and crying straight away. We're trying to teach them 'bottle'.
Ethan loves to clap. We sing him a song that involves clapping in the middle, and most times he smiles and claps at the right time.

11months old – Pictures and Videos

Wow…. 11months. I know I say this every month but they really do go fast. One month till their birthday!!

We have started planning the party, bought some stuff, found a cake recipe that tastes good and the boys will be allowed to eat. We’ll be having an egg and dairy free chocolate cake. It took a while to find a good recipe, but I’m very happy with how it tastes….. just hope it works on the day :)

Life is otherwise fairly good. We’ve been having some settling issues with the boys. Ethan got a new tooth (middle top right one) and he’s had a lot of pain with it, and somehow that turned into about 2 weeks of not wanting to go to sleep at night. We’re hoping things are calming down now, tonight was ok….. but last night was over an hour of hysteria….. it’s quite unpredictable. Ethan now has 3 teeth (two bottom, one top). Benny has 7 teeth (3 bottom, 4 top).

The boys are otherwise well. They are both standing and cruising (walking by holding onto furniture) all day. The love to explore the rest of the house, and have a great time when we take them into the hallway and let them go into the guest room and our bedroom.

 

Last week we gave the boys another food challenge. This time we tested foods high in amines. This included banana, pawpaw and cocoa. The boys enjoyed eating some new foods. By day 3 Ethan was miserable with his teething and Ben ended up with really bad gas pains. We’re not sure if Ben’s tummy pains are related to the amine challenge, but we stopped anyway. We figure in actual fact, we wont really give them too many amines anyway. Maybe a banana every few days and the occasional bit of cocoa. We’ll just slowly introduce salicylates and amines into their diet over the next few months. Below are pics of the boys enjoying some cocoa flavoured weetbix (got to get cocoa into them somehow during the challenge!!)

Ethan Ben

Below is a video of Sal playing peek-a-boo with Ethan in the ball pit. Ethan absolutely LOVES to play peek-a-boo….. he laughs and laughs and thinks it’s a great game! 

Ben standing by the couch

Sal reading Ethan a book

The boys LOVE the book ‘Where is the green sheep?’ Ben found it at the grocery store one day and just refused to let go…. it was pretty cheap so of course we bought it. We must have read this book over one hundred times. The boys love it!  It’s so clever, so simple. Here’s the words

Here is the blue sheep.
And here is the red sheep.
Here is the bath sheep.
And here is the bed sheep.

But where is the green sheep?

Here is the thin sheep,
and here is the wide sheep.
Here is the swing sheep.
And here is the slide sheep.

But where is the green sheep?

Here is the up sheep,
And here is the down sheep.
here is the band sheep.
And here is the clown sheep.

But where is the green sheep?

Here is the sun sheep.
And here is the rain sheep.
Here is the car sheep,
and here is the train sheep.

But where is the green sheep?

Here is the wind sheep.
And here is the wave sheep.
Here is the scared sheep,
and here is the brave sheep.

But where is the green sheep?

Here is the near sheep.
And here is the far sheep.
Here is the moon sheep.
And here is the star sheep.

But where is the green sheep?

Where IS that green sheep?

Turn the page quietly—
let’s take a peep. . . .
Here’s our green sheep—
fast asleep!

Below is a video of Sal reading it to the boys.

Benny has discovered he can bounce balls. He has a new ball (another grocery store impulse buy) that he will spend ages bouncing and chasing. Below is a video of Benny playing with his ball on the coffee table. He started bouncing in to Sal, but then discovered the box on the table would return it just as well!!!

Below are the rules of the house according to the boys. – Tracie found this at the shops and thought it summed things up nicely!