Monday, May 30, 2011

Kai & Julia Turn Two!!

As of May 18th, we have two two year-olds and one two month-old living in our house!  We celebrated Kai and Julia's second birthday with Elmo balloons, a few gifts from mom and dad, dinner and games at Chuck E Cheese, and Elmo cupcakes!  The kids loved waking up to find their balloons and cupcakes for breakfast!  Although, they had a sneak peak at the cupcakes the night before.  Jared was "in charge" of the kids while I was out running some errands.  He saw the twins in the hallway passing something back and forth and laughing quietly.  Once they noticed him looking their way, Julia and Kai made eye contact, Julia pointed in the opposite direction, and the two went running down the hallway.  Once Jared got near he saw crumbs and cupcake wrappers.  There also was a whole row of cupcakes that were missing from the cooling racks.  Those two ate four cupcakes in a manner of minutes!  






We had their birthday party over Memorial Day weekend since my parents and brother, Zach, were coming to town.  A lot of the kids friends were out of town or busy, but we enjoyed seeing my mom's cousin and husband (Chuck & Susan Traxler) who live in Grapevine, TX, and our neighbors.  We rented a bounce house and enjoyed more Elmo treats!
Happy Birthday!

Cookie Monster & Elmo Cupcakes

Julia & Uncle Zach

More Elmo!








Mommy & Isaac enjoying the party

Julia can now sing/hum Happy Birthday!


Yum!



We had a great time with my family in town.  The kids really enjoyed playing at the neighborhood pool.  My brother experiemented with his new camera and took some shots of baby Isaac and the twins.  I think they turned out cute!  (Although he is working on editing them still).



My camera (you can tell the difference!)
BTW... what a strong boy!

Rolling over....

and over!




Julia wasn't happy...just woke up from nap :)

My three precious babies!



Kai lov'n on Isaac & Julia with one of her "Gubber Grins!"
Yes, that is a wallet that she snuck!














Backing up... we enjoyed a quick trip to Tulsa the week before.  It was great to see some of our friends and catch up from the past six months!
Julia and sweet friend Faith!
Wow, that was a lot of pictures in one blog!  It's my attempt to document these years, so I like to post pictures so that they don't just take up space on our computer :)  We are now slowing down after all of the birthday celebrations and trips.  Now it's my turn to contemplate the past few years and thank the Lord for blessing us in so many ways.  These years go by so fast.  I'm sure I'll be in tears this week as I write letters to the kids (to put in their baby book) and update their albums.  All for now!

Monday, May 16, 2011

May Days

I can't believe that my "babies" are going to be two in just a couple of days!  It has been so fun to see them change so much the past few months.  They play and laugh all day long (although fights break out in the middle of laughter).  Jared and I have both noticed lately that when we join Kai and Julia in their playroom to play with them they have been ignoring us or just waving "bye!" to us.  Play time continues on into nap time and bed time unfortunately.  They squeal so loudly that we have to turn off the baby monitors so we can enjoy some quiet downstairs.  It makes you wonder what is so funny to them?  I guess it's an inside joke?!
We plan on taking them out to a fun dinner to Chuck E Cheese or the Rainforest Cafe on their birthday and then having their birthday party over Memorial Day weekend when my parents and brother come to visit.  The theme will be Elmo, of course!
Isaac is still doing well and growing like crazy!  He is wearing 3-6 month clothing, although he won't turn two months until the 18th (twins birthday).  He is starting to coo and smile at us.  Jared witnessed his first offical laugh last night!  He seems to enjoy Julia and Kai's company until one of them tries to sit on him or hugs him too tightly.  He is sleeping for 5-7 hours at a time at night, which helps me get a little bit more rest.


For a quick health update, we met with Kai's new urologist last week.  After receiving medical advise from a urologist at the Spina Bifida clinic that totally conflicted with the treatment that our urologist from OKC prescribed, we were wanting a third opinion.  We learned that treatment for children with neurogenic bladders (dysfunction of bladder due to spinal nerve damage) varies greatly depending on what urologist you talk to.  There is not a lot of "evidence based practice" in this area, so we are hoping that more research is perfomed in the future.  Our new doctor believes that Kai's testing from the past does not indicate a need to catheterize at this time.  He will have to catheterize when he gets older (unless he is in the small 2-5% of kids w/ SB who do not need to) to stay continent, but the doctor does not think that it is necessary for us to catheterize him until he is 3-4 and ready to "potty train."  We have decided to stop Kai's medicine and to stop catheterizing him for the next 6 weeks.  We will then do another urodynamic study to see if the pressures in his bladder have changed and if there is any damage (reversible) to the kidneys.  At that time we will decide if that treatment is best or not.  
It has been a lifestyle change for me to stop Kai's medical treatment.  It was such a routine part of our day....when he woke up, before nap, after nap, and before bedtime.  I have to admit that it's so nice to keep the gloves and medical supplies in the closet!  We pray that Kai will remain healthy without the treatment and that he will miraculously one day not need any help to be continent!


Julia is doing great and jabbers all day long!  She has become more independent and often I find her with her clothes off!  She loves to play make believe and will feed all of her dolls and stuffed animals.  Both Kai and Julia love drinking from cups without lids on them and eating with their utensils.  They also love coloring, jumping in their ball pit, swimming and playing outside.


The above picture is the best picture we could capture on Mother's Day.  It pretty much explains how most days go around here!  These kids have a hard time staying still!   We did have a really nice day.  Jared had flowers delivered and cooked a crepe breakfast.  I also received a card from the kids with certificates for backrubs, an uninterupted nap, and hugs!  We ended the day swimming at our neighborhood pool.  (The things I choose not to mention were finding Julia in her crib after naptime completely naked with soiled sheets and Kai crying all the way home from the swimming pool!)
We have enjoyed several visits from Tulsa friends lately.  We joined my old coworker, Kris, and her husband, Daniel, for dinner last week.  Then we had the Mueller family stay with us last weekend.  It's always good to see familiar faces and get caught up with good friends!  We hope to do more of that next weekend when we travel to Tulsa for a quick visit.

Tuesday, May 3, 2011

Baby Mania!


Here is my attempt to give an update on all of the kids and our recent trip to Nebraska in a short time before everyone wakes up from naps!
We survived the 12 1/2 hour (each way) trip to Nebraska for my grandfather's funeral over Easter weekend.  I won't talk much about the drive because we are finally recovering and I don't want to scare Jared away from driving up there again this summer!
We had a nice time with family including all of my siblings and their kids, grandparents, great grandma, aunts, uncles and cousins from the Jones side of the family and a visit from the great grandparents on my mom's side.  With the recent baby boom in my family, we had one two year old, two one year olds, three four months olds and a one month old!  It was a busy household!  Julia and Kai loved hanging out with their big cousin, Izzy.  We look forward to having them all grow up together being so close in ages!  Here are some pictures!
Kai loves his babies!

Grandpa Jones giving Smarties to Julia & Kai

Younger sister, Erin, with twin girls

Grandma (great) Jones w/ Isaac

Bath time giggles!

Four baby cousins!

Cute babies!
Easter pic

Gilbertson family

Mankin family

Kai w/ Uncle Zach

Busy grandparents!

Easter Egg Hunt

Julia is getting the hang of it!
The funeral service for Grandpa (Lloyd) Jones was very nice.  Some of the family members got up and told stories about grandpa.  We also watched a video that my aunt Starla made a few years ago.  It was heart warming to see and hear my grandfather talk.  It brought back many memories of him when he was still feeling well and was sharp mentally.  I am so blessed to have known and love/be loved by him.  My grandma is doing well and enjoyed seeing all of the family.  We look forward to seeing her (along with the rest of the Jones family) again in July.
As for updates on the kids, Isaac is doing really good and is growing so fast!  We had him weighed in Nebraska and he was 11 lb 6 oz, which means that he's gaining close to a pound a week!!  Yikes...he may become quite the chunk!  He has lost some of his hair in the front...our babies love the old man, receeding hair line look!  He is nursing well and only gets up once in the middle of the night and then goes straight back to bed.  He is really strong and holds his head up while on tummy time and when held by mommy and daddy.  He is becoming really tough as he's survived balls being thrown to him, toddlers accidently falling on him, and being poked in the face.  Poor guy!
Julia is such a big girl!  I have started a list of all of the words that she says.  I am adding new ones daily and she is well above 50 words.  She babbles a lot and loves to sing.  Her favorite song is "Jelly Man Kelly" by James Taylor.  I plan on posting a video soon of the kids singing to it :)  She is also our "condiment girl" and will eat ketchup, ranch dressing, honey, caramel by the spoonful.  She is very expressive and she keeps us laughing all the time!
Kai has become a very independent little boy.  He wants to do everything by himself and won't even take my hand when walking outside.  He is loud and still wakes up squealing with delight (most of the time).  He's very active and is now walking, running and trying to walk up and down the stairs, which makes me kind of scared.  He has had some problems the past few months with bladder infections and constipation.  We will be seeing a new urologist this week and hope to get some help in that area.  Kai and Julia are both very rough and love wresting with daddy or anyone else who dares lay down in the middle of the room!
Kids are up and dinner needs to be made. More later.......!