12 weeks.

Somehow I am already almost through my first trimester of pregnancy. Other than two weeks of nausea... it has been an uneventful 12 weeks. As hard as it is for me to get pregnant... my body sure handles it well once we get there.



I will be honest and say that I have had a hard time allowing myself to accept that I really am carrying two little babies in there, and frankly... just be happy about it. I think when you have gone through infertility, miscarriage, a rocky pregnancy and the trauma of receiving a diagnosis you never knew was coming at birth... well, you are always waiting for a bomb to hit. I was telling a friend yesterday that it almost seems like I don't believe that anything will ever come easy for us when it comes to adding to our family. That is a sad reality... but I think we have turned a corner.

Baby A...


We had an ultrasound yesterday for our nuchal translucency screening and everything looks great. Both babies had great neck measurements and both of their nasal bones were detected. It definitely was a relief to hear it from the doctor. Back story: Payton's nasal bone was not detected during our 20 week ultrasound with her... miraculously a level II ultrasound a week later did detect it... and we were told, "Your baby is fine... have a great life." Quite literally.

Baby B...


As they scanned the twins yesterday... we shared our experience with Payton with them. They said they were so sorry, but they couldn't help but laugh after all we went through... knowing how every screening the doctors had done had failed. We told them we were now quite skeptical when it comes to screening... they understood. Mostly we were there for the ultrasound and to see two heartbeats still pumping away... the screening results would not make a difference one way or another for us... and we were quite certain everything would be okay. More on that later.



Payton points to my belly every day and says, "Two babies." It is so cute. We have a whole lotta love in this house to give these babies... hope they don't get overwhelmed. Ha...

This is getting more and more real... love them so much already and we are beyond excited.

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We vacationed this summer in Myrtle Beach with my mom, sister and her family. We don't get to see my sister, brother-in-law and nieces very often since they moved... so it was nice to just have a week to hang out. It has sort of become a tradition of sorts for the kids to jump in the ocean fully clothed the night we get there... this year was no different. They love it... err, Mason and Payton love it... Nika was off somewhere watching, I'm sure.






Grandma and her grandbabies.

My niece Maya is the cutest friggen little thang with her piggies in her hair. Mason was playing with her when we were on vacation... and he suddenly proclaimed, "We are going to have two of you! We are so lucky!" Okay, be still my heart... love that kid.







So... while we were in Myrtle, we went on the SkyWheel 20-story-ferris-wheel of death. No way... never again. 


Payton cried. Mason cried. My sister cried (shhh). Not a joke... and I nearly had a panic attack because my kids were so upset. We almost had to push the emergency stop button before we even made it around once. No thank you... I'm good with my feet planted on the ground.





Cherish the memories.

Expecting two.

How was it that I worded it on facebook... something like...  

Table for 7 please!! We are so excited (and shocked and nervous and excited and still shocked and...) to announce that we are expecting twins!! 

Yes, I am for real and no, this is not a joke. We are very excited and the further along we get, the more relaxed I am and the more real this gets for us. It seems I am always waiting for a bomb to fall on my head... but things are going amazingly well so far. We are a little over 8 weeks pregnant right now.

I am high risk... I'm old, I'm having twins and ya know... I have birthed a child with Down syndrome. Gasp. I have had four ultrasounds so far and that is a definite benefit to this high risk thing. Really though... I have no concerns.

Today I got a nice 3D bonus ultrasound... you can see baby B nicely, crown to rump... and baby A has his/her back to the camera, but he/she is right in the middle of the picture... mostly a back of head/spine shot. 



Mason: What kind of babies are we having?
Me: What do you mean 'what kind'?
Mason: Are we having Down syndrome babies?
Me: No baby, you can't just choose to have a baby with Down syndrome.

*sigh*

So many thoughts about that conversation rolling around in my head.

Anyway... so excited and I think these babies will be here before we know it. Thank you so much to everyone who has prayed for us and wished us well in our journey to add to our family... I think it worked, double time.

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Our summer has been crazy... somehow we find ourselves on the go all.the.time. I don't think that is about to stop either. Like a friend recently said, "I'd rather my hands be full than empty." Yes... my thoughts exactly.



We went home to Wisconsin over the 4th of July for an overdue visit to friends and family... as well as Kyle's 20th high school reunion. Eek! 


The kids got to be in the 4th of July parade with their Grandma... Mason talked about that for days leading up to the event. He was so excited.




The kids with their grandparents on the 4th of July.



We drove up to Minnesota for a day to see Kyle's Grandma and some of his other family. The kids got to spend some time on a family farm... I miss living in farmland and wish my kids could be around that more.








Four generations of love.

Mmmkay... this momma is tired. And nauseous. And hungry. 

Night night.

apraxia: two years later.

Two years ago, Payton was diagnosed with Childhood Apraxia of Speech. It has been a long road and we have come so far. We also have a long way to go... but we are getting there. Payton has remained in PROMPT therapy and it truly has made the difference for her, in addition to her other private and school speech therapy.

And supplements. I have always been a huge proponent of supplements... here is what we are doing right now...

Juice Plus+ gummies (3-4 fruit/veggie/berry each day)
Longvida Curcumin powder (4 scoops every evening)
Honeycombs Gingko Biloba (2-3 droppers every morning)
Speak by SpeechNutrients (2 tbsp every evening)
Vitamin D3 (4000 IU each day)
Iron

An SLP friend of mine gave me this apraxia word list when we were trying to nail down Payton's diagnosis... and I have continued to document her repeating this list over the last two years to show progress.

March 2010, age 4 years 2 months


March 2011, age 5 years 2 months


May 2012, age 6 years 4 months


And my little unofficial off-the-top-of-my-head word list... repeated over the years. I think this truly shows the amazing progress she has made... love her!

March 2010, age 4 years 2 months


March 2011, age 5 years 2 months


May 2012, age 6 years 4 months

Makes my heart melt.

We are in the car now. They did the raffles and then it cleared out... so Payton wanted to go. She got a keychain from the dance... she is so proud! 

While we were walking out, Payton said, "Fun Daddy!" I told her, "Thank you for dancing with Daddy." She said, "Thank you for dancing, Daddy!" Makes my heart melt! 



That was the text message I got from Kyle when he and Payton were on their way home from a father/daughter 50's sock hop for girl scouts. Sigh... how did I, the mama, get so lucky to have these two in my life?!



A father/daughter dance... just one of so many dreams I have for my girl. She was insanely excited to dress up and pull away with her Daddy in his cherry red hot rod.

Gosh... she is so beautiful. I could stare at her all.day.long. No bias here... ha!

A special little thank you to Payton's friend, Julia, for making her night so special. Makes this mama's heart so happy. And this is where I have typed and backspaced over my worries about 472 times.



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From the moment we met Nika in her baby home... she has sucked on two of her fingers. Perhaps cute... at first... a natural soother for her as she lived the life of an orphan. Who would have known that her finger sucking would become the one point of contention between us.

Cute as she is... finger sucking is not cute when you are five.



We have been amazed at how much she has come out of her shell... especially this past year. She has grown so much... emotionally, physically and cognitively. She is finally using her speech spontaneously... and becoming quite the independent little girl. Her teacher tells me that she is a leader in the classroom... that is a far stretch from the quiet and shy little girl that refused to participate in group settings.

One little problem... finger sucking. There is no rhyme or reason as to when she sucks... perhaps when she gets bored, nervous or unsure about something. She knows she is not to suck her fingers when she is with me... but I leave and she sucks. There is question as to whether or not she sucks when I'm gone because she thinks she can get away with it or she just misses her mama. I like to believe it is the latter... but who am I kidding... home girl is smart and believes she can get away with it when I'm not there.

When her teacher told me she was purposefully removing herself from the general area of her classroom in order to suck (i.e. going into the bathroom, hiding in various areas of the classroom)... I really started to worry about what kindergarten would look like for her. If we hadn't curbed her sucking as much as we have... I truly believe she would still be sitting in a corner, sucking on her fingers and watching the world go by her... just as she did when we brought her home from Russia.

Enter the habit appliance.



Nika's dentist and I talked at length about my concerns for kindergarten. I feel like she is already going to have enough hurdles to cross to be included in a general education classroom. With 25 students in her class... her teacher is not going to care if Nika is removing herself to suck. That behavior will escalate to become the number one reason to kick her out of general education... and I just don't even want to go there.

So we had her fitted for the appliance and it lasted approximately 12 hours before it fell out. Sigh. I gave her Juice Plus+ gummies right before bed... uh yeah, oopsie.



Her dentist told me the next day she didn't think it was a great fit to begin with... so we had to start the process over. Phew. Now we wait for her second appliance to be made... praying this next one works and that this will become a thing of the past.

Remember when...? Now that will be a good day.

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There is something feel good about baking cookies with my girls. Both of them looking to me for reassurance and guidance that they are scraping the cookie dough or sprinkling the sugar just right.  



Teaching them the nurturing things that moms do... hoping that someday they will be able to nurture someone of their own.




For reasons unknown to me... I clearly suck in the kitchen. I burn my cookies every time... burn pizza every time. Where is Martha when you need her? Here is to hoping my girls don't remember the burnt part of baking.



Headed to find a semi-soft cookie to share with a tall glass of milk... if only they were not burnt. Sigh.

Night.

Space Shuttle Discovery

Last night I began hearing chatter of all these people who were getting up early to go see the space shuttle Discovery land at Dulles Airport. Eh? I had no idea what everyone was talking about... that is what I get for not watching the news. Oopsie.

I woke up this morning and got all excited reading about the shuttle after pulling it up on our local news website. I asked Kyle if we were allowed to give our kids permission to play hooky from school... to watch a space shuttle land.

Hell yeah, we were allowed! We realized that this would be a once in a lifetime experience for us to see... and I'm pretty sure our kids will remember this forever, rather than what they learned in school the morning of April 17th.

"Get your stuff together... we are going to watch the space shuttle land! I will take you to school when we are done. Let's go!"

Traffic was horrific. There were people everywhere. The highway became a parking lot and the police didn't care. That was awesome. We ended up sitting on an overpass right by the end of the runway. "Here it comes! Oh my gosh, this is amazing! Look you guys, there it is!"



Amazeballs.

Cue the floodgates. Oh my word... I bawled as I sat on the hood of my car snapping my camera. That dang fighter jet... does it to me every time. And my sweet son stood next to me rubbing my leg to soothe me... oh, his sweet soul.

We heard that the shuttle would be circling back around, so we moved down the road to another location. We all gathered on top of the car and waited.



This time we were literally right under the shuttle.

Amazeballs. Again.



Mason... cue the video.



Seriously a once in a lifetime experience... I was so happy we decided to go. On our way home... we were shocked to see the shuttle again! Apparently it hadn't yet landed, but it seemed it was landing this next time around, as the landing gear was now done.

So awesome.



I love our country. I love things like this that bring so many people from all walks of life together. So much pride. So amazing. Love.