Major catch up - March

And here is the proof of the chicken pox. Everyone got it quite bad - literally covered head to toe. Here's Alex with his on 2nd March.
And of course, we were just starting the boys with eating solids while all of this was going on. Luckily, it didn't seem to bother their appetite at all! Here's Alex with his baby rice.
And Isaiah eating his (before he was really covered in spots).
This is Michaela on 3rd March, with most of her spots crusted over.
And Isaiah following behind on the 4th of March with his spots. Surprisingly, he seemed to get it less so than Michaela and Alex. But even so, it was tough being stuck in the house for two weeks with everyone ill.
It's amazing how long it takes for the spots to completely go after getting chicken pox. We seemed to be picking scabs out of Michaela's hair for weeks! Here she is holding Alex.
Check out how much food the boys eat. And this was only about a week after starting solids properly!
Michaela is really into pretend play at the moment. Sometimes Mommy steps into the wrong place and manages to step onto her nursery, or Bookstart, or the shop, or whatever! One game she particularly likes to play is putting all of her dolls/babies/teddies to sleep. So she gets a book or paper and puts it under their heads for a pillow and another one on top for a blanket (see below).
And here are the boys 6 months old. Can hardly believe it that this time around things are moving so quickly. You can really see the difference in their weights in this photo - Alex is the chubber on the left, with our little Isaiah on the right. I weighed them two weeks after this photo was taken and Alex was 15lb 9oz and Isaiah was 14lb exactly.
Smiley Alex.
Concentrating Isaiah.
The boys really love playing and seeing how many things they can get into. We got this activity centre when Michaela was a baby and the boys just love it. Especially since there are so many things they can chew on! Here's Isaiah having fun.
Both boys are really strong and can now move themselves around. But it seems Alex is more on the go now than Isaiah as he'll actually push himself around the floor and roll around to get where he wants. Now if we leave the room and come back, you can never be sure where they might be. One thing both boys do love doing is push themselves up to look like they're flying - here's Alex doing that.
And not forgetting Michaela. She's really a girl now, and not so much a toddler. Just look how grown up she looks in this photo!
Daddy and Michaela decided to bake Mommy gingerbread men for Mother's Day. Unfortunately, Daddy forgot they might expand a bit, but Mommy still loves the result!
On the 26th, Michaela finally had her first hair cut. When we first discussed getting her hair cut, she was very upset because she didn't want to look like Daddy! But we went along to watch one of Mommy's friends get her hair cut first to show that it's easy and doesn't hurt and doesn't have to be a shaved head like Daddy! This is Daddy's cousin Dawna cutting her hair.
Michaela was really good for her hair cut and sat really well in the chair. And here's all the hair that was chopped off.
On Sunday morning, Daddy managed to get some really good photos of all three kids (which never seems to happen), so we couldn't resist putting them on the blog for everyone to see! Isaiah, Alex then Michaela.
Not much else really going on here. Just normal life for us - Toddlers on Monday and Wednesday, Michaela still goes to the Sandwick nursery on a Tuesday, sometime 11 o'clocks on Thursday and Kindergym on Friday. We've not really managed to get back into swimming after the chicken pox, but we'll hopefully get going with that again soon. Because our weeks are pretty routine, Michaela almost always asks just before she goes to bed 'what will we do after my sleep?'.

The boys are in their own bedroom now. It was pretty tough to begin with, with lots of getting up in the night, but they're not too bad now. It would just be really good if they would both have their really good nights on the same night, instead of on different nights. It is getting there though. Mommy's going to try to get their napping during the day sorted out soon. It's still very unstructured and short, but Michaela was the same at their age and got better, so we know there's hope to get them into 1-2 longer naps. It was going to be worked on a few weeks ago, but then we got chicken pox, so it's been on hold.

As usual, we hope not to leave it as long before blogging again........but don't hold your breath!

Major catch up - February

Wow, lots and lots to catch up on! Keiran and Caitlin were still here at the start of February (but it feels like such a long time ago). We went up to Granny Mam and Auld Daa's house for a farewell lunch and tried to get a photo with all the Christie grandkids (plus Keiran and Caitlin). Here's the best attempt - Eve, Isaiah, Elise, Lottie, Michaela, Megan, Alex, with Keiran and Caitlin in the front.
We got a lot of snow at the start of February, which Michaela just loved! Here she is with her first ever snowman, which she made with Granny Up-By. Turns out it was the wrong kind of snow for building snowmen, so Granny Up-By watered the snow and here's the outcome.
And sledging in front of the house.
Here's Michaela holding Alex. She really is so kind and loving to her brothers!
And holding Isaiah.
As with Michaela, Daddy decided to feed the boys bananas before discussing it with Mommy. Here is Michaela feeding Isaiah....
and Alex.
But, that night, Isaiah ended up spewing up banana, so Daddy had to get up with him and sort out cleaning it all up. For some reason, banana doesn't seem to go down well with our kids. Michaela struggled with it until she was over a year old and it seems the boys might be the same. Uncle Hop came over one night to say goodbye as he was back off to America and we put him to work, so here he is feeding Alex his bedtime bottle.
Her'e's Michaela sharing her bath with Isaiah.
And here he is after that bath. It's normally so difficult to get really good photos of Isaiah, but Daddy did a really good job here!
Nearly two weeks after the banana incident, we were ready to start the boys with solids. Here's Isaiah with his first taste of baby rice.
And Alex with his.
Turns out these boys are really good eaters! They will eat whatever is put in front of them and they don't seem to get full. We now just stop feeding them when we think it's enough.

The end of February brought chicken pox to our house. We actually took the kids around others with chicken pox so they would catch it now as Mommy got it when she was 14 and that was horrible. Michaela got it first, followed by Alex close behind and Isaiah about 5 days or so behind them. Photos to come in the March update.

Major catch up - end January!

Nicola came over for a visit and Alex was very taken with Luca getting to get close enough to pet. Thank goodness it seems none of the kids are scared of dogs so the holiday to Auntie Ivanna and her two dogs should be fine.
And as Mommy predicted on the last blog, Alex did indeed learn to roll over - on 31 January, so just a few days after Isaiah. But Alex was much happier having learned this new skill than his brother.

January 2009

Just when I think I'm getting good at the blogging, I suffer a setback.....

Anyway, here's the January update. Here are the boys (Isaiah left, Alex right) all wrapped up in their buggy to go for a family walk. They both fell asleep during the walk and looked so peaceful, but it was a bit too cold!
Daddy got a good photo of the sun setting.
Here's Michaela with possibly her favourite Christmas present, Dolly. Michaela has informed us that she's Dolly's mommy. She even gives Dolly a breastfeed sometimes.
Trying to get a photo of the boys in the bath that won't embarass them too much when they're older..... hmm, maybe not! Alex is in the front, Isaiah in the back.
As you'll all know, Isaiah had an operation on his stomach on Halloween. Here are the boys side by side, and it takes a good look to tell who's had the operation. Isaiah is on the right and you can just see that the scar is at the top of his belly button.
Alex sitting up in his Bumbo. They both like to sit in this chair, but they don't seem to like it for too long. Maybe that'll come as they get a bit stronger.
We're trying to get into a regular routing of going to the swimming pool. Our plan is to go most Sunday mornings. The boys seem to really enjoy being in the water and we like to encourage Michaela to swim as much as possible. It's a lot of effort to get everyone in and out, but we think it'll be worth it. Isaiah's chilling out in his seat (left) - so much so that he was nearly drinking the water at some points. Alex was too interested in the rubber duck Michaela had given him to look at.
Here are both of the boys in their Bumbos. How cute! Alex on the left, Isaiah on the right.
Daddy's cousins from Australia are home at the moment. We had them come to stay with us for a few days, which Michaela just loved! Here's Keiran holding Isaiah.
And Caitlin helping Michaela climb the rocks at the beach.
And Caitlin holding Alex.
Yesterday (27 January), Isaiah learned to roll from his back to his front! As you can see from the picture though, he doesn't like it. Maybe he'll learn to roll back again soon. We're really impressed because this is a few weeks ahead of when Michaela learned to roll over. And today Alex was trying to give it a go too - maybe he doesn't want to be too far behind his big brother?!
Not much else to really say. Everyone's doing really well. The boys generally sleep well at night (but not so much in the day). And Michaela is still being a really good big sister to them, helping out whenever she can. Our big news is that we've booked a holiday to see Auntie Ivanna, so we're off to California in September! Not sure how the travel is going to go, but luckily Granny Up-By is coming with us, so we can have one child each. Wonder who's going to get Michaela?!?!

Christmas Day!!

Christmas was very exciting in our house this year, especially for Michaela! Here's a picture of our tree with all the presents under it. Mommy and Daddy's presents are behind the tree so you can't even see them! Michaela's was by far the biggest pile (to the right of the picture) but the boys weren't that far behind her. It took about 3 or 4 attempts to get through all of Michaela's presents on Christmas Day. It took Boxing Day to open the boys' presents!
Michaela decorated our tree this year. Mommy put on the lights and the angel, but she did the rest. We did try to guide her a bit, but it didn't really work, hence the collection of red baubles on the right, silver on the left, etc. But we think it looks really good!
Here's Michaela with the presents from Santa - she's holding on to hers and the boys are the red bag and two red stockings.
Quite possibly Michaela's favourite present was a camera from Santa. We think she took over 200 photos on Christmas Day alone! Eventually we might get some of her photography on the blog.
And Christmas dinner at Auntie Nan's house - check out the amount of food!!!
Isaiah on Christmas Day.
Alex on Christmas Day.
And a slight lie in the title, because the following photos aren't from Christmas Day, but I can't remember which day they were from. Here's Mommy playing with Isaiah (l) and Alex (r) at Granny's house. They were both giggling away having just woken from a nap.
And I forgot to say that Auntie Ivanna was home for Christmas. Here she is with Michaela and Alex at Granny's house.

And with Isaiah at our house.

Christmas has been really fun for us as a family this year and I can only think next year will be even better (or complete bedlam, or both!).