The Jones Girls

Cliff and I celebrated out 10th wedding anniversary last night.   We went to go out to dinner and celebrate our anniversary.   Our favorite restaurant that is “our spot” is Benihana’s.    Our Sweet Sasha babysat our girls and we left the house at about 8pm.  We first went to Fry’s Electronics to pick out our anniversary present.  We purchased a new 2-line phone system for our house.  It is awesome!!    Then at about 9:15pm we cruised over to Benihana’s.  The moon was full, bright and gorgeous.  As we approached the restaurant, we noticed there were no cars in the parking lot.  We drove into the parking lot and we were shocked and disappointed to see a wire fence wrapped around the whole property.   It looked like a huge construction site.  My heart sank into my feet.  This was “our special place”.    So then we decided we would go have dinner at BStuart Anderson’s lack Angus.  We arrived there at about 10pm.    We got out of the car and we were met at the door with some stunning news that they changed their hours.  The closed at 10pm on Friday nights.  What steak house closes that early on a Friday night?    We get in our car and I call my girlfriend who owns the best sushi Japanese restaurant in town.    She had a slow night so she closed at 10pm.   Well, 3 strikes and we were out!!   We didn’t get to go to dinner and to be truthful, we were so tired by 10:30pm, we just wanted to go home.  So we got home and relieved the babysitter.  We snuggled in bed together and watched Sam I Am.   What a fanstastic movie that was.  I cried my eyes out.

So here is a little history of our Big Day:

We got married in a beautiful New England Chapel in Poultney, VT on September 19, 1998.  It was Cliff’s dream to get married in the church he grew up in.  So it was so wonderful for me to plan our special wedding and make his dreamcome true.   My childhood best friend, Deidre, was my Maid of Honor.  Cliff’s close friend and mentor, Bart, was his Best Man.  Lauren was our flower girl.  My mom was my only relative who came out for the wedding.  No one gave me away at my wedding.      It was a very beautiful and traditional wedding.    I had the wedding march going down the isle and we had Pachel Canon playing at the end of our wedding ceremony when we walked down the isle from the alter.  We had a flutist and a pianist play the music.   The church bells rung announcing the confirmation of our wedding.   What an incredible memory….

Cliff also had a dream of staying at the Lake St. Catherine Inn.  When he was a boy, he remembered all of the well-to-do folks stayed at The Lake St. Catherine Inn.  He hoped one day he would be able to stay there.  So, I made his dream become a reality.    We had our honeymoon at Lake St. Catherine.   We rented a beautiful lake-front cottage.   Our honeymoon was almost 2 weeks.  We rented a few rooms before our wedding and my mom, Deidre and I stayed in one room.  Cliff and Lauren stayed in another room.  We had our Wedding Rehearsal Dinner at The Lodge at the Lake St. Catherine Inn.   It was such a beautiful place. 

I am so proud that we have made such a beautiful and productive life together.   We can’t imagine life without each other.  We are true partners, best friends and love each other to pieces.    Our lives are stressful and we are constantly working on making things better for ourselves as well as for our relationship.  

We both have grown and learned so much in the 10 years we have been married.   We have learned that compromise and mutual respect are vital keys to make our relationship last.    “Sensitivity Lessons” are always in session in our relationship 🙂

We are both looking forward to celebrating another 10 more years for our 20th Wedding Anniversary.     We respect our wedding vows and take them very seriously.    

I love you with all of my heart, Clifford Charles Jones.  I am so proud to be your wife and for you to be my husband.  Thank you for loving me and giving me the wonderful life we have.   Thank you for loving me so much and giving my the GREATEST gift of all – our 4 daughters.  I am so Blessed by  God to have you in my heart.    We are soul mates and will continue our journey in Heaven one day together.  That is what marriage is all about…..

On Wednesday, Sept. 17th, I took all 4 girls to Chuck E. Cheese  in La Miranda for their first time.     I signed up for Chuck E. Cheese coupons and they e-mailed me a couple of great coupons which I used that night.    My friend, Victoria, brought her 3 year old daughter, Sophia and her 1-1/2 year old daughter, Juliana with her.   We all had a blast.  What a great place for kids. 

The triplets loved to ride on the cars.  Savannah enjoyed those too, but she really enjoyed some of the games there.  There was a cute Duckie Game and a cute Bumble Bee where she got to earn tickets for making good points on the games. 

Cliff joined us and played with the girls and then we had dinner together.   It was so neat seeing how much fun my girls were having with their daddy!!   We order pizza and drinks.  Their pizza was very good. 

I am thinking we might have Savannah’s 5th birthday party here.

The triplets love their baby bottles.   They love sucking on a bottle of milk and drift off to sleep for nap time or bed time watching a little Dora the Explorer or Baby Einstein.   I have been able to keep them on the same bed schedule for over a year now.      I have slowly been weaning them from their bottles.

In my experience with Savannah weaning from her bottle, she weaned herself at 14 months.  It was so easy and no big deal.    One morning she was so frustrated trying to get more fluid than the bottle would allow she threw the bottle across the room and she was done with bottles.  I handed her a sippy cup and she was so happy to be able to take a bigger gulp of fluid.    An important thing that I have observed between Savannah and the triplets with baby bottles is that toddlers still have a need to suck.   Savannah was so easy to let go of the bottle because she sucked her thumb and had her “Fi Fi” (blanket).     She was never into pacifiers.  The triplets don’t suck their thumb and aren’t into pacifiers.    I believe the Triplets have have a much harder time weaning from the bottle is because they love to suck on the bottle and since they don’t suck their thumbs or pacifiers, than the bottles are what they like to suck on.      I truly believe that most toddlers at age 2-3 will either be thumb suckers, pacifier suckers or bottle suckers.   

A couple of months ago I began this process.   I only allowed them to drink milk or juice & water out of , sippy cups during /the day.  I would let them have their bottles for nap time in bed as well as for bed time.  I would also let them have a midnight bottle too.   

On Thursday night Sept. 18th, I didn’t let them have a night time bottle.  They cried all night long.  It was a rough night.   I didn’t sleep all night and Cliff had to go sleep in his office at about 2am.   Yesterday I didn’t let them have their nap time bottle.  They cried for a bit and finally fell asleep.    Last night they did a little bit better without their bottles.  Today nap time was a little bit better than yesterday.   Tonight they are doing a little better than last night.   Maryssa is still awake and playing around in their room.  She will evenutally get the idea and fall asleep.

I give them a sippy cup of milk after dinner and they drink about 4-6 oz.    I give them a sippy cup of milk in the morning when they wake up and they drink 2-5 oz.   During the afternoon I give them sippy cups of diluted applejuise 50/50 and they sip for 1-2 hours about 6oz.   Also I offer them my glass of iced water throughout the day to give them practive with a regular cup.  So we are on our way to big girl cups now.

I have been having problems with them having extremily sopping wet diapers in the morning when they were drinking bottles at night time.   Miranda was getting really bad rashes from being in the wet diaper over night.   I have noticed that their diapers are much drier now and I think they will be much more comfortable in the middle of the night now.  Hopefully Miranda’s rash will now disappear.

With this idea of ditching the bottles and them having drier diapers at night, my next step is to start potty training them.    It was a bit difficult to grasp and tackle the potty training when they were still drinking  night time bottles and peeing about 18 oz woth of milk during the night.   So with no fluids after 7:00pm, hopefully I can start approaching the prospect of potty training them.

On Wednesday, September 13th, Amanda had an evaluation for Occupational Therapy at Woodcrest with a wonderful therapist named Michelle.   I took all of the triplets.     The evaluation went from 11am-1:00pm.     Amanda will be receiving Occupational Therapy after her thumb reconstruction surgery, probably at the end of October or early November.  She will be going once a week for 45 minutes.  The facility is located in Fullerton.   Our goals for Amanda will be to work on her fine motor skills, helping her find her center line since one arm is slight shorter than the other, helping her button, zip, etc. 

Amanda was receiving Physical Therapy and Occupational Therapy from Regional Center of Orange County, a non-profit organization that offers in-home therapy for children 3 and under that are developmentally behind.    Amanda was evaluated in June by Kim, her physical therapist, and the report stated Amanda was no longer delayed and was developmentally at her age.    The occupational therapist, Deborah, will be evaluating Amanda this week and she will be report that Amanda is no longer delayed and is developmentally at the correct age now.   This is such a huge and wonderful goal that Amanda has met.   She was receiving therapy since she was just a few months old.   

Since the birth of the triplets, Maryssa has always had congestion, stuffy nose, snoring, and problems drinking her bottle when she was an infant.  When she began solids, she was and has been very apprehensive about taking bites, chewing and swalling.   When she was 4 months old we took her to the ENT and he thought it was normal and that it was coming from her esophagus.  That didn’t sound right to me.    When she was 8 months old I took her to see a different ENT for a 2nd opinion.  He ordered X-Rays of her facial plate andhe couldn’t findanything wrong with her.  He also did a follow up on her 6 months later and said she was fine andhe didn’t really see anything wrong with her.

My “mommy gut instinct” told me that this was unacceptable.  I knew something just wasn’t right with Maryssa.    She was the middle sized baby at birth, and in the past 2 years she has become the smalled baby of the trio.   Her weight is 24 1/2 lbs and height 32 inches, compared to Miranda 30 1/2 lbs and 34 inches and Amanda 29 1/2 lbs and 34 1/2.    I contribute her regression in growth to an ENT problem.   So I requested a 3rd opinion with a Pediatric ENT.   For over a year my Medical Group denied a Pediatric ENT.   I kept fighting and didn’t give up.  Finally, in July, I finally got an authorization for Maryssa to be seen by a Pediatric ENT at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles.   I am so glad I was persistent and didn’t accept the denials and refusals that they kept giving us.  

I made Maryssa appt with Dr. Koempf the same day as Amanda’s appt. with Dr. Wright.   I took the triplets and we drove up to Children’s Hospital on Tuesday September 12th.   We were there form 10am-2:30pm.  Boy what a long day that was!!

Dr. Koempf ordered X-Ray’s of Maryssa’sface plate.   He diagnosed her with swollen adenoids and recommended an adenoidectomy.   Finally, we have an answer to all of this.    For 2 years I had been thinking her problems were caused by swollen adenoids, but the other ENT’s dismissed the idea.    So, Maryssa will be having surgery on Monday September 29th.  

Amanda will be having her thumb reconstructive surgery, called Pollicization, on Friday September 26th.   I have the surgeries planned so close together because my sister, Nadine, will be flying out to help me from September 25th – October 5th.  She said might as well get everything done and handled while she was here.

It is going to be a very busy and stressful end of the month.    I do believe that this is better to get this done for both girls while they are little.   The will recover much faster being so young and this will be all behind us.

This friend of mine has been on my mind for weeks now and today I received some news that fills me with so much sorrow.    A friend of mine who was pregnant with twins faced a very painful loss of her babies.     There was an out pour of support from many women that have become her friends through her journey of trying to conceive her babies.     Many prayers were spoken, candles lit, phone calls of support made between all of us.    

My dear friend, you have touched our lives so deeply and I think a silver lining that I would like to say is, I think this has brought an incredible group of the most loving and wonderful ladies, even closer together. It has also touched other women that have sought out to give you support.   The Lord brings good out of bad and I have to take comfort and have faith in that.

Every one of us care so much and want to do whatever we can for you. So please know you have true friends that genuinely love you, respect you, and thank God you are in our lives.

I came across this poem that just couldn’t leave my mind. It did make me cry but it really made a lot of sense to me. It exudes my true belief that these sweet and precious babies are in Heaven in The Lord’s gentle hands. God Bless these sweet, precious angels. My dear friend, even though I never got to meet these sweet babies, my heart feels full of emotions for both of your babies and you too. I want to make a dedication entry in my blog for you and your babies and I am including this dedication poem for them. Here it is:

I’m just a little baby
who didn’t quite make it there;
I went straight to be with Jesus
but I’m waiting for you here.

Don’t you fret about me mommy
I’m of all God’s most blessed
I’d have loved to stay there with you
but Heavenly Father knows what’s best.

Many who dwell here where I live
waited years to enter in,
they struggled through a world of sorrow
and their lives were marred with sin.

So sweet mommy don’t be sad,
wipe those tears and chase the gloom,
I went straight to be with Jesus,
from my lovely mothers womb.

Thank you for the life you gave me,
it was brief but don’t complain;
I have all of heaven’s glory
suffering none of the world’s pain.

Thank you for the name you gave me,
I’m thankful for all you’ve done.
I’ll be waiting here for you
in heaven up above.

I would have loved to stay with you,
And lived life by your side,
But the Lord has called me home,
I know it’s hard to understand why.

Thank you mommy for making me,
You made me out of love,
I can’t wait for the day I see you again
So you can see what I’ve become.

I’m an angel here in heaven,
The Lord’s here by my side,
He wants me to let you know
He’s sorry he made you cry.

He has a plan for me up here,
And a plan for you here too,
Someday we’ll be together again,
And this I know is true.

After 24 hours being in the hosptial, Savannah is now stable and oxygen level is 97%. The hospital discharged her and she got to come home. Yay!! They were very cautious and told Cliff that she is to be watched very closely and if she turns blue or if her cough gets so bad that she is struggling to breathe. She needs breathing treatments round the clock every 3-4 hours and is on Steroids and Strong antibiodics. I am hoping in the next few days she can overcome this, my poor baby girl. She starts school next Tuesday and she has been looking forward to seeing her friends and being back at preschool. We will see how she does, it is a whole week away so maybe she can kick this thing in the butt.  Her rash from the Roseola is beginning to slightly diminish and the fever is just about gone now.