The Jones Girls

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.

Thursday, September 14, the triplets had their 2 year check up with Dr. Gonzalez.     They received their vaccinations and won’t require anymore until they go to Kindergarten  ( yay ! )

Amanda is in the 75th percentile and weighs in at 29 1/2 lbs and is 34 1/2 inches tall.    My tiniest baby at birth is not the tallest.    She continues to amaze us all and constantly shows us her strong will to live.  Amanda can talk in 2-3 word phrases and understands commands and instruction.   She says cute things like “No Way” for no and “Yep” for yep.    She always cracks me up when she talks.

Miranda is in the 100+ percentile and weighs in at 30 1/2 lbs and is 34 inches tall.    She is showing signs that she may have a little eczema.  I have to put a special cream on little dry, red patchy areas and use a heavy cream on her skin daily.  Miranda is the best communicator of the bunch.  She can speak in 2-4 word sentences and can understand instruction and commands.  

Maryssa is in the 50th percentile and weighs in at 24 1/2 lbs and is 32 inches tall.   Her size at birth made her the middle sized baby.  She is now the smallest one of my trio.    I expressed my concerns about how small she is for a 2 year old.  The dr. said Maryssa has the healthiest BMI and percentile for her age than the other girls and not to worry that she is smaller.    Maryssa doesn’t talk as much as the other girls.   She is passive and lets everyone speak for her.  She is very intelligent and blew us all away when she picked up a ABC book and sighted all of the letters correctly by their names as well as numbers 1,2,3.  She also doesn’t call animals by there names, but by the sound the animal makes.   When she sees a duck she says quack, quack.  When she sees a dog she says ruff, ruff.    

Things that we are looking into:

Miranda’s dry skin and little red rashes

Maryssa will be getting a hearing evaluation and a speech evalutation because when we call her name, she doesn’t come to us or turn around.  We want to make sure she doesn’t have any hearing problems, although, at birth in the NICU her hearing test came out fine and if I whisper something to her, she will repeat what I say.   This may be just selective hearing and not paying attention to what we are saying.     Also, I want to make sure she doesn’t have any impairment for speech. 

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.

We celebrated The Triplets’ 2nd birthday and Cliff’s 50th birthday at our house with our close friends.   There was a really cool water slide (Little Tikes Crashing Waves), a Sesame Street Bouncy House, a Jumpolene which is similar to a trampoline, and a couple of baby/toddler pools.   It was so fun to see all 4 of my girls and all of their little friends have so much fun that day.  I was just amazed to see my 4 little girls running and playing – they are little people now.   Wow, I carried these precious babes in my belly and I have so many wonderful memories watching them all grow.

It was equally amazing to see my darling husband enjoy celebrating his huge accomplishment and what a triumph it is indeed to celebrate half a century!!   

I made my famous Kimberladas, lasagna, a Mediterranean dish and some other yummy dishes for all of our friends to enjoy.  It meant so much to us that they came to the party and celebrated with us.  

Blues Clues dropped of special goodie bags for all of the kiddos.   Cliff got a delectable chocolate cake that proudly displayed “50” and Happy Birthday Cliff.  The triplets got their favorite character, Elmo on their cake.    There were lots of candles to be blown out and it was so much fun.

Happy Birthday to the loves of my life.   And my dear Savannah, I am looking forward to celebrating your birthday in March.  I can’t believe she will be turning 5.

I want to thank God for blessing me over and over.  I am so grateful to Him for everything in my life and for showing me the way to Salvation.

Wow, I just can’t believe I typed TWO.   I have to say looking back a year ago, we have made so many wonderful memories and accomplishments this past year.

Today I have been reminiscing about the day I went into labor and all of the wonderful memories the day my precious trio was born.  The day they were born was so scary and concerning for Cliff and I.   To be honest, I don’t think that ever truly goes away if you have a preemie baby or a full term baby or a single baby or triplets.   You just worry all the time for your kids.   Also, the day they were born I was exhilarated and relieved that my girls in the world making history in their lives and ours.  Everyday doesn’t go by that I am in awe of them in what they do and the love I have for them as well as for my precious little Savannah. I just LOVE having 4 girls. Daddy loves having 4 little Daddy’s Girls too!!

I am so happy to see my 3 little girls turning 2 today. I can’t believe how fast time has gone by!! Just remembering 2 years ago I went into labor and told Cliff I was really sorry that I couldn’t hold them in any longer. It took him all day that day to sink in that he was going to share his birthday with his daughters that day and forever to come. For years to come his best and biggest birthday present was the birth of his 3 baby girls.  Speaking of Daddy, we can’t forget that today is Daddy’s birthday too.  Cliff has been on cloud 9 all day. He is thrilled to be turning 50 today. He feels like he is a lucky guy to get this far as a lot of his friends have passed away in the past 10 years and never made it to 50.

I am so grateful to The Lord for Blessing me with my precious girls.   They define me, and I define them.    I can’t imagine life without my girls now.

Happy birthday my darling little trio and Happy Birthday to the love of my life- my husband who has helped make this all possible for all of us. I have to say my dear husband Cliff, has given me the most precious gift I could ever ask for – CELEBRAING MY DAUGHTERS BIRTHDAYS.

Lots of cake and candles glowing in our house tonight!!