Happy First Birthday

It's been one year. Rich and I can't believe how fast this year has gone by. We are in awe of these little creatures who every day make us laugh, cry and remind us what is important. It is too scary to remember how fragile and precarious all of our lives were one year ago so I'd rather recount what we did to celebrate the first year.

Well, this wasn't so much a celebration but a necessity. We had an 8:00 am appointment with the pedi for their 1 year check-up so that meant for me packing the diaper bag with snacks, toys, blankets the night before and getting everyone up, feed, and changed by 7:30 am. I started getting ready around 5:30 which is what time Beckett is getting up anyway. When you take 3 1-year olds to the doctor for a full exam and shots, plan for 2.5 hours and lots of snacks. Big news is that they all have ear infections, no more formula, no more bottles, and they can have table food. I've been waiting for this day since the day they started formula- one of most devastating days for me. Tomorrow they start whole milk and our doctor suggested that we go cold turkey with the bottles. Meaning tonight was the last night my babies had a bottle before going to bed. I was getting choked up just looking at them.

All those tears for nothing. I realized that I don't have any whole milk for the morning. Only Light Vanilla Soy which I'm sure is not what the pedi had in mind. So I made up 3 more sets of bottles because I'm not sure when I will make it to the store and I already know they are not keen on drinking formula from a sippy cup. So much for that.

I wish I had my camera because when the nurse comes in with 12 syringes piled on a tray, it is pretty impressive. I'm sure the babies were not so impressed with getting 3 shots a piece on their birthday. Now for the weights-

Beckett- 17 lbs, 5 oz
Eloise- 16 lbs, 10 oz
Addy- 17 lbs, 6 oz

Still little but consistently gaining and they are on their own little growth curve.

Now on to the more interesting part of the day...
Our nanny, Maria, threw the babies a party with her daughters Jenny (she's back and Eloise couldn't be happier) and Sabrina and the little girl, Matilda, that Sabrina takes care of. When I walked into the house from work, this was the beautiful scene...






(no picture of Addy, she didn't want her hat or cake)


Thanks so much to Maria, Jenny and Sabrina for bringing so much love and joy to our family. See the outfit that Matilda is wearing? Jenny gave the triplets each one of these traditional outfits from Honduras. They are hand-embroidered and just exquisite!

Then we had another cupcake party an hour later with our neighbors- Clarke, Lisa, Chantal and Danica and a mom expecting triplets, JoSue.




Clarke is their rocker-cool-friend. She makes them CD's with the newest music, gives them musical instruments and cool clothes (remember the baby Chuck Taylors?), and best of all, comes over to play with them and help me out a few days a week. They adore her and I can't think of a better role model for our kids. She is also working on how to rig up a saddle on her Great Dane, Mae, so the babies can have pony rides. That would be so awesome. Thanks Clarke and Lisa for everything, especially Lisa for one year ago yesterday driving me to the hospital. We still laugh that I only took my purse, no overnight bag- why would I need that? I was only 30 weeks and 5 days pregnant so there was no way I was going to need to stay...




This time around, Addy went to town on the cupcake. It was all fun and games until she started to fling it on the ground.



Beckett did a pretty good job with his cupcake as well. Eloise was more interested in keeping clean and feeding me the cupcake. I was only too happy to oblige.


I thought all of the sugar would either put them in a coma or make them totally wild before bed. The later happened. Addy is able to stand by herself now so she was standing playing with her new animal puzzle. She then threw a temper tantrum and threw herself forward and got a bloody lip.


After I took Eloise out of the bath, the other two were having a meltdown probably from all of the sugar, so I put Eloise in her favorite place- standing next to the dump truck. She was so mad when I made her put a diaper on and get dressed.


One year ago our darling babies finally found us. For me, celebrating one year of life, love and happiness was so much more emotional than the birth itself. Probably because I was so sick, drugged up and didn't see the babies for 24 hours. Now I appreciate the importance of that day and when I look at their smiling faces, wouldn't have it any other way.