"TWIN"BEARZ: January 2011

Saturday, January 29, 2011

A Week of Dinner

We will tell people that the kids eat a lot of food, but most people see how skinny they are and assume they are being raised in the same impoverished conditions that I grew up in. But I swear, it is true that they eat possibly more than us (well, more than Laura, definitely not more than me).

Mornings are usually a relatively small breakfast, but Kestian will easily eat multiple pancakes, fruit, and an entire biscuit without blinking. He loves his grains and breakfasts. Their lunches at school are what we pack them, which is usually boring, and it doesn't seem unusually large or small. Dinner, however....

So this is a log of their dinners for the past week. Note that (with one exception) they ate everything and had dessert.

Dinner 1/23/2011: Tomato soup and stuff

This is the absolute second meal where Kestian ate soup (the first was at lunch the day before). We've tried before, but it took almost six years before he would eat it. It was funny watching him being mentally conflicted because he knew he would like it, but he has some sort of block that he had a hard time overcoming. I was proud that he did it, because I know his aversion to soup is entirely mental.

You can also see that I had just gone shopping for produce, because there is actually five types of fresh produce there (ALL on sale!). I also find it odd that some people think that they are doing something special by having a meal or two a weak that is vegetarian, but I find that at least half of our meals tend to be without us actually thinking about it. Do people really eat meat with every meal?

(I also didn't rotate the damn picture before uploading it. I was very inconsistent about the pictures, what with their angle and if they include the drink or not. Most nights the drink is water).

Dinner 1/24/2011: More tomato soup and fish and stuff

The kids probably liked this meal because it only had one vegetable (tomatoes), and they have to eat their vegetables before anything else. I continued the onslaught of soup to try to acclimate Kestian to it, and he ate it just fine (we'll see what happens when he leaves his comfort zone of tomato or chicken noodle). The fish is actually frozen tilapia, which we rarely get, but was on sale. I wasn't a big fan of it, but I don't really like fish (besides salmon, cod, or rawish tuna), though the kids ate it. Fish is a staple main dish for them.

Those cherry tomatoes are going to be a recurring theme in this because they were on really good sale, and both the kids and myself love to eat tomatoes. When it is the dead of winter I don't think twice about buying cherry tomatoes on sale. Heck, I grow my own tomatoes at home, and we will sometimes have to STILL buy tomatoes in the summer because we go through them so much.

Also, note the coupons scattered everywhere on the table. Blame Laura.

Dinner 1/25/2011: I break out the cans

I didn't want to overdo the soup, so I mixed it up with some canned mini ravioli. The bananas were going brown, so I gave them the last ones (they are usually a breakfast thing) and I also gave them a can of sliced carrots (they split the entire can, and no I don't heat them up). This was also the end of the fresh pears for the week.

Dinner 1/26/2011: Leftover pasta and the last of the tomatoes

That green tangle of things is 'french-style' green beans from a can, which the kids thought were neat at first, but now loathe them, and I do not blame them. The problem is that the can I opened was labeled as normal green beans, so they lied to me! At this point we may be running out of grapes, as I only went with the green ones, and this is the end of the line on tomatoes. I know that big jars of applesauce are so much cheaper, but you can't get strawberry or mango-peach in those sizes.

This was the only night where everything was not eaten, as Adelaide decided to only eat about 2/3 of her pasta. It wasn't because she didn't like it or wasn't hungry, but more she just decided it and was standing her ground (by whining). After it got past 7:00, it just wasn't worth it and she got ready for bed without finishing, but had no dessert.

Dinner 1/27/2011: Uhhhhh.....
For some odd reason I do not have a picture of this dinner, and I swear it is totally NOT because we got McDonalds!

Dinner 1/28/2011: Turkey sausage and stuff

I wasn't a big fan of the turkey smoked sausage, but it was passable. I would not choose to buy it, but Laura did and said it was on sale with a coupon, so I ain't complaining. The mashed potatoes had shredded Colby-Jack cheese and sour cream mixed in, and I thought they were yummy. The kids pointed out that they tasted like regular mashed potatoes. Thanks kids!

With most canned vegetables, we give the kids half the can each, but not with corn. I know it is the same weight and all, but Jesus Christ half a can of corn is huge. They get maybe a quarter a can, and even then Kestian will take forever with it (which is does with most things, but at least he eats it now).

Dinner 1/29/2011: Fish and chips

Today's dinner! This is the normal type of fish they eat, which is cooked in the oven alongside the OreIda crispy restaurant style fries. Look, we bought regular green beans instead of the stupid French style!

They also ate (so far) half a grapefruit. I know! This is the first time they've had it and they like it. What the hell is wrong with these kids? Kestian won't eat anything without prodding, especially nothing new, yet he devours grapefruit the first time he tries it? Odd kids.

I don't like fish, so I used the French toast that Laura made today and made a sort-of Monte Cristo with them, Swiss cheese, ham, and strawberry jam (Laura 'forgot' twice today to look for raspberry jam). That was SO much better than crappy fish that the rest of the family had.

NOTE: It has been about, what, four or five months since I've posted, but do not think that this is a pattern. You guys will be lucky if I post again, so enjoy this while you can.

Thursday, January 27, 2011

9 months!

Hooray! Mr. Fenton is 9 months old. I took him in for his well visit, and the doctor declared that indeed he is well.

Well, except for 2 ear infections. Actually, this was a surprise. Although I had taken him to the doctor about a week ago because he was all fussy and grumpy and poopy, and the doc discovered that he had two ear infections, we started him on an antibiotic and since then he has been his usual happy, joyful, hungry self. I would not have guessed that this happy baby still had two ear infections. Judging by the picture above, you wouldn't either.

But other that that, he's doing great. Here are his stats for today:

Length: 29.5 in (86%)
Weight: 20 lbs 12 oz (54%)

The other interesting thing that was suspected at his appointment last week and confirmed today is that he has a bifid uvuala. A bifid uvula looks something like this:

It's pretty harmless in and of itself, but could indicate that he has a submucous cleft palate. That also is pretty harmless in and of itself, but needs to be confirmed if he were to ever have his tonsils out. Because if he does indeed have this "hidden" cleft palate, removing the tonsils could result in speech problems because then he would no longer be able to "achieve proper closure between the soft palate and pharynx while speaking and develop hypernasal speech."

Interestingly, children with a bifid uvula can tend to have more ear infections: "Bifid uvulas have less muscle in them than a normal uvula, which may cause recurring problems with middle ear infections. While swallowing, the soft palate is pushed backwards, preventing food and drink from entering the nasal cavity. If the soft palate cannot touch the back of the throat while swallowing, food and drink can enter the nasal cavity."

I know some people like to ride out ear infections, but since this one looks pretty bad (the doc described it as red and full of puss), I think we will go ahead and try a different antibiotic. At this age, chronic ear infections could impact his speech development. I wouldn't classify Fenton as having chronic ear infections at this point, but if he could have a tendency towards ear infections because of his bifid uvula, I want to make sure we pay attention to it. And since Fenton does not really let us know his ears are infected, we'll be taking him back in a month to check on them.

We also talked about how his upper lip frenulum is also quite low and tight. We all know his lower frenulum was tight (remember how he was tongue-tied) and I now wonder if the upper one (which we did not even look at back then) also contributed to all the problems that we had when nursing that got me so ridiculously sick. It is possible, but that's something we''ll just never know, I guess. Anyhow, we'll eventually need to discuss the upper frenulum thing with his dentist (does it also need to be snipped?) as it could cause a gap in his teeth and possibly affect his speech.

But aside from all of Fenton's oral issues, he's doing just awesome. He loves to pull him self up to standing, chirps with delight when you hold his hands and help him "walk" across the room, crawls like a rocket on roller skates, and we suspect (and confirmed by his daycare teacher) we have heard him say "uh-oh*" on multiple occasions and possibly even "Papa."

I love this little guy!

*Kestian and Adelaide's first words were "uh-oh" and "down"

Wednesday, January 26, 2011

Genetics

I love to look at how the kids are similar or different from us. Who's traits did they get? Are they the same or different?

One thing we often notice is the difference in their hands. You may not think that people are all that different when it comes to the creases on their palms, or perhaps you assumed everyone has different creases on their palms. However, apparently there are basically two kinds of creases: there is normal, and there is what Damon has. Most people have three main creases on their palms, whereas Damon has what is called a simian crease.

Interestingly, simian creases can show up in people with certain genetic disorders. I think it's safe to say that's not the case in this family. (Or...maybe that would explain a few things...)

Anyhow, here are the pics of our hands so you can see for yourself. First, normal...

Then Damon...

Now let's look at the kids. Both Fenton and Adelaide have the normal hands...

Then there is Kestian. He's actually got one hand of each... Can you see the difference?

Here's his left hand, normal but close to being simian...

Then here's his right hand, all simiany...

Hands are interesting, but I'm not a palmologist, and I don't use Palmolive. Interesting still.

And it's not just hands...I seem to have passed on to the kids what we like to call "crushed ears." In this case, Damon is the normal one...

Whereas the rest of us all have a flat folded-over rim on the top of our ears...

It may be hard to see in these pictures, but if you were to run your hand on any of our ears, you can definitely feel the flat part.

There are many other fun things, like how Adelaide has narrow feet like me, how Kestian has this way he starts to turn his head before he turns his eyes (like his Papa), or how all the kids have Damon's frame. Genes. They be all coolz like...