This past weekend I took my first solo road trip with the triplets. My aunt passed away after almost two decades battling cancer and my parents were flying in from Hawaii for the funeral so after waffling about whether or not to go for almost a week, I decided the night before that I would go for it. Michelle couldn't make the trip because she was finishing up data collection and a class she was teaching and just couldn't get away. So the night before we rushed around packing things up for the trip. I must say we did quite well! I think the only two things we forgot that I realized later were their toothbrushes (they just used mine) and a comb (which we borrowed from Tara).
We had a driving buddy for the first 4 hours of the drive there because our good friends Carrie & Chris were headed the same direction on their big cross country move and that was a big help. Carrie helped manage the little scuffles over who got what toy and rubbed heads as various kiddos fought their nap or woke up too early from their nap. All in all the drive wasn't too bad. Google maps says the drive should take 7 hours and it took us just under 9 hours on the way there. After we parted ways with Carrie & Chris I stopped at a park for dinner so they could get out and play for a bit. Well, actually the park that I planned to stop at looked sketchy so I drove around a bit and found an elementary school playground for our picnic.
surveying the scene & eating yogurt!
Since I'd decided so last minute to make the trip I decided to keep it a secret from my parents and surprise them on Friday. The funeral itself was a no-kiddo event so we had to occupy ourselves for the morning. Thanks to a Facebook connection we ended up meeting another triplet family in Acton at the Children's Discovery Museum, which was a ton of fun!
It's a triplet boat party!
this musical ball run was a big hit!
Then on Friday afternoon we surprised them at my cousin's house. It was great and the presence of the triplets put some much needed smiles on everyone's faces. The weekend as a whole was pretty fantastic and it was fun to watch the kiddos playing so nicely with everyone. They all have moments of shyness and being super mommy/mama focused, but really they all warm up quickly and enjoy playing with all the different family members!
playing in the sand with Grandpa
water fun with Grandma...note my mom keeping Avery from jumping in =)
on a walk to see the alpacas across the street
"flying in the flowers" with Tara
(I'm so sad this one is blurry!)
I love this shot of my mom walking with Isaiah & Ellie
happy Grandma
Ellie LOVED the alpacas who all came walking right over to check out the triplets
Avery was nervous about them at first but she warmed up & then didn't want to leave
eating dinner on the deck with Jill & Claire
naughty Auntie Mary feeding the babies cake!
so pleased with herself for having two smoothie cups!
taking a "BIG bite" of Grandma's burger!
family....
second cousins
one of whom can't sit for too long
they were so excited to meet a nice cat!
Having fun blowing bubbles with Grandma
and climbing in the hammock with Grandpa
or just snuggling.
A special treat was joining Claire for a few minutes of Mickey Mouse Club
and eating goldfish!
On Saturday we went to my favorite place in Fitchburg, Coggshall park, with my mom and dad and Tara. I have such fond memories of climbing on the giant rocks there as a kid and it was fun that the babies are old enough now to actually do a little climbing. Stay tuned for a motor monday post about climbing! =)
Grandma & Ellie collecting pine cones
(the mountain laurel was gorgeous too!)
sweet Grandpa-grandson moment
someone was a tad excited about her nectarine!
Tried to get a group shot & had fun playing peekaboo but it's hard to get them to "boo" all at once!
this pic makes me think we need a "hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil" shot...
Ellie was excited to get to hold the keys
(and was fascinated that she could make the lights flash when she pushed a button!)
cousins
(Tara & I have always been BFF style cousins despite the fact that we never
lived near each other. She did a good job of convincing me to make the drive & I"m glad I did!)
looking for her next step
"hi Mommy!"
"you sure I can get up to you Mommy?"
Mr. Serious
I'm not even sure what this look is saying, but it's pretty adorable
Anyone have any good captions for this? If so leave it in the comments!
As always the time with my mom & dad went too fast. These shots are from Sunday morning just before saying goodbye & hopping back in the car to head home.
Avery & Grandma got the "cheese" memo...
Add in Grandpa! (and Isaiah's cheese!)
wow...everyone is looking at the camera!
trying to wear them out by running up & down the hill in Adam's backyard
and everyone wanted to hold Grandma & Grandpa's hands
Auntie Tara jumping in for a round
They probably ran up & down 20 times.
From the look of it, Ellie was actually starting to get sleepy!
All things considered the kiddos did remarkably well on the drive home. They all took a short nap soon after getting in the car and we drove for about an hour and a half before a planned stop in Hartford. We went to Trader Joes to stock up on snacks and pick up lunch and then popped over to a park to eat and move around. The park we stopped at had a splash pad so I had to change everyone into swim clothes which meant that stop took a little longer than planned, but they had fun and got some energy out which was the whole idea. Then we made it to Wilkes Barre, another 3.5 hours before stopping again. They took a pretty good nap again, which proved challenging because I desperately had to pee! So when I couldn't stand it anymore I did a "30 second entrance ramp pull open both doors & squat" style pee and just hoped no one would wake up! They did, but fell back asleep without too much fuss. We finally make it home a little past bedtime, but they were sooooo happy to see Mama and just to be home that there was no way they were going right to bed!
Something about saying our babies are twenty months just makes them seem way too close to being two! They are getting so big and so fun and so crazy! It's hard to believe how much they've changed in the past two months! Looking through pictures I couldn't believe how much they've changed since the beginning of April! They are in the middle of a huge language explosion and I think we hear at least one new word a day from one of them. They have the cutest little voices and it is getting a lot easier to understand them now. They have a lot to say and are starting to get a little ticked when we don't understand what they are saying. They say each other's names all the time and it is adorable! They like to say lots of names and will request that we sing the "hello" song from music class to various people (Abigail, Grandma, Grandpa, etc). A couple nights ago Ellie decided we needed to sing hello to the milk too. =) Silly babies we have!
running down the driveway
exploring at the Children's Garden
fun on our friend's porch swing!
ringing in 20 months with a bang--2 ear infections & the stomach bug =(
but making the best of the doctor appointment by ripping up the paper!
They also really like to all be together and whenever they are split up they can't stop talking about their siblings. One day we went to the Y pool & Isaiah had a bloody mouth that wouldn't quit so I took him outside to the playground to play while Michelle swam with the girls and she said the girls could NOT stop talking about him and barely even wanted to swim. And last week when I took the girls to the doctor and didn't bring Isaiah they asked about him about 50 times. Over the past month or so they have also started to differentiate between Mama & Mommy. The girls have it down and Isaiah transitioned from calling us both mama to now calling us both mommy most of the time or switching them. =) Here are a few videos of them playing & then a quick snapshot of each of our beautiful babies over the past couple months!
Isaiah
gotcha mom!
concentrating hard
this boy LOVES sandboxes
his "Oh!" face! He loves to pour water on his head &
tries to do it to the girls too, who are NOT fans!
Isaiah continues to be quite the little chatterbox! He is particularly chatty in the car. I wish I knew how to upload some of the recordings I have taken of them in the car on my phone because it is pretty hilarious and cute. He finally has the language to show us how much he knows and it is a ton! He knows and is willing to say pretty much any animal sound we throw at him. And he and the girls can now fill in & request animals when we sing Old MacDonald or Down on Grandpa's Farm in the car. Isaiah also really likes counting and says probably 75% of the numbers from one to ten and will say them in order to count with us. Most of them only vaguely sound like the number because he is still missing a lot of consonant sounds, but he has the right vowels and inflection. Two and six are his favorites I think. He had his annual evaluation for early intervention a few weeks ago and as we expected he no longer qualifies because all of his scores fell right in the average range! Hooray! Here's a quick clip of him just jabbering away & clearly trying to tell me something!
Isaiah is still our little explorer and wanderer and the other day at the park he just decided to conquer this big grassy hill and made it all the way to the top. Of course then he was stuck and too afraid to come down so I had to go rescue him! He's been kind of funny at the outdoor pool. He loves the pool and is very brave and repeatedly puts his whole face in the water, but then gets unexplicably nervous at times walking around the splashpad area. Isaiah has big feelings and when he's happy he's really happy and has contagious belly laughs, and when he is sad he is really sad! As I was looking through pictures for this post I noticed that I have WAY more pictures of him crying/melting down that I do of the girls, and I think it's because it just happens more often and sometimes over the most ridiculous things. Isaiah and I have been spending a lot of quality time together at night as I attempt another round of our co-sleeping night weaning plan. It has been going pretty well and he's had multiple nights recently where he has slept from 7/7:30 until about 5 before waking up and needing help falling back asleep. I'll take it!
Avery
getting dirty (probably as a ploy to get to go in & "wash hands"
happy girl bouncing on mommy's knees
super cutie
peeking...
Avery continues to be our most physical kiddo. She LOVES to wrestle and over the past few weeks has adapted her strategy to get her siblings to wrestle her. She used to give them hugs and then take them down, but lately she's been going for the submissive strategy and just lays on the floor and calls their names to entice them to come wrestle her. Avery loves to climb on top of the big cozy coupe truck that we have, which makes us nervous, but she has been a little better lately about only doing it when we are there. Her big crash when she stood up in the jog stroller and tipped it seems to have made an impression because now as soon as we see her thinking about standing up in a stroller we ask her what happened when she stood up in a stroller before and she immediately says and points to her nose, which is what she hurt in the fall. Speaking of physical skills, Avery is basically diaper free now except at night. She still has accidents and we are still working on getting the poop in the potty thing down, but overall she has been doing very well. Two weeks ago she refused a naptime diaper and I told her she could try it and she has been dry every time since. Of course then she got sick and had diarrhea for 5 days straight so that meant diapers all day every day so we'll see how she does now that she's better. She loves to wash her hands and would do it a hundred times a day if we let her.
Avery is putting two words together pretty consistently and is pretty insistent with helping us understand what she is saying when we don't get it. She has quite a screechy "no" these days and the other day she said no and crossed her arms. We have no idea where she got that from! Avery likes to pretend to make food for us and when you ask her what it is you are guaranteed to hear her say "noodles" because she loves a book we have from my mom about babies eating noodles. She knows the book too and will pretend to get noodles in her hair and on her nose and in her toes too. Avery is obsessed with babies and everywhere we go she asks if we are going to see babies. She is sooo sweet with any babies we do see like at music class and is very very gentle with them, softly touching their hair. It is pretty cute. She is also pretty into her "Humphrey dog" as you can see in this video.
Ellie
our little thumbsucker =)
another happy bouncing baby (er...toddler!)
Super Ellie & her sidekick monkey!
just a stunningly gorgeous pic of Ellie!
and an extra pic that captures her truly cheesy smile!
(she LOVES getting to ride on the front bike seat with me!)
Ellie has the best cheesy smile and she gives it up freely pretty much any time you ask. It is sooo fun and totally adorable! Ellie has really gotten into jumping lately and a couple times has actually gotten both feet off the ground. They all like to jump but Ellie & Avery have actually cleared their feet from the surface. Ellie has also gotten really into and quite good at climbing! I think she is probably a better climber than Avery though not quite as adventurous as Avery at climbing new things. Ellie is also talking a lot and putting two words together a lot of the time. She has the best pronunciation of any of them and is therefore the easiest to understand. She busts out new words all the time that take us by surprise. The other day her new word was "shadow." Ellie is also really good at filling in familiar books. They all do it now, but Ellie is probably the most consistent. So we read the book but leave off the last word and she fills it in every time, even if she is off wandering around the bedroom. Their favorite book to do this with is called Mommy, Mama & Me.
And just as Avery is obsessed with babies, Ellie is obsessed with baby dolls. She loves her babies and likes to bring them with her wherever we go. She also gets pretty territorial about whichever baby she is into at the moment and this has led to her new favorite phase "No, Mine!" She has totally overgeneralized it and will say it when she just means no sometimes, but she does have the most developed sense of ownership I think. Last night we gave them new water cups and this morning Ellie knew whose was whose despite the fact that she & Avery both had red cups, just with a different lid. We were surprised! Ellie is still the queen of snuggling and thumbsucking and she is still in a mama mama mama phase. When she's not being clingy though she is super fun to play with. Ellie has started to pretend to cook in their play kitchen and she and Avery in particular like to pretend to grab food from a book and take and share bites of it. It is pretty adorable. Ellie has generally been pretty anti-wrestling, but over the last few weeks she's been coming around to it and latched onto a new game where she likes to ride on Isaiah's back. =) Avery tries to entice Ellie to ride her back, but 90% of the time Ellie says "No. Aya (Isaiah). Back." It's adorable. If you've been following us on facebook you've probably already seen this video, but it's so cute it's worth watching again!
