Jillian Turns One

My sweet sweet Jill girl is officially a one year old.   She most definitely has been a fun addition to our family.  Over the past few months she's become quite the expert at scooting along "walking" while holding onto things, especially her lion toy that helps her walk.  I'm sure any day now she will venture to take her first few steps.  She has the cutest babble talk and of course her high pitches scream which we are still working on getting rid of.  Jill has a LOVE for all things soft.  Stuffed animals, blankets, and of course our furry couch pillow.  She loves to dive head first and nestle herself right in.  Transitioning from formula to bottle went super smooth.  We gave her half and half for a few bottles then solid milk and it didn't even phase her a bit.  She is however extremely particular about the temperature, only warm, never cold.  We had her on straight milk for a few days in a row at 11 1/2 months and we went in for her VCUG (the kidney reflux test) and discovered her entire large and half of her small intestine was full of poop... with her not drinking a lot of water (she tends to spit out half of it and make a mess) the straight milk was constipating her so we have done a combination of milk and formula depending on how her bowels are doing to make sure she is on tract and feeling A okay.    On the topic of her VCUG- Jill has grade III hydronephrosis or kidney reflux where fluid is going backward from her bladder into her kidneys.  70% of kids with her moderate severity will out grow it by the time they are 5 (which is awesome), if she doesn't out grow it she will need surgery.  From now until then she has a daily antibiotic to keep her kidneys free from infection and will have a repeat X-ray yearly.  She's happy and it doesn't seem to bother her other than the one UTI she got around 7 months.  The daily antibiotic should prevent her from getting any more UTI's.


For Jill's birthday we did the tradition Korean party full of a family dinner, Jill picking her fortune, and of course her adorable hand stitched Korean dress.  I absolutely love this tradition and I'm so glad my mom has been able to come to both Bennett and Jillian's first birthday to show us how its done.  Something I sure hope my kids will pass down to their kids and so forth.

 Money - Rich    Ball - Athletic   Pen - Smart   Rope - Long Life   Cake - Never to go hungry

 Jill picked 1. Money

 2. Cake

 3. Rope

 4. Pen

 5.  Ball wasn't picked.. she just ate the pencil eraser instead haha

 A few days after her birthday we had a second celebration with some friends and more family.  Jill did a rather impressive job smashing and flinging her cake everywhere.   Winston and Ellie were going hog wild over the cake on the floor and walls.  Bennett however was extremely concerned that Jill was so messy and even attempted to clean her face. (what an OCD good brother.. he must get it from me).  Jill's birthday celebration was just perfect.

9 mo & 22 mo

I know I say this every post but WHERE HAS THE TIME GONE and I can't BELIEVE Jillian is freaking 9 months old!

In the last month Jill has finally figured out how to crawl and boy is it cute to see her army crawl across the room attacking whatever she has her mind set on.  She even took a tumble down our basement stairs because the door was left open and we underestimated her ability to crawl... so quickly. eek. Luckily she only ended up with a bruise on her cheek.  No broken bones or gushing blood thank heavens.  She has also started to enjoy pretty much any food I stick in front of her.  She will attempt to eat it.  Oh how independent she is in comparison to Bennett when it comes to eating.  Bennett would let me hand feed him anything.  Jill has to put it in her mouth by herself.  She will turn away if I attempt which has made feeding her baby food on a spoon nearly impossible.  Thus I have resorted to her holding a squeezy pouch of baby food.

Oh boy is the girl stubborn (I wonder where she gets it from... --> me).  She went through a phase of two weeks where she fought us every single time we tried to give her a bottle and she refused the bottle.  We tried putting the formula in a sippy cup, changing bottles, making new bottles, etc and to no avail she continued to refuse.  The last day she literally didn't eat more than an ounce from 7am to 3pm due to her stubbornness.  It was a rough few days because she was so fussy and tired but refused to sleep because she was hungry and yet would not eat a thing. (and she wasn't sick or teething either).   Then like magic the very next day she went diving for a bottle and ate all 6 oz like a champ and hasn't looked back.  The last week she's been downing bottles like its her job, and boy is she good at it.

We have also managed to get our kids on a semi-same schedule yahoo!!!

7:30 Jill wakes up, eats bottle, plays
8:00 Bennett wakes up, plays
9:00 Jills #1 nap & Bennett has breakfast.
11:00 Jill wakes up, eats lunch
12:00 Bottle and Lunch for Bennett
12:30-1pm Both down for a nap YAYAYAYAYAYAYAYAY!!!!
3:00 Jill wakes up, bottle
4:00 Bennett wakes up, errands and dinner making
5:30 Dinner for the family
Sometimes Jill will take a cat nap
7:00 Baths and movie time
9:00 Bedtime for both.

I look at this two and am shocked I still have two kids under two, but not for long!  Bennett continues to be so much fun to hang out with.   He takes adventures all over our house and usually ends up in the garage "playing."  Yesterday I walked into the garage to find him sitting quietly and alone in his stroller.  He continues to love bath time & shower time.  He will stay in the shower alone for eternity. Its quite hilarious to watch a toddler shower alone.  In fact, some days the only way I can get him out of the tub without screaming is to ask if he wants to go on a walk in the stroller.  His immediate response is yes, and starts climbing on out.  I could see how having a newborn at this point would be a challenge for his/her safety because if we are getting ready to go somewhere Bennett always tries to "bring Jill along" by picking her up.   Luckily her 20 pounds stops him and she stays put until I am able to get her.

He is pretty much mimicking everything we say and even forming 3 word sentences.  My favorite is when I am getting something from the top shelf of the kitchen Bennett says, "Mommy, get down. Get down."
While playing basketball he loves to yell, "OOOOHHHH Nice!"
And of course poopy diaper changes are always followed with a wrinkle nose and "ew. gwoss poopy"
He still is refusing to go potty in the toilet even though he tells us immediately after he's gone poopy. Some days I get ambitious and think I will potty train him.. and all fails within the first hour.
He has an obsession with movies.  Every hour of every day, unless distracted, wants to watch a movie.  I try to mix it up but this summers flicks have included 101 dalmatians, Ratatouille, Finding Nemo, and Big Hero 6.

Jillian     vs.     Bennett

 19.5 pounds 63%    vs.   23.3 pounds 86%

29 1/2 inches 97%     vs.    30 1/4 95%  

17.5 in. head 66%    vs.     18.5 in. head 89%

A day in my life is definitely busy busy busy with these two but truthfully I wouldn't have them any other way.  With them being 13 months apart they have a built in best friend and its coming to fruition more and more each day as they interact with each other.  Bennett is always giving Jill her teddy and sharing with her.  He is so sweet and giving that he hardly gets into tisks with other kids over toys.  They laugh together often as they play with their ikea tunnel and enjoy watching movies together.

Squeaky Clean

I love projects.  I'm sure ya'll have come to know that I always have at least 4+ projects occurring at the same time with 20+ in my mind and on my list when the money presents itself.  Jumping from project to project keeps me busy (as if my kids aren't busy enough), but I enjoy the sense of accomplishment and the beauty in finishing these projects.

We finished our basement months ago, however there still was about 10% of the trim that needs to be completed before we can officially say its "finished."  We however lost our mojo motivation as well as Will's finishing nail gun and our air compressor.  Once we got our tools back I was motivated, but yet dreading the idea of having to repaint all the baseboards that have a layer of dust and gunk on them from sitting in our garage for the last 8 months.

A few weeks ago we submitted for our home to be appraised to drop our mortgage insurance and sure enough last week the appraiser called and wanted to schedule our time for the following day!!! I was in a panic. I knew we needed to get the appraisal done asap, but there was NO WAY I was going to have the time to finish all that needed to get done.  We instead scheduled it to give ourselves 4 days to get it done (and by 4 days I really mean 1.5 days because I worked two of the days and the guy was coming at 1pm).  Wednesday was a busy day.  Lance was out working for pretty much the entire day so I juggled both kids and their needs with cutting and installing trim.  By the end of the night I was able to get all the trim, caulk, and paint done (with the exception of the stair trim and three door trims because we were out of materials).  Exhausted and aching I went to bed and arose at 6:30 am Thursday morning to get the cleaning party started.  I wanted my house to look perfect with everything in its rightful place because I knew he'd be taking pictures of every room.

I literally cleaning, scraped, and scrubbed until 12:59pm. Dropped to the ground with exhaustion the second the appraiser left and laid down for a 10 minute nap before Jillian was awake.

How refreshing it is to see my entire home clean... all 3000 sq ft of it. I couldn't be prouder.... and yet the improvement projects will continue!! haha!

Now heres to hoping the appraisal comes back high enough! [fingers crossed]