The Carstens: January 2018

Happy second birthday to my Beth and Jake. I know a lot of people call them the "Terrible Two's" but I'm just not seeing that right now. Yes, there are tantrums. Yes, there are lots of no's heading my direction. But having two kiddos that can pretty much tell you what they want is awesome. Having two little people sweetly help the other out when they are sad or needing something is great. And having two babies that are now big kids is really, really fantastic.

But, selfishly, the best part about having two year olds is that someone magically sprinkled sleeping dust on them and they are now consistently sleeping through the night. Woo hoo! Let me tell you, two years of being woken up in the middle of the night makes for one tired Mama. I was super glad when they started sleeping longer than 1.5 hour chunks, (That was brutal people. Brutal. How I survived months of less than five hours of non-consecutive sleep I will never know.) and darn happy when they went into their three hour sleeping blocks. When they started only waking once a night I was just fine with that as I typically would be able to feed them and get them back down with minimal fuss. But as the time dragged closer to them being two I selfishly began to wonder if they'd ever start to sleep through the night. We'd get close in that Beth would sleep through the night twice or so a week. And so would Jake. It would just be on different nights. So I rarely got that full night of sleep myself. Then, BAM. Sleeping dust! And middle of the night wake ups are rare. I'm loving it!

Beth is turning into quite the talker. She's able to say whole sentences and asks the cutest questions. "How doing?" is by far my favorite. Every time she says it I'm reminded of Joey from Friends. But "Socks, shoes, coat go outside now" is a close second. She definitely knows her own little mind and isn't afraid to let you know (at the top of her lungs) when you have/haven't done something that displeases her. She can almost count 1-10 by herself but still needs lots of ABC help. Beth only likes the pink pacifiers and thinks it's great fun to try and wipe her baby's "stinky" bottom. She jumps by raising up on her tiptoes and has to babble to about 10 minutes before she'll fall asleep. Her best expression is the mischievous one she makes as she snags someone's toy and then races away with it cackling all the while. She's my naked baby and loves to undress herself and take her diaper off before saying "naked, naked, naked" and shaking her tiny tushy. She's such a happy girl. Her smile upon waking up lights up the room.

Jake is still my best cuddle bug. He's the one that randomly throughout the day will need a Mom snuggle. A few minutes of sitting together on the couch and he's back to action, but gives the best grumpy face if he's made to wait a few minutes for those snuggles. He's starting to talk in small sentences "two lovies", "go outside" but is still a master at the one word demand. He's much more agile and is able to jump completely off the ground with both feet, do a slightly sideways somersault, and kick/throw a ball. He's an eating machine!!! Even at two I'm amazed at how much food he's able to put in his body. If it's not a meal he's definitely snacking. When he runs he stomps his feet as if he's enjoying hearing the sound his feet make. And the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse Hot Dog Dance will have him running into the living room so he can bounce his little body to the beat of the song. He's able to fall asleep just by rolling over and loves to bounce in his crib when he wakes up.

Here are Elizabeth's stats:

Height          Weight              Head CM
Birth           17.5 in. 5 lbs. 8 oz.
2 Weeks 18.0 in. 5 lbs. 7 oz. 33.0 cm
1 Month 19.2 in. 7 lbs. 9 oz. 36.8 cm
2 Months 21.0 in. 9 lbs. 7 oz. 38.7 cm
4 Months 22.5 in. 11 lbs. 6 oz. 41.0 cm
6 Months 24.1 in. 13 lbs. 0 oz. 43.0 cm
9 Months 25.3 in. 14 lbs. 6 oz. 44.7 cm
12 Months 26.6 in. 15 lbs. 9 oz. 46.0 cm
15 Months 28.4 in. 16 lbs. 15 oz. 47.0 cm
18 Months 29.9 in. 19 lbs. 1 oz. 47.5 cm
2 Years 32.1 in. 22 lbs. 2 oz. 48.7 cm

This puts Beth at a whopping 10% for height and 1% for weight. But apparently they are now tracking BMI percentiles which puts her at 16th percent for her height/weight. Basically, I've got a teeny tiny who is on her growth track, meeting all her developmental milestones, and is saving me money on clothing as she stays in her sizes forever. She's still in 18 month outfits and size 3 shoes. For sanity purposes she's in size 5 diapers since that's what Jake requires and it's easier for me to have her wear too big of diapers then trying to make sure both kids have their needed sizes. Sorry, child. Them's the breaks.

Here are Jacob's stats:

Height          Weight              Head CM
Birth 17.5 in. 5 lbs. 10 oz.
2 Weeks 18.0 in. 5 lbs. 7 oz. 33.5 cm
1 Month 19.0 in. 8 lbs. 2 oz. 36.8 cm
2 Months 21.1 in. 10 lbs. 2 oz. 38.3 cm
4 Months 23.0 in. 12 lbs. 14 oz. 41.0 cm
6 Months 24.8 in. 14 lbs. 3 oz. 43.6 cm
9 Months 26.0 in. 16 lbs. 8 oz. 45.6 cm
12 Months 27.2 in. 17 lbs. 12 oz. 46.3 cm
15 Months 29 in. 19 lbs. 0 oz. 47.3 cm
18 Months 30.2 in. 21 lbs. 6 oz. 48.3 cm
2 Years 33.1 in. 24 lbs. 1 oz. 49.0 cm

Jake has a growth explosion this year! He's now 17th percentile for height (up from basically the first percentile) and 8th percentile for weight. How's he not bigger on weight I don't know as, like I said above, he never stops eating. But his BMI percentile puts him at a healthy 18% so I'm not worried. Jake is in size 24 month clothes and size 4 shoes. Due to his, ahem, blow out issues, a size 5 diaper is required enough that he's in them full time. As an added bonus we got his allergies re-tested and his IgE numbers have gone down which is great. His biggest three issues were peanuts, egg whites, and cows milk. Peanuts went from 50.80 to 5.99, Egg Whites from 2.09 to 1.80, and Cow's Milk from 0.97 to 0.58. At his skin prick test we learned that he is officially no longer allergic to egg whites! Yay! However, he still reacts to peanuts and dairy. So we wait and hope that, with a little more time, he will outgrow these allergies as well.

And now for the pictures. :-)

Abby helped me decorate for the party. She was a great help making sure all the streamers were "just perfect and pretty" for the party.

Jacob had a blast with the balloons. They lasted almost a month after the party - yes I'm really late with this blog post.

Both kids got BIG into Curious George a few months before the party. I thought this would be a really easy theme to work with, but instead found out there's nothing Curious George related locally. So less than a week to go before the party I scrambled. Someday I'll be more prepared. I swear.