Abigail - 6 months

Abby's turn for a post! Abby has made a lot of strides in the past couple of months. She has practiced rolling in both directions and is more tolerant of tummy time, so the flat spot on her head is starting to round out as a result.





Abby has loved watching her crib soother from her earliest days. Now she is able to hit the buttons herself (hard to tell if it's on purpose), and being able to roll to her tummy has its advantages.



It's fun to play dress-up with Abby because she looks so adorable in everything. She was confused by the sunglasses but enjoyed the trip to the farmer's market with dad.


Yes, dad put pants on her head again. I don't know why he thinks this is cute.


Abby was the first one to really love pureed foods. She took to them right away and is always excited to eat. She opens her mouth like a baby bird and is much less messy than her brother and sister.



Abby also has a great laugh. Here's a video of her discovering how to play peekaboo.

6 months old!

Wow, how has half a year gone by already?? I guess time flies when you're sleep deprived. The babies are doing great - experimenting with pureed food, rolling over, playing with toys, noticing the dog and cat, giggling, and just generally being cute. They are still not consistently sleeping through the night, which is driving us nuts. We have to figure out how to get them to eat more during the day so they don't need to wake at night to eat. It also seems as if they are starting to teethe, which makes them more restless. We regularly fantasize about getting a full night's sleep.




We finally got their high chairs - the kind that strap onto regular kitchen chairs. Now the adults have to sit on folding chairs and there is even less room in our kitchen. It's a lot easier than sitting on the floor to feed them, though!

the line-up


Messy peas


sleepy peas


serious peas


Stay tuned for individual posts about Abby and Zoey!

Lucas - 6 months

Time for more posts about each baby! Lucas is our big chunky guy. He gets heavier by the day and he has lots of adorable rolls of fat. He loves to eat and is really starting to get the hang of how to eat purees from a spoon.

Passed out after eating


He also loves splashing in the bath tub.

Relaxing in his robe after the bath


He does not enjoy when we play dress-up.

He's not sure about his new sunglasses




Lucas is also a very determined young man. He gets really frustrated whenever he is trying to reach the next milestone and keeps working hard until he gets it. There were many sleepless nights when he was trying to roll from back to tummy, and now he's an expert at rolling. His current area of frustration is wanting to crawl. He keeps trying to scooch across the floor to get to toys and is clearly mad that he can't figure out the crawling thing.



He loves playing in his exersaucer and is very systematic in his play. He starts with one toy and then moves to each one in a clockwise order around the circle.



Lucas is also super smiley and loves to laugh a lot. Activities like diaper changes, getting dressed, and eating often make him laugh. And of course being tickled makes him laugh too. He is our happy guy, and it makes us sad when we see him in pain from teething (we think that's what it is). We're hoping to see a tooth or two soon!



***News Flash!***
I started working on this post at 4:30am, after feeding Abby and while I was pumping. At that point Lucas hadn't gotten up to eat yet. Well, he didn't get up until 6:30ish! He went to bed at 7:30, so this was his first time truly sleeping through the night without getting up for any snacks. The last month or two have been rough in terms of sleep because of his cold, trying to roll over, and teething. I hope this is the beginning of a positive trend!

Feeding time at the zoo

We are gradually giving the babies a variety of pureed foods. So far they've tried rice cereal, bananas, sweet potatoes, applesauce, and avocado. We're making all of our own food - it's so easy just to mash up the food and mix in some breastmilk to make it liquidy. We hope to find the time soon to make some big batches that we can freeze. Zoey and Abby are the most enthusiastic and skilled eaters, and they each seem to have different favorites (Zoey - applesauce; Abby - bananas). Lucas doesn't quite have the hang of how to get food off the spoon and use his tongue to swallow it, but he tries. And Zoey is the messiest, of course.

The babies enjoyed avocado. Note that Abby is the only one without a green beard. She is a very neat eater.


Unlike the hilarious sweet potatoes, Lucas is very serious about his rice cereal


Zoey was not in the mood for rice cereal the other day


Today Zoey found eating rice cereal w/banana to be extremely exhausting

NYC

Last month we had visitors from New York. They brought these cute onesies. Shortly after these photos were taken, Zoey spit up all over hers and had to change. Ironic, yes?

Playtime

The babies are starting to play with toys more and more. It's fun to watch them discover what the toys can do. They're also starting to "share" and steal toys and pacifiers, which leads to some screaming.



They are getting better at pushing up during tummy time. Zoey can do it too - she just flipped herself over too quickly before I could take the picture of all 3 of them pushing up.


The babies are starting to be able to sit in a tripod position for a few seconds


Casey clearly feels that floor time is meant to include her too


Lucas loves his exersaucer


On Friday, Mali and I took the babies to the park to meet with some local moms of multiples. Everyone else had twins and kept saying "I don't know how you do it with 3!" The babies were quite exhausted afterwards. We are looking forward to getting to know those moms and babies better!

Introducing Mali

We are happy to introduce an important addition to our family - our nanny, Mali. She has been with us for about a month now and has been wonderful. The babies and the dog love her, and she has also been grandparent-approved. She has some medical training, which makes this anxious mom feel better about leaving her babies, and she has many years of nanny experience. Mali has bravely jumped in to learn all about managing multiples and does lots of fun things with the babies like going for walks, reading books, tummy time, and baths. We only have a couple of pictures of her in action, but you may notice her voice on videos from time to time. She does a great job of documenting the days she's here so that Jason and I can watch videos and look at pictures in the evenings to see what we missed.

Piloting the triple stroller


Mastering the art of feeding more than one at once


Somewhere we have a picture of her reading to the babies but I can't find it...

Welcome Mali!

More grandparents!

August and September were busy months for visitors. Last week Jason's dad Steele ("Papa" to his grandkids) and stepmom Barb ("Memma")visited from Detroit. They don't get to visit too often because they're so far away, so they hadn't seen the babies since they were one month old. It was fun for them to get to know the babies better, and great for us to have some extra hands around. We did lots of fun activities over the weekend, like visiting the farmer's market, watching Jason play in his soccer game, and going on walks. We hope it's not too long before we can see them again!

Watching the Michigan game from the new leather armchair


Off to the farmer's market (yes, that is a crocheted owl hat. Blame Uncle Dane and etsy.com. We have 2 more of those hats - will take a group photo soon.)


Feeding time


Floor time




Our little family


Papa with his arms full

Sweet Potatoes

It's funny how the babies' personalities infuse every daily activity. When we gave them sweet potatoes yesterday, they each reacted in their own unique way. (That's Jason's dad and step mom feeding them)

Lucas thought the sweet potatoes were hilarious


Zoey immediately grabbed the spoon and wanted to feed herself


Abby waved her arms like she was flying because she was so excited


***NEWS FLASH***

We interrupt this blog post to bring you breaking news: Abby rolled from back to tummy! She did it at 3am, with no witnesses. I heard her fussing in her crib and went to check on her, and there she was! She didn't really want to stay on her tummy, but it was exciting to know she could do it.




Here's a short video of Lucas laughing while eating

Grandma Di and Aunt Jo

This post is at least a week overdue, but better late than never, right? The week before Labor Day we enjoyed a visit from Grandma Di and Aunt Jo. They were thrown right into Baby Boot Camp and did a great job. The babies really enjoyed spending time with them and were thrilled to get an exersaucer and some adorable clothes. We hope they'll be able to visit again soon!

Lucas loves the exersaucer



Modeling a new outfit


Grandma and Zoey


What's so funny, Aunt Jo?


Fashion show


Bumbo time!


Storytime with Aunt Jo


Grandma Di with her arms full

School spirit

Last weekend we did a lot of fun things - the weather was a bit cooler (i.e., less than 95 degrees) and there was lots of stuff going on. On Friday, we took the babies to Fridays After Five, our city's free concert series. It was a bit too loud for them, but we managed to stay long enough to eat a little dinner and answer 5 million questions from strangers about having triplets. Apparently trying to fool the general public by each wearing a baby in a carrier and only pushing a single stroller is fruitless.

On Saturday, Lucas went with Jsaon to the farmer's market, and Abby went with Jason to a tailgate. And then on Sunday we took all the babies to a men's soccer game. They enjoyed getting dressed up in school colors and getting some fresh air.

Don't Zoey's feet look gigantic?? It's all about perspective.


Orange and blue.


Feeding Lucas. We should have found a shadier spot to set up camp.


Our other triple stroller - an older model Peg Perego Triplette.


The babies got dressed up in their Michigan gear for Saturday's first game. I'll let Jason do a separate post if he wants to discuss babies watching college football.

I like this picture because it shows how they all turned to look at me when I walked in the room. I'm so popular.


It feels good to be getting good enough at taking the babies out that we can do more things as a family. It also helps that the weather is getting a little more reasonable. I think summer in the south leaves us housebound the way winter in the north does.