As you know, Addison and Fischer were 9 months old yesterday! To mark the occasion, they had a couple of firsts:

We went to the store for our Thanksgiving shopping and they actually wore shoes!! We never put shoes on them to go out, but decided to yesterday. And, they actually kept them on!

We also let them have their first bath together, with toys and everything! Now that they can both sit up really well, it makes it much easier to do baths together. We will still do their normal baths alone but this was more of a fun bath. They loved it, and Fischer even cried when we took him out.

Today, they discovered a new place to play...

As usual, the babies are still doing something new almost everyday! Fischer has started making noises with his tongue, similar to what sucking your teeth would sound like (if you know what that is). I think he's even clicked it on the roof of his mouth a couple of times. It's pretty funny and he does it a lot now. If we do it to him, he usually does it back.  I am loving that they are starting to do stuff back to us! It makes me feel a little less ridiculous when I'm making weird noises and faces. :)

It has been a big birthday weekend around here! Scott's birthday was yesterday, and Addison and Fischer are 9 months today.

For Scott's birthday, we went to a Birds of Prey Center in Awendaw. THat's what he wanted to do, so it was like a field trip. It was a lot of fun! They had all kinds of birds there, and even did a flight demonstration.  Addison and Fischer liked it when the birds were flying around, but didn't pay much attention to the birds that were sitting still. Addison, especially, loved the flight demonstration!

 Here are Scott and the babies with the bald Eagle....

The babies found some pine straw to play with (meaning they tried to eat it) while we waited for the flight demonstration to start...

We tried to get a family selfer.... poor Fischer only got part of his face in it, and Addison looks mad!

After that, we came home and had a nice birthday dinner at home. The babies sat in their high chairs while we ate and had some puffs and a little bit of our rice!

Today, the babies are 9 months old.  Because of Thanksgiving, they won't be going for their 9 month check up until December 3. I am curious to see how tall they are and how much they weigh! Their newest thing is to yell back and forth to each other. Fischer will do a loud "AAAHHHH" and the Addison does it back. It's pretty funny! Here they are this morning playing in their new favorite spot - the kitchen!

Addison and Fischer say Happy Birthday to their Daddy!!!!!

We are learning very quickly that our little angelic babies can also be quite destructive. Yesterday, Scott discovered this...

That part with just a little bit of yellow is supposed to be all yellow. Addison and Fischer have somehow gotten the decal off, piece by piece, and eaten it. Or, we are assuming they are eating it because we haven't found the little pieces anywhere.

Also, this is a daily struggle with them....

This is the flooring of their "baby jail." They have figured out how to lift the end pieces and I find them chewing on it. This happens everyday. Fischer will usually stop when I say "No, Fischer!" but Addison just looks at me and keeps chewing.  Luckily they haven't eaten any of this yet.

And of course they are chewing on their board books and those are slowly coming apart. It's a good thing we don't let them play with regular paper books yet!

And here they are playing nicely in the jail, with their pelican toy in the background...

Today, we went to play with some triplet friends! They will be a year old in a few weeks, which means there were 5 very mobile babies and only 2  mommies! It was a lot of fun though! I was interested to see how Addison and Fischer interacted with other babies... at first all 5 kind of stared at each other. They slowly began to play with the same toys, crawl over each other, etc. We are hopefully going to their first birthday party so they can play again!

In other baby news... Addison has started saying some new sounds this week! These include ba, ma, and na. She only says them when she is upset and/or crying though, so it comes out more like "Aaah na na na, aaaaah, ma ma ma, aaaah, ba, aah, da" and so on. :) I'm still excited she is finally saying "ma ma" mixed in with all of the other sounds.

Also, both babies now think it's very funny to throw their pacis out of the crib so Bo will get them. We've had a problem with Bo getting them off the floor and not wanting to give them back.  So now that the babies are willingly giving their pacis to Bo, the problem isn't getting much better. Addison laughs so hard when she sees Bo holding her paci in his mouth. I guess this is just another reason to get rid of the pacis sooner rather than later! They are just getting them in their cribs, car seats and stroller now, so I suppose we are making some progress.  Our goal is to have them completely off by their birthday, so we have a little time...

Today, November 17, is Prematurity Awareness Day. You can go to www.marchofdimes.com/fightforpreemies to learn more!

When I got pregnant, I didn't think I would have premature babies. I did think they would come a little early, which is normal for twins. I was hoping they would come around 37 or 38 weeks. Instead they were born at 35 weeks. We were very lucky that Addison and Fischer had to go to the Level 2 nursery rather than the NICU. And they spent only 8 days in the hospital.  Their main challenge while there was learning to suck. They can't be sent home until they can drink from a bottle. Until they learned how to do that, they were fed through a feeding tube that went in through their noses. They finally showed the nurses they were ready to remove the tubes permanently when they both pulled out their tubes on the same night!

Things could have been much different for us.  I went into preterm labor at 28 weeks, and spent the next 7 weeks on bedrest.  I was 4 cm dilated at 28 weeks, so I think everyone thought the babies were coming very soon. The babies stayed in long enough so I could receive the 2 steroid shots, and then they stayed in for much, much longer.

While it was hard to go home without our babies, we knew they were getting the best care possible while in the hospital. And there is something comforting knowing they are being watched 24 hours a day. Bringing them home was scary, but also very exciting.  Our main challenge when we got home was keeping them warm. They were still very small so it really was a challenge!

I am thankful for the March of Dimes and the research they do. Without it, I think our lives would be much different right now! Here are some then-and-now pictures!

As you know, Fischer does not crawl on his hands and knees, but scoots around on his stomach.  When he crawls like this, he pushes off on his elbows and wrists. Today I saw a tiny little bruise on one of his wrists. He doesn't seem bothered by it, but I hate that he's bruishig himself! It certainly didn't slow him down at all today.

Also, because of his crawling style, his diapers have started to leak. Since he slides along on his stomach, it slowly loosens and pulls down the front of his diaper, and before we know it, his clothes are soaking wet.  I am going to have to start tightening the tabs every so often while he's crawling in between diaper changes. He had to change clothes 3 times today!

On another note, I managed to get a picture of his little teeth - you can sort of see them in this picture. Scott had to make him laugh while I took the picture.

Today was such a nice day, so we took the babies back to the swings in our neighborhood. They were still a little small last time we took them, but they did pretty well today.  Addison really liked sitting all the way forward in the swing, and of course she was smiling until I got out the camera and then she stopped, but they both seemed to have a good time!