This is going to be a very quick post since we are so late in the month! (They’ll be 14 months soon!)
Feeding.
Unfortunately, Eric is still throwing much of his food, especially meat. We believe that he is lazy and he finds meat a bit challenging, so rather than work at it, he just throws it. He eats the rest though, so I don’t think he is losing any weight. Still, it is a bit concerning, as I don’t know if his protein intake is right at the moment. I need to research what other foods are high in protein and see if I can get him to eat other things less challenging for him.
Elisa eats everything and is quite chubby. She loves her food though and I would feel mean if I had to stop or cut down her portions. Meat is not a challenge for her, and just finishes it all! She’s not so good with snacking between meals and more often than not she’ll pass on drinking water unless it’s at mealtimes. Eric does like his snacks though and always wants more (I only give them a snack in the afternoon after their nap, about an hour and a half before their dinner)
Sleeping.
They are sleeping quite well at night lately. Apart from a couple of days when they have been a bit under the weather, we have had lots of undisturbed nights in a row. It feels so weird though. Still something to get used to!
Their naps are quite regular still too, but the morning one is beginning to be a problem. If they wake up at around 6:30 am, they will sleep at 9:00-9:30 no problem, but if they wake up later (around 7:15 or so) then it is actually quite hard to get them to sleep at that time. The issue is that the routine until now has been to give them breakfast after their nap (at around 10:00) but if they don’t want to sleep their nap at the normal time, then breakfast gets pushed (which I don’t like).
So my plan, from Tuesday next week onwards (and I’ll tell you in a bit why from Tuesday and not Monday) is to give them breakfast at 9:30 and put them to nap afterwards (at around 10:00). Eventually we will push nap time a bit later every day, with the idea in mind to just drop the morning nap in a few month’s time, and getting them to have one nap a day in the early afternoon (maybe give them lunch at 12:00 and put them to sleep at 12:30 to 14:00-14:30)
Development.
They are both walking!!! Eric started walking about two to three weeks ago. He was giving a few steps here and there for quite a while until one day he just walked the whole length of the room. And then the following day he walked the whole length of the room AND got out of the room and turned into the hallway. And that was it. He is walking.
Elisa is now walking too. She took longer than Eric but her development has been much much faster. What I mean is that it took Eric two to three weeks of giving a few steps before he did the whole length of the room. Elisa on the other hand, started walking a few steps on a Saturday and by the Tuesday the following week she was already walking the length of the room! Such a fast learner…
They are really talking now. They are always babbling stuff. Elisa is still babbling mostly “da-da-da-da-da” with lots of different intonations, but Eric has got a much wider repertoire of sounds. What I am really happy about is that they are learning lots of sentences in Spanish now. For example, today Jon asked Eric “Dónde está la pelota?” (where is the ball?) and Eric started looking around the room for the ball! It was so cute and I felt to proud. (Until now, all commands came with a gesture. For instance: “pass me the ball”/” pásame la pelota” came with the extending the hand waiting to be given something. However with “Where is the ball” there was not gesture, and still Eric understood perfectly what was being said)
I must admit that I haven’t been great with the whole bilingualism thing until now. In the last few days, when I have realised that they are properly understanding words and commands, I have changed a bit and started talking much more in Spanish. And they understand. It’s so rewarding!
They are getting very good at hand coordinating games. They have several toys which require them to put objects into holes or poles and they can do them without a problem. They also love to throw balls and are very good at it! I would dare say that balls are their favourite toy ever. They roll them, throw them, bounce them… so versatile!
Elisa’s “thing” now is to point at things. When she wants something or when she wants to bring attention to something, she points. It’s so damn cute and also so handy! If she wants the beaker or if she wants to sit up on the sofa, she just points. Eric does it too, but much less.
Elisa has got 6 teeth (two at the top and 4 at the bottom) and Eric only has 4 (two top and two bottom) although you can see the fifth coming out now (at the bottom).
Socialising.
We have had a bit of socialising in the past month, although the great spell that we’d had in the last couple of months seems to have dried out a bit. I still take them out very often but we don’t necessarily interact with other kids.
The last two times that I took them to soft play before last, we were completely on our own in the place. We were there for about an hour and a half both times, and nobody else came in whilst we were there! In a way I like it, because that means that the twins can have full use of the whole facilities undisturbed, but on the other hand they don’t get any interaction. They get fascinated by older children. They stop and observe them very carefully. I wonder if in their heads they’re thinking “why can’t a walk and run like him” or “he’s making lots of interesting noises with his mouth”…
I have also found a class that fits around their current schedule. The class starts at 11:30, which is perfect as they finish their breakfast at around 10:30 and then I have plenty of time to get them and me ready to go. Then it’s just a 10 minute drive to the venue. It’s perfect! But that’s why I was saying that I will start changing their morning nap routine from Tuesday, because the class is on Monday and I don’t want to screw it… Then I will have a whole week of testing the new system before I know if I can continue with that class or not.
Health.
I am afraid it has not been the best. Nothing bad like Eric’s ear infection but lots of niggling little things. Elisa’s cough took a long time to clear (and it is still not 100% gone). They have also had quite a bad bout of conjunctivitis that has taken over a week to clear… The drops that the doctor prescribed didn’t seem to do much to be honest, and applying the drops on the kids was just torture! Whoever thought that eye drops and toddlers go together, should be shot.
On top of that, we’ve also had raised temperatures, especially from Elisa, and now we have a bit of diarrhoea on Eric. His poos are so bad that if you don’t change his nappy straight away, he gets a horrible rash. This had never happened before with him. Poor fella. I wonder if the diarrhoea is because he is teething and he is going to suddenly get four teeth all at once (maybe that will help with his laziness in chewing meat!)
I am awaiting for an appointment from the health visitor who said she would check up on me after a while to see if Eric is getting back to his normal weight (remember he lost a bit when he had the ear infection). I think he is getting his weight back, he’s definitely not lost any more. And I think I will appreciate some advice from her on what to do regarding his food throwing.
—
And this is pretty much for now. They’ll be 14 months old soon and we have a few weeks full of family and friends visits, and a couple of weeks of Jon being off work, yuhuuu!!
PS: They’re not babies anymore, they are toddlers!! Scary!!!
Climbing the slide is their favourite thing ever!
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.