Cora just took her first steps! She took 2 steps toward me before she fell!

One Year

I had every intention of writing at least this one on time, but it’s been a long week. The day before the twins’ birthday, all three kids woke up sick! Yesterday, Damon came home from work early because he’s sick too. I’m the last man standing! So far.

I can’t believe my last babies are no longer babies anymore. I almost cried when I noticed the Babycenter email said “My Toddler This Week.” As sad as it is, I am looking forward to this year. The second year is my favorite because they are little sponges. Everything is so new and exciting!

They had their one-year checkup on Thursday and both babies are doing great! Cora is 21lbs. 14oz. and 31.25 inches tall. Emma is 22lbs. 9oz. and 30 inches tall. So Emma’s still a little shorter and heavier, but not by much! She definitely feels more solid than Cora.

Neither girl is walking yet, but it won’t be long. Both girls can stand unsupported for minutes at a time, but Cora stands longer. She drops down carefully when she no longer wants to stand while Emma still falls on her tush. Cora also loves push toys right now. I remember when Abby first started using those, she couldn’t control her speed, so she’d fly across the room. Cora has already mastered it and can walk with it at her own pace. Emma would still rather play with the doodads in front of it instead of push it.

The twins are now completely off formula and bottles! The last of the formula was consumed the day before their birthday, and they’ve been fine with that. It was a slower transition than with Abby because they weren’t all that fond of milk at first. I think they didn’t like the cold rather than the taste. When we started mixing it with formula, thus making their bottles cold, they didn’t mind it.

They still eat pretty much anything, but Emma is much pickier than Cora. Cora has a hollow leg. She can eat as much as Abby sometimes! Emma’s least favorite is bananas, but she also only tolerates blueberries sometimes.

They both love to copy us now. When Cora stands on her own (she does it much more often than Emma), we all clap and say “yay!” Emma joins in cheers her on as well! It’s the cutest thing. Cora loves the attention, so she stands constantly just so she can get praised. And she claps for herself when she’s up too! She also still loves to play peekaboo. Emma puts her head to her shoulder when she wants to be cute. She also likes to shake her head no. It’s fun to get them to do these things by doing it first and having them imitate us. When they’re done eating, I always say “all done!” with my hands palms up. Yesterday, Cora copied me and said “a da!” Her first sentence!

Both girls are in a “MINE” stage right now. Whenever one has a toy, the other has to have it and tries to take it away. It doesn’t matter if she has her own toy, or if it’s the same toy. Cora is definitely the biggest culprit. Yesterday, she had a toy in each hand, but dropped on just so she could take Emma’s. When I gave Emma the toy Cora dropped, she did it again! Emma doesn’t let her get away with it either! This is the cause for most of the screams right now.

I can’t wait to watch them learn so many new things this year! Before we know it, they’ll be walking and talking constantly. It’ll be fun to watch them chase Abby around. They love their big sister so much! Nobody makes them laugh the way Abby can.

11 Months

I’ve been lazy with the blog, so this will be a brain dump post. I need to get something up, though, because I’m tired of seeing my cancer update. Thank you all so much for the encouragement and well-wishes through that journey. I’m so glad it’s over and behind us now!

So the babies turned 11 months on Sunday. Their first year has flown by! It’s gone much quicker than Abby’s did. I can’t believe their birthday is right around the corner. I really need to start planning a party for them! Here’s what they’re into now:

--Cora is so quick to laugh. It takes more work to get Emma to laugh, but it’s hilarious when she does. It’s more of a cackle than a laugh.

--That doesn’t mean Emma’s more serious than Cora. On the contrary, they are both really happy babies. Emma is easily excitable and tries to fly away. When she’s happy, she sits and flaps her arms up and down like she’s trying to take off.

--Cora is doing more regular crawling than her belly-crawl now. She still goes back to belly-crawling when she is going a long distance, or wants to go faster. Emma never did belly-crawl; she went straight to regular crawling.

--Cora tends to do things first, but Emma does them “right” when she does. Once Emma learns to do something, Cora learns how to do it “right” by watching her. See: the crawling.

--Another example: Cora learned to pull herself to standing about a month before Emma did, but she fell on her butt pretty hard trying to get down the first time and it scared her. For a long time, I’d have to go in to their room and repeatedly help her down during naptimes because she’d stand and get stuck. We learned Emma’s fearless (or has a really tough butt!) when she started pulling up. She plops down on her butt without a second thought. Cora finally figured out how to get down after Emma did, but she’s still very careful and goes down to her knees first.

--Speaking of knees, Cora loves to sit with her feet by her tush and her knees in front. Does that make sense? When she’s in this position, she likes to rock  up and down with  her upper body/tush when excited. Damon thinks this is the funniest thing ever!  Emma loves to dance any time there’s music on. I don’t know where she gets it from because Damon and I both have no rhythm whatsoever.

--While both girls are expert standers when there’s something to hold on to, only Emma has begun to let go.  And stay upright for a few seconds before falling!  I tell you she’s fearless!  Cora loves it when I let go of her and catch her, but she rarely keeps her balance for any length of time.

--Cora says Mama, Dada/Daddy, and Abby/Abba/Adda/Addy consistently. By far, her most used word is Abby. Cutest thing ever!  Mama only gets used by both girls when they’re upset.

--Emma says Mama (rarely), Hi, and da. Mostly, she just babbles.

--Both girls have learned to clap.

--Cora still loves peekaboo, and has learned to play on her own. She loves to find things to cover her face with. The funniest part is that she misses and gets it on her head, or it lands behind her, more often than not. She still thinks this is the best game and laughs hysterically every time!

--Another game Cora loves is to mimic us. If we make a noise, she’ll repeat it.  She’s going to be speaking in sentences before we know it!

--When they were born, some people from Damon’s work gave us some of those no-sew taggy blankets. You know the ones with the knots and tags along the edges. They each have 2, a big one and a small one. Emma LOVES these blankets. If we put one on the floor for her, she’ll happily spend a good chunk of time rolling on it, chewing on the tags, and carrying it with her.

--Emma also loves to watch tv. She won’t sit through a whole show, but she’s fascinated by it. Of course, she’s mostly interested in Abby’s shows. Cora’s too busy to sit and watch. She’ll watch for a minute or two before moving on to something else.

--Emma has become a much better sleeper lately. She’ll even sleep through the night once or twice a week! Mostly, she’s up once around 4. Cora has become a pretty light sleeper, so she usually wakes up too. I’ve got my system down now so I’m back in bed within 10 minutes, so their one wake-up isn’t all that bad. We’ve talked about splitting them, but they get really upset if one wakes up first and isn’t in her crib when the other wakes up. Plus, splitting them would entail either moving Abby downstairs or bringing a crib into our room. We’re not willing to do either option right now, so we just deal with Emma waking up Cora.

--Emma likes to flirt. She’ll smile at anyone who will look at her. She likes to tilt her head to her shoulder to be extra cute. Cora still takes longer to warm up. She usually just stares at strangers with a look that says “You can look but don’t touch.”

I’m sure there’s a ton more I’m forgetting, but at least now there’s a proper post up!

Um, this was a month ago

Cora just said Abby! She's sitting on my lap looking at pictures from earlier today, so I pointed at Abby and said her name. Cora immediately repeated it! It comes out as Adda/Addy/Abba and occasionally, Abby, but it's clear what she's saying.

**I just found this in my drafts. Oops! I never posted it a month ago. Better late than never!

I'm Healthy

So my surgeon called yesterday. I will need no additional treatment! NO chemo or radiation! I have to have biannual mammograms and an annual chest x-ray for a couple years, but that's IT! I'm so incredibly lucky!

Apparently there's dermatofibrosarcoma and dermatofibrosarcoma protuberans. It's the second type, DFSP, that is the more rare of the two. That's the one I have. Thanks to that extra little word, the fear that it can possibly develop in my lungs is eliminated. That was the one thing we were originally going to have to watch for, hence the chest x-rays. Since there is no risk of this happening, instead of a lifetime of annual chest x-rays, I'll only have to deal with the 5-minute inconvenience for two years.

I don't feel like I had "real" cancer. I only had to deal with a couple incredibly stressful months, but now it's all over. I didn't lose a boob. I didn't have to suffer through radiation, or worse, chemo. I didn't lose my hair. I didn't have to have poison injected to my body on a regular basis. How can I possibly call myself a cancer survivor? Sure I have a 2-3 inch scar, but that's the only lasting reminder I'll have. My scar is in such a prominent place I'll forever be having to explain it to people. I feel guilty telling them the truth since everyone fears cancer. Cancer is such a scary thing to deal with, but it's not always a death sentence.

Peekaboo

Want to see the cutest thing? Cora has become the "easy to please" baby. She loves to play games and is quick to laugh hysterically. She has 3 favorite games: the "near and far" game where we move her toward us and away, the "up high" game where we lift her up high, and peekaboo. Here's peekaboo. You can also hear her say "pepepepe" after I say peekaboo! Emma also makes a bonus appearance at the end!

Success!

I feel awful. I've been sitting on this news for days, but haven't gotten around to posting it here. I did update on Twitter and Facebook, so if you follow me there, you'll already know. I'm sorry!

Anyway, my surgery was a success! My surgeon called when she received the pathology report to let me know she removed all of the cancer! There's still a possibility I'll need radiation as a preventive measure, but I'll know more Tuesday. Apparently, there's some review board consisting of oncologists, breast specialists, and surgeons that meets every Tuesday. They'll look over my file and decide whether or not I need radiation. They didn't meet yesterday because of the holiday, so I have to wait until next Tuesday. Oh well. The worst is definitely over! I'll be monitored closely for at least a couple years to make sure it doesn't come back, but that's a small price to pay for a clean bill of health.

P.S. If you're in the Colorado Springs area, and are ever in need of a breast care surgeon (I hope not!), I highly recommend Dr. Ingrid Sharon. She was fantastic! On our first consult with her, we brought all the kids because Damon had questions too. Well, they didn't make it through the appointment, so he took them to the lobby while I went over everything with her. When we were done, she went to the lobby and spoke with Damon herself, despite it already being after-hours by then, and took her time answering his questions and re-hashing everything she'd already told me. After my surgery, she called to tell me everything we'd already gone over in the recovery room (a conversation I have absolutely no recollection of!), and put a nice hand-written card in with my release paperwork. Finally, she called me herself on Saturday (a holiday weekend no less!) with my results because she didn't want me to have to wait until Tuesday! I don't think I've ever been better taken care of by a doctor before!