The twins turned 8 months old yesterday. Do you know that’s 2/3 of a year? It seems nowhere near that long, but it also seems like forever somehow.

Things are as busy as ever in our house. Avery’s bottom two teeth are through and almost as big as Alex’s. They love using them and their gums to gnaw on table food. Soft veggies like carrots, green beans, peas, and potatoes have been a hit, as have pasta, chicken and rice soup, goldfish crackers, and pretty much anything else I can chop up into small enough pieces. Avery is a daintier and slower eater, while Alex is of the belief that the more he can shove into his mouth at once, the better off he is. He loves to steal things from Avery’s tray since she’s so much pokier. Unfortunately, I have to be careful what I give them because we think Alex may be allergic to milk, which is an ingredient in more than I ever realized. I had him at the doctor last week to see if she had any ideas why he was so whiny all the time, and why his reflux wasn’t improving. She suggested the possible allergy and now he’s on special hypoallergenic formula and we have an appointment with a pediatric gastroenterologist next week. She said we’d see improvement within a couple of days if the formula / dairy was the problem, and while he’s not as fussy, he is still leaving a slime trail like a slug wherever he goes. Our carpets are trashed, his clothes are changed about 3 times per day, and this new formula reeks. We’re sticking with it for another few days and then I am going to switch back to see if things worsen, which would help to confirm the allergy.

Alex has also been waking at night again. Sometimes I think it’s just a habit, but other times I think he may be having night terrors. It’s the strangest thing – he “wakes” in utter panic with loud screams and hysterical crying, but doesn’t want his binky or teething tablets or anything else that usually calms him. Even if Don or I pick him up, he keeps crying, and even though his eyes are open, you can tell he’s not really there. It’s scary for us and I hope it’s just a phase. It takes anywhere from 5 minutes to over an hour to get him back down and peaceful, if not asleep, in his crib. I did some reading online and there doesn’t seem to be much we can do about it if it is truly night terrors other than hope it passes quickly. It breaks our heart to see him so upset.

He’s also turned into a champion crawler and is loving his independence. We used to see the devilish glint in Avery’s eyes and think she was going to be the source of all our trouble, but Alex is holding his own. He has this great skill with finding the one thing in a room that you don’t want him to touch… the laptop computer, our touch lamp in the bedroom, the diaper can and trashcan, anything in the hall bathroom… They say this is the age when separation anxiety begins, but he has no trepidation about crawling out of my site. I ask him to follow me down the hall and he starts to, but then hangs a right into the bathroom to bang on the tub. And when I am changing Avery’s diaper, he slips out of the nursery and into our bedroom to bang on the lamp. One really cute thing he does is to stop at every new surface and touch it, from carpet to pergo to area rug, sort of like he’s testing to make sure it’s safe. I am VERY careful to keep the new stair gate closed at all times. The little bugger has gotten very fast!

Avery has turned into the happiest little baby. She always has a grin for us and babbles “mamama” and “dadada” nonstop. She has no apparent interest in getting mobile. If we sit her somewhere, as long as we stay within her eyesight, she’ll just play with whatever’s around or swing and wave her arms like a fool if nothing is around to play with. On her belly, she can spin in circles or scoot backwards, but there is nothing close to forward movement, so if I give her something to play with, I have to put her with her feet against a wall or she’s backed away from the toy about 2 minutes later and flapping her arms like a bird, trying to will herself forward to reach it again. She still hates naps. She takes them 2 or 3 times a day, but they are always short and I barely have time to eat or shower before I hear her in their room, babbling away.

Both babies have figured out how to push down the bumpers and peer out like little jailbirds to see what’s going on in the room. Alex likes to drop his binkies out through the slats. I guess he hasn’t figured out that they don’t come back when he does that. The other day, he fell asleep waiting for something interesting to happen.

Time to end the post – someone is awake and needs to be reminded it’s bedtime!

Avery’s had a very busy week! She’s definitely a tough little girl, too. Her bottom two teeth can definitely be felt just below the gums, sharp and ready to break through if they haven’t already. They are right at that point where it’s hard to tell. She’s also been really congested and wakes up with this terrible glob under her nose every morning that takes about 10 minutes to completely suck out. She sounds like she’s snoring when she drinks a bottle and I feel awful for her. She has an amazing talent for blowing snot bubbles – so gross. Since she’s been fighting this cold for over two weeks, I finally took her to the dr. today and found out her left ear is definitely infected, and possibly the right one too. She’s on amoxicillin for that and hopefully it’ll clear up soon. I hope she’s not inherited my crummy immune system. I know I had a ton of ear infections as a kid and had to get tubes in my ears. Through it all, though, she’s been as happy as ever. She smiles and giggles and doesn’t act like she’s sick or in pain – such a little trooper. Much different than her brother, who is whining during the day and waking often at night. I think he has a top tooth coming in now. It’s so funny to me how opposite these twins are – teething gives Alex fits, while Avery has sailed through without a complaint. But if Alex falls over from sitting and thunks his head on something, he doesn’t miss a beat, and if she does the same thing, she cries like there’s no tomorrow. Strange…

Avery has also started to very clearly say “Da-da.” She says it ALL THE TIME, much to Momma’s dismay. I know she hasn’t associated it with Don yet, though he insists she’s talking about him. I’ll remind him of that when she’s calling it next time she has a dirty diaper, or on one of her 5 am wake-up days. We have some really cute video of it that we just need to edit down to a reasonable file size before we post it.

And finally, a clear shot of Alex’s bottom teeth. They are much bigger now – this was taken a week or so ago. They are sharp, too. The little turkey viper accidentally bit me at dinner tonight and it hurt!