Miss Independent #4

 I'm convinced our girls have come to us with strong-willed personalities. (I am positive, at this statement, Scott would laugh and tell them they just take after their mother.) All of our daughters are very independent and capable. They all have strong personalities. They will do things in their own time, and they are harder to convince than our boys are. (For the most part, the boys just go with the flow...which is good when you have 4 strong-willed sisters!)

Harper is no different, and she is starting to come into that stubborn personality! Her independence is shining through. 

She does love her dad a whole bunch, and she loves her new bunk-mate Lucy. Lucy and her already have each other's back. When one cries, the other one comes running!

Lucy is our chocolate milk addict. She has 2 cups every morning. It is very important to her morning going well! Harper has started to watch, and this last week, she started to insist that she got some Nesquik too. We now have 2 official chocolate milk addicts.

Harper is convinced she is a big kid, just like her older siblings! She runs around with them and follows them down the stairs to their rooms. Her older siblings are so good with her, and most of them welcome the addition! Our kids are constantly coloring, and there always seems to be a cardboard box lying around! I peeked in to find shirtless Harper coloring on a box. She was so content, for about 20 minutes!

Harper has an addiction to ice...which has led to an addiction to climbing on the kitchen table to find ice! If we can beat her to it, she will run around with her own cup of ice, completely content!

We found this fancy dress in our storage shed, and Harper insisted on putting it on. (And the outfit is not complete without a hat...so we added that too!) She twirled and giggled once it was on...it was hard to get it off, in the end!

Independent eating. This one has become the most difficult. She wants to feed herself everything (with her own fork) but she wants to do it not strapped into a chair. Most times, we make her sit in a chair and scream/eat...but this day, she got to eat dessert with mom!

NST #4 and #5, 34 Weeks

I didn't take a picture at one of my NST tests this week...so i'll just combine the experiences! I had a normal Monday/Thursday appointment week!

On Monday, I had an ultrasound that measured Amniotic Fluid in both babies and it seemed to be about the same (2-3 cm of fluid for each baby). I had blood work done for my hypertension. I had to pee in a cup and have blood work along with it. They found that my proteins were still high, but had dropped slightly. My platelet level still dropped from the week before and my kidney function was elevated slightly (both are not good, but not too serious yet). My blood pressure was still elevated. I was dilated to about a 2.5, and I have been having regular contractions (At this appointment, I think they were measuring contractions about 7-8 minutes apart.) Once they were able to get both boys on the monitor for 20 minutes, they both seemed to be okay this week!

On Thursday, I had the best NST to date! I was there for 45 minutes, start to finish. We were able to get the boys heart rates, almost immediately! My blood pressure was normal every time the measured it (they have to keep the blood pressure cuff on the entire time I am there). Contractions were happening about every 10 minutes apart. Uneventful. I will take it!

Official evection date has been set April 27th, 6 AM. 9 Days and counting!

Jemma Loses Her 4th Tooth!

Jemma lost her 4th tooth!!! It's a really big deal around here because it's the first tooth she has actually lost on her own (and she hasn't had pulled by the dentist)! About a week after her top tooth was pulled out, we noticed her other grown up tooth had broken through behind her baby tooth. We really didn't want to go back to the dentist, and her tooth was kind of loose, so every chance we got we reminded her to "WIGGLE YOUR TOOTH!". 

We probably pushed it a little tooth much...and gave her lots of big apples to eat with her front teeth, but it worked! She went to show Scott how loose it was when he came home from worked, and it popped. Scott told her to "just pull it out". Jemma doesn't shy away from a challenge, so she stuck her hand in and pulled it out!

Jemma was SO excited!!!

 

So of course, with all the excitement, the tooth fairy totally forgot to come that night. (Good job, Tooth Fairy.) We were all awoken by the sobbings and wailings of Jemma at 6:30 AM the next morning, when she realized her tooth was still there. 

Thankfully, our family tooth fairy "Mollary Wintergreen" came to the rescue the next night. She had gotten stuck in a birds nest, so she couldn't get to our house until the next night. Jemma got a dollar and a little bag of legos as an apology. It seemed to smooth things over!

The Tomato Thief

Harper gets in to everything. She is starting her curiosity stage, and it has been hard to keep up with her! She is definitely faster than me, these days! We are constantly pulling her away from toilets and off the kitchen table. She can reach the first 6 inches of counter top, so all the food, dishes and utensils have to be pushed back. The other night, after dinner, this girl came toddling over to me...tomato in hand! Evidently, it didn't get pushed back far enough on the countertop! She enjoyed that whole tomato...eating it just like an apple!

 

Accessories!

 Macey used some of her money to buy a jewelry making kit! We looked up a YouTube video and I helped her make one...she has been pumping out jewelry ever since!

The girls got CTR rings from Grandma for Easter! They have been wearing them everywhere. We HAD to take matching pictures! Haha!

NST #3, 33 Weeks 6 days

I was so nervous for this NST. It had been a whirlwind of a week. On Monday, I had an NST and ended up staying overnight for Twin B. I was also diagnosed with hypertension that day, so NST tests were now twice a week. This was my second NST of the week, my third all together.

The first two NST tests ended with something being wrong. This one was no different! Twin A showed abnormalities in his heart rate, so I needed to monitored for an additional 45 minutes and then meet with my doctor. Thankfully, after the additional monitoring, all looked well. These boys just like to flip flop in scaring their mom! The NST lasted over 2 hours, but I got to go home in the end--so I will take that as a win!

Scott rescued the kids at home and let all of them run and ride bikes in the sunshine!

Blessings

The last few weeks of pregnancy have been SO hard! I try so hard not to complain, but it has been one of the hardest things physically, mentally and emotionally that I have gone through. One of the most incredible parts of all the hard things is seeing all the blessings. Heavenly Father has taken care of everything. For as hard as it has been, he has matched it, two-fold, with blessings. We have felt so much love, comfort and support. 

We are still moving along with schoolwork, but it has been so hard to keep up with Harper, teach school, entertain kids, and get all their meals ready. Scott wanted to help ease my burden during the day. One day he whipped up a batch of chocolate chip/sprinkle pancakes and put them in the fridge for the next morning. He didn't want to stress me out by putting together breakfast the next morning, so he gave the 5 oldest kids each a job--he made an assembly line--to put together breakfast.

Our neighbor brought our kids an Easter basket of goodies! There were plenty of Easter suckers to go around (we are still working on them, weeks later!). 

 Another day, Scott pulled together lunches for the kids. He drew on each of their lunch bags!

Harper has been teething and having a hard time. She has screamed through naps a couple days, but a quick car ride and a bottle put her right to sleep! Sometimes, the car is a magical place to be!

Harper loves her babies, and she is slowly learning how to be "soft" and take care of her twin brothers. (Hopefully, something sticks!)

The farmers of California brought more boxes of food, and we were blessed with more food, again!

Another day, more lunches from dad. We supplemented lunches with chicken nuggets from Grandma Bagley! The kids thought it was best thing they had ever had!

The kids have a pretty awesome aunt, too! She drove down with homemade lunchables for each of our kids. The kids LOVED it, and they ate everything! It was perfect!

Grandma Bagley offered to watch our kids from a Friday to a Saturday, so we could deep clean our house before the twins arrive! It was exactly what we needed! We were able to get SO much done (well, Scott did most of it...he was a god send!)! 

Harper has been struggling with stranger danger because we have kept her away from things for the last year! We are still working on getting her used to grandparents. I think this weekend was a great start!

The day after we picked up kids from Grandma's house, Lucy took a 3 hour nap on me! I didn't think she could sleep that long anymore...she must have had too much fun at Grandma's house!