Thursday, November 26, 2009

Happy Thanksgiving

Griff giving me either a wink or the evil eye. I prefer to think it was a wink.
Griffin laughing at my attempts to get him to smile at me.

Julia's beautiful silk bloomers. I can't tell you how cute she looked. Her dress was corduroy with the most delicate embroidery. Dressing her is like playing paper dolls all over again. I am never upset if she spits up because there's another outfit ready! Dressing boys is so cute, too, but little girl clothes are just soooo fun.






Braddock being very serious









Thanksgiving greetings to all our friends and family! It's been one of the busier months we've to date. Between chasing three toddlers all over the place and feeding them three healthy meals a day, the days go by so fast! I swear the eating and preparing of meals is most of every day. It's amazing without the formula how much these three eat! The amount of learning and growing boggles my mind, and I'd give anything to slow this time down. Bill and I are thankful for our children, probably three of the happiest little ones around, who bring us more joy in one day than we ever could have imagined. Griffin joined the land of the walking officially this week and is so proud to be there! The first walk half way across the carpet had him clapping for himself completely thrilled. I put video -- not very clear since I just used the camera and not our video camera but it's video! -- of Braddock and Julia walking and then one of Griffin walking, too. I couldn't get them to all walk at once to keep it to one video. We've been trying to take a Christmas picture which has been completely laughable. I don't know why I thought I could just sit them down and ask them to say cheese. I'll post the failed attempts some time soon.
Our Thanksgiving was really nice. It was quiet but most of the food was made yesterday so today was really easy. We are stuffed to the gills now and the kids are fast asleep. Bill already has the tree up, and we're ready to start with the Christmas tunes and treats! No Black Friday shopping for us unless it's online. In fact, a good portion of our shopping is already done. There's no longer time to spend hours at the mall trying to find the perfect gifts. Thank God for the Internet. I just don't know how busy parents survived without it.
Hoping everyone had a great day feasting and enjoying family. I know we did. More one of these days ( I will no longer lie and say soon that way if it is, you're shocked)

Saturday, October 31, 2009

Happy Halloween from our three little pigs!
















Happy Halloween to all our friends! We really only trick or treated at one house but they loved standing at the door waiting for the trick-or-treaters to come to us! We also had a cupcake with a candle and sang "Happy Birthday" for the second time in their lives. Today was their actual due date and so they are one year adjusted today. We are weaning off the formula and moving to the sippy cups with milk. We have toddlers now officially, three mini walkers who are into EVERYTHING! Now off to eat their candy....

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

Photo of the Day


Here is Poppy's head. It it covered in Griffin's spit up. The poor guy was playing with the boys on the floor and Griffin, in his excitement, lost his supper. And, yes, I did make my father-- who selflessly helps me and Bill every single day without ever complaining-- wait until I took a picture before I gave him a towel to clean it up. I'm sorry for that but I had to keep the evidence on film.


As breaking news, all three are taking steps. I won't call them walkers yet but they're very close. Braddock seems the most ready to walk but it's still just a few steps and a fall. That he's ready is such a triumph since he wore casts for seven weeks and had his Achilles' tendons cut on both feet. Julia likes to take one step and then dive at whoever is in front of her. She's just fearless. Griffin's steps are more cautious. It's so cute to watch how thrilled they are as they figure it out.


Wednesday, October 21, 2009

Baby Steps

I have no picture of this, but it's important to note that Julia has taken a few steps. This leads to a quick fall, but they are baby steps nonetheless! Both Griffin and Braddock find themselves standing unassisted, and once they do, there's a drop to the floor. But every time they stand, it's for a longer period of time. So really we're not far from three walkers in this house. Oh, Dear God, that is going to be something.

Photos to come!

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Pumpkin Picking

Sean, Sammy and (L to R Braddock, Julia and Griffin)



Sean and Sammy on the spinning strawberry ride with Poppy

Latest family picture!

We had a visit from Uncle Brian, Aunt Colleen and cousins Sean and Samantha. Everyone had a great day at the pumpkin patch. Our kids aren't big enough for the rides but they loved watching their cousins! The weather was really nice and they loved the hay ride to the patch. The only problem we encountered was that we couldn't bring the strollers on the hay ride and after a few minutes in the patch, they became very heavy! Sean and Sam were here all weekend and so they got to play with their cousins. My favorite line was from Sean. He said, "Look, Aunt Nic, the triplet is eating the chair. That is NOT good." Braddock was chewing on the edge of the rocking chair and Sean was right, not good. Sam and Sean were entertaining my three with songs and toys. They love watching the big kids, completely amazed by all the things they can do.
They still chew on every little thing they can, including leaves on the grass, lint on the floor, a four-day-old cheerio stuck to the high chair... Not only do I need more arms, I need more eyes, too. The play yard we have to contain them is working out nicely for their safety. This way I don't find one headed into the bathroom, one to the fireplace and the third towards the door. They really have outgrown their exersaucers and jumperoo. I knew the jumperoo needed to become part of the baby things of the past taking residence (and slowly taking over) in our garage when I saw Julia almost tip it over. The exersaucers are still out in case I need to stash one quickly to get to another. Soon they be garage residents, too.
We're in full birthday mode today. It started Sunday night with our first ice cream cake so the kids could sing Happy Birthday to Uncle Bill. They even helped blow out the candles. Today is Bill's actual birthday -- and a big one at that. (Hint: His age rhymes with Morty) So Julia got up a little early this morning to come in and give her Daddy some snuggles and giggles. All three helped me sign their special cards for their Dad. They will help me today get everything ready for the big celebratory birthday dinner, too. And by helping I mean hopefully they take a nap long enough to let me get to work. I'll let you know how that works out. Happy Birthday, Husband/Daddy. You are very loved.

Tuesday, October 6, 2009

long time comin'










So this is my update. Long overdue, admittedly, but here nonetheless. There are many things I'm missing but the pics are new. Julia and I went to our neighbor Audrey's first birthday party and this is her in her brand new shoes. She loves shoes -- like her mother -- so we better start saving. Braddock is in blue and Griffin in green in the above photos . And the one of all three in the new play yard. We waited before getting one but it's really the safest way to keep them playing without climbing under the tv or the couch or opening the stove, etc. With three crawlers and standers and wall walkers, it's controlled chaos. And if I'm being honest, it's not always that controlled.



I promise not to only post when the kids are sick, it just seems to be happening this way. Well, they've got the second cold of their lives. And this one was a doozy! Poor Griffin ended up in the E.R. on Sunday morning. His breathing was quite labored at about 4:00 a.m. even after his nebulizer so we took him back to Morristown. The saddest part of the story is that Sunday was the NICU alumni picnic and we couldn't wait to go. It's a big event for the NICU and we are so proud to be alumni... I swear we waited all year for it and .... we missed it. Amazing that we ended up back at the hospital for the first time on the day of the picnic. I'm happy to report that all three are doing remarkably better. It's a scary, scary thing when your children can't breathe.


Now for a brief update of what our life is like. Things since their first birthday have changed so dramatically, I swear I'm amazed every day. All three are speed demons with the crawling but they prefer to pull themselves up and walk using whatever they are holding onto. We call Braddock Spiderman because he scales the walls. They are playing with each other quite a bit. Chase is their favorite game. Julia is usually the leader (and let's face it, we're not talking just about this game...she's in charge of pretty much everything) and she starts crawling as fast as she can, squealing all the way and looking back until one or both of the boys notices. So when she gets their attention, she motors until she thinks they are playing along. Then she stops, sits up, and looks back waiting for them to catch up. As they get closer, she speeds away. They are laughing, she's laughing and on and on they go. Watching this brings this incredible joy, the likes of which I'm not sure I'd ever known before.
I do have a confession to make: My kids are biters. All three. And it really hurts. I'm sure this indicates some failures on my part but I can't worry about that just yet. I need to stop the problem. Julia will come over and act like she's going hug me and then I feel these little choppers sinking into my shoulder. She's got a lot of teeth and she's like a pitbull as far as jaw strength goes. Braddock enjoys biting when they are in the bathtub. Julia or Griff will crawl by trying to reach a tub toy and he sees the flesh and plots his attack on one of their backs or bums. I assume this is part of teething and I've read that we're not to react so as to not encourage it. So I simply say, "No biting. Biting no." Every once in a while, I can't help but raise my voice due to the pain the fangs they've got. There hasn't really been any broken skin so perhaps I'm exaggerating the pain some.

Griffin and Braddock and recently Julia are really into dancing. They hear music and immediately dance no matter what they are doing. This is something the boys seem more into. In the hospital on Sunday, the beeping of monitor was enough for Griffin to move to the beat. It's hysterical to watch!
I have to say what pleases me the most is their little personalities are all really funny. They are so full of joy. They are constantly learning and it's hysterical to see them master a new trick. Julia loves to say, "Yay," and start clapping. If one of even says the word clap, she'll use her skills and clap those hands. Braddock is just catching on and kind of just shakes his hands. Griffin has really taken a liking to blowing raspberries and he thinks this is a riot. It's not so funny when there's food in his mouth but it's hard not to laugh as he does it.

(I started this a couple days ago so I'm just going to post it now even though it's unfinished. If I wait to catch up on everything, I'll never get anywhere)

We're gearing up for Halloween. This year we're going to be the three little pigs and I can't even tell you how cute the costumes are!

Everybody is starting to feel better today, but now the runny noses are out of control and we literally have snot everywhere! The clean up is a constant thing and the laundry is always running. Keeping up with making sure the germs are excised from this house is really a full-time job on top of the full-time job of caring for three sick kids. All I can say is thank God for my Mom and Dad! I don't think I say that enough.
I'll have more one day soon.












Tuesday, September 8, 2009

Sickness be gone

We've all been sick. I had no idea how hard it would be to have three sick babies at once. I mean NO IDEA. These poor kids just had colds, but it was the first time and my God were we worn out. Grandpa also broke his ankle so we're really a complete mess!! He's getting his cast put on today hopefully and has been a real trooper. What's next, right?

If someone told me that you had to hold babies while sitting up all night to get them to sleep when they are sick, I might have at least been prepared for what was to come. It started with me, then Braddock, then Julia, then Griffin, then Gram, then Daddy. Grandpa was spared but he got the ankle so we'll call him affected, too. Oh, it was so sad to watch them unable to breathe from their noses but unaware that it was easy to breathe from their mouths. And the tears seemed endless. And let's face it, it was just a cold. I do NOT look forward to our next ailment. Griffin has had a more difficult time getting better, and he now has a nebulizer that he uses every four hours to help his lungs out. They aren't calling it asthma just yet but we were told it is pretty common for preemies who had oxygen for the time he did, so we're ready for it. Poor little dude was wheezing. Awful... the whole sick thing is awful and I'm glad it took a year to find out how awful.

But we all seem to be recovering now. My cough is finally gone away for the most part. Summer seems just about over here. We missed the last week at the pool and had to cancel two play dates with the same friend. So we're ready for a new season. I LOVE the fall and I am really excited for the leaves to change and the crisp air to come in. We'll have to decide what cute things they can be for Halloween very soon. If only I could sew!

Friday, August 28, 2009

Our First Photographs







Since they were turning one, we decided it was time to have the kids photographed. We did a search and found http://www.heathermosher.com/. After just a quick look, we knew we had to have her shoot them! She does such beautiful work and we couldn't be more thrilled with the results. The experience was wonderful and really easy -- not a word we use too often with three babies doing anything together. It was very hot that day and it had just rained so you don't see all the mud they were sitting in! We'd pick them up to change them and they were covered so between changes, we were using all the wipes to remove mud. They'd never even seen candy before and here they were holding lollipops -- I was cringing worrying about all those artificial dyes and flavors touching their lips! And I kept thinking what if they are allergic -- what a Mom I am, when push comes to shove, I was willing for look the other way just for the perfect shot. The biggest danger wasn't the high fructose corn syrup but the fact that they kept trying to chew on the sticks -- well, not really chew, shove them down their throats. All turned out fine in the end and besides needing a good bath, they seemed to really enjoyed it. I thought for sure they would be fussy but that wasn't the case at all. There are too many beautiful pics to post right now but here are some of my favorites. Notice how Griffin is holding up three fingers in the last one. It was too perfect!

Monday, August 17, 2009

Birthday Pictures
















This is our friend Angela blowing out the candles for her favorite triplets! It was her birthday, too, and she chose to spend the day with us celebrating the kids. Admittedly the pictures here are out of order but I'm just throwing them on to share. It's dinner time so I really need to run downstairs. Our one-year-olds are enjoying as the celebration continues. We've been to the pool four times in the last week. They can't get enough of the water and it is so hot, so it's perfect for us! Okay, more later. We had a nice time celebrating, and it was a Royal Celebration just as we'd hoped!








































































































Wednesday, August 12, 2009

A Letter to my Babies as They Turn One

My little dears, all three, no one first, no one last:

Today you turned one. I've avoided writing this letter to you all day because as I type it, I can barely see through the tears pouring out of my eyes, and I can't swallow past the lump in my throat. Interestingly, your Mommy isn't sad at all. I'm so filled with love and gratitude to all three of you. If babies can be heroes -- and I truly believe they can-- you three are mine. At this time last year, your father and I watched you struggle, your tiny chests fighting for every single breath. It scared us in ways we could never have imagined until we laid our eyes on you. From those early, frightening moments, you have done nothing but fill us with pride every minute since. And let me tell you, there is no gift in this world more precious than being your parents.

This year has passed faster than any year I've ever had. I feel like it was only moments ago that you were less than three pounds, your faces half the size of the palm of my hand. We had to learn to care for preemies so small, but little by little you grew, got stronger. Those days in the NICU are burned into my memory as if they just happened. In the blink of an eye, we were taking you home. First Julia, then Braddock two days after Julia, and finally Griffin two weeks later (just exactly the order in which you were born). We were up every three hours day and night to feed you, change you, soothe you -- tired beyond anything I had ever experienced before. In another blink, you slept through the night. However tired I was, there was a peacefulness in those moments in the middle of the night that I will cherish the memory of for the rest of my life. You were so little I could hold you all at once. The almost inaudible sighs you made as you were falling back asleep, I still hear sometimes and I smile. Yet another blink and you were rolling over, eating cereal, sitting up, crawling, standing. Bit by bit you have turned into these big, healthy babies who aren't really babies any more. That fills me with pride and breaks my heart all at the same time.

This year with you, I can say unequivocally, has been the very best year of my whole life. It was not nearly as overwhelming or as difficult as I'd imagined while I waited for you to be born. (that's not to say I didn't have difficult moments where I was overwhelmed -- every Mommy has felt that way. Luckily, those moments pass.) You have filled my days with wonder and excitement. For a woman who is always ready to move on to the next thing, you've made it very easy to stay right here with you all day every day, and I know how lucky I am to be able to do that. Not only did I get to spend this year caring for you, I also got to spend it with my Mom and Dad, and that has been the main reason I haven't felt overwhelmed. It had been a long time since I got to see them on a daily basis, and I've truly loved having them here helping us. (I think they've loved being with you, too.)

My children, thank you simply for being you. As you continue to grow, learn and explore this great big world, my only wish for you is a simple one: Buddha says, (and I'm not quoting exactly here)Love the whole world as a Mother loves her child. If you can do that -- knowing what I've learned this year, the love I feel for you three children -- I promise you can never lose!

Happy 1st Birthday.
I love you,

Mommy

Tuesday, July 28, 2009

A Birthday Gift to Unwrap


Here are the pictures of the kids opening their first birthday gift that arrived last week from Bob and Linda. Their first gift was really received early last week, fantastic Tripp Trapp highchairs from their very generous Granny, but those couldn't be unwrapped so we photographed this first unwrapping session. I wasn't sure what would happen but they just went after it ripping and trying to eat the paper. It's the coolest truck with farm animals and the farm sings "old McDonald." Is it Mc or Mac? I don't know. They LOVE it. Julia, the fastest crawler in New Jersey, just runs it down and tips it over. The boys prefer to push on all the animals to hear their sounds. Braddock squeals with delight when we gets ahold of it. So far they seem to share. They haven't quite figured out they should be upset when one of them takes the toy from another. That will come.

They seem to learn so much every day now. Julia pulled herself up to standing for the first time this morning. The boys just keep progressing and it's so nice to see. We're eating a few more solids. The biscuits are a favorite but I worry so much about choking!
We also had our first bout of an illness. Julia had a fever for about four days but it wasn't ever too high and other than seeming a little lethargic, she was fine. So the doctor didn't want to see her. I was hoping to get to one year without fevers. I guess since nothing came of it, maybe we're still in the running.
We're having a photographer shoot them for the first time next Monday at a park. I CANNOT wait to see how it turns out. I wish we had done it when they were tiny but I know we needed to keep the germs out of the house so now it seems like the perfect time. We're hoping the weather holds out.
It's been a rough week for me because I have some kind of tendonitis/bursitis and I haven't been able to lift my left arm for eight days. The pain that comes along with that is indescribable unless you've had bursitis before. As it is, with three infants, I'm short an arm so to only have one was really difficult. I seem to be on the mend now -- and not a moment too soon. It was a very LONG week but we're over the worst of it.

Wednesday, July 22, 2009

Griffin rocking out to the beat

So this video isn't very good but it is so cute. Griffin is our dancing man. Whatever he is doing, if music comes on, he just starts dancing. It may look to you like he is trying to balance himself, but really he's just feeling the music. He gets a bit camera shy when he notices I'm capturing this adorable-ness, but then he gives in and dances some more. You may notice he's sitting up all by himself. That started last week. He knew that the follow-up clinic -- that I've mentioned before where they follow the development of these preemies -- said if he wasn't sitting up by July 27, we'd need to get some help. So as if he knew the deadline was approaching, he figured he'd show us what he's probably been able to do for a while and chose not to. Griffin is really laid back. We know not to rush him because he'll get there when he's ready. Braddock is starting to move around now, mostly rolling with some commando crawling mixed in, so I assume Griffin will follow suit pretty quick. And then all bets are off. We will need eyes in the back of our head.... What I know for sure is that it's time to baby proof the life out of this house!

Tuesday, July 14, 2009

Julia on the move




This is our little lady dragging herself wherever she wants to go. She is so determined all the time. She sees the toy. She crawls to the boys, takes their toys, tries to eat the toys, moves on. They're left dumbfounded. Soon they'll start to protest and probably decide they better start crawling just to get their stuff back. And that, friends, is when the games will really begin.




Monday, July 13, 2009

Braddock speaks

Here he is saying "da da" in his very high pitched voice. He has many variations of this but the one is so cute. I will post Julia in her army crawl later today. Griffin just started to make his sounds this weekend and interestingly -- and I have several witnesses -- while trying to get my attention, he said, "Mom." It may have been an accident but he has said it more than once, so I'm saying he said it. Braddock only likes Da Da. He is making that very clear. See for yourself.

Our trip to the beach was great fun and relatively easy. As we packed everything up, it became very clear that a minivan isn't really big enough. I guess we'll start looking at busses or a limo would be nice.

More soon,

Tuesday, July 7, 2009

Babies on the move

Liam teaching his friends to play nice








The best I'm gonna look next to these kids!
Bill Sheehan and Julia
The Gorgeous Bride and Handsome Groom









Cristina enjoying Liam's fantastic sense of humor




all the babies rockin' out







It's July already. July....like in the month before we celebrate a first birthday. It's becoming more and more obvious that if I can't lobby Congress to get an extra hour or two tacked on to every day, I'm just going to run out of time. We still haven't planned the party. What kind of parents are we? We've been throwing ideas around but nothing seems to fit the enormity of the FIRST birthday. I am usually one to believe things should be understated, but OH MY GOD OUR KIDS WILL BE TURNING ONE and I'm freakin' out!! On the Fourth of July last year, I had too many contractions -- way too many like one every four minutes and I was only 22 weeks. The fear that I felt then and all those days where we just didn't know how this would turn out... well, that has earned us a celebration fit for royalty. Maybe I just came up with our theme... stay tuned. (I started this post so long ago that that now is the theme -- A Royal Celebration -- and the party plans are in the works)



This post is about our very first trip to Wrentham. For those of you reading this saying What the....they were in Wrentham and didn't visit, let me apologize right now. I'll go back to needing more hours in a day than I've got to work with. We came in very late Friday night to Bill, Cristina and Liam's house. They had to stay up past their bedtime just to be bombarded with armfuls of kids and all the stuff that comes with them. I am sure I spent more time getting everything ready to go than we actually spent in Wrentham. Cristina had many of the things we needed so we only had to bring one set of some of the bigger items instead of three. This made it almost easy. Well, the week leading up to this, I made lists; I checked them twice. I remade the lists I lost. I kept repeating my mantra, of "food, diapers, clothes and they'll be fine." So Friday comes and I insist we should leave around four because by the time get to a major city, rush hour is over, so, of course we should get on the road. Of course....well, i didn't consider the weather report of thunderstorms. We got underneath one that so kindly hovered over us from NJ to Milford, MA. Thank you, Mr. Thunderstorm. Very nice to spend the six and a half hours with you. What was supposed to be a four-hour drive came close to being seven. lucky us. The good news is that Julia, Braddock and Griffin didn't seem too bothered by it. They slept early and then I sat in the back and entertained for a solid four hours. They seemed to have a lot of fun. When we arrived, we fed them an extra bottle and amazingly they slept well despite being in a different environment.




Now, the purpose of our trip was a wedding on Saturday night but we'll get to that. First, I really did have some kind of allergic reaction -- possibly to a bug bite -- that called for a prescription of steroids to get the ginormous hives covering my body to go away. Cristina is not only superMom, she's a doctor, so this was very handy at 6:00 a.m. I can't imagine if I had to go sit in an emergency room somewhere. So with that little obstacle out of the way, we had a great day. We even went for a walk to Brian's new house. There we were like Make Way for Ducklings -- a little stroller parade -- right down South Street. The kids loved seeing all the new faces (which we really worried about since they've been having some stranger anxiety lately) and they all seemed to adore Liam. He can crawl and dance and he's very vocal. The babies were in awe of his skills. Some day soon, they'll be there. We had a jam session and that was awesome! Liam can really rock! So we were able to scoot out and go to Erin and Mike's beautiful wedding. Apparently the kids never even noticed we were gone which is all we could have hoped for. All their babysitters said they were very good and they even went to bed on time. We were really worried it would be a total nightmare, but we were so wrong. (and very happily wrong, I might add)



We really can't say thank you to The Sheehans/Cataldos enough. What a treat to be able to go out and not worry for one second that everybody was fine. It was also so special for me to watch my children with Cristina's child. I wasn't much older than they were when we all met on Stoney Brook Lane and began our lifelong friendship. To see our offspring forming their own bonds was the sweetest thing. We've got Liam taking Julia to the prom. If I keep the blog up until then, I'll happily post the pictures.


We have two more trips coming up this weekend and next. Hopefully, the organizing and packing gets to be second nature and we'll sail through the prep phase.


As for updated news -- and there's a lot of it. Braddock started with baby babble. He started with ba-ba-ba and now he's a complete da-da man. Julia is crawling commando-style but it's only a matter of days before she's up and about. She heads for the exit at all times so the running after babies stages has officially begun for us. Now all bets are off. Griffin, interestingly, crawls on his back. He is very quick, too. I'm sure this is not the preferred method of travel for him but I give his kudos for the ingenuity. He's core gets stronger every day and he's nearly sitting. Braddock in the last week is just about sitting, too. Julia's been there, done that. Eating is becoming much easier now and all three seem to love the food I make them. As Julia starts to crawl, we're working in the cookies and cereal puffs. She started using the ma-ma and ba-ba sounds just yesterday. Griffin has his own language that is a complete riot. He was very excited for the fourth of July and told us all about it for a really long time. It's so cute to see them "talk" to each other.


Okay, I'll save more info for a later post. Today we're lunching with Gram's dearest friend Patti and her mother about an hour from here. It will be exciting to see Patti's mom's reaction to them.
















Off I go. More soon.

Saturday, July 4, 2009

The Red, White and Blue....




Happy Fourth of July to all!

Sunday, June 21, 2009

Happy Father's Day


I write this blog but there's a Dad doing lots of work in the trenches, too, and he really doesn't get the accolades he deserves. He works hard every single day without complaining and loves his kids with his whole heart. I remember watching his rookie hands in the NICU with that first diaper change. (I laughed so hard the camera was shaking as I captured the moment) Now, he changes and feeds all three without breaking a sweat, just like an all-star. He reminds me every single day how blessed we are to have our kids, so on this day I'd like to tell him how blessed I am that he's their father.


There's also a grandfather here daily singing, "Heads, shoulders, knees, and toes" with no shame and all the appropriate hand gestures just to get three giant smiles. (and it works every time) Poppy is such a wonderful grandpa.
If I know anything for certain, it's that the men in our lives are the very best around, and our children will be better off for it.
Happy Father's Day to all dads.


These babies are so lucky to have such great men in their lives.




Happy Father's Day.