Sleep Training Pics

Maysie happy because I finally came in to get her at 8 a.m. this morning!
Jaeli always getting stuck, but at least she sleeps through it!
Makenna so proud she can stand up all by herself!

Here are a few pics of the girls during our sleep training experiment! Even though Maysie does not turn over very well, she still finds a way to move around. Jaeli is always in weird positions and Makenna is always trying to stand when you put her down. I have about 9 pacifiers on their changing table b/c they always lose them, they always fall on the floor or behind the cribs. Each morning I have been having to search under the cribs for them! It is much easier then trying to do it in the dark!

Sleep Training Update ... Ferber Method

An update on our sleep training.

The girls have been doing so good! They have always been good about going to bed, its the waking up in the middle of the night to eat. Thankfully, it has been going smoothly for the last 3 days. But I am sure it could change, so we just have to stick to it or else we have to start all over! They sleep from 9 p.m. until 8 a.m. every morning, with just a few cries here and there at night. They almost always go right back to sleep.

Sometimes I think its been too easy, but I think they were ready, so I think I was just preparing myself for the worst. If we can stick to this for a couple weeks, then we wont have to be so strict. As for naps, they have been doing pretty good with those also. It has only been 3 days...I have been keeping track, so I will have to post a link to the schedule once we complete the sleep training for all you mothers who are going to attempt it!

Why we are doing this:
Because this will teach the girls to go to sleep easily on their own, and to soothe themselves back to sleep in the middle of the night if they wake. This will also teach them to sleep through each others cries. They will not depend on us to put them to sleep. This way, we can all get a good nights sleep and in the future, they will hopefully take naps without a fight and sleep through the night. We should in return have happy, healthy babies (which is the main goal of all of this)!

Ferber Method

Step 1
Put your baby in his crib when he's sleepy but still awake.

Step 2
Say goodnight to your child and leave the room. If he cries when you leave, let him cry for a predetermined amount of time.

Step 3
Go back into the room for no more than a minute or two to pat and reassure your baby. Leave the light off and keep your voice quiet and soothing. Don't pick him up. Leave again while he's still awake, even if he's crying.

Step 4
Stay out of the room for a little bit longer than the first time and follow the same routine, staying out of the room for gradually longer intervals, each time returning for only a minute or two to pat and reassure him, and leaving while he's still awake.

Step 5
Follow this routine until your child falls asleep when you're out of the room.

Step 6
If your child wakes up again later, follow the same routine, beginning with the minimum waiting time for that night and gradually increasing the intervals between visits until you reach the maximum for that night.

Step 7
Increase the amount of time between visits to the nursery each night. In most cases, according to Ferber, your baby will be going to sleep on his own by the third or fourth night — a week at the most. If your child is very resistant after several nights of trying, wait a few weeks and then try again.

First night: Leave for three minutes the first time, five minutes the second time, and ten minutes for the third and all subsequent waiting periods.

Second night: Leave for five minutes, then ten minutes, then 12 minutes.
Make the intervals longer on each subsequent night. You can choose any length of time you feel comfortable with. (We have chosen...5 min. 10 min. 15 min. 20 min.)

Sleep Training

Well I have decided that since the girls will be 9 months in a week, we should become more strict about sleeping through the night. I also realized this when a couple days ago they made it all night long, unplanned! They have done it before once or twice, so I know they can do it, we just have to train them and stick to it or else we have to start all over again! We did not stick to it yesterday and man was it a bad day! They were so off schedule. So for my records and to help out all the other triplet mommies who struggle with it like I have been, I decided I am going to post each day or two on how well they do and what they did! Hopefully after a week or two they will have it down and we will not have to be as strict as we are about to be and they will catch back on after a day. They have always been great with going to bed for awhile now, even when they go to bed late. So hopefully it works with naps and sleeping all the way through also. Maybe Josh and I will actually see each other more through out the week and he can help me out some during the day when I am not working. And this way, he can spend more time with them. Wish us luck!!!
Here is what we are trying to achieve...

8/9 a.m. Wake up
8:30/9 a.m. Bottle
9:30 a.m. Light Breakfast
10/10:30 a.m. NAP TIME (must stay in at least 1.5 hrs but no more than 2 hrs)
12:30/1 p.m. Baby Food 2 jars of Stage 3 fruit w/ cereal.
1:30 p.m. Bottle 6 oz
2/2:30 p.m. NAP TIME (must stay in at least 1.5 hrs but no more than 2 hrs)
4:30/5 p.m. Baby Food 2-3 jars of Stage 3 dinners with veggies.
5:30 p.m. Bottle 6 oz
7 p.m. (nap only if really tired and no more than 1 hr.)
8:30 p.m. Bottle 8 oz
9 p.m. Bedtime

Pictures - 9 months

Jaeli
Maysie and Sammy!
Makenna standing all by herself (well with a little help!)

Here are some recent pics of the girls. Next week they will be 9 months old! We have our 9 month check up in a week, so we will see how we are doing! I am hoping to switch them to regular formula and to find out how they are doing on the charts!

Schedule

Makenna is always trying to make everyone laugh, including her sisters!

Makenna also gets her feelings hurt very easily, at the weirdest things too! It is so sad to hear her cry, it is a much different cry than when she is hungry or upset.

She has been doing pretty good on finger foods, she made a big mess with a biscuit I gave her! Oh so messy!

Maysie loves looking in the mirror, she is always laughing and screaming at herself!

Maysie also loves her feet in her mouth! It always makes her laugh!

Maysie in her blanket, smiling and giggling like crazy!

Jaeli rolled off the couch onto the pillow and then onto the carpet! She loved it!

Jaeli's new friend is our dog Whitney, she is the only one who laughs at the kisses, and wants more!

Jaeli in her blanket with lots of giggles and laughs!

All of them eating by themselves! (We need a little more practice!)

Okay, so the girls are almost 9 months and our schedule should be much better than it is. We have been putting it off for awhile, b/c it is Daddy's time with them but since he has started to "dream feed" them, I think its over due! The girls should be sleeping 10-12 hours a night straight and are only sleeping 6 or 7 hours before wanting a bottle. They should also be taking two 2 hour naps a day instead of three 45 min. - 1 hour naps. So we need to get a little stricter, everyone including Daddy, Mommy, Grandma and Grandpa! It will be tough for a couple weeks, but I promise, once we get it down, it will be much easier and we will have happier babies in the evening! I am going to have to figure something out and post it later! Here is our schedule now...

8/9 a.m. Wake

9 a.m. 7 oz

10:30 a.m. Nap (45 min - 1 hr)

1 p.m. 6 oz

1:30 p.m. Solids

2 p.m. Nap (45 min - 1 hr)

5 p.m. 6 oz

5:30 p.m. Solids

6 p.m. Baths

7 p.m. Always get tired so sleep from 1 - 2 hours

9 p.m. 8 oz

9:30 p.m. Bedtime
(4-6 a.m.) One always wakes for a bottle, so dream feed them all.

Family and Friends Comments

Hey everyone, I have been hearing from many people that they check out my blog often, however, you guys never leave comments! So leave me one every once in awhile so I know who is checking!

Maysie is finally rolling over!

Maysie has finally done it! She can do it by herself now! She is still pretty weak turning from back to stomach, but she can do it. She does good now turning from stomach to back! Finally! I was starting to get a little worried! And Miss Makenna is starting to pull herself up all by herself. She has done it twice now on the gate! I have been working with Jaeli on pulling her self up with my help, so hopefully she will get the hang of it soon! They are all about 1-2 months behind each other! My girls are getting so big!

LAST RSV SHOT!!!

Jaeli, Maysie, Makenna

Today was our last RSV shots! The nurse also said they will not need them next year unless one of them have a surgery or something like that. So lets hope they don't need them! Here are our weights:
Makenna 20 lbs 2 oz
Jaeli 17 lbs 11 oz
Maysie 16 lbs 6 oz
We are starting to slow down, so I think they will be around these weights for awhile! They did very good today! Makenna was trying to go every which way and tearing up the paper like crazy. Jaeli kept rolling over when we put her on the scale, so after 3 times of trying, we just layed her on her stomach! Maysie did the best. She is my drama queen, but today she only cried for about a minute and then she was laughing at Jaeli b/c she kept crying! It was cute!

Maysie Update (Hole in Heart)

Well I just talked to the nurse at her doctors office and she said her lungs and heart are of normal size, so no medicine! So this means that so long as in the next three months she has no symptoms and in 3 months the xray and echo come back normal, she will most likely NOT need surgery! She will probably just have a yearly Echo to check up on it and hope the tissue flap closes it or it closes on its own in the next few years! (So in other words, the tissue flap is keeping her from having too much blood flow through it and in return, no symptoms or lung and heart enlargement!) Yay Maysie!

Maysie's Hole in her Heart

Maysie had a long day going to the doctors! She finally passed out on our way home!

Well, the hole has not gotten any smaller, but that does not mean she needs surgery...yet. It is kind of confusing but I will try to explain it best I can!

Since she does not have the symptoms, blue mouth while eating, sweating while eating, and breathing heavily while eating, the doctor is not as concerned as he would be if she did have any of these symptoms. We have to go later today to get a chest xray to see if there is excessive blood flow to her lungs. If so, then he wants to put her on medicine to reduce it. He is going to see her again in 3 months for another Echo and xray and if the medicine has helped, than that means she needs surgery right away. But if she doesnt need medicine and the hole has not gotton bigger and she has no symptoms, she probably wont need surgery. There is some tissure on the valve where the hole is that is restricting the blood flow...which is good, but it has not closed the hole. If the hole was smaller, than they would just see her again 6 months or a year, but since the hole is the same size and she is bigger, he is a bit concerend. Eventually, that tissue may close the hole, in a year or two years or more, but there is no guarantee. He said the best time for her to have surgery, for her to recover well, is between 6 months and a year. So that is why we are doing another Echo so soon.

Lets hope and pray the chest xray comes back normal and the Echo/xray in 3 months also come back normal! Then no surgery, most likely never!

Updates

Well Maysie has her cardio apt. tomorrow, so hopefully it is good news and I will be sure to post about it.
Jaeli is rolling over like crazy, it will probably be sometime before she gets to where Makenna is.
Makenna is now trying to pull herself up. She does great if she has help!
Maysie will not roll over, any ideas on how to help her?
Baby food is going okay, still not perfect, but probably never will be! Maysie is loving it and the other two not so sure still! Of course they prefer the cereal with fruit over the veggies!
We have lowered all the cribs and taken off the crib bumpers since Makenna is starting to pull herself up!

And a big congrats to my sister Mandy! She is pregnant! It will be nice for the girls to have a cousin so close in age on my side! (I am hoping for a boy!)

Ba Ba (Bottle)

Makenna now says Ba Ba, meaning bottle! She just started saying it yesterday and today she has been saying it close to feedings! I have tried to get her to say Mama, but she would rather say ba ba, guess I know what is more important! She says it really softly too and clearly, even when she is playing! It is so cute! Our first word!

Jaeli's Mohawk!

Jaeli so far has the most hair! Makenna and Maysie not so much. Hopefully it will start growing more soon. I love playing with JJ's hair, she seems to enjoy it too! I can't wait until I can put them in pig tails...but then I will have to start brushing their hair daily!

Baby Food

So we are on a new stage now! Stage 2. We are now feeding them twice a day instead of once. I can still only get them to eat 2 jars, but it will take time! I am giving them less formula at those feedings hoping they will eat more. They seem to be doing okay! They hate the Garden Veggies! I had to mix in some Sweet Potatoes and Cereal to get them to eat it. Jaeli just kept spitting it out all over the place. They are not used to eating baby food at that feeding, so hopefully they will pick it up like the other feeding. They get 2 - stage 2 jars of cereal/fruit jars at lunchtime feeding and 2-stage 2 jars of veggies at dinnertime! They get about 30-34 oz of formula a day but only drink about 26-30 oz of it. In about a month or two I am going to start them on Stage 3, 3 times a day! I think at this time I am also going to feed them baby food before their feeding, so when they hit 1 year, they will be used to eating three meals a day! Should be fun! Hopefully, soon, they will be sleeping longer at night. They still only sleep from 10 p.m. until 6 a.m. Sometimes they will sleep until 7 a.m. if Daddy feels like staying up that late. My goal is 8 or 9 a.m. Maybe someday! But man, they are still messy!

My mom's birthday!

Maysie with my mom's ballon
Jaeli with my mom's ballon
Makenna loving the ballon!
My mom and the girls matched when we went over on Sunday to celebrate her birthday! (It was not planned.)

I met my parents at Flangans on the 5th for my mom's birthday. It was their first real restaurant experience! They did really well! There were 5 of us to take care of them! Jaeli got fussy at first, but we just passed her around and she was fine!

Big Girl Car Seats

Makenna's car seat!
Jaeli and Maysie's car seats!

So we have officially switched to the bigger car seats since Makenna has reached the 20lb mark! She can no longer ride in the car carrier. So I just decided to move them all. I tried to fit them all in the car, but it was too tight! I have two in the back and one in the captains chair. It is a pain getting them in and out, but it works! We took one of the captains chairs out to make it easier to get to the back. Once they hit the one year mark and are all over 20lbs, I plan on taking the other captains chair out and moving the bench forward and putting all three in one row. Hopefully it works out! I think we might be trading in the car for another van. That way we have two vehicles for them. The van we have now is a 2000, so we would like something a little more reliable too.

My Sister's Wedding

The girls with their second and third cousins!
Josh and I pretty drunk!

Here are a couple pictures from Kristin's wedding! The girls looked so cute in their dresses!

8 Months Old

"Mom I will help you! This is fun!" Maysie helping me with the laundry.
"Hang on mom, give me a second to pose!" Jaeli holding out her finger!
"Look dad, I can climb on anything I want!" Makenna making her way around! (This is her new smile!)
All sitting by ourselves! No one fell over during the pictures until afterwards! Then we had some tears! But they lasted about 10 minutes each, Makenna even longer!


Well we have made it to 8 months old! They are changing so much. One big change is how much they are grabbing for things. Anything and everything, they want it! They are also starting to interact with each other more.

Jaeli is getting really good at rolling over! Makenna sits all by herself for a long period of time until she finally falls over, and if she falls straight back, she lets you know it hurt! Usually she falls to the side and is okay. My little Maysie has yet to roll over. I hope she catchces on soon or I am afraid the doctor will make her go to physical therapy. I have been trying to work with her, but she just has no intrest in it. I know she can do it, she does turn to her side a lot, but just hates being on her belly. Jaeli was the same way, so hopefully she will roll over before our 9 month check up!

Baby food is getting better also. They are starting to keep most of it in their mouths, especially Makenna! It is not as messy as it used to be! I plan on starting Stage 2 next week and twice a day instead of once a day.

As for holding their bottles, they are doing pretty well. They get lazy a lot of the time, but when they are really hungry, they usually hold it the whole time and suck it down. I am hoping by the time they are 9 or 10 months, I can just lay them all on the floor and they will do it all by themselves!

I got tired of their clothes and Makenna was starting to look a little snug in them, so I decided to move up a size to 9-12 months. They are a bit big on Maysie and Jaeli, but hopefully they will grow into them soon!

They are sick this week, runny noses, hopefully it goes away fast. They are not sleeping well, but I think it is just b/c they are sick.

Naps are not great yet. I still have trouble, almost always, one of them will not go to sleep. They don't usually sleep for more than 45 minutes. Occasionally one or two will sleep 2 hours. It is hard b/c they are held so much by Grandma and Grandpa, they want to be held when they go to sleep too. I just need to start letting them cry it out more. It is just so hard! It would be much easier if I didnt work part-time and they were at home 24/7, but that is just not an option. I am hoping as they get older they will sleep better.

As for nighttime, they do pretty good going to bed, but they don't usually sleep past 5 a.m. Occasionally they will. I know they should be sleeping until 8 or 9, but I think they wake at 5 a.m. b/c that is what they are use to. It may just take a few hard nights getting them use to sleeping until 8 a.m. or so. But I don't think Daddy is ready for that yet! Hopefully once they get over their cold, we can work on a better sleep schedule!

Maysie has her Echo on the 16th. So I am crossing my fingers the hole in her heart has closed and she wont have to have surgery. I can't even imagine. But if she does, it is the safest heart surgery there is for an infant. Last time she went, there was no change from birth to 2 months old. So hopefully, 6 months later it will at least be smaller!

Bachelorette Party & Wedding

Me and Jarliyn!
Me and Josh!
The lovely bride! (Bachelorette at the time!)

I decided to just post a few good pictures from the Bachelorette party and leave the "bad" ones off! We had a good time, I think Kristin enjoyed herself also! It was a crazy night, but lots of fun. The wedding was beautiful and the reception was a blast! Hopefully I can get some pictures posted of the girls from the wedding soon, once we get them back!

CONGRATS KRISTIN AND GREG!