WHAT A WEEK!

It has been super busy since my last post. The Grandparents Hadden flew in from S.C. to babysit the girls for a week. K had a mini-meltdown since she was leaving her babies for a week. D and K flew to Virginia to find a house. K and D both had mini-meltdowns trying to decide what house we wanted...after all we had to decide in only 2 days!! Much craziness ensued, including doing 3 contracts on 3 different houses and fortunately withdrawing 2 of them just before they were accepted. So we are the proud almost-owners of our favorite house. This was the house that K picked out via the internet even before we got there. It is smaller than our current house (D and K are currently debating about whether to sell or store the excess furniture) but was in "move-in" ready condition....though one room is an awful neony-blue color and the room that D and K are going to make the master bedroom is boring basement color white. So ideally we would like to get those painted before the move, but obviously not a major issue. The plan is to close in the middle of May.
I am sure by now you are wondering, but how did the babysitting go. Well K was in tears as we left (in a tragic turn of events, Audrey got her very first fever the night before we were supposed to leave!!) and threatening to take one of the girls stashed away in my carry-on. However, I couldn't decide which girl to take, so I was forced to leave them both. As it turns out, the girls managed to not only survive, but to thrive. In another tragic turn of events, both girls cried when we got back. I am going with the theory that they did not realize that I was gone until the moment that they saw me and where then overwhelmed with sorrow that I had been gone for an entire week.
Brooke: She is eating much better and is now enjoying both pears and sweet potatoes (which I wish were not orange!!). She has suddenly become much more smiley which is adorable, but she has also learned to stick out her bottom lip in a huge pout. And finally she has started to love her mega-saucer. She rotates herself all the way around and plays with all of the toys! Yeah!! There is some discussion about teething because she is super drooly and frantically rubs her gums...but she is quite young and there does not actually appear to be any hint of a tooth.Audrey: She continues to be a rock star at eating and her spit-up is getting better. She has started to grab her feet and loves to flail them up and down. In fact she somehow uses this kicking to rotate herself 180 degrees in her bed...for you non-math people, that means her head ends up where her feet were when she went to bed.Here are some pictures...since I have spent limited time with them this week, please excuse the fact that they are in the same outfit (Thanks Mrs. Thacker for the dresses!!) in many of them. We had picture time after church today.

5 MONTHS!

The girls are 5 MONTHS old today!! What did we do to celebrate? Well, Brooke ate her entire container of pears without any crying! And both of the girls (finally) rolled over. We have been practicing our rolling over skills and both girls can now (Brooke was able to do it 2 days ago) push and kick themselves over from their tummy to their back. We are very proud of them.

Both: These glasses are waaayyy cooler than those hats!

Brooke: I LOVE my spoon!!

Audrey: I LOVE to sleep unswaddled!!

Audrey: OK. I have figured it out. If we put our arms like this and then move our legs, we can move!

Brooke: Who has a giant bow now??

Brooke: I know the TV is over there and if I could just stretch a little more...

NOTHING BUT PICTURES

Brooke: I am soo tired...I just can't jump anymore!

Audrey: I finally got my first Daddy shoulder-ride

We are so cute in our little summer dresses!!

Brooke: Don't they understand that I don't like PEARS!!

Audrey: I LOVE pears!!

Audrey: I am too cute for words in my giant bow!!

Brooke: Why don't I have a giant bow??

BIG NEWS

Well there is big news in the Hadden house....Audrey ate an entire jar (actually little plastic container) of PEARS!! It is very exciting to see her eating. Brooke on the other hand has not exactly taken to eating food...in fact I am pretty sure that not one drop of food has actually made it down her throat. Maybe Audrey is more motivated as she is trying to catch up with Brooke so she can get out of the hand-me-downs.

More big news: we will be moving to Virginia in May. My head says YEAH but my heart says BOO, so depending on the day I am either very excited or very sad-sometimes both.

So the next 6 weeks should be very interesting: a move and the introduction of vegetables.

CHA-CHA-CHA-CHANGES

Well as the title suggests (and yes you are supposed to sing the title), we have had a lot going on this week. As a result, this post will be quite wordy and pretty non-sequitor. So to all of my friends who don't like to read, I will put random pictures throughout to keep you engaged.

I will start with Brooke. She is clearly spurting...my little term for going through a growth spurt. She seems to have just shot up overnight. In the past 2 weeks she has grown at least 2 inches...and this is not a Hadden exaggeration. I have measured her and she is huge! I also think that she has gained at least 1 more pound. She also has grown a neck. We have had to officially move her into her 9 month clothes...which means we have had to buy some 9 month clothes. Audrey is now in sole possession of the 6 month wardrobe.

Brooke has also learned to make noise this week (lots of coo, goo, ga, oh) and to spit out bubbles on purpose. She has also decided that she likes to stand up all the time. She may be the first child to ever walk before she rolls over (no progress on that as she refuses to lay down!) Our solution has been to use the Jumperoo and a Play Center...both keep her upright and will hopefully encourage her to use her arms. Currently all she does is either put her arms on her belly or in her mouth. Unfortunately she and Audrey both put their hands in their mouths so much that their little faces keep breaking out. And they both stuff them so far in that they frequently gag themselves..at least once resulting in a massive spit-up.

We are currently trying to transition to sleeping unswaddled and in separate cribs. So far we are just working on this during selected nap times as I do not want to, in any way, disrupt that night time sleep.

We have also adjusted their schedule again. We shifted their meal times around so that they would eat their last meal around 7pm and be in bed around 7:30pm. We were quite worried that the first night we tried this, we would have babies up in the middle of the night. But our little stars made it all the way to after 6am!! SUCCESS!!

We have also started "eating" solid foods. I use the term eating very loosely. We are currently working on pears. It is hard to say whether they don't like the taste, texture, or spoon or whether they are just getting used to something new. Audrey has been more receptive and has eaten much more than Brooke. She seems to like or at least tolerate the new food. Though Audrey's chewing seems to involve sticking her tongue out so it has been a little bit of a challenge. Brooke seems to totally dislike the whole experience and basically just squenches up her face and refuses to let you put any in her mouth....any that does make it all the way in is promptly spit out using her new skill of blowing spit bubbles!

Also related to food, we have put Audrey on a new formula that is specially designed for babies who spit up frequently. And for any of you who have had the opportunity to feed the girls you know that Audrey is a massive spit-up machine. So far all the new formula seems to have done is make the spit up chunky...not sure that is really an improvement.

Finally I am putting a little video of Brooke making some of her noises. She really makes many more than this but seems to stop when the camera is present. However, she has been distressed that all the previous videos have featured Audrey so here is this one.

FUN WITH THE FAM!

D is finally finished with his major work project so we got to enjoy a wonderful weekend together as a family!! Super fun. Here are some highlights.

Here is Brooke kicked back on Daddy's lap waiting for her baby massage...not shown in the picture is the little freckle that I found on her leg this weekend...she is a little K!

Here are all the girls after a dinner out eating Chinese food. The girls were a huge hit at the restaurant as the waiter kept commenting on them to us and the neighboring tables.

Here is the whole family on Easter! The girls were precious in their little dresses.

Audrey really wanted this picture to be just her and the bunny, but Brooke is quite a load to move.

Here is Audrey enjoying the Easter egg hunt at the Fleming's house.

Here is a video of little Audrey laughing while playing with Daddy!...we felt that in the spirit of fairness of representation we should show her happy since we previously posted her screaming!

ZOO

We went to the zoo for the very first time yesterday...of course so did the entire rest of the city of Houston. I have never seen so many people there ever (and we love the zoo and try to go as often as possible), and every person seemed to have a stroller. It was super fun, though I am not sure the girls actually looked at any of the animals other than the fish. We went with my sister and her boys and a good, yet extremely windy, time was had by all.

Here are the girls in front of the flamingos. Their cousin John David told them that he was sure they would like them because they were also pink.

This picture is totally unrelated to the zoo, but it is just too cute to leave off!