Annabelle Chloe

::dusts off blog::

Well, it's been just a few months since I last updated this old blog and by "just a few" I mean 18.

I kind of got sidetracked by life (and having three kids in three years with two in Pre-K) and the further behind I got the less motivation I had to update here!

To play catch-up very quickly, Eli is now a feisty 2.5 year old who does everything he isn't supposed to do. Before 2 years old, he was climbing out of his crib and scaling baby gates. His newest skill is unbuckling his car seat buckle and chest clip while the car is moving so driving in the dark has become pretty terrifying for Mom and Dad. I'm pretty sure he has a death wish, but we're working on an intervention.

Grace is 4.5 and is in her last year of Pre-K. She is so excited to go to Kindergarten next year and asks daily if she's bigger yet since I told her she can't go to Kindergarten "until she's bigger". She likes to play pretend and boss around Eli who does whatever she says. She has quite the sense of humor and I am constantly writing down the funny things she says so I don't forget them.

Jacob is almost 6 (in two months!) and repeated Pre-K this year instead of attending Kindergarten. We decided to hold him back to let him mature for one more year mostly in the areas of speech and peer-to-peer interaction and he has come very far in both areas. He and Grace will now start Kindergarten together in the Fall. Jacob likes to play hide and seek and go to school. His favorite part of school is snack and seeing his BFF Tristan.

The biggest surprise this past year was finding out in May that we were unexpectedly expecting! In August, we found out that we were having another baby girl and have been over the moon waiting for baby #4 to complete our family. Unfortunately, after two relatively uncomplicated pregnancies we gave birth to another preemie. Fortunately, she is what they call a "late term" preemie and they typically do well. She is having some struggles though and is still in the hospital at 23 days old and will be there for awhile longer until she gets the suck/swallow/breathe reflex down.

This blog was originally created as a way to document Jacob's NICU journey and I figured it would be unfair to Annabelle to ignore HER journey so I had to resurrect this old blog and update on her status. For now, I'll post a pic with her stats and come back later to update on her condition and outlook.

Annabelle Chloe

12/16/13 @ 4:53 AM

5 lbs 15 oz 19.5 inches