Michael

Some pictures of Michael. He is realizing that he can stand by himself. Michael is helping mommy clean out her towel drawer.

Thomas

Here are some pictures of Thomas. Thomas is helping mom with the laundary, sitting on Great-Grandpa Andy's lap, trying to stand up on his own and upset about something.

Back to work

Life has changed at the Dillner household. Last Thursday I went back to work full time. I am really enjoying my job. I'm at a great school with wonderful kids. I am working with 5th and 6th graders. I definitely enjoy working with them more than I did the 8th graders I worked with in VA. The boys are adjusting well. They like going to daycare. They have a great time playing with their new friends all day long. I think they are starting to really miss mom, but it will take time for them to get adjusted. Just since Thursday Thomas has really started saying a lot more words. I think he hears his friends talking and he is trying to do the same. One of his newest words is 'no'. Michael is talking less, but it won't be long and he will have the 'no' word down. The boys are also taking a few steps between mom and dad. I am hoping that seeing other kids at daycare walking, will speed up the walking process. Well I have a few things I need to finish up before tomorrow, so this is all for now. I will try to put current pictures up soon!

Happy New Year!

We hope all of you had a Merry Christmas. Our Christmas seemed a little crazy and is not yet finished. Last weekend we took a shortened trip, due to sickness and weather, to Beloit for Christmas with the Dillners. We had a quiet Christmas at home with the boys and are heading to Omaha for Christmas with the Krehers this weekend. Besides all the traveling the boys are working on getting over a bout with croup. They are both feeling much better. They are also enjoying playing with all their new toys. Well I suppose I should go and finish packing. I just wanted to post a couple of pictures from Christmas morning. Michael is wearing the yellow and Thomas the blue. We hope you all have a safe and happy New Year!

Changes

There will be some big changes in the Dillner household in the near future. I will be returning to work full time after the new year. Sorry to disappoint all of those who thought I was going to say I was pregnant. I know lots of you were thinking that, but not at this time. Starting January 3rd I will be teaching 5th and 6th grade Special Education at Wheatridge Middle School is Gardner. The local school district does not offer contracts in the middle of the year, so I will be working as a long term sub. I have an understanding with the Special Education Administration that if they like me and I like them, then I will be offered a contract for next school year. I am excited to begin working again. I am saddened at not being able to spend the days with my boys, but I am thankful for the time I was able to spend at home with them. I will be working to find daycare for the boys between now and Jan. 3rd. We have met with one person and I have a couple more interviews lined up.

The boys got tubes in their ears on Thursday. By Friday they were back to normal. We got the boys' picture taken with Santa on Friday night. This picture was taken a few seconds before Thomas started crying.

Catching up

The last couple of weeks have been busy around here. I thought it would be a good time to sit down and catch you up on all the things going on around here. Early in November we took the boys to see and Ear, Nose and Throat doctor. At that appointment it was decided that the boys needed tubes in their ears. So on Thursday, assuming the boys don't get sick between now and then, the boys will have tubes put in their ears. It is a simple surgery that takes 5-10 minutes per ear. We are hoping that this might help with their weight gain. Also regarding the issue of weight gain, we went to see a GI doctor last week. We finally saw a doctor that had some common sense. He pretty much ruled out any GI problems for the boys. He took a look at them and said, they aren't skinny. Their weight is proportional to their heights and he was not concerned. Although he did want to make sure the boys were in taking enough calories. So I have been spending the last three days tracking how much they have eaten so a calorie count can be done.

We enjoyed a nice Thanksgiving with David's family. The twins and Dominic had a good time playing together. Since we were getting a family picture taken after Thanksgiving, we decided it was time for the boy's first hair cut. I have posted pictures of the event along with this post, Michael is the one looking to the side. It was more of a trim than an actual haircut. The boys did good, they sat on David's lap and looked around, Heidi our hair dresser cut their hair while they were looking around.

That pretty much brings you up to speed on life at the Dillner household. We are getting ready for Christmas. We are slowly pulling the decorations out of the basement. The tree is not up yet, and I'm not looking forward to putting it up. I wonder how many times it will get pulled down???

Making new friends

The boys have been busy making new friends. There was a cat sitting at our back door. The boys spend quite awhile trying to play with the cat, through the glass. The cat stayed around for a while, probably because it thought we were going to open the door. It was probably a good thing that there was glass between the cad and the boys, I don't know what they would have done to the cat if they could have gotten to it. David found a fuzzy caterpillar on our front step and brought it in for the boys to see. The boys were very interested in it. They wanted to feel it. We were afraid the feel would turn into a crushing of the caterpillar. So after a couple of minutes the caterpillar was taken back outside before the boys could terrorize it.

Pictures of Michael!

Pictures of Thomas!

My little pumpkins

The boys were pumpkins for Halloween this year. They are ready to go in their costumes. I had to work until 7:00, so David took the boys to the Halloween Party that the City of Edgerton hosts and then they came home to answer the door for trick or treators. While I was at work, the boys did get to share a piece of candy. They enjoyed it so much that Michael was using his sign ( I have been working on teaching them a few basic sign language signs and more is the only one he knows) for more. He wanted more, but daddy would not give him anymore. When I got home from work, we took the boys to a couple of our neighbors houses to trick or treat. Michael thought he figured out a way to get more candy. He put one of his pieces of candy in his mouth, wrapper and all. It just hung out of his mouth while we went to a couple more houses. I wish we had our camera with us. All in all, the boys enjoyed their Halloween and David and I will enjoy the little bit of candy we got from trick or treating!

Good People

It is nice to know that there are still good people out in the world. Last Friday, the boys and I took a trip to the grocery store and between paying for the groceries, holding one of the boys and trying to get out of the store, I must have forgotten or dropped my debit card. I did not realize this until Monday when the boys and I were at Walmart picking up a few things. I went to pull out my debit card to pay and it was missing. Needless to say I was upset, worried and mad at myself for losing it. I tried to remember when the last time I used it and decided that it had to have been at the grocery store on Friday. I had decided that I was going to call and see if by a long shot my card had been turned in and if not, then call the bank to cancel the card. In the mean time I was scared to check our checking account balance online, figuring someone had picked the card up and started using it. Luckily the call to the grocery store was a success. Someone had turned it in to Customer Service. When I told David all of this he, said, "I guess there are still good people out there". He is right and I am thankful for that.

In the picture the boys are 'helping' fold the clean laundry. Last week the boys and I spent sometime at my parents house, while David was in Pittsburgh, PA for a conference. We all had a good time. It was nice to spend some time at my mom and dads. It was also nice not to have to handle the boys by myself.

The boys are getting better at walking along things and walking while holding our hands. Their favorite things to play with right now, are cars, balls, their play telephone and anything they can walk along. The also enjoy getting their mail everyday, which is the junk mail.

15 months old!

Here is a picture of the boys swinging with their cousin Dominic. The boys had a good time playing together when John, Jilinda and Dominic visited over the weekend.

Yesterday brought the boys 15 month check up. We were relieved when the boys gained about a pound, and grew almost an inch. The boys are weighing in right at 18 pounds, their weights are within one ounce of each other. They are both about 29 inches tall. Again the difference in height is very small, only 1/8 of an inch. Other than being small and still not on the growth curve they were on, the boys were given a clean bill of health. We will keep giving them the pediasure and lots of good food to eat, and hopefully they will continue to gain weight.

Yesterday David and I bottled a batch of home brew beer. This beer is a holiday ale and will be ready to drink around Christmas. David is heading off to Pittsburgh, PA on Saturday. The boys and I will be heading off to Omaha on Sunday to spend time with my folks. I also think their will be a visit from David's folks this weekend. We are busy, busy busy!

Spelunking Fun!

Here a few pictures of the boys doing one of their new favorite activities, spelunking! Besides spelunking on the cart and the bookshelf, the boys enjoyed spelunking in the fireplace. That is until we covered it up with the toy box.

Success!!!

I am happy to report that it is now safe to say that the boys have been successfully weaned from breastfeeding. We had been down to nursing right before bed. We quit that feeding a week ago. The boys have done a great job going to sleep without being nursed. I am thankful to have a little bit more freedom and not have to be around to put them to sleep.

In other good news, all of the test results, that we had done on the boys because they aren't gaining weight, are back. Everything came back normal. We go back to the doctor in a couple of weeks for their 15 month check up. Hopefully they will have put on some weight and we can put this issue to rest.

Future Architects

Here are a couple of pictures of the boys playing with one of their favorite toys, the blocks. They love building with their blocks. Michael is in the blue and Thomas in the white. They also love to play with balls, they are getting good at throwing as well. They aren't limiting throwing to just balls, they like to throw whatever they have in their hands. We also love to sit and read books.


Otherwise all is well at the Dillner household. They boys are finding new things to get into everyday. They love to stand, anywhere they can pull themselves up to. They are getting very brave and are beginning to let go of what they standing against. David brewed a batch of Holiday Beer this weekend, so that should be ready to drink around the holidays this winter. Otherwise not too much is going on around here.

The answer is.

If you said that Thomas is in the green and Michael is in the blue, you guessed correctly!! Congratulations!

Monkey See, Monkey Do!

We never tire of finding new places to try to stand up and see the world from a different view. Unfortunately we usually only get up on our knees. We can't always up to our feet. We also never tire of finding new places to hide our toys. The only problem with this, is that we also can't remember where we put all of our toys. We really like to take them over the the stairs and drop them and listen to them fall down the stairs until they reach the bottom. We really hope that dad doesn't hurt himself on the toys in the morning when he is on his way downstairs to iron his clothes. We also enjoy playing with cars, we like to make them move on the carpet. Thomas is learning how to throw a ball. I, being Michael, haven't quite figured that out yet. I do know that my brother likes to beat up on me. His preferred method at the moment is pulling my hair. When I get the chance, I like to bang toys on his head, but when we do these things, mom puts us in time out. Mostly we like to explore the house, play with cars, build with blocks and read books.

I guess this weekend we get to help Aunt Jilinda, Uncle John and Cousin Dominic move. They are moving to Wichita and we are going to miss having them close by. Wichita isn't too far, nothing like Virginia, so we will still get to play with our cousin sometimes.

So who thinks they can tell us apart??? Is it Michael or Thomas is wearing the green????

Mad Science

This morning I have felt like a mad scientist. I have to collect urine and stool samples from the boys and this is my reason for feeling like a mad scientist. I will spare you the details, but just say that it requires putting samples into different vials. Oh the fun!!

Now you may ask why am I collecting the urine and stool samples. The boys are not gaining weight as they should be, so we are doing some investigating. We went to the doctor on Friday to recheck their ears and check their weight. The good news is that both of their ear infections have cleared up, while the bad news is that they haven't gain much weight. So since this is not normal the doctor wants to run a bunch of tests to determine if there is anything causing them not to gain weight, that is where the urine and stool samples come into play, along with blood test, and appointments to visit a couple other doctors. David and I are pretty confident that they are healthy and active boys, but we want to be sure that is the case.

In other news, I am working again. I am tutoring math a couple of afternoons a week up in Olathe. I am working to find daycare from about 2:30 to 5:00 on those afternoons, so I can go into work earlier. I am enjoying it. I love getting out of the house for a few hours. I also enjoy talking to other adults, and doing things non mommy related.

David is getting very excited to take 3 qualifying laps in a Stock Car at the Kansas Speedway this weekend.

Getting Around

The boys are getting very good at getting around the house, and getting whatever they want. Above are pictures of the boys showing off their new skills. Thomas is stuck on the bottom shelf of the cart. We won't be surprised to find him completely on the in the near future. Michael has recently discovered how to get up off his knees, as shown in the other picture. If the boys aren't thinking about what they are doing they will crawl for a short distance, but if they want to zoom across the kitchen or living room they will go to their tummies and the army crawl. They are pulling themselves up to anything they can reach. If the object is shorter they can get to their feet, but if it is a little bit taller then they just get to their knees.

Well the boys just woke up from their naps and are ready to explore the house, so I had better get away from the computer so I can chase them around the house.

We are in trouble now!

Here is a picture of Thomas showing off one of his newly mastered skills, pulling himself up to his knees on anything taller than he his. Another one of his favorite things is trying to climb onto the bottom self of the cart behind him.

It has been a crazy week around the Dillner household. The week started with a job interview for me and crabby teething babies. The job interview turned into a job for me. I will be tutoring math in Olathe a couple of afternoons a week. The crabby teething babies turned into crabby teething babies with ear infections. Since I will be going back to work, I now need to find daycare for the boys. Until we are successful in the daycare search I will work from 5:00 until 7:00 when David can be at home with the boys. One more thing to add to the busy week is trying to get my car fixed from the fender bender we were in during July. We are going to finish the busy week off with a trip to Omaha for the weekend.