Winter Wanderings

We have been keeping busy as usual, getting our routine down as a family of 5.  This is of course made easier while Heather is still on leave from work.  Ask us again in March whether 3 kids is manageable.  We took our first trip on the airplane, visiting Grandma Lu in Atlanta.  She is doing a bit better since falling and breaking her wrist in October, but she still is requiring a significant amount of extra care, which is difficult to manage from afar.  We did get to visit with our friends and family while down there.  We are now trying to keep everyone entertained indoors, with the near 0 degree temps here in New England. 

We visited a puppet theatre in Brookline for a show.  The girls loved it!

Some creative baby soothing to make it through dinner.

Dad and his three girls getting ready for bed.

Bright-eyed Tessie hanging out in the basement in the cradle.

A common post-dinner occurrence: dancing with Dad in the basement.

Grandma Lu holds her newest granddaughter for the first time.

 

We visited cousin Jenna, and the older girls got their hair and nails done.

Jenna holds her newest cousin.

We had lunch with our family friends, and here "Aunt" Emily holds baby Tessie for the first time

Our older girls were fascinated with the electronic entertainment Lindsey had.

The new house going up where Heather's childhood home once stood before the fire.

Dad and the girls went to the Morgan Falls playground on a beautiful Sunday afternoon in Atlanta.

Tessie taking a snooze.

More snoozing on Dad.

The girls have been doing a lot of drawing to entertain themselves this winter.  Here is a video showing their creativity.

One of the things we noticed pretty early on is that Tessie is an extremely loud breather, with a distinct high pitched sound when she inhales.  When we went to the 1 month checkup, I pointed it out to the pediatrician, who said, let's get it checked out by the ENT doctor. So off we went to the ENT, who shoved a camera down Tessie's nose to get a look at her throat with 3 people holding her still.  Turns out Tessie has a mild case of what is called laryngomalacia, where the muscles around her voice box are weak and the larynx narrows when Tessie inhales causing the sound.  This is self correcting and basically doesn't cause her any problems except for that she breathes loud.  The quote from the ENT doctor: "Looks like a classic case of mild laryngomalacia.  Give me a call if you need anything else." Clearly he wasn't concerned.  It was interesting though when we boarded the airplane for our return trip from Atlanta, multiple people kept turning around and looking at us in concern for Tessie because of the way she was breathing. I just smiled back at them.