3 Ballerinas!

We took family pictures, etc. last weekend and wanted to post a few. Family pictures will be posted around Christmas time. The girls are growing like little weeds. All are smiling now and starting to talk (coo). They just get more and more fun to interact with.

The only new information is that Carly went to see the hematologist. I really had no idea what I was talking about in the last post. I had said that arterial venous malformation and hemangiomas were the same thing. Completely two different things.... They are still doing studies; I guess Carly's kind of a stumper. She has symptoms of both the arterial venous malformation (AVM) and a hemangioma depending on the test they are doing. They know it's probably one or the other so they have sent information (MRI, etc) to a specialty clinic to see what they recommend. If it's an AVM (enlarged blood vessels the size of an adult in a small baby) then they would surgically go in and remove blood vessels and somehow trace a new blood flow into smaller vessels. I still don't understand all implied with this route. If it's a hemangioma, they will treat it with steroids and it should shrink. So, once again, we are waiting. We are also putting off going to the dermatologist in SLC until sometime in the spring (or until the get the underlying stuff in her arm taken care of). Thank you to those offering a place to stay! But she is doing great and is quite the little charmer. She loves smiling at everyone, including strangers. Very friendly little girl.

Nothing else really new with the others. Madison has mellowed out a bit since her wild newborn days. She does still have ridiculous, exhausting amounts of energy but I think she is finally learning how to self soothe like the others are doing. And Mckenna is still as sweet as can be. Although she is finally starting to get a little louder in her crying and demands. I think it's good, they will probably all be loud to be heard above each other. They are still eating and sleeping about the same. Unfortunately still going through a ridiculous amount of diapers (25-30 a day) but that's the life of triplets I guess! Kyle and I figure and some day we will be able to sleep through the night, maybe in 18 years! Enjoy the pictures!

Here's the two best of the pictures we took. These girls are exhausting when it comes to picture taking....

L to R: Madison, Carly, Mckenna

L to R: Madison, Carly, Mckenna

5 months old!

Well, it has taken me about two weeks to get this blog posted! These babies are busy! It's amazing how much can change with them in a month. They are smiling now and even more awake during the day than they used to be. All are doing so well. We just went to our last eye doctor appointment (they go every other week) for Carly and Madison. Mckenna will go again in two weeks but then should be done as well. They do have to do a three month follow up to the eye doctor in January but that is a whole lot better than every other week.

Carly is going to a hematologist next week to see what the next process is for her arm. They will starting with injecting some sort of medication that will kill off the extra capillaries and hopefully shrink down the size of her arm. They believe she does have a certain type of hemangioma and they called it arterial venous malformation. They still don't know until they get rid of the masses (one at her wrist and one above the elbow) if her ulna bone (one of two long bones in the forearm ) is missing or just shortened due to the hemangioma. I guess we will just slowly find out information as we go. She also has an appointment with a pediatric dermatologist in Salt Lake at the end of October to start working on her port wine stain (caused from the hemangioma). We might go or might have to postpone if the hematologist says that we don't need to take care of that yet. Anyway, poor Carly will have a lot of appointments for awhile.

The are continuing to grow at a perfect rate. They were weighed last Thursday and Mckenna was 10 lbs. 10 1/2 oz., Madison 11 lbs. 13 1/2 oz., and Carly was 11 lbs. 14 oz. They are definitely feeling heavier when we have to lug three car seats around to doctor's appointments. I guess it just means that my arms will get stronger.

Below are a few pictures of the girls taken about two weeks ago. We have cut Mckenna's hair since this (just trimmed the top cause it was out of control). I don't like the straggly hair thing so I'd rather have it short and thicker until it's thick enough to start growing long. Oh, that seems like so many miles down the road from now....

Girls having social time together. L to R: Madison, Mckenna, Carly

Mckenna- 5 months old

Madison- 5 months old

Carly- 5 months old

I just think this picture is cute. I was trying to get a picture of Carly smiling (she has the biggest smile so far) and this is about as close as I could get to it.