12 Month Stats

The girls had their 1 year well child visit with our pediatrician yesterday. She thinks they are doing great and rewarded them with three shots. Good thing they forgot about it two minutes later. We switched to whole milk today and they didn't even notice - mama's buying a new pair of shoes!

Zara
Birth: 5 lbs 2 oz | 18.25"
2 weeks: 5 lbs 2 oz | 19.3"
2 months: 10 lbs | 22.5"
4 months: 13 lbs | 24.8"
6 months: 15 lbs 15 oz | 26.75"
9 months: 17 lbs 14 oz | 28"
12 months: 19 lbs 13 oz (43rd percentile) | 29" (65th%)

Alexandra
Birth: 5 lbs 8 oz | 18.5"
2 weeks: 5 lbs 6 oz | 19.5"
2 months: 10 lbs 8 oz | 22.5"
4 months: 13 lbs 8 oz | 25.3"
6 months: 16 lbs 1 oz | 27"
9 months: 18 lbs 9 oz | 29"
12 months: 20 lbs 11 oz (59th%)| 29.8" (85th%)

Its Been a One-derful Year

We had a great weekend celebrating the first birthday of Alexandra and Zara. We spent Saturday at the zoo and the park with Lydia, Michael and Benjamin and Sunday we had a small-ish party with some family and a few close friends. The icing on the cake was the best Portland weather we have had all year - so much fun in the sun. I will re-cap the party in another post with lots of pictures very soon.

We showed this video at the party to capture the best memories from the last year. Marcus did a great job! It has been an amazing year for all of us.


The First Year from Natalie Shirzad on Vimeo.

Girls in Bellingham

The Shirzad girls road-tripped up to Bellingham last weekend. We left Marcus home to work on some house projects and we visited all the Bellingham family - Aunt Lydia and boys and Aunt Maria and girls. Plus Sara made the trip up from Everett to spend time with us too. The girls did awesome during the long drives and we were able to even visit friends on the way home! They didn't have too many naps and definitely were not on our normal schedule, but they rolled with it and had a great time playing with their cousins.

Watching Sophia's softball game - her team won!

Benjamin and Lexi

Busy, Busy

I am really behind on blogging so I'll just dive right in to the current happenings and hope to update soon on what we have been up to.

The word "busy" describes these girls perfectly and I have a feeling that it going to last for quite a while. Lots of fun, too! They are tuckered out every night and go to sleep very quickly. Play hard, sleep hard. We are enjoying this long Memorial Day weekend with some family time and looking forward to all the extended family that is visiting next weekend for some birthday festivities.

 

Busy Girls from Natalie Shirzad on Vimeo.

11 Months

I cannot believe my babies will be toddlers in a few short weeks. Craziness. Oh, but they are giving us glimpses of what's coming. They climb on everything these days. We are trying our best to let them explore and learn with some semblance of caution.

• Both girls are still great eaters. They eat almost anything we give them and stopped eating baby food purees around 10 months old. Their favorite foods are cheese, strawberries, avocado and flavorful meats like pork tenderloin and roast lamb. They are down to two bottles each day - one when they wake up in the morning and a second one before bedtime. We plan to switch them to the sippy cups for those last two bottles in the next few weeks so wish us luck for a smooth transition! They are drinking about 12 - 16 oz of formula now. 
• Five teeth each (3 on the top, 2 on the bottom). 
• They are expert crawlers and also spend a lot of time cruising on furniture, windows, walls and anything else they can find. Both are standing for a few seconds on their own and will walk if we hold their hand, but still seem to be working on the balance for walking.
• The girls babble and squeal constantly. They are learning to verbalize if they want to get our attention and they say a few words, but not really with purpose yet. Of course they say "dada" all the time, but just crack up whenever I try to get them to say "mama". I guess they just think I'm hilarious. 
• Lexi is very social and knows how to wave and will hold her arms above her head when we ask, "how big is Lexi?" Zara enjoys watching, but doesn't play those games yet. Both girls love a good game of high-five or chase. 
• Pulling all the books off their bookshelf and playing with them is their favorite activity. They also spend a lot of time clinking blocks together. It is fun to watch them play together with them each holding a block and working together to hit the other's block. 
• Zara is a big lover of music. She has some great dance moves and shimmies in her high chair when we play music during dinner. As soon as the bass starts, she gives us this serious look and moves to the beat. I need to get it on video. 
• We get asked a lot if they have different personalities. Yes, they definitely do, but they are so close and really seem to be best friends already. Fights are pretty rare and I'm not sure if that will keep up. So far they seem to be very in-sync with each other.
• Both are still excellent sleepers - we feel so lucky that we can count on 12 hours without interruption every night and 2 solid naps each day. It really makes being their parents seem easy most days because we play and eat and then they go to sleep and we relax. They are definitely not perfect and it is still unnerving when they are both screaming at the same time, but it doesn't happen too often and we know at that point that they are hungry or tired (or both). 
• Our unofficial home weigh-in this week put them each at 21 pounds. They are wearing size 12-18 month clothes.

We have had very few warm days so far, but we did sneak outside last week to play (eat dirt). This has been a very cold, wet spring this year. It is taking a lot of patience, but we are hopeful that warm weather and long summer days are just around the corner. Our nanny, Lindsay spends two days each week with the girls. She is so great with them and helps with many chores around the house too. They usually go on walks to the park and she took them to the library for the first time last week. They loved it!