Neola turned 21 months back on February 12. I was shocked last night when I googled the last update I had posted for Neola and could only find one for her at 13-14 months! I did write this post about her life in the spica cast for hip dysplasia after that, from when she was 15-16 months. But I still have a lot to catch up on! #fourthchild
Size
Due to Neola getting her last immunizations late and then being in a spica cast, Neola just got her 18-month immunizations and well-child check yesterday. So at 21 months, she weighs 26 lb 3 oz (74%) and is 2′ 10.5″ tall (87%), with a head circumference of 19.09″ (89%). She has definitely seemed to be taller than our other kids at this age, so these measurements are not surprising!
She is wearing all 2T clothing, and some 3T shirts/dresses. She wears size 6 shoes, and size 5 diapers.
Sleeping
Oy. This is still such a challenge. Neola has always wanted to be held for naps, even when she was a baby. But she was actually a decent night sleeper until about a year ago, when we were in Florida for the month of February. Our last 3-4 nights there, she started waking up a ton, so I pulled her into bed with me. And that was the beginning of the end. In hindsight, I should’ve just muscled through those rough nights, keeping her in her pack n play as much as she would be. (Just like I should’ve muscled through rough nights with Corbin at that age without resorting to letting him play games on my phone, which created a major problem for a few years). But here we are.
Since last February, I have been sleeping on a mattress on the floor in Neola’s room (with her on her crib mattress on the floor). It actually worked well for the time that she was in a spica cast and rhino brace for hip dysplasia, but now, I am over it. I want need her to start sleeping better, and napping on her own. I have been resistant to making changes, mostly because I get into a groove and I really dislike making changes. It feels like such a herculean effort, especially when I am managing so many different things already. But I need to keep the end goal in mind. Life will be so much easier and manageable in the long run if/when Neola starts napping and sleeping on her own.
The way things go right now, though, are this: Neola usually wakes up for the day between 6:30 and 7:30. She typically only takes one nap for 1.5-2 hours, usually starting between 11 and 1 (which I know is a big range — poor girl is at the mercy of the family’s schedule!) She also falls asleep in the car fairly easily (sometimes she just screams, but more often, she just falls asleep), so that means some days, she takes a short morning nap, or a late afternoon nap, and then her bedtime is messed up. It actually happens about once a week. She ends up staying up after the other kids, and motors around playing on her own contentedly while I fold laundry. That’s the only time I ever get laundry folded! On a normal night, though, she goes to bed between 7:30 and 8:30.
What do I do while I am holding her for her naps? I listen to podcasts, read ebooks on my phone, research things, etc. It’s actually a pretty enjoyable time, and I do appreciate the way it forces me to take a break. But the challenge is that it makes it harder to get school done with the girls (especially on the days that Corbin is home instead of at preschool).
Eating
Neola can be a finicky eater, and I often feel like she doesn’t eat what I give her, but I think part of that is that 1) she’s so busy that she doesn’t often want to sit at the table to eat and 2) we often feed her in the car on the way somewhere. Neola is at the age where she hates getting into her carseat (she would much rather play in the car!), so I often bribe distract her with a treat to get her in her carseat with minimal drama.
Neola’s favorite foods (the ones she will eat the most consistently) are: applesauce, goldfish, mac & cheese, raisins, and candy. Other foods that she usually likes (but not always) are: cheese, bananas, berries, bacon, summer sausage, yogurt, and celery or carrots with dip. Like many kids, she loves dipping her food in either ranch or ketchup. Dip makes all things better.
Neola is not afraid to use her front teeth to take bites (Corbin hated doing that, so he always wanted his food cut up at this age). She will rip off a bite of a meat stick or carrot like it’s no big deal!
Development
Because of being in a cast and rhino brace for hip dysplasia, Neola didn’t start walking until she was about 19 months old. She was able to crawl around for 10-15 minutes at a time in her spica cast, but it was hard work. Once she got into the rhino brace, it was only a day or two before she was crawling around. She was also able to stand, sit, and climb the stairs in the rhino brace. She was much happier with the increased mobility (in the cast, she often got bored and whiny). She had to wear the rhino brace day and night for 12 weeks. (As I write that, I am shocked that we survived!! 6 weeks in a cast, and 12 weeks in a brace.) By the end of her time in the rhino brace, she was even taking a few steps in it. So once she was cleared to not wear it during the day, it was only a day or two before she was walking.
She is supposed to still be wearing the rhino brace for ~12 hours a day (at night). We had her most recent hip dysplasia appointment right before Christmas, and she was still wearing the brace at night until about the second week of January. But she progressively got less and less tolerant of it. At first, I started taking the brace off around 5 AM, so that Neola would sleep in later. Then she started waking up an hour after going to bed, upset that she was in the brace, so I would take it off. Finally, she started screaming when I even tried putting her in the brace at bedtime, so we just had to stop it. She gets another x-ray at the end of March, so praying we’ll still get good news.
Her treatment for hip dysplasia has actually gone really well, though. When she had her first surgery, we were pleasantly surprised (considering her age) that she was able to have a closed reduction (no incision). After six weeks in a cast, her femur ball stayed in the hip socket well enough that she didn’t need to be recasted (as we been planning), but could go straight into a rhino brace. All of her x-rays since then have shown progress, albeit slow. Mainly what her doctor is looking for now is for the hip socket to grow deeper, to better match her other hip socket (that didn’t have dysplasia).
Besides Neola having a wider-than-normal gait, looking at her now, you would never know that she had been treated for hip dysplasia. She is a busy, active, rough-and-tumble toddler! She loves being in the mix, often instigating roughhousing and wrestling. In the past 3-4 months (and especially since she started walking), Neola and Corbin have really started playing together. Overall, Corbin is good at toning down his play to Neola’s level, though he does occasionally make her cry. Just recently, Corbin and Neola were playing “Alligator” where Neola would run around while Corbin “chased” her making alligator noises. It cracked Neola up.
Neola also gets a lot of attention from Emma and Annabelle, but does not like being coddled, cuddled, or babied. She is an independent little girl!
Things Neola loves:
- Carrying/hugging baby dolls, most often several at once. “Baaybeeee,” she says in her adorable little voice.
- Pushing/pulling around a laundry basket, wagon, stroller, sled, or shopping cart full of various things. Emptying the things out one by one, only to turn right around and put them back in one by one.
- Taking baths or playing in water in the sink or in a bowl on the counter
- Climbing onto the kitchen table or counter
- Coloring with markers and pens
Playing withEating playdough
- Being in the mix with her siblings
Things Neola has done since her last post:
Celebrated her 2nd Christmas
Gone sledding & snowmobiling
Played in the leaves, hiked in the woods (on Mommy’s back), and had a couple of winter campfires
Went to the Great Wolf Lodge waterpark (she did well overall) and Otter Cove Children’s Museum in Fergus Falls
Dressed up like a ballerina for Halloween and playing games at Big J’s Pizza Arcade
Words that Neola knows and says right now are: Mommy, Daddy, Ba (ball or sheep sound), Baby, Help (when she wants to help with laundry), See (when she wants to be lifted up to look outside), Guys (referring to Emma, Annabelle, and/or Corbin), Nana (banana), Side (when she wants to go outside). She also says “Yeah!” a lot in response to different questions like “Do you want to get down?” or “Do you want to go have a snack?” Probably the thing she says the most often though is “Daddy Shy” or Daddy Tie” — Travis and I debate whether it’s Shy or Tie at the end — or “Mommy Shy/Tie”. So much so that we’ve started calling her Buschky Shy or Buschky Tie. Her nickname started off as Babushka, then morphed into Buschky. We also call her Ba-bee (short “a” as in cat).
And that’s Neola at 21 months!
Hopefully I’ll post another update on her around the time she turns 2 (on May 12)!
Life, Really Blog 