The Banks Family: Quarter birthday

Teagan is now 3 months old and she is turning out to be quite the talker. She makes lots of squeals and coos. She kicks her feet a lot and likes to suck on the side of her hand or my arm. She started spitting up more and drooling a bit too, so we've had to pull out the bibs. She had her first cold recently, which luckily was mild, but all the same, it sure is irritating for a baby to not be able to breathe through her nose. We're not used to fussy babies, so it was very hard to listen to all the crying and frustrating to not be able to take away her discomfort (or mine!)

Claudia is super into writing right now and it's really clicked that letters make words and words make stories. So she wants me to spell words for her to write and she has been writing her own mini-books. She tends to write her words mirror image (backwards), so we will keep working on the correct orientation. She likes to help us with shopping by writing her own grocery list and referring to it while we're at the shop to make sure we get everything.

We all had a great Christmas and New Year's celebration. We started with a quiet Christmas Eve of just us, and on Christmas Day my parents hosted a lovely party for everyone. Then for our New Year's, us, Neely & Emilio, and my parents all went out to Alta Lake. Glen & I got to go skiing at Loup Loup twice. It was cold, sunny, and no wind. Absolutely perfect. We had so much fun. There was also over a foot of dry snow on the golf course, so Claudia got to go sledding for the first time. She also made snow angels and a snowman.

Right after the holidays, my grandparents (my mom's parents) have had some health setbacks. Grandma fell and although she didn't break anything, she was still in pain and needed a lot of assistance so she moved in with my parents to recover. Since she's my Grandpa's primary caretaker, they decided it was time to move Grandpa into a dementia special care facility. It's a quality place and he's doing quite well there, but of course it's hugely sad for everyone. After Grandpa got settled, then Grandma started to get disoriented and slur her speech, and it was discovered she had acute hyponatremia (low blood sodium) and needed to be hospitalized for a few days. It's a potentially very serious condition, but thankfully easily treated with electrolyte replacement if caught in time. They tracked it back to a blood pressure medicine she had just started. So it's been a very stressful and emotionally challenging time for everyone involved, especially my mom. Grandma is currently living with my parents because she still requires a lot of care.

Christmas Eve at home.