little trooper

Drew had his 15-month checkup today. The poor thing had more encounters with needles than he probably cared to have. His iron has been a little low at his past two visits. So today, along with his normal vaccines, he got his finger pricked to test his iron count again. Our doctor came back a few minutes later saying that it's lower now than it was at 12 months. It's still on the borderline and not horrible, but she told us to go ahead and get bloodwork done at a lab, just to try to see what's going on.

So after naps today, we went to the lab. I've never had good experiences with LabCorp (I went while I was pregnant with Grant and had long waits each time). This was a new place (CPL), and much nicer.....there was nobody else there, so we went straight to the back. The lady drew blood from his arm, just like for an adult (I assumed that they might do it differently for babies....not sure why!). I held him and he just stared at his arm as she poked the needle into it....and didn't cry until a few seconds later, when she moved it around to find the vein. He cried until it was over, but thankfully it only took about 30 seconds to fill up both vials. Then a minute later, he and Grant were running up and down the aisle and he acted like nothing had even happened.

Tonight before I put Drew's pajamas on, Grant pulled one of the band-aids off of his leg (he had one shot in each leg this morning). Drew brought the band-aid to Dean, fussing a little bit. Dean realized that Drew wanted him to put it back on! After Dean stuck it back on, Drew started walking around proudly again.....I guess he thinks a band-aid makes him a big boy. Later Dean traded it with a spider-man one. He was so proud of it!

Drew is still very small, in terms of weight. He only weighs 23 lbs (25th percentile). His height supposedly puts him in the 65th percentile, but I'm not sure I believe that. His 12-month clothes mostly still fit (except a few pants), and Grant had long outgrown 12-mo clothes by this point. Drew still seems little to me! All of his four molars have just poked through, so the doctor asked if he's been especially fussy. He hasn't! With all of the issues we have, at least I am very thankful that they both handle teething remarkably well!

Here are a few band-aid pictures from tonight:
Pointing it out to me....

Pointing it out to Daddy: