Wordless Wednesday on a Friday *wink*

How'd they fit?!

Not much to say tonight. But I was looking through some pictures of the girls from when they were just a couple weeks old. And I came across this picture....

Two days before this picture was taken, Adalyn weighed 6lbs 3oz and Alivia weighed 6lbs 10oz - a grand total of 12lbs 13oz which was 2oz shy of their total birth weight.

I laid down on the recliner and Nate and I positioned the girls exactly like they were when they were residing in their mobile home. We couldn't for the life of us figure out how they fit!! I was pushing feet down to keep them at about the level of my ribs (where they would've run out of room if they were still in my belly), yet their feet were still too high. And well, Addi's head probably would've been fully birthed in the position she's at.

Hmmm. So yeah...how'd they fit?!

A sleep update

Yeah, so we haven't had anymore nights where they slept straight through the night. I knew it was too good to be true, so I didn't even get my hopes up. Good thing! But it hasn't been terrible either. In fact, I need to applaud little Miss Alivia because she has slept through the night the past 5 nights. She always has been our better sleeper. In the last 3 of 5 nights, Adalyn has been up twice. And the other two nights she was up once. We keep saying that one of these days she'll realize that sleep really is a good thing!

Here are some pictures of our little Packers fans. Adalyn was wearing Aaron Kampman's jersey and Alivia was going old school by supporting Frank Winters.

And on a little side note...someone tried to kill the possessed little puppy toy. This puppy starts singing songs at random times during the day when no one touches it or is even around it. Apparently one of the girls got sick of its shenanigans. I'm not sure which one is responsible, but I'd sure like to know!! Because I walked into the living room to see this by the toy box....

Vacation pics

The whole crew in Miami the night before we got on the ship.

The water in CocoCay

Our ship with the boats that took us to the island
Nassau, Bahamas

Nate standing in front of The Majesty of the Seas in Nassau

It was a little breezy on the pool deck at night!!

A view of the pool deck at night

The maze of stairs inside the ship

It's been a tooth explosion!!!

So in the last 4 weeks, we've gained 10 new teeth! And actually, in just the past 2 weeks, the girls got 6 molars! Holy cats! That's a lot of teeth in a short amount of time. Adalyn was the lucky recipient of 7 new teeth in the past month whereas Alivia just got her 3 molars. So the total tooth count is now up to 22 - eleven for each baby girl. Just one month ago we had been stuck at a total of twelve teeth for a few months. And then they just started coming, bing, bam, boom!

The odd thing is that they've been sleeping better than ever! Knock on wood. Knock on wood REALLY hard. In fact, just last night they finally slept through the night. What?! Are these seriously my children? I go on vacation, come home, and they're sleeping well? For several months now, if one of them would sleep through the night (which by the way, didn't happen all that often), the other one would inevitably get up at least once if not two or three times. But last night, they finally collaborated their efforts!! We'll see what tonight brings.

Man, I remember blogging back in September about a night we had where they were up a combined 8 times, followed by 4 times and then 5 times! And here we are, a restful night of sleep for everyone in the house. But like I said, we'll see if it continues. Our typical night has usually involved getting up an average of twice. Either twice with one baby or once with both of them...sometimes just once with one of the girls. And honestly? I can live with that. It's not ideal, but it's such a far cry from where we were just a couple months ago that I'll take it!!

Our vacation was wonderful. The ship was absolutely beautiful. The ocean was amazing. And the food was out-of-this-world-yummy!!! Because of the yummy food, Nate and I promptly began a diet upon returning home! Yikes. Overall, we had an absolute blast. Yes, it was tough leaving the girls, but the smiles on their faces when we came back home were absolutely priceless. I have some pictures to share but I need to download them first! However, I work really early tomorrow morning so I best be getting to bed! Good night.

Bye-bye for now

We're leaving early tomorrow morning for our cruise. I'm so excited but I'm so nervous about missing the girls too much to really, fully enjoy myself. I know it'll be good for Nate and I to re-establish ourselves as husband and wife instead of just mom and dad. But man, it's going to be hard saying goodbye to my precious little peanuts!!

We fly in to Miami tomorrow. We get on the ship on Friday and our first stop will be Saturday morning in Cococay, Bahamas. Sunday morning we'll arrive at Nassau, Bahamas. And then Monday morning we'll be be back in Miami and flying back home that afternoon. So we're only going to be gone for 4 nights. I know that it's about time Nate and I do something together.

While packing tonight for the trip, I started thinking about the last big trip we took. We went to Disney back in May 2008. I was 16 weeks pregnant with the girls and my "morning sickness" had luckily just disappeared a few days before we left. I remember being in the airport walking to our gate and I told Nate that I was going to pass out (not the only time that trip that I felt that way!! click here for reference). So what does he do?? He summoned one of those little golf cart drivers and had the guy drive us to our gate!! Nate thought it was great and was waving at everyone as we passed them. For those of you that know him, you can definitely see him doing this. Me, on the other hand, I was so embarrassed! If only I had actually *looked* pregnant while getting this ride. Even being 16 weeks with twins, I still didn't really have a belly. So I just felt dumb. But that breeze in my face sure made me feel so much better!!

Let's hope I don't have any issues walking to my gate this year!!! Haha.

Fun with hats

The girls absolutely despise wearing their OWN winter hats, but apparently they like mommy's fuzzy hat. Nate took these pictures while I was at work the other day. They sure look like they had loads of fun!!

Halloween a little late

We didn't do much for Halloween this year. We just stayed at the house and handed out candy to the kids. The girls really enjoyed watching all the people come to the door. We didn't splurge this year and get the girls costumes. We knew we wouldn't be going anywhere, so there really wasn't a need for costumes. But we are full-heartedly looking forward to next year when we'll take the girls out Trick or Treating for the first time!

Meanwhile, I just tried to snap some photos of the girls in their Halloweeen outfits. Can I tell you that pictures are getting harder and harder to come by? Getting a good picture of just one of the girls is hard enough. But getting both of them in a picture? Almost impossible. They move...a lot. By the time you position one baby and reach for the second, the first baby girl is already gone. Grrr. But I try nonetheless!! That's the go-getter in me. Ha! Just kidding.

Ummm, an interesting little story. Alivia is afraid of pumpkins. In fact, she is afraid of anything that is big, round, and rolls. We actually noticed this a couple months ago when Adalyn decided to push our yoga ball out into the living room. I've never seen a baby crawl so fast to get away and then cry so hard. Out of curiosity, I brought a couple other balls into the house. Basketball? Afraid. (not good by the way, as mommy wants them to be basketball players!!!) Soccer ball? Afraid, but not terrifyingly so. Softball? She's ok with it. So anything larger than a softball produces high anxiety in my poor little girl. I can just see it now...she's going to be on the Maury Povich show because of an odd phobia of things that are big, round and roll. Remind me to DVR that.

Anyway, she was fine with the pumpkin for all of 10 seconds before Adalyn gave it a good push. Once Alivia realized we've got another roller on our hands, she wouldn't have anything to do with it! Though Nate and I put her next to it a few hours after the fact hoping to snap a couple quick pictures. She lasted for about a minute. Then she must've remembered she has a phobia. So yeah, there aren't really any pictures of Alivia with the pumpkin! Good thing I didn't bring ALL of them into the house!

Adalyn absolutely loved the pumpkin.

This is about as close as Alivia would get.

Little stinker screamed at me and then gave me this face.

Addi's trying to eat the pumpkin.

All smiles since the pumpkin is nowhere in sight!

These are the best pictures I could get of them together! I know, pathetic.

Birth Story Part 3 (final part!)

We arrived in the triage room at 11:15pm. They hooked me up to the monitors and sure enough, I was contracting every 2 minutes. Within a few minutes, they had confirmed that my water definitely did break and they moved me over to a labor room. Oh, and by the way, I was still just 3cm. Good grief!

By 1:15am I had an epidural and was feeling pretty good. It didn't take fully but it definitely took the edge off. So at 2am the nurse checked me and I had progressed to 5cm. Man, was I relieved! I was seriously beginning to wonder if I would ever move beyond that dreaded 3cm!! I think I drifted in and out of sleep for the next couple of hours. I know my parents arrived at the hospital around 2 o'clock. I gave my dad a big hug because he had to leave right away. He was flying out to Cleveland in just a few hours but wanted to drop my mom off. So he made the hour and a half drive to drop her off, give me a kiss, then turned right back around to catch his flight.

Meanwhile, Nate took mom back to our house so she could relax there until she got "the phone call." At 5:30am, the new nurse checked me and said I was 8cm. So I called mom to let her know that I was probably a couple hours away from pushing. Just minutes after the nurse checked me, I could tell that my epidural had worn off. So she got the anesthesiologist in to hang a new bag. And right after that, I told her that I was feeling a TON of pressure! So at 6am, she checked me yet again and I was ready to have some babies!! Then all of a sudden it got put on hold because they wanted to make sure they were fully set up for a twin delivery. Even with an epidural, it was really hard not to push in those 10 minutes!

Finally at 6:10am we were ready to go! I'm not sure why, but I never did get moved to the operating room, which completely surprised me!! Dr L said that I would be delivering there just in case they had to do an emergency C-section on the second baby, so I had totally prepared myself for having to deliver under fluorescent lights. Anyway, after 55 minutes of pushing, Baby A was born at 7:05am, weighing 6 pounds even and 19 inches long. The nurse turned to Nate and said “daddy, do you know what it is?” And he proudly announced that we had a baby girl, Miss Adalyn Jean!

The OB then checked to see where Baby B was. He could feel the head, but the baby was still quite high. So instead of making me push, he let me labor through a few contractions so the head could naturally come down. Once the baby was further down, he broke the water. I don’t know exactly what time I started to push with Baby B, but it wasn't long and Baby B was born at 7:33am, weighing 6 pounds 15 ounces and was 20 ¼ inches long. The nurse again asked Nate “daddy, do you know what it is?” After a bit of hesitation, he excitedly proclaimed that it was another girl, Miss Alivia Mae!!

I suffered from post partum hemorrhage that they gave me some meds for and watched me very closely for. But I didn't care. I was too entranced in these two little lives that I was holding in my arms. I didn't know I could love something/someone so deeply until I looked into their eyes and they stared right back at me. My two little girls, who I fought so hard to protect, were here and they were healthy. And I was completely oblivious to anything else going on around me.

Birth Story Part 2

So...starting from where I left off, we got home early Saturday morning. Probably around 2am or so. And I can honestly say that I have absolutely no recollection of what I did with myself the rest of the day. I know I slept for a bit right when we got home. But other than that, I have no idea. Nate said we went for a walk that afternoon, but I don't remember it.

Anyway, I woke up early Sunday morning (October 12th) and definitely felt "different." By about 10-11am, I was experiencing such bad back pain. For those who know me well, you know that I RARELY miss a Packer game. Sundays are reserved for football! So I was laying on the couch trying to watch the game, but I never would've been able to tell you who the Packers were playing or who was winning because I was zoning out (by the way, they were playing the Seakhawks and they won - I was informed after the fact!!).

I was so restless. I was on the couch with a heating pad on my back. Then I was waddling around the house. Then I was leaning over the bed. Then back to the couch, etc. Anything I could do to alleviate some of the pain in my back. At one point, Nate followed me into the bedroom and dug his thumbs into my lower back trying to provide counter pressure. It helped, but the minute he stopped, the pain was back. All this time, I'm thinking that I threw my back out. Let's face it, I had just been taken off bedrest and I was huge. So of course in my head, I moved the wrong way and boom...instant back pain. I NEVER associated the pain with early labor. In fact, I remember crying that day thinking that I had to deal with this pain for another week until I was induced. Because I still didn't think the babies would come on their own.

Fast forward to 5:00 that night. I again decided to sit in the tub. After less than an hour, I got really uncomfortable (again, still very restless). So I got out of the tub. I'm not sure what I did the next couple of hours. I was zoning out again. Common theme the past 48-72 hours. At 8:30pm, I thought "the heck with it, I'm taking an Ambien and some Tylenol and I'm going to get a good night of sleep so I can start the day off better tomorrow." I thought for sure some sleep would make me better able to cope with the pain both physically and mentally.

By 10:30, I still wasn't sleeping, so I decided to go to the bathroom even though I really didn't feel like I had to. God knows I didn't want to *just* fall asleep only to be awakened by my squished pregnancy bladder. Wouldn't ya know it, I felt a pop!! But no fluid. And then I remembered Dr L telling me that I may not be able to tell if my water breaks because "Baby A" was so low and might act like a cork. Hmmm. What to do. So I sat there. 10 minutes passed and I was just about to go back to bed. Instead, I stood up, sat down, stood up, sat down, etc. Anything I could do to see if little Baby A might moves its head just a bit. Nothing. And just as I was about to give up, I felt a VERY discernible pop with just the smallest bit of fluid.

So I went to wake up Nate around 10:45pm and told him that I *think* my water broke. He immediately jumped up and asked if he had time to take a shower. I told him it was fine because I wasn't in any pain (well, I was in pain, just not any more pain then I had been in all day!!). We left the house at 11:00 and by the time we were checking in, I was really regretting letting him take that shower! The contractions had hit hard.

Birth Story Part 1

All of my other hospital admissions are well documented throughout the blog, so I figured that I should probably start at the beginning and tell you all about my "false labor" experience before you get to hear about the real deal.

On Friday, October 10th, I went to my scheduled appt with Dr L at 11:15am. As always, she did an ultrasound to check the babies' heartbeats and their position. And like they had been for several weeks, both remained head down. She then checked to see how dilated I was and I had progressed from 2cm a few days earlier to a good 3cm.

After the appt, Nate and I went to the mall to do a bit of walking. I decided that I wanted a smoothie from Orange Julius because nothing else seemed remotely good. I was actually kind of sick to my stomach. As we were there waiting in line, my back started aching pretty badly, which seemed to only intensify my upset stomach. I asked Nate if he would wait in line while I made the slow walk to the car. By the time I got to the car (at the opposite end of the mall), Nate had caught up to me!! Yeah, I really didn't and couldn't walk all that fast.

Anyway, we went home and I put a heating pad on my back. By about 5pm I decided to take a nice long soak in the bath tub to relieve some of the pressure in my lower back and hips. I think I must've sat in there for at least a couple hours. By 8pm, I was really wondering if we should be going in or not. After somewhat of a lengthy discussion, we decided to head to the hospital. We got there around 9:30pm Friday night.

Upon arrival, they hooked me up to the monitors and I was contracting very regularly at 3 minutes apart. But just like during most of my pregnancy, some I felt quite strongly and some I didn't...or at least they weren't terribly painful. I guess I was experiencing so much constant pressure in my back that it was hard to really tell that there were rhythmic contractions happening! They had also checked me right when we arrived and I was still 3cm. Ugh. So we sat in the room and watched some TV for the next two hours and I was still contracting every 3 minutes. After those two hours passed they checked me again. Still 3cm. Grr.

The nurses suggested that I walk for a couple of hours to see if the contractions would pick up and become stronger. Do you know how hard it is for someone who is heavily pregnant and just got off 2 1/2 months of bedrest to walk for two hours?! But we did. I figured if all else fails, I'm going to try to jiggle them loose!! When my two hours were up (by now it was 1:30am the morning of Oct 11), Dr L had just arrived on the floor to do a delivery. So the nurses had her come in to check me. And you know what? Still 3cm.

My first thought was "you've got to be kidding me!!" I'm not sure how, but somehow I was able to laugh and I asked Dr L what time I should be checking in for my induction on Oct 18th. Because at that point I was fully convinced that these babies, who wanted to make an entrance far too soon, were not going to come out without a little medical intervention.

Since I was still contracting every 3 minutes, they gave us the option to stay for a while too see what would happen or to go home. Nate and I opted to go home. The hospital beds were too dang uncomfortable for me to stay there any longer than I needed to. I preferred the comfort of my nice soft couch....

Poor babies

To sum it up, today stunk.

You see, last night it suddenly dawned on me that the day the girls' 12 month well baby visit was rescheduled for, Nate and I aren't going to be on dry land!! Their appt had gotten rescheduled for November 13th. And I'm not exactly sure how, but I completely forgot (until last night!) that we'll be on a cruise! Yeah, I don't know how that slipped my mind. Bad mommy.

Anyway, so I called the office as soon as they opened up this morning. I knew Dr K would be booking out into December already, so I asked if she happened to have any cancellations sometime soon and told them that I would be ok with bringing the girls in at separate times to get their shots, etc. Turns out, she's out of the office this week. But they said that another doctor was in the clinic today (she only works 2-3 days a month due to having young kids at home) and she would be able to see both of the girls at the same time. I used to work with this doctor's husband when I worked on 7th floor at the hospital, so I felt pretty comfortable going to see her.

Unfortunately, since it was rescheduled at the last minute, Nate couldn't go with. So I had to take the girls by myself. And can I say that it was the most heartbreaking thing I've had to do in a looong time. Poor babies received six shots each!! SIX!! Three stabs to each thigh. I wanted to cry right along with them. They've never received so many shots at one time...the most they've ever had was 3. So this was traumatic - for both babies and mommy. Do you know how hard it is to console two inconsolable babies at one time? They tore my heart out.

In better news though, they are doing absolutely wonderful as far as development goes. Dr T was very pleased with their progress and said that they look fantastic (well THAT we already knew!! haha) And since the girls are now sleeping, I'm headed to bed as well. Today wore us all out.

Happy Birthday x2

The day started with the girls deciding that they would wake up at the crack of dawn. Adalyn was up by 4:45am and refused to go back down. So by 5:30 I decided to stop fighting with her and flipped on the lights so she could play. Shortly thereafter, Alivia was awake.

At 7:05am, I sang Happy Birthday to Addi, told her how much mommy and daddy and lots of other people love her, gave her a good squeeze and then she decided she was ready for bed! She was back in her crib within 15 minutes. Then at 7:33am, I repeated the process with Livi. And wouldn't ya know it, the little stinker was also ready for bed within minutes! I came to the conclusion that the girls are just like their mom and wanted to be wide awake for when they made their grand entrance into this world! As a kid, I always used to set my alarm for 11:56pm so that I would know exactly when I was born. I guess I can't fault their early morning rising if they wanted to be awake for the big event!

And for their birthday, they got to make a trip to the doctor's office to get weighed! Yay! Their 12 month appt got bumped until 13 months, but me being the Type A Personality that I am, I needed to have accurate weights at one year for their baby books! Luckily, the nurses in Dr K's office were very understanding of these "big milestones" (their words, not mine) and said I could come in for a weight check. Fantastic!

And drumroll please......

Adalyn was 19lbs 8oz - placing her at the 27th percentile

Alivia was 19lbs 10oz - placing her at the 29th percentile

Ironically, both girls gained exactly 2 pounds since their 9 month appt.

At 7:05am, this precious baby girl entered the world.

Here she is today on her first birthday.

And at 7:33am, this sweet baby girl entered the world.

And here she is today on her first birthday.

Both girls sleeping peacefully at 1 day old. (Livi left, Addi right)

And both girls clapping because today they turned ONE!

P.S. For those of you who don't know, in Adalyn's newborn picture, she's just wearing a heart rate monitor that they put on every baby right at birth. Both girls were as healthy as can be. They didn't even need any supplemental oxygen!

1st birthday party has come and gone

The party was on Sunday the 4th (ironically, the same day I was celebrating last year because that's the day I was taken off bedrest!) and the girls did so well. I was a little nervous that they'd skip their afternoon nap because of all the activity and then it would be downhill from there. But they surprised everyone! They showed us that they were getting tired, so I put them down without high hopes that it would actually work and they stayed down! In fact, it was getting to the point where we wanted to do gifts and cake but we were missing the guests of honor. So everyone was contemplating waking them up!

Anyway, the girls were really mesmerized by all the people and activity. They didn't quite grasp the concept of opening up their gifts, so Nate and I had to help out a little bit. But they had fun watching!

When it came time for cake, I thought for sure that Adalyn would dig right in and Alivia wouldn't even touch it. She tends to look at me like I have 5 heads whenever I put something new on her tray. So I really didn't expect her to slam her hand right in the middle of it! After she stuck her hand to her head, I think she was a little confused as to why everyone was laughing so hard because she just seemed frozen...she didn't move her hand for what seemed like 5 minutes! (I'm sure it was much shorter than that, maybe like 2-3?)

And then my little Adalyn who loves to splash and kick and cause chaos in the tub just pinched at the cake. It was almost like she was meticulously picking it apart. Taking off one sprinkle here, a bit of frosting there, back for one more sprinkle, etc. I guess it just goes to show that kids are totally unpredictable!

Oh, and I want to give a little shout out to my sister-in-law, Chelsea, for making the cakes for the girls! Sorry they didn't eat more of them (honestly, I'm not sure Alivia ate any!), but we really did appreciate you doing that for us. They turned out wonderfully, so thank you! Of course, thanks to everyone else who came to the party and helped celebrate the girls first year of life. The girls really loved your company...and the toys and clothes too!!

Just some pictures of the party

I'll write more about the girls' birthday party later, but I've been short on time. So I just want to post some quick pictures.

The girls' Dairy Queen cake

Getting a family picture with their hats on was almost impossible!

Alivia slammed her hand in the cake...

And then proceeded to stick it to her head!

Adalyn was a little more dainty

We got a wagon!

Of course we had to test it out right away...we like it!


The girls having fun on their new ponies and wearing their new pajamas!