12/31/2009

Happy New Year

In the new year I see -

A move to a new house

New cars for mommy and daddy (well, mommy got hers yesterday)

A new job for daddy

A graduation for the big brother

And a year from now, all of celebrating New Year's together when the babies are home

On to a bigger and better 2010

Happy New Year!

12/25/2009

Merry Christmas

So it snowed. And snowed. And snowed. Now on top of the 10-12 inches we had from a storm 2 weeks ago, we have an additional foot or so. Being snowed in at home is not how I wanted to spend the twins first Christmas.

Luckily Chris had yesterday off and was able to go see them in the morning before it was really doing too much. That made me feel better since we didn't go see them Wednesday night because it had rained during the day and got pretty slick and yucky out at night. Today is 3 days since I've been to see them.

We've called the NICU's several times checking in on them, but its not the same. As least we know they are warm, safe and in good hands. The Bergan nurses even assured me that they were loving on Payton so we didn't need to worry about her and to stay home and be safe.

So even though its not how we wanted to spend it -

Merry 1st Christmas Parker and Payton

We can't wait till next year when you're home with us for Christmas

12/22/2009

Introductions

While the babies have met quite a few people over the last 10 weeks (yes that's right - 10 weeks in the hospitals), they are getting to finally look like little babies, and not quite so fragile and breakable.

Last night, Chris was exhausted and stayed home to go to bed early. Which happened to work out well because I was able to go meet one of my best girlfriends, Kristin, for dinner. We met at Village Inn. That seems to always be out place because we like the option to get pie if that's not the only reason we went there. :) We were able to sit and have some girl time. Complain about the traffic (wow!), Christmas shopping(why is it that we have to go to 100 different stores?), the snow coming (yuck!).

Afterwards we went to see both babies. After getting them changed and wrapped back up, Kristin got to sit with them and rock. They did really good and didn't set off any alarms at all. They sat, they talked, they were warned that Kristin's two girls want to dress them up like a pirate and a ballerina when they get home.

It was nice letting them have some time with a surrogate auntie. Now tonight I have to take up some tape to put the pictures Sydney and Ava made for them to decorate. :)

Characters

We have two little characters. Each with their own personality. Which, at only 36 weeks, is already shining through.

Payton is very demanding. She likes people to pay attention to her but not always touch her. She thinks it's funny to make her alarms beep sometimes. When she is done with something she is just done. She's very happy and loves to smile. She prefers things go her way (I predict Parker getting bossed around a lot in the near future).

Parker is much more laid back. He likes to just lay around and look at things. He loves to have his hands up by his face. He's pretty content on his own, but loves to be cuddled up. He's especially fond of daddy. Even for being quiet, he has no issue telling you that he's mad. And if he doesn't like something, he will just quietly take care of it on his own.

"Adversity does not build character, it reveals it."

12/14/2009

Aunt Bo

When I was little, I called Abby, BoBo. It just kind of stuck - only as she got older it got shortened to Bo. She's decided that she wants the babies to call her Aunt Bo. Friday night she and Parker had a special conversation and she got to hold Payton for the first time.




Baby Steps

Big Sister Payton - She has been working hard the past week. She is now out of her incubator and in a crib. Her feedings have been changed from a continuous amount to a bolus feeding. Every three hours she would get fed. They started by stringing her feeding over 2.5 hours, then kept decreasing by 30 minutes until she was getting fed over 30 minutes, once every 3 hours. Now she's doing some bottle feedings. It's a lot of work for such a little girl to try to remember to breath and suck and swallow. During last weeks Thursday night - Friday morning shift, they admitted 7 new babies to the NICU. They needed room so they moved Payton to the satellite NICU. It's down the hall from the other and for babies that need a little less direct care. She is currently sharing a room with a set of twins. She's such a big girl now. :)

Little Brother Parker - He is holding his own. He still has his strider a little from when he was intubated. But it's much better. Mostly, you can only hear it when he gets really mad. We're spending a lot of time sitting in the chair in his room looking around and talking about snow and his room when he gets home and the new car seat we bought for him. He's still on his continuous feedings. They want to make sure he has a little more time to heal from the strider before starting because any reflux could aggravate it. He's on a 2 week decreasing round of steroids to see if that helps. They had an ENT doctor come check him out last week to see if they need to do a scope on it. Dr. Lusk decided that they would wait until this round of steroids and see what happens. At that time they may decide to do a scope.

So we keep moving forward. And we keep having more and more time to snuggle with the cutest, more adorable babies on the planet (and I'm not biased). :)

12/08/2009

Getting ready for Christmas



Santa visited both NICUs over the weekend. It was set up by March of Dimes so that we could have their pictures taken. It was so nice to get to do something normal for our babies. They wore Christmas jammies from grandma. We had a good morning with them. :)










12/04/2009

Has a familiar ring to it...

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/25/health/25trau.html?_r=2

The Brady Bunch

No, not that one.

Bradycardia

Payton and Parker are both having issues with these. They have had mild ones that they are able to resolve on their own. They have had some that they need to be stimulated to come out of. They have had some that are bad enough that they need to be bagged to come out of it.

They've had lots of them, all kinds. Their heart rate drops, the oxygen saturation drops. There's really no sign that it's coming, just all of the sudden it is and the alarms are going off, nurses coming quickly into the room.

It's scary when they have them. Payton has had one that she needed to be stimulated to come out of while both of us were holding her. Parker has done it too (although it's been a little better since going back on the steroids). It helps a little that now we know what to do to try to help stimulate them when they have one.

Hopefully, as they keep getting bigger and their brain develops more they will remember what to be doing all the time. For now, we just keep trying to pay attention when they get out so they don't get away with it.

12/03/2009

The weekly update

The latest -

Payton is doing well. We've moved off the high flow nasal canula to a normal one. The high flow was irritating her nose and causing a bloody nose a little bit. And she doesn't need the high flow anymore. She's gone up on her feedings twice this week. She has her temperature probe off and is keeping herself warm inside her incubator (she's not quite ready to come out of there yet). She even got to wear clothes for the first time yesterday. She is loving time that we spend together in one of the chairs. She even has a new bow in her hair from one of her favorite nurses, Lynsie.

Parker has managed to stay off the vent. He is having a little bit of a rough time getting going and staying that way on his own though so this morning he started his second round of steriods to try to help him. He is still on the high flow nasal canula. He has gone up on his food this week too. They are going to start working with him to loose the temperature probe (one less wire). He is very alert now that he is feeling better. He even does really well when we do his bath at night.

These updates are subject at any time to change. But to night if you need us, we'll each be at one hospital snuggling with them. :)