February Recap

February started off with a bang with Carter turning 20 months and my baby shower for Madeline and Molly! Emily was in town for the weekend and I was able to get out of the house, put on real clothes, and visit with a lot of people I had not seen for awhile at the shower.  We also got a lot of things taken care of at home with Emily's help.  

The rest of the beginning of the month was pretty low-key as I was still on bed rest.  Matt went out of town one weekend for work so Carter and I spent the weekend at PawPaw and Nana's.  

I started swelling around the middle of the month

We purchased some little girls things...and 2 of everything! 

After my 31-week OB appointment I started going into the hospital for NST and monitoring 

We tried to take it easy

Cooper turned 8 years old

On February 21, 2014 Madeline Kate and Molly Ann were born! We spent the next 4 days in the hospital. 

Carter met his sisters via FaceTime

Once we were discharged from the hospital we split up the rest of our time at home and at the NICU.  We are blessed with a ton of family surrounding us so we were able to spend as much time up at the hospital as we wanted to while someone watched Carter for us.  

We snuggled babies everyday

I pumped and pumped and pumped some more

And the girls turned one week old! 

It was the slowest and quickest month of my life.  I wanted to girls to be March babies (like their mama!) but God had other plans for them.  I'm thankful they are here safe and healthy and everything is okay with me.  I'm thankful I had such a great doctor looking out for me all month.  And I'm thankful for two of the strongest little girls I know! 

32 Weeks

February 18, 2014

Pregnancy Highlights:

How far along: 32 weeks

Size of babies: squash

Genders: girls! Madeline and Molly Ann!   

Weight gain: 25 pounds
Belly growth: 12 inches 

Movement: movement is starting to slow as they are losing any space to move around 

Sleep: none, zero, zilch...a few cat naps here and there
Stretch Marks: none yet

Symptoms: intense itching, heartburn, restless leg, insomnia, rib pain...just general uncomfortableness

Cravings: water, ice cream or anything cold
Belly button: further and further out
What I miss: sleep

Best moment this week: checking a few more things off of our To Do list

Best husband moment/quote: "You take the girls, I'll take Carter...deal?"
Notes: not only do I have cholestasis (again), but I also have symptoms of pre-eclampsia.  This is really scary since I developed HELLP syndrome with Carter so we are keeping a close eye on things.  They ran labs and did monitoring Thursday, Friday and Monday.  I will go back again on Thursday and we will possibly be meeting our little girls soon! 

Comparison picture to 32 weeks with Carter:

31 Weeks

February 11, 2014

Pregnancy Highlights:

How far along: 31 weeks

Size of babies: pineapples...yum! 

Genders: girls! Madeline and Molly Ann!   

Weight gain: 24 pounds
Belly growth: 11 inches 

Movement: still getting lots of kicks from Madeline, but also some pushing from Molly.  

Sleep: none
Stretch Marks: nope

Symptoms: intense itching, heartburn, restless leg, insomnia, rib pain

Cravings: water
Belly button: further and further out
What I miss: sleep

Best moment this week: making more progress on the nursery and starting to feel "ready"

Best husband moment/quote: "Do they really need ALL of these clothes?"
Notes: looks like my cholestasis is back...not fun

Comparison picture to 31 weeks with Carter:

30 Weeks

February 4, 2014

Pregnancy Highlights:

How far along: 30 weeks

Size of babies: cucumbers

Genders: girls! Madeline and Molly Ann!   

Weight gain: 22 pounds
Belly growth: 11 inches 

Movement: lots of hiccups this week, especially from Madeline

Sleep: yuck
Stretch Marks: nope

Symptoms: everything hurts...basically complete misery

Cravings: nothing sounds good anymore
Belly button: further and further out
What I miss: doing anything without pain, sleeping, playing with Carter

Best moment this week: my baby shower on Saturday! M&M were spoiled! 

Best husband moment/quote: "I'll rub your back if you will rub mine."
Notes: Madeline was 3 pounds 5 ounces and Molly was 3 pounds at our ultrasound yesterday.  And the tech said they both have hair! 

Comparison picture to 30 weeks with Carter:

Madeline and Molly's Baby Shower

Almost as soon as we found out we were expecting twin girls talks of a baby shower began.  I was hesitant to have a real baby shower since they are typically reserved for your first child.  And I didn't want people to feel like they had to bring two gifts instead of one.  I went back and forth over the idea, and finally my mom suggested we have an "open house" type shower: guests bring their gifts unwrapped to display and come and go as they please.  No shower games, no opening of the gifts...just a small celebration of the babies (and mama!)

Once I realized how much stuff we would actually still need to purchase, this idea of a "open house" shower really seemed perfect.  And after I got put on bed rest I really needed something like this where I could sit and greet guests but still be present at my own shower.  Plus bringing gifts unwrapped helped me not have to bend and stretch as much.

When people asked me what we needed I always replied "diapers!"  It's not the most glamorous gift to give or receive, but it honestly was our biggest "need."  We ended up receiving 2, 226 diapers...enough to last us 4 months! And to think, that would actually be 8 months worth of diapers had this been a singleton pregnancy!

Laura, Stephanie, Sara, Emily and Missy threw the shower at Nana's house.  This also meant that I got a weekend of Emily all to myself! (Sorry, Eric!) She was absolutely invaluable to me that weekend...hosting the shower, loading and unloading all the gifts, logging all the gifts and putting away almost everything.  There's no way I would have survived the weekend without going into labor without that girl!

We were blessed to be handed-down enough girl clothes that we won't have to buy anything for at least the first year.  But we also received some pretty cute twin pairs of clothes...something we don't have with hand-me-downs.  I can't wait for the girls to be here so they can wear everything!

Emily and her mom made the desserts...aren't they talented?!

I'm so thankful so many people came out to celebrate Madeline and Molly! We seriously have the best family and friends anyone could ask for and the girls are blessed with lots of love.  They will have so many "aunts" and "uncles" who love them! Just thinking about how many people have prayed over them (and me!) makes me cry.  Having someone to love you is special, but having someone to love your babies is priceless.