Monday, August 4, 2008

Signing Off For a While

Hello all, as you may know, we have now just moved out to the country. We are getting ready to put our house on the market, so we currently have 2 mortgages to pay (yikes!). So, internet service does not yet make it into the budget. Therefore, we will be going on hiatus for a while. (Not to mention the fact that we will be busy unpacking!)

So, to all who may read this, please say a prayer that we sell our house quickly! I think I'll miss blogging, so hopefully I can start up again in a month or two.

Talk to you all later!

Sunday, August 3, 2008

Say What?!!

"You had better get to the hospital! You are dilated to a 6 with a bulging bag!" my doctor said with big eyes. Words that every woman at the end of her pregnancy would love to hear! Well, in my case, it really happened when I was 37 and 1/2 weeks pregnant with the twins. I was a bit in shock, because we weren't really prepared to hear that. I had almost told Dan to just meet me at the doctor's office on his way home from work, as the appointment was at 4:30. We had Catherine with us and had planned to get something to eat afterwards. Luckily Dan had put my bag in the car just in case.


Then the doctor said, "I'll meet you at the hospital and we'll break your water and have some babies." So Dan took me over to the hospital and we walked up to the labor and delivery desk and I said, "Yeah, um, my doctor sent me over here because I'm dilated to a 6 and oh, yeah, I'm pregnant with twins." You should have seen the looks I got with that statement! I don't think they really believed me. While I got checked in, Dan raced back to our neighbor's house 20 min. away, left Catherine there, and raced back. When the doctor came in, I was dilated to an 8 and it was all so surreal. I had been having contractions every 10-15 minutes for the past few days, but nothing that wasn't tolerable, so I didn't think I was in labor. Go figure. A woman who used to deliver babies doesn't even know when she is in labor.

Then, the hospital bureaucracy kicked in and they said I had to go deliver in the operating room, even though we were planning a vaginal delivery, you know, just in case. So by the time they moved me there and everything got set, I was dilated to a 9, and remarkably, still fairly comfortable. The nurse next to me was just shocked that I didn't have an epidural. Then, the doctor broke my water, and my pain level went from tolerable to full-speed transition labor to the max in the space of about a minute. Yet, somehow, I was able, on that very narrow operating room table, with about a thousand people running around (okay, maybe it was 10), to sort of relax and breathe through the contractions.

After about 30 minutes, all of a sudden I felt that urge to push and so I did, and Dominic just came flying out. The cord was around his neck, but he just went through it. Wow, was I surprised. My next thought was, oh my gosh, I have to do that again?! Then 9 minutes later, at 7:02pm, Anne made her appearance. After a little bit, I sent Dan to check on the babies and take pictures, and then once they were done with me, they took me to my recovery room and brought the twins in so I could hold them. Wow, it was so amazing to see those two perfect little babies. Dominic and Anne, our precious twins, now big 3 year olds. We love you very much!

Saturday, August 2, 2008

Happy Birthday, Dominic and Anne

Today is your 3rd birthday, twins! You are such a joy and blessing!
You started out so small, Dominic at 5#, 11oz, and Anne at 6#, 8oz,...
...that you could share a bassinet.
Then you started growing and growing and soon you were one!
You have always loved to play together:
We love you very much!
Today is the day we are moving to our new house, so hopefully it is going well. What kid gets a new house for their birthday?
Stay tuned for tomorrow's wild and wacky twin labor and delivery!


Friday, August 1, 2008

Twin Time

Today is the day we are closing on our house, so I planned this post a while back. I am doing a 2 or 3 day spread of the twins as tomorrow is their third birthday!

I will never forget the first time I saw the twins. At the time I worked part-time at a crisis pregnancy center, providing sonograms. I had the portable sono machine at home one weekend and on Monday, before I went in, I just couldn't hold out any longer. I put the probe on my stomach and was shocked when I saw two little babies. I almost couldn't believe my eyes and I remember I just started grinning and laughing. Then I had to call Dan and confess that I did a sono without him. And then I told him there were two babies and he didn't believe me at first. So he had to come home and see for himself. What a double blessing!

This picture here is about a week later and if you click on the picture you can see it bigger.
Then later on I had one of those fancy 4-D sonos and it was so cool. Here is Dominic:
And here is Anne:
This is me at 36 and 1/2 weeks along, about one week before the twins were born. Boy, was I huge!
Here they are! This is about 2 hours after they were born. I remember thinking that I didn't know who to look at first. And I just marveled at them. Dominic is on the left, Anne on the right.