A Day in the Life

12:30am I go to bed
6:15 Boys start to wake up
6:45 Matt and Will are up- I change diapers and outfits, strip Will's bed and start a load of laundry
7:15 Bottles
7:30 I get a shower- boys in pack n play
8:00 Breakfast- while boys eat, I prepare fruit for rest of the week
8:30-10:00 Playtime for boys- I wash bottles, clean kitchen, check e-mail, referee fights, take photos and play
10:00 Bottles- Will falls asleep; Matt stays awake
10:15 Will asleep on bed; Matt destroys bathroom while I put on make-up and start another load of laundry
11:00 Will wakes up- more playtime while I wash more bottles and try to get some work done
12:00pm Take boys upstairs while I work- boys manage to find every choking hazard in the room
1:00 Bottles- I pack bag to go into work
1:15 Load up to go to the office
1:30 Arrive at office- quickly get most important tasks done while boys are quiet
2:30 Trek across campus to hang "nanny needed" fliers
3:30 Load boys back up and head home- both fall asleep
3:45 Matt wakes up- he plays inside while Will sleeps in van and I make my lunch
4:00 Will wakes up- bottles
4:15 Playtime
5:30 Daddy arrives
6:00 Off to the grocery store
7:00 Back home- I ride my bike with the other harried moms in the neighborhood while Chris gets boys ready for bed
7:30 Bottles and bedtime
7:45 I wash bottles and Chris makes dinner
8:00 Dinner as I work
10:45 Blog time
11:00 Bedtime for me... hopefully

Success!

Today was a big day in our household. First, we finally made it back to our favorite 8am church service after nearly a year of being heathens. We were up at 6:15 and out the door at 7:30- quite an accomplishment in and of itself. It wasn't until the drive to the church that Chris asked me how we were going to keep the boys quiet during the service. The thought hadn't even crossed my mind. I was just thrilled to have made it into the car with two clean, dressed and fed boys.

When we arrived at the church, I apparently missed the sign that read "Please take your children to the nursery. Parents who keep their children with them in the sanctuary receive a one-way ticket to hell." Here's the deal. I completely respect that our church wants an adults only service and wants us to remain focused on the lesson. That's definitely hard to do when you're trying to contain two squirmy one-year old boys. But I will not put Matt and Will in the nursery until I am ready to suffer the consequences. I view a church nursery as a place where children have one hour to infect themselves with every possible virus known to man and then return the next week to infect themselves with the new and improved mutation. I've spent long miserable nights with Matt and Will when they were sick at the beginning of the year, and I have no desire to willingly go through that again. Let me at least teach them to blow their noses before I deal with another sickness x 2!

We did manage to keep the boys contained for 45 minutes but ended up leaving early. We have no idea what we're going to do next week. Maybe we'll just return to being heathens.

The major news of the day has to do with our sleeping arrangements. Chris took down the cribs (for like the 5th time) and reassembled them in Matt and Will's nursery. As I type, the boys are sleeping soundly in their cribs in their very own room. This is huge! We're all breathing a sigh of relief that the cribs are finally being used. Poor Tom spent months (and probably half of our inheritance) building the cribs, and then they sat unused for the better part of a year!

Here are a couple of recent photos of Will and Matt. Will is on his new truck and Matt is lounging on the floor.

Walk this way

Chris, Tom, Cathy and I enjoyed the March of Dimes walk this morning. Here is a picture of Chris and I with some of the wonderful NICU nurses who took care of Matt and Will. Can you tell how excited Matt is to see them? As usual, he immediately fell asleep when we put him in the stroller.

The highlight of our day was upgrading to a new super duty diaper pail- the Diaper Dekor+. We've been getting by with our current pail, but it's definitely time to move up to the big leagues. This pail means business!

Before and After

Will

Matt

Tomorrow Chris and I are participating in our local March of Dimes Walk to support their mission to help prevent premature births through research and education. We will be celebrating the health of Matt and Will alongside many other parents and their precious NICU grads.

The boys were in the NICU for 5 weeks before we finally brought them home on May 31. Though it sounds like a long time, we were blessed to be surrounded by an incredibly caring NICU staff. I vaguely remember the neonatologist coming to my hospital room in the wee hours of the morning after I delivered Matt and Will. He stayed with Chris and I for quite a while to explain Matt and Will's condition and answer any questions we had. Over the next 5 weeks that same neonatologist was one of my biggest cheerleaders; he always had a word of encouragement for me.

In addition to the neonatologists, the boys were cared for by incredible nurses. They were competent, gentle and kind. For quite some time the boys had one-on-one care, so two nurses were only responsible for our children. It was comforting to know that when we said goodnight at the end of each day, they would be in the care of such loving women.

I never would have been successful at breastfeeding if it weren't for the amazing lactation consultant at the hospital. How lucky was I to have consultations with her every day for 5 weeks!

We saw many of these staff members when we visited the NICU on the boys' birthday. It was like a mini-reunion in the hallway with a dozen or so doctors and nurses surrounding Matt and Will. On this day they didn't see them as baby A and baby B, they saw them as Matt and Will- two healthy boys full of life.

"A photographer's dream"

Today a professional photographer came to the house to take pictures in celebration of Matt and Will's 1st birthday. I had very low expectations, because after all, I am the resident photographer in our household. Will typically hams it up for the camera, but Matt is usually unimpressed. It can also be quite a challenge photographing them in the same shot; Matt always tries to scurry away. As soon as the photographer walked in, I explained the differences between the boys and imagine my surprise when they reminded me that I should not put labels on them (the #1 rule of raising twins apparently). Matt was gratuitous with his smiles and poses while Will was as shy as can be.

The photographer was wonderful and took some beautiful shots of both boys. She even told me they were "a photographer's dream" because their eyes were so large and so beautiful and captured the light perfectly. As I am not a professional photographer, I don't do so well at capturing the light, but I have a feeling she did just that. I wouldn't be surprised to find one or both boys on the pages of her web-site, and if and when that happens I'll be sure to brag about it right here.

The best part about the photo shoot was the fact that they TOOK A NAP in their CRIBS afterwards. It's hard work being models.

Below are my quick photos taken before the shoot began. Matt is in light blue; Will is in navy.

Twice Baked

Matt and Will have tried a very limited number of foods, so the prospect of giving them cake on their birthday was scary. Scary in the sense that I didn't want to have to suffer through another night of no sleep due to their stomach problems; I did enough of that in the first year. So using a borrowed "whole foods" cookbook, I concocted banana oatcakes for the boys. I baked them yesterday evening and several hours later while wrapping them up after they cooled I realized they were still RAW inside. Not having enough organic oat flour, wheat flour and brown sugar to bake two more cakes, I did what any other bad mom would do and stuck them back in the oven to re-cook. I guess I'll find out soon enough whether or not that was a wise move.



The birthday celebration was rather uneventful. Will slapped his cake around to show it who was boss and Matt threw his on the floor. Apparently they haven't yet developed an appreciation for whole foods.

One year with Matt and Will

The boys turn one tomorrow which means we're throwing a party to celebrate the fact that we survived the first year of raising twins. Nothing could have ever prepared me for what it would be like to care for two babies, and nothing could have prepared me for the overwhelming amount of love I feel for Matt and Will.

One year ago tonight, I was in the hospital on bedrest hooked up to too many monitors to count. Little did I know that the next evening my water would break and my journey of motherhood would begin. It is sometimes hard looking back on those weeks prior to the boys' birth. They were filled with so much worry. Would the doctors be able to stop labor again? How early would the babies be born? Would they suffer any complications? How long would they stay in the NICU? And above all, what did I do wrong? I put up a good front and was the model patient, but inside I was fearful and blaming myself for putting my babies at risk. If only I had been able to eat. If only I had gotten enough protein. If only I had not worked so many hours. If only I had rested more. In the end nothing could stop my water from breaking at 33 weeks. It just happened as I was lying in the hospital bed. I knew immediately what it was and then layed there in bed, alone, afraid to call the nurse because I knew that the babies would be born that night- 7 weeks too soon.

During the many ultrasounds we had, we opted not to find out the sexes of the babies. We both felt it was the ultimate in surprises, although nothing surprised us more than finding out we were expecting twins. In the delivery room that night, I wasn't even concerned about the sexes. I was more concerned about hearing them cry and making sure they could breathe. Immediately after each boy was born, Will first followed by Matt, they were evaluated by a team of NICU staff and whisked off to their home for the next 5 weeks. Right before each boy was taken to the NICU, the nurse brought them to me, one at a time, and I briefly touched their heads. Thank goodness we have pictures of those precious moments of our newborns swaddled in their blankets looking like any other babies that had just come into the world. Because the next time I would see the boys they would no longer look like healthy newborns and instead be hooked up to IV's, leads, monitors and oxygen.

Now, on the eve of their first birthday, Matt and Will look like the picture of health. They are crawling, standing, cruising and babbling. Matt is daring. This morning I found him stretched out across his rocking chair trying to pull himself over to the exersaucer. He attempted this feat just the other day but ended up taking a nose dive to the floor and getting stuck between both toys. He's going to grow to a boy that will take a fall, get up and brush himself off and exclaim "didn't hurt" as he goes about his way. Matt loves the dogs. Every morning the boys take turns going with me to let them out of the pen. As soon as we walk outside, Matt starts pointing and exclaiming "da, da" which is certainly different from "da, da" his name for Chris.

Will experiences a full range of emotions. He's always the first to smile, laugh, cry or pout. When he's mad at me and I try to pick him up, he dramatically throws himself backwards and kicks his legs. He's definitely going to be a professional tantrum thrower. Will's smile lights up his face. He'll smile at just about anyone. Recently he went to lunch with daddy Chris, uncle Chris, Gran and Papa. Chris told me he was completely turned around in his high chair grinning at the women at the next table. He was enthralled and loved the attention.

The first year with Matt and Will has been a wild ride. My goal for the second year is to be better about documenting their lives. I hope this blog will help me accomplish just that.

Happy Birthday Little Bugs!

Love,
Mama