Welcome to my new blog. Somehow the old blog didn't feel like it fit anymore so I thought to myself, "New babies, new blog!"
Blog Disclaimer: I will try my best to update regularly..........however.......I do now have three children and I am starting to feel like there are really only 12 hours in a day so please cut me some slack if I miss a week or so.
Back to the beginning: These are some of the only pictures of me pregnant (not a big fan of having my picture taken). I think these were taken in September which would make me about 6 months pregnant.
I had forgotten all the crazy things people ask you and tell you when you are pregnant. Women seem to always want to tell you how hard their sister-in-law's cousin's manicurist's labor was. Really??......do you think a pregnant woman wants to hear your horror stories about the very thing she is fixing to experience. Also, when people found out I was pregnant with twins the next thing out of their mouth usually was "Does it feel different then being pregnant with just one baby?" Once again, Really??.....just think carefully about the question you just asked me.On November 13th my cousin got married and Zoe Scout was her flower girl and Colin was an usher. They were super cute! The wedding and reception were like our last hurrah before the babies were born. It was the best time I have ever had at a wedding. I didn't care how pregnant I was....I danced as much as I could and loved every minute of it.
November 22nd: Colin starts his job with the Fort Worth fire department. This was orientation day. They invited all the families to have breakfast and we got to tour the facility and trucks!
November 24th: The boys arrive!
Cort on the left: 5 lb 12 oz 18.5 in long
Jude on the right: 6lbs 7 oz 19 in long
Confession time: Many of you know that Colin and I elected to wait until birth day to find out the sex of our babies. This drove many of you crazy and believe it or not that kind of fueled my fire to not find out. :) The truth is.......I knew that Baby A, Cort, was a boy. I found out about 2 weeks before they were born. I was getting a sonogram by myself and the sonographer accidentally told me. I did not tell Colin that I knew until the night before my c-section but I did not tell him Cort was a boy....I didn't want to ruin the surprise for him.
The morning of Nov 24 we woke up early and dropped ZS at a friend's house and preceded on to the hospital. I remember feeling like the drive was so final and that I did not want to stop being pregnant. We arrived at the hospital about 8am, filled out our paperwork and then they put me in a pre-op room and starting getting me ready for my c-section. I was so nervous. I remember shaking and crying through almost the whole two hours of prep. My delivery with ZS had been such a breeze and I was really apprehensive about the c-section and whether or not the twins would be healthy when we got them out. The one thing I had no worries about was getting the epidural. It was so easy with ZS that I thought it would be that way again......I was wrong. In order to get an epidural in the anesthesiologist has you arch your back and bend over at the waist as much as possible. This is super easy if you only have one baby in your stomach but if you have two it is not very easy. Added to the difficultly of being able to arch my back is the fact that I have around 40 degrees of scoliosis. The anesthesiologist had to try 3 times to get the tube in. The first two times were incredibly painful.....I could feel him threading the tube down my spine and on top of it all they do not allow your husband to stay while they do it. Poor Colin, I know he felt helpless as he stood outside the door listening to me cry.
Once they got the epidural in things calmed down and they wheeled me to the operating room. From here on out things were great. There was some tugging and pulling and the pulled Cort out saying "It's a boy and look at all the brown hair!" I remember smiling at Colin as he got up to go see Cort and then bracing myself for the announcement of the next baby. The dr. pulled out Jude and said "It's another boy and this one is blonde." I remember being totally surprised and thinking "What on earth am I going to do with two boys?"
Right after delivery they put both boys on my chest. They call it skin to skin contact which helps preemies regulate their heartbeat and hopefully avoid the NICU. It worked, no NICU for the twins!
Jude on the left and Cort on the right.
Cort and mommy.
Zoe Scout sees her brothers for the first time.
My grandparents: My grandfather is also a twin so he has a special connection to our boys!
Here is my good friend Julie who kept ZS for almost 2 weeks after the boys were born. She has been such a great help to us and even arranged for people to bring food to us for 12 weeks!
The first six weeks: I don't remember a lot but here are some picture highlights.
Jude had bad jaundice and had to lay in a pep bed for a day and a half.
They love to sleep together. Cort in the blue, Jude in the green.
We are so thankful to all of you who have given of your time and resources to minister to our family in the last 3 months. I feel so honored by God that He would entrust these precious children to me and I look forward to the joy they will undoubtedly bring to the rest of my life.
Special Note: Thanks to my cousin, Jen and her new husband Mark for spending part of their honeymoon shopping for the "Thing" outfits featured at the top of this blog! Love you guys!
