Two Month Appointment

I took the girls, all by myself to see the doctor for their two month appointment. And good news they are growing big and strong!!!!

Hannah weighed in at 10.4

Sarah Grace weighed in at 8.13

Them waiting on the exam table waiting for the doctor.

Not a Good night

There are good days and there are bad days in life. You never know what is going to come your way. I had a good day, I hung out at my friend Jens all day with the girls. It was relaxing! However I had a not so good night. I was (am) having difficultly sleeping. When this happens my mind starts to wander and goes places it shouldn't. Tonight it went to Sarah Grace. I don't really know how I can explain how I feel, because even when I type it I know that it's wrong and I shouldn't feel that way. And it doesn't make sense and its the way I feel, if it doesn't make sense to me how can it make sense to anyone else? So how do I get myself to sleep. I go pick my little one up out of her crib and I rock her and cry. And regret the fact that its after midnight and I'm still up and the girls will be up in a few short hours. And yet here I am typing! Yup I've lost my mind:)

Football Preparation

Harmon and I are eager for the first home game of the season, we love football and are looking forward to sharing football with our girls! In preparation for the season we ordered the girls dresses from the school bookstore and I custom ordered dresses here locally. Well both dresses came in today. The dresses we ordered from the bookstore are ridiculously large... and the dresses I had done custom came out amazing!!!

Breastfeeding is a Struggle

Breastfeeding has always been extremely important to me. It is so totally better for baby. And I'll be honest when in public I judge people based on whether I see them bottle feeding or breastfeeding. When I found out I was having twins I started reading the books on breastfeeding twins. It is possible! One hour after birth Hannah nursed for 40 straight minutes. It was heaven everything I wanted. Then there was Sarah Grace who wouldn't latch, how wasn't gaining weight, who had jaundice and the pediatrician said oh she's not getting enough fluids for the jaundice to go away you have to supplement her. I have never made progress trying to breastfeed Sarah Grace, I just can't get her to latch. I have successfully breastfeed her once. Sitting in the lactation consultants office.  Hannah on the other hand I've had a lot more success. However I will nurse her for an hour and she will still be hungry and nursing her is accompanied by toe curling pain. So for a while I tried my best I nursed Hannah, feed Sarah Grace and then pumped so Sarah Grace could get at least some breastmilk. This process took almost 2 hours. And I felt like I wasn't doing good enough for either of them and I was exhausted. So I went to pumping pumping pumping. I pumped every two hours and had no where near enough for even one girl :( So I took all kinds of herbal supplements. With minial success. Finally I got my doctor to write me a prescription. I have seen vast improvements. But I still want to breastfeed my babies. And I judge myself, and am hard on myself for not being able to. I am still trying to with Hannah although until today I hadn't brought her to the breast in a few days. Today I actually breastfeed Hannah twice and both times she only took an ounce of supplemental milk afterwards. I'm wondering if now that I have a lot more supple if it's easier for her to get it. My lactation consultant said that since we have never been able to get consistantly good latches it is like Hannah is trying to drink through a bent straw, she is putting up all this work but barely getting any. I took this picture after what I consider a successful nursing session. 

  

Honda Odyssy

Our trip to Waycross was for one day. We did not spend the night. We took enough stuff for the girls for one day and we took a change of clothes for Harmon and myself so that we could change out of our church clothes. We didn't take enough clothes for the whole weekend for him, me or the girls. We didn't take diapers for a whole weekend. We didn't take the dogs or things for the dogs. Needless to say we didn't even have a portion of what we would need for football weekends. And yet our trunk was FULL. It is because this one day trip Harmon realized that we needed a van. I've been trying to tell him this for, well months. We started looking and we narrowed down our choices to the Odyssey and the Sienna. We went and played with both and decided we wanted the Odyssey. But out purchase of a van would and did heavily depend on what we could get for the Camry and what kind of deal we could get on new van. Well we went this past Saturday and the stars aligned we bought a van!!!!

The girls love their new ride!!!

Our Trip to the Mall

I'm out of order I know, but this is a funny story. Last week I decided to go to the mall and buy a book called Babywise and look for white bloomers I could get engraved with the girls first initial to wear under their new Tech dressers this fall. We get to the mall and put the girls in the stroller and headed in. I made sure Barnes and Noble had the book I wanted but decided to get it on my way out. As I am leaving the bookstore Sarah Grace starts to wake up. Not fully, she let out some cries and then went back to sleep. I went into The Childrens Place, which had adorable cupcake outfits! However they were in the very back of the store and let me tell you my double stroller did NOT fit in there! And as I tried to exit the store squeezing through the racks Sarah Grace woke up. Not a little but blood curdling screaming. So we stop and in the big comfy I feed Sarah Grace, she only drank half a bottle before going right back to sleep. So I start to shop again. And of course my stroller did not fit in the little stores in which I wanted to shop! Dumb childrens stores your shopping for babies and toddlers and yet you don't leave enough room for a stroller!!! Are you kidding me? And then Sarah Grace started screaming again. Ok so lets settle this. I head all the way to the food court where they have a nice sitting room with comfy couches and a little room to change diapers. I go to change Sarah Graces diaper. To learn the bottle of plan water I had brought had completely leaked. Meaning everything in the diaper bag was wet. I didn't have a dry diaper to put back on Sarah Grace so I put a damn diaper on Sarah Grace and then settled in to have Sarah Grace finish her bottle.  She finished her bottle and just would not settle. So we left one failed trip to the mall in which I left empty handed. All I got was this one photo of Sarah Grace on the changing table. Which made me realize I really need to start carrying a changing pad, they no longer fit on the flips. 

Oh and did I fail to mention Hannahs name? That is because she slept through everything!

My Girls

Of course I love my girls more then just about anything. (People tell me God 1st, Harmon 2nd, and then the girls, this is pretty easy for me). We tried to get pregnant for two long years. Lots of failed infertility treatments and a miscarriage later we got pregnant with the twins. They are 8 weeks old and sometimes it just hits me, I am so blessed and lucky and loved. God granted my prayers and then some! When it hits me its like wow it really happened, they are here and amazing. It just fills me with happiness. 

I personally feel I have overall come to terms Sarah Graces' diagnosis of Down syndrome. I love that little girl so much. It does not matter to me she, is still my little girl. Sometimes I feel like our two years of infertility was prepping me to really appreciate her for everything she is worth. But just like it hits me suddenly how happy I am and how blessed I am to have both my girls, sometimes it hits me, my perfect little girl has Down syndrome. And it makes me sad. Sad that we will have to fight for her the rest of our lives. And know that people will look down on her and think less of her just for her disability. It makes me sad knowing she is going to have a hard life. Every milestone she achieves she will have worked and fought so hard to achieve. 

Cloth diapers!

I love cloth diapering my girls. I know people think I am crazy. Others think I'm totally normal. It's better for the environment, better for my wallet and most importantly it is better for my girls! I recently sold my NB AIO diapers. And scored a bunch of free diapers from another mom of multiples. Because of this I decided to take stoke of everything I have. I promise I am still saving money. 

Starting at the top left to right:

3 dozen GMD nb prefolds

7 kissaluv fleece fitteds

10 Bummis Super Whisper Wrap size small

4 Bummis Super Whispher Wrap size medium

8 Fuzzibunz OS pockets

6 Kawaii OS pockets

6 Charlie Banana OS pockets

6 gDiapers size small

11 Flip covers

3 Thiristies pocket size 2

4 NB covers

1 Bummis Super Bright

2 Thiristies duo Wrap size 1

6 gDiaper inserts

6 Thiristies Hemp doublers

12 bumgenius inserts

12 flip organic prefolds

(of course all pockets have two insert that go with them)

So far my favorite cover is the Thiristies and my favorite pocket are the Charlie Bananas. I loved my prefolds and covers for the newborn stage, but as Hannah grows out of them I think I will prefer the pocket diapers. I stuff them when I wash and I am ready to go just grab and go!

Eeks amateur photographer

Early in the week there was a photographer that is trying to build her portfolio and offering free photos to the first set of twins under a year that responded. Well I have volunteered for a photographer like this before and we got AMAZING photos taken on the Georgia Tech campus. Well this time.. well I will let a couple of the photos speak for themselves.....

Cardiologist

As we know Sarah Grace has Down syndrome. This is a diagnosis that we are still learning about and learning to live with. It is very common for children with Down syndrome to have heart problems. This Tuesday, while a friend watched Hannah, I took Sarah Grace to see the pediatric cardiologist.  She was such a little doll! She and her cloth diaper were the talk of the office! When we got there they asked me to put her in this hospital gown. I didn't even know they made hospital gowns that small! She didn't mind all the wires from the ekg, she just didn't like the blood pressure cuff!

We came away with good news. Sarah Grace has two holes in her heart. One usally closes within the first 4-6 months of life. The other hole usually closes within the first week, and while Sarah Grace is 7 weeks old he is not concerned at this point because it is so small and he thinks it will close on its own so he's going to give it some time to close on its own.

Dogs and Stroller

When we drove back into town after our trip to Waycross we decided since it was not blazing hot and the dogs had been stuck inside all day we would take them all for a walk. My big baby splurge was my stroller that I totally love. Well it has car seat adapters and the actual seats. Well I had the bright idea the seats can recline so why shouldn't we just put them in the seats and recline all the way... Well this is what we got

I realized as we were walking around the block why this is a HORRIBLE idea. Had we been hit or the dogs knocked the stroller over or anything they would have gone flying!!! They were technically buckled in, but they were so big that they would have just gone flying, where as had we used the car seats they would at least be snug and secure in the seats. Sure if the stroller had been hit by a car we'd still have problems, but they would be safer then in those seats. So lesson learned, the seats got put away in the closet.

Meeting Great Papa

Today we took the girls to Waycross for the first time. The girls were introduced to my Papa, one of the best people I have ever known in my life. Someone that taught me so much, someone I admire greatly. I love the photos of him holding my girls! It was amazing and worth the trip to Waycross. 

Both Girls

Tomorrow I'll give the details on our first walk in the stroller with the dogs!!!

Fuzzibunz = still too big!

Hannah is growing out of her newborn sized prefolds. So I thought it would be a good idea to try the one size fuzzibunz on Sarah Grace needless to say this did not work out so very well. Specially since Sarah Grace is smaller then Hannah. The result was hilarious!

 

It was literally falling off her.

 

 I decided I would leave this diaper on her for just long enough to feed her so that she wouldn't get mad again and make her wait for her dinner. Needless to say she took this as an opportunity to poop!!! It is a diaper and it did hold it in so I guess it did its job.