Wednesday, October 31, 2012

Random pics (1st month)

This post will just be some random pics during the first month of their lives. My mom and I would just snap random shots of them here and there. They're just SO CUTE!!!
 



 

 No description necessary other than: TIRED. :) 
 Harmony was just sleeping on my chest and put her hand under her face. I thought it was so cute! My little poser.
 I Love this picture. They're so beautiful and sweet.

 This is all you get in the way of Halloween costumes. My mom got them these little hats from H&M. So cute! Our little lambs.
 The first month was a blur. I'll admit that. Even now I try to think back on how things were. The girls have always been so good. They only ever woke up one time during each night. They would usually eat late around 11 or 12, have a 2 or 3 wake up and then again at 6 or so if I remember right. The KILLER was the 2 hour feedings. Nurse, Bottle and Pump. It was rough.

Wednesday, October 17, 2012

Two week Dr appointment

My mom and Denisha were able to go to their 2nd week well baby checkup. It's nice that their well baby check ups don't require a copay. I was beginning to go broke. Not quite, but kinda. :)
Their 2 week appointment went great. The Dr is now confident they're growing and eating well. He didn't need to see them for any additional visits. They're just so sweet. I was so, so sad for them to have their heel prick test though. I can't even remember who had who but I had one baby on the table and my mom and Denisha had another baby holding them when they cried getting poked and squeezed for blood. Sad. They did pretty good though and calmed down right away. The girls travel really well and are such good babies. They're so chill and sweet. I absolutely love being a mom more than anything. LOVE! 

Tuesday, October 16, 2012

First Bath

Brand new babies are so fragile. I didn't love the sponge baths. Being able to really bathe the babies was a nice little step. Chuck totally did the bathing all by himself the first time.
Cute little Harmony

All clean and bundled
Sweet little Charity

I love naked cuddly babies all bundled in towels. Is there anything cuter? :)

Monday, October 15, 2012

Newborn Pics

Nothing is sweeter and more precious than brand new little babies. I am so grateful for my sister for capturing our little girls at their most vulnerable, newest little stage in life. They are so sweet!
 
Charity
 I love this one of them all snuggled together

 Harmony. I'm blowing up the individual shots of them to go over their beds in the nursery to always remember how they were when they first arrived. :)
We took some naked pics of the girls obviously. It's always a little risky to hold a baby with no diaper on. Denisha said she's seen babies pee without diapers during newborn shots a lot. Sure enough when I was holding Harmony, changing the girls positions, she peed all over me. Denisha's reaction was "Oh gross!". I said "What do you mean? You said newborns pee all of the time." She replied "Not on someone". Nice. Luckily I hadn't gotten dressed yet because I was covered. At least it was only pee! 
 
  Little Harmony. I LOVE these little ruffle outfits. We took them in in the shoulders. They're actually supposed to fit like Rompers but they look more like a little dress on my teeny babes.
 This shot is the money maker with both of them smiling. How sweet is this? It was so natural for the girls to be all snuggled next to each other. LOVE THEM!!!
 Some momma lovin
 I just adore these little girls. I heard having a child once described as having your heart outside of your body walking around. It's so true. They are a part of me out in the world. I love them more than anything and treasure EVERY SINGLE MOMENT I have with them. They are my greatest joy and blessing.
 Sweet little Charity
 Charity looks a little uncomfortable in this shot, poor thing.
 Grandma with the babies.
 So sweet.
 Before and after. Both experiences have been absolutely amazing.
My sweet angels.
 We LOVE our girls!!!
 These were just taken in our backyard. I LOVE the fall colors.


 This shot is amazing. Chuck is such a great dad. I always knew he would be. He absolutely loves his girls. He says he's nearly at the point of tears every time a girl smiles at him. I feel the same way. Parenthood is our greatest blessing in life.

I'm so, so glad my sister was able to take these lovely pictures! Thanks Denisha! I'm always amazed by your talent. Thank you for sharing it with us and capturing our sweet family!


Saturday, October 13, 2012

My sister's in town!!!

My little sister Denisha came to town!!!
Denisha is a proud mother of three little girls. I have made it a point to go to Kentucky after the birth of each of her daughters. It was so sweet to bond with her and her new babies. She wanted to return the favor for me. It was a HUGE sacrifice for her and her family. Her husband, Rodney, had to take a week off of work, and she had to leave her little girls at home (ages 6, 4, and 2). I never had to sacrifice that much visiting her. I was so glad she came. I know she was glad to meet the girls but I know it was hard for her to be away from her girls at the same time. What complicated things was Paisley got sick and Bentley hurt her hand while she was away. Sad!
 
Denisha flew in on the 13th of October. Originally I was going to have the girls on Tuesday the 16th. That would give us a couple of days to get ready and we planned to see the movie Pitch Perfect together while she was here. Sadly I had them two weeks earlier, but it all worked out.
 
She's here!!! I was able to go with my mom to pick her up from the airport. I surprised her. yay!!! The first thing she did when she got there was change her clothes, hold the girls and then eat some dang food. She nearly starved herself on carrots on her flight from KY.
 
The girls were so excited to see her. :)
 Watching the sleeping babies on the monitor. :) One night Harmony (in the back) was staring right at the monitor without blinking. We were all dying laughing. It was so funny.
Picture! Just a random pic while I tried on my pre-pregnancy jeans.
 She came to their two week Dr visit. Their heel pricks were so sad! I cried. Here she is holding the girls with their little band aids . :( I don't like the Dr.
 Taking two week old pics. She is the BEST!!! I'll dedicate a post to the pics. She's so talented. She's taken so many pics for Chuck and I. I am indebted to her up to my eyeballs!!! :)
 Holding the wee ones. So sweet!
 Feeding Harmony
 We went to see Pitch Perfect after all. My mom came too but she's obviously taking our picture for us. We LOOOOVED the movie. Chuck was a super stud and stayed home taking care of the girls on his own for the first time. He's amazing. We asked him if we should call someone to come over to help him. He not only refused help but was offended we'd even ask. :) My sis and I wearing matching sweaters. We are besties. We know the same movie quotes, we like the same everything. She completes me. And no, we're not twins but we have been asked in the past.
Thanks Denisha for coming out for their birth!!! I cannot wait until we can come visit you and see you again!! Our little girls need to be besties too!!!

Pre-pregnancy jeans!

I didn't dare step on the scale until a week and a half after the girls were born. To my surprise I had dropped 50 lbs just like that. I thought "Wow. If I've lost that much weight I wonder if I can fit into my pre-pregnancy jeans." I slipped them on and buttoned them right up. I couldn't wear them for too long because of my incision but it felt WONDERFUL to have my body back. At first I was concerned with how fast the weight came off. I called to ask my nurse if I should be worried. The receptionist who took my message said this was the first time she'd ever had that complaint. My nurse called back and told me to enjoy it. She said if the weight continued to drop at that rate to let her know. After another week I lost the last 10 lbs. I don't know what attributed to it. My guess is I have exercise and breast feeding to thank for that. I'm sure it being my first pregnancy helped as well. I do not take it for granted, however. I definitely feel blessed. Having babies does a number on your body. While I was pregnant I wondered if I would ever get my body back.
 
 It was great to recognize my feet when I looked down. Instead of seeing this:


I saw this:


Yay!!!

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

One week DR visit

Since the girls were born preemie and had lost close to the 10% of weight in the hospital our Pediatrician, Dr Cox wanted to see them at one week instead of waiting until two weeks. His office just opened a new location in Riverton. We live closer to their South Jordan location but they couldn't fit us in that office in time. They could fit us into the Riverton office however. My mom and I got the girls all packed up and ready.
This is our first real trip out of the house. Yay!
We got all checked in and taken back. The first thing we did was strip down the babies to a dry diaper for their weight. Harmony weighed in at 5.4 and Charity weighed in at 5.8. He was concerned their weight hadn't gone up from leaving the hospital. He was interested to know how much they were eating. We decided I would feed them and then weigh them again. Keep in mind I use a pillow to feed them. I sat up on the table and crossed my legs to try to imitate it. It was a nightmare. The girls weren't nursing well. They kept pulling away. I tried nursing them individually. I was so uncomfortable. It was cold and took so long that my pain medication wore off. It was a nightmare. Finally we decided each of the girls had nursed for 30 minutes and re-weighed them. While reweighing them the Dr discovered the scale was set to pounds instead of pounds and ounces. The difference? When 5.8 looks like 5 lbs 8 oz it was really 5 lb 14 oz. I was beyond frustrated. He looked at the weights and said "Oh! I'm okay with those numbers!" UGH!!! I just walked away tearing up. I couldn't believe the past few hours were for naught. We could've done without all of the struggling and pain. I knew it wasn't anyones fault so I didn't make a big deal about it. I just wanted to leave. I wanted to eat, go home and take some meds. YIKES!
He wanted to see Harmony in another couple of days though to make sure she was still growing. Those two appointments were not "Well baby" appointments so we were charged our office copay. Copay for two babies means double copay. I never thought about that. Ouch.
At the other Dr visit he took a look at both babies to be sure. All was well. He was happy with their growth but it was then he suggested nursing, bottle feeding and pumping. The girls were using up too much energy nursing for so long. It was a pain but it worked.
All told we were at the Dr's for THREE hours.