Puppy Love

 

  It's been nice to have dogs again. We were especially grateful for them the other day when our neighbor and a few other houses in our cul-de-sac were broken into during the day. I wasn't home but I'm certain the barking dogs kept them away. At least I feel a little safer having them around.

 

Niko and Jack don't seem to mind the boys. They mostly ignore them. But in the past few days Jack has taken a liking to Grant. I think it started when Clay used Grant's feet to kick Jack's favorite ball. Now Jack will bring Grant the ball and leave it by his feet. He loves to lick him as well.  We are trying to teach Jack that the only acceptable place to lick the boys is the feet.  Grant enjoys laughing at the dogs when they bark and jump around. We're happy that the boys don't seem to be afraid of Jack's craziness.

 

 

  

Niko and the big hole he dug in the backyard.  All that hair can get hot so he likes to cool off in the mud

El Paso

During spring break we decided to make a trip to El Paso to visit my parents and collect our dogs.They have been with my parents since last July. We dropped them off there to be watched while we did some traveling. We never got to do that traveling because the boys came a few weeks later but it was nice to have them taken care of while I was on bed rest and then while we spent our time at the NICU. My parents have been wonderful to care for them for this long and they seemed to enjoy the grandparents' home. I'm not sure Jack was ready to leave the excitement of my parents back yard.

First road trip with the boys went pretty well. We debated on what would be the best time to travel for them and us and decided to leave Austin late afternoon so they could sleep through most of the trip.  They took a nap the first couple of hours and then babbled and played with toys for the next few hours until it was time to eat. They really only got upset when we were trying to find a place to stop and feed them and then when it was time to sleep. They love the car but they love their beds more and for about 20 minutes they did not want to sleep anywhere else. After calming down and falling asleep we had a quiet peaceful drive. Clay was an awesome driver and drove through the night. We arrived around 3 am without any problems.

Reid meets his Great Grandma Zuniga for the first time.

In El Paso we enjoyed introducing the boys to their great grandma and some cousins, and celebrated my mom's birthday. We were also lucky enough to be there the same time as Aunt Sonya, who was home for her spring break. They enjoyed all the attentions but hated napping.  They got little sleep during the day which made them grumpy but helped them sleep through the night. We introduced them to our dogs Jack and Niko. The original plan was to only bring Jack, the younger dog, home with us. But as we were loading the car Niko, who can't walk due to being hit by a car, dragged his way to the door and towards our car.  He kept howling and barking at us.  He knew we were leaving and wanted to make sure he was coming. It broke my heart to leave him again so we decided that even though it would be a lot of work to care for him I wanted to bring him home.  The trip home went well despite taking a lot longer than the first trip.  We left earlier in the day so we had more feedings to stop for and now two dogs that also needed to be let out. Our car was way to full.  Maybe a mini van is in our future, especially if the boys ever get a sibling.

 

We've been told that both Reid and Grant look like their Abuelito by different people but I think Grant favors him more.

6 months

It's incredible how little we've documented the boys life since they entered our world 6 months ago. We have a ton of pictures and I kept a pretty regular journal while visiting the boys in the NICU for close to three months. Sadly those things never made it here. But now I am a stay at home mom so I should have plenty of time to keep up with these sorts of things, right?

Life with twins is unlike any thing I could have imagined or prepared myself for. However, I would gladly do it again. For all the stories I've heard about life with twins these boys have been incredibly good to us. Of course it gets a little crazy when you're feeding and changing babies multiple times in the night and trying to teach a baby to sleep through the night when the other one is screaming. I love it though and it hasn't been as hard as I told myself it would be.

It helps to keep them on a pretty tight schedule. The NICU helped regulate their eating and sleeping times. They eat every four hours and usually take about three naps. They are doing really well putting themselves to sleep and we don't usually have any problems at night or for naps. They usually wake up once at night but for the most part sleep from 8 to about 8 or 8:30. This past week however, they have been waking up almost every two hours. Hopefully they can figure it out again and get back to normal. During the day we keep busy reading, singing, going for walks, occasional visit to Dad downtown for lunch, and just taking care of their everyday needs. It's amazing how quickly the day goes by.

The boys have done exceptionally well catching up in weight. At their six month appointment they were in the 70th percentile for weight but 3rd for height. Grant is now a little over 20 lbs. and Reid is not far behind at 19 lbs 6 oz. They are no longer being measured on the preemie charts which doesn't often happen this soon. Reid and Grant love to eat and we can't believe they have come so far. We remember the feedings in the NICU when we would struggle for half an hour for them to get through 40 ml. Developmentally they are still behind. We've seen a number of specialists since coming home: an optometrist, a pulmonologist every month for RSV shots, a cardiologist to check the PDAs they had at birth, ENT and audiologist to check Grant's hearing, and a developmental specialists. They have been given pretty much a clean bill of health by all the doctors but we will continue to see the developmental specialists until the boys catch up to where they should be.

They are babbling and laughing at us. Grant is especially talkative and is always trying to talk to Reid. Reid doesn't always respond but when he does it is the cutest thing. Watching them talk and smile at each other is the best thing about having twins.

Grant Reid

Grant loves jumping and will often jump himself to sleep.

Home at Last

After....

73 days in the NICU

212 trips to the hospital

292 hours spent at their bedside

168 times scrubbing in for 3 minutes (8 1/2 hrs.)

8 lbs. 7 oz. combined weight gain

11 inches combined growth in length

Countless prayers and well wishes



Our boys are finally home.

Double, Double, Toil and Trouble

Magically our boy and girl twins are now twin boys. The idea of two boys has taken some getting used to after the original excitement of having one of each. When we found out about the change at the ultrasound the doctor pointed “it” out several times to make up for the previous failure, and now we have more ultrasound penis pictures than we know what to do with. Luckily, we had not done too much boy/girl purchasing or decorating and are finding it a bit easier to plan for two boys. They are set to arrive around October 21. The babies seem to be doing well and growing on schedule now weighing in at a little over 1 ½ lbs. each. I have largely left the morning sickness behind now although it never really was morning sickness: pretty much any time of the day sickness, including my favorite - driving down the interstate at 70 mph with no bag or shoulder to pull over onto.

I have adjusted to the idea of being outnumbered by boys and think it will be fun to play with cars and trucks, sports, and all the boy stuff they do. It is a debate in the household whether we will have soccer or basketball players. Clay bought the boys some stuffed soccer balls the other day so I better get on it if I want the indoctrination to start early. Everything more or less seems to be falling in to place as we prepare for their arrival. We're both excited and at the same time overwhelmed by the prospect of doing everything double. But we can't wait to bring them home.

The first of many, many pictures...

One of the first ultrasounds at 7 weeks when we found out there were two little beans growing inside me.

In this one the boys seemed to be head butting each other. Can't wait till they're doing that out of the womb.

New Additions

Finally a new post...has it really been 7 months since I've added anything new? I apologize to all those out there who have been dying to hear about the exciting Holland Days. Here's a quick run down of the past months since the last time I posted: Worked every week day for 12 plus hours (and some week ends), took a few days off for Christmas break to host Clay's family for Christmas, turned 29, several doctor's visits a week, took a road trip on Valentine's day in search of the best pie and BBQ in TX, got a new calling as Primary President, more doctor's visits, got pregnant, got really, really sick, more doctor's visits, slept a lot, visit from my parents, and celebrated 7 years of wedded bliss. It doesn't seem like we've done a lot, but everyday life can get pretty busy. We try to keep it fun though and do some exciting things on the weekends. We've been to a few concerts, seen some movies, hung out with friends, and just tried to enjoy the time that we actually get to see each other.



We are now ready for our lives to a get a little bit more exciting. As I said we found out we were pregnant at the end of February. After seven years, and the help of some fertility doctors we are trilled to be expecting a boy and a girl in October! I can't say how excited and thankful we are for this opportunity. I'm now 17 weeks along and comfortable enough to talk about the pregnancy with co-workers, friends, and people at church. Up until about 15 weeks we had only told our parents/siblings and a couple of friends that are very observant. Now, I want every one to know how happy this pregnancy makes me and how grateful I am for the two precious babies we will one day get to hold. Perhaps these new little additions will keep us updating our blog.

The Great Cram of 2009

This is what I was doing over my winter break--stacking up books that I should've been reading. On January 12th and 23rd I had my two "comprehensive exams" to determine whether I can continue on in my phd program, the first on political theory and the second on public law. Each exam was an eight-hour exam consisting of three essay questions. The plan was to study over last summer, but when that didn't work out too well, the plan was to study during the fall semester, and when that didn't work out that well, the plan was to study over winter break, which I finally managed to do. The books shown in the photo are several (not all) of the books contained on my reading lists for the two exams. It was a miserable few weeks. However, I am also the master of distraction/avoidance,/procrastination, and even while studying during the last weeks in December and early January, I managed to read two entirely unrelated books (one of which was The Story of Edgar Sawtelle, which I really liked. I recommend it for any Shakespeare and/or dog fans out there) and beat a video game (Call of Duty: World at War). I learned last week that I passed the political theory portion, and will hopefully find out that I passed the public law portion sometime this week. However, I will add a disclaimer that I think I really botched one of my public law essays. I wouldn't be entirely surprised by an inadequate overall score as a result (okay, a failing score--it is essentially pass/fail). If that is the case, I'd have to take it again in August. Hopefully that is not the case. The exams are graded by all the faculty teaching in those areas, and we can see their grade sheets/comments when they are done. It is an eye-opener seeing the range of grades different graders will give the same exam, some commenting how well you answered the question, others commenting that you didn't answer the question at all. You've got to love academia.