Monday, February 23, 2009

11 steps

Audrey has been walking pretty consistently now but usually only takes 5 steps at a time before she falls down or decides crawling would be much faster to get where she's trying to go. Well yesterday she took 8 steps at her grandparents house and then 11 steps later on that night while we were at home. It's so cute to watch her walk!! Now I just need to catch it on camera.

My sister's softball game!

We went to my sister, Shelby's, college softball game on Saturday. It was so much fun! The weather was just perfect. For most of the day we didn't need to wear a jacket or anything. Granseur used the burst feature on our camera and was able to capture the sequence of one of Shelby's pitches.







At one point during the game Shelby was up to bat. There were already two outs and Shelby had two strikes and three balls. On the next pitch, she had a great hit and was able to get her team two runs on it. It was very exciting!
Apparently watching softball games can be very exhausting!

Shelby hanging out with Audrey after the game.


I was also able to go shopping for some more maternity clothes while we were in Fayetteville. I desperately needed larger maternity clothes because I'm HUGE. I also got some truly LONG pants. I had some other maternity pants from Gap that were "long" but they really weren't. Motherhood Maternity just started selling longs in their jeans this month so I got some and they're half the price of the ones from Gap. YAY! I don't know what's taking retailers so long to sell long maternity pants. Do they think tall people don't get pregnant or something?!
After Shelby's game we got to visit Granseur's sister, CiCi, since she lives in Fayetteville. We went out to eat at a Caribbean restaurant and Audrey got to taste goat! It was just a fun day.

21 week belly pics

I didn't take a 21 week picture with my pregnancy with Audrey, so I just went to the next week for her.

Twins - 21 weeks, 1 day



Audrey - 22 weeks, 2 days

Friday, February 13, 2009

Stairs and vomit

Okay these two things don't really go together but today we visited a friend who had moved into a new home and Audrey discovered how to climb stairs! She could climb them all by herself and made it up about 8-10 steps! I was NOT looking forward to this fascination but it is cute to watch her learn.

Then I took Audrey to have lunch with her little boyfriend and all she wanted was some milk and yogurt. She ate at 11:00 but I got to see an encore of her food at 1:30! Seriously...I don't know how she does this. She'll just be playing and vomit randomly way after her meal and then go on her way. I clean vomit up almost on a daily basis. I think its worse than poop because you don't really know its coming and you don't have a special station all set up ready to deal with the vomit. It usually sprays everywhere, too. The worst part....the smell! Since I'm pregnant the vomit smells 10 x worse to me than I think it would to anyone else which in turn makes me almost vomit. I have to remind myself though that I am the mother and being a janitor is just part of my job.

Now here's the REALLY gross part. After I changed Audrey's clothes and cleaned her all up, she actually took a nap! (and a long one at that!) I've been up since 4:15 this morning with her so I decided that I deserved a nap, too. Well, when I wake up I realize I have just taken a nap w/ vomit on myself. Since I'm pregnant, I can't really tell what's going on in that space underneath my boobs but on top of my stomach. Apparently vomit likes to hang out there! I thought I was being careful when I picked her up to change her but I guess some of the loveliness made it onto my sweater. GREAT! Luckily it wasn't that much since I also come close to throwing up at the sight of baby boogers. (I was never destined to be a nurse.)

Thursday, February 12, 2009

She loves swings!

It's been so nice outside lately. Windy, but nice! Yesterday it was about 73 degrees and today it was 69 degrees. I took Audrey to the park yesterday and she got to swing in a swing for the very first time. She loved it! She screamed and laughed she was having so much fun. She also loved the wind blowing in her face. Today I took her to a different park and she got on the swing again and I helped her go down some slides too. She doesn't seem to think slides are that great yet. We also took a little walk. Its so nice to get outside. I can't wait until spring! I try to take adavantage of all the nice weather outings since I know that I probably won't be leaving my house very much soon!

Tuesday, February 10, 2009

19 week belly pics

Twins - 19 weeks, 1 day Audrey - 19 weeks


I know, I skipped a week. I just forgot to do it since we were busy with Audrey's surgery at the time. Oh well.

Thursday, February 5, 2009

Surgery doesn't stop her!

I've been amazed at how Audrey has just bounced back from her surgery. Besides the incision, you'd never know she had surgery by the way she plays and acts. We were concerned she'd be immobile for a little bit while she was healing ( we were told recovery would take 2-6 weeks), but she's been on the go! Tonight she even walked for the first time! She took four steps all by herself. You could tell she was proud of herself. We were, too! We don't get to see Daddy that often and he happened to home for an hour this evening in between work and something else. Normally, we don't see him all day! Well.....it was within that hour that she decided to take her first steps and he was actually here to see it. That was exciting! :)

Tuesday, February 3, 2009

We're having.....

2 BOYS! We had an ultrasound yesterday and found out the sex of the twins. It was a surprise...the lady from the perinatologist's office called yesterday morning and said they had an opening at 11:15 and could I make it? I said YES! :) These are some pictures of our little boys.

This is twin A. I love how on the left you can see Baby B trying to nose his way in the picture.



And this is Baby B.


Most of our ultrasound pictures are 2 D and the regular black and white you usually see, but we were shocked and thrilled when they did a 4D for us! I loved it. I think its amazing that I can "meet" them now.

Sunday, February 1, 2009

We're home!

I haven't explained exactly what the surgery would entail so here's a good synopsis. This is not our hospital webpage but it describes pretty accurately what Audrey had done. https://www.ucsfhealth.org/childrens/medical_services/urology/vreflux/ureteralFAQ.html

We left the hospital this morning around noon. Last night was kind of rough. Audrey did well recovering from surgery but as I'm sure you can guess, the hospital couch and chair were NOT comfortable at all. They were definately not made with pregnant women in mind. Audrey was tethered to an IV and a catheter during our entire stay so moving around was a challenge. Really, we just stayed on a chair and took turns holding her the whole time. That was a challenge as well because a lot of the time she just wanted to be free and play. The crib they had in there for her wasn't all that great either. The mattress was extremely soft so she couldn't really walk on it. If she tried, she'd just fall and bonk her head on the metal bars. Also, the mattress didn't fit well in the crib...there were gaps all around the side. So if her foot got in there she'd fall and get hurt. The crib bars were very thin metal so she couldn't grab them well. If she started to fall and put out an arm to catch herself, her arm would just go through one of the gaps and she'd hurt herself.
Of course since she's a baby you can't tell her to hold her foot or arm still so her IV kept getting messed up every few minutes. It was in her foot at first, but when the machine starting beeping at us every 30 seconds, we finally had to switch the IV to her arm which meant poking her again in the arm with a needle. She was not happy! It was so sad. Granseur was gone getting dinner for himself and we all know that he's the one she finds the most comfort in. While they were doing it she was screaming and crying and reaching for me as if to say, "MOMMY! FIX IT!" It really hurt for me not to reach for her and scoop her up from the "mean" nurses. :*(

She finally went to sleep at 10:30. She woke back up at 4:00 but it wasn't because she was in pain. She just wanted to play for an hour! I've never been so happy to see my child so happy and alert and well at 4:00 in the morning. :) She went back to sleep and got a couple more hours of sleep after that. Audrey didn't like getting her catheter and IV out but we were excited! We could finally move from one spot! Then like I said earlier...we got to leave at noon. We're all so glad to be home. Granseur's parents even brought us dinner.
Audrey is still taking pain meds and antibiotics. She goes back to the doctor in 3-4 weeks to see if the surgery was a success. For right now, she has bloody urine. That'll last for about a week or so and we're told its normal. Other than that, she seems pretty much back to normal. I couldn't have asked for a better outcome. Thank God!

Here's some pictures from the surgery

Um, why are we here so early?

Getting ready for surgery. She's pointing at an IV bag.


Just out of surgery and coming out of anesthesia. You can tell she's zonked!

Mommy finally gets to hold Audrey. Her face is so pitiful. I was so happy and relieved to hold her. I cried A LOT before she was taken away from me for surgery. I knew I was doing the right thing but it still somewhat feels wrong to have your child taken away knowing that someone is going to cut her open. Then of course there's that fear that the surgery may go wrong and I won't ever get to see her again. I am so thankful we live in the times we do though. If it weren't for this surgery, continuous infections would damage Audrey's kidneys to where they wouldn't work anymore and she would die.


Reading cards from visitors.
Resting in the best spot in the world.

Audrey in the horrible crib. We always watched her while she was in it and moved her IV and catheter around while she would walk around and play.


And yes, I guess some people might think its weird that I took pictures on her surgery day, but like I said....there's that fear that it may be the last time I see her. I also thought it was very sweet how her Daddy was taking such good care of her.