Miscellany at 34w2d

Many many things going on! I've been wanting to post an update for a while, so I will just go ahead and break it down into various categories. I am 34 weeks and 2 days pregnant today! Time is drawing near when we will get to meet our two daughters!

To Do List
Trying to complete my list of things to do:

THINGS TO DO:
1. Bring up baby bassinets from storage in basement and wash them.
2. Clean out all the junk piling up in my office/nursery.
3. Sew jackets and bonnets for babies' homecoming outfits.
4. Write up birth plan by Monday morning! DONE
5. Meet with doula Monday morning. DONE
6. Pack hospital bag.
7. Wash all the preemie/newborn/ size 0-3 clothing.
8. Strip, wash, and sun my used cloth diapers. DONE
9. Install one car seat in Tim's car (need room for Mary Anne to ride to hospital with us). Get it inspected.
10. Tour hospital Monday night. DONE
11. Buy things like baby Motrin, pack n play sheets.

BIG THINGS I FINALLY FINISHED!
1. Ordered my EZ2 Nurse pillow
2. Ordered the snap-n-go double stroller
3. Ordered all the cloth diapers
4. Bought two car seats
5. Attended baptism class and picked Godparents
6. Sewed dresses and booties for homecoming outfits.

Baptism
As you can see from the lists above, Tim and I attended a baptism class here at our local Catholic church. I had called on Monday, February 15th, to find out what was required for having a baptism held there and they said we had to attend a class which is only held once a month. Coincidentally, there was one scheduled for that night! Luckily, we were able to attend it. At the class were two sets of parents that had planned to attend the previous month's class, but had their babies that day! One set of parents brought their children with them: two baby girls, just a month old! When I saw them, I said, "Oh! We are in the same boat!" The mom just looked at me and said, "Well be prepared to get absolutely NO sleep!" Yeah, we've heard that before. It was just a simple one hour class with a video, so we are glad to have taken care of that.

On the way home, we discussed Godparents and we picked two siblings each, for a total of four. We will wait until the babies are born to "assign" them. We called each of the four over the next two days and each one was honored to be asked. We feel badly that we have eight siblings between us and can only pick four. Not to mention very close friends.

So our little girls' Godparents will be my sister Amy and brother Paul, and Tim's sister Annemarie and brother Andy. The baptism will be held after the 4:30 p.m. Mass on Saturday, May 15th. I confirmed the date with the Church just yesterday afternoon.

Stretchmarks
Last week, I started noticing a mottled area of skin above my belly button. The skin feels so thin there, all stretched out. At my OB appointment on Friday, I asked my nurse Lynne if she thought it might be stretchmarks. She rubbed the skin and noticed that it had a different texture so she said, "yes, I'm afraid so!" Boo! I never had any with Thomas, and was hoping I would get off scott-free this time, too. Oh well! Yesterday they have turned into dark red lines radiating like the sun away from my outie belly button. For both pregnancies, I religiously used "Bio-Oil" on my belly twice a day from 10 weeks on. And I was hoping my "old" skin would keep me safe!

Babies
The babies are doing really well. They move around a lot! They are staying head down, at least, but I think they enjoy kickboxing each other. I can feel Baby A's bum pushing out on the left side. She just seems to like hanging out there. Yesterday, the u/s tech told me Baby B is now facing in towards my back. So she is in a great position. But you can't get pictures of her that way. Things are so full in there, and they are getting so big, that actually it will be difficult to get any decent ultrasound pictures from here on out. I have tried to videotape the girls moving in my belly using my digital camera, but they must have a sixth-sense about it and stop each time I press record!

I went in yesterday for the limited scan where they just check blood flow through the hearts and the cords, and measure the levels of fluid around the babies. They did very well with both. I also had my biweekly non stress test, and they moved quite a bit for that, so the nurse got all the measurements she needed. Interestingly, I had three surges (contractions) that I didn't feel in that 20 minute period. But we had been having an animated conversation throughout, so she felt I was just too distracted to have noticed them. Here is my collage for 34 weeks:
We had another six inches of snowfall this weekend in our never-ending winter, hence the theme!

The doctor came in at the end of the ultrasound to check on them, too, and said they looked great. He then asked, "Do you have any questions for me, while you've got me here?" And I said, "Yes, actually I do." This is the doctor who delivered Thomas, and he got into quite a bit of rush near the end of his delivery, which has always bothered me somewhat. (He had said to stop breathing and start pushing! I think the room full of doctors, technicians and a million nurses was getting to him. Tim noticed he had also grabbed forceps and might have even been tempted to use them!) I asked him if I would be allowed to give birth on my own schedule, or if he thought I might be rushed again. He said that if I give birth to full term twins (latter part of 36 weeks onwards) then there would only be two nurses there, so no rush. But if it was before then, the whole NICU staff would be in the room, so yes, there probably would be more urgency. So it just confirmed for me that he did feel a need for a rush if he had people watching and waiting! Boo!

Hospital Tour
On Monday evening, we drove down to the hospital I will be delivering at (the same one where I delivered Thomas). We met with the same Maternal Care Coordinator. We filled in a few forms and then she took us on a tour. We got to see some rooms we hadn't seen before, because they were all full at our last tour in 2008! But I am guessing we will probably be laboring in the same or similar room that I labored in with Thomas (down near the OR), since I will have to again do my pushing and delivering in one of the ORs. We saw the operating room that Thomas was delivered in. How strange to see it again. She did show us the baby nursery that we didn't see last time, since we knew we wouldn't have a healthy baby hanging out in there. She even pushed a little bassinet up to the window with a dark haired boy in it. She later told us he weighed 7 lbs. 11 oz. -- Thomas' weight! We ran into my favorite mother-baby nurse, Renee. I was glad to see her and reminisce. She did ask us how Thomas was, so that was a bit of a shock.

After our tour, we went out to dinner. Last year, at our local animal shelter's silent auction, we bid on a gift certificate for a restaurant called "Thomas". (How could we not?) It has been on the back of our minds to use it before it expired, so finally we pulled it out and saw it was expiring March 20th! It is located just a few blocks from the hospital, so that made it even more convenient. We enjoyed many "small plates" of food like Oyster Mushroom Bruchetta, Steak Tip Flatbread, and Crabcakes. Yum! I paid the price, however, for this indulgence by having very bad heartburn all night and into the next day! No more overeating for me.

Sad news
I will probably post this also on Thomas' Carepages, but my friend Rebecca Johnson and her husband lost their son Jasper yesterday morning at Children's Hospital in Boston. You may have noticed her comments on my Carepages posts. Jasper was born a few days after Thomas, also with congenital heart defects. It is so hard to know that another parent has lost a child, and all the pain that they will face. Please say prayers for their support.

More gifts for the girls, and an update

A month ago, Tim and I went to dinner with one of his coworkers from New Hampshire, Pattie. Pattie had made a gift for our girls and was able to deliver it in person at dinner. Pattie has followed the story of Thomas and wanted to celebrate the upcoming arrival of the newest members of our family.
She crocheted two baby blankets is soft pink with white trim. The gift bag they came in was adorable, too. I draped one across the crib in the photo above. (Click on all images to enlarge.)

And then last week we received five boxes throughout the week! Two of them were filled with cloth diapers and accessories that I had ordered, two were packed with more hand-me-downs from my friend Christina, and the fifth was a gift sent by my sister Amy!

Amy knew she would have a hard time NOT buying things once we learned I was having baby girls. This is her second gift she has sent! They are a set of five adorable onesies, perfectly sized for small newborns. The colors and patterns are wonderful!
The two pairs of little pink shoes are very soft inside. They match the onesies perfectly.

Christina sent me more small clothes, since she knew we were all set pretty much for 6 to 9 months sizes. She'll be sending another two boxes of sizes 0 to 3 months, whenever she and her twin girls can get out through the snow to the post office! But the two boxes we received last week are sizes 3 to 6 months. I lined up all the adorable dresses on top of the couch, and then from left to right, she sent: sleepers, jeans, shorts, shirts, pants, and onesies.I've pulled out the smaller outfits labeled 3 months to put in the drawers, and boxed the rest for when they start growing. My mother-in-law is going to have a lot of laundry to help me with when she arrives!!

I spread out on the floor of the nursery all of the cloth diapers and accessories we have received so far. I've begun washing them and putting them away. I actually diapered one of the Peter Rabbit stuffed animals Thomas received, just to see how hard it was. It wasn't at all, even using safety pins.
Something I just ordered today is called a "onesie extender". It makes the bottom of a onesie a little longer so a baby can wear a cloth diaper, which tends to be a little larger than a disposable diaper, with the correctly sized clothing. So many things to think about!

A little update on me and the girls, since I know that is all anyone is *really* interested in... ;-)

I am doing pretty well. I have really cut back on household chores. I am still trying to sew baby layette (picture below showing what I've completed so far). Tim has picked up the chores of going to the supermarket, a lot of the cooking and cleaning up, ironing shirts, and carrying things around for me. I get exhausted just showering now. When I walk up and down the stairs, I feel like my pelvis is going to split! I don't go outside if it is the slightest bit slippery; I do not want to risk a fall.

The girls move around quite a bit. Some days they can be pretty quiet, but nearly every night they come out to play! Tim and I laugh to see the bumps roll across my belly. I can feel their hiccups nearly every day. We are trying to talk to them more, and play with them by pressing back on their limbs. I am rereading my Hypnobirthing book, trying to prepare myself for another natural childbirth. I'll be writing up our birth plan this week, and next week we will have our tour of the hospital (again). I'll be meeting with my doula, Lynn, soon, and hiring her for the delivery.

We have discussed our name choices and finally made a "short list". (Sometimes I forget what I've already written about, so if I am repeating myself, blame it on my pregnancy brain!) We had done the same thing with Thomas, but didn't pick any of the names on our short list after all! So these girls will just have to wait to be born to be named. We are thinking of baptism dates and godparents, now. So many things to figure out!

Sometimes I think they will be here in three weeks, and I just want to be prepared! At least I finished up our tax paperwork, so that is something we won't have to worry about. The nursery could use some tidying up. I will be moving all of Thomas' things (funeral programs, ultrasound pictures, memory box, etc.) out of the nursery furniture and into a chest his grandfather (my dad) made for this purpose. And when Tim's mom arrives in March, I am sure she will help me with washing everything all over again, since things have been sitting here for over a year.

We did buy our car seats, but our stroller is on back order. Tim will bring up the two bassinets in a few weeks and put them in our bedroom, for the babies to sleep in for the first six months. We will have them share the crib for their naps, I think. I bought an infant carrier (aka wrap or sling) to be able to carry the two babies around with me, at least until they weigh 10 pounds each.

And as you can see below, I finally finished sewing the purple dress. I will work on their jackets next!

In my 8th month!

I hit 32 weeks on Monday and am now officially into my eighth month. I can hardly believe how quickly the time has flown! It is February already... and I could be giving birth in March which is JUST next month!

Yesterday I went in for my ninth ultrasound. This was a complete growth scan. I also underwent Non Stress Testing (NST) which I will now do twice a week from here on out. NSTs check to see how your babies are faring. They want to see their heart rates accelerate twice in a twenty minute period, and also to see how they react when you have a contraction. And then lastly, I had an office visit. I guess I'm going to be having one of those weekly now, too. Scans are still every other week, alternating between a limited scan (like I had at 30 weeks) and a full scan (like the one yesterday).

First I had the NST, which the three of us passed. I only felt and saw one Cx on the monitor, so it was nice to see I'm not having more than what I feel. Baby B wasn't getting in her second acceleration, so I pushed on her leg and boy did that get her heart racing! All the NST techs were so sweet, they were talking about Thomas and how glad they were that I didn't break my waters on Friday. They said they were praying for me when they heard I was coming in to be checked! I showed them his pictures. It was really nice how much they remember.



Then I had a bit of a wait in the office until I went in for my ultrasound. The tech always examines Baby A first, and then she looks at Baby B. Not only does she look at their anatomy (brain, heart, kidneys, stomach), she measures their limbs, head circumference, and belly circumference. Then she examines the placenta, the cord, and the fluid levels. Baby A has a very large head. Uh oh! It measures 36w4d or so. Both babies are still in the same position -- head down, spooning. Heads are touching, I think. They are in the 75th percentile or so for size. Baby A weighs 5 lb 4 oz, measuring approximately 35w4d; Baby B weighs 4 lb 15 oz, approx 34w4d. I hinted about doing a 3D ultrasound, but the tech didn't take the bait. She is nice but not overly friendly like the tech I had last year. She videotaped a little bit and printed seven pictures. Then she had me wait while she got the doctor. I was just about asleep when he appeared. The OB said everything looked great.

Lastly, I had my office visit. I love my nurse practionner. I talked to her for about 15 minutes about my various questions. We talked about the epidural, and what I should do. I keep going back and forth with this. Best case: I don't need it for either birth. Worst case: I need it for an emergency c/s and it isn't in, so I get general anesthesia (gas) and sleep through one or both of their births. She measured my fundus -- I am 45 weeks, yes you read that right. (That means I look as big as a woman carrying a single baby who is five weeks overdue!) Then she measured me side to side and started laughing and said, "I"m not even going to tell you!" Well I measure 59cm side to side. We joked about figuring out the square footage inside. She won't look at my cervix until my 36wk appt, unless I request it.


So that's the update. I have to say, it was hard getting behind the wheel of the car. My belly is squishing my lap big time. I dread driving myself twice a week now until the end. Ugh.

Here is a photograph of me taken this morning. I decided to model a new pair of nursing pajamas I bought on sale yesterday:

So I thought my water broke Friday...

This might have a little more graphic info than you are used to... so here it is, my Friday in all its yucky glory:

On Friday morning, I was catching up with some emails and message boards, and doing some research at Babies R Us online. I started to feel strangely light headed, so I ate something sweet with protein (a granola bar and then a bunch of cashews). But it got worse so I went to lay down and had to get up instantly from the awful vertigo I experienced. Yuck, I hate when my head spins! I felt an urge to pee, and did and there was more than usual (even though I had just gone to the bathroom) and it was clear and it smelled sweet and came out easily, which is not usually the case these days, with all the pressure down there. It made me wonder if it was just urine, or if it could have also been some amniotic fluid. Then I sat down in the living room and called Tim and told him I felt really awful. He didn't know what he could do for me, and I didn't have any ideas. I just wanted him to know. After I hung up, I went and sat in the bathroom for ten minutes before finally succumbing to the urge to throw up. Ummm... never eat dry nuts if you think you might puke...

Anyway, I soaked my underpants completely and my pants, and didn't even feel any of it come out. It didn't smell like anything.

I called my OB's office and had to wait for a nurse to call me back, since they were all on lunch and had to be paged. The receptionist warned me that the nurse would probably tell me to head to an emergency room, if I thought I broke my water. I called and told Tim, so he left work (he had my truck as it was snowing here, with already at least an inch on the ground) to come and pick me up. A nurse called a few minutes later and said to come into the office, they would check me out there.

I had no idea if I should even be packing a bag! I didn't want to give birth! I ran through a few scenerios in my head, from having read other women's experiences. It could just be a slow leak, and so I would probably be admitted into the hospital and placed on hospital bedrest. Or one of the membrane sacs did burst, and so they would administer steroid shots to help the babies' lungs mature, give me antibiotics, and then induce me in 48 hours, or remove the babies by c-section. Or it could just be urine in both cases, and so I would just be embarrassed and head home. I was hoping for the third case.

While waiting for Tim to arrive, and there was no rush according to the nurse, I bagan packing a few things just in case. I grabbed my digital camera, battery charger and cell phone charger, several magazines, a Suduko book, and two books for reading. I packed a few pairs of underpants and some comfy clothing. (I was thinking more along the lines of hospital bedrest.) Also my toiletries, a photo of Thomas, and my pregnancy journal. I didn't pack anything for the babies, as nothing had been washed yet!

Tim arrived and got a bag for me and we piled everything inside. Got in the truck and headed for the city. The roads weren't too bad, you could see all the salt and sand placed on the roads near home. The scenery was very pretty: all freshly fallen snow clinging to bare trees with about two or three inches on the ground. We hoped it wasn't an omen! Traffic wasn't heavy and we caught nearly every light. We parked in the lot closest to the office and walked in. I only started having the contractions as I begain packing the bag, so they were still pretty light. Tim told me he was wearing the same shirt he was wearing when I went into labor with Thomas!

The office was completely empty! Maybe they don't take appointments on Friday afternoons, but whatever it was, it sure was nice!

We went in a regular exam room, I undressed, and the NP (nurse practioner) did two swabs. One was the PH strip test, and that was negative, and the other was a new test called "amnio-sure" which is a lot like a home pregnancy test, in that you have to wait several minutes to see two lines (positive), but having just one line is the control (negative). So she did that and it was also negative for exposure to amniotic fluid. While she had the speculum in, she took a look at the cervix and at a glance, it is still closed and high.

But nurse was concerned that the gushing on the toilet didn't sound right, so she is letting the OB on call know in case something further happens this weekend with me. I told her I would much rather be embarrassed to learn it was just pee, then have it be amniotic fluid.

So Thank God it was negative. Of course, my BH Cx totally ramped up the rest of the day, and I had like ten in that first hour after the nurse was done; they got up to two to three minutes apart in the car ride home. So I drank a bottle of water, ate something, and napped for a bit in the glider we have in the nursery.

Today we are off to Babies R Us to purchase car seats, stroller, monitors, and quite a few other things with the gift cards we received from before.

Tuesday is my next appointment, and I will post an update after that.

Sewing baby layette

I went shopping a few weeks ago, looking for some memorable, adorable homecoming outfits for the girls. These are the outfits they would wear home from the hospital when they are discharged. I didn't find anything I really loved. So I decided to try sewing some outfits instead. There was a sale on at Joann Fabrics for Simplicity Patterns at 99 cents each. (Normally they are priced $9 to $12.) Keep in mind I haven't really sewed anything like this since junior high school. The only clothing I've ever sewed was a wedding gown for my barbie doll!

At the store, I looked through the Simplicity Catalog in the baby section, and only saw one pattern that I liked. Remarkably, it was a vintage pattern from the 1940s that they reissued. I am *pretty sure* that my mom once owned this pattern, lol. I then walked through the store selecting fabrics to use, buttons, lace, and other notions.

I decided to make one baby's layette in pink and one in purple. I also bought some cute pale blue toile and soft green toile (with bunnies) to make one of the simpler dresses on the pattern, perhaps as Easter outfits. But first, I need to focus on the homecoming outfits, which will include a short-sleeved dress, a jacket, a pair of booties, and possibly a bonnet.

I decided to start with the booties. They seemed simplest, as they only involved cutting out two pieces. But soon I was messaging one of my November Mom friends who sews little girls' dresses for her Etsy store, "Princess Crossing". What is a seam allowance, I wondered! (I still don't know if I sewed the booties correctly, or not!) When I finished them, Tim thought they seemed kind of big. I pulled out Thomas' plaster foot cast (!!) and put one of the booties on it. It was about a 1/2" longer than his foot, and he had long feet. So maybe they are a little big. But at least they are finished. They are made out of felt, embroidered, with contrasting ribbon.


On Saturday, I finally started sewing the dresses. I began with the pink fabric. I found myself running back and forth to the computer to Google so many things. I didn't want to start cutting until I really understood what a seam allowance was: was it built into the outline of a pattern? Fortunately, there have been others online before me asking these kinds of questions, and Yahoo Answers provided me with some clear direction! Feeling more confident, I pinned and cut out the fabric. I chose to go with the XXS size patterns - for babies up to 7 lbs. I even compared the pattern to some of the dresses hanging in the nursery armoire, and thought that size would be fine.

After cutting out the back, front, and two sleeves, I then had to do the embroidery on the front of the dress. I asked Tim for his opinion about the colors of embroidery thread to use, and he helped me select the green for the leaves in addition to the stems, and only one color (purple) for the flowers. I finally decided on using white for the centers of the flowers. After I added the white lace around the neck, that turned out to be a really good match.

If you notice, the flowers on the dress match the flowers on the booties. I do the embroidery by hand. It reminded me of the days when I used to do embroidery on my blue jeans when I was pretty young!

I then sewed pleats along the front of the dress. The iron came in pretty handy for this stuff. Tim had brought it downstairs earlier for me to use while sewing. Once the pleats were done, I moved to the back of the dress. I had to cut a slit along the back, where the head will come through, and sew similar pleats. Finally, it was time to join the two pieces together. Once they were joined, I sewed the lace around the neck hole, and lined it with white hem tape. I'm not completely happy with how that came out, though.


Next up was sewing the sleeves. It took me half an hour to figure out how to feed the elastic band through the end of the sleeve! Thank goodness for the Internet! After they were sewn, I showed them off to Tim. He found it amazing, it is cool that I can sew something like that!


By the end of Sunday, I had sewed the sleeves on, closed up the dress, and sewed two buttonholes! In bed, I sewed the little buttons on. This morning, I finished the hem with a slip-stitch. So here is the finished pink dress!

Front:


Back:


It isn't perfect, but it is homemade! And maybe they will only wear it once, but I feel like I've made a family heirloom for them to treasure. I never got to pick out a homecoming outfit for Thomas, so perhaps that is why I am determined to make sure these are extra special.

Next up: the purple dress! Then the jackets!