Lessons Learned Today

Today, Matt & Jeni learned a lot!

First off, this morning Jeni spoke to the nurse practitioner and learned some things about our girls. Apparently, Olivia and Sydney have thrush. Thrush is a common issue with babies and causes white sores on the inside of the mouth. This could be one of the reasons why the girls have not nursed or eaten from the bottle as well lately. They will receive meds for this and it should go away soon. Olivia will also possibly have her cannulas taken off to see how she tolerates room air. This will be huge for us as we do not want her needing oxygen at home!

Our next lesson of the day was our CPR lesson. Jeni and I attended an overview on how to perform CPR on an infant or toddler. We did this at the hospital in the NICU. For both Jeni and I it was more of a refresher as we have both been certified in CPR at one time in the past. My certification has been expired for 14 years, but I still remember most of it...

Papa Gale and Grandma Vicki came up and visited the girls today. It had been nearly 2 weeks since their last visit and they could clearly see how much the girls had grown and changed. During their visit, Gale & Vicki shared that they had run into Nana Sharon and Papa Rick at Cracker Barrel and had a impromptu "grandparents breakfast." We learned that during this get together Nana Sharon shared her plans on showing what a proud grandparent she is... During her upcoming class reunion, she plans on inviting all of the attendees to come see pictures of her grandbabies over the PA system... Isn't that cute? We love you Sharon.

After feeding the girls, we braved the endless rain and headed home. I got a haircut and then made it home in time for nice fall-like dinner of tomato soup and grilled cheese. The rest of the evening was spent watching college football, the season opener of the NFL, and the final evening of the Republican National Convention.

That leads to the last few lessons I've learned after watching the last 3 nights of the RNC and last week's DNC...
1. The Republicans have the cooler mascot. I mean, can you really get excited about a donkey? As ridiculous as those elephant hat are, I'd kinda like one. And you could never really wear a jackass hat. Well, I guess you could... it would have a Kansas Jayhawks logo on it... :)
2. Dance music should never, ever be played at either convention. The God-awful dancing shown tonight was just embarrasing. The RNC definitely needs to improve its diversity, if only to improve its music selection and rhythm...
3. A great way to loosen up any party would be to have a drinking game associated with a John McCain speech. Simply have everyone take a drink every time McCain says "My Friends" and you'd need to line up cabs to drive your guests home... I counted 11 "My Friends" in tonight's speech alone... and that was a scripted speech! You should hear him in his town hall formats...
4. The RNC had a better backdrop to its final night of speeches than the DNC. The White House columns were o.k., but any man would kill to have that 8 story flat panel LCD screen to watch football or play Madden on!
5. Watching the delegates react to speeches at these conventions reminds me of a combination of a cheesy Branson music show and a WWE wrestling event. There are lots of corny lines and jokes and pandering to the audience for laughs and boos. The speeches are designed to clearly identify the heroes and villians that the crowds again are supposed to cheer and boo... The problem is that for most people watching at home, the spectacle isn't entertaining enough to watch longer than 5 minutes without dismissing the ridiculousness and flipping the channel.

Sydney....cuddling with Mommy while she was eating.

Olivia....she cuddled with Daddy while she was eating, but Mommy slacked and didn't take any pics of that. :(

Well, that's all for today!

TGTIF! (Thank goodness tomorrow is Friday)!

M

A Return to Regular Programming....

Alas, my darling, political-minded hubby has had his say about the politics of the U.S. these days or his take on the 'State of the Union'. Sorry that many of you had to be exposed to his ramblings. I listen to them daily. It's sad to say that often he is right, but often he also makes me crazy with his ramblings as well. It's a double edged sword.

I apologize for the lack of a blog yesterday, we're just getting the readership used to the fact that once the girls come home there will be many a day where the blog won't be updated, because it will be the SOS (same old stuff)...I can't take credit for that...Crazy Granny Nana Sharon came up with it, but she used a different word than stuff. :)

Let's see...lots of news...tonight Matt and I ventured out (after a romantic dinner of lasagna, garlic bread, and caesar salad) to see Baby Caroline and her tired parents who are affectionately known to our girls as Aunt Amy and Uncle Keith. She is so gosh darned cute. You should see her cute baby fat rolls (and you COULD if I'd remembered our camera...I know, my bad). Amy and Keith did a great job!!!!!!! It was cool to hold her, but weird because she is SOOO much larger than each of my girls. I can't wait until they are as big as her! I think I need to bust out the arm weights and work on my arm muscles before they get that big! :0)

News on the girls....I was sad to hear yesterday in a conversation with our nurse practitioner that Sydney will more than likely be coming home before Olivia. Sydney has in the past 3-4 days been a champ with the bottle and today was a champ at nursing..you go girl. Olivia USED to be a champ, but has in the last 3-4 days slowed down her love of the bottle and breast. Thankfully, however we think we have an answer as to why Olivia slowed down with eating and have her and Sydney on some meds to fix that! :) Remember, the last of the goals the girls are working on to come home is being able to eat on their own. So, since Sydney is doing better with that she's on track to come home earlier than Olivia. But you never know, Olivia COULD catch up to her!

I had ANOTHER conversation with our Nurse Practitioner Chris about health restrictions when the girls come home (I've had plenty of these conversations with our other NP Michelle about this as well). We'd had a conversation with another one of the NP's Holly this weekend, and so I was sharing that with NP Chris what we had talked about. Needless today, she was NOT HAPPY about what NP Holly had told us. She basically said that with Olivia's lung disease (reason why she's still on oxygen and very common in preemies), that we'll have to be SUPER SUPER careful about exposure to others. She wasn't a fan of us taking her anywhere she doesn't need to go and taking her in a crowd. So, I asked her what a crowd was and she said more than 6 people and as little exposure as possible to kids who attend school as they have fun little kid germs that could be super dangerous to her in particular. The concern is as great for Sydney, but she was pointing out that we'll have to keep an extra special eye out on Olivia for awhile because of her lung disease.

Another one of our talking points that we discussed was their concern about the girl's calcium and phosphorus levels. Both of these vitamins are vitamins that babies get in the 3rd trimester from their mom's bones. WELL, since we didn't have a 3rd trimester, they were worried that the girls would need some additional vitamins. Until now, the girls have been getting regular vitamins added to their breast milk. WELL, apparently that's not enough. SO, what we are starting (as of today) is mixing some Neosure (a special formula) to one bottle of their breast milk a day to assist them in gaining these vitamins. Apparently Breast Milk doesn't have enough of these 2 particular vitamins in it to help them gain what they need. SOOOOOOOOO since they are starting this new thing, Olivia is going to have to wait another 2-3 days before they try her off of her oxygen. PLEASE say a prayer or two for her that she does well off of it, as I would really prefer to not have to bring her home on Oxygen.

Today I also attended the Mother's Milk Lunch, which is a support group for mom's in the NICU who breastfeed. Today's focus was what you need to do to be discharged from the NICU. It was neat, there's whole list of things that Matt and I need to have done (at the hospital) before the girls can come home. SOOOOOOOOOOO tomorrow we'll be attending ONE of those requirements....Infant CPR class. YAY. Thank you Matt's boss Marion who is allowing him to attend this 1pm class. She rocks, seriously, and I mean that (esp. since I know she doesn't read our blog)...WE could not have asked for a better replacement for Brian Duffy as Matt's boss. SHe is so supportive and very family oriented and it means a lot.

WE continue to get the girl's nursery in order and the house as well! Tomorrow night promises to be busy as we need to get some more things put together and hopefully some more things hung in the nursery. ONce it's organized, I promise we'll put some pictures of it up on the blog. The girl's name letters are done (well, all but Olivia's A) and they look awesome! I'm so proud of myself, I didn't know I was so talented! :O)

Olivia

Sydney

Olivia...

Sydney...

Olivia!

Sydney!

Well, I'm off to nap...

Hope all is well!

J

Putting the "Labor" in Labor Day

Happy Labor Day to everyone!

We'd like to recognize the arrival of "Aunt" Amy & "Uncle" Keith's little girl, Caroline, this morning just before 11 a.m. today. Seems Caroline decided she was big enough at 8lbs 15oz. and was ready to enter the world. Amy started having some pre-labor indicators last evening and headed to the hospital around 2:30 a.m... I received a text early this morning that Amy and Keith were at the hospital and just waiting to see what happened next. Then around noon I received a phone call from Keith telling me the good news! Both mom and baby are doing well! We are very excited for Caroline's arrival and look forward to many play dates with her and our girls!

Here's a quick recap of our weekend:

Saturday was a big day for me as it started with my Fantasy Football draft. After that the guys played some poker following the draft. After poker, I went down to see Sydney & Olivia briefly. I stopped in long enough to feed them both before heading home. I made it home in time to get comfy on the couch just before kickoff of the Mizzou/Illini game. (See the previous post for related pictures).

Sunday: Jeni and I spent most of our day at the hospital. It was bath day for both of the girls. As you saw in an earlier post, Olivia has had a bath given by mom. However, this was Sydney's first time in the tub. As you'll see, she wasn't exactly a fan. Following the hospital, we went out to our friends' Laurie & Dan's house in St. Charles. Laurie & Dan have the cutest 3 year old (soon to be 4 in December) triplets ever! Alyssa, Peyton, & Taylor entertained us all evening long with lots of giggles, squealing, & wrestling. It's amazing how quickly they've grown! We hadn't seen them since around March and they've gotten so big and talk so much now! And, they are all very excited hearing about our girls and can't wait to meet them!

Monday/Labor Day: Jeni went down mid-morning to spend time with Sydney & Olivia. I hung out at home and caught a ride down with Nana Sharon & Papa Rick. Sharon & Rick got in some quality time with the girls and some good pictures. They both needed to get some good pictures to take with them to Sharon's class reunion and to Rick's family gathering in Lebanon (the city in Missouri, not the middle-east country).






After feeding time and diaper changes, Jeni and I went home. I did some yard work while Jeni ran some errands. We spent the rest of the evening relaxing on the couches with the dogs. After a stern lecture of "how much stuff we have to get done around here", I put together the girls' Baby Einstein Exersaucer. I've also been informed, I've got many shelves, pictures, and curtains to be hung before the girls come home.

Speaking of which, the Nurse Practitioner says that targeting the next 2 weeks for the girls coming home is pretty reasonable, which we were excited to hear! So, mark your calendars, because it seems like the Sept. 12 day may be pretty accurate.

That's all for now!

M

M-I-Z....

Z-O-U!

Great victory by my own Missouri Tigers last night against the rival Fighting Illini. The Illini hung in there and gave the Tigers a fight all the way 'til the end, but the Tigers got the win.

I'm looking forward to another exciting and historic season of Tiger football.

And so are my girls!

Check the little tiger fans below!

Olivia is amazed by the Mizzou offense!

Sydney reacts to Chase Daniel throwing an awful interception...

Mizzou had everyone biting their nails late in the game, including Olivia!

Sydney is thrilled with the Tigers' victory and shows the "Mizzou is #1" sign.