Our Family of FIVE!

OK, so we clearly didn't have a plan for September 30th :-) ... and we didn't communicate too well with all of our friends. Anyways, the girls decided to come last Wednesday ... they decided they wanted to be September babies instead of October! I went in for a sonogram and check-up. The girls looked great at the sonogram. Then we went to see Dr. Wood for my checkup. She decided to go ahead and check my cervix. I was dilated 4 cm!! She sent me back to the hospital to be monitored and rechecked 2 hours later. If I progressed past 4 cm, I would be admitted for delivery. She told me to go ahead and take out my Terbutaline pump, which wasn't planned to come out until Friday (2 days later). Sure enough, the terb pump was doing it's job, because as soon as it came out, the contractions started coming!! Two hours later I was dilated to 5 cm. I was admitted around 2:30. Cooper Marie was born first at 6:47 PM and Conley Kate was born second at 7:03 PM. Cooper weighed 4 lbs 13 oz at 17.5 inches and Conley weighed 5 lbs 4 oz at 17.5 inches. Cooper was a breeze ... delivered with only 2 1/2 pushes! Then we had to have a c-section to deliver Conley because she turned bottom down. Although we had prayed for Conley to turn head-down to avoid a c-section, God had a better plan for us. It was a blessing that she turned that way though, because her placenta had detached/abrupted 70%. Had we been able to deliver her vaginally, it could have cut off her oxygen and caused me to lose even more blood than I had. I ended up losing twice as much blood as a normal c-section already. All that to say, we are thankful that Conley turned the way that she did! Because of the large amount of blood loss, I was VERY "out of it" during the c-section as well as the next couple days to follow. During the c-section and in the recovery room immediately after, I could not keep my eyes open hardly at all. I barely remember talking to anyone. Hence the reason for little communication while we were in the hospital. It's all still a blur really! They monitored me to see if I would need a blood transfusion, but my counts showed that the transfusion was not necessary. I was throwing up all night after the delivery into the next morning, and I could not finish conversations without falling asleep even the day after the surgery. NOT FUN when you have two beautiful babies to start to bond with! I was hooked up to an oxygen monitor the night of my surgery, which went off every time I started to doze because my levels would drop. We couldn't sleep because of the alarm going off, so they put me on oxygen finally just so I could sleep. It was such a crazy blur of a night! We stayed until Sunday because it took me until then to feel well enough to go home.

Although the delivery and recovery for Mommy were tough, the girls have done GREAT from the start! They didn't have to spend even one minute in the NICU ... PRAISE GOD!! They have been breathing just fine on their own, nursing well from the start and are absolutely beautiful (if I do say so!). We have gone for two follow ups for their weight and jaundice. Both girls are already gaining weight since we left the hospital, which is great! Cooper's jaundice has already started to go down, and Conley's did plateau today but we'll go back tomorrow to see if it is starting to go down. They both have a little bit of dark hair and definitely are identical!! We are thankful that Conley has two "angel kisses" (or "stork bites) as they are called by the nurses so that we can tell them apart. Conley has one on her head and one in the corner of her right eye. They will go away eventually, but for now we are glad that they are there so Mommy and Daddy don't feel bad getting them mixed up!

It is so strange having such tiny little babies since Campbell was born almost twice their size! They are just so precious to hold and so so sweet already! We are loving every minute with them! It is so amazing to just watch them and think what miracles they are, all three of them....Campbell, Cooper and Conley! Our ONE embryo with Campbell that was our first miracle....and then our ONE embryo with Cooper and Conley that surprised us...God is SO good! To think that they doctors didn't think our second baby would make it. I look at both of them now and can't imagine either of them not being a part of our family.

Campbell is SO sweet and cute with them and is doing great! She really is loving being a big sister! She is definitely happy to have Mommy and Daddy home with her, since we were both at the hospital from delivery until Sunday. I'm so happy to be home with her finally too ... and on my feet (although it's still a recovery process)!

We are being so careful with them being so tiny and young right now with the flu going around, so we have decided to keep Campbell out of Mother's Day Out until I return to work. We don't want her bringing home anything, and if she were to get sick she couldn't be here in the house with them until she was better. We are avoiding large crowds indoors for the time being or having them around many kiddos. We still welcome visitors to come meet them! We are just being careful not to have little kids around them right now and to sanitize well. The Women's Center at HEB actually went on "lock-down" the weekend that I was discharged only allowing immediate family to visit mommies and babies because of the flu.

Although this has been a long few months for us, it of course is all so so so worth it now having the girls here with us and being able to bring them home from the hospital immediately. We can't thank you all enough for your prayers and support for the last few months!! We are so very blessed with such wonderful friends and family!

Conley

Cooper laying on Mommy

Cooper in pink and Conley in yellow

Cooper on left and Conley on right

Conley on left and Cooper on right