They Have Arrived!!

I'm so sorry about the lack in posting. It was an extremely difficult and long pregnancy and I honestly didn't have the energy or gumption to post things. Well, that's all over with now because our babies have arrived!

Charlotte Jo and Harold Benjamin were born on September 14th (Ben's birthday actually.) I carried them until almost 38 weeks which is pretty long for twins. The day before I delivered my uterus measured 57cm from bottom to top (to give you an idea of how big that is, a full term woman with a single baby *might* measure 40cm.) It was a bit depressing that the Dr couldn't help but chuckle every time he measured me. My belly was also 53 1/2 inches around when I delivered, whew. I have some pictures of myself at that time along with pictures of the twins that I will post when Ben comes home with the memory stick from the camera. Haha.

The twins were born at 1:09pm and 1:15pm. Both weighed in at 6lbs 6oz each (yep, they weighed exactly the same.) Charlotte was 19 1/2 in and Harold was 21 1/4 in. They are so tiny! Neither of my other girls were even close to being this small. I suppose it's a good thing they were small, there were two of them after all. Although I had to deliver the babies in the operating room, I did not have to have a c-section. My recovery has been swift and I feel good.
I will make sure to post some pictures of the twins as soon as I have them. Thank you all for your care and concern. We love you and appreciate you all very much.

18 Week Ultrasound

Well, we had our 18 week ultrasound yesterday. And.... WE HAVE ONE BOY AND ONE GIRL!!!! I just want everyone to know that I WAS RIGHT! Haha, I have been wrong with both of my other pregnancies, so it's nice not to be wrong again.

Here is our little girl in profile.

Here is our baby boy in profile.

Here is a 3-D image of the two of them together. Or rather Baby Boy and Baby Girl facing backwards (she wouldn't turn around for this part.)

Here is our baby boy in 3-D profile. We tries to get one like this for our baby girl, but she was NOT being cooperative (sounds like she might have the same personality as her sisters)

The babies are looking great. They are both measuring on schedule. They are also both breech, but they are still so small and have plenty of time to flip (hopefully). At one point in the ultrasound they were facing each other and kicking and punching like mad. It looked like just a tangle of limbs, haha. Thanks to everyone for your love and support. Now, baby names...

Ultrasound Pictures 11 1/2 weeks

We had an ultrasound this week and I was so nervous. At my last ultrasound the Dr. couldn't get a picture of both babies together, and I was worried that maybe he had just gotten the same baby twice! My worries were unfounded though. There are definitely two babies there! Seeing them moving around and kicking each other in the head made it so much more real for me. I'm starting to get really excited.
Both of the babies are measuring a few days big, but that's good. The ultrasound tech still wasn't for sure if they are fraternal yet. The tech could only find one of the two key indicators of fraternal twins. We may never know for sure. She also couldn't tell if there is one placenta or two. I'll have more ultrasounds and things may be clearer then. Here are some pictures of the babies. Baby A was moving a lot during this part and we couldn't get great shots, but enjoy anyway!

We're Expecting More

A complete suprise today. I went in to the dr to have my first ultrasound and he found TWO BABIES. I am still in shock. There is no history of twins in my family, I guess there is a first for everything. From what the doctor could see, the babies look to be fraternal. We are going to have another ultrasound in two weeks to make sure everything looks good. I'll keep everyone posted!

We're Expecting!

I think most everyone knows already, but for those of you who don't, we're expecting baby #3! I put a little widget on the blog so everyone can see how things are going. I haven'e had my first appointment yet, but I will post the ultrasound pictures when I get them. We are super excited to add another beautiful baby to our family.

Lucy's First Birthday

 My tiny baby is getting so big! Lucy turned one on November 20th and we had a big party with all of our friends. She had a lot of fun just watching all of the other kids running around. She is so wonderful.

Lucy went crazy for her cake. Not crazy like throwing it everywhere, but crazy like she had never eaten before. She was really controlled and just kept shovelling through it. I think she would have kept on going all night if we had let her.

We took the cake away after a little while. This is what's left of a two-layer chocolate cake after we finally took it away from Lucy.

Catching Up

I really don't have much in the way of excuses for not posting in a while. I suppose I was busy, and it was the holiday season, and I was out-of-town, but none of those reasons are very good. So I am going to do some catching up on my blogging starting with Lucy's first birthday.
It may take a couple of days for me to get all caught up, but just be a little patient and I will reward you with some awesome pictures of my beautiful daughters.

Halloween

I found my camera just in time for Halloween (thank goodness) so I got some pictures of our costumes. I took Cloe and Lucy on Friday to a couple of businesses during the day to do some trick-or-treating. Cloe dressed as a fairy princess with no wings. She was pretty adamant about it. I tried to explan to her that fairies have to have wings or they wouldn't be fairies, but she wouldn't have any of it. Oh well. I just put a bear snowsuit on lucy which is the same one that I put on Cloe at that age. They look so much alike!!

                                                                 Cloe 13 1/2 months

                                                                 Lucy 11 1/2 months

We went to our ward party/trunk-or-treat as a family that night. We went as Blue Man Group. I thought it was a clever idea, but I was surprised to have so many people as us what we were and then not know who Blue Man Group is when we told them. Weird Alaskans.

Me and the Girls

The Family.

(Ok, I promise my double chin isn't that bad. The liquid latex paint we used made my neck stick together and I couldn't move it.)

Of course Blue Men have blue feet!

First Day of "School"

Cloe kind of started preschool today. She is in a neighborhood preschool (kind of like Joy School.) There is only one other little boy in it, but I think it will be good for her to do different things. She REALLY didn't want to go, but we just took our time and about 20 minutes later she was running to the car so that she could go.
I have mixed feelings about her going. It's not really preschool, more like a structured playdate. It's still so weird that my Tiny O is at school. I can't believe how big she is!

Wearing her new clothes from her birthday

Her ladybug backpack (she put a couple of her new toys in there)

New Hairstyles

I have been looking for new hairstyles to try on Cloe, but haven't been very successful. But, I was talking to my sister, Callie, the other day and she was having the same problem. She found a website with AWESOME style, some of the styles are a little too awesome (weird) for me, but there are some cool ones. I've tried a couple lately. What do you think?

Here is the first one I tried. It's a picture from the back. It took me about 20 minutes to do.

Here's a shot of the same one from the front. The messy side-bun looked SO cute with a flower. As you can see, Cloe couldn't take her eyes off the T.V.

Here is a shot of the one I did yesterday. I did the little twisty things all over her hair and then ended in what the website calls a "flower bun" Ben said that she looked like she was ready  to go to the prom... It does look a little formal, but I had to try it to see what it would look like. Haha, we didn't even end up going anywhere yesterday.

Here is a back shot of the "flower bun". Her hair really is too thin for this kind of style, but you never know until you try.

Ben's Photography Class

For Summer semester Ben took a digital photography class. I wanted to post a couple of pictures that he took and edited. He did a great job.

Grandma and Grandpa

We were so happy that Ben's parents were able to come see us for a couple of weeks this summer. We had so much fun with them. Cloe loved all of the attention, I mean, who else but a grandma would blow bubbles with a kid for five hours straight?

Lucy sharing some of Grandpa's ice cream

Cloe and Grandma at the Golden Days Parade

Grandpa and Lucy ready for church

Cloe helping Grandpa mow the lawn

(NOTE: That is NOT our house. Our house is a nice light color, not Salmon Orange.)

It was so much fun to have someone come and visit us (hint, hint.)

Thanks for coming up Grandma and Grandpa!!

Cloe's Comments

It seems like Cloe is always making us laugh with the crazy and silly things that she says. So, I want to share all of these with you. I will keeping posting them under the new Cloe's Comments section of our blog.

I Know, I know...

I know that I said that I would post and didn't... I've been so busy. I know that sounds like an excuse, and I guess it is.

I know that a lot of you already know what is going on with Lucy, but I am going to post a little bit about it for those of you who don't know.

I took Lucy to her six month check-up and it turned out that she lost weight from her four month to her six month check-ups. Lots of diet-tracking and blood tests later, we found out that everything is normal but that she needs significantly more food than she was getting. I try not to feel terrible about her being malnourished and everyone says that it's not my fault, but it's so hard to see how skinny and tiny your baby is and not blame it on yourself. I've gotten over those first difficult weeks and am doing better with everything. In the meantime, nearly all Lucy does when she is awake is eat. I feed her pretty much all day, and she is gaining weight really well. Her doctor was concerned about the fact that she wasn't able to sit up or roll from her back to her front and refered her to a state-run program called Project Teach. A couple of therapists from Project Teach came over a few weeks ago to evaluate Lucy and see what she needed and what we can do for her. They found that while her cognitive and fine motor skills are right where they should be, her gross motor skills are that of a four-month-old (she is 7 1/2 months old.) I was pretty stunned to hear that she was that far behind and had a hard time not blaming myself again. The therapists from Project Teach and I made a plan and they are starting to see her a couple of times a month. They come to our house and help me learn new ways and excercises to help to stregthen her muscles. Lucy is thriving with all this work. She can almost sit up alone and can roll from her back to her stomach with ease.

I think it will just take a couple of months to get her all caught up. Cloe is having a harder time with me spending more time with Lucy and is acting out more, but I know that she will be okay with it all.

Thank you all for your love and support; especially those of you who have helped me not to beat myself up over all of this. Here are some new pictures of the girls.

Sorry...

Sorry I haven't posted anything in a while. We were out-of-town for a while and then my computer bit the dust. I'll get some of our new pictures up here as soon as I can!

Six Months Old!

Lucy is now six months old and I can hardly believe it's been that long already! She is such a sweet, wonderful, easy baby. She is getting better about sitting up (she still springs back straight occasionally) and she is so fun to be around. Cloe likes to help me feed her baby food, but I have to be really careful because Cloe tries to shove the spoon down her throat, haha. My girls are so sweet and I love them so much. 

Lucy is reaching for the camera. She always reaches for things with her palm turned upwards; I love that about her.

My happy baby!

First Solids

So, I was going to wait until Lucy could sit up by herself before giving her solid food, but for some reason she wont sit--even supported! You have to forcibly bend her in half and then she springs back. So, I  waited until she seemed interested in food. We gave her some baby oatmeal that was really runny and she loved it!! I'm so glad that she did even though it made a huge mess (it always does the first time..)

Eye-ing her next bite

She had to have a bath afterwards because she was so messy........ She hated it

I hate when she gives me this look like, "Why are you doing this to me?"

Four Months

Our little Lucy is four months old now and I can hardly believe it has been that long already!! She is so sweet and so happy. Her favorite person in the whole world is her big sister Cloe. It's so funny the way she lights up when Cloe comes into the room. Lucy slept through the night for the first time last night, it was awesome (Cloe didn't sleep through the night until she was eight months old...)

We are so happy to have our Lucy Goosey in our family.

I was trying to get a picture of her crazy hair. I seriously can't do anything with it!

I love this one! She has a pretty stressful life after all...

Shopping in the Kitchen

Kids have such amazing imaginations! As Cloe gets older I am so impressed by what she comes up with. The other day she got a little star-shaped pillow and hung it off her arm like a purse, grabbed some magnets that look like credit cards and went into the kitchen to shop. She slid the credit cards through the crack in the pantry doors to buy things. She looked so funny! I tried to get her to hold up the cards to the camera, but she didn't quite get it (she kept looking and the cards instead of showing them to the camera.)

She is turning in to such a little girl. She is so much fun!

Lucy Update

Lucy is looking at her big sister Cloe, she spends most days just watching her.

Well, I had a couple of videos to post, but I'm not sure how to do it... I'll keep working on it. In the mean time, Lucy is getting so big! She started laughing more and more and it is the most beautiful sound in the world! She also rolled over Friday night (from belly to back)! Now I can't even put her on her tummy because she just rolls right over! She is such a good baby!