Christmas Pictures

My two girls

All 4

Paulie

Alex

Juliet

CAT as baby

The cat continues behaving like a baby or at least occupying baby places:

Car seat

Grandmother's lap

Changing table

As you see, the babies are starting to protest this invasion of space.

Thanksgiving in New Jersey

Wow! We took our first day-long trip and made it. I got one of those handy car adapters for my Medela pump. I pumped every 3 hours sitting in the middle row between two babies while the big sister was in the third row with a third baby. Once I was done pumping, we fed the fresh milk to the babies, then stopped to wash the pumping things/eat/use potty. It worked out pretty well - a 10 hour trip took us only 12 hours. 

The babies were a hit with the cousins, even the boys:

Babies with JD, David and Brandon

Nicole feeding one

Nina feeding another

And Sidney after feeding the third (with the babies' big sis)

A Poem by Big Sister

She wrote these as a school assignment (they just finished studying poetic terms and were to write a poem):

My Mother’s Triplets

Paul and Alexander are two identical boys.

Juliet the, 3^rd triplet is a girl who makes little noise.

They have a small body with reddish yellow skin.

Their arms and legs swing around in glee,

and their gorgeous baby blue eyes look up at me.

Juliet’s hand clutches my finger tight

while I am telling her goodnight.

They start to whimper

because they know it’s almost time,

time for their feeding because they think it’s sublime.

Every three hours we feed their little tummy.

“When Alexander starts to fall asleep,” sais mommy,

“please change his diaper so he will wake”,

and I am very careful so the babies I will not shake.

When Paul the 3^rd starts to cry

I like to sing him a lullaby

and wrap him in his blanket.

The triplets are the sweetest babies I’ve met,

Even though they can’t take care of themselves yet. 

Too cute for words

2 month old check-up

The kids had a good 2 month well child check - all weighing in at around 9 lbs. They also had 3 shots each (including the RSV one). Here are some pictures we took in the waiting room:

Alex (notice the elf ears!)

Paulie

Juliet

Goldilocks on trial

My 11-old's most recent play is "Goldilocks on Trial" - performed by the middle school kids. The play is a comedy with a variety of fairy tale characters participating in a trial of a naughty Goldilocks. She was the Little Pig of the Three Little Pigs, "the one who didn't get eaten". Standing behind her in the picture is the Big Bad Wolf (a very tall 7th-grader), who at one point during the play grabs my sweet daughter and carries her over his shoulder off the set. With her kicking and screaming, of course.

Sorry and belated Halloween pics!

I apologize for not posting on the blog for a while. November has been a hard month for us. I got sick with mastitis right after Halloween. Mastitis was shortly followed by a painful gastrointestinal issue, resolution of which took weeks. I finally got better after a minor procedure at an outpatient surgical center.

On a more positive note - for Halloween we made our first long trip with the babies. We drove 2.5 hours to our former neighborhood so my 11-year-old daughter could trick-or-treat with her best friends. We stayed overnight at mom's and went to our former church on Sunday. A couple of friends at church organized a baby shower for us - which was really sweet.

All three

Paulie

Alexander

Juliet

Helping hands - thank you!

Grandma

Father

Big Sister

Happy one month Birthday to babies!

Role confusions/we've all gone a little sixes and sevens (bonkers)

It started with the cat. He thinks he is a baby in desperate need of a diaper change. I do admit, with the window and all, it is a nice spot for a nap. Except the cat also enjoys the other changing area we have, without a window. At first the grandma would take the cover off the changing pad and wash it, so the babies would not be exposed to cat hair (too late for that, it's everywhere). Then it became too much laundry-wise, as the cat would jump onto the changing table as soon as grandma turned her back on him.

Then Juliet decided to turn into a Buddha. And not jut once, but after every feeding.

And the weirdest of them all, my oldest decided that preteen years were a bit too much for her and started to regress back. And not slowly, either. She skipped all the way to babyhood and now drinks out of the baby bottle too. Thankfully, it is just cow milk. We are trying to discourage the behavior by totally ignoring it. Some of us can handle it better than others. Grandma, a few hours after agreeing to give neither positive nor negative attention to the behavior, could not handle it and just screamed with - "That's enough!" Granted, her 11-year-old grandchild has almost worked through a gallon of milk in the 2 minute (she timed herself) 2 oz portions at a time. By the way, the kid did authorize the taking of the picture below last night (when it was still kinda cute, if a little disturbing). Today we are just ignoring it, or at least trying to.

All grown up :(

My previously little girl's 1st dance (middle school) was on Oct. 9. It was pretty eventful. A boy a year older than she is invited her to a slow dance. And the school bus had a flat tire around 11 pm still 40 minutes from home! Thankfully, her mom is basically awake 24 hours a day, so the timely rescue was no problem.

Temporary sleeping spots-2 swings & a bassinet

Alex

Juliet

Paul

Getting pretty

1st bath (Juliet)

1st bath (Alex)

We made it 7 days with triplets at home!

We are exhausted (mom, dad, grandma). The babies eat every 3 hours. They are slow eaters; feedings and changing take about 1.5-2 hours, leaving an hour in between the feedings. I pump breast milk and everybody, even their older sister, help with feeding/changing. I hope to transition to direct breast feeding as soon as possible. At this point I use a nipple shield to help them suck when they are put to the breast one or two times a day each.

Big sister

Paul, Juliet, Alex (from L to R)

3rd home on Monday, Sept. 28: Paul

Two home on Saturday, Sept. 26: Alex and Juliet

They changed their mind on letting Paul go. Then they wanted us to wait a few more hours in the hospital to see how Alex and Juliet ate (they were eating very slowly the feeding before). I was starting to feel like we'd never get the kids home - the NICU staff would just keep delaying forever. But we did finally come home with two.

1 week 1 day old (all three to come home tomorrow)

Paul (pooping?)

Alex (1 hour car seat testing)

Juliet (fashion statement thanks to creative NICU nurses)

1 week old

Paul (NG tube out)

Alex (still in NICU for 'technical reasons')

Definition: Technical reasons in NICU = delay that has nothing to do with the babies health. For example, malfunction in the A/C system plummets the temp in the room. The baby gets cold, someone records it in the chart, can't release the baby for 24 hours.

Juliet (in bassinet)

Day 6

Paul with Grandma

Alex (was to go home next day)

Juliet (last day in isolette)

Big Sister (set up a swing out of the box all by herself)