Week 34, almost 35

Girls still both doing fine, but wow what a week. A brief timeline:

Wednesday: I catch the flu. Called in sick to work, Jenn and I basically spent most of the day in bed. By the evening I was feeling better, was able to eat some Jello and soup.
Thursday: I was scheduled to be out of work anyway as Jenn had two sonograms that day, in the morning with our OB and the afternoon with the specialist. Felt OK, maybe dragging a bit but was able to keep real food down, no big deal. We go to the sonograms, all is looking great. That night, Jenn throws up. Uh oh.
Friday morning: Jenn is throwing up again that morning. I drop off her laptop at her work for repair that morning, and when I call her for directions she's sounding like death warmed over. I go to work for about an hour and tell Penni I've got to head home the rest of the day to take care of Jenn. Stop at the store on the way home and get the usual "I'm sick" stuff; soup, 7Up, Gatorade, Jello, etc. I get home and try to get some liquids in Jenn, and she can't even keep Gatorade down. I head out again after a bit and get some Pedialite after doing a little internet research on how best to stop dehydration. After sleeping some Jenn's doing a little better, she's keeping down water and the Pedialite, and by the evening is able to handle some toast.
Friday night: Jenn has been having contractions all day, but around 7-8 they start getting more frequent, and, more troubling, more severe. She grins and bears it for a while, we hem and haw some trying to decide what to do, and eventually err on the side of caution and head to Wesley. We get checked into labor and delivery there, and by then Jenn's having contractions 3-5 minutes apart and is starting to think this might be the real deal. They check and indeed, she's 60% effaced and 1cm dialated. They call our OB and docs decide that she's dehydrated, so they're going to put some fluids in her to see if this helps, then check her cervix again and see if progress is being made. Nurses seem to think that this might be happening though, they're asking us if we like 9-13 as a birthday.
Friday around 12-1am: The torture begins. In the best of times getting an IV is something that Jenn mortally fears; being dehydrated, it's pretty much all she can do to keep it together. Several nurses try and fail. They call in an anesthesiologist nurse, she fails as well. Finally they call the anesthesiologist, and he gets it, though it was a bit of a struggle for him as well (and he was kind of a jerk about it too). Finally though, in go the fluids. At some point during all this though, another cervix exam is done, and there is no change, which basically means Jenn's not in labor. So along with the fluids Jenn also gets a little morphine to help her relax and help dull the contraction pain.
Saturday around 4am: Another doctor does another cervix check, still no change, definitely not labor. Jenn's gone through about 3 bags of fluid by now, turns out she was more than just "a little" dehydrated. We both try and sleep fitfully at various times during the night, we're basically just hanging out so they can monitor the girls and make sure everything is OK.
Saturday around 6am: We finally get the OK to get out of there. After all of that we go home, grab some McDonalds breakfast on the way home and start our weekend.

The good news is that getting all those fluids did wonders for Jenn, her contractions are nowhere near as severe as they have been, and we got ample confirmation that the girls are still doing great. The "bad" news, of course, is that she's still pregnant. Week 34 with twins is definitely taking it's toll on poor Jenn; getting out of bed/chairs is painful, babies and bladder keep her from sleeping well at night, it's hard for her to get comfortable, etc. Nothing you wouldn't expect from a twin pregnancy I suppose, and as far as the girls doing well, we basically could not have asked things to go any better so far, but still, not very fun for momma. How long it will be now no one can say, but presumably it will be within the next couple of weeks or so.

As for the rest of it...there really isn't all that much of the rest of it. We're just kind of in a holding pattern of course right now, so there's not really all that much to tell. Kevin sends word that his crew are in Chicago tonight, getting ready to head over to France tomorrow for the next 9 months. Parts of Wichita had 8+ inches of rain this past weekend, lots of houses were flooded. Jenn's birthday is Thursday, assuming we're not in labor, sounds like maybe Mom and Dad are coming down. Chiefs are galactically bad, and I'm sitting here rooting for the Cowboys of all teams because I have Romo on my fantasy team.

Week 32

Things continue to go well. We had a sonogram today, both girls still looked good. We also got a picture of Baby A's hair:



Jenn's on what she likes to call "house arrest" at this point. She had a positive fetal fibronectin test last week, which they perform basically to see if you're not going into labor within 2 weeks (~95% chance of this if the test is negative). If it's positive it seems the test becomes less useful, as the prognosis becomes "Meh, you might go into labor within two weeks or you might not". She is not dialated at all though right now, so it's not like delivery is imminent.

We also had a little concern last weekend while getting a steroid shot, which helps babies lungs develop, a precaution due to the positive fetal fibronectin. Jenn was having pretty severe contractions, ones that were timing 3-6 minutes apart. Since we were at Wesley anyway we went to labor and delivery, they spent 2.5 hours trying to get both babies heart rates on the monitor at the same time for a 10 minute stretch, and finally a resident checked her over and cleared her to go home. Turns out these contractions were perhaps a result of her level of activity, so "Dr. Mike" put her on bed/couch rest, and contractions have been much more manageable since then.

The new goal is Week 34, two weeks from now, which the resident at Wesley this weekend said would probably be the cut-off point for when they would not try to delay labor. DePew today however talked like that they wouldn't try to delay if she went into labor tomorrwo. So basically it's just wait and see at this point: we want to go as long as possible but it could happen at any time.

In other news, work threw us a shower the other day as well. Of note are the cakes they got:





I've worked with Penni and Ruby, who threw the shower, for over 8 years now, apparently they know me pretty well.

Just a quick picture

The local sherpa's tell us that it is best to make our ascent on the north face, so as to avoid the harsh southern winds. We are awaiting the last of the supplies, due to arrive from a local village tomorrow morning. Even at base camp the air is dangerously thin, so I must keep this entry brief, for even the effort of typing is strenuous at this altitude.

Week 30, and the new nephew

Linda had her baby yesterday around 1pm. Jalen Durant was 6 lbs 6 oz, and is doing great, as is Linda.

Things continue to go great for us as well. We had a detailed sonogram yesterday, both girls weight in at around 3 lbs and measured between 29 and 30 weeks, right where they should be. Doc said that getting to Week 38 is still the goal, but also that it's not uncommon for twins to decide it's time anywhere from 34-36 weeks as well. In three weeks we have another sonogram and will start weekly appointments with the high risk specialist to do sonograms where they basically just watch the babies for a while, and look for specific movements and some other criteria. Plus Jenn will continue her weekly appts with our regular OB.

Babies room is pretty much done. I still need to hang some curtains, and get the dressers finished, but aside from that, the room is painted, the border paper is up, the cribs are assembled, and the glider rocker is gliding. We still have a few things to pick up, bottles primarily I think, and some odds and ends stuff, but overall I think we're fairly prepared.

Kevin and Kelsi (and Harrison) are getting ready to leave for France around the first of September. Some kind of program through Spirit; Kevin will work over there for 9 months, get a bump in pay and have Spirit pay for nearly all their expenses while they're over there. Kind of odd to think that by the time they get back the girls will be ~8 months old.

Week 28

Things are still going good. Jenn had an appointment/sonogram with the OB yesterday and everything looked well. At an appointment last week she got the results from a 24 hour urine test that revealed a protein number of just under 300 mg/L, which is apparently the low end threshold for being concerned about preeclampsia, which had us a little concerned. However the doc said that just having some trace proteins isn't uncommon and would account for the reading; they're going to do another test at some point to be sure but he was not worried. He also said that as of right now he's hoping to have the girls go to 37 weeks.

Which will suck for Jenn, because this whole pregnancy thing has really been hitting her like a ton of bricks this week. Severe round ligament pain, to the point she's limping around a little, and is having more trouble getting in and out of chairs/bed. Doc was ready to pull her from work, told her that "most women with twins don't make it at work this long", but instead she's going to try and be more diligent at just putting in 4 hours at the office each day and finishing up at home. Basically, she's pregnant with twins, and it's starting to really show.

We got a new car this past week. Chevy Equinox, tan/gold/brown/sandstone metallic depending on which adjective I happen to pull. It's got a lot of fancy features on it: heated, leather seats, sunroom, remote starter. Essentially I was looking for a model that offered both side curtain airbags and power seats (for Jenn to more easily change the position/height when she drives it), and about the only model we could find in dealer stocks around here happened to have all this other stuff.

Jenn had her first baby shower this pass weekend, down in Canton with most of the aunts/cousins from my side of the family, plus her mom and sister, Julie Hoyer, etc. Got a lot more clothes, some baby seats, blankets, a lot of other stuff that I don't really remember. She has another one this weekend, thrown by Tricia and some other friends.

Been feeling the girls move a lot more as well, both internally by Jenn and externally as well. I got kicked in the back early yesterday morning, with Jenn laying up against me.

Still need to get the border paper up in the girls room, Jenn talked like her mom might come over some night this week and give it a shot. We've painted a couple of old dressers Jenn had that we'll use for baby room furniture. After that it's just assemble the cribs and glider rocker we bought, and after that it will just be minor decoration left.

Week 26 (and a half)

Still going strong. Jenn has had a couple of minor sonograms the past couple of weeks and everything still looks great. Jenn has been getting noticeably bigger as well, moreso almost every day. Starting this week Jenn is going to be working half days at the office, then coming home to put her feet up and finish up the work day remotely.

Jenn felt one of the babies (she thinks Baby B) hiccup yesterday morning. She was in the bathroom I believe getting ready for work and all of the sudden felt weird movement. She was actually able to see her belly move a couple of times as the baby hiccuped. Some movement felt last night as well that she wonders if it might not be one of the babies kicking down on her abdomen.

Out utero, preparations continue. Mom and dad came down this past Sunday, and mom helped me get the girls room painted. White on top and pink on bottom, with soon-to-be-applied border paper as separation. We also last week picked up both cribs and a glider rocker from Babies R Us, which are sitting in the garage waiting to be assembled. We're also going to paint a couple of older dressers to use in the girls room, which should pretty much take care of the furniture issue.

Jenn has a baby shower this weekend up in Canton, one mom and all the aunts are throwing, then has another one Tricia and some other friends are throwing the weekend after I believe.

Car shopping continues as well. I think we have the list pared down to a couple of choices at least: Chevy Equinox and Toyota Highlander. Still need to take some test drives, perhaps later this week.

Week 24

We had our first sonogram and consultation with the high risk specialist last week. In the words of the doc, the girls (this is pretty much official now) "looked great". The sonogram was intensive; they got down to the detail of looking at the lobes of the brains, chambers of the heart, umbilical cords connecting to the abdomen, kidneys, blood flow, etc. No problems seen. She also put our minds more at ease by declaring there were no signs of twin to twin transfusion or preeclampsia. She also said that, at this point at least, she didn't think Jenn would have to be put on serious bed rest, and didn't see any reason why we wouldn't be looking at a Week 36 delivery.

In the outer world, preparations continue. We got the spare bedroom pretty much cleaned up this weekend, just need to get the furniture moved downstairs. After that the painting will begin. Jenn has picked out the cribs she wants, and we have at least a good idea of what glider rocker we're going to get.

We also picked up carseats last week, in anticipation of getting a new vehicle. Considering several different models of small to mid sized SUV's, or possibly sedans, and Feature #1 on the list is whether the vehicle will fit two rear facing car seats in the back and still allow us to sit comfortably up front. We're going to take one along with us when we go looking to see how they will fit. The idea is to get this probably-SUV now, and then get a minivan at some point after the girls are born.

Last weekend we also went up to KC and did quite a bit of baby shopping. Picked up a lot of clothes mostly, and looked for cribs/rockers and such. Overall Jenn is doing OK, but definitely gets tired a lot easier these days. As we found out in KC, too much walking is a bad thing.

Week 22

Things are still going great. We've had some "interesting" sonogram mis-adventures the past few weeks. Missed appointments (or ones I couldn't go to), rushed sonograms by the technician, sonograms by a different doctor as our OB was off delivering babies or something, etc. Hasn't been very fun, but the important part is that both girls are still doing great, no problems to speak of. In fact our OB on one of the sonograms thought that he saw the fabled membrane between the two, meaning two pregnancy sacs, which is a good thing. As the title suggests we have passed Week 22 this week.

I say "girls" because we have also had another confirmation on that as well, one that sounded quite a bit more sure than past guesses the doc has made. Still not 100%, but these things never are, so in the absence of any contradictory evidence, It's a Girl. We have decided on the names Kayla and Megan. Emailed Linda and Mom and told them the names, Linda responded that Kayla was on her list if her 2nd had been a girl.

For her part, Jenn is definitely feeling pregnant these days. Not sleeping very well at night, problems with her hand falling asleep all the time and having to pee multiple times during the night. Her feet are swelled, tough for her to walk/stand for any length of time. Typical pregnancy stuff I guess. She has done exceptionally well with the gestational diabetes, is an old pro at testing and giving herself insulin shots. She has also been feeling the girls move quite a bit, in particular during the evenings it seems. Whenever we have seen them moving on sonograms they both seem very active, which is a good sign.

We're definitely entering the home stretch. End of June, and by all accounts/guesses we're probably looking at an end of September delivery. We still need to get registered, something we were going to do this weekend until the weekend got busy all of the sudden. Perhaps next week. Also still need to get the spare bedroom cleaned out, start decorating for the nursery. Jenn has selected a theme, and it sounds like has some ideas for colors/painting/etc.

Went to and got back from Orlando for the TechEd conference fine. Picked up a couple "baby gifts" on the way back at airport stores; two pink Minnie Mouse "onesies" for 3 months, and a Dr. Suess "Thing 1 and Thing 2" onesies for 6 months. They won't be wearing them right away, but choices are a bit limited when you're at the airport, and it'll probably be a while before I'm in Orlando again so I figured what the heck.

A possible milestone

Jenn believes she's been able to feel the babies moving the past couple of days. She's not 100% certain; more of an "in the absence of any other explanation" thing for the weird feelings she has, but given we're approaching 20 weeks it seems likely.

Week 19

Still going strong. Jenn had a little bit of worry this week as she was having some cramping around Tuesday night I believe. She went to the doctor Wed and found she had a bladder infection, which she got antibiotics for. More pain on Thursday, but different pain, a sharp stabbing, which turned out to be round ligament pain it looks like, and nothing to worry about. We figure we've passed the halfway point, seeing as how twins rarely go full term.

The course of all these she had a couple of sonograms done (we were scheduled for one anyway this week), and both babies continue to look good. Heartbeats were visible, arms were moving, etc. No attempts were really made to confirm the "It's Girls" prediction as they were just very quick checks. Sounds like we may be getting a more detailed sonogram with a high risk specialist sometime in the next few weeks.

Everything has arrived for the home theater (except for a couple of HDMI cables which should be here next week), we got a TV stand this week, it's all sitting in the basement ready to be setup. That's the task for this weekend, Dad will be coming down to help me out.

I'm going to Orlando the week of June 9-13 for an MSDN conference. After that, probably have to get serious about getting the upstairs spare bedroom cleared out, getting some of that furniture moved into our bedroom, in preparation for the nursery.

Linda found out she's having another boy the other day. They didn't seem to like my suggestion that only 3 more and they'd have their own basketball team.

Say hello to the Vogts Girls (maybe)

Jenn had another sonogram yesterday afternoon (Ruth went with her as I couldn't make it), and talked the doctor into taking a stab at finding the sex of the babies. And while he cautioned her "Don't start painting any rooms yet", he apparently did find some tell-tale signs of girls in one of the pictures.




The last picture in particular apparently shows the detail. Hard for me to see but that's why I'm not wearing a white coat right now I guess. Aside from this everything still looks fine, Jenn and Ruth got to see them moving and such, growth of both were still within expected and both are still growing at the same rate. Everything is right on track.

16 Weeks

Had a 16 week sonogram this past Thursday, a more "official" sonogram on better equipment. The pictures the machine spit out were not that great, but the machine apparently did have better resolution. Tech was able to see details like leg bones, fluid in the bladder and stomachs of both babies (which means the kidneys are now functional), measured head circumference, etc. Everything was still looking great. The measurements I saw the tech take were all coming up with late 15/early 16 week measurements, both babies were moving around. Did not find out the sex, tech did not even try, said it was way too early. Jenn will be going for another doc appt with a sonogram on the regular machine next week, and probably we will be having another sonogram on the "good" machine somewhere around the 18 or 19 week time frame.

This week Ruth is having a garage sale. We took over some of our old stuff we don't want anymore, mostly just stuff that was sitting in storage, a bunch of my old games and movies that I can't imagine what I was thinking when I bought them. As a side effect of this the basement is now pretty much cleaned out and ready for a new TV. Looking at a Sony 46" LCD model, just a matter of figuring out where to buy it from at this point.

Another sonogram

Had another sonogram Thursday afternoon. It was supposed to be next Monday but Jenn had to move it up due to work conflict. She had emailed me about it but I had completely misread the email and thought it was just a time change on Monday so kind of ignored it, then coincidentally had taken off this afternoon to go get my hair cut and run a couple other errands. I'm standing in Gamestop in the mall waiting on Mastercuts when Jenn calls me and wonders if I can make the appointment in 30 minutes. Oops.

Sonogram went fine, everything is still looking great. We saw a lot of movement out of them again this time, baby B in particular curling up and stretching out, moving their hands, etc. Jenn finds it hard to believe she can't feel anything yet with as much activity as we see on the sonograms. We have an "official" sonogram scheduled for Thursday of next week, using a machine with better resolution and such. Should have some pictures of better quality, and with a little luck we might even find out the sex as well.

~13 weeks down

Which as I found out means that we are just now passing the first trimester, and not last week when I posted. Oh well.

Sonogram this past Tuesday. Was supposed to be this past Monday but our doctor was caught at the hospital delivering a baby. We were scheduled to go to his west side office, which I did, getting there a bit early, only to find a note on the door, "We've moved to some random address on 13th street". A quick call by Jenn confirmed that their new offices are in the old Albertson's on 13th and Tyler. So we made it just in time to wait 30 minutes in the waiting room.

But the appointment was good and got us these pictures:

- Baby A
- Baby B
- Baby A and B
- Baby A Heartrate
- Baby B Heartrate
We took video too which I have not uploaded from the camera yet, but will. It didn't turn out too well as the camera was having problems focusing on the sonogram monitor, the refresh rate was noticeable through the lens and the camera kept trying to refocus, but Jenn and Ruth watched it and apparently you can see some of it OK. The little ones were quite active at times.

Everything is progressing fine, both babies had heart rates in the 150's and measured around 13.5 weeks.

Jenn continues to have a "heaviness" in her abdomen, as she describes it, which the doc confirmed was just her uterus growing. She's very anxious to feel them move. She's also quite anxious to know if they are boys or girls, going so far as offering the doc a bribe if he'd try to find out, but he flat refused. He gave us a "maybe" at our next appointment which will be around the 16 week mark. Jenn seems to be past the worst of the tiredness, but still gets a bit nauseous if she's hungry and doesn't get something in her stomach pretty quickly.

We're also getting serious about picking names. Or at least I am, as Jenn has had a list several dozen long for quite some time now.

One third of the way there

We are passing the first trimester, sometime last week/this week. Jenn has said this week that she is starting to "feel pregnant". This weekend she was feeling what I think she called a "heaviness" in her belly/abdomen, which worried her some, but a quick call to the doctor on Monday reassured her that yes, it's the uterus growing, pushing other stuff out of the way.

Jenn's still feeling tired most nights by the time she gets home, but seems to be coming through that OK, albeit slowly. For a while there she was lights out by 8:30 or 9 easy, but lately it seems like it's more "physically tired" than sleepy, as she'll lie down and watch TV until I come to bed. Nausea still present as well, but by all accounts not too bad so long as she's able to get something in her stomach when she's hungry.

I have heard that the second trimester is the "nesting" trimester, and this will likely be true for me at least. Major projects include finishing up on organizing the basement, purchasing an LCD TV/sounds system/stand for down there, moving some of the current spare bedroom furniture into our bedroom (matching stuff), moving the rest of the spare bedroom stuff downstairs to storage, and I assume painting and/or decorating the room for the babies. Plus other stuff I'm sure I'm just not thinking of right now. This weekend me, James, Becker, and maybe Ron are going over to Kevin's for a "Day of Debauchery", but after that I'll definitely have to use my weekends to get going on all the other stuff. I have a feeling May, June, and July are going to be over almost before they begin.