Home Renos Continue!

Week 31. No doctor's appointments this week. I did a few more chores, things like crocheting, piling things to go in our hospital bag and organizing the house. Our nursery furniture should be here in the next few weeks, and I'm excited to get it set up! Then I can do one final organize and clean and it will be all ready for the cubs! I look forward to sitting in their nursery and just being happy.

Tuesday was a busy day with two city inspectors coming to check out our basement renovations for framing and electrical work. The framing passed code and we were given the go ahead to drywall. The electrical however did not. We figured the inspector was having a bad day. We booked a re-inspection right away for Thursday and changed a couple small things (which were not unsafe and should have passed..) Then the drywall company came in the afternoon to do a board count and give an updated estimate. He pointed out a bunch of places where we still needed framing, mostly in the ceiling, which we'd never thought of. Also he noted that we'd have to frame almost the entire stairwell as the home builders had not done it. Needless to say, it was a rough day for Phil and I.

We had our fifth prenatal class, of six Tuesday evening. The topic this week was breastfeeding. The class was interesting but I found most of the information I'd already learned from reading books and magazine articles. Phil found it helpful and that's a big part of why we're taking the classes, so we can both be on the same page. I know that there are so many factors at play, that you won't know if or how much you can feed until you meet your babies, so I'm determined that I'll be able to feed two babies and am going to give it my best. With my stubborn streak and Phil's help, I'm hopeful we'll do well. Next week is our last prenatal twins class and we'll be learning about baby care. Now we're getting to the fun stuff!

Wednesday evening I was supposed to meet with a girlfriend and she was going to paint my belly. She runs a face painting business here in the city. With all the basement news we'd gotten the day before, we had to cancel our plans and work on the basement framing instead. I'm hoping to re-book some time with her in early December and take some painted belly photos.

So instead, we spent Wednesday evening doing more home renos. We went out to buy more lumber..again. Lowes is now like a second home to Phil I am sure. Phil worked really hard (even though he was sick) and got all of the ceiling and bulkhead pieces framed and ready for drywall. He also got the speaker wire installed. I'm so proud of this man! He is a champ and works so hard to get things done for our family. I worry about his health though with all of the stress from working and doing home renos. Though, like a typical guy, refuses to see a doctor for a health check-up. (I haven't come up with a good way to trick him into one yet. Maybe something like the dog going to the vet. Who wants a car ride?) He certainly deserves some relaxation time in the near future!

An electrical inspector came back and looked at our work Thursday morning. He was here ten whole minutes and everything passed. Yay! One step closer! The items left on our to-do list are to frame our stairwell (I'm hoping this will go somewhat smoothly) and to run CAT-6 cables. Phil plans to tackle the job Friday evening, and Saturday if needed. Then we can call for drywall (fingers crossed) and they can be here and boarding everything by next week sometime. I can't wait!

As if we (Phil) didn't have enough on our plates, we're also attempting to update our master bedroom. Our plans are to paint our master bedroom in preparation for some new bedroom furniture. We've (I've) been debating the past couple of weeks between a pale green vs a muted blue, with dark wood furnishings. We'd like it to be a calm, put together space. (It's been years in the making and finally we're actually going to get some real adult furniture! Yay!) We have a few places picked out and hope to find a bit of time to go shopping this weekend. Plus, visit another small Christmas craft market in our area. Perhaps Saturday.

Sunday is our second wedding anniversary! I'm not sure where the time has gone. It seems like yesterday we were on the beach, saying our vows in front of family and friends. (I miss the beach.. and this reminds me of just how long it has been since we've been to one.. time to plan another vacation! Okay, I really need to learn to slow down..I know.) I don't have a clue what our plans are, but I'm sure it will be lovely whatever we do, as long as I'm with Phil.

31 week belly.. there are two cubs in there!

Love & Pregnancy Aging

I'm just going to come right out and say it. I'm noticing more and more that I'm feeling like an old person lately. Or at least, how I imagine it would feel to be old. Pregnancy has caused me to slow down significantly. I laugh at how slow I now walk, and trying to sit down on the couch has become a bit of a challenge. I thought today about how a power chair would be nice. Ha-ha. Getting up off of the couch? That's a whole other challenge. I also need Phil's help to get out of the bathtub now. Mostly for safety's sake, but I still find it funny. Being quite independent normally and now dependent is something I've had to come to terms with. Asking for help? Me? Never. Well okay, maybe sometimes. My "waddle" has become pronounced as well in the past week, but I try to hide it and walk "normally". My steps are so small that I'm sure my gluteus muscles have never worked so hard. I also have to take a lot of breaks. Who knew pregnancy would swim along smoothly like nothing had changed, up to week 30, and then bam! You're just like an old person! (with a full set of teeth.)

Tuesday evening we had our fourth prenatal, Twins & Triplets class. The class was about postpartum challenges and how life will be changing, mentally and physically. I find the prenatal classes very helpful and enjoy learning all about what we can expect. Also I like when others in the class ask questions as most of the time I am wondering the same things myself. There are twelve couples, with twenty-four babies in the class. The other couples we sit near are very nice and it's fun to chat with them, especially since they understand exactly what we're experiencing. This week the class started an email group to keep in touch.

Wednesday, early afternoon, we went to see the OB. Phil's been at every ultrasound since week 8, but hadn't come along to the OBs office yet as there really wasn't much to see. This was his first time there. This week we asked Dr.Chang questions about our delivery and let her know our birth plans, what we wanted and what we wanted to avoid if possible. The appointment went well and we were checked by a medical student. She did her best to listen to the babies' heartbeats and then she measured my belly, which normally isn't done with twins, but I let her as I was curious what I was measuring. I hope that she learned something from talking with us. My BP was still low to normal at 110/78 and my belly now measures 41 weeks! I love my belly.

Wednesday evening we drove back to Foothills for a panel discussion class, held by the Twins, Triplets & More Association of Calgary(or TTMAC for short). Two families with four month old babies (twin identical girls and twin fraternal boys) presented what their experiences have been caring for twins. It was interesting to hear from the new parents on all kinds of topics. They spoke about things to buy/not bother buying, sleeping, feedings, birth experiences and a bunch of other twins tips. We will now be using an ipad app to track our babies feedings and changes. We found a cup holder to attach to our City Select stroller and will be buying it soon. (Phil will be so happy! Starbucks here they come!) The best part of the class was just listening to how the parents were coping with the challenges of having two babies. I think we learned a lot of useful information.

Friday, early afternoon, (our first ultrasound appointment which wasn't plunk right smack in the middle of the morning rush hour! - yet still during a snowstorm..) we got another glimpse at our cubs. I love seeing them. We don't often get good images of their faces, so what they look like will be a surprise to us when they're born. I know we are very spoiled in that we get to see them so often. Every two weeks like clockwork now. We've talked about possible future pregnancies and how if we have a singleton we'll be feeling slightly in the dark, as normally you'd only get two ultrasounds total! The excitement is building and we only have approximately 7-8 more weeks to go!

The ultrasound went great. No more photos from here on out, so now you'll have to wait until they're born to see them! The babies have moved slightly from a vertical separation between them to more of a diagonal across my belly. Baby Girl is tucked on the bottom, still head down! (Good baby girl! Please stay that way.) Baby Boy is more on the top and he's the one I feel the most movement from. Also.. they have big heads.. Thanks to Phil, or perhaps thanks to my mother's side of the family. Either way I'm preparing myself for some extra pain at delivery.

Baby Girl is now measuring 1497g(3lbs 5oz) and she gained almost an entire pound in two weeks! Baby Boy is measuring 1649g(3lbs 10oz) and he also gained nearly a pound! (Good babies.) The technician also did one last internal ultrasound to check my cervix. Anything 2 cm or less and they begin to worry that delivery may be near, in which case they'll give you steroid shots to help the babies' lungs mature faster. Our number went back up again! We're measuring over 4.6cm which they said is quite long. Also, completely closed, so the technician figures that delivery is farther off for us and she joked that we may be needing induction at week 38. One can hope. My BP was the lowest it's been so far at 102/64. All good news! C'mon 6lb healthy babies, Jan 8-11th.. perhaps I can will it to happen...

I'm feeling more and more pushing/kicking movements in my belly. I love it. I feel the cubs wiggling around almost the entire day now, and feel bigger kicks 2-4 times a day where we can actually watch my belly moving. I call Phil over to feel them multiple times per day. I don't want him to miss a thing or feel left out at all. He doesn't understand how important he is in this puzzle, but I try to let him know. I'm more in love with him than ever. It's so beautiful to watch our tiny cubs moving. I'm sure I will spend a lot of my time just staring at our kids once they're born. I still can't get over what a miracle this truly is.

30 weeks according to OB, measuring 41 weeks

As for our ongoing basement renos, last weekend Phil completed all of our electrical work and last night he framed around the electrical panel. Go Phil! We plan to get the speaker wire, CAT-6 and coax cables run this weekend, and then we're done! On Tuesday, the dry wall company comes for an assessment, and the city inspectors are coming to look at our framing and electrical work. Seems like things are moving along! We may just get this done before Christmas celebrations.

This weekend we may hit a Christmas craft market or two (depending on how far I can manage to walk), buy some decorations/baking and then take it easy. I also have a bi-weekly massage scheduled for Sunday, which will just be heaven..

Never Ending To-Do Lists & Karate!

Welcome to Month 7!

Being at home to rest. So far, it's been rather.. well, slow. I'm training myself to just sit down, take breaks and try to keep myself in check. I put one chore-type item (organizing/cleaning) on my list to do each day and then force myself to stop. I've discovered that I'm a mover at heart. Also that I don't like clutter. The next few weeks are going to be challenging. At least it's in someway this experience is preparing me for all of the tasks which will get pushed to the wayside once our cubs make their arrival. Patience is key!

For example, I have big plans to get our basement renovation completed (Phil's job), finish setting up our nursery (Phil's job), insulate & organize our garage (Phil's job), wash our quads & get the tire repaired, then get them stored in the trailer for the winter (again, Phil's job), paint our master bedroom (Phil would paint).. Do we see a theme here?? Then I'd shop for & purchase new bedroom furniture (shopping is not something on my can do list really, online dreaming is more like it right now), sew together a bunch of minky baby blankets & crochet baby blankets/hats (as gifts for pregnant girlfriends). All of this is on my "To-Do" List before the babies arrive.. Wish me luck.. I have a feeling I'll be needing it.

This week we had only one appointment, to our prenatal class Tuesday night. The topic this week? Cesarean sections and medications. I was apprehensive to go. (I'd much rather have taken a nap..) I know it's something we may need to know, but I think sometimes I'd rather be oblivious. If there's one thing I've learned from pregnancy it's that the more you read/the more knowledge you have, the more you find to worry over. I sometimes think that knowing less would somehow be a blessing in disguise. If only my personality wasn't so independent. I'm much too "take charge" for that and read all of the time about what is going on inside of my tummy. I like to know exactly what's going on, so I'll know if something is amiss. Curse my curiosity!

The class was informative, and yet so very scary. I didn't like the thought of being tied to a bed by tubes and wires. The epidural (which we are basically required to get with twins - in case the need was to arise for an emergency c-section) looked horrible and not fun in the least. I've had girlfriends tell me to "get the epidural" as they've all had good experiences with it. It's still very creepy to me. that wasn't the worst part. I think having the IVs stuck in me where I'll actually be able to see them will be much worse.

With twins, at the Rockyview Hospital, we will be delivering in the operating room, whether it's a natural birth or a c-section, and not in a labour & delivery room. What this means to me is that it will not be a nice serene room, but rather I should expect to be completely surrounded by people of various talents. I'm okay with all of the people. What I am not okay with is that they only allow one person in the room with me. My own mom will have to wait outside for a few hours while I am in the OR delivering babies and then if necessary in the recovery room. This is not exactly how I planned it. (We're hoping Baby Girl - aka Baby A - will be head down at the time of labour and then we can try for natural births.)

We were told in class this week that at about 32 weeks along with twins, the babies will run out of room to flip around. If at our 32 week ultrasound, on December 1st, Baby Girl is head down, then we should be expecting natural birth. If she's breech, we will begin to prepare for a scheduled c-section. At least we will have some idea ahead of time. I hope she stays head down like she was last week..

29 Week Belly Photo - Getting big and still two months to go!

In other news, Phil returned to karate back in September. (I am so very proud of him.) He & I are both still green belts, though I think he will be a blue belt soon enough! As for me, I am not sure when I will find the time to return to training. Perhaps the term in September 2012, once the babies are big enough to be left for a few hours.

On Saturday we are spending the day at a local Karate Tournament. Phil is competing for the first time in a couple of years and I am going along to cheer for him, as well as our club members. It will be nice to see them again! I plan to bring along my crocheting to keep busy over the course of the day. (Also a big bottle of water + lots of snacks.) Hope my butt doesn't get sore!

For the next two days, my brother is visiting. Tonight he got to feel little girl kicking. He thought it was really neat and "kind of freaky". I think he is excited to have a niece and nephew coming. We have plans this long weekend to work a little bit more on the basement/clean up and watch a few movies in addition to all of the karate going on. It's going to be a wonderful weekend!

Appointments & More Appointments

This week has been a busy one for appointments. We had our second twins & triplets prenatal class on Tuesday night, where we learned a bit about labour and birth and learned the answers to some questions we had wanted to know. Things like: If my water breaks is it both? The answer is: No, its not both. Baby A's (in our case our daughter's) water would break and she would be born. Then Baby B's (our son's) water would break and he would be born. After that both placentas would be delivered. Who knew it worked like that in twins? We also learned when to go to the hospital, as it's different for twins and singleton births. So far prenatal classes have been very interesting. The class ended with the Dads learning massage techniques for the Moms' labour.

Then Wednesday we had our second OB appointment. I got the results from my glucose screen blood test, to check for gestational diabetes, and learned that I passed the 1 hour test, so I will not have to do the 3 hour test. Yay! I'm healthy. The nurse weighed me, and I didn't look this time. I've decided that as long as we're all healthy I don't really care what I weigh. That'll be a challenge I'll deal with in the spring/summer next year at the gym. My BP was 120/70, so right on normal this time rather than low as it has been. Baby Girl's heartbeat was 150 and Baby Boy's was 146. They both appear to be doing great. We're also into week 28 now and their survival rate if born early (which they will not be) is now 90%. I like those odds. I keep on telling them to "keep growing big and strong", to "keep their hearts beating", to "protect each other" and "stay away from their cords as they're not toys". They've been good listeners so far.

Thursday we had another class in the evening. This one was for Infant CPR, which hopefully we will never need to use, but good information to have none the less. We basically did a refresher on how to give CPR to babies and what to do if they were to choke. The instructor also went over how to safety proof your home. The course was held at the Children's Hospital ans while it was very nicely decorated and friendly, we hope to never need to go there again.

This morning (Friday) we had another routine ultrasound appointment and visit with the perinatologist. The drive there was pretty scary as it was the first snowfall of the season and the roads were like ice skating rinks in places. Traffic was crazy and there were accidents on almost every road we went down. Our appointment time was for 9am and we left the house at a quarter to 8, thinking over an hour to do a 30 minute drive would be good. We were still 10 minutes late for our appointment, but I'd called ahead to let them know we were on our way.

The ultrasound went very well and was quite quick this time around. We got to see the babies' umbilical cords for the first time and had the technician do a gender check for us. (We realized we'd never actually had a gender check from a medical ultrasound but rather from the 3D ones only.) The tech determined that Baby A is in fact a girl (she was head down & hopefully will remain that way) but couldn't see Baby B as he was breech, but we're pretty certain he's a boy from the 3D photos..

Both babies gained about a pound since our last ultrasound three weeks ago. Baby girl now weighs 1160g or 2lbs 9 oz & Baby boy weighs 1251g or 2lbs 12oz. Their heart rates were normal and my BP was again normal at 110/64. My cervix measured 4.1cm this time (0.6cm shorter than last time) and was still completely closed. The perinatologist (who is a really nice doctor - but I don't remember his name) said that they worry if it's less than 2cm, so we're double that length and doing well. He also told us that the babies have the right amount of amniotic fluid and that also is looking good. We go back again for another ultrasound check up in two more weeks, November 18th. The photos we got are not the best, but it's gotten more difficult to get good quality photos since the cubs are getting bigger. Here are the best two pictures from this morning.

Baby Girl's Face (Top of her head to the right)

Baby Boy's Face (Top of his head to the left)

Saturday, I am going for a nice relaxing pregnancy massage! While I am working on helping blood flow to nourish our cubs, Phil will be at home working on the electrical wiring for our basement reno! I look forward to getting the project moving along and dry-walled soon. I can't wait to see defined spaces and actual walls! We have some nice wood/lam flooring to install and plan to paint the basement in browns with white trim to match the rest of our house. We've already bought the light fixtures as well. We're hoping to celebrate Christmas in our new rumpus room (as my grandparents called it) with our family. Hopefully it is nearing completion by that time. It's going to be beautiful.

I now am feeling the babies move at all times of the day and with more force than previously. They still don't "kick" as much as "wiggle". They both seem to be night owls (like me!) and are active almost everyday like clockwork at 11:30pm. I also notice them moving around a bit in the mornings around 6am and around 5pm. Phil can now feel movements on his hand quite easily. Sometimes we can actually see my belly moving, which is so very neat! Pregnancy at times seems to fly by so quickly. I'm doing everything I can to just enjoy the experience.

28th Week (27w5d)

This week our doctor took me off of work so I can get some much needed rest. I entered the third trimester and basically hit a wall with eating and sleeping. Up until now, I'd been able to eat normal sized meals, eat whatever I felt like and sleep the entire night through. All of a sudden, I noticed I can barely eat anything without feeling full right away and I've learned that some foods are just plain mean. I also am now waking up at least once per night to to go pee. I don't mind any of this as it just means we're doing well. I am very thankful to the doctor for giving me the time to rest and prepare for our cubs' arrival. We know that twins average birth around week 35-36 (which would put us right around Christmas/NYE), but hopefully our cubs will keep warm in their den for another 8-10 weeks and into week 37-38 in January 2012!