Nurse Visit

Nurse came by this morning, for her second visit. She gave the green light for the babies to take a bath! I can't call them stinky babies anymore. I think my mom and Swapna's mom are more excited about the news than the stinky babies, they can't wait to give the babies a bath.

Shruthi was trying to put her hand in the mouth this afternoon(they do that when they are hungry), but somehow she managed to put her thumb in her mouth and started sucking on it!

Shruthi weighed in at 6lb 5oz and Vennela weighed in at 5lb 10oz. They are making pretty good progress. I had to go to Sales Goals project party this evening, so missed the 5pm feeding, made it home by 7:40pm, both girls greeted me with big screams. They both were hungry, at this rate, they will be ready for Old Hickory pretty soon.

Missed a big messy accident this evening, was feeding Vennela, and she started making noises, thought they were from the bottle. Boy, was I wrong, she was pooing and of course her overjealous grandma put on her diaper very delicately;) I missed the mess by a few millimeters.

Happy Birthday

Today is Swapna's birthday and of course I completely forgot about it;) Mom reminded me as I was leaving for work. I made up for it with a Mocha cake from German Gourmet and a mango milkshake from Elevation Burger:)

Baby Shower

RMS folks at work had a surprise baby shower for me. Brenda came by my desk around 3pm saying we have to go to the Dept meeting. I didn't have a meeting in my calendar, so I just slid over to Vidya's desk and checked his calendar, and of course, there it was, Surprise Baby Shower for Gopi! Well, I had to act surprised when I walked into the conference room:) That was really nice of everyone for doing the baby shower.

I think both girls still have the cold. They were fussy all evening. I put Vennela on her tummy, she complained for a while, but finally fell asleep. They were really unhappy after the 8pm feeding, finally fell asleep around 10pm, just in time for the 11pm feeding. I had the privilege of doing the 11pm feeding, Shruthi did fine, but Vennela was too tired to finish her food.

Full House!

And more visitors! Margaret came by in the morning, she was all amazed by the babies. Ravi and Veena drove up from NC in the afternoon. They got stuck in the infamous I95 traffic for about 2 hours. I showed off my baby handling techniques, think I scared them a little.

Got a big Edible Arrangement from Amy, Jim & Tommy. It is beautiful. Have enough fruit to last for at least a week!

And of course the big visit is from my parents, they came in from Doha, on Qatar Airways. All of us went to pick them up, and of course we were late and dad already called our cell phones and home by the time we got to the airport. Ravi & Veena left after dinner.

Emergency Doc's Visit

Had to do an emergency doc's visit today, luckily, it was a minor thing. Swapna noticed that the girls are breathing heavily and weren't finishing their feedings, she looked it up on the web and of course it talked about some virus that premature babies are susceptible to. Doc said that it is just a common cold and there is nothing to worry about.

I was 0 for 2 today, got the babies identities wrong twice today;) I was so sure this evening that Swapna was just playing with me, I checked their nail polish;) This will only get harder as they grow older. I have to come up with something other than the nail polish to tell them apart.

Did a ton of shopping today, Trader Joes, Safeway, Target, Babies R Us and the Korean Store! I don't think we had ever gone to this many stores in a month, let alone a day!

Robyn came by for the 8pm feeding. She got the babies wrong too! A slight consolation for me.

Doc's Visit

Went to our second docs visit yesterday. It was less uneventful than the first visit. Both girls are doing well, gaining weight. Shruthi weighed in at 5lb 2oz and Vennela at 4lb 7oz. While waiting for the doctor, we fed the babies and I was trying to burp Shruthi, she moved her head off the burp cloth and promptly threw up on my jacket;)

Both girls were fussy yesterday. They were feeding fine, but were only calm as long as someone is holding them. It was hard, we weren't sure what the problem was. Both of them finally fell asleep around midnight. I suspect they were just gassy. Hopefully they will feel better today.

More Visitors

The girls are very popular. They had more visitors in a week than we had in a year;) First was Robyn, she came by and fed one of the girls. Nikki and Lisa stopped by in the evening, on their way home from Shenandoah. Moole and Narasimha stopped by later in the evening, haven't seen either of them in four years.

Vennela was not comfortable the whole morning, she was happy only when we were holding her, Swapna thinks it's because of her umbilical cord. She seemed to have recovered by the evening. We finished the 8pm feeding by around 9 and put them in their cribs, we went back to check up around 9:30 and both girls were wide awake, looking up with their big eyes. You can't get them to wake up when they are feeding, but when it's time to sleep, they are wide awake;) They both started crying around 10pm, one hour after their last feeding, both were hungry already. We have to increase their feeding amount. Pretty soon we will have to start using big bottles!

Nurse Visit

Shruthi gave us a scare yesterday morning. She pulled her hat over her mouth and nose and started crying. Good thing we caught it in time. No more hats for Shruthi! Elizabeth, the nurse came by yesterday evening. She weighed the babies, Vennela was at 4lb 6oz and Shruthi at 5lb 1oz. They seem to be gaining about 1oz per day, good progress.

I got the night shift duty for the weekend, 2am and 5am feedings. Got up at 2am and fed Shruthi, she did well, finished her feeding in 45 mins. I set the alarm for 5am, but forgot to turn it on;) Luckily Swapna and her mom were on top of things, so the babies didn't miss the 5am feeding.

Swapna had fun feeding the babies this afternoon. We wanted to get the babies used to breast feeding, so didn't give them bottles for their 2pm feeding. The babies weren't happy, both of them started screaming, Swapna kept busy, swapping them. Now we know how to make them breastfeed, wait till they are hungry.

Learned a new trick to wake up the babies, putting a wet towel on their tummy seems to work all the time.

Babies had a lot of visitors today, first came Tracy, then Robyn & Scott and Amarnath & Jessee. Jesse got us a boppy pillow and Robyn got the babies a pink bouncer. Ann and Dave also stopped by in the evening.

Pink Pink & more pink;)

We didn't buy any clothes in 'P' size for the babies. Day before they got released from the hospital, I went and got a couple of dresses for them. We thought they didn't need many P size dresses and the tons of new born size would fit them fine. Poor things, the new born size dresses were so big, they look like they were floating in them. Felt sorry for them, so went to Babies R Us to get them some P size clothes, and I was in for a shock - the only P size dresses I could find are either in pink or blue or much worse - Barbie styles! I hate pink! Which marketing genius made the decision that girls should always wear pink and boys always blue.

The nurse came by today, to check up on the babies. She took all the info and said that she would come back tomorrow to do the checks. We are glad the nurse is coming by to check up on the babies, makes us feel more secure.

Got home in time for 5pm feeding. Shruthi was fussy after the feeding, very unusual for her. She was awake and was crying, stopping only when we held her. We thought may be she still was hungry. It took us two hours to figure out the problem - her diaper was wet, so was her dress and the blanket. Lesson learned, if the babies are complaining, first thing you do is check their diaper;)

First Docs Appointment

Had the first pediatrician's appointment this morning, 7:45am! The docs office is close by, but they kept the office too cold and asked the babies be completely undressed. Both babies weren't too happy, to be unwrapped from their comfy, warm clothes in a cold room. Swapna got stuck doing the paper work, so I ended up changing both screaming babies. Shruthi weighed in at 4lb 12oz and Vennela came in at 4lb 2oz. They are back up to their birth weight. Doc said both are perfectly healthy. We have to go back to the pediatrician next week.

Vennela wasn't finishing her quota of food today. I hope she is fine and this is a short term effect of her moving from hospital to home.

Tara booked her tickets for 5/31. We decided to do the Namakaranam on the same day, at home.

Babies Are Home!

Today is the big day, babies come home today. I went to work and stopped by the hospital on my way back. Swapna got there an hour earlier, got a ride from Jessee. Terry, the NNP was great, she sat down with us and explained everything to us. I think the nursing staff at Virginia Hospital Center was the best, everyone we dealt with, Roccio in labor & delivery, kanika in post-partum and Terry, Martina, Vladka, Jamie and Kizzy in NICU were amazing, the NICU staff in particular. The NICU staff made us feel very comfortable leaving our precious babies with them.

Got a bunch of goodies as parting gifts from the hospital. Babies got to wear their brand new outfits, Shruthi got the green alligator outfit and Vennela got the elephant one, so cute. Shruthi got the nail polish, the purple one. If we ever lost track of who is who, look for the purple nail polish! The babies were fine on the drive home. Both were fast asleep. Vennela slept through everything, but Shruthi woke up 10 minutes after getting home threw up and started crying, poor thing. The drive must have upset her. That freaked Swapna out a little. Vennela was goofy, slept comfortably in her car seat, with both hands up in the air, as if someone was pointing a gun at her. Swapna was busy preparing dinner and aunty and changed the diapers and fed them. Both are resting comfortably in their new digs, the crib from Linda. It should be an interesting night, with feedings and changing diapers every three hours. Hopefully, changing of the environment won't stress them out too much.

Went to the hospital for 11am feeding. The doc had a big surprise waiting for us - she said we can take the babies home tomorrow! The babies are doing exceptionally well, so there is no reason for them to stay there anymore, she said. The doc called our babies and a second set of twins in the NICU 'the fantastic four', because they were doing so well. Exciting, the little ones will be home tomorrow. And scary too, we don't have the home ready yet.

Went out this evening and finished the rest of the shopping, hopefully we didn't miss anything. It's been raining like crazy today. This has been a very, very wet Spring. Looks like we are making up for last year's drought.

Going to work tomorrow, made chocolate dripped strawberries for work. Milk chocolate came out well, white chocolate was a dud, not sure what I did wrong.

Baby Visit

We went to the hospital for the 11am feeding. Vennela was being lazy, didn't want to breastfeed, but finished her bottle in one big gulp. They changed the baby formula today. Both babies are upto 35ml each feeding, and we don't think it's enough for them. We put both babies in one crib and took pics. When they are next to each other, its hard to tell them apart. Shruthi is a little bigger, but other than that, it's hard to tell them apart;)

The head nurse, Terry says that the babies are doing very well and she thinks that the babies will probably go home by the end of next week.

Robyn surprised us with a balloon tied to the front porch. We are all inside the home, but she sneaked up and tied the balloon without any of us noticing it.

Big surprise when we went for the 5pm feeding, the babies are in a bassinet! The bassinets are less intimidating. Vennela was great with breastfeeding this evening, with the football hold.

Swapna is Home

Swapna is home today! But the little ones are still in NICU;) They are progressing nicely. They are off the heated incubators today. When we went for the 11am feeding, both girls were fast asleep, finished their feeding in their sleep.