Written by Jessica on Monday, February 25, 2008

We're close, oh so close, to getting the all the boys' rooms finished. Taylor has moved over to "dads room" and dad is now forced to share with me, and the babies are taking over Taylor's old room. Taylor was very excited to move to "dads room". He also got a new big boy bed. Here are some pictures of Taylor's new room. The weird track that is on Taylor's train table is his new marble track. He's spent countless hours building this track up and tearing it down. Our little engineer....




Now here are some pictures of the nursery....and no, I didn't spell "Tucker" wrong, I broke the "C" while trying to hang it, so I'm going to have to work my magic with some super glue!




I went to the dr. today and all looked well. I had the glucose tolerance test. My sugar was 111 and the cut off for gestational diabetes concern is 140. So I guess I can eat all the sugar I want, my body knows what to do! Right now I think it's storing it all on my back side... Maybe the babies are getting a little too. I go to the specialist this Wednesday, so hopefully we'll be able to get some good 3-d pictures of the boys and all good news again. I'll keep you posted!

Written by Jessica on Friday, February 08, 2008

People always ask me how many months I am (expecting me to say 9 months the way I look), but I never know. I have a hard time converting weeks to months. Especially since you're pregnant 10 months and unless you've been pregnant before you probably aren't aware of that. Anyways, according to this website, weeks 20-24 are the converted to 6 months of pregnancy. Everyone I encounter calculates this a different way, but it only makes sense to divide the weeks by 4, hence I'm in the middle of my 6th month... I am a little over 22 weeks now. I actually found a website that converts facts for a singleton, twins, triplets, and even quadruplets! And here's what the article says about our boys:

Each of your babies now weigh over a pound and are approximately 12 inches long. Space is getting very cramped inside now and you most likely look like you could have the babies at any time! Week 24 marks a special time for you. This is generally the week that is considered the week of viability for the babies. Although your babies still need time to grow and finish the `final touches`, there is an 85% chance of survival if they were born now. Of course, your babies would need to spend a few months in a NICU for advanced care. However, almost half of babies born at this time will have some kind of lasting effect from being born prematurely. Pay special attention to any signs of preterm labor and call your doctor immediately if you experience any symptoms of preterm labor. Your babies will have periods of rest and awake times throughout the day, but they may not coordinate their schedules! You should be feeling them move every day at different intervals. The babies will bump into one another and nudge each other for some extra room! Sometimes they will all stretch their legs out in one direction and you will see an obvious budge on one side of your abdomen. The membrane that separates the babies is amazingly elastic. Every joint in their bodies is flexed at this time. The chin is at the chest and their elbows are tucked at their sides. Their legs are often brought up to their chest and the feet are tucked under their bottoms. On ultrasound, you will often see that they like to have their hands up near the face. After delivery, you will notice that your babies keep thier hands clenched and often have their feet tucked upwards.

Written by Jessica on Thursday, February 07, 2008

Maybe it's because he has his own space on top of his brothers, who knows, but baby C has been the most cooperative in letting us get good pictures and letting us see him when we want to. He also doesn't get as involved in the brotherly kicking matches going on nowadays. Again, that may be because he has more space to himself. Here are a couple 3-d pictures of baby C at exactly 21 weeks, and an approximate weight of 15 ounces.
The periontolgist took lots of time with us and really explained a lot and gave us more information about the babies than we've gotten the entire 20 weeks before. He did confirm that they are all indeed boys. We've seen this and been told 10 times they are all boys but we just can't believe that out of 4 children we aren't going to have a girl. Wade's in heaven. He's trying to figure out how we can put them in 3 different high schools so that they can all be starting quarterbacks on the varsity team.
As far as their development, they are right on track. They were 14oz, 14oz, and 15 oz. All measuring 21 weeks or greater and they are all very close in size and weight which is a very good sign. They've completed much of their development phase and now they are in the growing phase. I have to try to get these boys beefed up so they can come home soon after they're born.
Apparently my iron is low which is causing me to be even more tired than I would be normally just carrying 3 babies, so I've got to eat lots of iron rich foods to get that up to help with fatigue. Other than that and the pressure of three babies kicking and playing in there, I'm doing good. They should all be over a pound now, so at only 3 pounds of baby and we need a lot more than that for them to be born healthy. So I'll save all my complaining until they're a total of 9 pounds or more, then I'll tell you all how I really feel! As I side note, the doctor did say that having been stretched out with Taylor (8 lbs 10 oz) is a very good thing.
I go back to the specialist on the 27th of this month, so hopefully we'll get more good news from him. If nothing else we get to see some really cool pictures of the boys in their world. = )