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Archive for April, 2008

March of Dimes March for Babies

Posted in march for babies on April 30, 2008| 7 Comments »

So this Sunday my husband and I will be doing the March of Dimes March for Babies. I’ll be pushing my monstrosity of a triplet stroller for five miles. FIVE MILES, people. This wouldn’t be such a big deal except that without the babies the stupid thing weighs like a hundred pounds. Add the babies, the diaper bag, the water bottles… well, heck, I’m going to be pushing 150+ pounds. For FIVE MILES. Did I mention I’m incredibly fat? Serves me right, I could use the exercise. Good news is that we go for a nice walk nearly every weekend. Not five miles, mind you, but a nice walk in our hilly neighborhood, and we’ll be fine and we’ll have lots of company.

I set a lofty goal of $500 and hit that goal in my first weekend after signing up to walk without really trying, so I doubled my goal to $1000. I still didn’t do much advertising beyond putting up a badge in my sidebar and sending out a few emails. I know you’re all inundated with requests like these, and I know you all donate to worthy causes throughout the year. Amazingly, I’m still really close to reaching my goal despite not even really trying… because you guys are truly amazing. So far, I’ve raised $807.

The March of Dimes has touched so many lives… I have little doubt that without the research that the MoD has promoted my babies would not have arrived here safely. They were born prematurely, at 33weeks, and while they were relatively healthy, that was an incredible gift that I was given thanks to the careful education from the MoD, my doctors, and many others. Each of my babies had their own set of issues in and out of the NICU. Sam needed some help breathing at first (nothing major, and few people knew about it, but he had what the NICU nurses called WWBD…Wimpy White Boy Disorder, which quickly cleared up). Abby, an IUGR baby born just 2 pounds 11 ounces, needed a blood transfusion after a sudden drop in her hematocrit. Ellie came home on a heart monitor due to bradycardia of prematurity and later became a failure to thrive baby (and has now outgrown even that diagnosis!). Compared to other stories, these are all minor issues, but without the help of the MoD… each of these problems could have been MAJOR issues a decade ago.

Even if you can’t donate, please think of us on Sunday. Think of all the babies that aren’t as lucky as our three. I will be thinking of all of the babies that were lost this year with each step I take on that five mile walk, grateful for every ounce of that 150 pounds I’m pushing. Some people aren’t so lucky to have such a large load to push, and I’m painfully aware of that.

Thanks to all of you who have already donated… you really are an amazing bunch of women (and men!). And thanks to all of you for all of your support through one of the shittiest pregnancies I would have wanted to have endured (and I know mine paled in comparison to some others!), and one of the most amazing parenting experiences I could have asked for. I’m walking on Sunday for my three premature babies, for many babies who were lost last year, for the hope that no more babies will have to be lost to prematurity in the future… and I’m also walking in celebration of all of you wonderful women in the blogosphere. You are incredible.

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Toes!

Posted in tirplets pictures on April 30, 2008| 8 Comments »

The problem with having incredibly talented friends is that it makes me very embarrassed to post the lousy photos that I have taken. I mean, seriously… now that I’ve posted all the crappy photos that I took yesterday, here I go posting all the positively brilliant photos that Jessica took yesterday. At least I didn’t post her photos first. I’m smarter than that, you see. I had an absolutely delightful time with Jessica yesterday. She even provided me with a delicious kosher lunch (she’s the best!). Every time I visit Jess, I leave wishing I could move to Winchester. Alas, it’s not in the cards right now, but gosh do I wish it were!

ANYWHOZIT, the point is… Jessica took some phenomenal photos of my babies. Here’s some proof:

My girls are definitely sisters, but definitely not identical twins! Ellie’s on the left, my smiley monster. Abby’s on the right (process of elimination, you see)…my bald-headed angel. They are so gorgeous! (if I do say so myself!!)

Sam, my stunned little monster! He always has his mouth agape! Jess had to work hard to get pictures of him with his mouth closed, but she did it (I’ll post some of those later). Sam was cranky at the beginning of the photo shoot, so there were fewer photos of him, but boy were they cute!


Abby wasn’t so happy about being squished into this one, but we tried!

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Toes!

Posted in tirplets pictures on April 30, 2008| 8 Comments »

The problem with having incredibly talented friends is that it makes me very embarrassed to post the lousy photos that I have taken. I mean, seriously… now that I've posted all the crappy photos that I took yesterday, here I go posting all the positively brilliant photos that Jessica took yesterday. At least I didn't post her photos first. I'm smarter than that, you see. I had an absolutely delightful time with Jessica yesterday. She even provided me with a delicious kosher lunch (she's the best!). Every time I visit Jess, I leave wishing I could move to Winchester. Alas, it's not in the cards right now, but gosh do I wish it were!

ANYWHOZIT, the point is… Jessica took some phenomenal photos of my babies. Here's some proof:

My girls are definitely sisters, but definitely not identical twins! Ellie's on the left, my smiley monster. Abby's on the right (process of elimination, you see)…my bald-headed angel. They are so gorgeous! (if I do say so myself!!)

Sam, my stunned little monster! He always has his mouth agape! Jess had to work hard to get pictures of him with his mouth closed, but she did it (I'll post some of those later). Sam was cranky at the beginning of the photo shoot, so there were fewer photos of him, but boy were they cute!


Abby wasn't so happy about being squished into this one, but we tried!

Read Full Post »

March of Dimes March for Babies

Posted in march for babies on April 30, 2008| 7 Comments »

So this Sunday my husband and I will be doing the March of Dimes March for Babies. I'll be pushing my monstrosity of a triplet stroller for five miles. FIVE MILES, people. This wouldn't be such a big deal except that without the babies the stupid thing weighs like a hundred pounds. Add the babies, the diaper bag, the water bottles… well, heck, I'm going to be pushing 150+ pounds. For FIVE MILES. Did I mention I'm incredibly fat? Serves me right, I could use the exercise. Good news is that we go for a nice walk nearly every weekend. Not five miles, mind you, but a nice walk in our hilly neighborhood, and we'll be fine and we'll have lots of company.

I set a lofty goal of $500 and hit that goal in my first weekend after signing up to walk without really trying, so I doubled my goal to $1000. I still didn't do much advertising beyond putting up a badge in my sidebar and sending out a few emails. I know you're all inundated with requests like these, and I know you all donate to worthy causes throughout the year. Amazingly, I'm still really close to reaching my goal despite not even really trying… because you guys are truly amazing. So far, I've raised $807.

The March of Dimes has touched so many lives… I have little doubt that without the research that the MoD has promoted my babies would not have arrived here safely. They were born prematurely, at 33weeks, and while they were relatively healthy, that was an incredible gift that I was given thanks to the careful education from the MoD, my doctors, and many others. Each of my babies had their own set of issues in and out of the NICU. Sam needed some help breathing at first (nothing major, and few people knew about it, but he had what the NICU nurses called WWBD…Wimpy White Boy Disorder, which quickly cleared up). Abby, an IUGR baby born just 2 pounds 11 ounces, needed a blood transfusion after a sudden drop in her hematocrit. Ellie came home on a heart monitor due to bradycardia of prematurity and later became a failure to thrive baby (and has now outgrown even that diagnosis!). Compared to other stories, these are all minor issues, but without the help of the MoD… each of these problems could have been MAJOR issues a decade ago.

Even if you can't donate, please think of us on Sunday. Think of all the babies that aren't as lucky as our three. I will be thinking of all of the babies that were lost this year with each step I take on that five mile walk, grateful for every ounce of that 150 pounds I'm pushing. Some people aren't so lucky to have such a large load to push, and I'm painfully aware of that.

Thanks to all of you who have already donated… you really are an amazing bunch of women (and men!). And thanks to all of you for all of your support through one of the shittiest pregnancies I would have wanted to have endured (and I know mine paled in comparison to some others!), and one of the most amazing parenting experiences I could have asked for. I'm walking on Sunday for my three premature babies, for many babies who were lost last year, for the hope that no more babies will have to be lost to prematurity in the future… and I'm also walking in celebration of all of you wonderful women in the blogosphere. You are incredible.

Read Full Post »

Pictures!

Posted in tirplets pictures on April 29, 2008| 8 Comments »

I took an extra day off work today so that the triplets and I could go visit Jessica and her Five Little Monkeys (triplet boys and twin girls). We were supposed to go last week, but I was really sick and didn’t want to risk germifying them. Unfortunately, this meant Julian didn’t come with us, but at least I got to see Jessica. While we were there, I got some fun pictures of the kiddos:
Abby:

Ellie and Abby:

Sam:

I also have some pictures of the kiddos at the park from several days ago:
Abby in her sunhat:
Sam Snoozing in the Swing:
Ellie and Sam in the Swing:

And finally, no post is complete without some fun with food:
Broccoli-Faced Ellie:

Abby:

Sam:

Believe it or not, broccoli is actually Sam’s favorite food, but that was toward the end of his meal, and he was ready for actual milk, which he regards as actual food. This solid food stuff is still just for fun as far as he’s concerned, and when he’s really hungry, all he wants is MILK! Moo!

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Teanie Beanie isn’t Teanie Anymore!

Posted in failure to thrive on April 29, 2008| 11 Comments »

Ellie finally lost her Failure to Thrive Diagnosis! We can start weaning her from the 28cal/oz bottles and she can be nursed as often as I want when I’m home and she’s healthy and perfect and best of all I don’t have to bring her back to the doctor for SIX WHOLE WEEKS to be checked up on! Hopefully she’ll maintain her terrific growth without the 28cal/oz fortification. In fact, actually, the doctor said he wants to see her growth slow slightly, because he doesn’t want her curve to be so steep forever. She’s done a great job with the catch up growth and now it’s time for her to level out like the NORMAL BABY that she is!!

Hopefully she’ll still do okay after we wean off the 28 cal food… the last time we dropped down off the 28 cal, she lost weight pretty quickly, but that was then, this is now, so I will assume that different circumstances will yield a different result. And if she doesn’t do well with the drop down, we’ll find another solution.

Ellie is 14 pounds, Abby is 14 1/2 pounds and Sam is just about 16 pounds. Ellie is finally on the charts in the 4th percentile for weight, which puts Abby in the 5th percentile and Sam in the 7th. None of them are on the charts for height yet, but they’re getting there. The percentiles are rough approximations, incidentally, so take them with a grain of salt.

I had a great visit today with Jessica and her five little monkeys. Pictures to come in a subsequent post!

Read Full Post »

Pictures!

Posted in tirplets pictures on April 29, 2008| 5 Comments »

I took an extra day off work today so that the triplets and I could go visit Jessica and her Five Little Monkeys (triplet boys and twin girls). We were supposed to go last week, but I was really sick and didn't want to risk germifying them. Unfortunately, this meant Julian didn't come with us, but at least I got to see Jessica. While we were there, I got some fun pictures of the kiddos:
Abby:

Ellie and Abby:

Sam:

I also have some pictures of the kiddos at the park from several days ago:
Abby in her sunhat:
Sam Snoozing in the Swing:
Ellie and Sam in the Swing:

And finally, no post is complete without some fun with food:
Broccoli-Faced Ellie:

Abby:

Sam:

Believe it or not, broccoli is actually Sam's favorite food, but that was toward the end of his meal, and he was ready for actual milk, which he regards as actual food. This solid food stuff is still just for fun as far as he's concerned, and when he's really hungry, all he wants is MILK! Moo!

Read Full Post »

Teanie Beanie isn’t Teanie Anymore!

Posted in failure to thrive on April 29, 2008| 9 Comments »

Ellie finally lost her Failure to Thrive Diagnosis! We can start weaning her from the 28cal/oz bottles and she can be nursed as often as I want when I'm home and she's healthy and perfect and best of all I don't have to bring her back to the doctor for SIX WHOLE WEEKS to be checked up on! Hopefully she'll maintain her terrific growth without the 28cal/oz fortification. In fact, actually, the doctor said he wants to see her growth slow slightly, because he doesn't want her curve to be so steep forever. She's done a great job with the catch up growth and now it's time for her to level out like the NORMAL BABY that she is!!

Hopefully she'll still do okay after we wean off the 28 cal food… the last time we dropped down off the 28 cal, she lost weight pretty quickly, but that was then, this is now, so I will assume that different circumstances will yield a different result. And if she doesn't do well with the drop down, we'll find another solution.

Ellie is 14 pounds, Abby is 14 1/2 pounds and Sam is just about 16 pounds. Ellie is finally on the charts in the 4th percentile for weight, which puts Abby in the 5th percentile and Sam in the 7th. None of them are on the charts for height yet, but they're getting there. The percentiles are rough approximations, incidentally, so take them with a grain of salt.

I had a great visit today with Jessica and her five little monkeys. Pictures to come in a subsequent post!

Read Full Post »

A Good Few Days

Posted in food, tirplets pictures on April 25, 2008| 12 Comments »

It’s been a good few days. Yesterday, despite the fact that I had no nanny, no husband, and four kids to contend with, I was moderately productive. I got a shower (for the second day in a row! Whoo hoo!). The kids all got clean clothes. Laundry got done. Baby food got made. We even got out of the house. It was still a hard day, but it was a good day.

I had promised J that we WOULD get out of the house. So I started planning first thing in the morning a way to get out of the house. And after the first feeding of the morning, I thought, “Okay, we’ll leave soon…” Except, then Abby and Ellie fell asleep and I remembered that whoops! It’s naptime. And I put Sam down for his nap, too. Thanks, girls, for reminding me. Also, J needed breakfast, duh. So I made him breakfast and while I was at it, I thought I should take the opportunity to steam some carrots and bake some sweet potatoes for some baby food while J was engrossed in “Walking with Dinosaurs” and the babies were sleeping. SO, I stayed in the kitchen and worked on some baby food.

By the time I was done steaming, baking, and pureeing (hey, that takes a LONG time!), the babies were awake. You’d think we could finally leave the house, except everyone needed to be changed. And J needed socks and shoes. And the phone rang. And then… Oh right, then it was time for the babies to eat again. So I decided, because I’m an idiot, that TODAY would be a good day to experiment with actually FEEDING the babies this new solid food that I made them, because if not now, when? (We haven’t really experimented too much with solid food, just occasional tries here and there since our initial experiment, so it wasn’t a given that they’d get the food yesterday, but I figured I could live life dangerously)

We’re not really good at solid food eating yet, so it takes a really long time. By the time I got to Ellie, my poor girl looked like this:

Not to worry, she DID eventually perk up:

By the time we were done with carrots, it was time to feed actual, you know, MILK, since the carrots weren’t actual nutritional substance for the babies (not yet anyway) and they were positively STARVING (did I mention that feeding them solids takes FOREVER?). I fed them and then fed J and never did get around to feeding myself. Then I got emergency back up bottles ready just in case, got the diaper bag together, the stroller in the car, the car sets put in the car (Seth had taken them out when he’d needed more space in the van for something for some reason last weekened), got everyone loaded into the car at at 3pm, 6 HOURS after the thought of leaving my house had first crossed my mind, my four children and I finally left the house.

And I should mention this is the first time that I’ve taken all four children out of the house all by myself. And it’s a big monumental moment, right? So I should be going someplace totally cool and nifty right? But I couldn’t think of ANYPLACE interesting to go that could accomodate a big stroller, four kids and a tired mom. So we went, um, to…

Wait for it…

Target.

And now I’m not sorry about our forced quarantine for the last 6 months, because we are a giant walking FREAK SHOW. I can’t tell you the number of people who stopped to ask “Oh! Are they triplets? Are they identical? How many girls/boys? Do you have any other children? [please note, J was standing RIGHT THERE NEXT TO THE STROLLER] Isn’t it nice that you got it all done at once? [who says I’m done?] Are they natural? [who ever heard of an unnatural baby?] Were you doing fertility treatment? [who’s business is this???]” It’s unbelievable how many people actually asked such questions. MOST people, thankfully just said, “God bless you, what miracles you have” or something to that effect, but AT LEAST half a dozen people took it a whole lot further than that, which is so not okay. I had an agenda, people. Okay, not really, but I could have had an agenda! What if I’d had things to get done? What if I wasn’t just out of the house for the sake of getting out of the house? What if I truly had things I needed to accomplish and you just ruined my ability to do so? Gah!

There’s a piece of me that kind of enjoys being special, I’ll admit that. But most of me really HATES attention. Particularly from strangers. And I despise being the walking freak show. It’s hard enough walking around the neighborhood and getting all sorts of attention from people who KNOW us, but to get all that from people who DON’T know us? Oy.

Anyway, we survived. J got through Target with a new dinosaur, the babies got a couple cute summery outfits and a bunch of new take n’ toss bowls for packing up their food. You should see my freezer now:

Quite a contrast to back when my fridge was full of milk. The times they are a-changin’!

Tonight I pureed a bunch of broccoli. I’m on a roll!

We’ll see if they like it. I’m betting they won’t. Today, they expressed a definite preference for sweet potatoes versus carrots, even though Seth can’t tell the difference between the two in a blind taste test! They don’t like bananas much (I’m betting it’s the texture they don’t like), but we’ll keep trying it. We’ll try broccoli in the next couple days.

Here are a few more feeding pictures, from today:
Sam

Ellie

Abby

Read Full Post »

A Good Few Days

Posted in food, tirplets pictures on April 25, 2008| 12 Comments »

It's been a good few days. Yesterday, despite the fact that I had no nanny, no husband, and four kids to contend with, I was moderately productive. I got a shower (for the second day in a row! Whoo hoo!). The kids all got clean clothes. Laundry got done. Baby food got made. We even got out of the house. It was still a hard day, but it was a good day.

I had promised J that we WOULD get out of the house. So I started planning first thing in the morning a way to get out of the house. And after the first feeding of the morning, I thought, "Okay, we'll leave soon…" Except, then Abby and Ellie fell asleep and I remembered that whoops! It's naptime. And I put Sam down for his nap, too. Thanks, girls, for reminding me. Also, J needed breakfast, duh. So I made him breakfast and while I was at it, I thought I should take the opportunity to steam some carrots and bake some sweet potatoes for some baby food while J was engrossed in "Walking with Dinosaurs" and the babies were sleeping. SO, I stayed in the kitchen and worked on some baby food.

By the time I was done steaming, baking, and pureeing (hey, that takes a LONG time!), the babies were awake. You'd think we could finally leave the house, except everyone needed to be changed. And J needed socks and shoes. And the phone rang. And then… Oh right, then it was time for the babies to eat again. So I decided, because I'm an idiot, that TODAY would be a good day to experiment with actually FEEDING the babies this new solid food that I made them, because if not now, when? (We haven't really experimented too much with solid food, just occasional tries here and there since our initial experiment, so it wasn't a given that they'd get the food yesterday, but I figured I could live life dangerously)

We're not really good at solid food eating yet, so it takes a really long time. By the time I got to Ellie, my poor girl looked like this:

Not to worry, she DID eventually perk up:

By the time we were done with carrots, it was time to feed actual, you know, MILK, since the carrots weren't actual nutritional substance for the babies (not yet anyway) and they were positively STARVING (did I mention that feeding them solids takes FOREVER?). I fed them and then fed J and never did get around to feeding myself. Then I got emergency back up bottles ready just in case, got the diaper bag together, the stroller in the car, the car sets put in the car (Seth had taken them out when he'd needed more space in the van for something for some reason last weekened), got everyone loaded into the car at at 3pm, 6 HOURS after the thought of leaving my house had first crossed my mind, my four children and I finally left the house.

And I should mention this is the first time that I've taken all four children out of the house all by myself. And it's a big monumental moment, right? So I should be going someplace totally cool and nifty right? But I couldn't think of ANYPLACE interesting to go that could accomodate a big stroller, four kids and a tired mom. So we went, um, to…

Wait for it…

Target.

And now I'm not sorry about our forced quarantine for the last 6 months, because we are a giant walking FREAK SHOW. I can't tell you the number of people who stopped to ask "Oh! Are they triplets? Are they identical? How many girls/boys? Do you have any other children? [please note, J was standing RIGHT THERE NEXT TO THE STROLLER] Isn't it nice that you got it all done at once? [who says I'm done?] Are they natural? [who ever heard of an unnatural baby?] Were you doing fertility treatment? [who's business is this???]" It's unbelievable how many people actually asked such questions. MOST people, thankfully just said, "God bless you, what miracles you have" or something to that effect, but AT LEAST half a dozen people took it a whole lot further than that, which is so not okay. I had an agenda, people. Okay, not really, but I could have had an agenda! What if I'd had things to get done? What if I wasn't just out of the house for the sake of getting out of the house? What if I truly had things I needed to accomplish and you just ruined my ability to do so? Gah!

There's a piece of me that kind of enjoys being special, I'll admit that. But most of me really HATES attention. Particularly from strangers. And I despise being the walking freak show. It's hard enough walking around the neighborhood and getting all sorts of attention from people who KNOW us, but to get all that from people who DON'T know us? Oy.

Anyway, we survived. J got through Target with a new dinosaur, the babies got a couple cute summery outfits and a bunch of new take n' toss bowls for packing up their food. You should see my freezer now:

Quite a contrast to back when my fridge was full of milk. The times they are a-changin'!

Tonight I pureed a bunch of broccoli. I'm on a roll!

We'll see if they like it. I'm betting they won't. Today, they expressed a definite preference for sweet potatoes versus carrots, even though Seth can't tell the difference between the two in a blind taste test! They don't like bananas much (I'm betting it's the texture they don't like), but we'll keep trying it. We'll try broccoli in the next couple days.

Here are a few more feeding pictures, from today:
Sam

Ellie

Abby

Read Full Post »

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