As Promised

This is Drew the first time we gave him rice cereal. We tried our very best to make it fun, and be excited about it all. But none of that mattered. As soon as we put it in his mouth he looked at me, looked at Michael, looked confused, then spit it all out. The look on his face said "Mommy why did you do that to me?!" Needless to say, he hated it.


And this is a picture of Ben thinking, the exact same thing his brother thought of the rice cereal. The only difference being that he was equally confused as to why we were smiling and taking pictures of the whole thing. At least it was a fun time for the grown-ups! The good news now is that we have a less messy way to go about it now. Heather Miller, a friend of mine from church who has a little more mommy experience than I do, told me to try a medicine syringe to get the food into their tummies. Lo and behold, it worked! So until they reach the point where they can get their mouths to use the spoon, we have an alternative.


I have to admit that I am the queen of taking pictures for no apparent reason. My only reason for taking these was that they are just getting so big! Look at them sitting up like such big boys on the couch. I was so impressed. I think that we're going to have to start working on smiling for the camera. 9000 pictures of blank stares might be a little overkill, dontcha think?

Thank you for praying for our boys while they were sick!!! Everyone is now much much better. The whole drama culminated in me taking Drew to the ER at Vanderbilt Children's Hospital, while Michael stayed home from work with Ben. I know that this may seem like an over-reaction on our part, but at 4:30 on Monday morning, after another sleepless night due to him crying and not keeping anything down, we decided that he had been without fluids, without sleep, and not any better for too long. So, rather than wait till our Dr's office could see us, I took him on. And its a good thing I did. They got him an IV of fluids and he immediately began to look and feel better. Michael had several work emergencies come up, and our good friends Darci and her little boy Brax came over to take care of Ben for us! They were our heroes!!! We thank God every single night for our small group, and the friends that we have in it!!! They have each been there for us so many times, and this was no exception. So, after all that drama, we are worn out, and are trying to take it easy.

I Hate Bugs

Whether they be the six-legged kind or the tummy kind, I hate bugs. And since there has been a tummy bug flying all over church for the last few weeks, I guess I shouldn't be surprised that it has now come to visit our house.

Last night at about 3:00 a.m. Drew woke up and was really upset. I put him on the couch with me, in the hopes that that would help all four of us get a little sleep for the rest of the night. No such luck. When he blew out a diaper onto me and the blankets we were on, I took his temperature, only to find that it was over 102. So, Michael and I gave him a bath, some infant Tylenol (thank heavens for that stuff!), and I took him back to the couch. Michael took Ben to bed with him. Since he had none of the symptoms that Drew had, we thought he might make it through without catching it. We were wrong.

So today the three of us spent all day in our pj's, just snuggling, and trying to keep Pedialyte down. It breaks my heart to see my sweet little babies feel so rotten. All they want to do is lay on my chest, and I am more than happy to oblige.....that's something I can't get enough of. Days like today remind me of the things that are really important. The laundry that has been cleaned but not put away for a week, the messy kitchen, and all that other stuff just finds itself low on the priority list when my babies just need their mommy. Please please keep them in your prayers as their little bodies try to shake this thing.

Love to you all!

Life in the Fast Lane (times two)!

I'm honestly always amazed at the number of people who tell me "you need to update your blog page." And I know that it's true: I do need to do it more often. But with these two little bugers, who has the time to even check email? At any rate, though I do feel bad that I don't keep up with this a little bit better, it does make my day to know that there are so many of you out there who actually take time (and for mommies, that is a very sacred commodity) to check in on us. I know that the real reason you put up with all of my ramblings is to see pictures of the boys. :) So, here you go!
This is a picture of Drew laughing so hard at his mommy...I never knew I was funny until I had them! And this is a picture of Ben in the middle of rolling over!!! He looks a little confused because I think it still surprises them a little when they do it. But they flop right over onto their backs as soon as you lay them on their tummies. It's so neat to watch them discover something as simple as rolling over. But everything is brand new to them, and to watch them put it all together is just so fun.

In other news, we went for our 4 month visit to Dr. Leeper's office (shots are NOT fun!) and he said the boys aren't gaining enough weight. So, we have to start rice cereal, both in the bottles and out of a spoon. I've been trying now for about 20 precious minutes to upload pictures of their faces as they tell me how they feel about it because it's priceless. But blogger is not wanting to cooperate. So you'll have to wait till next time to see. It's hilarious, and very messy. They HATE the spoons. But we are giving it our best efforts twice a day, Heaven help us!

They are getting so big. I think they do something that completely amazes me everyday, and I have never loved doing something so much. I am the luckiest girl in the world to have my two little guys and my one big guy. God is so good!

Brave Little Boys

What a whirlwind the last 9 days have been! I've been trying to post these pictures of the boys' surgery on here for the last 4 or 5 days now, and have been horribly unsuccessful. I think if I could do a little better at posting more often, each page wouldn't take all day long to read. But I digress, and have precious few minutes to write as it is anyways.

So for those of you who live far away, and haven't heard yet, Ben and Drew handled their surgery like little angels -- honestly, they did better with it all than their mama did! From the moment we got to Vanderbilt, they had all of the nurses in their sweet little hands. Just cooing and smiling and being themselves. They were very brave, and the only time they really seemed to be upset about any of it was as they were coming off of the anesthesia. I, on the other hand, was pretty pitful. And, I was thankful that I have two babies so that as they took one away to do the surgery, I had the other one to hold. We stayed one night in the hospital, and went home the next day. Not too shabby, I thought, seeing as how they are only 3 months old.

After that, we found out that Michael's grandma, who had been sick for some time now, wasn't doing very well. So we packed up the car, and quickly headed for Missouri. She passed away last Sunday, and though it was a sad trip, it's always good to be with family. We enjoyed getting to see everyone, especially Dresden, our neice who's 4 and LOVES her baby cousins! So now we're back home for a little while, and are getting back into our daily routine.

It's good to be home!!!

So.....this morning after the first feeding of the day we were playing on the floor as usual. Just playing and singing and being silly. I was loving on Ben, right in his face. And that little buger chose that exact moment to spit up in my face. There I was, in my robe with baby spit up in my eye. I cannot even begin to tell you how gross that was. Ahhhh...the joys of motherhood that no one warns you about.

Anyways, I couldn't resist taking some pictures of these little guys while they were playing! They're getting so big, and have come quite a ways in these short 11 weeks. Just in the last several days they have discovered their smiles, and it's so sweet to watch them smile at me and kick their legs in excitement.
Here is Ben playing in the Baby Einstein Exersaucer that the girls from work gave us. They're still a little bit too small to really play with it, but they really seem to like looking at all the bright colors and fun shapes. Lots of visual stimulation.

And Drew is laying on the boppy (my very best friend these days) playing with this toy that he lays underneath. He looks up at it, and watches all the lights and listens to music. They just kick their little legs and coo, so I guess that means they like it.

This was taken when my sweet sweet friend Katharine came to visit while on her way to Atlanta (sorry Anna Banana! I just HAD to steal her for the night!).

Ben gives his Aunt Britt some good lovin'. I'm so glad that she lives in town!!! Some days she is the only way I get to take a 15 minute shower!!! Sad, but true. She's in grad school, so she's got lots of time to come out to the house, or run errands with us.

And here Aunt Britt gets to give DrewBoo some love.
We've had such a good week. In addition to Britt hanging out with us, Angie, one of our friends from church, brought her little boy Elijah over to play one day. He's a good bit older than the buddies, but he seemed to have fun playing with all the toys. And yesterday we went for a walk in the park with Darci, her son Brax and Sallie, who should give birth to Eli in just a few weeks. We have such a great group of friends, and it's so neat to be a part of group of people to raise your children with.

Today it is super icky outside - thunderstorms and rain and lightning. So, we are not going out to lunch with all the mommies like we'd planned. Instead we are having a fun day at home and just hanging out.

Thanks for checking in with us!!! I'll keep you all posted on how Ben and Drew are doing as soon as I get another spare second. Love you all.

A Christmas to Remember...

In front of our Christmas tree at home...

The twins with my Nana and Papa, their Great-Grandparents...

Sleeping through Christmas day in front of the fire...

Well, we headed to my parent's house in Montgomery, AL on the Thursday before Christmas right after the boys got their 2 month shots. They didn't like it very much, and they let us know it. But they were little troopers, and slept almost the whole way home. Honestly, it was probably harder for me to watch them cry, than it was for the boys. But they survived and so did I.

Once we got there and got all settled in, Drew began crying uncontrollably. If you've spent any amount of time around the twins, you know that they just don't cry very much. So I immediately knew something was wrong. I picked him up, and for some unknown reason checked his hernia. It was protruding much farther than normal, and he acted like he was in pain. So we called the pediatrician and the on-call nurse at the Vanderbilt Children's Hospital (where the boys will have their surgery on the 27th) and they said that if it were to get worse, it would be best to be near a Children's Hospital. Feeling worried for our baby boy and sad about leaving family, we threw everything in the car, and headed back to Nashville at 10:00 pm on Christmas eve. We got home at about 2 in the morning, and walked in to an empty house, a bare fridge and two boys who were WAY off their schedule. But Michael built a fire, and we pulled dinner together with what we could find, and we made the boys' first Christmas one we'll always remember! At least you can't say we're boring...always an adventure! Merry Christmas!

it's about time!!!

i cannot believe that ben and drew are 8 weeks old, and i have not posted one thing since their birth! i'm horrible at this whole blog thing. but what can i say? things tend to stay pretty busy around here. to be honest, it's really comical how many times i've sat down, and actually tried to update this page. but inevitably, just as soon as i start, someone will start crying or need something. even now as i sit here and type, ben has spit his paci out by accident and is telling me that he'd like me to come and put it back in his mouth.

life has held so much for us since the birth of our little guys: first baths, first halloween, first thanksgiving, and this past weekend we had christmas with michael's family. next weekend we will be with my family in montgomery. the twins have no idea what christmas is, or even that there are presents involved, but we are enjoying this season with them. we took them to the opryland hotel to see the lights, and i got so much pleasure from watching the boys watch the twinkle lights. they loved it! their eyes were as big as saucers, and i don't think ben even blinked. so cute. they've come quite a long way from their meager 4 pound start at life. we go to the doctor on thursday, and i'm certain that they now weigh more than 8 lbs a piece! here are just a few pictures from our journey thus far. ... and i promise to do better with the updates! ;)


though this is a terribly unflattering picture of me, i had to include it because it shows just how little my sweet baby boys were when they were born. i get teary just looking at this one.




here is a picture taken at the breakfast with santa at otter creek. i just love our church!!! and since getting anywhere with these little fellas is quite an ordeal, we were very very late getting there. but we got the picture! for those of you who still can't tell them apart, ben is on santa's left, eating his hands because he's hungry, and drew is on the right!


and here we are at the opryland hotel. all four of us!!! look at how big ben and drew are! merry christmas!!!