Julia is home

And we've got the pictures to prove it!

She's had visitors from the neighborhood already, including Divya and Rom, Miss Bickie and Suzanne, Chimene, and Kris and Al. All were sufficiently swept off their feet to allow future visits.

All dressed up!

True ladies dress up when they go out on the town and Miss Julia is no different. Aunt Jamie bought her a very pretty outfit for the occasion

A big morning!

Miss Julia gained two ounces, and Miss Ella an ounce. Miss Julia just about 5 1/2 lbs!

Miss Julia comes home tomorrow!

Julia got permission today to go home on Wednesday, 3 weeks after being born! She's been doing great on her feedings and she's growing like a weed so she is ready. We can't wait to have her home!

Not so impressed!

Can I go to sleep yet?

Miss Ella gets a bath!

Miss Julia got her bath Sunday, Miss Ella got her turn today. Interesting technique where the baby is put into the tub fully wrapped, then one body part at a time is taken out to be washed. No crying at all, which is surprising for a preemie!

Big Milestone!

Both girls are over 5 lbs!

Julia almost 5 lbs!

Another good day to grow!

We had to say goodbye to Grandmommy Alice today, but on the same trip to the airport we picked up Aunt Jamie! Straight from DFW to the hospital, where Aunt Jamie got to feed Ella a bottle.

Aunt Jamie played all day with Miss Lauren, learning how to fly like a fairy ... she can explain it to you later.

Mike and Suzanne went back to the 8pm feeding. Miss Ella did a gavage and Miss Julia did her usual 50 ml from the bottle.

White Kitty Does His Part

Everyone is pitching in. White Kitty decided to help stress-test the new car seats we bought for the girls. At 3pm he jumped into one and made sure it would hold his 22 lbs. Three hours later he declared the car seat safe and got out!

My Baby Bugs

Miss Lauren will always be my Baby Monkey. Miss Ella and Julia look like they have some monkey in them, but they need their own nickname.

Lauren helped come up with Baby Bugs because they are so small and cute. To help tell them apart Miss Ella will be Lady Bug and Miss Julia will be June Bug!

A day at the zoo

Sunday we spent the day at Fossil Rim, the nearby drive-through zoo. Lauren has been there many times before, but it was a chance to show Grandmommy the many different animals. The zoo was hit especially hard by hard wind the previous week when storms rolled through Texas. None of the animals were hurt, but many of the bigger trees were damaged or destroyed in the giraffe area.

Hallelujah!

Miss Julia, feeling the spirit!

The Milk Coma

Miss Ella demonstrates the condition of bliss attained when one gorges on a full bottle of milk. When you are a wee one like the girls a full bottle represents 3% of your own weight. When you are putting down that much of the sweet liquid it sometimes can be hard to finish the bottle in the first place!

One arm, two babies technique

One of the nurses pointed out a technique she learned from another twin mother. This way one of your arms is freed up. Works great, but it seems like the method will break down once the babies get bigger and more active. Right now they are bundled up tight!

I plan to put this to good use with a remote control. I wonder if the twin mother watched a lot of playoff hockey as well?

Miss Julia closing in on birth weight

Every night the girls get weighed, and the stat board gets updated. Both are growing, and Julia is about to get back to and above her 1920 g birth weight.

One week old!

Miss Ella, Miss Julia

Visit from Lauren

Miss Lauren got a chance to see, hold, and even feed the babies today. Her only requirement is that those babies have some clothes on, naked babies make her crazy!

Beach Bum

Miss Julia gets in a little beach time thanks to her friend bilirubin. Both girls got some days under the lights. Turns out all the light also helps work off the calories. Would be great if it worked for everyone, but unfortunately it only seems to work on the smallest girls who don't really want to lose weight anyway.

Hospital Art

I've been able to spend a lot of time at Plano Presbyterian hospital over the last couple months. A lot of time. I haven't been able to find the stairs yet but I have found some neat things. Right across the hall from one of Suzanne's rooms were some windows overlooking the back of the hospital. Each evening when the sun sets the sunlight flows over the building shown, bounces off the 8 story hospital tower, then bounces back with the circles as shown above. The circles are created by the window panes which focuses the light just so. This picture was taken out of the NICU in the main tower as the sun set Friday night.

Email Announcement

Grandmommy and Ella

Grandmommy came in and went straight to the hospital to see her babies. Miss Ella's IV in her hand wasn't doing to well so they moved it to her head. Nice look, isn't it?! Fortunately they were able to take it out a couple of days later.

The Big Sister

Lauren got her first chance to be the Big Sister today. As you can see, Miss Julia has already picked up on Lauren's affection for the color pink!

The Big Sister

Miss Lauren got to play big sister for the first time today. As you can see Miss Julia has already become a fan of pink like Lauren.

Little fingers

Miss Ella's little fingers around mine

Dinner time

Here I am giving Ella her dinner. You can see her pod here in the NICU in the background. She has her own pod right now, and there are 2 guests per pod, so for now we can have 4 visitors at the same time to visit the girls. Once they move both incubators to the same pod then we'll be limited to only two guests. (Big Sisters don't count against our total - they always get in for free!)

Over my shoulder is her LCD with all of her vitals. They monitor the preemies all of the time. Mostly they are checking to make sure the babies do not stop breathing. Very early babies can stop breathing long enough that it can also impact their heart rate. When that happens the nurses come over and rub the baby and that usually gets them to breathe again. Fortunately Ella and Julie have not had any of those episodes.

I'm doing a gavage feeding for Ella. They wire a tube through her nose down to their stomach, and feed them by attaching a bottle with their formula. The gravity drips it right down, and the babies do not need to even wake up. Before the next feeding the nurse will create a little vacuum in the tube to check to see how much is still left in the stomach. Sometimes the stomach has not had enough time to process all the food so they know not to add quite so much the next time.

Ella's first bath

Click on the title above or here to see video

Miss Ella was put on a CPAP just after being born. A CPAP is a Continuous Positive Airway Pressure machine that kept little Ella's lungs inflated with a light pressure.

When it came to put it in someone came up behind me and dad and said "You should go." His expression was completely blank so I couldn't tell if he was serious or was joking. Turns out he was the doctor, and he was serious, so we left.

The CPAP was a big set of tubes coming over Ella's head and up into her nostrils. Not very attractive. And it also prevented her from getting a bath right away. This video was shot right after midnight. They've taken off the CPAP and are using a little oxygen mask to help her our instead.


At the end of the video you see the nurses putting back on the headband that holds the CPAP in place. They took Ella off of the CPAP in the morning.

First Pictures!

Miss Ella Jane Mahaney

Miss Julia Cate Mahaney

Babies are here!

The Mahaney Babies were born on April 9th at 6:19 pm. Both girls weighed 4 lbs, 3 oz. Each came out with a good cry and were more vocal than their big sister Lauren when she was born. They were born in their 35th week so each was swept of the NICU for care.