Settling In

We survived our first night at home and everything is going great. A big thank you to our NICU nurses because we actually feel like we know what we're doing - they trained us well! Because the boys are still on regulated feedings, we are sticking with their three hour hospital schedule. Every 9, 12, 3 and 6 o'clock throughout the day and night we take their temperatures (to make sure they are keeping them up), change their diapers, and feed them. Sure makes for a busy day! Luckily they do really well in between feedings and sleep most of the time. We usually each take a baby for feedings, etc. but last night I did the 3am shift by myself so Andy could sleep, and this morning he did the 6am shift so I could sleep. It definitely helps to get more than 2.5 hours of sleep at a time, plus we've been sneaking in naps when we can throughout the day. We know the lack of sleep is going to catch up with us at some point, but it's not so bad so far. Plus, we're still so enamored at the fact that we have two babies in our house that we don't really mind the late night feedings!

The oxygen supplier/ monitoring company came by yesterday to set up permanent oxygen machines for the house. The fairly large machines plug into the wall and convert the room air into oxygen that flows to the boys. Unlike the portable oxygen tanks that only last about 25 hours, these can run forever (as long as the electricity doesn't run out!). Speaking of, if we were to lose power, the monitors can run on battery for 15 hours and we would just use their portable oxygen tanks. We had some storms today but thankfully no disruptions! The permanent oxygen machines are pretty loud and make constant noises of air being blown in spurts. Hard to explain, but it is actually soothing for the boys and we don't really notice it anymore. The bad news is that each machine weighs 35 pounds so we haven't left the living room yet. We are both sleeping on the couch for now, but will eventually cart everything upstairs for the nighttime. Since Max and Tyler were so used to staying in the same environment all the time in the NICU, we wanted to get them acclimated to their new home before moving them around too much. Guess we also need to start lifting weights before we're ready to lug those things up and down the stairs every day! ;)

Overall we really have no complaints. It is better than we ever thought it could be and we are so in love with these babies. We had our usual Friday night pizza and movie, but this time we got to pause the movie for bath time with the boys at our house rather than driving to the hospital. Best Friday night in a long time!

Thank you to everyone for the emails, texts and phone calls since the boys came home. I guess it shouldn't surprise us anymore because we've had such amazing support all along, but it makes us feel so lucky and blessed to have so many people checking on us and following the blog. Our nurses kept telling us that Max and Tyler are doing so well because of the support we have been giving them, but we know we couldn't do this without support from everyone else. The fact that the boys are home a whole month before their due date (May 11th) is a testament to their amazing progress. So thank you for sharing this journey with us and helping our boys do so well!

Here are some pictures, including photos of three of our amazing nurses. We really miss our second family at the NICU!

Our primary day nurse Edra with Tyler

Our primary night nurse Karen

Our secondary day nurse Ginny (who was with the boys whenever Edra wasn't working and she was)

After their first baths at home. Since we can't move them (easily) upstairs to the bath yet, we used wash cloths like we did at the NICU. Tyler (left) sucking his thumb and Max (right) sucking his whole hand. Must be time to eat! Both boys have found and sucked their thumbs on several occasions.

Tyler wearing his monitor belt to hold his leads in place. They each wear two leads (see below) that monitor their heart rates and breathing. Rather than the sticky leads that stuck straight to their skin at the hospital, this monitoring system has leads that velcro to the belt so they stay in place. A bit more cumbersome but it works pretty well.

Not the greatest picture, but these are the leads that are placed below each armpit to monitor heart rate and breathing. The machine beeps (very loudly) if they go 20 seconds without breathing or if their heartrates drop really low or go up very high.

Big blue oxygen machines on each side and the monitors in front. As you can see, there are tubing and wires all over the place!

I woke up just in time to catch Andy on his solo shift - changing diapers and taking temperatures here. Father of the Year? Absolutely.

Feeding two babies at the same time? No problem!

All wrapped up in their Swaddle Me wraps. A must-have for all new babies, in our opinion! They fight it at first when you restrain their arms, but they love it and usually fall right asleep.

Another video, although still not extremely exciting. Brothers chilling out after bath time. (Tyler on the left, Max on the right)