Hawaii Vacation- 2008

We are home from Hawaii!!! It was a long and fabulous vacation but we are happy to be home and ready to get back to real life. We have so many things to look forward to in the New Year! Here are a few of our photos!

Update

Steph's OB appointment was great yesterday. Both babies are doing well and had great heartbeats!!! Steph was able to schedule our level 2 ultrasound and her next OB appointment together so Darin and I could attend both. We hope to find out the genders of our little ones on Friday, January 9, 2009! Big sisters, Hannah and Olivia will be going with us to celebrate that day. Hannah is hoping for two girls and Olivia doesn't have a preference, they are both excited!

We are still in Hawaii and are hoping our flights on Saturday get delayed a few days. It's so relaxing here. We went to a great beach this morning, the kids played in the water and built a sandcastle. We are going to our first Luau tonight, I think both the girls will be mesmerized by the dancers. Hannah is at the movies right now with her Nana, Papa and cousins...I don't quite understand going to a movie while in Maui but at least I get to enjoy a little quiet time completely by myself!

Back to Steph and my babies...the last craving I heard about was for onion rings. I hope Steph was able to satisfy everyone with a pile of onion rings. Steph has promised a belly picture so hopefully she'll deliver soon...maybe with a little begging from all of you (hint)!!!

I'll update more when we get home from this glorious vacation (I'm still in denile that I have to go back to temperatures below 0...it's 85 here today)!

OB Appointment

Steph had a great OB appointment today...except for the one hour wait (how dare people go into labor during her appointment)!!!

Steph grew 3 cm since her last visit, my babies are getting big fast! Dr. Richman was able to find both babies' heartbeats on the Doppler very easily today! Baby A's heartbeat was 140bpm and Baby B's heartbeat was 145bpm!

I'll be in Hawaii during our next appointment but I'll try to update everyone assuming I can spare 5 minutes off the beach!

16 Weeks

Our twins are 16 weeks today!!! Here's some information on how they are growing. In the next few weeks, the twins will double their weights and add inches to their lengths. Right now, they are about the size of an avocado each. 4 1/2 inches long (head to rump) and 3 1/2 ounces. Their legs are much more developed, their heads are more erect than they have been, and their eyes have moved closer to the front of their heads. Their ears are close to their final positions, too. The patterning of their scalps have begun, though their locks aren't recognizable yet. They've even started growing toenails. And there's a lot happening inside their little bodies as well. For example, their hearts are now pumping about 25 quarts of blood each day, and this amount will continue to increase as the twins continue to develop.

Steph has an OB appointment tomorrow so I'll update with all that good info soon!

Ultrasound photos - 13 weeks 6 days

Here are the latest ultrasound pictures of our twins. They were taken at 13 weeks and 6 days.

Baby A...it looks like this baby is picking her/his nose.
Baby A's legs and feet!

Baby B's profile!

Reflections...Waiting for Our Fertilization Report and Our Transfer

Reflections...Waiting for Our Fertilization Report and Our Transfer

My primary nurse, Anne, promised us that she would call the day after my retrieval with our fertilization report. I was a nervous wreck but Darin was very confident that everything would work out for us this time. For me it was a very long wait because at the time I was a teacher and school was out for the summer so I really had nothing to occupy my time. It was really easy to let my imagination get the best of me and only think of the worst possibilities. It’s easy to do when you have no control over the situation. When Anne called late that afternoon I was so nervous so I got very quiet. She went on to tell me that everything looks good for transfer and blah, blah, blah. Everything she was saying was great but I really just wanted to hear a number and she finally told us the news we’d been waiting to hear…13 of my 17 eggs fertilized!!!! Hearing the news was such a relief, I think I actually started jumping up and down in celebration. After my mini celebration Anne told me that she would call the following day for our next update. We still had two more days of waiting before our transfer. I called Darin at work to share our happy news and we went out to dinner that night to celebrate the fact that we had successfully jumped through another hoop. It didn’t matter that we still had a million more to go, we were so happy about this victory. The next day was filled with the same excruciating waiting. 5 minutes felt like hours to me. Our little embryos still had so much growing to do before transfer and it was hard not to worry about them. Only another person who has been through IVF knows this kind of pain. Anne finally called that afternoon and told me that all of our embryos were still growing and dividing perfectly! She said our transfer was scheduled for the next day and that she was going to call our Gestational Carrier, Lisa, to give her the information! As soon I got off the phone I got back on to call Darin and share our news. Our transfer was the next day, July 3rd 2004 at 7:45 a.m.