I’m pleased to present Paige Amanda Kaufman, weighing in at 7.2 pounds and Cole Richard Kaufman tipping the scales at 6.7 pounds. That’s right, the babies are finally here. What a long pregnancy we had. It only seemed like Tobie was pregnant for a few months. The babies are being evaluated in the NICU for a couple of weeks and then they will come home.
If you haven’t guessed it already, the babies would have been term today (remember boys and girls, term is 40 weeks). Based on their current sizes, Tobie would have been huge if she carried them past 35 weeks. Probably moving forward, this day, will be the day we use to calculate the babies age when we enroll them in school or try to see where they are at developmentally and physically or when telling people we don’t know the babies’ age. It’s just too confusing explaining the difference between corrected age versus adjusted age. So for those keeping track at home, the babies are 1 day old.
Things have been progressing pretty well. We finally have a date for Cole’s hernia surgery. He is scheduled to go under the knife this Tuesday. Paige’s crying is starting to get louder. (I can’t believe I’m missing silent Paige!) I don’t know if her paralyzed vocal cord is repairing itself or the other one is just over compensating for it. She doesn’t get another exam for it for another 2 months. She is becoming more and more active. The babies know how to work the system already. They cry and fuss to get you to hold them. They love the hold! We have been trying to hold them less lately so they can save all their energy to nipple. Overall, the babies have been nippling better and better. We ended up buying some Advent bottles and nipples that allow you to dial in the amount of flow and have some sort of negative pressure in them. This has really allowed the babies to take the next step.
Paige has been doing pretty darn good nippling lately. It’s funny how we were so focused on Paige nippling we weren’t that concerned with Cole. Now Cole isn’t nippling as well as he was before. I guess that’s the twin conundrum (double the pleasure, double the fun, wait isn’t that a gum slogan? whatever.). If you look at them on a weekly basis, they are doing very well with weight gain and nippling. However, they still aren’t taking enough feeds by bottle to justify taking the ng tube out of their noses. We did remove Paige’s tube for almost a full day Thursday because she was nippling consistantly. Currently Paige is on adlib feedings. Basically we still try to feed her every 3 hours, but we let her tell us how much and when. If she doesn’t finish the bottle, then she is out of luck. Hopefully this will only make her more hungry for her next feed. She is still having some choking episodes during a lot of the feeds, but if you watch her close enough, you catch her before her heart rate drops too much.
So with Cole’s surgery scheduled, we are in the home NICU stretch. I don’t want to jinx it, but what the hey, the babies should be coming home May 8th. During the next week we’ll be weaning Paige off O2 completely. We haven’t been quick to do this because we wanted her to stay longer in the NICU with her brother. There have been many times were her nasal prongs were no where near her nose and she was satting fine. Knock on wood, she’ll not be coming home on O2. Cole defintely will. You pull out his nasal prongs and his O2 saturations drift into the 70s (we want them above 90). So I think that’s it for now.
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What a BEAUTIFUL way to celebrate! I LOVE the hats!!! Hey - does this mean that your children will celebrate 2 birthdays? Talk about jealous friends!!!
We too wonder which date to celebrate more (although for us April 23rd was the due date) and to use for calculations… but I think the answer used most often is that they are amost 4 months old even though docs and schools will want the adjusted answer.
I’m so glad to hear that things are going well, and hope the best for Cole’s surgery. I’m looking forward to any advice, as Lessa’s is the next day.
It must be so exciting to feel that your in the home stretch… and terrifying that it will actually happen.
So…
If I understand correctly, you won’t have to completely fear for all the other drivers in Phoenix until 4/29/2022?
It’s nice to see all the good news lately; these two really have come a long way (and don’t worry, you don’t have to believe in a kinna hurra, they’re doing great).
As a quick shameless plug for you; what do you really need off of the registries right now with the kids coming home so soon.
Happy Birthyday! Glad to hear the babies are doing great and that the homecoming is justr around the corner.
As far as the adjusted age, we only really used that until they were 2-3 yrs old. We definitely used it when they were meeting their developmental milestones. But when they get to school age they won’t even ask. By that time, there are many children in the same grade that are 3-4 months apart. Have a great week, and I hope all goes well with Cole’s surgery.
Eric, that’s the best pic of you I’ve seen all BLOG - must be the blue in the hat - I think you should keep wearing it.
Thrilled with the updates as always - you guys are all fantastic!
Valerie, I’m married. This isn’t the best place to try to hook up.
Such beautiful babies….precious miracles. It is so fun watching them grow. They are looking so healthy and alert. You have been blessed. Thank you for letting everyone into your lives. Keep sharing…Cat
Beautiful Kids! Looks like some great progress!
HELLO FAMILY !!<br/>So glad to hear the good news…<br/>Yes, I agree with Joe - what is it that you need??? Can’t wait to see the blog of the day they come home !!<br/>~Gina B.
Well, genetics certainly do play a part. I can see where they get their stylishly hndsome pointy heads from. Both you & Tobie have beatifully pointy heads that are multicolored. I can’t imagine that was comfortable for Tobie during the pregnancy IS that why they’re in the NICU for a few weeks?
Is that…it can’t be…is that a Bratz hat on your head?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bratz
What a clever idea, with the birthday on their orginal due dates. One of those time I kicked myself saying ” Why did’nt I think of that” Cute babies.