I just love all 5 of my babies!

I just love love love all of my children! Each one of them are so unique and It is so amazing how I love them all the same! My love for them is so intense, I just CANNOT wait until the quads come home! It aches when I see them because I just want to hold them in my arms. They are looking more and more like newborns instead of preemies that should still be in my tummy! Once the babies are able to feed, maintain their own temperature (which they are doing), and breath on their own, they will be able to come home. The NICU staff says to count on my original due date which is mid April, but my fingers are crossed they will come home even earlier!

Next week I get to start working on nursing with Madelyn and Parker (since they are on the canula). I am so excited! I am so so so excited to hold them again! It has been three weeks since we have got to hold any of them since we had RSV in our home. And Preston still hasnt been able to be held! I cannot WAIT!

Dahlia

Dahlia is doing fantastic and we are very proud of her! We are hoping to get her on the CPAP machine by this weekend. She is definetly the touchiest of all of the babies! When we touch her she automatically desats! She is a very alert baby and is usually pretty easy to wake up when she hears our voice. She has very big pretty eyes and just loves to look around! She is such a honey, we love her so much and she reminds us so much of her big sister!

Preston

Our little man has been doing fabulous! I still often think about how swollen and bad his condition was just weeks ago! I cannot believe how much better he is today! His hair still is the lightest of the bunch! It definetly has a honey color to it! He just loves to hear our voices. The other night I got to give him a bath for the first time and that was amazing! He just loved it! I am so proud of how well he is doing! His ventilator settings are getting lower and lower and we are hoping to see him on the CPAP very soon! We get to start holding the babies again in a couple of days and I cannot wait to hold Preston for the very first time! Oh and Preston is no longer on any kind of antibiotics!!! YAY!!!

Parker

Wow! Our baby boy is doing so great! He was on the CPAP for a day and did pretty well but got kind of uncomfortable. He likes to lift his head (he is very strong) and the helmetness (if that is a word lol) stops him from being able to move around as much. So Amy (one of our wonderful primary nurses) talked the doctor into putting him on the nasal canula! He has been doing good on that and we are hoping to be able to keep him on that until he is able to breathe on his own. I felt so lucky because Amy let me hold him for a second and it was so amazing!

Madelyn

Madelyn is still our tiny little princess. She weighs 3 pounds 4ounces and the other quads are now reaching 4 pounds. She is still doing so well on the canula! She loves to grip our fingers and is a very alert baby. She is so beautiful and we love to look at her! I cannot believe how well she is doing for her small size!

Eva

Big sister Eva has now recovered from RSV and is 100%! She was such a trooper while she was sick. We will be taking her into the doctor to have her retested for the RSV just to make sure it is completely gone. I really cannot believe she is a big sister. She is still my baby too! I am so proud of her for the patience she has had while Trever and I have to come and go so often. She is awesome! She is loving having Aunt Mariah living with us!

Can they come home yet????

Big Sister Eva!

Our Sweet Little Madelyn

Madelyn right after mommy gave her a bath.

Mommy getting to hold Madelyn for a second.

Madelyn with her little bow mommy gave her.

Little Parker in clothes!

Parker in his big boy crib!

So handsome!

Dahlia in her big girl crib!

So Stunning!

Dahlia is such a honey!

Sweet baby Preston!


Awwww!

Little Preston in clothes!

Our little babies are growing so big! Dahlia just hit 4 pounds!!! I cannot believe it! Parker and Dahlia are now out of their isolettes and Preston will be out too in the next few days! All 3 of them are now wearing clothes as well. Little Madelyn is doing so well on the canula and should be in clothes in the next couple of days. It was so exciting tonight because the nurse let me giver her her very first sponge bath! Trever and I are just so so so in love with all 5 of our children! It is so crazy to think that one day very soon we are all going to be here in our home together! I cannot wait for Eva to meet her siblings, I know she will love them! Eva is doing a whole lot better and we thank all of you for your supportive and caring comments from our last post! We are really happy because we still get to see the babies, we just are gowning, gloving, and wearing masks. We wont hold them until Eva is 100% better but she is well on her way!

What a Week!

To some of you this post might seem like we are overreacting or not being realistic. Those of you who have had children in the NICU will probably be able to empathize with our level of concern and sadness. If you have been following our blog, you will see that last week Eva was exposed to RSV. She seemed to be getting better but then suddenly took a turn for the worse. Today we decided to take her in to the doc since her cough and runny nose had gotten pretty bad. After swabbing her nose he positively identified her condition as RSV and not a common cold. This is particularly upsetting because this virus is very contagious, agressive, and fatal to our babies in the NICU. Eva is expected to overcome it, but the quads would have a very hard time if they contracted it. To make matters extremely worse, we have been told we can finally hold our sweet baby Preston! But, since we have RSV in our home, we now cannot hold any of them for another 2 to 3 weeks! BREAKS OUR HEARTS!!!! Not only can we not hold them, none of our family members that are around Eva can hold them either! Jenna's mom from Washington is coming this weekend and she is crushed.

It has been a tough week. And such an eye opener.......The babies have done really well and we feel so lucky EVERYTHING hasnt come crashing down. For all of our friends that feel like we have abandoned them over the past 7 months, we are sorry you feel that way. Jenna was literally confined to a couch, not able to lift a finger, not able to be a mother the way she used to be, not able to be the wife the way she used to be, and most definetly not able to be the friend she used to be. She could no longer host gatherings or set up outings. If anybody thinks this was easy for her, let me tell you she spent many days and nights in tears because she missed her friends. We want to thank all of her friends that have supported her and made the effort to come and sit on the couch just so that she could have company.

I have watched Jenna wallow in guilt for not holding these babies inside her longer, even though we all know there is nothing more she or anybody could have done. We just really hope and pray that the day will come that we will be able to have all of our children together, in our home.

We are so proud of each one of our babies. They are such fighters, including our little Eva!

For the update on our little ones!

Preston

Preston is doing amazing!!! He seems to be coasting along and we are so glad his little body is getting better. Last week we found out he had a Grade 2 Brain Bleed. Today they did a follow-up ultrasound to see if it had gotten bigger. We were very nervous about this because he had a really large head growth over a period of 24 hours, so we thought his bleed may have gotten worse! Well, we were so happy to see that there was no change at all!!! Yay for Preston! He now weighs 3 pounds 6 ounces, smaller than Dahlia!

Dahlia

Dahlia has been doing fabulous. She had a small Urinary Tract Infection last week but is much better now. We are hoping to get her CPAP by the end of this week! She got to start wearing clothes on Saturday! She looks so adorable! So we made her this little outfit out of a doll clothes pattern! Dahlia is now our biggest baby! She weighs 3 pounds 8 ounces!

Parker

Parker is so handsome! He sure has us wrapped around his little fingers! He tried the CPAP last week but got pretty tired after a day. Then they found out he had a Urinary Tract Infection as well and they think that is the reason he didnt do so well. He started wearing clothes yesterday,but since the RSV scare we have not been able to see this wonderful milestone. Yesterday he weighed 3 pounds 3 ounces (Yay!!) The pic below is our little man on CPAP and the one below that is him back on the vent.

Madelyn

Madelyn is such a little trooper!! There is not to much to report on her. She is still chugging along on the nasal canula. She is still our littlest but man is she a fighter! Yesterday she weighed 2 pounds 13 ounces.

Preston Surgery Went Well!

Yesterday Preston had his heart surgery to close his PDA. He did very well and we are so so so glad he had it done because the doctor said it was very very large. Because of the surgery, he should start improving on his ventilator settings. Unfortunately, we have been exposed to RSV (moms of multiples you know how scary this is) and Eva woke up with congestion and a cough today. So we have not been able to see the babies and we were not able to see Preston when he woke up from his surgery today. We are very sad about that and we have decided to stay isolated as much as possible....

Little Parker got extubated yesterday and he is on the CPAP. He has not been doing too well on it and they might have to intubate him again. Today the doctor said he has a fever so he might have an infection as well. Dahlia's urine culture came back positive too so we think she has an infection. I am hoping we dont have another rough week ahead of us but we are praying so hard that they will all get better. Madelyn is doing very well on the nasal canula!

We appreciate all of your prayers!

Baby Update!

So little Preston has been having a rough last couple of days. Preston was scheduled to get his PDA heart surgery on Friday but that morning they called us and cancelled because they found gram positive rods in his blood. This means that the MRSA could have gotten in his blood, the very thing we have been so worried about. Also, we found out that he has a Grade 2 brain bleed. There is really not much we can do for that but hope it doesnt grow to Grade 3 or 4 (the worst).We will just continue to watch it and get another ultrasound in 3 to 4 weeks.The doctors and nurses say this shouldnt affect him developmentally so we will keep our fingers crossed! He has continued to pee and he is no longer swollen! The nurse said hopefully we will be able to hold him by the end of this week.. Today when I saw him we got some really great news that it was not the MRSA that got in his blood, it turns out it is Staph Epi (epidermis= skin) which is a bacteria that is alot easier to kill. We are so glad it is not the MRSA! His blood levels seem to show us that his little body is fighting the infections and that he is getting better!

Madelyn is doing AMAZING!!! Today she got off of CPAP and is now on Nasal Canula!! This pretty much means that she is breathing on her own she just gets a little bit of flow of oxygen to open up her lungs and remind her to breath. Its kind of like standing in front of a fan. She now weighs 2 pounds 9 ounces! She is going up on her feeds and tolerating them well!

Dahlia is doing very well too. We hope to get her on CPAP this week. Her and all of the babies will be getting an eye exam tomorrow so we are hoping all goes well with that! Dahlia hit 3 pounds exactly today! That definetly feels like another milestone!

Parker is doing fabulous as well! He will be put on the CPAP tomorrow after his eye exam. He weighs 2 pounds 10 ounces. He is our very active little boy. Its so cute because he always wrinkles his eyebrows!

We are so so so ready to have them home with us!!! I cannot wait for that day. We have been spending time catching up on sleep and getting our home ready. We cant wait for Eva to meet them!!! We are excited for Grandma and Grandpa Jones to get here on Friday!

We also want to thank the Young Women of Statesmanship Club for the blankets and onesies they brought us! You girls are so amazing! Thank you for thinking of us!

Madelyn on Nasal Canula

Preston sucking on his thumb.

The most gorgeous pics and video........

The most amazing lady emailed me a couple of weeks ago offering to do a photo shoot of our beautiful babies! As you can see, her work is amazing and it brings me to tears everytime I see these photos. Please check out her website at http://www.laurieruthphotography.com/ she is fabulous!

All of the babies are doing very well. The only scary thing that has happened lately is Preston has an infection but they are controlling that with antibiotics. Also, last week we were told that he would not have to have heart surgery to correct his PDA. Today, however, we have learned that his infection has opened the PDA and he will have to have the surgery now. The doctors are hoping that we can hold off until he is more stable and until they can get rid of the infection before they have to perform the surgery.

Madelyn is doing so well on her CPAP! Her settings continue to go down every single day! Dahlia and Parker are getting medications to help their ventilator settings become more consistent so that they can get on the CPAP as well.
They have all been gaining weight except for Preston, but this is very good because we want Preston to continue to pee out all of that fluid. Their current weights are:

Dahlia- 2 pounds 14 ounces

Parker- 2 pounds 9 ounces

Madelyn- 2 pounds 5ounces

Preston- 3 pounds 3 ounces

We are so proud of them! We are getting really excited for them to come home. It wont be for a while but we are so eager to be their primary caregivers! We also are very excited for them to meet their big sister Eva!!!