Now and Then

We cannot believe how fast time has gone. We look back at pictures from the beginning and it seems like such a long time ago. The babes are growing and changing so quickly. It's great to see them growing so well and discovering new things, but it's also sad to see them growing up so quickly. I guess we just have to enjoy each day and stage as we're in it.

Here are some pictures from the first few months compared to now:

The first "room" that they shared

Their bedroom now


Family Picture just over 1 month old

6 months old


Everyone in Maggie's bed just over 1 month old

Party in Maggie's bed at 6 months old

Everyone in our bed with Daddy 6 months old



There wasn't too much play time in the beginning. It was pretty much just eating and sleeping with some awake time. Now they love to play. Everyone loves:

The jumperoo




The play mat

Casey did start on the mat with everyone, but ended up under the swing


Their bumbo chairs - we have play time in them where they love to steal each other's toys. A toy will start in one of their hands and then the one next to them will grab it, play for a while and then the next one grabs it from them. It's quite funny to watch.


They also have story time in their chairs. They like to look at books and then I read to them.


Tummy time - well I wouldn't say they love it but they like it more than they used to. Now they lift their heads up and push themselves up, grab toys and roll over onto each other where as they usd to just lay there and cry. No one is crawling yet, but Maggie can scoot herself backwards a little bit and the boys can get themselves halfway turned around.

Thing 1, Thing 2, Thing 3

We got these great shirts for the babies from my friend Amanda. They are so cute! We had some fun with them in these shirts. You may notice in some pictures that Thing 1's belly is a little bigger than Thing 2 or 3's.






It's funny, because in most of the pictures where we have the three of them together Mitchell seems to always be munching on Casey arm or hand. We really do feed Mitchell...I promise! In this picture it looks like Mitchell is examining Casey's hang nail.

Finishing Pumping

Well, despite all of the guilt that I am feeling, I have decided to slowly stop pumping and move the babes onto all formula. For the first 2 and a half months they got all expressed breast milk. When they started drinking more I had to supplement with some formula. Things always changed depending on how many bottles they were getting at the time. Lately they were getting half to three quarters breast milk and the rest formula. Maggie came home from the hospital on Neosure, a high calorie formula twice a day. She will have to stay on it until she is above the 25th percentile for her actual age (she is around 20% now).

At their 5 month NICU follow-up appointment I asked the Dr. if there was a certain age that he recommended I continue pumping until. He said getting them through the early few weeks and months on breast milk was the important time. Now, they are all growing well and are healthy and have gotten the benefit of breast milk for half a year. He said at any point I decided to stop and move them to formula would be just fine. If he would have recommended that I continue until 9 months or a year I definately would have done it. But getting his approval to switch over was nice.

For the past month or so I have been really run down and tired. Some days more so than in the eary days when I was functioning on a lot less sleep. I used to get maybe one cold a year, if that, but in the past 5 months I have had 3 colds, a flu and 2 bouts of mastitis.
Also, I didn't like plumping them in the swings all of the time when I was pumping. I tried to do it earlier when they were napping which worked okay but there are many times that someone needed a soothie or something while I was pumping. That also left little time to do anything during their naps. If everyone was down by 10:00am, I would get cleaned up from the feeding, have about 45 minutes until I would pump, it would be 11:30 when I was done and everyone would be up again (if not sooner). That was on a good napping day.

I know that doing it this long has been great for them and big accomplishment, but there still is some guilt for quitting. I am sure that many moms struggle with knowing when the right time to stop is. But in my case, a better rested mommy might be better for the babes (and for Daniel!) in the long run.

So, I have been decreasing the number of sessions a day that I am pumping and should be done in the next week or two. I will pack up the pump, take it back to Shopper's and pay a large rental bill. Although it has saved us money that we would have otherwise spent on formula. We now have them on a store brand formula (except Maggie's high cal) which is about $10-$13 cheaper per tin than the Nestle formula we were using for a few months. So now that we are using the cheaper stuff, it won't end up being all that much more money per month to use formula compared to paying to rent the pump.

Bring On the Bacon!

Well, maybe not quite bacon yet but we did start on rice cereal. It was interesting to watch everyone's reaction. My mom made a good point, saying that when you have three kids spread out over the years you it can be hard to compare everyone and remember exactly how they reacted to certain things. In our situation it's fun because all you have to do is look at the next baby to see what they are doing and how they are reacting.
So for us, the cereal is a work in progress. Casey started off making a real poopy face everytime the spoon went into his mouth, but he did take (and swallow) some of it. A week later he has gotten the hang of it and now actually seems happy when the spoon goes in.
When Mitchell started, I thought he found his way to catch up to his big brother. He seemed to really like it at first and took it the best out of the three. One week later for him, he still does like and has also gotten better at keeping more of it in his mouth.
Maggie is a different story...let's just say she looks really pretty while she is sitting in her chair drooling all over the place. She doesn't seem to mind the cereal and lets me put it in her mouth, but she just kind of rolls it around and then it comes dripping out with all of her drool. Daniel said she is like a Saint Bernard right now drooling all over the place. But, I do have to say that this morning she was keeping a little more of the cereal in.

As soon as I get my act together I will make them some other food. I am planning on making it all, or at least the majority of it. I looked at the prices of the jars of baby food and then times that by three, it will save us a lot to make it myself. I will just make a big batch of a few things and freeze them. The doctor said now that we can start on meat right away along with fruits and veggies, so they will be able to have a gourmet meal.

For those of you who have been to our house you know that it is not very big. But in our kitchen right now we have managed to sqeeze in a 3 high chairs, a swing, a jumperoo (because there isn't room in the living room) and of course our kitchen table. Our small living room has our couch and love seat plus 2 swings, a jumperoo, 3bumbo chairs and a basket of toys. It is like an obstacle course. We should make everyone sign a waiver when they walk through the door releasing us from liability in case they trip on anything while they are in the house!

Here are a few (actually more than a few) pictures of the babes and their first few cereal feedings. Some of the pictures are before and after shots, you can tell by either a clean face or a messy face. In the individual pictures Casey is first, then Mitchell and then Maggie.

Fun Time

We have had a few play dates so far, but probably the most interesting one was with two other moms of multiples. We got together a few weeks ago at one girl's house and there were 7 babies between us 3 moms! Two sets of twins and our trio! It was fun...we got a great picture right before we were leaving of all of the babies together and surprising everyone posed perfectly...there was no crying!
We are planning to get together every second week either for coffee or some kind of an outing. Hopefully once the weather warms up we can get out walking on some of the trails. Although I'm not sure we can find a paved trail wide enough for all 3 of our double and triple strollers.

The picture is of all 7 babies. Aida, Abby and Leah are cuddled in the corner. Casey, Maggie and Mitchell are in their car seats (we were on our way home) and Queen Ruby is watching over everyone from up top. I am sure we will get some more great pictures of everyone together. And maybe one day we will actually get a good visit in when the babes can play with each other.


We have reached a point in the past few months that the babes are much more interactive, talkative (if you can call it that) and smiley. We are having so much fun with them and can only imagine how much more fun is to come.
Here are a few more recent pictures.

Maggie flipped up her hood, while in the jumperoo. This picture was taken a little while after she rolled from her tummy to her back....she is showing her bigger brothers up!

Daddy is already trying to influence Mitchell to be a baseball player (preferrably a Seattle Mariner).

Casey decided that he needed to update his look with a new blankie-hat.

The boys being goofy and laughing at Daddy, while Maggie was still getting her beauty sleep.

Everyone hanging out first thing in the morning before breakfast.

5 Month Check-Up

We went for our second NICU follow-up appointment when the babes were 5 months old. Their pediatrician was very pleased with everyone's growth. And the bags and bags of clothes that they have outgrown can attest to how much they have grown. Their NICU days seem like a lifetime ago. I guess time flies when you're having fun!

Their weights and heights are not just following the normal growth curves, but are increasing and moving up on the curves each time.
The doctors talk about their actual age, which is how old they are, and their adjusted age, which is their actual age - how many months early they were.
At 5 months old, our babes are 3 months adjusted. So developmental things, like crawling, walking, talking, etc., are all based on their adjusted age. It would be completely normal for them to be about 2 months behind in reaching their milestones, although they may happen sooner. We'll just have to wait and see.

Here they are, their birth weights and their 5 month weights:

CASEY
Birth: 4lbs 9oz
5 Months: 17lbs 10oz

For Casey's actual age he is in the 75th percentile for his weight.
For his adjusted age (3 months) he is off the charts...too high to measure!

MITCHELL
Birth: 3lbs 13oz.
5 Months: 15lbs. 9oz.

For Mitchell's actual age he is in ~ the 40th percentile.
For his adjusted age he is in the 90th percentile.

MAGGIE
Birth: 2lbs 15oz.
5 Months: 13lbs 4oz.

For Maggie's actual age she is in ~ the 15th-20th percentile.
For her adjusted age she is in the 75th percentile.

The doctor was also impressed to hear that everyone is sleeping so great. All 3 babies have been sleeping through the night since the middle of December (3.5 months old). At first when they starting sleeping through the night, we were still up at least a few times a night plugging soothies back in for Maggie and Mitchell. But now, Mitchell usually sleeps through without needing his soothie and some nights Maggie needs it only once. Casey usually sleeps right through, although he is awake sometimes at 5 or 6 in the morning chatting and squealing away content in his crib and then falls back asleep on his own.
Everyone gets their last bottle between 7:00 and 7:30, they go to sleep anywhere between 8:00 and 8:30. They wake up for the day between 7:30 and 8:00 in the morning and have breakfast around 8:30. 11-12 hours...they are great night time sleepers! I should find some wood to knock on right now.
I still get up once in the night to pump, but I am usually back to bed about 45 minutes later. Things are a lot different now compared to when they were eating twice and I was pumping twice a night, each time taking about 2 hours.
Although they sleep great at night, they sometimes struggle with their naps. Some days they rotate and someone is up pretty much all of the time during nap time. So my "free time" during their naps is not always free.
But some days they do all nap good and I can get a chunk of time when everyone is down. If I had to choose, I would definately rather they sleep better at night.

Our First Christmas

This Christmas was obviously very special for us. Last Christmas we were still hoping and wishing to be blessed with a baby in our lives. We just decided, why waste time, let's just speed things up and have 3 at once!

We went out to Daniel's parents in Muenster on Christmas Eve and spent a few days there. Daniel's brother Brady and his wife Indra moved back to Canada from Australia earlier in the fall, so it was nice for the whole family to be together.
We also went out to my parents at Jackfish Lake for a few days. It was first time everyone had been together out at the lake since our new additions. We are going to have a lot of fun with the babes there over the coming years.
A few pictures from our first Christmas:

Our First Fall

On Thanksgiving we were lucky that our families all travelled to Saskatoon. My sister Gail and her family hosted Thanksgiving supper at their place. They were even gracious enough to have us drop off the babes early so Daniel and I could go back to our house for a nap before we went there for supper. After one week, it already seemed weird being in the house without them there.
Then a few days later Daniel's family came to our place. It was the first time our niece and nephews on that side got to see their cousins, and Julia, especially was pretty excited.
There were some good pictures from the first family get togethers on both sides, but some of the best were our 3 little munchkins in a brother-in-law Dave's Roughrider jersey.
Maggie, Mitchell and Casey



In November I spent a few days out at the lake at my parents while Daniel was away at meetings in Florida. That is where we got out for our first walk in the Triple Decker stroller. It is just a big metal frame and then the car seats clip onto it. It is really easy to use and folds up so nicely to store in the back of the van.
Here are a few pictures of our first walk.





We were lucky enough to have a fairly nice fall/early winter so we did get out for a few more walks over the next few weeks. Once it got colder I would go and still do go to the Soccer Centre every now and then and walk on the indoor track. It was nice to get out and moving again.

Getting out with the babies has obviously drawn a lot of looks and comments. And I don't blame people as I would be curious too.
A few of the funny comments have been: "Do you really have 3 babies in there?" or "Excuse me, are those twins?" as this man jumped out of his van and started jogging after me in a parking lot. Those are just a few if the good ones. Some of the regular lines are "You must have your hands full" and "Triplets?!"
But one of the nicest comments was a woman who said "Wow, are you ever lucky".

My friend Jen (and her little boy) and I went to Costco a few weeks ago and that was an adventure. We stopped to look at a few things and the people started to swarm. I tried to be polite and snuck away to side aisles. Jen had Luke in the shopping cart and I had the babies in the stroller. We were commenting that it would have been fun for her to tell someone that all of the babies were her's and just see what their reaction was.
We got the shopping done that we needed to and then hid in the back of the cafeteria part and sat down for ice cream and a drink. The babes were great during the outing and eventually fell asleep in the stroller. I think they were just so amazed at all there was to look at.

It does take a little while to get everyone packed up to go somewhere, whether it is Daniel and I doing it together or me by myself. We have a pretty good "pack and load" routine to get everyone strapped into their car seats and into the van. It will be so nice when it warms up and we can get outside for walks.
Here is a picture of everyone bundled up and ready to go.


This Halloween was obviously our first. I had wanted to get them some sort of an outfit/costume but couldn't really find much. Then Iris, a woman that I worked with, stopped by for a visit and gave the babies Halloween preemie onesies....they were so cute! Casey was the pumpkin, Mitchell was the ghost and Maggie was the kitty.
These are our little trick or treaters. Mitchell is doing his best scary, mean ghost impersonation.





Our first fall/winter also brought along monthly trips to the hospital for RSV shots. We sent out an email to a lot of our family and friends about RSV, which is a respiratory virus. In toddlers, kids and adults it can be nothing more than a common cold. However, in babies that are at high risk (which our babies were because they were premature) it could start as a cold but develop into a life threatening illness. It is passed on through contact, which is why Daniel and I were kind of insistent on people washing their hands and using hand sanitizer when they came to visit us, as well as not coming over if they were sick. Thank you to everyone for respecting us and our babies health.
Our babies qualified for the RSV shots because they were born under 33 weeks (actaully 2 hours short of 33 weeks). If they would have been born any later, they either would not have qualified to receive the shots or the doctor would have had to pull a lot of strings to get them covered. I know at one time the shots were $900 per shot. So $900 x 5 shots x 3 babies = $13,500. Yikes!
We have two more RSV shots to go and then that will be it. So far (knock on wood) we have not gotten sick. Well, actually the babies have not gotten sick which is actually pretty amazing considering Daniel and I have both had two colds each and I had the flu.