Quilts

One of my mom's good friends from grade school (yep, they go back that far) lives in my area and has become one of our good friends as well. She designs and sews quilts, and even made one for me when I was born. (I have it here somewhere and must find it...Mom, if you know where it is, I want to put it up on my wall.) Anyhoo, she made quilts for the twins when they were born which hung over their cribs in the nursery...until they got tall enough that they could pull them down. Now that the twins are in their own room upstairs, we wanted to move the quilts to their new room and put them up where there's no fear of someone pulling them down. Our friend (let's call her M for simplicity sake, since I'm not sure if she minds her full name being on my blog) came over last week to put up the quilts and also deliver a brand new one for the baby. She came up with a fantastic idea of hanging the twins' quilts from the slanted ceiling and successfully accomplished the task! It was rough going, but she's quite creative. Here's a picture of the final product:

Here you can see how she hung it on the wall.

And here is a picture of Tzipora's gorgeous new quilt (and how it's hung on her wall)!

In other news, I got my blood test back and I'm not particularly anemic! My hematocrit was 35.4%, and my hemoglobin was 11 g/dl. (Normal hematocrit for women is 36.1 - 44.3% and normal hemoglobin for women is 12-16 g/dl) So I'm juuuust below normal values, so as long as I eat foods high in iron I should be good to go. Yay!

Checkups for Everyone

The baby had her 1 month checkup earlier this week, and I had my 6 week checkup today. The baby weighed 8lbs 15oz and measured 20.75" at her checkup. She gained a little over 2 lbs in just under 4 weeks! That's perfect!!! The pediatrician said that she looks great and is developing right on target.

As for me, my favorite midwife was working tonight (you know, the one who delivered the baby). I was SOOOOO happy, because she doesn't work every Thursday evening, so it's the luck of the draw to come in on her night. Anyways, she told me that everything was healed and looking great. I'm in tip-top condition...except for the fact that I might be anemic. She took a CBC, so we'll find out tomorrow if that's the reason I'm super tired and dizzy. I should also start taking my placenta pills, but especially if I'm anemic.

I have my first test of the semester next Monday, and I'm feeling pretty good that I'll do well on it. I got 100% on my first lab quiz last week, and hopefully I'll do that again on tomorrow's quiz. I just have to study really hard for it. It's on the heart, so I need to make sure I keep my atria and ventricles straight...and all of the little valves and such.

And now, for something funny. I was at Costco the other day, and in one of their main displays they were selling bathing suits. I was like "Bathing suits in this weather? What are they thinking?? We're going to have snow on the ground until September!" LOL Silly Costco.

Pregnancy Updates

I know what you all really want... You really want to see pictures of Baby #3, right? Ok, well she finally gave us a decent profile shot at today's ultrasound, so here you go!

Now for the updates. The ultrasound went very well! Her heart rate is 150bpm, which is normal and the same as always. The baby is growing, but still measuring just about a week behind. The good thing is that she's actually picking up days, so she's really measuring less than a week behind now. Yay! My cervix is still awesome at around 3.25cm. This means that we'll have one more ultrasound in two weeks, and if my cervix and the baby both look good then, we don't get any more ultrasounds. (At least not unless they want to do one for another reason in the coming weeks.)

I had my 1 hour gestational diabetes test and passed with flying colors. Woo hoo!!! They like to see results under 140 mg/dl, but under 130 mg/dl is even better. My level? 115 mg/dl!!! Go me! And the orange drink really wasn't all that bad. They also tested me for anemia. My hemoglobin is 10.6 g/dL, and my hematocrit is 32.5%. Both levels are slightly lower than they were at the end of August, but still not so bad. I could probably make them better by actually remembering to take my prenatal vitamin... :-)

The twins are saying more words, so I really need to update their word pages. They're also climbing stairs now!!! (They can only go up so far, but that's awesome because it means we don't have to carry them up stairs.) Very exciting!!

Not a UTI, Not Anemic

I've been having this nagging cramping in my lower pelvic area since Wednesday, and it's driving me mad. I thought it might be a UTI, but they did a urine and blood test, and everything came back normal (including my white counts). What else was normal? Well, my platelets are at 159,000/cmm, my hemoglobin is 11.1 g/dL, and my hematocrit is 32.8%. Much lower than in June, but higher than it was at this point in my last pregnancy. The midwife says that iron isn't necessary (yet) and hopefully they'll keep an eye on the levels as we go forward. In any case, still no idea what's causing my pain...they say take Gas-X and Tylenol and we'll see you at your appointment later this week (Thursday). I also have an ultrasound scheduled for Monday, so that will be good as well.

As for the twins, their high fevers are now low fevers (around 99.0) and both are feeling MUCH better. They were acting like themselves both Friday and today, even with the low-grade temps, and they've been eating like normal. The only "abnormal" thing was the super long mid-afternoon nap (like 2.5 hours). Hubby and I took a nap at the same time, and we all were zonked out for about the same amount of time. heh oops! Gotta love those Shabbos naps!

Bittersweet Day

Today is June 11th...what should have been my father's 82nd birthday. But sadly he is not here to celebrate with us...not his birthday, not the twins, not the baby-to-be. *sigh* Unfortunately he never had a chance to even meet my husband. In either case, at least he is watching down on us and can smile at his grandkids from up above. :-)

In other news, the twins had their 15 month checkups at the pediatrician. Dovid only weighs 19 lbs and is in like the 1st percentile for weight. He's 29.25 in tall, which is in a slightly higher percentile but not by much. Chana weighs 22 lb 10.5 oz, which is in the 50th percentile, and she's now 30.5 in tall (57th percentile). The dr says they are two healthy babies, but she wants to see them at 18 months to check up on Dovid's weight. She's also sending them to see an audiologist and someone to check their speech, since they're still not talking or understanding words. I'll make those appointments on Monday...

As for me, I got my hemoglobin and hematocrit levels from last Monday. My hemoglobin was 13.4 g/dL (the lowest normal for pregnant women is 11 to 12 g/dL!!!) and my hematocrit was 36.5% (and normal is 35-47% for women). YIPPEE!!! I'm not anemic, and both levels are even going up! :-D

What a Week!

This week was the most obnoxious week on record. I started the week with an inkling that I might have gotten pregnant (let me tell you now, I'm not, so don't get your hopes up). I had all sorts of symptoms...metallic taste in my mouth, nausea, exhaustion, clumsiness, the works. I started using OPKs because I like them better than HPTs. I only had two left of my ancient internet cheapies, so I used those up. Each one looked darker than I would expect for my luteal phase, so I bought some at CVS to keep testing. The CVS brand turned positive. WHAT?? I would've sworn in a court of law that I had ovulated over a week prior, so they had to mean pregnant, right? Wrong. I had no signs of pending ovulation at this point, and all of my HPTs were clearly negative. So I checked my cervix. I know that it's usually high when I'm pregnant, and I also wanted to see if I had any fertile mucous. Instead what I found was a polyp. There was something there that I had never felt before, and I was terrified. So I called the OB/Gyn in the morning (this was yesterday), and she saw me only a few hours later. I know the nurse, who I had spoken with on the phone, thought I was just being a hypochondriac, but I knew what I had felt. And I was right...there was a polyp. The OB asked me if I wanted it removed, and I was like "umm of course..." And now they have to test it to make sure it's nothing weird and "just a polyp". The strange thing is that she found it in a bizarre place. Most polyps originate from the cervical opening, mine was nowhere near the opening... Anyhoo, she also took the full panel of blood tests to help me figure out what on earth was going wrong with my cycle. Here's what they found:

TSH: 1.54 uIU/ml
FSH: 2.5 mIU/ml
LH: 3.3 mIU/ml
Prolactin: 12.2 ng/ml
Progesterone: 12.14 ng/ml
Hemoglobin: 13.2 gm/dl
Hematocrit: 38.8%
hCG: 1.1 mIU/ml

This means, TSH is normal, FSH is normal, LH means I SHOULD NOT HAVE GOTTEN A + ON MY STUPID OPKS!!! Prolactin is normal (yay), progesterone means I ovulated most likely when I thought I did (ahhh so I was right!), hemoglobin & hematocrit are normal, although the hematocrit is juuuust barely on the lower side of normal (which means I'm still not anemic). hCG confirms that I am not pregnant at all...so my OPK REALLY SHOULD NOT HAVE BEEN POSITIVE. I am really furious at CVS at getting my hopes up for no reason and you can be sure I'm sticking to internet cheapies from here on out. I called CVS and they want me to send them the rest of the OPKs for testing, and of course they're going to reimburse me for the purchase. Now everyone just needs to pray that they don't find anything weird from the polyp they removed...

Success!!

Dovid finally got his first *real* taste of food today!!! First off, he was a total pro at picking up the pieces of sweet potato that Shifra had given him. These are the EXACT SAME sweet potatoes that I made for Shabbos...spices and everything, except we cut the round slices in half so it would be easier to pick up. He definitely was chewing it, and it looked like he tried to swallow but coughed a bit up. Until a few minutes ago Shifra wasn't 100% sure if he had actually swallowed any of it, but she changed his diaper he had an orange piece in his poo!!!! YAY!!! Go Dovid!!!

Chana wasn't interested in food earlier when Shifra was feeding them, but I gave her some just now with Dovid and as soon as I wasn't looking at her, she picked up a piece of sweet potato and started chewing. lol Luckily I have it all on tape:



In other news, I am *not* anemic!!!! My hemoglobin is 13.6 gm/dl and my hematocrit is 39.7%--both within the normal range! I was shocked...and asked the nurse if my results had been switched with someone else's. lol Seriously, I don't know if I've ever had normal hemoglobin ever...even before pregnancy. So, the nurse told me to keep up the good work and stay on my iron once a day. Wheeee!!! I rock!

I Failed

You heard right. The same person who never failed a course or exam (well maybe an exam once or twice) failed her glucose screening test...by 1 point. *sigh* They want to see a glucose reading under 140 mg/dL and mine was 141. Now even 140 isn't good, but 141 means I have to go for the 3 hour glucose tolerance test on Monday. It's going to be hell. I have to fast starting at midnight the night before and I can't eat until the test is over--which probably won't be until at least 1pm. I'm going to starve!! :-(

My hemoglobin is also low, but it's better than last time! At the beginning of December my hemoglobin was 9.8 g/dl and yesterday it was 10.8! Still below normal (which is 12), but at least it's going in the right direction. At the rate I'm going, it should be just about 12 when I deliver. Sweet.

Now for the really good news. I had another ultrasound today and my cervix is back up to 1.8cm! They want me to come in next week for yet another check, but the doctor says to keep doing whatever it is I'm doing. :-) I do have two great pictures that I want to post, but I'm having major trouble getting my scanner to connect to my computer, so I'll get those up when I can.

Last, but not least, my husband and mother share the same brain (oddly enough). This morning I awoke to find a box of Totally Light 2 Go sugar free lemonade powder waiting for me in the kitchen. And then the mail came. And there's a package from my mother with 3 packages of Totally Light 2 Go (different flavors) and hot cocoa mix. They bought the exact same brand (it's sweetened with Splenda, so it's the only sugar substitute I'm supposed to have) and it came on the same day. Go figure! It is delicious, and it's working. I've already had about 2 1/2 tall glasses of lemonade (and gone to the bathroom about 10 times) in the last 2 1/2 hours. I HIGHLY recommend this to all pregnant women who are having a hard time getting enough water. mmmmmm

Anemia

My OB tested my blood for anemia at my last appointment (and at my own personal request). And, guess what, my hemoglobin is low! (Biiig shocker there lol) I've always been borderline anemic, so pregnancy is definitely taking a toll. She wants me to start taking iron twice a day, but I do need to check on dosing. When I asked how many milligrams, the nurse said "aren't they all the same?" Well, I checked and they're not all the same. So I'll be calling them tomorrow to find out. *sigh* My blogger friend Nancy has a post today about pooping while giving birth, but I won't have to worry about that if I'm on iron twice a day because I doubt I'll ever be able to poop again!!!! hehehehe Just kidding. I am allowed to take a stool softener, but who knows if it will work. I guess we'll see!