1 Week Old

Hello everyone! First of all, I want to thank everyone for all the prayers and support during this journey. We have been so blessed with 3 healthy babies, so God must have been listening to all of you who kept us in your prayers.

The delivery was an amazing experience and I think the shock has just started to wear off that we had 3 girls! We feel so lucky that everything went so smoothly during the delivery and that there were no complications when they arrived. I came home from the hospital on Saturday (they let me leave a day early...I was ready to be home) and the girls are still in the hospital. But, they are doing remarkably well and are already almost ready to come home. They had told us that their stay could be from 2 weeks best case scenario to anywhere up to 6 weeks or more. They are talking about Molly and Tess being home as early as this weekend which will be record time!

This week we've been spending the afternoons/early evenings at the hospital with them where the nurses allowed us to do more and more with them each day. In the beginning, it was just being able to hold them and then we started taking their temperatures and changing diapers all while they were in their incubators. They were under special lights for a couple days for jaundice so they had to wear these eye protectors, but they are all off those now. Molly came out of her incubator yesterday and Tess came out tonight. They are all off their feeding tubes and IV's now so they are now feeding through bottles. They love to have Dad give them a bottle! Tonight they even allowed me to breast feed for the first time with Molly and Tess for one of their scheduled feedings and it went well. They are still hooked up to the monitors with cords for vitals, but those are the only things attached to their bodies now. Madeline is only about a day or two behind Molly and Tess progress-wise. They all lost some weight which is typical and are slowly inching back towards their weight at delivery. Molly is still the largest weighing only 4lb, 5 oz while Tess and Madeline are both around 3 lb, 12 oz. They are all incredibly tiny that it is hard to picture them being out in the real world. They are such good babies...very peaceful and even starting to smile. We just love them so much. Watching Dennis interact with them is just priceless and makes my heart melt...he is a natural.

It has been a very busy week between trying to recover from the surgery, visiting the girls in the hospital, Dennis trying to fit in a few hours at work each day, and me pumping milk around the clock for the girls. But, we are so excited and ready for what is to come. I'll try and keep this blog updated at least until they are all home safe and sound.
Here is a link to some photos:
http://www1.snapfish.com/share/p=718151210904631068/l=374178498/g=4245146/otsc=SYE/otsi=SALB
In other baby news, cousin Anne Burns Thomas and husband Jim also had a healthy baby girl who arrived last night - Katherine Rose (Kate), joining brother Will. So, that is 5 girls for the Burns family in the last month!