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7:30, 12, 4, 8:30

Tristen and I are now just over two months in as twin parents and I think we’re doing quite well. There are plenty of things that aren’t quite back to normal yet, but we’re doing well and the boys are doing well.

We had the two-month checkup on Tuesday. Fawkes is 9.4 pounds and 21 inches while Phoenix is 9.6 pounds and 21.25 inches. Dr. Renton said that Phoenix will probably always be a little bit larger than Fawkes. (As an older brother who is noticeably shorter than his five-year younger brother, I think Fawkes will be okay.) So they’ve roughly doubled in size (weight, anyway) and they’re registering on the curve for non-premie babies already. They’re at 3% and 5%, but they’re on the chart and as time goes by they should drift towards the mean.

Before this past night I was convinced that we were going to have alternating good nights and bad nights, because that’s what was happening. We had a pretty rough night followed by a pretty good night followed by a rough night followed by another pretty good night. They broke the cycle last night though because they gave us a really good night.

It started off with us putting the boys to bed a little bit late. I couldn’t remember the reason we put them to bed late, so I asked Tristen just now. “It wasn’t family dinner,” I said, going through some possible reasons. “That was Tuesday.”

“No,” she said, then started thinking. After a good five or ten seconds she remembered the reason and gave a one-word answer. “Oh yeah,” I said when she reminded me. We had a little bit of a laugh that we had to put the boys to bed a little late because of what it was.

Anyway, we didn’t get them to bed until I think around 8:30. We fed them at 7:30, I bathed them one at a time in the kitchen sink while Tristen would take care of the non-bathing baby. We got them all ready for bed and hooked them up to some boobage for a nightcap while I read to them a little bit, then we laid them in the pack & play in our room.

In an effort to elevate the boys a little to mitigate reflux, we had moved them to some rockers for a little while, but that wasn’t working great so we moved them back to the pack & play with some towels stuffed into one side to create a little bit of an incline, but that didn’t work out great either. A couple nights ago we started putting the twin Boppy in there, and that’s worked out pretty well.

Anyway, they went down pretty easily. I think we only had to go back settle them down a couple times. Then we watched this week’s The Walking Dead before taking a nap in the living room. Tristen missed the last scene or two of the show and I let myself fall asleep just a little bit later. I think it was around 10:30.

We woke up to some crying coming from the video monitoring app a little after midnight and I think started feeding them around 12:30. We didn’t have any bottles made, so, invigorated from my little nap, I decided to prep some bottles, let the dogs out, that sort of thing. With all the stuff I’ve got going on with work, I decided to get a little bit of that done, which was actually very productive.

I heard crying around 3:00. I pulled up the monitoring app and saw that Tristen was attending the boys. I used the intercom feature of it to tell her that I was warming up some bottles. By the time I got back there though, she was back in bed and both boys were pretty settled, so I decided to wait a little. I think it was about 3:40 that they started stirring again, so we fed them then.

We were out of breast milk at that point, so Tristen got up to pump. One of the boys, I think it was Phoenix (not because I can’t tell them apart, but because it was really late and I just can’t remember for sure which one it was) was a little fussy, so I got up a few times to take care of him. I needed up having to carry him around the room a bit and eventually let him lie on my chest for a bit to settle him down before finally putting him back in the pack & play.

I have a vague memory of Tristen getting back in bed. She nuzzled up on me, but I think she got up a couple times to take care of one of the babies. She told me this morning that Fawkes had spit up a good bit. I can’t remember at what point it happened, but the boys both ended up snuggled up with us somewhere in the wee hours.

And that was that until after 8:00. They started stirring and we fed them around 8:30.

All in all, it was a really good night and, aside from me staying up late to work, we got a good bit of sleep in. The previous night was similar to that, so I’m really hoping they’re embracing the four-hour feedings.

Let’s see, what else has been going on in life?

Milly’s becoming a teenager. For the most part, she’ll come home, do her homework, then hang out in her room, mostly playing Minecraft Story Mode or drawing. It’s not like she’s back there brooding or anything though. I’ll go look in on her and talk with her, and she’s fine. I’ll sometimes take one of the boys back there with me, which she really enjoys. She’ll kiss them and hold them for a minute or we’ll do little silly things with them. Once the weather warms back up I’m sure she’ll be playing with her friends instead of hanging out in her room.

She also got a retainer recently. When I took her back to Amanda’s on Tuesday Amanda tried to show me how to adjust it, which I’ll have to do a few times this coming week. It’s making Milly talk a little funny, which is why we waited until after the play to get it done, but she’s taking it in stride. She was telling me on the way home from school the other day how some sounds were kind of hard at first, but she’s adjusting.

We did family dinner at Torrie and Johnny’s on Tuesday. Tacos. I had forgotten that Amanda had asked to have Milly back home earlier.  Amanda and Jason are going out of town for a wedding today so we’ll have Milly a few extra days and I think she just wanted to have a little more evening time with her. I told Amanda I’d be fine with her picking Milly up earlier if she wanted, but she said it was okay and to just make sure she’s back at 7. I like that we’re able to work with each other like that. I mean, that probably sounds one-sided, but there have been other times I’ve been more lenient with my time, too. It’s a nice feeling.

Tristen’s been getting out with the boys a bit. Nothing big, but she and Torrie (along with Sebastian, Fawkes, and Phoenix) all went to Costco the other day and Target yesterday. They actually ran into Amanda and Milly there, although there was very little interaction, as I’m told. Tristen said she was about to turn down an aisle and she and Amanda caught each other’s eyes. She gave Milly a little wave and went to the next aisle. They were all checking out around the same time too, and that time Milly went and gave Torrie a hug, but overlooked her stepmom and brothers until Tristen said something to her.

Milly’s had a hang-up about her mom and her stepmom running into each other for a couple years now, even though they’ve all been in the same place together a number of times now: dance recitals, the play, that sort of thing. I won’t get into all of that too much, but I think at this point it’s on Milly to understand that her mom knows and accepts Tristen’s role in her life, whatever she may feel about it.

Anyway, Target yesterday, Costco the day before, a couple trips to the park to walk around with her mom. It’s nice that they’re getting out and about.

Oh, and Tristen got a call from work the other day with some potentially really good news. I won’t go into it yet, but it’s something that could be really helpful.

Speaking of work, work has been good for me lately. I’ve got a lot going on, which is a little stressful, but I’m handling it and I’m looking into ways of delegating some tasks. I’ve already got one of the things that tends to take up a lot of my time covered, hopefully with ongoing consistency.

What else is going on? I got a haircut yesterday. I guess that’s about it. Back to work for me.