Tumble Bumble: Busy week of parenthood

Hey all --

A lot has happened in the last week and all has prevented me from finding much if any time to put up an update and post new photos. Hope came home last Monday night. It's been fantastic having her home. Initially, I thought it would be great to test the waters with one baby before trying do handle both at the same time. But after a couple days/nights of taking care of Hope, I realized that one baby is a TON of work and immediately became frightened at the idea of juggling two at once. Regardless of my parenting fears, nothing was stopping my boy Jack who decided to become a great eater overnight, had his feeding tube removed mid-week and joined his sister at home on Saturday afternoon. Since then, life has been consumed with feedings and naps (both by the kids and Kevin and myself). Overall things are going okay. The nights have been tough as they eat every 3 hours followed by a date with my pump so I am working with multiple chunks of sleep in the 1-1.5 hour range. Kevin has (of course) been helping as I don't think I would get any sleep if I bottle fed eat baby on my own back to back and then pumped. Ugh. Kevin's mom is here as well to help so I am sure between the three of us we will figure this out . . . eventually.

And on to the photos . . .

First off, the babies were photographed by a professional at the hospital before Jack's discharge. They are pretty good and you can access a slideshow of the proofs at www.bellababyphotography.com (password: 0422johnhopegrugan)

Here is Hope on her discharge night in the car seat

First ride in the mini-van

Trying out the bouncy seat

After Hope's first bath

Jack post-removal of his feeding tube (the more he fills out, the more we think they look alike)

After their photo shoot, we left them in this basket for over an hour where they happily cuddled and slept together. Kevin took over 100 pictures with our camera in addition to the professional ones. They were so cute.