I was up most of Wednesday night with contractions. One every hour on the hour and then at about 5 am, I started to have them every 10 minutes. I woke Andre up and then, Murphey's Law, they quit. Oddly, I felt the need to say, "no, really there were contractions," looking around, "they were here, honest, you just missed them." "I'm sure they'll be back, bet they just went out for a moment...to uh, get the paper or a cup of coffee, they'll be right back."
But they didn't come back. Andre called the nurse the next day and she had us come into our already scheduled appointment early. Trying to "fit into" a busy doctor's schedule is not a good idea. You wind up waiting twice as long to see him for half the time. Big mistake.
Anyhow, our doctor thinks I'll have the girls sometime next week. This is, of course, just some sort of voodoo prediction. I'm not dilated at all, but I am about 50-60% effaced. Both babies have dropped, are head down, and their faces are facing my back. But, I don't think he really knows for sure when they'll come and I'm starting to think they may camp out in my belly indefinitely--like middle age college kids still living with their parents. Its cozy, they have everything they need, someone to cook, clean, do the laundry, and the rent's free so there's no real urgency to move out.
I am entering my 36th week. For twins that is quite an accomplishment, I'm told. They are now considered full term and we are expecting that they won't need to be in the NICU at all. Both twins are weighing just over 5 lbs and we could even see some hair in the sonogram. We tried to get a good picture, but they both have their little booties facing out now. Rowan has been head down for a while now, so our sonographer warned us that her head may be a bit cone shaped when she's born. They're both doing well, just hanging out upside down like two little monkeys.
I have to say, my most favorite thing, even more than seeing them on the sonogram, is hearing their heartbeats. I'm not sure why, but it always chokes me up a bit.
Looking back it seems like this time has gone by so fast. Yet,looking ahead I feel like that kid that keeps saying, "Are we there yet?"
I think the experience of becoming a mother has changed me somewhat. Some ways I can't quite explain right now and may never.
There is a feeling, an idea that we can start over again. With these new lives there is a renewed sense of hope. The generational Etch-a-Sketch: we can shake things up and its new again. I don't mean I want to live vicariously through them, just that there's another chance, that maybe this time the world will be a little better and their lives will be a bit more....
With that comes a great responsibility to help create this better place for them, to make sure that they are happy, healthy, and that it is the best possible world we could give to them. And it is increasingly upsetting to see so many things in the world that do not belong in our new Etch-a-Sketch. Intolerance, war, environmental disaster, the Bush administration, the Olsen twins...I could go on, but you get the point.
Luckily, we have lots of time to just dote on them and make them happy. Play with their little toes and coo and sing sweet songs to them. That is, of course, if they ever decide to move out of my belly.
I think Andre is planning on creating some sort of visiting schedule for the girls, but I'm not entirely sure. He'll post details about the girls when the arrive and let you all know.
That is what I imagine my little twin girls saying to each other. See, we are under the proverbial gun. If they don't come out on their own, we induce in seven days.
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Andre has been busy finishing last minute baby room renovations. 
His friend Coitt came over today to work on crown molding with him. Coitt is a great friend and helped me convince Andre of the necessity of crown molding in the babies' room. Thanks Coitt.
Yesterday was Easter. We had a great time at my mom and grandmother's house. Thought I'd share a picture of Andre with the head of the rabbit piñata. He's so funny. I wasn't feeling well and thus missed the piñata and cascarones which were done outside. While laying on the couch I felt as if someone was staring at me. I turned to look and there's Andre with this giant rabbit head. So funny! The kids had a great time and the weather was beautiful. It was so nice to hang out with family and enjoy the day.
From the "Nature's Best 2007" photo exhibit at the Smithsonian! Taken by Eddie Schermerhorn, age 15 of Boulder, CO.
From dark in the shadows of library stacks, where you think you see movement. There I arrise! Books on fire apparatus, fire officer tactics, and policy strewn in my wake, Mr. Mono Returns!!
I had another doctor's visit yesterday and another sonogram. It was pretty uneventful. They just checked to make sure the girls were moving and that they had enough fluid. Our dr. says that they will induce at 38 weeks if I haven't had them by then and if I go into labor at 36 weeks they won't stop it. Both girls are still head down. We could see Evelyn sucking her thumb. It was really cute.
I'm not sure what I want to say about IVF exactly. 
We also used intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI), shown in the picture (although this isn't our material). They pick up one sperm in a glass pipette, break off its tail, and insert it directly into the egg. You can tell this is a mature egg because it has a little hat on. The glass pipette is 1/2 the size of a red blood cell. Once again amazing.
After that we wait to see what happens. Out of the 15 eggs my body produced our doctor was able to retrieve 8. Out of those 8, 7 eggs fertilized. These fertilized eggs continued to divide. Some did better than others and on day 3 they transferred the two best looking embryos. One was 7 cells and one was 9 cells. This is the actual picture of our embryos. The remaining 5 embryos didn't make it past day 3. For some reason they just stopped growing. I was sad about that and fearful that if this cycle didn't work that we would have to start all over again from the very beginning. 
So, when we found out we were pregnant it was such a great feeling. And when we found out it was twins--that was awesome. This is our first picture of the twins taken by Dr. Vaughn at just 4 weeks and 6 days.
So, since you can add pictures, I set aside my competitive nature and added some of Andre's relatives on the de la Reza side and their pictures (much thanks to Susie for the pictures). This is Andre's great grandfather Jorge de la Reza. I love this picture. He looks so happy and optimistic--I can really see Andre in him. 
This is a picture of my great-grandmother Florence Vance. She's the one on the left. She was a tax assessor. At my grandfather's (Bid) funeral several relatives I didn't know said I favored her. I love the pictures that show the clothes back then. We don't know who the other lady was.
We put in new carpet, bought Roman shades, and painted. We have yet to put the second crib together and the wall decorations are still in the infancy stage (no pun intended). The fish on the wall aren't really that bright and the jury is still out on them. They're made from fuzzy fake fur, so the light catches them. I may put up vintage travel pictures instead. Hmmm, not sure yet. Here's a picture anyway. 
Notice the bottle of Bac Out in the basket. Yes, insane we may be, but we are using cloth diapers. We have a diaper service that will provide us with unlimited prefolds. Then we bought several various brands of all-in-one diapers. These are really cool. Check out this picture of a Fuzzi Bunz diaper:
Its actually quite similar to a disposable diaper. All you do is snap it on. Fuzzi Bunz are pocket diapers, so they have a pocket inside and you can stuff it with washable liners to make it thicker at night or when you need extra absorbency. With breastfed babies, you don't even have to rinse them out prior to washing, you just throw them in the washer. Our diaper service will wash these for us along with our prefolds. And considering that disposable diapers take 500 years to decompose in the best of circumstances, we're really excited about cloth. They're cheaper too, especially with twins and less likely to irritate your baby's skin.
