May 25th. Due Date.

Today, May 25th, should have been their "due date" last year. Instead they were born March 21st, minutes before midnight. I have no good memories of their birth. The entire experience was terrifying, heartbreaking and nightmarish haze. The 6 weeks they spent in the NICU was a rollercoaster of emotions. It still feels like a bad dream. But we all survived.
As I watch my little daredevil monkeys climbing the sofa and tottering about the living room it's almost impossible to imagine that these were my tiny, fragile preemies, born too soon, weighing only 2 1/2 lbs each.

So when I catch Emily climbing a 4 ft tall dresser.....

Or Zoey munching on a box of crackers her daddy left out...









It makes me smile.

And while I'll always be a little jealous of the mamas who had healthy newborns and left the hospital with their babies, I know my journey has taught me a lot about being grateful and enjoying every precious second with my girls.

Overtime and Underbudget! Project Playroom!

 We moved into a 1950's ranch-style house with faux wood laminate and wood paneling several years ago. Since then, Cody and I have done almost all the remodeling on our house. Immediately we set to work on the floors and kitchen, then the living room and bathroom. Eventually the nursery. Slowly but surely the whole house is coming together.
Sure it would have been faster and easier to just hire someone or *gasp* move into a newer house without the laundry list of repairs, but that's not our style. We loved the location and we liked the challenge. Our most recent project was turning the spare room into the girls' playroom. Originally we planned for a week to complete the girls' playroom remodel.... 3 weeks later, it's done. Finally. We allotted $500 for the renovation and came in $200 under budget! How awesome is that????
We tried to stick with "green" items- underlayment made from recycled bottled for the floor, low VOC paint, wood flooring made from renewable wood. My first choice was cork, we have used cork flooring in other rooms in the house and I love it, but this time it was nearly impossible to find cork flooring locally, so we chose a nice pine instead.
Removing the several layers of old floor... 

The Awful laminate

 

Pretty New Floor and lots of new storage!

In the end we decided to move the cribs in here too. The room had plenty of space for all their toys AND now we have their old nursery to turn into a real guest bedroom (yet another project *sigh*) I love the way their room turned out. It's bright and cheery and safe for babies to destroy play.  

I posted this on Facebook last week and now I'm adding it here in an attempt to keep all my recipes in one place for easy reference. Cody and the girls love this focaccia and I've tweaked the recipe in many different ways- sundried tomatoes, onions, cheese, whatever I'm in the mood for.


Roasted garlic, sea salt and rosemary Focaccia.

1 teaspoon white sugar
1 package active dry yeast
1/3 cup warm water
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 & 1/4 teaspoon sea salt
1 head of roasted garlic
fresh rosemary

In a small bowl, dissolve sugar and yeast in warm water. Let stand until creamy, about 10 minutes.
In the mixerl, combine the yeast mixture with flour. Add in additional water, 1 tablespoon at a time, until all of the flour is absorbed. Knead briefly for about 1 minute. Remove from bowl.
Lightly oil the bowl, place the dough back in the bowl and turn to coat with oil. Cover with a damp cloth and let rise in a warm place until doubled in volume, about 30 minutes.
Preheat oven to 475 degrees F
Deflate the dough and turn it out onto a lightly floured surface; knead briefly. Pat the dough into a sheet and place on a lightly greased baking sheet. Brush the dough with olive oil and sprinkle with seasalt and cover with mashed roasted garlic and rosemary.
# Bake focaccia in preheated oven for 10 to 20 minutes, depending on desired crispness. If you like it moist and fluffy, then you'll have to wait just about 10 minutes. If you like it crunchier and darker in the outside, you may have to wait 20 minutes.

Earthfest at LSU

I brought the girls up to LSU for Earthfest the other day. I'm guessing it was supposed to be an Earth Day celebration but they were a little late in having it (no surprise there- LSU is notorious for being slow).
Either way it was nice. The Ag center was out with a whole host of farm critters and there was a table filled with free plants. Zo and Em each came home with a tomato plant for our garden.
This was also the first time the girls have been to the "parade grounds" at LSU. It's basically a big open field where you can always find students tossing a frisby or sunning themselves year round. Em and Zo had a blast and got a good taste of nature... literally. I discovered they both have a love of oak leaves... nom nom nom. Oh well. It's just fiber, right?

Hurricane Zoey

From clean and orderly to complete chaos is less than 4 minutes...

NICU reunion

On March 21st, 2009 Em and Zo made a early debut. 10 weeks early to be exact, weighing a whopping 2.9 lbs and 2.10 lbs. They spent 6 weeks in the NICU at Woman's hospital and I will be forever grateful to the amazing doctors and nurses there.
Every year the Woman's hospital NICU throws a party to celebrate the tiny babies that have "graduated" from there. I remember arriving at the hospital to visit the girls just a few weeks after their birth and stumbling upon last year's party. There were multiples EVERYWHERE. In fact most of the kids at the party where sets of twins, triplets and even a couple Quads!
Well this year we were excited to go back! There were games and several bounce houses for the kids, pictures and cake (yay cake). Only one of the girls doctors was at the party and it was nice to thank him again and let him see how the girls have flourished.
Overall it was a great day and I look forward to next year when the girls are able to enjoy the games more.

First Easter!

Zoey and Grandpa

Emily and Grandpa

I had grand plans to visit the New Orleans Audubon Zoo for Easter, however Mother Nature had other plans.... It rained.... after a week of *gorgeous* 75 degree weather and sunny perfect days. Blah.
We did get as far as the Clubhouse in Audubon Park for lunch where Em and Zo amused the waitstaff with their antics.