Our first 'outing'

They are getting big! To the average person, they are just the size of a newborn, but to us--they are filling out and look so big. Their basinet is looking smaller and smaller. I snapped this yesterday when Sydney was awake (ready to eat) and Ethan wasn't quite there. She was sweet with him--but a little bugged that he was in her space.

Last night was a bit of a long night. Doug and I vowed to go to bed by 9 pm because we needed to be up early with Ethan to get his cast off and go get a new cast put on at 7:30 am. Ethan didn't quite cooperate. He refused to be comforted and was screaming and crying pretty constantly for about 2 hours. It was pretty tough because we didn't know what could be wrong. (We mentioned this to the doctor this morning when he got a new cast and he said that his cast may have been too tight because he'd grown a lot in the last 10 days he's had it.)

With a new cast coming we needed to soak off the old on. We began by wetting a rag in sugar water and wrapping it around his cast at about 3 am with a dry rag around it. After feeding him at 5 am, Doug held his casted leg in a basin of sugar water while I proceeded to cut it as best I could with some dull medical scissors the hospital gave us. My hand is still sore and I will be bruised. It was some tough work. After about 15 minutes of cutting, his cast was off and we stuck him in the bath to wash off the sugar water. His ankle and top of his foot were really red and sore looking--poor guy. I would be fussy too if my foot was jammed in a cast! His foot is actually slightly turned out right now but will come back to midline after the casting is over.

Here is a quick video of his bath time.

His new casting went well, though after a long night with Ethan being fussy and Sydney deciding it was noon-day between 2 and 4 am, I stayed home with Sydney and Doug took Ethan to the doctor. He had a good report from the doctor and he said he re-casted it in the same position with a much bigger cast than his last one. We will go back next Monday and see if he will move to a brace, get a cast for another week, or have the tendon release surgery. We are hopeful that it is not the latter.

At 2 pm, my friend Kayla met us at my parent's house to take photos of them. Doug and I love "naked" baby photos so we took them on their first outing. We needed a location with better lighting because we live in a basement with very little natural light. I was shocked how Doug and I left covered (literally) in their bodily fluids of all kinds after their 90 minute photo shoot. We laughed when Doug would yell, "he's throwing up!" and I would follow 30 seconds later telling Doug, "she's peeing!" Thanks Kayla for your time (and patience!) and my mom for taking the 'Green Machine' to her carpet after we left. It was really fun. I'll show off the photos soon.

After their stressful photo-taking experience, they are wiped out tonight (hence, I have time to write this blog with my mom here helping us tonight). I couldn't resist taking these photos of them when we pulled into our garage. It was only a 5 minute drive and they were OUT! Their little necks will hopefully get stronger soon to hold their heads up in their seats. I gave them another bath because they didn't smell so hot. I am overcoming my fear of being dirty--but it's hard to give up!