Weekend update

Time flies when you're not hospitalized: I've been home for a week now, and so much has happened! The babies continue to amaze everyone with how well they're doing, and Ted and I could not be more proud of them. Here's the very latest on the Fab Four:

Isaac was moved to a bassinet on Friday, and he is doing great at keeping his temperature up. He is bottle-feeding about half the volume of his feeds; the rest is going down his tube (he needs to work on that if he is going to come home anytime soon!). I plan to try nursing him tomorrow, so we'll see how that goes. Although he usually acts pretty sleepy for us, he was very alert (and forgiving) as I tried my hand at giving him a bath today:

Isaac getting cleaned up by Mom

Lucia was moved to a bassinet on Friday night, but she had to be put back in her isolette today after a post-bath temperature plummet. The nurse says this is normal and nothing to be worried about; they are just putting her back in the isolette to be on the safe side. Like Isaac, she is bottle-feeding about half the volume of her feeds. I tried nursing her yesterday, but she just looked up at me like, "What is this all about?" and then fell sound asleep. Here she is back in the darkness of her isolette:

Lucia snoozing in her isolette

Jude was moved to a bassinet yesterday. His temp today was on the low side of what's desirable, though, so his nurse decided to postpone his bath; we don't want him to go back into the isolette like Lucia did if we can help it! He is bottle-feeding more than half the volume of his feeds; when I tried nursing him a couple of days ago, however, he was only interested for about 5 minutes. Here is one of the few moments today in which his eyes were open:

Jude pretending to take a bottle from Dad

Dahlia is still in an isolette, but the nurse thinks she'll be able to come out in the next day or two. Although she still doesn't have much fat on her for insulation, it's clear that she won't stay skinny for long: She is bottle-feeding all her feeds (which means no more tube in her nose!), and she is putting on more weight each day than any of the others. I tried nursing her the same day I nursed Jude, and she fed for close to 20 minutes! I think our little runt looks pretty serious about showing up her big brothers and sister:

Dahlia sleeping in Mom's arms

And last but not least, behold the picture of the reunited quads that I promised to post last time. Happy New Year!

The Fab Four
(taken by the night nurses on December 30, 2008)