Update for last week, and the Rodeo!

Sorry all for the delay in posting. Very busy week back in Vancouver, and back here in Edmonton too. First off.. everyone is progressing well. Dillon is a chunky 4lb 9oz, and Madeleine is 3lb 8oz (give or take). They have been having some technical issues with the scale in her incubator, so they weighed her on an external scale. She is still gaining weight at the same pace of her brother, but is still about 1lb behind due to her lower birth weight and some early issues she had which disrupted her feeding. It will be interesting to see if she catches up over time, or is always a little smaller than Dillon.

They have moved pods now, into "E" Pod. We have been in "B" and "C" pod over the last 2 months. The pods are arranged by severity of care in the ICU, with A, B & C pods being the higher risk, and "J" pod being the last one we are in before we would be discharged. So.. things are moving along. They are still in level 3 ICU, but pod E has both level 2 and level 3 babies in it.

They are still both being trialled part time on low flow oxygen (the small tube under their nose). They are both doing really well. Last week they were only doing an hour or so, and now Madeleine has done a 13 hour stint, and Dillon has done around 9 hours continuous. They are both now almost on a room air oxygen mix of 23 or 24%. We will probably start breast feeding today, as they are an low flow when we hold them.

Here are a few videos that clearly point out the difference in personality already developing in the twins. They were both taken out to be weighed the other day. Dillon (the first video) is fairly quiet about the issue, he squawks once or twice. Madeleine.. well... not so quiet. Sigh..

Dillon....


Madeleine...



For those of you wondering what a pod looks like, I took this little video showing what the room looks like. I took it 2 weeks ago, so it shows the twins still in Pod B, but Pod E looks essentially the same.




Had a very busy week in Vancouver last week, but managed to get the babies room kitted out during the 4 evenings. Its a color called olive oil, kind of a yellow green combo. White cribs, change table and a taupe couch round it out. Felt good to make them a nice home to come back to.

As they say, when in Edmonton, do as the Edmontonians do.. We went to see the Canadian Rodeo Finals at the Rexall place (local version of GM place) on Saturday night. Yee-haw Quite a sight to see. We were the only ones out of 18,000 people not wearing cowboy hats and some form of Wrangler denim/corduroy combo outfit. You know you are at the rodeo when they have events like the wife carrying contest, where drunken men throw their wives over their shoulder and attempt to race to the other end of the area, predictably stumbling and dropping their wife on her head. Good times. The other interesting Darwinist event is called bull poker. 6 guys sit at a poker table and they let a bull loose to charge them. The last guy who manages to stay in his seat gets $500. Yup.. $500 for risking your life with a charging bull.




Well that's it for last week's catch up.