What I've learned...

We were hanging out with our good friends the other night.  Their daughter is basically 2 months younger then Kendall and Seren.  She is adorable.  Anyway they were sitting with her between them and comparing her looks to their own.  "I think she has my mouth but your eyes" and "No her mouth is more heart shaped like mine".  I just held one of my daughters and smiled.  I didn't really care which parent their daughter looked like so I wasn't going to comment or add my opinion.  I have noticed I don't really comment on things of that nature with babies and their parents.  I guess it's just not my focus anymore.  Anyway it just made me think about the things I've read about how genetics are not just in whole passed down from the parent.  It is not one parent or the other that is reflected in the child's appearance.  It could be a paternal aunt, a maternal grandmother or a distant relative that a child appears to have the look of.  Truthfully they only look like themselves in my opinion (and as DH puts it).

So some things that I have learned from being the mom to two beautiful girls via egg donation are:  genetics play no part in how we feel about our kids,  genetics are so much more complicated (ie epigenetics) then most people seem to understand, parental love is deeper than anything that would be "skin deep" or in that realm and I have the children I was meant to have heart, body and soul.

*side note* There is so much information on epigenetics.  I agree with the article above that it does not or should not discredit the donor's egg or DNA.  I know I wouldn't have been able to get pregnant or have these kids without her (and I plan on telling our kids that same truth).  But I also believe that there is some play on the appearance and ultimate outcome of children born of donor eggs through epigenetics.

5 months old

Weight:  No official measurements.  We're guessing around 13 pounds or so.  Kendall is bigger than Seren at this time. 

Eating:   They eat about 6 oz  every 3 to 4 hours.  We have been introducing solids a little bit for the last few days.  I have been making these which has been fun.  They have tried avacados, green beans and pears (and rice cereal).  Kendall loved avacados and Seren hated them.  They both ended up enjoying green beans the second time around.  The pears and rice cereal have just been tolerable and eaten.  

Favorite Things:  They still love each other.  They hold hands pretty frequently and I've found both sucking the others hand on occasion.  Kendall unfortunately has found her thumb which is both positive and negative...positive in that she doesn't suck well on binkies and negative in that, well, it's thumb sucking.  They like watching their parents behave like crazy people to entertain them.  They love dancing and both giggle at being danced around the living room.  They like the dog.  They stay awake more now so it's more fun and challenging to entertain them.  We now have a double jogging stroller that I think they enjoy.

Dislikes:  Being hungry and tired.

Their Accomplishments:   They both do excellent at tummy time.  Kendall rolls over tummy to back and is so close to going back to tummy but gets stuck on her arm.  Seren has rolled over by accident but it scared her so she doesn't like to.  I try to work with her on it and encourage her which helps.  Seren loves to be held up so she can stand.  Seren is still very social and laughs a lot more now (developing high pitched squeals).  Kendall is becoming more social and smiles a lot more now and laughs.  We practice having them sit up and they are doing well at this also...obviously not on their own yet but getting there quickly it seems.  They have improved a ton in eating solids in the last few days...I thought it would take them longer to learn to swallow.

Our Accomplishments:  Nothing really new.  I have been reading up and researching baby food which has been enjoyable to do.  We are keeping up with a routine of sorts for them which seems to help.  We have our house listed and manage to keep it pretty clean despite taking care of two babies. 

Sleep:  Bedtime routine is really starting to catch on.  We bathe every other night usually, sometimes every couple of nights.  We feed them dinner around 8 or 8:30, change into pajamas and then put them down.  Tonight we did our first session of bedtime storying after pjs.  It went very well and they were easy to put down afterwards.  Seren has taken to enjoying a verse of singing by mom before falling asleep too.  We have had a few nights the last week or so of them sleeping 8 and 8 1/2 hours...so those have been super nice.  It definitely seems they are catching on to skipping their middle of the night feeding.  YEAH!!

DH was playing "look at me" entertainer behind me with the camera...obviously doing a good job 

Kendall

Seren

Starting solids...

We have started the girls on solids.  Adventures in baby food making as I call it.  It has been interesting and fun.  They seem to like cereal when formula is mixed in (not so much with water).  They have also tried avacado, pears and green beans.  Kendall has been open to trying most anything it seems and Seren is more reluctant surprisingly.  I have been making my own baby food for them.  This has been more enjoyable then I was expecting.  I started a blog on this also that you can find here.  So if you have ever wanted to try making baby food and think it's too hard...trust me it's not.  It is really pretty simple (at least so far).  I even have my good friend ("the copycat") talking about how she's going to make her own now too...despite the fact she was mocking a friend of hers (behind her back) for being a suzie homemaker and making baby food.  Don't knock it until you try it.  I just love that I'm able to add more variety to their diet then what you can find in the jars.  Plus then they can get exposure to what we eat and other tastes so hopefully (fingers crossed) they won't be picky eaters in the long run.

Skiwampus...

That's one of my new favorite words.  Anyway my body is skiwampus and can't decide what to do with itself.  I started back on my birth control about 3 months after the girls were born.  Two weeks into taking it I started a period.  I thought well I did miss a pill on accident that's probably why but stopped taking the pills to allow my body to straighten itself out.  I waited a month or so past this period to see if anything else happened (asking a general doctor on the way to run my FSH and estradiol...no go from him :p).  Then I started back up a little less then two weeks ago and low and behold another period seems to be rearing its head.  It's been really light so I'm not sure.  But this time I haven't missed taking any of my pills so what gives?

Now I'm understanding why menopausal women find this so annoying.  Before I used to think "yeah a period off schedule...maybe something is happening".  But now it's like I have no expectation or desire (at least at this point) of pregnancy the skiwampus periods are really just annoying instead.  I wish my body would figure itself out so that I could get on with the day.

On the interesting side of life...we put our house on the market less than a week ago (we've had one showing...not sure if it was a favor or actual potential buyer), DH is interviewing with jobs (hoping to have less stress and more time at home) and we bought a used jogging stroller (hopefully it will inspire some exercise once it stops raining...when did I move to Seattle and not realize it??)

Single white "baby" syndrome?

Can babies have a single white female?  DH may laugh at this post or think I'm shallow but oh well.  Here is the jest.  My good friend...yes I love her despite some mild dislike of what she does...copies a lot of what I/we do.  Should I be flattered or annoyed?  Her daughter is basically 3 months old and our daughters are basically 5 months...two months apart.  When we were thinking of names for our girls we settled on Kendall's full name easily (I knew I wanted my mother's name to be the middle if we had a daughter).  But Seren wasn't so easy.  We debated on Riley (Jeff's dad's name...due to a long standing tradition of the males trading off William and Riley for their sons names...Jeff's first name is actually William and he goes by his middle).  We considered if we would have another child or chance at DE IVF and settled into Seren Olivia instead.  We shared this name with this friend.  We debated some more and about a month before they were born we decided Seren Riley would be perfect (in case we never had a boy or another child at all).  I mean who wants to be the one that kills a generational tradition.  My friend asked about names in December and when I didn't mention the middle names she pried a little more to find out.  Well low and behold once Olivia was off the table for us...it suddenly became their daughter's middle name.  Kind of bugged but it happens.

Then it came to the bouncers.  We had a brown and pink ones for both girls and my friend liked them.  She told me they looked at others and couldn't find one they liked as much.  This got copied too.  Then it was their baby blessing dresses.  She was going to make L's dress but it fell through.  She asked where I had bought the girls' dresses.  I gave her a few places I had looked and a direct link to the one I selected (so that she wouldn't pick it).  She bought one from the same place and a nearly identical dress saying she kept eying the one I picked and it would have been her first choice if not for the link I sent.  I mentioned I might add color to the twins dresses to make them more individual and if this was "church approved".  She asked someone she knew (I thought on my behalf) so I thanked her.  She told me "I didn't just ask for you I wanted to know too as I was thinking of doing that".  Next, most recently, they were at our house with the girls hanging out on the floor.  Their daughter doesn't love tummy time but when placed by the crib mirrors I have out for the twins she smiled and seemed to do better.  What do they do?  Immediately get on their smart phone and order their daughter the exact same one without leaving or even pause for thought.  Seriously?

I guess it shouldn't bother me.  It's just baby items.  But there are TONS of baby items out there.  Why do you have to get so much of the exact same stuff we have?  Hopefully it doesn't keep up but I'm kind of interested to see.

The world of twins...

In case you've ever wondered...twins will get commented on every time you go out.  I wouldn't say I ever get sick of people adoring my kiddos...what's not to adore right?  But it does somewhat get old to hear and answer the same "twin" questions over and over.  A few memorable ones have been..."Oh you have twins" and someone in the same group as this person "are they the same age?"  (huh? yes...they are twins after all).  And then yesterday a little girl about 3 or 4 years old asked her mom, "why does she have two babies?"  Okay so some of the attention is fun and I'm sure that it will diminish as they get older.

Also it is a lot of fun to see them interact and see their personalities were/are different so early...even from week one.  Seren is still our social butterfly.  She loves people.  She will smile and "talk" to just about anyone.  Kendall on the other hand is slower to warm up.  She loves to smile at her dad and Grandma Draper and she warms up to me pretty easy now.  Can you imagine a baby who is/was slow to smile and giggle for mom?  It happened.  They also like to lay  by each other and smile, coo and reach out.  Kendall will grab at Seren and Seren will smile at it, until she finds her movement restrained by Kendall's grip.  I usually put them at arm's length so that accidental eye gouging or scratches don't occur.  Although now they often have wiggled closer when I've been out of the room for a few minutes.  They reach out for each other's hands and sometimes will (I'm sure not 100% purposefully) hold hands.  It really is such a treat to have twins and see this interaction everyday.  It's no wonder that twins are ahead of the curve for social interaction.

Male perspective

Once again I got this link from another blogger.  It's about a male perspective in the world of infertility.  It's fairly short and I think worth the read.