Week 25 continued and a little bit of week 26

Jay gave an update a day early to let everyone know about our current visiting restrictions, so I'll continue and be giving more details on our previous week. Week 25 started out pretty calm. About the middle of the week I started having some uterine irritability and I had to get a shot to calm things down. This irritability continued for the next 3 days, nothing major, but enough to get a shot in the arm. I had some guests during the week that gave me some familiar company while Jay was in Tyler at work. He was able to join me on Thursday night after work for a long Labor Day weekend.

The weekend brought lots of activity. We started Friday morning with another ultrasound. Haven and Jackson look great. My cervix had shortened a little, but nothing too concerning.

Our parents, Melissa, Silas and Eli came to see us and spent most of the day here. After lunch we had our NICU tour. I was a little anxious about that, thinking it would be a little scary to see. Turns out it was quite the opposite! Seeing where they will be living if they spend time in the NICU helped and made me a lot more comfortable with the possibility. The charge nurse that showed us around was so helpful in explaining things that would be very scary just walking in to. It is very nice and very private. Initially they will have to be in separate beds and rooms, but the wall in between retracts so that it becomes one big room that we can go between instead of walking from room to room. There are 2 different beds that they can be in depending on when they get here. One of them has a top that comes down and encloses them to help keep their temperature regulated until they can maintain it by themselves. Once they can both do that, they will get to share a bed. The nurse showed us a set of twins that are now able to share. It looked like a bunch of blankets piled on top of each other in a crib. It was cute. Even though they can maintain temperature, they still keep them very warm by layering blankets on top. There is a room they offer to new parents that we will be able to stay in for a few nights to give being on our own a trial run. That way if we have any problems, the nurses station is 2 steps away. Seems like cheating, but is also a good idea, as I'm sure a lot of parents get home and don't know what to do the first couple nights by themselves.

We also got to see Jays sister Melissa and our nephews, Silas and Eli. It was so good to see them but hard not to get up and play with them. They were a little confused by the whole hospital atmosphere. Melissa was able to get a lot of pregnancy pictures for us. I was very excited to be able to get these done and they turned out great!

Today is Friday September 11th. Jay got in town last night and we had another U/S today. We are 26 weeks 3 days today. Every 2 weeks we have a more detailed u/s where they estimate weights. Jackson is estimating 2lbs. 3oz. and Haven is estimating right at 2 lbs. They both have very long legs that measure over 27 weeks. Their tummies measure right at their due date of December 15 and their heads always measure a couple days ahead of their due date. Everything internally looks "beautiful" as our Dr explains it. We tried to do a 3D u/s today, and got a little glimpse of Jackson. His hands were right in his face ever time, so we could see in between them at times. We did see his little mouth opening and closing on 3D which was neat, and could see features here and there, but never a full picture. We could see his little hands perfectly though. They were moving so much it was even hard to get a good 2D u/s. On another good note, my cervix is stable from my last u/s. Based on the measurement, my Dr said percentage of making it to 32 weeks is 85% so we were very pleased with that, and hoping things stay stable! I think that is all for now. Thank you for keeping up with us and for your prayers.

With Love, Jay & Rebekah Haven & Jackson