Uncles and Aunts (Part 3)

Switching to my side of the family, my sister Belinda paid a visit today. Auntie Belinda, as she'll be known from now on.

Here she is helping Chris get a little expressed milk into Sophie.

Baby?

I'm so confused about Matthew. I mean he looks like a baby in his birthday suit, but tickle him or pick him up and he sounds like a laughing hyena. Or a herring gull. (Or a machine gun.)

In his clothes he looks like a puppy. Any sign of him sprouting a tail and he's off to the circus.

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Eye to eye contact

Every day, our little charges seem to grow more and more aware of their environment. Sophie is good at direct eye contact now and appears to take time on details. She does take the mickey a little, by staring intently at me, then going cross-eyed and drooling. One of us is clearly mentally defective and I fear it’s not Sophie.

Matthew, on the other hand, scans the whole room, not dwelling on anything for long. He's clearly a big picture man.

Aware that newborns see contrasts rather than colours, I drew a big smiley face and planted it in front of both of them today. Sophie, as expected, studied it for a while, looked away, studied it again and spent reasonably long periods focused on it.

Matthew, also as expected, did follow the face for a while when I slowly moved it across his field of vision, but quickly returned to scanning the room for a way to escape the nuthouse he’s found himself in.

Uncles and Aunts (Part 2) and Yiayia

Uncle Luis on Saturday. Uncle Nico, Auntie Gyorgyi, cousins Sophie and Leni and Grandma today. Now, Grandma in Greek is Yiayia (pronounced Ya-ya), but we're sticking with the English for Uncle and Auntie...so confusing. Apart from the twin cousins, Chris and I both have twins in our families, so there was always a good chance, I guess, that we'd end with twins too.

A few weeks ago, Sophie and Leni were baptised and they seemed so small then. Here's Luis and me holding the two cuties. Chris was heavily pregnant at the time, so got to hold the candle.

Small they may have been, but compared to our two, they are positively enormous! They are only a little over one year old. So much growing for our two to do to catch up!

Yiayia, Nico and Sophie


Gyorgyi and Leni

Uncles and Aunts

Our little cherubs are blessed with 3 uncles and 3 aunts – 3 on either side of the family. Very symmetrical. Chris’ family all live in London whereas mine inhabit the deep south (near Brighton). Also, although Chris is a Londoner born and bred, her mum is Greek and her father Portuguese. I’m not saying her family is any closer than my thoroughly English family, but they are much more likely to phone, drop in or meet up for lunch than mine. My family is close in a long-distance sort of way.

Anyway, it’s been no surprise to me that we’ve seen a whole lot more of Chris’ family so far, than mine. Luis, one of Chris’ brothers, dropped in today for the obligatory cuddles, chat and photo shoot. Here he is with spotty dog Matthew.


After the rush of visitors at hospital, it’s nice to be able to show off the bubbas at our leisure.

If it moves, suck it

In common, I guess, with all babies, Matthew and Sophie start sucking anything in range when they get hungry - their hands, the sheet, each other...

Road trip

Having insisted that Chris takes a couple of hours extra sleep in the morning, she was woken by a health visitor for a chat and to weigh the babies. Sophie is nearly back to birth weight and Matthew has put on a decent amount of weight too.


In the afternoon we stuffed the twins into their car seats and popped round the corner to our first NCT group afternoon coffee.

We had a lot of fun showing off our little treasures. Although we were first in our group to deliver, two other new mums have also there, so there was plenty to chat about and notes to swap. Must be pretty weird for the mothers-to-be though, twiddling fingers and watching the days go by. But it’s so worth the wait!

Oh yes, Matthew’s cord stump fell off today. Typically, and unlike his little sister’s, it was a messy affair, but I’m sure he’ll have a cute little belly button soon.

Life at home

Now we’re home we’ve really been able to appreciate our little treasures so much better. Matthew seems much less grizzly – I’m sure the temperature a couple of days ago was making him uncomfortable. He slept in his own Moses basket last night and we had a good night’s regular feeding and nappy changing. Both twins are feeding really well now and we have no fears over Matthew’s early weight loss. Our midwife dropped by again today to give Chris a chat and Matthew a quick check over.


The rest of the day was given over to Chris relaxing as much as possible and slipping into the routines at home. I popped into Mothercare for the umpteenth time and Chris caught up on some tv. A spell in the garden to bathe the babies in jaundice-busting bright light really helped distance the days before.


The cats really haven’t adjusted to the babies yet. Both have stared intently at them, but then beaten a hasty retreat to the conservatory.


Two things about Sophie. She lost her cord stump today. Small thing, perhaps, but when you spend so much time studying the babies, quite momentous. Secondly, she’s slowly losing the hair on her back – she was born much furrier than Matthew. Somebody described a newborn baby as a peeled monkey. Sophie was only half peeled.

Matthew and Sophie side by side

They come as a pair.

Here are a few shots from the past week. They've changed so much in just a few days...

We're out!!!

Another bright, sunny morning, and hope springs eternal that today we can spring Chris from jail. The paediatrician had two blood tests lined up for Matthew and if the second showed his jaundice to have eased sufficiently, both Chris and Matthew would be able to join Sophie and me at home.

Today dragged past.

I had a visit from a community midwife in the morning. She, too, had been surprised to find that the father had taken a twin home without the mother, but had correctly worked out the reason. Chris had, indeed, had a much easier time of it overnight just looking after one baby. The midwife gave me a few tips, gave Sophie the once over and walked home as her car broke down outside the house.

Lunchtime came and went. My mum offered to babysit to let me visit Chris without needing to take Sophie with me, so I spent some time after lunch and early evening with her, helping to pass the time before the results of the second test came back. Chris held her sanity together through her routines of feeding, expressing milk (she’s world-class now) and, of course, changing Matthew’s nappies. The temperature again exceeded 30 degrees. Unbearable.


I returned home and waited and waited for Chris to call. Losing patience, I called her at 8.30pm and in floods of tears she said “Come and pick us up”. Two hours later (why does everything take so long???) and I reunited our little family in our living room. Mum stayed for a glass of champagne before discretely departing. Here's Chris with Sophie and Mum.


AT LAST!!!! Home never felt sweeter.

Seven days and six nights poor Chris had to spend in hospital. Scary, depressing, frustrating, yet ultimately the most elating time we’ve had together. Chris came close to bleeding to death, was roasted in a cell for four days, but walked out with the most gorgeous babies in the world. Surely a price worth paying.