our little models :)

What a fun, great day! We had a bit of a rough night last night because we were both so tired and the kids wouldn't cooperate for a bit, never wanting to nurse at exactly the same time. But we had a wonderful night, only got up twice for Bethany to nurse, and now they're into nursing at the same time and getting into a great rhythm. We had a great day today, and it was fun to have some visitors last night and today! During our day time when we had some down time, we decided to have a photo shoot with our little guys. They are SOOO much fun! They are still very mild mannered, and we've been amazed at how much they are awake and happy! We're starting to see the little differences between the two, and they are getting really easy to tell apart for us. we'll probably be heading home tomorrow or Thursday at the latest, and we're excited for that. But for now.... enjoy our little models!

My gosh how am I ever supposed to go back to work with faces like this left at home?

Some friends that visited us last night- great to have them! (and the kleckners, but we got no pics!)

Kylan sleeps while Judah is just really curious about the world around him... and the camera!

Bethany looks on with love and awe..... we've been doing a lot of that today.... holy cow, can you GET ANY CUTER??????

WE HAVE BABIES!!!

Dear planet, I am pleased to announce the arrival of two of the coolest people ever into our world..... Judah Neal Miller and Kylan Douglas Miller! We met them yesterday, November 2, 2008, at 12:04 and 12:05 respectively, after a long, hard, 20 hour natural labor and eventually an emergency C-section. Bethany showed some of the most incredible courage that I've ever seen in my life and she did an incredible job at bringing these two into the world! Judah weighed in at 5lbs 14oz yesterday and was 19 1/2 inches long, and Kylan weighed 5lbs 11oz and was 19 inches long. They're not identical, but right now it certainly takes a trained eye to tell them apart! Yesterday was without a doubt the most incredible moment/day of my life. I can't even describe what it's like to lay eyes on these little people that I don't even know yet, but love more than life itself. Wow, what a gift from God! Pictures to follow!

it's like the neverending story

So seriously, if two weeks ago when I was writing my last post, someone had told me, "Hey don't stress out- the babies will still be hanging out in there for a couple weeks." --that would have saved me some significant emotional energy. So here we are, heading into the final week of October, and .......nada. Today marks our 37th week, which is considered full term for twins. So in twintheory, we are pretty much overdue. Now the official 40 week due date for Bethany is November 15th, but bottom line is that twins just don't ever last that long, except, apparently, ours. We really tried everything that I know to try- the right foods, the long walks, disc golfing, weeding, raking leaves.... bungee jumping is about the only thing left that I can think of. So I guess that implies that Bethany is totally off bedrest, being plenty active, and more full of baby than I've ever seen her. In fact, most of her IS her stomach right now. It's like there's a beach ball in there that happens to have 2 heartbeats. But they seem to be comfortable in the hot tub for the time being, but maybe this week will prove something different. I've kind of turned a corner in the pregnancy at this point. For so many weeks I've been on pins and needles, waiting at any moment for the babies to burst forth and make a dramatic experience. But after weeks of sleepless nights and days where I could get nothing done, I've tried to focus on what needs to be done, keep doing well at my job, and taking care of the house however it needs to be. When the time comes, it will come, and I absolutely can't wait, but my constant nerves really aren't helping to bring them any quicker. So for the moment, I'm pretty relaxed. Still impatient, but just taking things as they come.

Last night was kind of fun because after our midwife appointment in Bart, we stopped at a mini disc golf course to play and meet the guy who pretty much created the sport, and designed all the mini baskets around the country. His name is Donnie, and he runs the mini disc golf world championships every year. He played with us, showed us around the course (it was on his property) and gave us new ideas about how to grip and throw, and then gave us a whole bunch of mini discs, just as a way to welcome us to his course and thank us for coming. He's an awesome guy, and I think he got a kick out of the fact that Bethany was out there in the final stages of her twin pregnancy still throwing pretty darn good. He said on more than one occasion that he wished he had a camera to take a picture of her because her side profile as she threw was just so great, with her giant belly and a little mini disc!

Then last night, Bethany headed to a girlfriends house and they did like a girl's game night with a bunch of them. I stayed home, watched a movie, did more research on mini disc golf, and cleaned up the house. It was actually pretty therapeutic and I enjoyed some solo time, and I was glad Bethany got to hang with friends. I even got a surprise visit from 6 of our high school kids, who just came by after their homecoming football game to say hi and hang out for a bit. It was great to see them and chat. They stayed for about an hour.

Ok, all for now. I really hope my next post is with pictures of two small humans, when I'm all exhausted and sleep deprived and totally pumped about being a dad.

just waiting

this is the book I'm reading right now-->

Ok, time for a quick update.... no news yet to speak much of, but tomorrow morning marks the 35th week, and that means that we are pretty much in the clear. That being said, linked with Bethany's spiral towards insanity because of our green couch, means that today she will slowly ease back into activities, and, well.... que sera, sera...... I'm reading up on stages of labor so that I can be a good coach when the time comes. I'm all excited now for strange things like ripening, dilation, the active phase, and of course, who can forget transition- the motherload of labor pain. I have to say, my experience in competing and coaching distance runners definitely gets me excited to help Bethany "push through the pain." Somehow, though, I feel like I may need to approach it a little different than I do on the track!





It's been neat to see the support that we have at the church and community. It's incredible. Every meal for the past 4 days has been brought and provided for us, including a steak dinner last night from our old neighbors! Bethany's small group made her a giant card last Sunday with notes of encouragement, and just last night, because she couldn't be at WITH, one of the girls brought in a special basket for gifts and cards for Bethany, and as each kid arrived, they wrote something to her that I could bring home and let her read. It meant so much. We get little gifts of clothing, booties (I cringe as I use that word, but this is my life now, so what can I do?) and encouragement cards all the time- and sometimes totally anonymously, so we don't even have anyone to thank. God has blessed us with such wonderful friends and family. Ok, all for now, trying to stay focused for another day in the office.... it's next to impossible.

as the uterus expands....

...... so does my excitement for the little ones. This is just a short post. I'm not even sure if anyone is reading this stuff, but it ends up being really helpful in chronicling this whole experience, when we'll be able to look back at the timeline and remember the emotions of each stage. We're heading to bed, trying to get some rest in case we're rising in the middle of the night for the hospital. The bags are packed, our birth plan is printed, and the car seats are in. Bethany had some decently strong contractions earlier this evening that got us thinking we could be in for a long night, but then they seemed to have eased up a bit, so we decided it was best to try and get some sleep just in case. We both talked this evening about how we're glad we had the friday night excitement so that we could both be at peace with me staying home from Atlanta. The whole staff is out there now, having a good time, but I couldn't be happier where I'm at. This is where I need and want to be, whatever this week has in store.
All for now- I hope you get some rest tonight..... oh, who am I kidding? I hope I get some rest tonight!

a little break!

Well, the subaru is ready and waiting for action.....

ok, so it turns out that everything was a bit of a false alarm. Our midwife discharged Bethany at noon yesterday and we went home carefully, trying not to disturb that doggone uterus again for a couple of days. We came back to the hospital last night for the second shot for the babies lungs, which went uneventfully (thank goodness) and we were home by 9:30. On a side not, the Lord is teaching me what it feels like to truly be sleep deprived again for the first time since college. I'm sensing it's all a part of the preparation of living on less sleep than I ever thought possible.

Bethany's on bedrest now until the babies come, trying to stay horizontal as much as possible, but she's able to move around when she needs to, to get up, go to the restroom, or raid the fridge. We're just trying to work against gravity as much as possible for a bit. If the contractions start again, though, I don't think we'll fight them.... all the signs point to the fact that the babies are developing really well, so if they start sometime after another day or two, let the good times roll......

Bethany's parents had scheduled to be in for yesterday and today, so that works out well to have some extra hands around to cook and clean! Bethany's mom is cooking ferociously and freezing many meals for post-babies busyness! They'll head back to perkasie this afternoon after the eagles beat the redskins.

On another side note, Bethany's doing wonderful through all this. She's had a great attitude, and needles and hospitals definitely scare her, but she knows that sometimes they are both necessary! She's been fantastic, and really hasn't complained a bit throughout this whole pregnancy. I think she's a little anxious for what's ahead too, though! Who wouldn't be?

the experience begins....

Well, whether this is the moment or not is still to be determined, but without a doubt, last evening I certainly entered the "Labor mindset." It all started with a routine trip down to Bart, where our midwives are at. On the drive down, Bethany began to have regular tightening, non-painful contractions.... but they quickly became closer together, sometimes only 3 or 4 minutes apart. Because she is still considered preterm, this is not ideal. Our midwife did a basic exam, and said it would probably be wise for us to head to Ephrata hospital, for Bethany to get a cortizone shot, which would help develop the babies lungs in case they try to make a surprise entrance into the world soon. And besides, on of our midwives was on duty in Ephrata, and she was willing to wait for us, give Bethany the simple shot, and we'd be on our way. Well, here I am at 9am sitting in a hospital room with my wife, so clearly this didn't all go down like we thought. Here's what happened.....

When we arrived at the hospital, the contractions had once again picked up (still non-painful, which is a sign that all out labor has NOT yet begun). They put Bethany in a room to observe her contractions and see if they could eliminate them, and also check out the babies heart rates (which are GREAT!). So they put an IV in her to flood her out, hooked her up to all kinds of wires and monitors, and did an internal exam, where they found out that her body seems to be preparing for labor (that still doesn't mean it will happen today or tomorrow or this week, for that matter) but either way, they said that they needed to do an ultrasound to see if everything is ok, and find out some other information. So at this point now we've been in the hospital for several hours, the IV has done nothing to help the contractions, and we've heard the words "overnight" come out of our nurses' mouths more than once.

They then gave bethany a shot designed to relax her uterus and stop the contractions. This seemed to work, but the side effect was that she became extremely shaky, compounded by the fact that she had not been allowed to have anything to eat for 6 hours now. So that was pretty hard on her, but she made it through well.

So after that it was down to the basement for our ultrasound, which was fantastic. The boys are head down, and it looks like they will certainly stay that way. Their estimated weights are 5.0lbs and 4lbs 15oz. That's great for 34 weeks! So anyways, we were all excited, the contractions had stopped for an hour, and it was 9:30pm last night, and we figured we'd just get discharged a few minutes later and be heading home. Well, when we got back up to Bethany's room, they put her on the monitor just to make sure, and sure enough, a contraction came about a minute later, followed by another one 6 minutes after that. So, they said we needed to stay the night and be monitered, to make sure that Bethany doesn't go into labor. She made it through the night alright, and now we're waiting for another internal exam to see if her dilation and effacement has changed at all. If it hasn't- and if she's still about 50% effaced, then that means these contractions aren't really progressing labor, just being a big pain in the butt and threatening to bring on labor. Either way, we are definitely in the home stretch and Bethany is on bed rest until the babies come. last night was a long and stressful evening, but we were able to go to bed by about 1:00am or so, and the nurse brought a cot out so that I didn't have to sleep in a chair, which I appreciated. I read some Psalms to bethany about finding rest in God as she fell asleep last night. She's been wonderful through this, and she's had a great attitude even with how much she hates hospitals.
So hopefully in a few minutes we'll get that exam and Bethany will be able to come home! We'll still need to come back tonight for the final cortisone shot (its a two shot series) but I just want to be able to have bethany rest at home and then allow her body to do what it needs to do before labor comes!
Ok, all for now. This has been a crazy last 20 hours, a little scary at times, mostly just strange though, as we figure out if this is it, or just a false alarm! thanks for your prayers!