counting.

we have several counting and numbers books of course and cole can say most of his numbers, although he often does not get the right order.  

this morning i was sitting on the floor and we were talking about the babies and we have been trying to tell him that there are going to be 2 babies.  whenever we talk about babies, he likes to lift up my shirt to see my belly and says "baby!" while patting my belly.  this morning i asked him how many babies are in mommy's tummy? and he replied, 5, 6, 9! 

i laughed and laughed and thanked god that we only have 2 babies and were not going to become the next jon and kate plus 8.  

cole has done very well with counting in spanish too.  

brenner really wants cole to be bilingual and so he interjects spanish words throughout the day.  

i am sure cole will be bilingual any day now.  

but he does like to count in spanish, as long as we count with him.  we start with uno and then go back and forth.   so basically cole only says the even numbers to ten.  

once again, i am sure his spanish skip counting skills are going to come in handy one of these days.  

here is a video of cole counting in spanish with brenner. 

blessed be your name.

many of you are aware of the things going on in our life right now.  

but in case you have missed it, here is an update:

last week at our ultrasound, our doctor failed to see a dividing membrane between the babies, indicating that they may share one inner sac.  this is very rare and can have many complications so we were referred to a specialist in dallas to get a clear answer.  the good news is that the girls are in two separate sacs, yet do share a placenta (meaning they are identical), which is called monochorionic/diamniotic twins.

the bad news is that the reason we were unable to see the two separate sacs last week was because of the high amount of fluid in the placenta.  today we learned that the fluid/blood is being unequally distributed to the two babies.  our doctor believes that we have what is called twin to twin transfusion syndrome.  this means that one baby will get too much and the other will get too little unless treated.  right now, both babies are strong, are a good size, have all functioning organs and were kicking the entire time today.  however, if things to not normalize, we will have to do something.

we are going back on monday morning, to check to see if the fluids have equalized some.  If they have not, then we will go to houston for a procedure that goes into the placenta to help severe the blood vessels that is taking away from the smaller baby.  this does have a high success rate, especially when caught as early as we have.  

obviously, this is a little overwhelming.  especially when i have pregnancy hormones, which means three times the amount of estrogen in my body.  hello.

on our way to our appointment on monday, one of my favorite songs came on the radio.   it goes something like this:

blessed be the name of the lord, blessed be your name.

blessed be the name of the lord, blessed by your glorious name. 

you give and take away, you give and take away.

my heart will choose to say, lord blessed be your name.  

i love this song, and god speaks to me through it every time i hear it.  while i am overwhelmed at points throughout the day, i also know that god's plan for my life has never been what i thought it would be.  ever.  it has been better.  it has not always been easy, but it has been what i have needed and he has drawn me closer to him.  god's track record is perfect in our lives.  and we are choosing to say blessed be your name, lord, blessed be your name. my heart is choosing to follow you no matter where you take us.  

please pray for our little girls.  our god has the power to heal!

we are having...

GIRLS!!!!

we found out yesterday that we are having two little girls.  honestly, brenner and i both thought that we would be having at least one boy, i don't know why, and so we were surprised when we were told that they are both girls!!!

here are a couple of pictures of the babies:

baby a:  this one seems feisty.  she kept kicking the other baby in the head when it wasn't her turn!

baby b: she was arching her back

so what did i do as soon as i found out they were girls?  

i went shopping of course!  i  moseyed on over to  target and found a couple of precious outfits.  

these outfits are for when they are 12 months, so it will be a while before they can where them, but they were too cute!  

things are about to change here in the campbell house!

trip to the zoo.

we go to the zoo frequently here in waco because we have a season pass.  we love our zoo, since it is a natural habitat zoo and it is beautiful, shaded, and you can see all of the animals up close.  

here is an example:

here is cole about 3 inches away from a cougar.  

and he has been this close to a bear, lion, otter, an orangutan and more.  

cole is obviously unfazed by the large feline next to him as he munches on a pretzel.

we love the waco zoo!