Quick Update

The babes had their three month doctor's appointment this week.  Brady is now two feet tall and weighs 12 pounds, 7 ounces and has transitioned almost exclusively to six month clothes.  Rooney is 23 inches long and weighs 11 pounds, 2 ounces.  Her acid reflux seems to be turning a corner, we still struggle with it, but it seems to continue to get better. 

Brady is definitely our sleeper. He is in bed no later than 8:00 and more often than not sleeps for 10 or 11 hours (a few times 12 hrs).   Rooney typically gets up to eat twice a night and often times we find her waking up her brother by kicking or hitting him...or so we thought.  With the help of Grandma G. visiting this week, we decided to separate them at night.  What we learned was that the culprit was not our feisty Rooney, but rather our sweet Brady.  While alone in the crib the first night, I found the little rascal in all four corners, crying once because his foot was stuck and he had kicked the mobile button enough to turn it on twice. Quite impressive in my opinion because he doesn't rollover yet and slept through all the movement!!  Miss Rooney on the other hand was found peacefully sleeping in the exact same position she was placed in.  Whoops.  I guess I was blaming the wrong kid.  Either way, the days of them sharing a crib are over!

 Our little reader

 Wearing camo like his four older cousins

 Giving us a wave hello

Stylin in her skinny jeans, while eating Sophie and pulling her hair(which she does all the time!)

3 Months

My babies are three months old today!  Lee may have been a bit premature to celebrate sleep last week. Brady has only slept through the night one other time and has had several nights he was more interested in talking than sleeping.  He is definitely our vocal one at this point!  His talking and laughing are the best sounds in the world!  Rooney is busy smiling and has a few sounds she shares with us, but is mostly just a drooling, smiley girl with her tongue out:)

Since, Lee did a great job updating everyone last week on the babies I won't bore you with too many baby milestones, except to say they continue to keep us very busy and we fall more madly in love with them everyday! 

This past weekend, we made the trek via public transportation to Brooklyn to an art showing.  Is it normal to take 3 month old babies to an art gallery?  Well, Lee, Brady and I decided it was just to support one of our favorite organizations Burma Ed.   Ms. Rooney apparently wasn't to keen on the idea and slept the entire way there (two trains and a walk through a busy section of Manhattan), the entire 2.5 hour stay at the gallery and the return trip home...just to wake as we walked in the door.  She is one funny girl, as that was close to the longest stretch of sleep she has ever had!  OK, enough rambling...here are some pictures of my loves....

Rooney was not interested in smiling since she was hungry:)

Trying out their Bumbos for the very first time

Brady is a big fan of his Daddy

The beautiful Rooney

While Daddy works, we take naps by the water.

Sweet, delicious sleep…

…oh, how I missed you!! But I was happy to welcome some sleep back last night, when my wonderful son slept for 10 hours, uninterrupted.  From 9:00 to 7:00, he slept through whatever his sister sent his way (since they’re still sharing a crib, she sometimes screams and kicks in her excitement, frustration, anger, hunger, any number of reasons). But Brady persevered and slept through it all for 10 glorious hours. And to her credit, Rooney didn’t do too badly – only two night feedings, both of which were relatively short and uneventful.

We’ve been hearing from a lot of other parents that 12 weeks is the magical milestone where we should start seeing R&B sleep through the night, and wouldn’t you know it, today is 12 weeks (or last night was depending on if you look at the time difference between Hoboken and Delhi).  But without splitting hairs, Brady likes to be exact (he did,after all, wait until full term for twins - completion of 37 weeks - to convince his sister that they should make their grand entrance into the world).  So, we’re looking forward to a lot more full nights of sleep, though we understand it might be wishful thinking, especially given that Rooney still suffers from acid reflux, but she seems to be doing much better.

The last couple of weeks have been great, with R&B becoming even more interactive and starting to “speak” more. Their voices are developing very well (may a little too well in those moments when they’re not getting their way). Their personalities are becoming more defined. Physically, they continue to grow with Brady tipping the scales at 11.4 lbs (25%) and Rooney coming in at 10.3 lbs (also 25%), both of which are awesome positive trends that their Dr. is pleased with, given where they started. And they continue to get stronger – I swear I had Rooney walking this weekend with just a bit of support for balance. I won’t get into the noises that come out them these days, except to say that I’m often at the same time impressed and disgusted.

Our little thinker, Brady, really enjoys, and gets fully engaged in, being read to, regardless of if it’s Stacey reading them akid’s book, or me reading about the Yankees’ latest trades or the Giants’ Super Bowl match-up against the Pats. Rooney continues to showoff a flair for the dramatic, and making sure that we, and everyone in the building, know when she’s displeased with the speed in which her bottles being prepared, or the position she’s in while being fed or put down for a nap. They both love their activity mat and are more and more enjoying the swing cousin Ben was nice enough to lend them.
But, enough of the ramblings of a proud dad, here are some recent pics of our beauties.

Playing on the activity mat

Holding hands

Rooney telling secrets

Tummy time

More visitors - this time giving the soon-to-be-parents some practice

Liebster Award

We are honored to receive the Liebster Award from the guys over at Just One Out of Seven Billion.   These two great midwestern guys live in Delhi with their beautiful twin boys born only a few days after R&B.  Lee and I were lucky enough to meet up with Doug and Chad in Delhi for a great night before our four little bundles of joy arrived.  If you haven't checked out their blog, I suggest you go do that now!

The Liebster award is given to blogs with less than 200 followers who deserve more recognition. 

The Award comes with a few rules. You’re supposed to:

• Show your thanks to the blogger who gave you the award by linking back to them
• Reveal your top picks for the award and let them know by leaving a comment on their blog
• Post the award on your blog
• Bask in the love from the most supportive people in the blogosphere – other bloggers
• Hope your recipients pass the award to their favorite blogs to keep the love flowing

There are a couple blogs that I would like to award -

1.  Dreams Come True in India -  Go check out the lovely Milena and Nevaeh at this blog.  These beautiful babies were R&B's first play date and their mom was the first person to hold R&B after they were discharged from the hospital.  M&N were born two days later and we were so happy to meet them before leaving Delhi.

2. Tandoori Baby - Anu and her family are currently in Mumbai picking up the new addition to their family, an adorable son, born with the help of Surrogacy India in Mumbai.  Her son, Erik, was just issued Swedish citizenship so it won't be long now before the blog continues with the family home safely!

R&B

We often get asked if the babies interact with each other and until about a week ago we always answered, "No, they don't even notice the other one exists".

Well, R&B are finally starting to notice each other, but not in the way we expected them to.  You know, smiling at each other or gently interacting on their activity mat.  Nope, they notice the other by laughing as soon as they hear the other one cry.  It is quite funny to have a laughing and crying baby at the same time, but I thought the other one would be upset when they heard the cries, not enjoy it.  God help us when they are teenagers!

This past week their new friend, J's mom took some pictures of the babies during their playgroup.  Check out of her great shots!  Can you tell she happens to be a professional photographer?

 Cuddles

 TO & TT

 I just can't help kissing her:)

My loves!

Two Months

Our babies are two months old today (January 7th)!   While they grew like crazy during the first month it wasn’t very noticeable since they were still so small.  This month, however, they continued the pace and are now weighing in just over 9 lbs for Rooney and 11+ lbs for our big man. We’re now on our third round of clothes, having grown out of both preemie and newborn sizes.  Both R&B seem to have moved out of the newborn stage with each of them able to hold their heads up with limited supported.  The oh-so-sweet cross-eyed stares have been replaced with engaged babies filled with their own reactions, fantastic facial expressions and the sounds of laughter from one special little fella.  They’ve become huge fans of staring at the large map of the Caribbean that’s hanging above our living room couch.   Lee frequently holds them up to the map and asks them to point to the country they want to visit.  Rooney always raises her hand to Cuba (US restricts almost all travel to Cuba) and Brady points to Puerto Rico (direct flights are available almost hourly from our local airport).  So, typical of their personalities, Rooney chooses the most difficult route and Brady seems to choose the easiest!  

We don’t have a set schedule in the apartment, yet.  Both babies have started to take longer afternoon naps and go to bed around 7 every night.  We continue to struggle with Rooney’s acid reflux issues, which means more frequent feedings of smaller amounts and long periods of keeping her upright – not so fun in the middle of the night.  If anyone has suggestions on helping babies with acid reflux, please share! 

This past month, was obviously filled with holiday celebrations. Our first Christmas as a family was wonderful and spent with Lee’s side in Connecticut.  We loaded our entire (rental) car with baby things, seriously I was on a mission to fill that thing with any and everything we may need.  I pride myself on being a light packer, but truthfully that’s only when I’m flying.  Give me a car and I become a hoarder and will apparently pack it with every single bit of baby paraphernalia I can find in our apartment! 

We continue to introduce the babies to friends and family!  The highlight of this month was R&B meeting Grandma and Grandpa Khan.   I don’t know what it is about these two Grandpas, but they seem to think that babies are only supposed to sleep while being held J.   Grandpa Khan definitely logged as many hours holding a sleeping baby as Grandpa Gallagher did earlier in the month of December.  Grandma Khan hung out with the babies a bit longer, got her hands dirty with a few diaper changes and introduced the babies to the sound of  the fire alarmJ  (no, fire, just a oiled pan that got a little too hot while Grandma Khan was making us some delicious aloo parathas).   R&B also had a lot of visitors who have travelled from far and near to see them this month - multiple boroughs of NYC, Hoboken, Milwaukee, Tamarac, Chicago, Thomaston, Mocksville, East Brunswick, Bayonne, San Francisco, and Easton, PA (on their 2 month birthday – thanks aunty Chuck).

Lee’s work schedule should now start to get busy and I will be home solo enjoying the babies.  So far, I love being home with them and have big plans this month to work on getting them on a more regular schedule, but I’ll continue to let each baby take the lead (with a little coaxing from me) on their schedule (not that I’ll have much choice with a certain feisty little gal).

 R&B with Grandma and Grandpa Khan

 Their friend the peacock (I don't know what is so interesting about it, but they both love this bird)

 Smiles

 Brady trying to read Rooney the book, "I Like You"

Brady and Charlsie hanging out

2011 - What a Year!

Tonight we bid 2011 a fond farewell, a year filled with many life altering and unbelievable events. This was definitely a year we will never forget, highlighted by Brady & Rooney's arrival, our wedding and the seven weeks we spent in India!  A quick summary of a year that was NEVER boring.

January - I married the love of my life and a new Khan Family was "officially" created (after a short nine year courtship)!

February - was all about recovering from the wedding and planning the details of our trip to India - the honeymoon and SCI part of the trip!  Lee also closed a pretty big deal, so we upgraded some of our honeymoon hotels (behind us is the Lake Palace Hotel in Udaipur from the James Bond movie "Octopussy").

The Honeymoon

March - was life changing with the following message from SCI -

"We are very happy to inform you that the value is 221.2 and we would like to congratulate you as R is now pregnant."

April - We received news that we had strong healthy heartbeats growing in Delhi!  I also started to learn the meaning of patience (it took a lot of reminders from Lee), as October seemed so far away.

May - This was probably our quietest month of the year.  We kept ourselves busy with work and school.  At the end of May, we started to share the news and the below photo  with family and close friends!  TO, now known as Brady, was already showing signs of being the "big" brother, taking up most of the room in Mrs. R's belly and pushing Rooney off to the side).

June - Weddings, weddings, weddings...we had a great month attending my brother Tom's wedding and one of my best friends Meredith's wedding! We got a sneak peek at life with multiples by taking care of Tom's three boys - Jack, Max and Sam - the weekend of their parents' wedding...Lee might still not be over that exprience.

July - We celebrated our wedding in my hometown with many family and friends who couldn't make it to Florida for the big day in January.  

August - I made a mad dash to the end of my MBA - the month flew by as I finished a semester's worth of classes in five weeks while working full-time.  Luckily, we were able to fit in a quick trip back to my hometown for my little cousin Colleen's weddding.  It was a gorgeous evening with great family and wonderful food!

September - MBA completed!  I attended my last class during the first week of September and then we had a quick babymoon/graduation celebration trip to Montreal!  While there, the babies got us worrying, as R was in the hospital having contractions at only 30 weeks, but it all worked out for everyone involved. 

At the end of the month, our sisters threw us a wonderful baby shower!  Our family and friends generosity was so appreciated, as we gathered all the 'must haves' for TO&TT.

October - The wait was almost over, or so we thought, we had a celebratory drink before boarding our flight to Delhi.

November - The month our dreams came true!  Welcome to the world Brady and Rooney!!!

December - We spent the month loving on our little ones, watching them grow and enjoying life as a family of four!  Cousin Ben also seems to like the new additions. Thankfully, Lee's hair grew back to normal (don't know what he was thinking pretty much shaving it before we headed to Delhi).

2012 will no doubt be eventful, as we raise our adorable little babies!  We wish you all a wonderful, healthy and successful New Year!  Thank you all for your love and support through 2011. We are looking forward to helping many of you celebrate the arrivals of your long awaited bundles of joy, a couple more weddings, and generally good times with wonderful friends and family.

18+ pounds of baby

R&B had their six week doctors appointment this morning.  Brady is now 10 lbs and Rooney is 8 lbs 4 oz!  Check out the difference six weeks and 8+ new pounds can make...

Brady at 5+ lbs

Brady at ~10lbs

Rooney at ~4.5 lbs

Rooney at 8lbs 4 oz

Our Little Models

R&B had their first professional photo shoot this week.  Check out some of the photos HERE 

We owe a thank you to the guys and girls over at Faith to Vishwas for posting the name of their photographer on their blog.  We called her and before we knew it, she was at our house working her magic!

This past week, we were managing the twins without the help of the grandparents, as this guy decided to head back to his other grandsons....as you can see Rooney was not too excited about his departure.

But reinforcement is on the way with Grandma Khan heading north on Sunday. And just a few days later R&B also get to meet Grandpa Khan.  We're all looking forward to spending our first Khan family Christmas together, with the family having grown by three since last Christmas (hard as it is to believe, Stacey wasn't actually a Khan until January of this year).

Enjoy the photo shoot pics HERE

One Month

Rooney and Brady are a month old today!  How is it possible to feel like you have known two little people forever, yet holding them for the first time feels like just yesterday?

The last month has been truly amazing.  We’ve enjoyed the babies more than we ever thought possible.   “Operation Get Out of India” feels like ages ago.  Both babies continue to be masters of the eat, cuddle, sleep and poop routine. This past week they’ve added two new talents – belching and farting like old men – Lee is very proud!  I never knew something so loud and stinky could come out of such cute little bodies.

But what a difference a month makes.  A big night out on the town used to end after 3:00 AM, now 10:00 comes around and we still can’t see straight but it’s not from the drinkin. Talking about how many bottles we went through also has a newmeaning – some of you might remember that dinner at our place a couple years ago when we had 20+ bottles of wine, a couple cases of beer and some mixed drinks – now, how many bottles we went through refers to Enfamil. All joking aside, we couldn't be more happy with the changes in our lives!  We love you Rooney and Brady!!

Our thinker - Brady

 Rooney

Happy Boy!