July Madness - I actually updated the blog!

July was the month I headed back to work... and so the fairly easy life ended.

Having to manage my sleep without the luxury of taking naps during the day between feedings has been tougher on me, and likewise on Kim. Our nanny Cori is a huge help, but on the days she is not there, the burden falls on Kim... and that can lead to a long tiring day for her.

Luckily, I'm taking 3+ weeks in August to spend with the family (and steal away for a fishing trip!!!)

The babies are getting bigger, and even little Nate is approaching the 10 pound mark.

Smiles are more common now, and no matter how tired you are, you can't help but let it touch your heart and smile back. It's amazing how one smile from a child can make everything better.

Here are some much needed pictures for the blog, I hope you enjoy.

Aunt Yvonne came to visit for a small bit one afternoon, and so I thrust all the kids on her for the picture I love to take so much. :)



Sophia has been a HUGE help! She likes to get in the kids faces a bit too much to give them her love, but she will endlessly run and get binkys, blankets, burp cloths etc... to help out. She has also learned the Cougar fight song and much to Kim's chagrin, she sings it quite often. GO COUGS!


We had a small incident with Nate the other night where I had to take him to the emergency room at Children's Hospital. Net Net is that he is going to have a hernia operation on the 8th of August to repair a hernia on the right side. It doesn't bother him much, but the doctor's say it could be very dangerous if not repaired, so of course... better safe than sorry.




Gabrielle is definitely showing that she is very vocal, and very demanding. Sophia has already nicknamed her "Crabby Gabbi" for the strength of her cry. When she wants something, you know it... and she seems to be wanting more and more these days. She is the one that most wants to be held all the time these days, which can be tough with two others that need it too.

All in all, things are going well. Trips in public are still a spectacle, and almost comical at times. You would be amazed at how many parents of multiples are out there, and they will always come up and commiserate with you ;)

During my time off I plan on building Sophia's playset, visiting with my mother and sister who are coming for a short stint, and going fishing in Idaho with my buddies. But I really plan on spending more time with the kids. I want to spend time with each of the babies aside from feedings, where I get to enjoy them and not just worry about the next task... we'll see how well I pull that off. I also look forward to spending some quality time with Sophia. She is a ton of fun these days and has the best sense of humor. She cracks me up all the time (and drives me nuts at other times... must get that from me)

Two Months Old - Where has the Blog gone?

Wow, it's been nearly a month since my last blog entry... I apologize for any of you still patient enough to check back in with the confidence that I'll eventually update things.

A lot has been happening, but pictures have not been as fluid as they were before... bad parents. I'll give you the highlights of the last month's happenings, but there won't necessarily be pictures to accompany things :)

Most recently, Grandma Harrington paid us a visit and got to see Sophia on her 5th birthday as well as the triplets who have nearly doubled in size since she saw them last, on the day of their birth.

Overall, we have been doing pretty well. The little ones are still feeding every 3 to 4 hours, but they are taking more, and eating faster, so the promise of sleeping through the night seems near.

We have decided to not be tied to the house, and take the kids out a couple times a week on errands and what not. We've been to Costco, the mall, and car shopping, without any problems. They actually have slept up to 7 hours on our day of errands before, though we were getting really nervous near the end that we may have a coma inducing melt down. But we feel pretty good that we can continue life as normal... well mostly normal.

You see when we go out into public with the entourage we are viewed as either a rock star or as a freak show... hard to distinguish the two some times. It truly is amazing how people feel the need to talk to us, approach the babies, or take pictures. No questions seem off limits, and people feel like the triplets are public property as many come up and try and get a view. I truly believe it is extremely innocent curiosity that gets them to throw away rational communication with strangers, but it can become overwhelming at times.

Some of the comments we have heard:
"You have your hands full" (90% of our comments are this one)
"Wow! I am so glad it's you and not me" (sounds like it's better that way)
"Did you use fertility drugs?" (excuse me... do I even know you?)

One lady even followed us for about two minutes in Costco asking me questions. Now while my comments may sound flipant, I have been answering these types of questions for about two hours so far on our errands.
(Lady) "Wow, triplets... how does that happen?"
(Mark) "I'm not sure I should tell you this but... when a man and a woman really love each other..."
Kim practically ran away from this lady... and I strolled after her pushing the monster stroller, trying to be polite to this lady, but at the same time end the conversation.

Kim found some videos on YouTube that other families of triplets have posted of their trips in public that really illustrate this fact as well.

But overall things are really great, and we feel truly blessed! We have great friends, neighbors, and family that have been offering their unending support. Thank you soooo much to everyone who has been so supportive and helped us through this exciting, yet tiring time.

All is Quiet on the Western Front

It's 4 days till the actual due date for Jack, Nate and Gabrielle and they are doing great! We have been doing a lot of things (well, a lot for having triplets I'm told). We went to Duvall days last week, and I'm pretty sure people thought Kim's pushing the triple decker stroller was part of the parade. We've been to Ixtapa, and found that the Fiesta table suits are needs perfectly! We even had Ryan Oloughlin, to make it a set of quads, with us, and we ate in peace comfortably.

We went to my in-laws last Sunday to celebrate Sister Virginia's 96th birthday, so we took some pictures of the kids with both Virginia and Great Grandma Wilcox.

Kim has been working on since getting out of the hospital, which is great, since now when we say "Baby needs a new pair of shoes" we mean it times 3. Since I'm off on paternity leave, it gives her a good chance to get her work done, and let us have a semi-normal social life :)

Our scheduling system seems to be working terrific (knock on wood) as neither Kim and I are ever feeling super tired, and a small nap here and there helps refresh us. The only thing that could be better is if Kim and I could actually spend some time together, as currently we are ships passing in the night.

Picture Day!

We had the great fortune of one of our friends and neighbors, Lynn Lehto, who is a very accomplished photographer, come up to our house for a photo shoot for the triplets. None of these pictures are from picture day... but it's the latest I have ;)


Kim bathed the trio this morning and did a great job with them all, while I got Sophia and myself ready.




Lynn showed up at 10:30 and we figured out where the best lighting would be for natual light. We started the photo shoot off with some family pictures, then lined the triplets up on a bean bag for some pictures still in their clothes. They were all awake, and all doing great at this point.





We next removed all their clothes and diapers for some of the au-natural pictures. The babies all threw a fit, as they are not super excited about being naked (hopefully they keep this trait through college).





Lynn is used to working with sleeping babies (Ryan O - fits the bill) but she worked through the nuances of trying to get three tired babies all to not cry at the same time. We did some binky manipulation, a bit of holding, and what not to get them okay for the pictures, but of course that came with a couple times of Kim and I getting pee-ed on... but oh well.





Lynn was great, and I'm sure the pictures will be great. Jack, Nate and Gabbi were not in their best form, but then again... they are only a month old.

One Month Old

The trio sleeps while they were still in the hospital

Once again I slack tremendously on the blog updates, thanks to all have pushed and prodded me to update the blog.








Sophia and Gabbi play


Kim had the idea that we should stay the night with them one night and both get up for each feeding, to make sure we can handle the process. I don't recommend this to our faithful readers, as all it really did was wipe us both out the next day. We stayed the night Thursday and Jack and Gabrielle came home with us on Friday. But little Nate had to stay in the hospital till he could do better on his feeding.

Jack and Gabbi - profiles

The first night home we tried a new e strategy: one of us goes to bed at 10:00ish and the other would do the midnight feedings. Then the one who was sleeping earlier would get up at 3 and 6 and do those feedings. The idea here was that we both could get a chunk of solid sleep (5 hours) that could be remedied with a nap during the day to make it more conducive to living a normal, less sleep deprived life. The concept was good... but there were a few glitches the system. For this night, the main glitch was that no one told the babies that they are supposed to go to sleep afte their midnight feeding. So from 1:30 to 3:00 they squawked and squawked, which had me checking on them every 15 minutes or so. I got a little more sleep after the 3:00 feeding, and then after the 6:00 feeding I was already up, so I started on my household chores. Tired.... but productive :)


So here it is Tuesday, May 29th, and we are hanging out at the hospital with Nate on what is (so we are told) is his last day here. Tomorrow, we will be a complete family at home.. YAY!

Gabbi says "let the fun begin"

Our feeding system seems to be working pretty good for the most part... but we will need to convince the little ones that their awake time is during the day and not at 3 in the morning. Plus adding Nate to the whole mix may change things.


Jack and Gabbi seem like they have jumped leaps and bounds in just the 4 days they have been home, and Gabbi has already scored higher on the PSAT then 40% of the juniors in Washington State. Okay, so maybe that is a stretch, but they are doing quite well. When we first took them home, it would take 30 - 40 minutes to get them to drink their 2 ounces of their bottle. The first ounce would scream by, then the remaining ounce we would have to continually wake them up, and shove it in their mouth to get them to take it. Now... they it's about 12 minutes to finish a bottle, which means quicker turn around on our sleep, another YAY!

They share a crib now!

Okay, okay, okay... so I'm not the most prompt blogger... sheesh. Sorry about the absence to our loyal fan base ;) All the pictures were starting to look the same, i.e. swaddled up, tube out of their nose... and half asleep.

The kids have been doing great, and are progressing as best to be expected. We are very fortunate to have such a wonderful nursing staff helping us out, as they have definitely made this as easy as possible for us.

As per my title, they are all sharing the same crib now... which was very exciting for us, for some odd reason, it seems like progress ;)

Gabbi acting coy

They are working on learning to take their formula from bottles now, and they are doing pretty good on that front so far.

They have all gained weight since their birth, and continue to grow. Here are their original birth weights, and their current weights.

Nate gets a bath... ladies don't look too close

Jack was 4lb 7 oz and is now 5 lb 6 oz

Nate was 3 lb 1 oz and is now 3 lb 15 oz (might be 4 lbs by the time you read this!)

Gabrielle was 4 lb 1 oz and is now 4 lb 15 oz (almost 5lbs!)

Looks like the week of the 28th for them starting to come home... but we'll have to wait and see. Kim and Sophia and I will spend a couple nights at the hospital near the end of the week to get more used to the regular feedings and ween our way into the nights. Stay tuned!

Cribs for the Masses

Daddy and his little girls

It's Friday and the kids are now all out of there Isolets (sp?) Soon they will all be able to share the same crib!

Jack eyeing the world

We're mid way through week 35 for the triplets justacional age, and the nurses told Kim today it would probably be closer to week 38 before they were able to go home. I was looking forward to them coming home in week 37... but I guess I will have to wait a little longer.

Gabrielle gets fed

They are doing really well right now, but I can't imagine having them off of their monitors... as those really reduce the stress of "is he breathing, is he okay" We'll miss those when we get home... but it will be nice to have them home.

All three have been gaining weight this week which is great news, as they need to get bigger so they are not so fragile to hold.

Nate sports his spring outfit

Kim has become the resident expert on our equipment and process with the babies, so when they bring expecting couples through she gives them the whole spiel about what everything is, how the process goes, yada, yada, yada. It's pretty impressive to see how much of the information she has absorbed.