HOME sweet home.

At last Hudsie, Olive, Megan and Eliza are HOME.

Our beautiful girls

As most parents would appreciate things got very hectic after Boxing day, with Olive at home and Eliza still in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. We did it tough over the next month, with Megan and I often making separate trips to the Hospital, while adjusting to the rigours of much less sleep.

Olive in her commuting to hospital guise.

Of course there were so many joys in having Olive home too, and it would be wrong to accentuate the negative. We loved having her with us, so did her fur sister Zizou and Great Aunt Mani. It was just a wrench not having Eliza with us too.

The girls chillin' at NICU

Also I started back to work in early January, which added another layer of complexity. It was a number of things at the same time; it was wonderful, challenging, stressful, blissful, and very tiring. Eliza had a tough month after Olive left. She caught a wee cold (probably from one of the many additional visitors allowed into the unit around Christmas), which set her back a long way.

After 94 days in NICU, we were over it.

She had a very bad case of the snuffles and not having a clear airway meant she was mostly nil by mouth for about a fortnight, with her feeds coming exclusively from her nasal gastric tube. But as she has done so many times in her short life, she bested the cold, and has fought her way back to reasonable health with much determination and little complaint.

Hey Sis let's get outta here.

Finally last Thursday, the 26th of January, 96 days after her birth, she was allowed home! There were a few things less than ideal about her discharge. She still has her gastric tube in place, and Megan and I have been trained how to insert it, test it and feed through it when required. We've been given a fancy pump to do this at night, but most feeds have three methods - breastfeed, then bottle and then we top her up "Boulis" style using the power of gravity to let the milk trickle down the tube into her tummy.

Also to my chagrin on the day of Eliza's discharge I was away completing filming on a project which has been in gestation for almost as long as the girls! A special mention must be made to some people who helped us so much over this period.

Olive shows Eliza the ropes!

Our buddy Paul Schrader went to the hospital in my stead and helped Megan home with both babies for the first time. He did this with great grace, as he does most things, and stole the glory of slotting two car seats into the Mazda 6 for the first time. Megan's Mum Winifred moved into our house to help ease us through the first few nights of dealing with two hungry mouths to feed. And now Megan's Aunty Mani has returned for her second stint as chief cook and bottle-washer.

Schrader the glory/baby stealer!

GreatAunty Mani and Olive

Grandma Wini

And little Lizzy

I am going to be out of town filming over the next 3 weeks, which will help keep the wolves from the door. The transition from Megan's pregnancy to our recent semi-normality has been well over 3 months. A long period in anyone's language, particularly for me having lost a fulltime job in September. We've been really fortunate that I've found two freelance gigs which will allow me to be around Wellington for most of the time. But the kicker is that some time away is impossible to avoid.

Knowing that Megan, Olive and Eliza have the safety net of Mani and Winifred is a godsend. It is a heck of a lot of work having two (effectively) newborn babies in the house at the same time, and Megan and I both understand that without this support, life would be impossible. We really can't thank Mani and Winifred enough for this help at the most important time of our girls' lives.

Aunty Katherine, Cousin Holly and Great Aunt Mani.

Many hands make Olive full.

Granddad David and Eliza.

Now for some stats. Eliza has been out of Hospital for 9 days today, and her progress is fabulous. She has shot up from her discharge weight of 2.71kg to 2.89kgs yesterday. Also her breast feeding and bottle feeding improves every day. We think she has a minor reflux problem which slows her feeding down, but we are on the right track with finding a drug to help soothe this pain, called appropriately Peptisoothe.

Beansprout Eliza and Aunty Aya.

Meanwhile Olive has bloomed in her first month home, growing from 2.88kg to a whopping 3.78 yesterday. Having said that most new observers of Olive are still surprised by how tiny she is. Megan is frequently asked if she is newborn, and her answer is always a pleasant yes (it is too hard to explain). Despite all of this Olive does still have the most oversized pair of cheeks either of us have ever seen, so she is big in some departments!

Olive is chunking up and ready for it!

The next milestones for us will be, navigating my tricky work commitments, and patiently waiting for Eliza to ditch her feeding tube. Once that is out of the way, we'll just have the simple task of having two babies in the house at once. That will be a breeze!

Good skills from Mama Megan (she took the shot too)

Uncle James on the "Boulis" feed.

A special mention should also go out to the wonderful people who have gifted us meals over this period; Mary, Kirsten, Marianne, Lecretia, Nikki, Katherine, Winifred, Erin and the Multiple Birth Club all knew that food is the best way to a family's heart! Which isn't to discount the wonderful generosity of so many of you, who have given our girls amazing wardrobes of clothes and plethora of toys to come home to.

What we probably won't be doing a great deal of from here on is blogging. It is so hard to find the time to do it now we don't have the fabulous NICU staff to help with the girls. Anyhow we are now at a stage where the more interested amongst you can come and get to know Olive and Eliza in time. Trust us they are certainly worth meeting.

A final thought here should go out to all the team at Wellington's NICU. They brought our babies into the world safely and then looked after them so well. They have encouraged and taught us so much and given us all the help we could have had. We are so lucky to have been given this gift of happy, healthy babies, and there is no way we could ever repay the debt. Needless to say as Eliza grows out of her tiny clothes, we'll donate them back to this amazing place to help them help other parents starting out on this tricky journey.

Happy family.

Can't forget Zizou.

As if she'd let us.

Thanks very much for reading, for your emails, calls and texts. We could not have done this without the support. Arohanui. HOME xxxx