Just look at these precious smiles! I mean, this is so much sweetness for one photo! I LOVED meeting Charlie and Ellie and big brother, Lofton for their newborn photos recently. If this doesn’t give you second thoughts about adding more babies to your family, I can’t imagine what would!! ;P Enjoy this sweet family’s story as they share with us a little more about their beginnings and how they celebrated their twins’ arrival!

 

 

Parent’s Name: Ilar Paul and Brooke
Babies Names: Charlie and Ellie

How did Mom & Dad meet?

We met at Mississippi College in marketing class. The first time I really talked to him he sat down at a table in the cafeteria with me and my friends and told them he was going to marry me. A few weeks later he asked me to help him study and ended up taking me to a music room in Aven Hall and played the paino and sang to me all night and that sealed the deal for sure! I called my mom at three in the morning from my dorm to tell her all about it.

How did you tell family and friends you were expecting?
Lofton our three year old wore a Big Brother shirt to the hunting camp for Thanksgiving. We told him to tell them how many babies we were having and he held up five fingers. After that shock, we settled everyone down when we told them it was really just two!

What was the best, most surprising or most difficult thing being pregnant? ( Dad can answer, too)
The most surprising thing was finding out we were having twins. We went for a sonogram expecting to see our one little baby and the doctor said here’s one baby and over here is your second baby. We went out to the car and just stared at each other for twenty minutes.

 

Did you find out the gender beforehand? What were both Mom and Dad’s reactions.
We had a gender reveal party at our house and popped a huge gold balloon and down came both pink and blue confetti which we were hoping for but wouldn’t actually say out loud. We were very excited.

 

How did baby prep go? (Setting up the crib, decorating the nursery, buckling in the carseat,.)
Baby prep was pretty nonexistent because they came so early. We were 28 weeks pregnant when Charlie’s water broke on a Saturday morning, the day before Easter. We had gone that Friday night and bought the car seats from Babies R Us because we had a coupon that was about to expire so we laughed and said at least we can bring them home! Them being in the NICU for five weeks gave us plenty of time to prepare for their arrival.

 

 

 

Was labor and delivery what you expected? If not, tell us how things were surprising or not what you expected.
We rushed to the hospital when Charlie’s water broke thinking we would be having two babies that day but they actually were able to keep the babies inside for six more days so they could develop and get steroids to help their lungs to mature and magnesium to protect their brain. We were very thankful for that. We spent those days praying so so hard for our babies because we knew they would be coming early and they would have to be so strong and mighty to survive. Praise God they were!!

 

 

 

What were Mom’s first thoughts when she saw her baby? And Dad?
Going into the OR to have the babies was definitely the scariest experience of my life. I wanted them to be ok more than I had ever wanted anything in my life. Seeing them out and breathing and thriving was an absolute miracle. We are so thankful that we serve such a big God that took such good care of them and us!

 

 

What have the first few weeks at home with baby been like?
Having your babies stay in the NICU for so many weeks will make you so crazy thankful to have them at home that you don’t care how many times you have to get up to feed them or how exhausted you are. It makes holding them in your arms even sweeter and even more of a privilege. These sweet weeks at home with the twins and Lofton have been so very perfect. Lofton is super loving and helps take such great care of “his” babies.

You can even write a little bit about your baby’s newborn session if you’d like.
Our newborn session with Destiny by far exceeded our expectations. We had no idea how much time she would spend getting them perfectly positioned and somehow she got a picture of everyone in our family looking normal at the same time! That’s very rare with a three year old. Getting him to look at the camera and not have his tongue out is very rare! Lofton loved watching her tv and eating her snacks while she worked her magic with our twins! We love our pictures so much and hope she will take all of our pictures for forever even though I know she specializes in newborns.