The Quints 4th Birthday!

Kyndall, Kassidy, Rustin, Ryder and Kaydence

I am more than two months late, but I am finally posting pictures from the quints birthday! Their birthday fell on Sunday this year, so we went to church in the morning and had a few families over for cake in the evening. They are old enough to really "get" birthdays now, so they were SO excited!

The Fab 5 with their gifts---Five is a very "normal" family size, so the quints birthday is like some families Christmas! (Something I should have thought about before saving all the present wrapping until the last minute :-) )

The present wrapping started out with order and taking turns....

...but quickly evolved into mass chaos!

The quints take a break----All that present un-wrapping can be exhausting!

I made each of the quints their own little mini-cake in their color. In addition to color coding, each of the quints has a symbol that they chose to identify their things when multiple colors are not available. Kassidy--flower, Kaydence--sunshine, Kyndall--heart, Rustin--basketball, Ryder--changes his mind a lot (for his cake it was a monster)

Kassidy, Kaydence, Rustin, Kyndall and Ryder

Happy Birthday to Kassidy!!

Happy Birthday to Kaydence!

Happy Birthday to Rustin!!

Happy Birthday to Kyndall!!

Happy Birthday to Ryder!!

For the rest of the party guests, I made two cakes---a chocolate cake with chocolate ganache filling (to die for!) and...

Lemon cake with raspberry cream cheese filling

The day following the quints actual birthday, we had their "friend" party. After spending lots of time on Riley and Kaiya's birthday parties this year, I decided to make life easy on myself and have the quints party at the Big Bounce.

We invited all the kids from church who are in their Sunday School classes----there are 21 kids their age, so it was a big group! I was really interested to see what my kids would do at the party. They don't get invited on playdates with other kids very often and they are so used to playing with each other, that I wondered if they would stick together or branch out. To my surprise, none of them stayed together---they all buddied up with someone else.

Kassidy with her friends Paige and Marcy

Kaydence with her friend Emmie

Rustin with his buddy Weston

Kyndall was more of a free spirit, running around by herself---she did join a bunch of other girls watching a movie for a little bit.

Ryder with his pal Andrew

We sang Happy Birthday and had cupcakes. I made rainbow cupcakes (pink, purple, yellow for the girls and blue, green, white for the boys) but I was so busy I forgot to take pictures of the inside!

Party Room

Present Time!

Present un-wrapping quickly turned into a free-for-all!

The Party Kids!

The quints with the cute gal that hosted our party at the Big Bounce! It was so much fun, and the best part----I didn't have to get my house ready for a party, or clean up after the 4-year-old invasion!

The Quints 4th Birthday!

International Multiple Birth Awareness Week

This week (Nov 1 – Nov 8) is officially International Multiple Birth Awareness Week. Who would have guessed? In honor of this, I decided to answer a few of the most common (and some slightly ridiculous) questions I get about my multiples! (Note: these are meant to be humorous and/or informative and not offensive in any way. It does not bother me to be asked these questions, but after you get asked the same questions over and over, you start to see the humor in some of them!)

Are they all yours?

YES


Are they natural?

No---some body parts are plastic and I think artificial coloring was used to make Rustin’s hair that fabulous shade of red. Just kidding---I know people don’t realize how silly that question is when they ask it. Of course they are natural, however they were conceived by the help of fertility medication (which I think is what people really mean when they ask that question!)


How many eggs did the doctor implant?

NONE. I did NOT have IVF. I was not ovulating on my own, so the doctor put me on medication to help me ovulate. He monitored me VERY closely and warned me that with the medication, the odds of twins was 20% and triplets was 5%.


So, what are the odds, anyway?

The odds of getting pregnant with quintuplets, if you are using fertility mediation, is 1 in 56,000. I actually had higher odds of getting struck by lightening in my lifetime than of having quintuplets.


Did you know you were having quintuplets?

I love my triplet-mom friend, Robin’s response to this question, “Uh... did you know you were having a singleton? Yeah, the same way you knew you were having one is the way we knew we were having three. This isn't 1922."


Were you trying for multiples?

Seriously?? No one in their right mind TRYS to have multiples and no sane doctor would help you. Multiple births, especially high-order multiple births, have very high risks associated with them for both the babies and the mother.


Are they all identical?

No---other than the obvious fact that they all look completely different, I have three girls and two boys, so biologically it just isn’t possible for them all to be identical.

Are they twins and triplets?

Nope, they are called quintuplets.

But you have some boys and some girls?

Yes, but they were all in the womb together, so regardless of gender they are still called quintuplets.

How much did they weigh when they were born?

They ranged in size from 3 lbs 6 oz to 5 lbs 1 oz. Their combined birthweight was 21 lbs 7.6 oz, which is the current World record.

Are they…okay? I mean, are they healthy?

Yes, we have been very fortunate. All of the kids are happy, healthy, and progressing exactly how they are supposed to be. They are very normal three-year-olds.

How are you going to put them all through college?

Teach them how to work!

Are you going to home school?

Are you crazy? Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE my children, but the school system here is just fine and I am counting down the days (21 more months to be exact) until they go to kindergarten! Right now I have to put “keep children alive” on my daily “To Do” list, just so I can get one check mark at the end of the day. I am looking forward to having time to clean, organize, decorate, shop, etc.

How do you do it?

How does any parent do it? Let’s face it---parenting is a tough job, but somehow we all take what we are given and do the best we can! My life is busy and challenging, but we have a routine and we just take it one day at a time. Raising children is the hardest thing I have ever done in my life, but it is also the most rewarding.

Wow, you have your hands full!!

If I only had a nickel for every time someone said that, I wouldn’t have to worry about funding the kid’s college educations! One of my fellow quint-mom friends, Sara Tyre, has a quote on her blog that I have always liked. It says, “If you think my hands are full, you should see my heart!”

I am so grateful for all seven of my children. The fact that five came together certainly makes life interesting, but I can’t imagine life without even one of my precious children. Each came with his/her own personality and each adds a new dimension to our family. I love my life, despite the challenges, and I am grateful every day for the miracle that all of my children are.


Do you have the cutest quintuplets ever born?

YES....ok, no one has ever asked me that one, but here are some recent pictures and you can be the judge!

Rustin, Kyndall, Kassidy, Kaydence, and Ryder

Kassidy

Kyndall

Kaydence

Ryder & Rustin

International Multiple Birth Awareness Week

Wilkinson Quints 2010 Calendar

Announcing...
the Wilkinson Quints 2010 Calendar!

The calendar features 12 months of adorable pictures of the Wilkinson Quints. Photographers for this years calendar include Kristen Duke, Betty Ann Curtis (my mom) and myself. Below is a peak at some of the pictures included in calendar. To see thumbnails of all 12 pictures, visit our website at http://www.wilkinsonquints.org/.

Calendars are just $12.99 each or 3 for $30, and would make a great gift! All proceeds from the calendars will be used to support the consumption of diapers and wet wipes at the Wilkinson household!

To order, click HERE, or use the PayPal button on the right.

November

February

May

Wilkinson Quints 2010 Calendar

Moments of Cuteness

I often get asked if things are getting easier. The answer is yes…..and no. If you look at things on the “easiness” scale from the very beginning, I would say that for the first 18 months, things continually got a little easier, with some big jumps in “easiness” around 6 months when we got everyone sleeping through the night, and again at 8/9 months when all the babies were taking two naps a day on the same schedule. For the past six months, the line on the “easiness” scale has fluctuated a lot---up for a while then down for a while, then up for a while, etc.

In some respects, things are definitely getting easier---the babies are getting a bit more independent and are able to do more things for themselves. Their vocabulary is expanding and they can understand more which means they can use words to tell me what they want, rather than just crying.

On the other hand, all these feelings of independence mean that the babies are doing all kinds of things, not all of which are good. They are curious about everything and now they are tall enough and smart enough to actually act on their curiosities. They have no concept of things being dangerous, which is a little scary. They interact more with each other, but don’t understand the concept of sharing, so there is a lot of fighting going on. In a nutshell, they act like typical two-year-olds.

Some days I feel like I run from one problem to the next. Fortunately, there are many cute moments to make up for the mischief and mayhem. Yesterday we had one of those moments. It was Monday, and all of us were a little grumpier than usual. (It seems like it always takes a day or two to recover from the weekend when the schedule is thrown off.) The morning was filled with fights and tantrums. Things improved a little bit after their naps, but it was still a pretty rough day. At one point, everyone looked fairly safe for the moment, so I decided to make a quick trip to the restroom. When I left, Rustin and Kassidy were fighting over a book in one corner of the room, and Kyndall, Kaydence and Ryder were playing with toys in different parts of the family room. When I returned, this is what I found:

Kassidy, Rustin, Kyndall, Kaydence and Ryder

Total Cuteness! I raced for the camera and took a few pictures. To my surprise, they got mad when I stopped taking pictures and they asked for more! They are so funny sometimes!

Where's your nose???

Where's your head???

Here are a few more cute and not so cute moments that I managed to get pictures of:

NOT SO CUTE: Somebody left my bedroom door open, and within minutes my entire wrapping paper collection was spread all over the room.

CUTE: Virginia leading the quint train (minus Kyndall) around the house

NOT SO CUTE: Kaydence got into one of Kaiya's bags and had a great time with the markers. Rustin (not pictured) was a willing accomplice, only he decided to see if the marker was as fun to eat as it was to color with.

CUTE: The babies love books and Kaiya loves to read to them.

NOT SO CUTE: Our entryway has a table surrounded by a gate. It is supposed to be a place where people can put things like shoes, bags, keys, etc, to protect them from the babies. Somehow, Kyndall not only got past the gate barrier, but she managed to climb into the table. Kyndall is also the first one to climb out of her crib (it was at nap-time, so it was a pack-n-play in Kaiya's room, not a regular crib). I went to get her up, and found her asleep in the middle of Kaiya's floor, surrounded by all of Kaiya's CD's, CD cases, dolls, and stuffed animals. (I wish I would have gotten a picture of that one!)

CUTE: Kyndall can squeeze herself into the smallest spaces.

NOT AS CUTE: Kaydence turned a small crack in the TV into a gaping hole.

CUTE: I was trying to take a picture of Riley on the last day of school, and all five babies ran over and wanted to be a part of the picture too.

NOT AS CUTE: Ryder climbed up onto the desk in the kitchen (which he knows is a no-no) and tried to close the laptop so he could reach the phone (also a no-no). At the time, the mouse was sitting on the computer keyboard, so the result was a broken computer screen.

CUTE: Five babies all dressed up for church! The girls especially love to get dressed up on Sunday. They get really excited when I bring out the dresses, and they fight over who gets to have their clothes put on first. When they get their dress on, they spin around and say "so pretty!"

Fortunately, the "cute" moments outweigh the "not as cute" moments at our house. Life with (nearly) 2-year-old quintuplets and two older kids might not be "easy", but at least it isn't boring!

Moments of Cuteness

7 Reasons Why I Love Being a Mom

#1 Riley

#2 Kaiya

#3 Kassidy

#4 Kaydence

#5 Rustin

#6 Kyndall

#7 Ryder

7 Reasons Why I Love Being a Mom