Three Lees in a Pod plus the Little Sprout: Big Day Out

Last week, on Monday, we took Rosemary to the "hearing doctor" (that is how he introduced himself to us). She had failed her hearing screen in the NICU, and then passed it a couple of months later. They wanted to see her again 6 months later, and last Monday was that day. Well, when we got there the "hearing doctor" checked for fluid in her ear with this bizarre machine, and told us that she had so much fluid in her ears that she probably wouldn't pass the hearing test. I asked what that meant, and he said that it probably meant that she has an ear infection. Apparently, "hearing doctors" cannot check for an ear infection, and I was told to go to our pediatrician, and possibly an ENT, to get it cleared up. Great.

So, on Tuesday we were off to the pediatrician. I decided that if I was hauling in one kid that may have an ear infection of which I was completely unaware, that I would haul in ALL of the kids. Well, it turns out that Rosemary has a double ear infection, and Piper has a right ear infection. Henry is fine. Since we had to do something with Henry since he was there, the doctor measured Henry's head circumference. He had a huge spike in head circumference percentiles about a month ago, which led to a CT scan and all, but thankfully he doesn't have any scary brain issues -- we just have to keep an eye out for any more rapid head circumference growth. Anyway, the good news is that his head has not had another growth spurt and in fact has stayed almost the same since last month. So, all is good with Henry and the girls get their first bubblegum medicine (which they LOVE).

While I was there, I asked the doctor how bad RSV risks were now (we're under lockdown until it's over). He said that it was better, but the risks not over. He told us that our plan to take the babies to church on Easter (April 12) was fine as long as we don't put them in a nursery and "keep them away from toddlers." He did say that we could get out now if we went somewhere that we weren't close to a bunch of people or inside and could keep people from touching the kids -- like the zoo.

That was all we needed to hear. ~~Gary and I~~ The babies have been so tired of being cooped up in the house, and were so happy to get out. We made plans for the trip all week. We didn't even have shoes for the kids, so we had to buy shoes (I made the point that since they aren't walking that they perhaps didn't need shoes, but Gary insisted that they could not go to the zoo without shoes). So, here are the kids at home getting ready for our big day out.

Piper:

Henry:

Rosemary:

And everyone:

Here we all are loaded up at the zoo. We decided to take the single and double strollers instead of the triple stroller. It just draws less attention that way. We put the girls in the double stroller for Gary to push, and Henry in the single stroller for me to push.

The kids have never ridden in a stroller sitting up -- usually they are in their carseats in the stroller, but even that is a rare occurrence. Henry wasn't sure what to think about it at first, so he held on for dear life for the first few minutes.

Here's Piper with the flamingos:

Henry with a sea lion:

And Rosemary with the flamingos:

Here's some shots of the babies enjoying the experience, Piper, then Henry, then Rosemary (as you can see, Piper isn't sure what she thinks about it yet):

And here are some shots of Gary and me with the babies -- and the occasional animal or animal's behind, as the case may be (luckily, we ran into our friends Aaron and Lisa so they took a picture of all 5 of us):

Having the single and double strollers worked great. We have heard horror stories of other parents of triplets having a hard time getting out because of the attention they get, so we were a little apprehensive. We did got a lot of attention for our "twins," but it was not bad at all. Here's the most common comment of the day: "Wow, looks like you've got your hands full there." That is as original as it got, folks. I'm not sure why people feel the need to comment on triplets when they see them in person. I can somewhat understand that triplets aren't common and that people are going to stare at them, etc., but the need to say something -- just anything -- to us is very odd to me. Anyway, we had a few moments of weirdness with people strangely checking the kids out or asking questions or making comments, but we followed the advice that our friends Al and Quenta gave us early on and didn't make eye contact with anyone! It was an amazing day out.

When we got home, we asked the babies what they thought about the zoo and then took these pictures of them in their carseats (Piper, then Henry, then Rosemary):