how we survived the first 6 months with twins

The twins are the best things that ever happened to Luke and I. I never imagined I could have twins and was completely thrilled when we found out. Besides the panicked middle of the night thoughts "how am I ever going to do this??" I think we have handled it pretty well. We survived and I really feel like we thrived as well these first 6 months. We got the babies home from the NICU when there were about 8 weeks old and I can't believe how much they have grown since then. 
Everyone asks us how we do it with twins so I thought I would round up what made a difference for us these first 6 months. 

1. Schedule Schedule Schedule. I know everyone has differing opinions on scheduling with babies but with twins it really was a must for us. If you don't want to be feeding babies 24/7 you need a schedule with two. The babies adapted really well to a schedule since they had been on one in the NICU, we didn't have to change that much when they came home. 
We went with a loose version of Babywise. I say loose because we went with the general idea of eat/wake/sleep but I was flexible. If the babies were supposed to eat at 12:30 and they were both still sleeping I would let them sleep for 15 more minutes or if they were awake at 12:15 we would go ahead and feed them. It helped us a lot.  
 
At first we fed them every 3 hours and as they got older we would stretch it out as the babies seemed ready, if they consistently seemed tired at their 2:00 AM feeding we would push it back a little and see how they did. They were sleeping 8 hours a night by about 4 months until we hit the 4 month sleep regression (which happened for us at 5 months and continued for about a month) Now they are back to sleeping through the night, 12 hours a night. Cue the angels singing.

2. Boppy
We used these for everything. We fed them in their boppys and and they did lots of tummy time in their boppys. You need these, 2 of them. And extra covers for when they spit up.

3. Aden and Anais swaddles
We own about 16 of these and use them every day multiple times a day. We swaddled with them at the beginning and now we use them for burp clothes, lovies you name it. You need lots. And their sheets and bibs are the softest ever.

4. Honest Company EVERYTHING
Everything we use for the babies is the honest company pretty much. I don't use the diapers because they aren't cheap and when you are buying for 2 babies, yikes. But we use their shampoo, lotion, their intense balm is amazing for everything from the cuts their little nails leave to dry skin. I wasn't a fan of most of the babies laundry detergent I found and I love the honest detergent, we use it for our clothes as well now.  I've started using their shampoo and conditioner for me and well and love it. The bundles are great, you save money and get it delivered to your house. win win. I also read Jessica Alba's book when the babies were born and it is great.

5. Video baby monitor with multiple cameras.
You have twins you need these, one camera on each baby. 

6. PUJ bath
Best bathtub, folds flat, is soft and easy to use. To make our babies like bathtime better, we would put their towels in the dryer before hand so they were nice and warm. (Aden and Anais has great towels too)

(And I forgot to include these must haves in the roundup photo, think of them as freebies)

7. Baby wearing wraps
Huge help with twins, wearing one of the twins allowed me to be hands free to help with the other one. Now I still use them all the time, with teething its a lifesaver. And the funny thing is so far they switch on and off with being clingy or fussy. One will be clingy for a few days while the other one is bouncing away happily and then after a few days they will switch. Heaven help me when they are both teething at the same time. I borrowed a moby wrap from a friend in the beginning and Luke still uses that one and I use the sakura bloom. they love both.

8.  Levana monitor
After having our babies in the NICU for 2 months being constantly monitored I was a little nervous when we got them home. They ended up coming home on heart monitors and that allowed me to sleep better at night knowing if something happened I would know. After they got off the hospital monitors we found the Levana monitor. It tracks movement, so if your baby stops breathing in the middle of the night it sounds an alarm. It clips to their diaper and the twins are still wearing theirs now, even with moving around and flipping over it doesn't come off. We have had 2 false alarms but those were both because we didn't get them on the right way. It makes this mama sleep better at night.

These are some of the must haves for us that allowed us to love the first 6 months. I can't believe how fast the girls are growing and when I think of them crawling and walking and it makes me tear up. Sappy mom alert.