Infant Kick Study

Today was a BIG day for Piper and Phoebe, they got to tour their future college campus! ;-)   Go Trojans!!

Before we went on our campus tour we first started our day off at the Development of Infant Motor Performance Lab in the BICE Clinical Research Center (WOW, what a drive!).  My friend Cassie from CSUF set us up with a colleague of hers at USC who is conducting a study on infant kicking.  During the study Piper and Phoebe were laid on their backs and hooked up to a ton of motion sensor monitors
(I thought it was pretty cool).  Using a motion analysis system the babies kicking motion was captured and then analyzed to determine the forces that infants generate while kicking.

Both girls were really good during the study with only a few tears towards the end.  They both pee peed on the table during the test, which I guess is normal but that was NOTHING compared to what Piper did to me after the study.  Right after Piper was done with her turn I put her diaper and clothes back on.  It was time for her to eat so I was feeding Piper and Barbara (the wonderful lady who is conducting the research) was taking some measurements of Pipers legs.  During that time Piper was making some pretty loud noises from her tiny tushie.  We all laughed and thought nothing of it.  Well when I stood up I discovered that somehow Piper managed to poop through her diaper and I was covered in baby doodie.  I could not help but laugh SO hard.  Thank goodness for the extra onesie I had packed in the diaper bag.

So one of the best parts of the study was that Barbara weighed and measured the babies, wahoo!  I am SO excited to say that Piper is now 8lbs 10oz, 21" long and Phoebe is 8lbs 1oz, 20" long.  Both girls keep amazing me at how well they are doing.  I love my baby girls! 

Right after we were done at the lab James and I enjoyed a nice lunch (we were starving) and then we drove over to the main USC campus.  We had a great time walking around!  One of our goals today was to make it to the bookstore where we spent way too much money on some fun USC gear.  One of the items we bought is a surprise for our friends Rob and Julie.  As I am typing this message they are both in Seoul Korea meeting their son Robert for the first time.  We can hardly wait to meet Lil Rob and to give him his special gift that we bought for him today!

Another stop we had to make was in Heritage Hall so we could take a picture next to a Heisman Trophy.  Even though the girls "appear" to be sleeping they are actually super excited to be here.