Flynn and Margot - Day 3 Update

At the end of day 3 (Monday night, India time) Flynn and Margot are doing well.  They have started bottle feeding a bit and are expected to be on bottle-only in the next several days.  They are breathing just fine. 

Finally, names for our newest family members

We are very excited to share with you the names of the newest additions to our family.  It won’t be a surprise that we’ve selected family names.  Ken and I want our children to feel a strong connection with their families, both immediate family and extended family.  Family names are a part of that connection.  The names we’ve chosen are also a nod to our families’ histories as well as the joining of the Gotham / Walsh and Wingard / Jackson families. 

Cornelia’s first name is her grandmother’s / Ken’s mom’s name.  Ken’s mom was named after her mother’s sister who was named after Cornelius Jackson, a relative living in the 1800s.  According to Ken’s great aunt Ida, Cornelius Jackson lived in Virginia as a free black man during slavery.  Cornelia’s middle name – Walsh – is her grandmother’s / Mike’s mom’s maiden name. 

Our newest additions will be Margaret Jackson Gotham Wingard and Flynn Roy Gotham Wingard.  Like Cornelia, both of them are named after their grandparents. 

Margaret is Mike’s mom’s name.  Most people call Mike’s mom Mary, but family and friends from her childhood call her Mary Marg which is short for Mary Margaret.  She was named after her mother’s two sisters.  Jackson is Ken’s mom’s maiden name.  Margaret will go by “Margot.” 

Flynn is derived from Ken’s dad’s name – Flen.  We’ve just changed the spelling a bit.  Roy is Mike’s middle name, Mike’s dad’s first name, Mike’s great grandfather’s first name, Ken’s middle name and Ken’s dad’s middle name and the name he uses.    

Other names we considered included:

Barack and Michelle

Jay-Z and Beyonce
Luke and Princess Leia

Kirk and Uhura 

Sponge Bob and Square Pants

The newest Gotham Wingards

Ed. Note:  At the time I wrote the following message to our families, names had not yet been finalized or announced.

On Saturday morning we welcomed to the family our two newest Gotham Wingards.  We have a boy and a girl, born on Saturday, August 24, 2013, local (India) time.  The boy was born at 11:56 a.m. local time (11:26 p.m. Pacific time on August 23^rd) weighing 1.87 kg. (4 lbs., 2 oz.) and the girl was born at 11:57 a.m. (11:27 p.m. Pacific time on August 23^rd) weighing 2.18 kg. (4 lbs., 13 oz.). They arrived earlier than expected but still made it to week 34 and both are healthy and strong.  Names are still pending but should be announced soon, and our new departure date for India is not yet determined.

How we heard, or “Welcome to our normal.”:  Ken, who is in Los Angeles filming HomeMade Simple, called me at home asleep in bed in San Francisco at 3:25 a.m.  He had just read via an email from our agency in India that our surrogate had gone into labor and the babies were coming.  Ken was thrilled and near tears with excitement, which is what he does.  I was excited of course, but I also went into total panic mode which is what I do.  “These babies are coming too early!  Will they be okay?  When are we going to fly to India?  Ken is scheduled to be in LA for another three weeks.  How are we going to get Coco to Savannah before we go to India!  Oh my god, what if they're not Virgos!  This is not going according to the schedule!!!!”

Ken then called back again at 5:03 a.m. with the good news.  Two babies.  A boy and a girl.  Both healthy.  (Both Virgos.)  “Whew.”  And I admit that I then fell back to sleep.  

Flynn Roy Gotham Wingard

Margaret "Margot" Jackson Gotham Wingard