Ashley Crandell, a mother of a 5-year-old girl, and her husband decided to give their first-born daughter a sibling. Life, however, had other plans for the family, which ended up suddenly finding themselves with five children!
Ashley got pregnant through I.U.I after 4 years of trying and when she found out she was expecting quadruplets, she was pleasantly surprised! In fact, she mentioned that even though the period of pregnancy was difficult, she remembers it with emotion.
Mom of quadruplets Ashley Crandell remembers exactly what she was feeling when she snapped her final bump photo. “It was bittersweet because I really loved being pregnant. I knew I was going to miss feeling them move around – it was like a party all the time,” Crandell, 37, said. “But at that point, my entire body ʜᴜʀᴛ, especially my back and feet. I could barely walk up the stairs in our house. Everything was swollen.”
On Sept. 16, Crandell posted before-and-after pregnancy photos on Instagram. In the first slide, she’s 31 weeks pregnant and about to leave for the hospital, in the second, she’s 31 weeks postpartum and holding all four kids. “It’s crazy to think they all ever fit in there,” Crandell wrote in part.
Wesley, Emma, Leah and Nora were born ᴘʀᴇᴍᴀᴛᴜʀᴇʟʏ by C-sᴇᴄᴛɪᴏɴ on February 11 and spent 70 days in the ɴᴇᴏɴᴀᴛᴀʟ ɪɴᴛᴇɴsɪᴠᴇ ᴄᴀʀᴇ ᴜɴɪᴛ until they learned to eat and breathe on their own.
The fact that the four babies were born ᴘʀᴇᴍᴀᴛᴜʀᴇʟʏ doesn’t reveal anything today! They’ve put on weight, are sitting on their own and crawling at the speed of light, as their parents say.
As for 5-year-old Isla, she enjoys the company of her siblings. “I’m impressed with the way she handled everything,” her mother said. “She likes to feed them and change their diapers and is very involved with them. It’s completely customized, even though the four dimensions command attention wherever we go.”