When Vickie and Curtis Eberle of Prairie du Sac, Wis., woke up Monday morning, they were planning a day of celebration for the second birthday of their fraternal twins, Gideon and Delilah.
When the couple, both 29 and married for eight years, went to bed Monday night, they were the new parents of a second set of twins, also fraternal, and also a boy and a girl, Emmanuel and Bibiana.
The almost too-unbelievable-to-be-true coincidence is, indeed, true. The Eberles, the parents of three older children, have two sets of fraternal twins born on the same day, exactly two years apart.
"I knew it was a possibility that they could be born that day but I also knew I could not go into labor that day and have them after midnight," Vickie Eberle said of her first reaction when her water broke Monday morning, nearly one month ahead of her Feb. 26 due date.
"In the back of my mind I thought, 'It would be really cool,' and I was kind of hoping for it," she said. "But when push came to shove, I was just focused on getting through the labor and having them come out healthy."
Come out healthy they did: Bibiana at 5 pounds-5 ounces, and Emmanuel at 5 pounds-12 ounces, just like their older siblings two years ago. When the twins and their mom go home from the hospital today, they'll join a bustling household.
Along with the two sets of twins, the couple, who conceived the twins naturally and both have twins in their extended families, have 7-year-old Simeon, 5-year-old Cecilia and 3-year-old Felicia.
"I think it's going to be kind of crazy but we'll have two shifts," Eberle said. "We'll get into our routine of the older kids being at school and the younger ones at home, and then when the older kids get home, we do homework, have dinner and do family time together."
Eberle works full time as a medical coder, at the same hospital where she delivered the babies, and plans to return to work after her nine weeks of full-time and then part-time maternity leave ends. Her husband works from home as a self-employed life insurance salesman, allowing them to juggle who watches the kids.
If there is any sign the Eberles had any intuition this coincidence could possibly happen to them, it is this: They held the party for the older twins' second birthday early Saturday, instead of Monday. Next year, however, that won't be the case. All four siblings will be celebrated on their collective big day.
"We'll celebrate them all together," Eberle said. "Generally, we just do family and their godparent and cake and presents. When you end up with this many children, it's hard to do a big bash for every one of them every single year."
Speaking of many children, Eberle says their sixth and seventh babies might not be their last.
"When we got married, we talked about wanting to have four kids," she said. "But now we're just open to how many kids the Lord wants to give us. We're open to more children but if that's not in the plans, that's not in the plans."
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