Parents who welcomed twin girls after only 23 weeks of pregnancy are now helping other families of preemies by sending them an unexpected gift—a Mr. Potato Head doll.
Eric and Kristin Moan, of Anoka, Minnesota, had their daughters Dylan and Haden five years ago. A NICU nurse at the time suggested they use a stuffed animal to compare it to the tiny newborns, as a way to track their growth over time.
Eric, 39, bought a pair of Mr. Potato Head toys, and he and Kristin, now 37, assigned one to each girl. The dolls became a useful way for them to see how their babies were progressively becoming bigger and stronger.
Family: Eric and Kristin Moan, of Anoka, Minnesota, had their daughters Dylan and Haden five years ago after 23 weeks of pregnancy and used Mr. Potato Head toys to track their growth. Dylan is pictured as a newborn next to her doll
Idea: A NICU nurse who suggested Eric and Kristin use a stuffed animal to keep track of their daughters’ size, and the parents ended up using a pair of Mr. Potato Head dolls. Haden is pictured with her toy as a newborn
For four months, the parents took photos of the twins next to their Mr. Potato Heads and showed the resulting pictures to their loved ones.
‘It gave us something to look forward to,’ Kristin told Today. ‘People were curious how the girls were doing, and it was our way to share with everyone how they were growing.’
Now, Dylan and Haden are healthy five-year-olds who will begin kindergarten next year.
Their parents have started The Potato Head Project, a non-profit organization that aims to help other parents of preemies, by sharing the tip that worked so well for them.
Together, they send Mr. Potato Head dolls, much like the ones they used with Haden and Dylan, to families of premature babies around the country.
All grown up: Dylan (left) and Haden (right) are now healthy five-year-olds who will begin kindergarten next year and have long outgrown their Mr. Potato Head dolls
Useful: For four months, the parents took photos of the twins next to their Mr. Potato Heads and showed the resulting pictures to their loved ones. The twins are pictured as babies with Mr.-Potato-Head-themed pajamas
Since creating The Potato Head Project in 2013, they have provided more than 1,000 packages to fellow parents.
‘It gives them a sense of hope,’ Kristin said. ‘It gives them something to look forward to while they’re waiting to know when they’ll be able to bring their babies home.’
The parents occasionally still take photos of Haden and Dylan with their Mr. Potato Heads, showing how they can now hold between their hands the same toys that were roughly their size when they were born.
But the twins also appear in pictures next to dozens of other Mr. Potato Head dolls, since they are now old enough to help with the project.
‘They know what isolettes are,’ Kristin said in reference to a brand of incubators used to keep premature babies in a controlled environment, ‘and they know these babies are really sick. They don’t know a world that’s different than everything they went through themselves.’
Supportive: Eric and Kristin have started The Potato Head Project , a non-profit organization that aims to help other parents of preemies, by sharing the tip that worked so well for them. Haden and Dylan are pictured helping with the project
Comparison: The parents found the Mr. Potato Head dolls were useful to fully realize how much their daughters were growing. Dylan is pictured as a baby with her toy
Evolution: Over the months, the girls ended up outsizing the toys that were once roughly their size. Haden is pictured as a baby with her doll
Lending a hand: Haden and Dylan now understand the dire conditions in which they were born, Kristin said, but do not yet realize the impact they have had through The Potato Head Project
On The Potato Head Project’s Facebook page, Kristin and Eric also share photos of other babies who have now joined what other members sometimes call the ‘potato head family’, and send them supportive messages.
Once a year, Kristin also tries to share photos of Dylan and Haden as newborns with their Mr. Potato Head dolls, to remind other parents, as well as herself, how far her daughters and other preemies have come.
She described Dylan and Haden as ‘two little one-pound babies (barely the size of a Potato Head) who in a few short months will turn FIVE years old’ and provided a vivid insight into the lives of preemies and their parents, writing: ‘Dozens of blood transfusions, hundreds of pokes and all of the scars to prove it.
‘Specialists all over the State we see often, and while daily reminders of where we have been get fewer and further between, it is what the future holds for our little girls that keeps us forging on.’
Kristin, who said she and Eric fund The Potato Head Project through, among other methods, financial donations and toy drives, thanked the organization’s supporters and looked back on her daughters’ role in shaping the initiative.
‘While they know of their tragic birth, they know no different,’ she wrote. ‘They know we help the babies, they know the photos and packages well, but what they do not know yet is the impact they have made over just their first few years.’