If you are looking for evidence of miracles, look no further than nine-month old Southampton twins Lailah and Sierra Simons.

Watching them giggle and practice crawling, it's hard to imagine that just a few months ago they were born severely premature and weighing just over three pounds, collectively.

For their parents, Jermaine and Kerry Brown Simons the morning of April 14, 2006 started out normally if somewhat wetly.

Mrs. Simons, originally from Columbia, Maryland, went work as Pompano Beach Club assistant manager. Her husband, Jermaine, caught a ride in to work because the weather was bad. It was his first day on the job.

Mrs. Simons' twins were due August 5, 2007.

"I found out I was having twins on my first exam," said Mrs. Simons. "Jermaine dropped me off that day and was coming back later to pick me up. I called him and said, 'are you driving? Are you at a stop light?' I didn't want him to freak out and have an accident. But he took it really well."

By mid-April, Mrs. Simons was five and half months pregnant. For the second day in a row she found herself leaking fluids.

"The day before, I went to the hospital and they checked me out," she said. "They said I was okay, and they sent me back home and told me to take the rest of the day at home and keep my feet up. "

But that morning the leaking returned and Mrs. Simons decided to go back to the hospital.

"I left work in hysterical tears because I knew something was wrong," she said.

At the hospital, the news was not good.

"They did an exam and found I was two centimeters dilated and 100 percent effaced," said Mrs. Simons. "I was so scared and Dr. Emma Robinson said 'we need to get you off the Island'."

Flying Mrs. Simons off the Island turned out to be more complicated than one would expect, however. The weather was extremely bad on the East Coast.

"Dr. Robinson tried really hard to get me a flight off the Island," said Mrs. Simons. "Colonial was my insurance company and they were absolutely amazing. The nurses at the hospital were great. I was so scared.

"I called Jermaine at the hospital and told him what was going on. It was his first day and he'd only been at his job for an hour. He hadn't taken his bike to work he got a lift in because it was pouring with rain.

"So he had to get a lift to the hospital. His parents Claire and Timmy Simons came an hour later."

It was decided that Mrs. Simons would be flown to The Washington Hospital Centre, Washington DC, partly because her parents lived close by, and because the hospital in Baltimore didn't have a bed.

But once the decision was made, Mrs. Simons had to wait almost two days for the weather to clear.

"They were worried about whether we could land on the East Coast," she said. "While we waited I couldn't eat or drink anything. I was on an IV drip.

"When they flew me out they had to switch everything from the Bermuda Hospital to their care," she said. "Every IV had to come out. Everything had to be redone. They put me on a stretcher. They put me on the runway. A guy in a car came out and looked at my passport. They snapped me into the side of the plane. I thought, well if the plane goes down, I'm obviously going with it."

The plane was small, and there was only enough room for her husband to go with her. She had to leave one bag behind.

In Washington DC doctors got Kerry stabilised and she was moved to a regular maternity ward.

Six days later, on the morning of April 22, Mr. and Mrs. Simons had only just decided on the name 'Sierra' for their second twin when alarms sounded.

Mrs. Simons found herself, in the blink of an eye, in excruciating labour.

"It was like an episode of ER," she said. "All the sudden all these alarms started going off. Jermaine went off into the hallway and found a nurse."

Doctors and nurses wasted no time.

"They took me to the operating room," said Mrs. Simons. "The nurse said she could feel Lailah's foot.

"She said 'well this isn't going to be a regular delivery. You are going to need an emergency c-section'. She was so calm. The Washington Hospital Centre is just an amazing hospital."

Doctors tried to give Mrs. Simons an epidural but given the short time frame, quickly gave up.

"I was hysterically crying and shaking," said Mrs. Simons. "They put one of those hairnets on me. Jermaine was actually videoing the thing.

"They tried to do the epidural, but I was so tense they couldn't get it in. I couldn't do it because I was in so much pain and I was so scared."

Mr. Simons had only just scrubbed up when he entered to find Mrs. Simons being put under general anaesthesia.

"You can stay for an epidural c-section, but not general anaesthesia," she said. "The next thing I knew I woke up and it was about 45 minutes to an hour later and the babies had been delivered. Lailah was one pound 8 ounces, 12 inches long and Sierra was one pound and 13 inches long. They both were intubated. They were so tiny."

But the good news was they were both alert, and their Apgar scores were good for their circumstances.

"To make a long summer very short, they were in the hospital until July 31," said Mrs. Simons. "A week after they were born they both had a patent ductus arteriosis (PDA) ligation surgery.

"It is a very common surgery with preemies, because their heart valves stops them to being able to breath as well. So they snip this valve."

Surgeons went in from the babies' backs to perform the surgery so, today, the girls only have a tiny scar under their left shoulder blade.

"They both had those surgeries at Children's National Hospital, which was amazing," said Mrs. Simons. "They were both fine. They had their ups and downs but they progressed."

Throughout the summer, Mr. Simons flew up to see his daughters.

The Simons were not able to hold the girls at all until almost two months had passed and they were finally extubated.

One of the scariest moments for Mrs. Simons was walking in to find staff reviving Sierra.

"She was purple,' said Mrs. Simons. "I almost fainted. I started crying and they rushed me out of there. When I came back in she was pink and perky and wide-awake. Sierra was the sicker one.

"This happens a lot with preemies. She just wasn't doing that well this morning. I always believed she was going to make it because of Jermaine. Every day he was like: 'you are going to be fine. Everything is going to work out for the best. Everything happens for a reason'."

Luckily, the twins had good strong hearts, but like most preemies, their lungs needed time to mature.

Mrs. Simons said the twins were lucky enough to find themselves in an amazing neonatal intensive care unit (NICU).

"The nurses all loved the babies," she said. "The nurses there said that sometimes the mothers don't come back for their babies at all, much less visit every day."

Mrs. Simons was 24-years-old when the twins were born and her husband was 23. They were married just after Christmas 2007.

"Having the babies changed my life," she said. "We're both a lot more mature now."

When Lailah and Sierra were eventually discharged from the hospital they weighed around six pounds each. They remained in the United States for a few more months until it was safe for them to fly in September. When they finally came home to Bermuda they weighed around nine pounds."

Nobody really knows why the twins were born so early.

"I did get shots when I was in labour while in Bermuda to help with their lung efficiency," said Mrs. Simons. "Before I went into premature labour, I took all the prenatal vitamins, and took extra iron.

"Doctors said they didn't know why it happened, I was just really tiny. They don't know if I would have gotten much bigger. It would have happened at some point if it hadn't happened then."

Mrs. Brown was told that if she had given birth when she first went to the hospital in Bermuda, the twins would not have made it.

"Doctors told me that if they had been born the day I had arrived in the United States their chances were slim and the doctors would have had to make a decision whether to resuscitate them," she said. "When they came out, they had to revive them.

"But because I was able to keep still with my feet up for six days with no food, that saved their lives."

Before they left the hospital, both twins needed surgery on their eyes, which is common with preemies.

"In the early months they had to have a heart monitor to make sure they didn't suffer from sleep apnea," Mrs. Simons said. "When they came home they only had to be on a monitor in the car when I couldn't see them, or when they were sleeping."

The worry was that they would fall into too deep a sleep and forget to breathe.

"They never stopped breathing," said Mrs. Simons. "I am so lucky that they are healthy. The paediatrician says they are growing great. They were both on a preemie infant formula. They were on that up until about a week ago. Sierra had to switch off it because she was having horrible gas, so I had to put them on a lactose free formula. Lailah stopped with it last week.

"The doctor said it is amazing how alert and attentive they are. Their eye contact is good. Even though they are six months corrected age, they are about nine months old."

They are rapidly becoming so mobile that they have a tendency to head butt each other in an attempt to get somewhere. Perhaps it will later be said that they always were in a rush. Sierra now weighs 13 pounds nine ounces and Lailah weighs 12 pounds 13 ounces.

"They are definite miracles," said Mrs. Simons. "I am in communication with the head doctor at the Washington Hospital NICU, and he is amazed at how well they are doing. Our social worker at the hospital said she had never dealt with a nicer family and a nicer insurance company."

Lailah and Sierra are cousins of Royal Gazette reporter Jessie Moniz. They were due to be born the day after her own daughter was due. Instead, they beat her by approximately four months.