The conjoined twins who were separated at Medical City Children's Hospital in Dallas are expected to be released from the hospital Wednesday, eight months after their surgery.
Medical City announced Monday that Owen and Emmett Ezell are expected to be released to a local inpatient rehabilitation center this week.
To celebrate the twins' health and success, a small celebration is being planned on Wednesday prior to their departure. Ahead of that celebration, the hospital and Ezell family released two new photographs of the now 9-month-old boys on Tuesday -- one of the pair sitting up in their bed and one of them both with their mother.
In the past the hospital had said the boys had to pass three major hurdles to go home -- eating and breathing on their own and fully healing from their surgical wounds.
"This is the next step to getting the boys home with their family," the news release said.
The hospital said Monday the twins are breathing on their own through a trachea breathing tube and that they are no longer being fed through an IV, but they continue to be fed through tubes in their abdomens.
While at rehab, the boys' parents will learn to manage those tubes until the boys can eat on their own.
The boys are expected to be released on Wednesday, but the hospital says as with any fragile patient, the release could change.
The hospital plans to celebrate the twins release at the hospital Wednesday, though the boys will not be there because of their fragile state.
The family has been chronicling the boys' progress, since their separation surgery in August 2013 on The Ezell Twins blog.
The Ezells are selling T-shirts through their blog that read, "The Works of God Displayed in Them, John 9:1-3."
The funds donated go into a trust fund set up for Emmett and Owen and their direct care.
—Elvira Sakmari, NBCDFW.com