Post-Weekend(ish)

Where one goes...

...the other follows.  They take turns being the leader and the follower, but it's always the same; where you find one, you will find the other.

This weekend it was into our bedroom, which apparently was THE place to be.

Yeah, those sheets may or may not have been sitting there waiting to be folded for about two weeks.  Just ignore them and move on, buddy.

Brooklyn is still winning in the hair department.  But look!  (Closely!)  Caden has actually been getting a lot of hair.  Relatively speaking.

The main fascination was the window.

Though Caden also rekindled his relationship with the mirror.

 

"Guess what?  You have to wash this now!"

We were sick again (colds...though it's amazing how a cold can knock you out.  Especially when there are little people around that DON'T LET YOU FREAKING SLEEP.  Though in their defense, it was because they were also sick and couldn't breathe, which is actually a pretty legit reason to keep waking up), so mostly we done hung out at home.  (Hence the 2879 photos I took over the weekend.  Something to do besides stack up another tower of blocks + avoiding any real work I should be doing.  Good work, me.)  

The ottoman was also a favorite place to hang out, and make goofy faces.

"Mine!"

"Let me be all adorable and twin-like and tell you a secret..."

"Just kidding!  Imma eat your ear!"

Daddy was available for cuddles when stuffy noses got to be just too much.

Also, Caden's turn to figure out the stairs.  (Please note the safety net poised below.)  He climbed up to the first step last night and up the first few steps today...we'll see if the interest continues.  (Fingers crossed for NO since I'm avoiding buying a baby gate.)  

"Dude, I got this."

Now prepping for Thanksgiving (buy ALL the food!  Vaccuum!  Dust!  Clean bathrooms!  Put toys away somewhere!  Anywhere!) and attempting to get over this stupid cold *cough cough*.  

Fingers crossed they can breathe and stay asleep tonight.  

Nine Months

Life, Lately

This pictue pretty much sums up our happenings around here.  Babies always thisclose to me, thisclose to each other (actually, usually on top of me and/or each other), and toys everywhere.  Also, it's usually slightly blurry around here.

+++++

What should you do when you get home and your brother is sleeping peacefully in his car seat?

Why, wake him up of course.  Gently, like, by grabbing his arm and face.  And smacking his legs with your hand.

(Caden: Gah!  It's you!)

Not pictured: Brooklyn stealing his pacifier.  Which is probably why she crawled on over in the first place.

+++++

Since they spend 99.99999% of their time on top of or near each other, they tend to grab each other a lot.  At first it was hands and feet (which are apparently delicious), but now they grab fistfulls of each other's cheeks, poke each other's eyes, and stick their hands in each other's mouths.  And they think it is HILARIOUS.  If Tyson or I come at them with a soft, warm, washcloth to gently wipe their face, they are NOT having it, but if Caden tries to rip off Brooklyn's lower lip?  She giggles like none other.  Babies, man.

Of course, it's ridiculously adorable.  As long as you're patroling so they don't ACTUALLY claw each other's eyes out.

+++++

Standing is the coolest.  If either of them are fussy (particularly Caden), all you have to do is stand them up next to something and life.  Is.  AWESOME.  Of course, most of the time they are pulling themselves up and down on anything and everything (Brooklyn a bit more gracefully than Caden.  Until very recently, the best that could be said of his Getting-Down-From-Standing-On-Things skillz was that he was falling...with style.  Or he would just stand forever, since pulling himself up was one thing, but getting back down?  Nah.  I guess I like it just fine up here.) 

Hello winter!  Though don't be fooled, they could care less about the snow.  I tried to point out the whiteness and snow falling the other day to Caden through the patio door, but he was more interested in the door handle (the eating of it) and looking at my pointing finger than looking at, y'know, what I was actually pointing TO.

+++++

We've gotten much more of a routine down, which is nice.  A routine that they are BOTH ON.  Wake up between 6-7 in the morning, eat breakfast between 7-7:30.  Nurse and take a nap for about an hour sometime between 9-10.  Wake up, play, eat lunch sometime between 11-noon (depending on the day), more playtime.  Nurse and go down for another hour-ish nap between 1-2:00.  They wake up fussy, (which, WTF?  You just napped!), but it's easily cured with a snack and/or leaving to run an errand.  Playtime until dinner between 5-5:30 (and usually nurse again between 4-4:30), then baths, books, playtime to wear them the hell out before nursing one last time and going to bed, which is usually between 7-7:30.  It's amazing to me that I can put times to these various things.  Previously it was like a shot in the dark to guess when they might nurse or nap or do basically anything...9:00?  11:00?  Maybe?  And I viewed people who had a schedule ("Oh yeah, we run errands after Michael's 10:00 nap."  What?  His "10:00 nap"?  You can associate his nap with a TIME?!?  We just have like, a nap or two.  Probably.  Hopefully.  Sometime during the day.)  to be some sort of magician.  I had read that other people with twins didn't have much of a schedule until their babies were in the 8-10 month range, so I guess that's true here.  Except now I wrote about it on the internet, so that's all gonna go out the window any day now.

+++++

Speaking of naps, Brooklyn has been awake for at least a half hour while I've been typing this, and playing happily in her crib.  WITHOUT waking Caden up.  WIN.

+++++

And...this is how I found them just now:

It might be hard to tell, but Caden had Brooklyn's pacifier and Brooklyn had Caden's (you can't see it, but it was in her crib).

Victory!

Cuties.

Things People Have Said to Me Since Having Twins

From the crazy to the ignorant, here are some things that have been said to me since finding out we were going to have these two cuties.

1. "Sleep when they sleep."  Do you really think they consistently sleep, for long stretches at the same time?  And even if and when they do, I have about 3493 other things to do...laundry, cleaning (ha!), feeding myself, picking up clothes and toys, going to the bathroom, etc...I don't think I can relax enough to fall asleep!
2. "You're so tiny, your belly must have looked ridiculous!"  "You must have been HUGE while you were pregnant!"  This is sort of a compliment, I suppose, but also one that I have no idea how to respond to.  "Why yes I WAS the size of a whale!"
3. "Are they yours?"  Related to the above, since I think they mean that I look too small to have actually had twins, but again, it's a pretty awkward question to respond to.  In fact, most of these are pretty awkward questions to formulate a response to.
4. "Is it true what they say about twins?  Can they read each other's minds?"  First off, how would I know?  Second of all, they are eight months old.  Their favorite thing about having another small person around all the time is stealing each other's toys, and using the other to climb on things.  Third of all...really?
5. "Were you surprised when you found out it was twins?"  Nope, just what we expected!  We planned it this way, doncha know!
6. "Were you trying?"  Why?  Not only is it none of your business, but what if we weren't?  Do you then think it's funny that we got two babies, instead of just one, which would have been enough of a surprise?  And what if we were?  Are you really just trying to find out if we were using fertility treatments?  I'd rather have you flat out ask me, although, again, none of this is any of your business.
7. "Are they twins?"  I saw my favorite response to this somewhere online: "No, I found the other one in a parking lot and thought, why not?"  I find this question particularly amusing since Caden and Brooklyn have always been so similar in size, hardly being more than a few ounces or even more than half an inch different.
8. "Do you think having twins is harder than having one baby?"  I mean, they practically take care of each other, right?!?
9. "So is a twin pregnancy harder than a regular one?"  Someone actually asked me this.  Since at the time I was measuring well over 40 weeks pregnant, and was only around 32 or so weeks along, I'm not even sure I managed a gracious response.  I don't know how this is actually a question.  "No, it gets easier the more babies are in there!"
10. "Congratulations...and my condolences."  There's no need for that.  Having two does mean more work, but I don't need your sympathy.
11. "Two boys or two girls?"  We get asked this a lot, but never if it is one of each.  It's like people expect that twins are always the same sex.
12. "Are they identical?"  My go-to response for this is, "Nope, it's a boy and a girl", so hopefully they get the hint.  What I really want to say is something like, "Everything but the penis!"
13. "My kids are (x) months apart, so I know what it's like to have twins!"  "My kids are (x) months apart...I think it would have been easier if they were twins!"  To the first: no, no you don't.  You did not have to go through a twin pregnancy or have two babies going through the exact same stages at the exact same times (I actually had a store clerk say this to me once and her kids were three YEARS apart!).  To the second: no again.  I'm not saying that it would be easier to have a toddler and a newborn, but I don't think it's harder.  I'm sure they are both hard, but in very different ways.  I'm also sure that they are both hard in their own way and both easy in their own way at different times.  At the very least, you got to experience having one, single child to take care of for however many months, and that is something that (for better or worse) I will never know.
14. "How lucky, you're done now!"  "Isn't it nice that you can be done having kids?"  Huh, there's apparently a cap now on how many children you can have in America.  It's amazing how many times we've heard this, and the funny looks I get when I bother to explain that we do want more kids.  (Just...not for awhile.)  Also I think people tend to say this because we have a boy and a girl, which implies that having two of the same is somehow less desirable.
15. "What do you do all day?"  "Don't you get bored?"  Let me remind you that there are TWO BABIES here.  And ONE me.  It's anything but boring.  The general list of things I do each day might not be long: laundry, change diapers, nurse, make food, etc., but I do these things approximately 239 times.  Each.  I usually do 1-2 loads of laundry a day (always diapers), but sometimes as many as 5 or 6.  Which then needs to be folded and put away.  They still nurse 6-7 times per day (so 12-14 times total).  (Let me just point out that the average newborn nurses 10-12 times a day.)  There are probably at least 6-7 diaper changes in there...times two.  And you might think, "Oh, a diaper change, that doesn't take very long."  OH YES IT DOES. The other day it took me over a half hour to change both of their diapers in the morning and get them into fresh clothes for the day, since they are now so wiggle-y and don't want to sit still for anything.  It's like a wrestling match every time one of them needs a new diaper.

So what should you say when you see a mom with twins?  Or heck, a mom with any number of children?  Try this: "Congratulations.  They're beautiful."  Bonus points if you add, "Can I help you with that?"  (For example: while there are a lot of wonderful people out there, it is amazing how many people don't even get the door when I'm trying to push the stroller through!  I can do it alone, but it's so much nicer, and seems like basic common courtesy, to get a little help!)

Also just to add, that this isn't to say that I mind or get annoyed talking to people about my twins.  I actually do enjoy it most of the time, if for no other reason than A) I get a little adult interaction and B) I have something to laugh over with Tyson later.  And in the years to come!

Post Weekend

All sorts of new things going on 'round these here parts.

First, Brooklyn decided to climb the stairs.  Though they have both virtually ignored the stairs their entire lives, that all changed on Friday.  Brooklyn crawled over to the stairs, pulled herself up onto the lower one, saw me coming down, and started climbing like it weren't no thang.  Caden cheered her on from below.

They have now gone back to ignoring them again, just leaving me in the mild terror that anytime I run upstairs to do any minor thing (Turn the dryer on!  Throw diapers in the diaper bag!  Grab a new shirt since yours is full of food/spit/slobber!) they will again remember and be halfway up them in the forty seconds it takes me to do said thing.

So there's that.

Saturday morning, we woke to the sounds of the pair of them babbling in their cribs and walked upstairs to find:

this adorableness.

"Y'know what would really make this morning meeting better?  Warm milk."

They continued to have many more meetings in this fashion throughout the weekend, clearly savoring their time after waking up to continue plotting the takeover of our household.

(Spoiler alert: hey guys, you've ALREADY taken over our household!)

I took some pictures on Friday, thinking about how big they looked sitting right up at the table (yeah...how big they looked with their sippy cups and all...), since their trays were being washed.  (Seriously, high chairs?  And the trays?  Those things get NASTY.  Can we invent a self-cleaning version here people?)

But that was no match for Saturday night, when we went out to eat and they sat in high chairs at the restaurant for the very first time.

They thought they were big shots.

What you can't see: they could have practically SHARED a high chair.  There was about eight times more chair than baby going on.  

Caden is pissed that we are eating burgers and fries and all he gets are star puffs.  Brooklyn is just glad there is food.

Seriously, what is this crap?

And there was even a chance to get a little spruced up for the coming holiday.

Cheers!