Wedding Season

Its Wedding Season! This is great news for an extrovert like me. This is not so great news for an introvert like my husband. But thanks to the wonderful Myers-Briggs, we have recognized our differences and found ways to cope.

Anyhow…we have five weddings to go to this summer- a combination of high school friends, college friends, people who used to be in our discipleship groups, etc. I love weddings because I get to see people I don’t normally see and there’s cake. Awesome.

Well, I have five weddings but in my current state of postpartum (how long can I claim that?) I have one dress. Heh. So if you see me at one of the weddings, just pretend that I haven’t worn that dress at every other wedding this summer. I do have a fun fashion idea but I need one more person to help. So email me if you are interested.

Well….when I started this post I was going to five weddings…but now I’m down to four since J & I both managed to get a stomach bug overnight Friday night. My mom rescued us from the girls all day Saturday and we recovered instead of partying. Sad. But I did recover enough to go to a wedding shower on Sunday. And there was cake there.

And for free:

Can’t…Resist…Cloth…Diapers

I love a fluffy bum!

4 Months Old!

I know some boys who are FOUR months old!!!

Rhys is 11 pounds 11 ounces and 23 1/2 in long. He actually moved up on the weight chart a bit to 7%- and that is on the 4 month chart!

Owen is 11 pounds even. He dropped a smidge on the weight chart but he’s still on the 4 month chart. Plus he was still getting fortified breastmilk at his 2 month appointment and the past two months he has only gotten breastmilk so….all that to say… we are pleased with his progress.

The boys aren’t like 4 month olds (actual age) but not quite 2.5 month olds (adjusted age) either. They are both rolling from belly to back and pushing their shoulders and chests up when on their bellies. They track well and can locate a voice from behind or beside them. They are smiling like crazy and occasionally give us a big laugh. Rhys is really starting to coo and talk to people.

They are the center of attention everywhere we go! People just cannot resist twins! Its ok… I kinda like the attention.

So I think they look different (its the cheeks and eyes) and all you people who only see them in still pictures probably think its easy to tell them apart. But you would be wrong. When they are moving and making different expressions, its quite difficult to always know who is who especially if they aren’t beside each other. Well Rhys now has a red dot (its something vascular I forget what the ped called it) on his chest. Its about the size of a dot you would make with a pen. BUT its something different. So if all else fails, we can now just check out their chests to determine which baby is which.

I Blinked

And went from this (left) to this (right) 

 

 

I turned around and my little baby who was swaddled (straightjacketed according to my dad) turned into a toddler who asked Mommy to fold her in the Furman blanket!

Stop growing up so fast Sienna! I’m having a hard time dealing with the fact that in less than a month… you will be two.

A Typical Day Take 2

Let me explain my I should get more done… as I’m typing my typical day out, I’m thinking where does the time go? What do I do for an hour while the boys sleep and the girls watch their show? Its a whole hour with usually only a few interruptions. Because in reality- my morning chores:

unload dishwasher

make beds

wipe down bathroom

start dinner

start laundry

check calendar

clean up breakfast

get everyone dressed

usually takes me until afternoon! And every time I kept typing clean up- which I felt was a lot- I was wondering why I have to rewash the clothes in the washer because they were left there all day and all night? Again? My weekly list of chores- basic chores like vacuuming and cleaning out the car- never get done. I barely make a dent in my weekly list. That’s what I was referring to when I said I should get more done.

But… I also fight myself. I want to be lazy. I want to do what I want to do (cleaning isn’t it). I have to fight myself every day to keep going and sometimes I win. Sometimes I lose. (You figure out what that means.) I am selfish and I am sinful. And I have to work hard at working hard.

I also think that I fall into the trap of not recognizing all the repetitive tasks I do. Tasks that are necessary and tasks that are important- but repetitive and not something you’d ever find on a to-do list. Buttoning Cinderella’s dress. Making a garden with Legos. Finding the buckets and paintbrushes so the girls can paint the fence with water. Replacing batteries. Patting babies. Singing Do Re Mi. Things that may seem trivial to some but are life to me. I do truly love  what I do. And I’m so thankful to have the chance to stay home with my babies.

Lots of words, not so many pictures. I’ll get back to that soon.

A Typical Day

A while back, Sarah D asked me what a typical day was. Well… here goes

7 – 7:45 wake up and nurse twins while Jonathan gets girls breakfast , eat my breakfast, check email, blogs, etc

7:45-8:15 take shower and get ready while J troubleshoots with kids, boys usually go back down about 8

8:15-9 get girls dressed, do morning chores (make beds, start laundry, unload dishwasher, start dinner, etc), play

9-10 girls usually watch Sesame Street, Super Why or Sid the Science Kid and I work around the house. Or sleep if needed. On Mondays and Wednesdays, my mom comes from 9-12:30 to help me! Yea mom! If she’s here I usually run errands with the girls or do some cleaning I don’t normally get to (which is a lot!).  Or I take a big nap while she’s here. On occasion.

10 –11 nurse twins and play with them while they are awake! Snack time for me and girls

11-12  boys go back down for naps around 11 and the girls and I usually play inside- this is when we color and play dress up and play dough and I throw in some laundry and wipe bathrooms down. Truth be told I’m usually still cleaning up breakfast and snack (Sienna is SO messy!) at this point. But I always have good intentions of getting lots more done.

12-1 fix lunch for me and girls, eat, clean up, read books and girls go down to nap around 1

1-2 nurse twins and take pictures of them! Ha! This is when they get floor time since their sisters are “sleeping”

2-3 put twins down for naps and have silent alone time. I usually just sit and stare into space. Sometimes I do that but usually I check blogs, facebook again and then do my most important to dos for the day (I pick 3 a day which is kind of ambitious). I try to make important calls during this time (yesterday it was my pharmacy coverage- two separate issues took pretty much the whole hour). Sometimes I just talk to Brenna for the whole hour.

3-4 girls up- snack time and play

4-5 nurse twins and girls play outside during nice days. I try to start prepping dinner

5-5:30 put twins down for another nap and ok really try to prep dinner so someone can cook when J gets home

5:30-6:30 J gets home and does something fun with the girls and I cook or he cooks and I  keep the girls out of the kitchen

6:30 one twin (it varies) is usually up by now and we eat dinner

7-8 nurse twins, give girls baths, stories, songs, bedtime for girls, bedtime for twins

8 breathe

8-10:30 try to catch up on everything in my life that needs to be done and prep for tomorrow (finish laundry, load dishes, sweep kitchen, vacuum under S’s chair- did I mention how messy she is??? and our dining room table is on carpet???, etc) If I have to run an errand, this is when I get to go! And I’m usually pretty tired by now so I move a little slower.

10:30 nurse twins and watch House Hunters International

11:15 go to bed

11:15-7 get woken up anywhere from 2-7 times for pacis, blankets (3 year old!), screaming (1 year old!) or thinking I heard something (me!)

7am repeat

I’m typing this out thinking “Gosh I should get more done during the day!” but I didn’t include the 15 diaper changes or the 14 drink pourings that I do every day. I didn’t include the 20 hand washings and the looking for the missing croc. I didn’t include the time outs and warnings.  the early waking from naps and growth spurts. the bloody lips and tantrums. And honestly every task takes me 15 times longer to complete because I am interrupted every 4 seconds during the day.

It takes nearly every bit of energy and every minute of the day to do survival stuff- laundry, dishes, food, grocery shopping, keeping the kids from harming each other. Throw in our fridge not cooling (3 weeks ago) and my whole life is in chaos for days because of the time I had to devote to that. This is why it took nearly 4 months to get the boys’ birth announcements out. And I somehow managed to think taking a leadership role for MOPS would be a good idea.

But.

Its getting better. I’m learning how to streamline better and getting more organized. The boys dropped their early morning feed and while they aren’t sleeping straight through, they usually just need a quick pat and paci to go back to sleep. The girls play well together and independently (most of the time). The boys are just easy. I’m getting my groove back and sufficiently lowering my expectations at the same time.

So…what questions do you have? I know Merritt wanted to know something about how identical the boys will be? Give me some questions and I’ll answer them.

Smiles

The boys have been smiling now for a few weeks but I haven’t caught it on film…till now

I thought Owen was going to be the more serious one but he was just taking his time. He’s got the smiling thing down now and its so much fun. This is the best picture of him smiling that I’ve gotten so far. (He’s grinning at his biggest sister.)

Rhys smiling at Chief!

The boys are both really content babies. Its so wonderful. I prayed hard against reflux and colic and mspi and the Lord has answered my prayers! They are really really happy babies and it is so much fun. I think every mother who has had a fussy/high maintenance/ colicky baby wonders if she’s doing something wrong. I would think is there something I’m not doing- something so obvious that no one thinks to tell me? It was so hard emotionally having babies who were not content. But I’m not doing anything different this time around and my babies are so content. So for any moms that have a hard baby- it really is the baby not you! And they outgrow it. Eventually.