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Many of my friends with newborn twins ask me tons of questions about infants. How do you get them to nap at the same time? How do you get them to eat at the same time? Do you put them in the same room? Do you put them in the same bed? How much do they eat at a time? Questions questions questions! When I talk to moms of twins my questions are as follows: - Will I ever get my memory back?
- What kind of washable paint do you recommend for my kitchen walls?
- Is it ok to bind my kids legs so that they never learn to walk?
- What time do you have your first drink of the day?
- Will I ever shower before 2:30 in the afternoon again?
- When should I start teaching Wyatt how to change the twins diapers?
- Do all of your kids think that their names are “NO TOUCHING” too?
- What was my first question?
We bought a swing set last weekend from a friend of mine that is moving to Texas. John, Keith, and my friend Sherri's husband Tim moved it from their backyard to our backyard in three trips. John is still working on getting it level and square, but we are really excited about it.
We did a serious amount of shopping today with the boys at the outlet mall. Everyone was tired... including Mom!
I lost my good hairbrush somewhere in the truck last week. I can't remember how it ended up in the truck (possibly hidden in something by Wyatt) but I noticed it when I was driving and I looked in the rear view mirror and saw Wyatt brushing Sammy's hair from his car seat. I recall confiscating the brush and putting it somewhere really safe, but not a clue where that was 2 hours later after the kids and supplies were unloaded from the truck. I looked for it quickly again this morning as I was loading the kids up to take them to the Children's Museum in downtown Pittsburgh, but to no avail. Forever lost I thought. We spent all morning and a bit of the afternoon at the museum and then I got ready to load the kids into their car seats and low and behold I spotted my lost hairbrush. Here's the great part.....it was sitting face up in Jonah's car seat. Apparently he had rode all the way to the museum atop a hairbrush bristles pointed up and never made a peep (in hindsight he did squirm a little when I struggled to strap him in to his car seat which seemed a little tighter than usual....) and pleasantly chatted and gurgled for 30 minutes while I drove along. In the true problem-solving tradition, today we initiated a new tradition called "Booty Call" at the beginning of each trip! So much for the Mom of the Year award!
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These pictures are of Wyatt and my friend Carrie's little girl, Lauren, playing with a HUGE Light Brite today at the museum. They loved it! 
A group picture from the playgroup today!
This week we are hosting playgroup twice! Today was the playgroup of moms with twins and we had 5 adults (including me) and 12 kids (including mine)! Needless to say I had to do some cleaning afterwards! The kids all did great and I am LOVING my first floor playroom! I am taking it as a sign that everyone had a good time today because all of the kids were hysterical when they had to leave...full blown tantrums and tears! I was sad and very proud all at the same time?!? Tomorrow we are hosting the other playgroup at our house. We are doing a Halloween party complete with treat or treating and costumes and the whole nine yards, so it should be fun with lots of good pictures to share tomorrow. I had a tv Mom moment tonight at 11pm when I was embroidering the boys names on their trick or treat bags and making rice crispy treats for tomorrow. I was thinking this is what my Mom must have felt like when I was in elementary school and would casually mention at 8pm that I had a panorama of a log cabin due the next day which was equal to half of my total grade for the whole marking period. Good times! In other news, Sammy's 87% circumference for a 9 month old head is finally starting to spring some new pearly whites!
Apparently this is where we are going to start storing our extra rolls of toilet paper!
Anyone that has ever met Wyatt knows just how much his blue blanket means to him. If he had to choose between me and his blue blanket he would choose me, but only after some serious consideration! He has been sleeping with it since he was 10 months old! Occasionally when I forget to close the gate at the bottom of the stairs and Wyatt sneaks upstairs, I know that I can always find him in the same place. He will be sitting on the floor of his bedroom sucking on his blue blanket after having reached through the crib bars and pulled it through. Sucking on a blanket for hours every day means that the blue blanket can take on quite a foul smell after some time which is why I created a replica of the original blue blanket so that the original can be washed (in bleach) without interrupting any sleep routines. I can't remember when it started (I'm sure that it was John's idea), but Wyatt became attached to sleeping with a glow worm ("baby") as well. There are a few issues with the glow worm sleeping arrangement 1. Wyatt likes to run down the batteries on purpose so that we have to use a screwdriver (which he is obsessed with) and change the batteries at least once a week 2. The glow worm starts to smell like the blue blanket after a while and 3. We couldn't purchase a replica of baby because they changed the design and the new glow worms looked and sounded totally different. So, you can imagine how excited I was at the Mothers of Multiples garage sale to find 3 backup glow worms ($1 each) to use when we needed to wash one of the originals. Thus, it was with great frustration that I came home late at night last week to find that John had put Wyatt to bed with, not 1, but 4 glow worms!!!!! So much for outsmarting my kids! Does anyone know where I can buy 4 backup glow worms?
This is how excited Wyatt gets when we let him stay up a little later than normal at night!
The Wheels on the Cart (sung to the tune of the Wheels on the bus)
This is the way we go to Costco, Go to Costco, Go to costco
This is the way we go to Costco
To get Mommy's flu shot!
- We made it to the pediatric ENT this morning and were only about 10 minutes late. These days I consider 10 minutes late "on time", so I was thrilled to be at the doctor's office on time this morning. This particular pediatric ENT also does hearing tests and there were several older men in the waiting room when we arrived on time. There was also an office phone on one of the coffee tables in the waiting room, so while I was signing us in at the front desk, Wyatt was calling the receptionist at the front desk to tell her that we were there. Thankfully we didn't wait long at all in the non-pediatric friendly waiting room and were ushered back to the exam room after about 25 people admired the boys and how cute they were in their matching outfits. Our exam room contained 2 tv tray type of tables which each held about 100 (no exaggeration) sterile stainless steel instruments for looking into a persons nose and mouth. I immediately whipped out the candy that I had loving packed in the diaper bag for distraction purposes and yelled out into the hall "Is the doctor going to be long, because we may need to wait back in the waiting room?" upon which the doctor arrived and introduced herself thank God! Wyatt is now officially terrified of doctors so he pretended to be a pillar of salt for the next 25 minutes and I was off the hook. The doctor examined Sam with tons of different instruments and diagnosed him with Laryngomalacia. Laryngomalacia is the most common congenital cause of noisy breathing, or stridor, in the newborn. Laryngomalcia describes a condition where the tissues of the larynx (the voice box), above the vocal cords, are soft or floppy. Because of this, when a baby with laryngomalacia breathes, these floppy tissues may fall over the vocal cords and partially block the opening into the windpipe or trachea. This results usually in a high pitched, fluttery inspiratory noise. It can be worse when the baby cries or eats. Laryngomalacia is believed to represent an immaturity of the tissues of the larynx. In the majority of cases, laryngomalacia resolves on its own without any specific treatment. The tissues of the larynx become more firm as the child grows and the stridor usually resolves slowly over the child's first 18 months of life. The stridor may be worse with feeding, because of the increase negative inspiratory pressures associated with sucking, and it is suggested that feeding be done slowly and allow the child frequent rest periods. In small percentage of children with laryngomalcia, the obstruction caused by the collapsing tissues is more severe. This can result in poor weight gain because the baby is unable to eat without developing airway obstruction so they won't eat. It can also cause severe oxygenation problems and even heart complications. In these more severe cases, surgery may be needed to trim away some of the collapsing tissue. Sammy's case is not severe and he does not have feeding difficulties or failure to thrive issues, so we are thrilled to finally have an official diagnosis. This is also exciting because it may mean that Sammy does not have, or will not develop asthma. He also may not have a weakened immune system (as I have always thought). Needless to say we are thrilled that Sammy does not have any serious respiratory complications and he will grow out of his noisy breathing in the next 2 years! **********************************************************************
- I also forgot to mention that at the doctor's appointment this week Jonah weighed in at 19 pounds 4 ounces and Sammy was 19 pounds 6 ounces which is 23% and 25% respectively at 9 months. Wyatt weighed 29 lbs 9 ounces which is the 68th percentile for 24 months. I can't remember their height measurements, so I might repeat that myself at home and see where they are on the growth curve for fun. Wyatt has weighed almost the exact same amount as he did one year ago! It will be interesting if the twins start to catch up with Wyatt in terms of size, then people will really think that I have triplets!
We spent all day today at home inside the house. All of the boys were cranky and tired today and the twins were running fevers on and off all day from their shots yesterday. I am hoping that tomorrow will be better because Wyatt has speech in the morning and then I am taking Sammy to see a pediatric ENT. I made an appointment for the ENT to evaluate Sammy's noisy breathing and see if she can determine the cause. I didn't take any pictures of the boys today so I am posting a cake eating picture of Wyatt from last weekend.
There were 13 immunizations between the three boys today at the doctor office! 5 for each of the twins and 3 for Wyatt! Sammy needed the most sympathy afterward (no big surprise). It actually went well and am hoping that tomorrow the boys will feel like themselves! We have some plans tomorrow, but I am planning on playing it by ear and seeing how everyone feels!
Today was a bust. We all love it when Grandma and Grandpa come and visit, but the day after they leave is miserable with a capital "M"! Wyatt gets all caught up in being lavished with attention from Grandma and Grandpa all weekend and then when they leave I am left with one unhappy little guy! He demands unrealistic amounts of attention all day and when he doesn't get it he acts out. I lost count today of the number of temper tantrums, time-outs, and naps that Wyatt had today. I guess that the only solution is to have Grandma and Grandpa retire and move to Pittsburgh......soon!
Tomorrow will probably not be much better either since all three boys are going to the doctor's office for immunizations. John has been practicing using the doctor kit with Wyatt to help ease his anxiety, but I am not sure how much it will help. Today I caught Wyatt giving his cars shots, so I am not quite sure that he understands what they are really about.
"I can do it" seems to be the theme so far as a two year old.
Here the boys are dressed up for Grandma and Grandpa.
Could they be any cuter? 
Ok, so apparently Sammy sleeping on the counter yesterday did not mean that he was really tired, but that he was going to have a full-blown fever of 102.7 today! Yipee! Sadly, this is so normal for us that we went about our regular day like nothing was going on. Wyatt had speech, we went to playgroup, we went to Barnes and Noble, and then spent the rest of the day at home. I am starting to think that Sam runs a fever when he is cutting teeth. We have doctors appointments for all three boys next week, so I will ask about it then. In other news it cooled down a lot tonight and we turned the heat on. I put all of the boys in warm fleece pajamas before bed just in case it got cold in the house before the heat kicked on. Then Wyatt learned a new trick....unzipping his jammies and taking them off, which is a perfect trick for these cold fall nights! Anyways, he didn't know what to do when I took his pajamas off and put them on backward with the zipper in the back. He looked down for the zipper, looked up at me and said "all gone"! Score: Mom = 1 Wyatt = 0
We had playgroup this morning and I guess that Sammy was pretty worn out, because he fell asleep on the counter after he finished his bottle. It wasn't even quiet in the kitchen, so he must have been really tired. The last time that he did that was when he was about 7 weeks old! It looks like my plan to get them all napping at the same time is working perfectly!!!!!!
Today I gave Sammy his first haircut. He needed some ear holes cut in his hair because I was worried that he might be missing some of our conversations from lack of hearing. He sat really still and it was pretty easy. Just for fun I slicked his hair back afterward and styled it so that I could get some glamor shots of him. I have no idea who he looks like, but we think that he is pretty cute!
Jonah has perfected the military crawl and he is quick too! If we forget to shut the basement door for even just a second, he is on it crawling as fast as he can to try and commit suicide I presume. I feel like I have to start baby-proofing all over again, which is funny because I am still trying to baby-proof for Wyatt (which is a lost cause...). I have fantasies that the twins will be less gadget-oriented than Wyatt, so baby-proofing will actually work with them. Sammy does not seem to have the kind of personality where he will get into everything, but my little McGyver.....now that might be another story!
What a big help!
Lately it seems like the boys all nap together for a long time in the afternoons if we jam pack the morning with a lot of activities. Today we went to story time at the library and got home around noon. The boys all ate, got changed, and went down for a nap until 3pm!!!!! It is a lot of work to get out in the mornings (I have to pack the diaper bag the night before) and I usually don't look so good, but I think that it is worth it so that I have some down time each afternoon! Hmmmmm I may be onto something!
Today was a perfect birthday for Wyatt. We packed a lot into our day including:
Speech therapy, library, lunch with Dad at a hot dog shop, nap time for the boys, watching the bus, wagon ride around the subdivision, dinner with Keith, cake, gifts, bath, and bedtime. What an amazing two years it has been!
