On the twin front, Reese and Ryan are into absolutely everything and I am more exhausted than I have ever been in my whole life. Our house has become an obstacle course of gates that keep them inside and outside of dangerous places in our home.
I'm trying to treat them like "big" kids these days, and so we've been doing big kid things. Like eating in booster seats. We try to use utensils whenever possible. The kids are very proud of themselves and clap after most bites. Hysterical.
{ Gracie is poised and ready to help in case anyone misses their mouth }
We've also been working on putting our toys away in toy boxes or bags when we are done playing with them. The kids are SO into putting things away now. Last week it took my 35 minutes to figure out where Reese put away my car keys (they were in Joe's gym bag). I find a lot of objects put away in funny places, like this.
They are also very into helping these days. Sometimes it is just easier to let them help than it is to try to contain them. Even though by "helping" me they are creating a mess that will take me another 30 minutes to clean.
{ helping me unload groceries }
They are seriously so full of personality these days. They'll go out of their way to make you laugh. Peek-a-boo is pretty much the funniest thing they've ever seen.
Ryan hates wearing socks, or really anything on his feet. When I go to get him out of his car seat, I usually find his shoes on the seat next to him and his socks in his hands. He's, of course, sound asleep because as soon as he's put into anything with wheels that moves, he becomes a narcoleptic.
I've been trying to come up with a SAHM routine that works for us and I'm not really doing so well in that department. Most play places are too hard to navigate with two similar aged kids on my own. There are a few classes I can attend with both of them together, but for the twins it ends up being around $375 for an 8 week session which is, in my opinion, outrageous. So I'm trying new things and hoping to find some stuff that sticks.
Our library's story times are done in groups and require registration. The class for nonwalkers was seriously terrible, and since it is hands on my kids mostly got stuck sitting there watching other kids get lifted into the air since the class was clearly designed for singletons. I was miffed that the instructor spent 8 weeks "modeling" the activities with a plastic doll rather than offering to use one of my kids and lend me a hand.
I signed back up for the gym and daycare about a month ago and that has also gone horribly. Reese has a meltdown of nuclear proportions as soon as I walk out the door. She hold her breath and turns so red that they inevitably come to get me. Last time I went with them I was on the treadmill for 3:48 before the daycare girls came to get me. Awful. I'm hoping if we just go consistently, that eventually she'll stop crying. Or, you know, eventually I'll have a nervous breakdown and it won't matter anyway.
I am bound and determined to create a routine for us at home, and to find time in that routine for me to spend away from the kids as well. Balance is something my life lacks terribly, and if I don't rectify it soon we're in for a lot of trouble when numero tres arrives.
