Magical Babies

Some days are magical. Everything gets done, everybody's happy and things hum along with a beautiful, smooth efficiency. Those days are great and they recharge everybody and get us through the tough days-- tough days like the Monday before last.





That Monday was so tough it's taken a couple of days (well, a week and a couple of days) to recover from it. The day began with a very long to-do list. The kitchen was clean, but that was about it. All the floors were desperately in need of a good vaccuuming before all the dog hair swirled together to form a life-size replica of Katie that would certainly escape through her doggie door and scamper madly through the neighborhood terrorizing cats, squirrels and mailmen alike. Laundry was piled up in all the hampers in all the bedrooms and the cherries from the back yard tree which tasted so good a couple of weeks ago ripened very quickly and fell to their doom where they stayed, baking in the hot summer sun while we were away and now the back patio is covered in sticky cherry goo-- which Biscuit has repeatedly run over (and over and over and over and over) with his scooter and now tracks into the house. Yes, it is lovely. You get the picture-- an overwhelming mess, much of it grosser than the usual daily, run-of-the-mill messes -- and, just like a magic show, just when you think you're as amazed as you can possibly be, something even more amazing happens: Bean poop.



Yes, we've done this post before but not like this. Please allow me set the scene a little more colorfully. You can already imagine all the dirt, dog hair and laundry and my frustration exacerbated by the further messiness everybody (Hubby and Biscuit) keep bringing into the house from the patio (and marching up and donw the hallway past the bedrooms, coincidentally while the Beans are trying to nap, but that's another set of woes and therefore another post entirely) and now add to it, add to ALL of it what can only be described as an endless march of poopy diapers.



Endless? Well, perhaps that's a slight exaggeration-- but only very slight because there were in just one day eight. Yes, eight. Eight, ocho, huit, 8. Four per Bean. Two were monstrous, two were petite, two were about average, and two were complete surprises (those were both from Pooki). The house smelled like poop all day. Oh, how we suffer!

In the end, all was well. And even clean. But that's why it's been so long since I've posted to you, dear blog. Sorry for the snub-- you know you're always on my mind. Now, I must go-- I smell something funny...

Don't Read An Unjustifiable Rant

Dear Hubby,

Again this year, you've asked me what I want for my birthday. Here's the short list:

Obedience. From you. Do what I ask when I ask and don't give me a bunch of flap because honestly, I'm just not that interested. When I want your opinion I'll take the bit out of your mouth.

Is this too much to ask? It's only one measly little thing and the best part is that it will cost you NOTHING out-of-pocket. All you have to do is exactly what I want, except for those times when I say I don't want you to do something (like do the dinner dishes or bring me coffee in bed) in which I will expect you to understand that "no, honey, you don't have to do that" means "YES! do it NOW and make it snappy!!!"

I've also decided that I'm tired of doing laundry and preparing food every day, so I'd like you to do that, too. And you know those times when I beg you to take the Beans for a stroll so I can vaccuum because when I vaccuum around them they totally freak out and SCREAMSCREAMSCREAM inconsolably? Instead of that, I'd like you to take them out and vaccuum so that I can read a book. Because although I so very much enjoy vaccuuming and could never consider it a chore, I really should keep (what's left of) my mind sharp so that I can be a better partner to you :) HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!

And let's talk about dusting. Dusting is when I take a cloth or ten and walk around the house cleaning dust off of things like the TV I practically never watch, the books I never get to read, the projects piled on my desk that I have no time to touch, and all the Craps that permanently inhabit our house. I'd like you to do that, too.

Then there's the matter of the stinky Diaper Genie. I'm tired of Doody Duty so please see to that, too.

Oh, and I'd like a couple of light bulbs. You know the light bulbs that burnt out in the garage the week after we moved in here? And how I have to walk across the garage floor at night with my arms straight out in front of me to get to the dryer or the door, and have to take really big, marching steps to make sure I don't stub my toe on the shoes you left out there? Yeah, if you could replace those, that would be greeeeeaaaat. Okay?

I'll stop there for now. Remember how I was giggling this morning over what I was going to post today? This was it. This is what I decided I wanted for my birthday while cleaning up the coffee that overflowed from the coffeepot and ran all over the counter because of-- what did you call it? Oh yeah, the "stupid coffeepot". Really? It's the coffeepot's fault? The coffeepot malevolently unseated itself from its happy little home in squat-and-receive position after you carefully set it there last night, figuring he'd show you who's boss? There's no operator error in the equation? Is this like the time you blamed the Bean you were holding for spilling coffee ALL OVER THE BED one morning? Who was holding the Bean? Who wasn't watching where the little Bean appendages were flying? And who ended up cleaning that mess?

Oh, wait there is ONE more thing. I would like for you to delete the phrase, "Do you think this is still good?" (said while holding up something from the fridge/ counter/ cabinet for my inspection) from your vocab. Yes, it was really funny (for you) to keep asking that of me the first eighty-nine times you used it after I politely asked you to please knock it off and then told you to shut the hell up. If you quit saying that, I might be able to let the entire obedience thing go. That's how much I hate you asking me that. If you don't know don't ask me anymore, because I'll tell you that it's ALL good and then you can get your own food-poisoned self to the hospital because I'll be too busy rolling on the floor laughing because a) you actually had the nerve to ask me that question AGAIN, and b) you were dumb enough to believe my answer.

That's all for now. Fortunately you'll understand, since you're really the only person on Earth who gets me. I know you won't give me what I want, but I'll always enjoy attempting to manipulate you into doing my bidding. Love you, and Happy Birthday to ME!!!! I'm sure I'll enjoy getting to do all that housework by myself :)

Bean Kisses

Hubby and I met in college and once, during our first round of midterms together, I fell asleep on him at about noon after pulling an all-night studying session the night before. I ended up drooling in his armpit and that’s probably the moment he knew I was the girl for him. I learned something significant that day: if love can conquer drool, what does it possibly have to fear? I think it’s fortunate that Hubby has a thing for drooly girls. Because now, he has three.

Pipsi has a bit of drool on her chin. She also has some on her cheeks, her shirt, and it’s dribbling out of her mouth right at this moment. Drool is constantly leaking from that kid. It’s pretty cute and I never have to worry about losing her-- I can just follow the slippery trail. And, the Beans have recently begun bestowing kisses. Big, huge, slobbery, open-mouthed, tongue smearing, drool trailing kisses. All over the place. One of Pipsi’s favorite places to kiss her Mommy is on the butterfly. I have a tattoo of a small butterfly on the back of my left shoulder and she’s decidedly in love with it. She wants to marry it. How do I know? Because she kisses it ALL THE TIME. Not just once or twice a day. ALL THE TIME.

The Beans also kiss each other. That's cute not only simply because it's a baby kissing another baby, but also because they leave little drooly spots all over each other. Pooki kissed Pipsi right in the middle of the back this morning. No, please don't tell me that I'm misinterpreting a foiled attempt by one Bean to bite the other. It was definitely a kiss and there was the big wet smudge on the back of Pipsi's dress to prove it.

It's certainly nice to see a little bit of love balancing out the fighting over toys. Just like the drooling, I know it's a stage that will eventually pass-- though probably not as quickly. My hope for the future is that the love outweighs the fighting at least most of the time. Maybe they'll even get lucky enough to someday (in their late, late twenties and after grad school) find a guy who thinks their drooling is as cute as their daddy does. A mom can hope...

Two Against One

Tonight I can lay my exhausted, throbbing, weary head to rest on my pillow (which smells just like old baby formula, by the way) assured of the fact that my little Beans will not be mortal enemies forever.

Over the past couple of months, Pipsi has made known to the entire world, or at least to the entire neighborhood since we've been keeping the doors and windows open, her utter displeasure at having her sister in her personal space. Pooki, meanwhile, thoroughly enjoys sharing everything with Pipsi and really isn't interested in playing with anything unless Pipsi has her hands on it. This can be very tiresome for whomever is watching them, and that's usually me. They require constant supervision (of course) and more than a few diversionary tactics in order to maintain a modicum of P & Q.

Mornings can be particularly challenging. Both Beans need naps by nine o' clock. They need to be in their cribs, Binking with a Blankie by the time the big hand is on the twelve. Every morning when they start getting cranky (at about eight) I hear the Phantom of the Opera in my head, saying his bit about "If these demands are not met, a disaster beyond your imaginations will occur!" Not the most beautifully constructed piece of scripting ever written, but it captures the sentiment pretty accurately.

This morning was no exception. Both Beans were in the Playground squirming around and acting like they needed to be spray-painted green and sent to live in a garbage can on Sesame Street when I ran to the back of the house for two minutes to visit the potty. I emerged ninety seconds later and, hearing no screams, neither the bashing of heads into plastic nor thumping on the floor and none of Pipsi's dramatic grunts or moans of malcontent, I snuck over to my desk in the family room to check my email. I got the screen up and opened the tab when I realized that I heard... nothing. Nothing at all. And something had to be wrong.

I shot up from my hunched-over position in front of the computer screen and scooted quickly around the dining room table (yes, we have a dining room set in the kitchen where we should have a kitchenette but our dining room is instead our library because neither of us can stand life without our books-- but that's anther post) and peeked around the wall separating the kitchen from the living room, expecting to find Pipsi underneath Pooki or contraband (I don't know what, but it only takes about a tenth of a second for a paranoid mom's mind to go berserk in panic) shoved in their windpipes and both babies blue on the floor, or I don't know what horrible scene laid out before me.

And I caught both Beans red-handed. They know they're not supposed to play with the wipes, and I can only guess that the second they found the box without Mommy's eyes on them, out came the forbidden wipes. They had them in each fist and scattered out around the floor and on the toys closest to them. They were trying to chew on them but once they got them up to their mouths they made a face that said, "Ew! That's icky!" then pulled them away, reconsidered them, then gave them another taste to find them just as un-delicious as they were three seconds before.

Gasp! "What are you doing, little Beans?" Both Beans immediately looked up at me, then simultaneously looked at each other. The little partners in crime then took entirely different tacks. Pipsi immediately dropped hers, smiled at me, and then turned to play with the car as though she was pretending that the entire thing never even happened. Pipsi's like that. I can tell her no and she'll look at me, drop whatever she has in her hand (wipes, paper, cookies, a lock of hair, a fistful of sisterflesh), smile, and play with something else. No problem, Mommy. The world is full of stuff for me to touch! I was just going to touch this other stuff right over here.

Pooki is not like that at all. When Pooki hears the word no, she goes on lockdown mode. The contraband is encased in a steel-trap fist and she literally throws her body on top of it in an effort to hide it from me. The item she's craziest about is her hairclip. I can't tell you the number of times I've had to practically pry it out of her hand. Now I just wait until she has it in her mouth and take it out of there, although that's getting trickier now that she has all those teeth. One of us may very well lose a finger one day soon. And then how will I get that out of her mouth?

Anyway, the cuteness factor was definitely very high for a couple of minutes there. But then I got to wondering during those last few minutes before Happy Nappy. Today it's wipes, tomorrow... what? Cookies? Dog food? The World?!?! And when they're caught at something truly heinous, will Pipsi have any problem maintaining her own innocence while throwing her twin under the bus? Will I ever stop worrying about these ridiculously impossible scenarios and let my kids live anything approaching a normal life?

I don't know. All I know is that I love Happy Nappy. And if the Beans occasionally want to give each other wipe baths I shouldn't stress about it. After all, there are worse things that could happen. And I sould be so happy of the fact that occasionally they'll come together to do something besides destroy each other. I just hope that they don't ever decide to destroy me.

Well-Travelled Beans

What's scarier than toting a tween and infant twins to Costco or the mall for an afternoon? Toting them across the country for a few days.

We started bringing the Beans out in public when they were very small. I think I soloed to the mall with them for the first time when they were about five months old. It really wasn't that bad. There was no pooping, screaming, barfing or melting down. If anything, they seemed to like it. It was nearly impossible to get into or around any of the stores but that wasn't really the point of the exercise. I really just wanted the Beans to be as easy-going and flexible as possible when it came to travel or a variation in the daily routine. We also walk around the park a lot in the stroller and I take them to the grocery store for dinner ingredients almost daily, so they're very used to getting out and seeing new people.

It all seemed to have paid off last week. We got to take the Beans with us to Hubby's son's graduation back East (sadly, Biscuit was still in school, so he didn't come this time and was sorely missed by everyone). So, not only did we get to see one of the coolest kids on the planet graduate from high school and hang out with him and his awesome mom for a few days, the Beans got to be there for it too, and they did absolutely splendidly-- up until the last four hours.

Seeing as how everything happens on the East coast three hours earlier than it does here, and since we were only there for four days, Hubby and I decided to keep the Beans on their California schedule. A wise move. Though it meant that we didn't really get up until 10 am local time and weren't able to get out the door until at least 11 or closer to noon, the little Beans were able to last until later in the evening and they had plenty of energy to smile and flirt and generally be their adorable little selves. They were even considerate enough to save their poop for early in the morning or at the end of the day when we were conveniently in the hotel and able to take care of it relatively easily. What perfect little angels!

Except for Saturday. I know what you're thinking: "One day? Only one day out of the whole vacation? Wow, you are one lucky duck!" Right. But Saturday was our day in the air. We were somewhere over Kansas when we noticed that Pooki (the stealthy pooper, remember) smelled a little off. Have you ever tried to change a monstrously stinky, gigantically poopy diaper at 32,000 feet in an airplane bathroom? Did you even know planes have changing tables? I didn't-- until Saturday. And I was fine just plodding along through life without ever having to put that nugget of wisdom in my pipe and smoke it, thank you.

Honestly, I don't know why engineers bother to put "changing tables" in the plane lavs. It must be a law and they must have done the bare minimum to meet the requirement. Seriously. I completely understand that space is at a premium on a plane, but come on! The Beans aren't that big to begin with. As babies go, they're both in about the 65th percentile for height and weight. And neither one fit on the platform without turning them diagonally so that their Bean noggins were directly in front of a vent blowing cold air directly in their faces. Imagine my chagrin when I closed the door, unfolded the table, and tried to turn around. Wasn't going to happen! Where do I put the diaper bag? On the floor? Of an airplane lav? I don't think so. Not if I ever want to touch it again. I tried hanging it on a hook and caught it just in time to keep it from falling on the Bean's head. And so it was that I cleaned about eight pounds of poop off of the diagonally-positioned Bean bottom with the diaper bag over my shoulder and one foot on the toilet and got not a spot of poop anywhere it didn't belong and, more importantly, kept the squiggly, squirmy little Bean from falling to her doom from the "changing table" to the floor. Yippee.

And so it was that I was feeling very accomplished and confident as I emerged from the lav to find Hubby standing near the door with the other Bean. No, she wasn't poopy, but it had been a few hours since she'd been changed and since we were already there we swapped babies and I changed the other one (admittedly not as carefully because she wasn't poopy, a move I would intensely regret in just a short time) while Hubby chatted up the flight attendants. He enjoyed that-- because you know, no woman can resist a guy with an adorable, flirty little baby strapped to his chest. Sometimes a guy just needs to have a little fun.

Anyhow, we finished up and returned to our seats. The flight was getting a little bumpy over the Rockies and the captain turned on the FASTEN SEAT BELTS sign, so we strapped in and, of course, Pipsi started grunting. Really grunting. No problem, I thought. I just changed her and everything should be peachy keen. We'll get over the mountains and I'll scoot up to the front and take care of business. If only that was how it had happened.

We were still just under an hour away from landing. But the flight didn't smooth out. There must be something about the excitement of Vegas, where we were landing to change planes, that gets into the air and makes for a wild ride. I don't know. Maybe it's anticipation, or the ups and downs of the blackjack table, or all the hot air Celine Dion pumps into the atmosphere when she talks about herself, but we bobbled around like an apple in a water barrel for the rest of the ride. Ordinarily I wouldn't have minded but the smell emanating from Pipsi's bottom was unpleasant not only to me, but for everyone seated within a ten-row radius. It was ripe, rank, and reeky. This surprised me, honestly, because while Pipsi is dramatic in her bowel movements, they're not usually quite so stinky. It was when I repositioned her, removing the sweatshirt I'd used to cover her in an effort to minimize the stinkiness, that I realized that her pants were wet. This was not good. We were twenty-five minutes from landing and Pipsi's pants were fouled in the worst way possible. Wet poop. And it wasn't just on her.

It's funny. The TSA employee who'd examined the diaper bags when we first arrived at Dulles for check-in had commented that we were "very prepared". And I thought we were. We had two extra pairs of pants, four shirts and a handful of bibs, extra bottles, toys, and a couple of bags of Cheerios and jars of baby food with their own spoons from home and bottles of hand sanitizer. But I never considered bringing a change of clothes along for myself in case the Beans pooped on me.

What happened? Eventually we landed and got off the plane, trailing the stench of poopy pants behind us. Eventually we changed Pipsi's diaper and clothes and she smelled great and smiled her beautiful smile and fell asleep. I desperately scrubbed at my pants with baby wipes and eventually just pretended that I wasn't the one who smelled like poop, occasionally looking around and frowning a little like I was trying to figure out the source of the poop smell and maybe (hopefully) looking innocent.

All things considered, even though we had a not-so-auspicious finish to the trip, the vacation as a whole was certainly a thoroughly enjoyable success and we would do it again in a New York minute. We lived, we laughed, we loved, we smelled like poop-- and we had a great time. And congratulations again to the newest, bestest grad in the family!!!!

What I've Learned The Hard Way

All morning I've been racking my brain trying to remember if there was anything that happened in my life that may have prepared me for having twins. Or if there was anything I did that made me deserve it.



Offhand I couldn't remember anything (as a side note, I think I'm still in the throes of pregnancy brain-- if I remember anything from the past eighteen months I don't think I'd ever let Hubby back in the house). So I can safely say that, if nothing else, this has been a tremendous learning experience. And most of that learning has happened the hard way.



This week has been particularly challenging. All throughout my pregnancy I hoped that I wouldn't have a spitter. But I got one. A spitter who is also a biter. What fun. I'm sure we'll be very popular in playgroups. Once. Feeding is a joy! What shall we have for lunch today, Pooki? How about razzberry Cheerios with razzberry yogurt and razzberry applesauce? Does that sound spittably delicious? Biscuit didn't understand why I was feeding her so much razzberry everything. Then he was home once for a feeding. Now he gets it. Everybody gets it. They get it all over them. I don't even bother showering in the morning anymore. I just hose it all off at night before climbing exhausted into bed. That's something I've learned the hard way.



The Beans are seriously fighting over toys now. That's great. I learned that each one gets a particular look on her face when planning to invade the other's personal space to swipe a toy. I've learned that distraction is a useful tool. They've learned that the toy given them as a distraction is a useful tool, too. I've learned not to distract them with toys that are heavy, blunt or sharp enough to hurt the side of a Bean's head when they come into contact. Unfortunately I learned that the hard way too.