Song

Caleigh was playing with the doctor set that Santa gave them last year and held the stethoscope up to Rik's chest.

"What do you hear?" Rik inquired.
"I'm listening to your song," replied Caleigh.
"My song?"
With a innocent smile, Caleigh answered, "Yes. It's your heart song."

:::sniffle::: My heart just broke a little.

When You Wish Upon a Star...

Rik and I have always been excited at the thought of taking Alessa & Caleigh to Disneyland. He and I went to Disneyland for a portion of our honeymoon & it was there that Rik had his "I want THAT moment at Disneyland". We were sitting in front of the statue of Walt & Mickey silhouetted by Sleeping Beauty's castle. A ways in front of us stood a dad, with his little one on his shoulders. Partially through the firework show, the little one draped her arms around Daddy's neck and placed her cheek ever so gently on the top of his head. Rik was hooked. Come to think of it, that may have been the moment he decided he wanted little ones of his own :)

We've always debated when to take the girls for the first time. In my opinion, any younger than 4 and Mickey is still just a giant scary rat. You should have heard little 2 year old Caleigh SCREAM when the poor guy in the Rudolph costume walked by during the Christmas tree lighting ceremony. Some of my first, though very fuzzy, memories start when I was 5 or 6. So we agreed that 5 would be a good age & decided that the likely "first time" would be in the fall of 2010.

However, fate has interceded. Laura, all but a sister to me, asked the girls to be her flower girls in her wedding in October (they'll be 4) down in the Long Beach area (within 45 minutes of Dinseyland). We thought to ourselves, "it seems such a waste to be ALL the way down in Southern California just to have to spend the gas money AGAIN the next year". Hear the chipping sound? That's my resolve. Apparently the Santa that visits my parents' house heard it loud & clear as well. Under the tree this past Christmas, we found 2-day park hopper tickets for our family :::chipchipchip::: And to top it all off, we'll be staying at the timeshares that my aunt & uncle belong to so our lodging and food costs will be very minimal :::shatter:::

So we're going to Disneyland after Laura & Ryan's wedding. :) We've delved into the plans wholeheartedly. From watching the little snippets on the travel channel to picking up travel brochures; making a huge deal when a Disney commercial comes on the television to pointing out everything in their story books; making a mouse shaped mark on the kitchen wall and measuring the girls against it for the past 8 months to introducing them to the classic movies (Cinderella, Peter Pan, Song of the South... just kidding) - we're ramping the girls up for the trip. The Taylors are in full fledged Disney mode.

For the most part, it has proven to be a valuable bribery tool. "Girls, you need to eat your green beans/corn/carrots so you can grow strong and tall so you can go..." "TO DISLEYLAND!!!" Yes, they call it Disleyland. It's terribly cute. However, even the most carefully laid plans can come back to smack you in the face.

We were driving in the van the other day trying desperately to finish our errands. The girls had been very patient.

"Alright girls, we have one more stop and then we're going to go home for dinner."
"No, Mommy," Alessa responds, "we're going to Fresh Choice for dinner."
"No, Honey. We're not going to Fresh Choice tonight."
:::enter Disney commercial::: And with the pleading, glisten-y eyes of the very best cartoon princess, she retorts with...
"We are if you just BELIEVE!!!"

:::sigh::: No more travel channel specials for a while.

Observations of a 3 Year Old

This afternoon I received a call from one of my best friends, Meg.

"Christy, it's been one of THOSE days - is the offer to swim in your parents' pool still standing?"
"Absolutely! The girls are unlocked from their room, er, wake up at about 4 so we'll meet you there at about 4:30?"

Meg lives through the twinsanity that I do and on top of it she has adorable little 9 month old Caitlin. The thing that's the greatest about hanging out with Meg & her boys is that our children get along eerily well. There's a reason for that - they are carbon copies of each other. Aside from Meg's boys being about 9 months younger than my girls (alright, and that whole "Y - chromosome" thing") they are exact replicas.

Alessa/Ian is our observer - hanging back to watch everything before acting - but also our little police patrol & quick to right any wrongs the other children may be commiting. Caleigh/Brendan is super cuddly and our little silly heart with a joke, song or dance ready to spring forth. They all get along fantastically well and Meg & I joke that they'll always have a date to any dances.

Meg & her brood met me at my parents and we spent about an hour in the pool before breaking out food for dinner. Food kinda becomes communal when with a group of children :) The children had a grand time splashing in the pool & kicking the ball around on the grass before it was deemed time to get ready to go home.

Meg & I stripped off their wet suits and began the process of dressing all the little ones in pajamas when Meg noticed Alessa staring :::ahem::: AT Ian with a perplexed look on her face. Alessa then pointed:

"They have something coming out of the front of their bottoms - I don't have that."

:::sigh::: My little observant one.

Instant Karma

I have dozens of stories about my girls rattling around in my head, so you'll have to forgive me if the story doesn't quite fit into the current time - I know I'm writing about Halloween and it's almost the Fourth of July. However, I go back to my earlier statement that if I don't write some of these memories down, I'm going to lose them. With that being said:

Life lesson: Do unto others as you'd have others do unto you.

Last Halloween a friend & I decided to meet up for a little play day to get the kids together and get the heck out of our respective dens. We thought, "Hey, the play area over at the Roseville Galleria looks fun. Let's go there."

The outing was not quite the relaxing/fun for the little ones/catch up with an old friend time that we thought it would be. The pluses to the play area at Roseville Galleria are these: the entire area is fenced in with a gate that has a high latch; the entire area is padded (the ground has that spongy rubbery mat stuff & EVERY structure is covered in a 6 inch think layer of foam) and lastly, there is a silly kangaroo statue with an upraised hand (~40" – about first grader height) at the entrance with a sign that states "You may play in this area if you are below my hand" or something to the effect & "Parents must supervise their children at all times". Apparently we weren't thinking very well as it was Halloween, late enough in the day where some schools had let out, and the area has quite a few people who need their parental privileges revoked. Do we see where this is going?

The play area was literally SWARMING with about 50 costume-clad, sugar-filled children. First off, let me say many of the children were NOT below the kangaroo's hand. People, I want my children to be happy and have a great time just like every other parent, but what does it teach your child if you disregard clearly posted rules just because you want to. The rule is not "to be mean" to older kids, it's for the SAFETY of the younger ones. Go take your FIFTH grader - yes, FIFTH GRADERS WERE THERE - to the park to run off some energy.

So, my friend & I spent the entire time trying to keep track of our children in the herd and make sure they didn't get hurt. Let me say we were the exception, not the rule, when it came to active parenting. I watched a lady - on a cell phone, mind you - gesture her third grade "little princess" toward the play area and not even slow her step toward the Starbucks. Wow Lady. After watching your little terror interact with the other children, I'll tell you this: you'd better get your face out of your cup before you have a lawsuit or two on your hands. About 15 minutes later, Ms. Starbucks came back out to sit on the benches in the area - cell phone still firmly attached to her ear.

Coincidentally, it was about this time that "Little Princess" decided that Caleigh was in her path and with one sweep of her wand-welding arm this 8 year old knocked my 3 year old face-first to the ground. I gritted my teeth & waited for a moment. Caleigh looked to me to check what her reaction should be so I said "Up, up! Brush yourself off!". Caleigh got up and continued on her way. Ms. Starbucks decided- about 2 minutes after the incident - to put her caller on hold and shout at her terror, "Harmony (I kid you not- ironic isn't it?)! You need to tell that baby you're sorry!" Harmony threw a quick mumble over her shoulder in our general direction from across the play area and Ms. Starbucks gave me a shrug as well as a "kids will be kids" look before going back to her call. I was so angry! Not that her kid knocked mine down, but at her non-parenting. I wanted to yell, "Your utter lack of interest in anything going on around you infuriates me Woman! Besides, your child is WAY TOO BIG TO BE IN HERE ANYWAY!" I didn't, but I quietly hoped that I would never EVER get her child in one of my classes.

Why am I telling you this? To get sympathy for my Caleigh? Heck no! She's fine - she can take it, she's tough! The reason I'm telling you this is because of what occurred at the very next moment. As Harmony turned her head back the way she was going after the "apology" mumbled in Caleigh’s general direction, a fifth grader inadvertently stepped out in front of her - effectively becoming a wall. Harmony landed flat on her pink tutu - unharmed mind you, remember, the whole thing is padded. The fifth grader shrugged and kept going. Harmony sat there for a moment with lip quivering before sweeping over to her mother in a fit of sobs.

As the late John Lennon once mused, “Instant karma’s gonna get you”…

Wow. Just. Wow.

"The thing that impresses me the most about America is the way parents obey their children."
~King Edward VIII

Ouch. I feel your pain Edward, I feel your pain.

Besides my own 2 monkeys, I have two dozen others that I borrow for a few hours on a daily basis. I'm a preschool teacher and have a full class of 24 four year olds. I know, I'm kind of a glutton for punishment aren't I? But the best part about teaching is they surprise and amaze me on a daily basis. It's amazing to watch them as they progress academically & socially.

It also reminds me on a daily basis that I'm doing a decent job raising my own girls. If nothing else, it shows me what NOT to do with my own children and how blessed I am to have 2 healthy, normally-functioning children. I have 2 "challenging" students who have just been placed in my class because I'm known to have a way with "spirited children" (read: I don't take any of their nonsense and put up with exactly zero of their games). Boy and Girl, as they will be known from this point forward, remind me daily that not everyone is born to be parents.

Girl is not only very defiant toward authority in general, she is outright disrespectful toward adults. I've seen her shout, pull, shove, hit and even spit at various teachers, her parents and even HER GRANDMOTHER. I know I was brought up "old school", but at what point did it become acceptable to a parent to allow your child to act that way toward their elders!?!? I was absolutely appalled to watch her yell at her grandmother and pull her out the door while her parents did nothing to stop it - no feeble words of protestation, no idle threats, not even enough sense to look ashamed of how their child was acting!!! Wow. Just. Wow.

Boy is a child who has issues. It's one thing for a child to lash out when they have been hurt or wronged in some way, it is another thing entirely when Boy will reach out & smack other children in the face or will see if his foot can reach far enough to trip them just because they pass close enough. It's as if not all connections are being made in his head. The word "impulsive" only BEGINS to describe him. That's what makes teaching him so difficult. Boy is a terribly sweet child and is never actually malicious in his actions. He just never thinks about them. To make matters worse, his parents "don't see a problem" and say - alright, everyone together now - "boys will be boys".

However, the impulsiveness provides for some very interesting conversations. Yesterday he raised his hand in class. I have been using positive reinforcement as much as possible and immediately called on him. "Great job, Boy! What a quiet hand! What would you like to say?" Silly me, I thought he wanted to add to our class conversation about "camping"

"Did you know I'm a superhero!?!? Yeah. I can save the world - all by myself, I don't need any grownups." :::sigh::: Wow. Just. Wow.

Swallowing The Frog

There is currently a book about overcoming procrastination that likens the unpleasant tasks we have to complete as "frogs" and states that the best thing to do is to "eat the frog" first. We all have one or a few frogs we have to swallow each day, but if you eat it early you don't have to spend the day watching the frog jumping around before you eat it.

I think laundry is my "frog" and most frustrating of all household chores. I procrastinate and procrastinate until it is MANDATORY that I wash the clothes (read: as of tomorrow, my children will have no more clean underpants). It's because of my procrastination that the whole ordeal becomes more terrible - I now have ~9 loads of wash to do. The horrendous catch with laundry is this: unless you're doing laundry while everyone in the family is nude & the beds are stripped, THERE IS ALWAYS MORE LAUNDRY to be done!!! :::sigh:::

The girls & I sat on the floor tonight sorting their laundry to be washed. They've gotten pretty good at it & like to do "their" job. To keep from losing those little socks, I put all of them in a "delicates" bag with a zipper. As long as I remember to actually zip it up, it works so very well that I can honestly say I have never had one of my girls' socks drop out of my pant leg while in public. The girls take relish in going through the mountain of their clothes & placing all the socks in said bag as well as tossing all underpants in the laundry basket and placing all the towels to the side.

I actually enjoy the sorting (& folding afterward). The girls like to sit & talk with me & race to find all the socks while I go through turning all the clothes right-side out and spotcleaning them. I know, it sounds exceptionally OCD to put OxyClean on every mark & stain, but it has made me one of the top sellers in the Mothers of Multiples Clothing & Equipment Sale for the last 4 sales. It may take a few extra minutes each time I do their laundry, but it means more clothes make it through the beating my girls give them.

Watch Out For Squirrels

Recently at Target, Caleigh, being somewhere OTHER than our house, immediately decided she needed to check out the new bathroom - still within the first year and a half of being fully "potty-trained", I'm not comfortable calling her bluff quite yet.

With a "Do you really want me to take her into the men's restroom?" look from their father, Mommy left Alessa with Daddy & headed into the bathroom with Caleigh with potty ring in hand. I entered a stall and stopped dead in my tracks as there was urine ALL over the seat (come on people - be considerate). I said to Cailegh, "Wait a minute, Love - there's pee-pee all over the seat. Let's go in another stall." As I opened up the potty ring & sat her on the toilet in the new, non-urine covered stall, she looked at me very seriously and we had the following conversation:

"Mommy, do you know who went pee-pee all over the seat?"
"No Honey, I don't."
"It was the squirrels."
Blink. Now I was intrigued.
"The squirrels?" I asked
"Uh huh. See that hole up there?" she explained, pointing to the vent in the ceiling, "The squirrels needed to go potty so they came through there but they missed the seat & went pee-pee on the toilet."

Yes, that's right ladies and gentlemen. Next time you're in a public restroom and there's urine all over one of the toilet seats, be sure to warn the management that they have a squirrel problem.

The Riha Hitchin'

Today my girls participated in their first wedding. My fingers were crossed the whole time. They "practiced" in the back yard for months. They finally accepted that flower girls don't "throw flowers on Tall Sarah's head", they instead toss flowers in front of her to "make a beautiful path to walk on". They know to WALK straight to Daddy who is officiating the ceremony.

The Rihas' wedding took place at his parents' house in Rescue. What a gorgeous place! Beautiful house, huge yard & amazing view - we had a straight, surprisingly clear, shot of Mount Diablo. The groom was dashing, the bride was stunning & the food... mmmm. I was a little aprehensive toward the fact that the wedding wasn't supposed to START until 3pm though. Why, you may ask? Because my girls are locked in their darkened room... er, nap from 1:30 or so until 4. They rarely nap these days. However, if they don't at least get their "down time" (see: locked in darkened room for a length of time), all bets are off as to their demeanor for the rest of the afternoon/evening.

My worries were all for nought. They did a fantastic job if I do say so myself :)

Life lesson: Sometimes your children's actions will pleasantly surprise you... sometimes.

After a few walk-throughs before the ceremony, the girls WALKED down the center aisle (with only a little ushering from the back), they didn't freeze like deer in headlights (even though they only knew less than 10 people there) and they behaved well during the ceremony (alright, so I bribed them a little with princess fruit snacks...).
They walked straight down the aisle dropping handfuls of petals. When they got to altar, they both had petals remaining. They both looked quizically at their baskets. Caleigh looked at me & loudly stated, "Mommy, I still have flowers!" while Alessa just shrugged & proceeded to empty the remaining petals, handful by handful, into a neat pile in front of the archway. :)

A Vocabulary Lesson From 3-Year-Olds

Life lesson: Try to use a new word every day.

Here are a few words that my girls use on a regular basis.

glitter poop - GLIT - ter - poop - n. - litter box
"Daddy went outside to throw away the glitter poop."

lasterday - LAST-er-day - n. - anything that has happened in the past
"We looked for eggs lasterday." "Lasterday when it was Christmas we saw Santa!"

nexterday - NEXT-er-day - n. - anything that will occur in the future
"Nexterday we're going to be flowergirls." "We're going to Disneyland nexterday."

hugantous - hue-GAN-tus - adj. - a word to describe an object when "huge", "gigantic" or "humungous" just doesn't cover it
"That tree is hugantous!" "We saw a hugantous bulldozer!"

toebear - TOE-bare -n. - a creature without shoes or socks
"Mommy, I want to take off my socks and be a toebear."

magnet flying glass - n. - an instrument used to enlarge items being viewed
"We found a bug! Can we have the magnet flying glass?"

Down At The Car Wash

Life lesson with twins: Everything will now take you about 3 times as long to finish.

Deal with it. It's a fact that having twin "helpers" makes everything exponentially more difficult/time consuming/complex... and exponentially more fun as well. For example:

4:00 pm - I decided that today was an excellent day to wash the minivan. When the girls were let out of their room...er, woke up from their nap, I changed them into soakable clothes, gathered the necessary "stuff" to wash the car & headed outside with my 2 ducklings in tow.
4:15 pm - I sprayed down the minivan and filled the bucket with soap & water. The girls were fascinated by my sponge and decided that the old washcloths I had given them to "help" with just wouldn't suffice. Back into the house, dig up 2 old kitchen sponges from under the sink & trek back outside.
4:30 pm - Actually begin to scrub the van in earnest this time as the girls "help" me by washing the other side.
4:35 pm - Console a soaked & crying Caleigh while trying to explain to Alessa that if she's going to spray her sister, then turnabout is fair play & she needs to think about if she wants to get wet. Caleigh edges closer to the hose. :::sigh:::
4:45 pm - Break up a sponge and suds fight. Yes, they were both laughing at the time, but boy does the car wash soap hurt if it gets in your eyes.

5:00 pm - Shriek in dismay as my entire back is soaked by my water loving, hose-wielding Alessa. Convince Alessa to give up the hose because "Mommy has to wash off the soap"...for the dozenth time.

You see, when washing a car on your own, you don't worry about the other side drying because it's usually such a short amount of time or it's just water. Not so with "helpers" - I had to constantly rinse the opposite side of the van to keep their soap from drying. In addition to the added "drying soap" aspect of having twin "helpers", there's also the height aspect. Three and a half year old children seem to see only what is DIRECTLY in front of them. No higher, no lower.

Do you see where I'm going with this? Needless to say, washing the van took me 1 1/2 HOURS.

I Never Thought I'd Actually Do It...

...I never thought I'd start an actual blog page - yet, here I am sitting at my computer wading through questions like "does this color go with my blog theme"? :::sigh:::

I'd like to thank my friend Robin for unknowingly inspiring me to start it up. I go to her blog almost daily in hopes of reading another tale of John :) I realized that virtually every day my girls do or say something that brings me to the verge of tears - sometimes from frustration, sometimes from laughing so hard - and if I don't write them down, I'm liable to forget.

This brings me to my first written life lesson for raising twins: Don't sweat the small stuff - and it's all small stuff.

I know it's terribly difficult to look on the bright side of things when one child has just upended your entire cup of cranberry juice and the other is screaming because the cup was unintentionally upended ON them. I know it's tough not to look at spot cleaning the carpet as yet ANOTHER thing being added to the never-ending "To Do" list. I know how hard it is not to scream when you've finally put down one child and you get no more than 20 minutes of slumber before the other is suddenly awake and sobbing. However, in the grand scheme of things, it's nothing. The seemingly endless diaper changes, midnight feedings (and 2am...and 4am...) and mind-numbing sleep deprivation all too quickly turns to 2 indignant preschoolers with arms akimbo stating, "I can do it MYSELF." :::sigh:::