10.5 months

It's been almost two weeks so I think we've truly established a new pattern now: the boys are down to one nap a day. The afternoon nap was becoming more and more of a struggle and yet they seemed to need more sleep, so last week we tried out loading them up with food and milk and a diaper change and then laying them down at 11:30am or so. The first day, last Monday, Theo slept for 3 hours! They seem much happier all day and they're still sleeping 12+ hours at night, so I think we've found a good routine for the time being. It also gives me a good 1.5 hours at the very least to get laundry done, to make dinner, or to check my email, not to mention to make and enjoy lunch in peace.


The boys still enjoy lots of time on the floor for rolling, pivoting (the most amazing physical accomplishment they've achieved yet--in a second they can do a full 180 degree turn), exploring the carpet pad, and grabbing and eating small pieces of leaves, food, and general detritus that hasn't yet been picked up by the vacuum. They have less and less interest in the plastic jungle climb-on thing as they want to be more mobile. They get up on all fours a lot and Beck especially gets up in downward dog pose a lot, with his butt up in the air, up on his hands and feet. While there have been single crawl motions here and there, there is no forward movement yet recorded. Both continue to move well backwards. Case in point: last Tuesday morning I was prepping veggies to go in the slow cooker for chili while the boys were playing in the cabinet in the kitchen where I keep plasticware, etc. I cut my finger and went upstairs to have Jeff deal with it (I am still a wimp when it comes to blood). I was upstairs for no more than 4 minutes while Jeff cleaned it out and bandaged it up. When I came back down I was stunned to find Beckett in the family room, about 20 feet (and down one step) from where I left him. He was grinning up at me, having obviously gone down the one stair backward. Lesson learned: we can't leave the boys alone in the kitchen any more!



The boys are eating three meals a day now: breakfast at 9:30am, lunch when they wake up from their nap, and dinner at 5:30 or 6. They nurse five times a day, or four times if I work and don't come home to nurse them at lunch. We haven't tried putting them down for the one midday nap without nursing first. They also usually have one or two snacks a day, one in the morning and one in the afternoon. Their eating is pretty variable; sometimes they eat what seems to be a huge quantity, and other times they are not interested at all. Usually they alternate, though, so when one is not hungry, the other will eat anything in sight. They are eating more and more "table food"--meaning whatever it is we're eating for that meal, or leftovers from an earlier meal. Their favorite foods seem to be macaroni and cheese, beans, banana bread, and yogurt. Jeff's parents found the yogurt they like at their Price Chopper in Johnstown, so we're back in the chips! We bought a flat of it Saturday when we were visiting and the boys ate a ton of it all weekend.


Mostly the boys want to walk, either holding our hands or with the walker (thanks Ana and Robert!). Theo does more of a shuffle walk, all business, and Beckett does more wandering, checking things out along the way and pausing to look out the window, grab a cabinet handle, touch his toes, pick up a toy, or wave. Beckett has also started walking with only one hand on the walker, or in the hand of the accompanying parent. I think they'll be walking on their own very soon!

Visits with friends and family

We had a great visit to the Rosamond Gifford Zoo with friend Sara E. and her son Preston. This time everyone stayed awake the entire time, which was a first. And when watching the lemurs eating (NB: feeding time at the zoo seems to be at 4pm!), Preston reached over and gently took Beck's hand. How beautiful!



This is the boys sharing a pack and play at the Grandparents Leibowitz this weekend for Easter. As you can see, they still enjoy sharing a small sleeping space! This is wakeup at 7am.

We contracted to resurface our back deck. But then when our contractor took off the decking, he found a whole bunch of structural problems that had to be addressed before continuing. The only upside is that he's a super nice guy and the boys LOVE watching them work!

Getting Ready for Baths!

Getting two babies ready for baths, then bathing them, and then extricating them and dressing them all while never leaving babies unattended in the water can be stressful. I try to break down everything into small steps so that neither baby is alone at any point along the way. So I get them both undressed (down to their diapers) in their rooms, then take them both into the bathroom while I run the water. Then I take off both their diapers while in the bathroom. (Sometimes this small lag between diaper being off and being in the tub creates a small mess--it's a hazard of the process.) Then each is deposited in the water within 10 seconds of each other, so neither baby is out of arms' reach. After they are done playing and after I have washed them both, I drain the water while they are still in the tub so that when I leave the second baby in the tub to take the first out, there is no water left in the tub. (Again, another opportunity for pee outside the diaper.) I sometimes dry and dress them right in the bathroom so that there are no opportunities to drown themselves.

The truth is, the times that they have fallen face first in the water while playing, they have just pushed up like they do on solid ground, lifting their faces out of the water. They don't like it, but they don't just sit face first in the water. It's just too scary to contemplate so we try to exercise extreme caution around the bath!

Oh, and the laundry hamper is full of clean diapers. I take the time when they are playing in the tub to stuff our cloth diapers from my perch on the top of the toilet.

Outdoor Fun

On one of those lovely days last week we went for a great walk up to the top of the reservoir near our house. I pointed out, for the boys, where they were born, where we live, where they were conceived, where Mama stayed in the hospital in September, where Mama had her thyroid out in October, and where Daddy's favorite basketball team plays.

On one of those unbelievable days the week before St. Patrick's Day we spent the afternoon trying out our swings (from Diane and from our neighbors with twin boys down the road) in our tree.


Mindy and her kids took the kids to the park near our house to try out the swings there.

Guess Who's Standing Without Help

Yesterday Beckett took the next step towards walking (no pun intended).  As you will see in the video, he is now able to stand on his own for several seconds at a time.  Stay tuned for a similar video featuring Theo, who was practicing this same skill last night.

Things I Covet

I never used to covet things, or envy other people's things. Now I have children, and I covet things for them!

Thanks Sarah and Susan M. for turning me on to these. (I think these are actually a cheaper alternative to what you have for Toby.) Don't they look awesome?

We're picking up one of these (used) at the Multiple Moms Mingle sale this weekend.

I've heard good things about this toy so I found one on Craiglist that I'm picking up tomorrow.

I've been harassing Jeff to buy and install a wall mirror on the wall in the playroom. Theo and I went out Monday night and finally bought one, which we hope to install tonight.

Why is there no manual?

I continue to find it amazing how little we, but also the world, seems to understand about babies.

Monday I read the following articles about infant sleep:
http://jamestown.ynn.com/content/health/child_wellness/563880/child-wellness--infants-and-sleeping-habits/

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/denene-millner/cry-it-out_b_1163864.html

Now, the first article and accompanying video is just poorly made, poorly researched, poorly written. It would probably be fair to say that it is dangerously misleading, except that no one probably reads or watches YNN so it's hard to imagine there being harm done. But still, it's just a bad article. But the second article is interesting and anxiety-producing in its own way. Really? Every time a baby cries, its brain cells die?? Folks, I have two babies. Sometimes I'm with one and the other is angry I'm not with him. Sometimes they are both in their highchairs and I'm making up their food and they want it RIGHT NOW. Sometimes they are fighting over a toy and one pulls hard and falls backwards. Suffice to say, there is crying in this house. I think it's fair to predict that there will be crying in this house for the foreseeable future. Am I to worry about brain cell death every time Theo or Beckett doesn't get his way? Is all crying the same, e.g. is crying for 45 minutes before going to sleep the same as crying when they fall over backwards on the carpet?

Then this morning I woke up to this in my Facebook Multiple Moms Mingle group. It seems one of a set of twins born in June 2011 died of asphyxiation December 23 in his PeaPod travel crib. No recall has yet been issued. It is heartbreakingly sad for the family, and worrisome for us. We have been using our PeaPod Plus for several months now when we travel, and the boys have seemed to enjoy it. Well, at least not to suffocate in it. We had been planning to use it when we visited Kathy and Greg for Easter weekend, but now we may have to consider another plan.

Last night Beck woke up at about 10pm and cried on and off for about 5 minutes before falling back to sleep. The problem is, you just never know when he wakes up whether he's still half-asleep and was just laying on his own arm wrong and will go back to sleep, or whether he's just cranking up and is going to end up needed to be held and/or nursed. At least we can't tell. So we waited a few minutes and he went back to sleep. Theo did the same thing at about 1am, but for less than a minute. It seems the experiment of going to sleep at 7pm worked-Theo slept til about 7am (and then happily babbled in his crib for another 30 minutes), and Beckett would have slept longer but we woke him up at 8am so we could pile them in the car and take Daddy Lovebo to work (our other car is in the shop). They woke up once around 3:30am and ate and then went back to sleep after babbling to each other for a little while. I'm curious as to why they sleep less well, and also why they seem to wake up angry and sleep-deprived (and too early) with a later bedtime. The mornings after they went to bed later, they woke up crying and then were hard to console, whereas normally they wake up slowly, babbling to each other for as long as 45 minutes before they seem to need us to come in. Why, babies, why?