Intrepid Murmurings

So, I finally caved.  It was against my finer judgement.  I really don't trust my precious equipment, even point and shoot cameras, to the hands of 3.5 year olds.  But, alas.  She adores it.  Occasionally it is an extremely good distraction technique and maybe we will end up with a few decent pictures of ME in the process, which is, erm, very rare these days!  I actually love seeing what she decides to take pictures of.  I have to delete heavily in order to give some sort of order to the chaos, but here are a few of the ones I like best:

Note that it is her making us do all make these ridiculous faces!  And that up at the top, most of the pics are of Delia (both in green flowers and pink shirt)  who loves to follow her around and ham it up for the cam (complete with fat lip and stitches - that is a story for another post, perhaps).  Elsie (in blue)  is not quite as sure what the big deal is and would rather do her own thing.  Here are a few more, for the Emma fans among us...

Ah!  So as you may have noticed in my sidebar (if you actually come to this site and don't just read in a reader of some sort) I have decided to join the NaBloPoMo (National Blog Posting Month -- a spinnoff of the more, erm, hardcore "National Novel Writing Month", of which I definitely have no desire to partake in). 

Anyway.  This means I ought to post every day, which I had forgotten about today until RIGHT NOW, when I was intending to be heading to bed.   So I am going to cheat and copy something I had written somewhere else, in response to this question:

"If someone (with supernatural powers) told you that you could have had your two same children one at a time instead of as twins, do you think you would go for it?"

I think this thought comes up for a lot of twin moms, especially in the overwhelming first few years.  Though probably more for folks who had twins as their first, and likely only, pregnancy.   Having had the singleton experience,  I am now pretty thrilled to have gotten the added challenge of twins.  I feel like I have gotten the best of both worlds!  And also that I somehow landed the fertility jackpot after a few years of not knowing if I would ever get pregnant at all.  I had wanted to have lots of kids young-ish, and it was incredibly hard when things did not go according to "the plan".  But then!  Now I have want I wanted all along, in basically the same timeline.  And since I am not a fan of pregnancy (AT ALL) I like the two-for-one aspect of that, as well.  

I do like and appreciate that I have been able to have two births, and two infancy times, though, which those who only have twins do not get to experience.  I know there is a lot of envy that first time moms of twins have about not getting to experience a "normal" pregnancy or life with a baby, and the (relative) ease of a singleton.  In my case, I was able to enjoy E & D's infancy more than I did Emma's, despite the chaos and horrible sleep deprivation,  I think because I was more experienced and less worried about stuff, and also more resigned/used to what motherhood is like.  I imagine the change from 1-3 kids was probably much less shocking than what 0-2 would have been.  We really knew what we were getting into.  

Not that I am all sunshine and roses over here!  Ha ha!  I spent most of my pregnancy being totally overwhelmed and unhappy with the idea of twins.  I felt like Emma absolutely didn't get the attention she desperately craved during my pregnancy, and still gets the short end of the stick a lot.  I very often wonder what kind of kid she would be, and what kind of bond I would have with her, if I had not gotten pregnant at all, or at least not with twins.  So I guess this is my mama-guilt/worry, somewhat related to the twin thing.  

But in terms of Elsie and Delia, I don't really worry or feel sad about them as much, in terms of one on one/bonding time.  At least not right now!  I feel like we get those moments each day, snuck in here and there,  enough that we are all happy and close.  They are really happy-go-lucky kids, which is different from how Emma tends to be.  In their first six months or so I did feel really bad at times, that I just couldn't meet all their needs, to hold them when they wanted, help them with sleep in the ways I preferred.   They had to be left to cry for what felt like a lot some days, and it was really a challenge to know I couldn't parent them the way I did my singleton. 

But the pro's of having a same age sibling, now that they are a bit older, are overwhelmingly obvious to me now!  I feel like Elsie and Delia are SO much happier and easier to parent than Emma was at this age (I suppose this could partly be due to me not being horribly miserably tired and sick due to pregnancy, though!).  They are SO much better with sharing, playing with each other and other kids, letting me do stuff instead of constantly needing to entertain.  Not that I did that with Emma either, but I am even more chill and relaxed (lazy?) now than I was then.  I am sure some of this is more characteristic of having siblings at all, not necessarily just twins/multiples, but I do think having a sibling the same age really intensifies it.  

All in all, I definitely feel twins are pretty damn cool, and wouldn't trade it for anything (even a couple years of awesome sleep, ha ha!)

Ten things I love right now:

Millions of new words/signs/phrases a day from Elsie and Delia.

New ones today: "squeaky shoes" (she shoo), "no, get off" (na, geh oh) -- this one in regards to a twin tackling & pinning you down any time you lie down on the floor, ha ha.

Dancing with all my girls after dinner!

Emma's constant narration and storytelling (luckily I can tune it out when I want)

Which includes things her "pretend mama" does for her, stuff that I, therefore, don't have to do! Ha ha!  

All the hugs, kisses, sharing and sweetness between Elsie & Delia. 

Elsie's glee at having mastered blowing a (very loud) whistle.

Halloween Candy

My generally cheerful and happy go lucky babies

Three sisters playing together well!  

Ten things that suck right now:

Babies constantly climbing on the kitchen table (I need to put all the chairs on top of the table but man thats lame too)

And gouging and denting it by banging with metal objects that they seem to pull out of the air?  

Our grocery bills.  Still not used to this family of 5 thing!

Babies dumping stuff.  Everywhere. All the time.  Tiny tornados of destruction.   

Whining, bickering, ignoring

Pushing, hitting, biting

Disrupted sleep at night .

Constant interruptions during the day.

How physically draining the toddlers are, and how mentally/emotionally challenging the preschooler is. 

Lonnie being sick! Get better soon! 

Yesterday was a crazy day!  Here's how it played out:

• Everyone wakes up (happily, really late for them -- 6:45!  Woo hoo! Thats a hour or more of sleeping in!) 
• Make breakfast for everyone, eat, do dishes
• Change diapers, get everyone dressed, Emma ready for school
• Quick shower and getting ready for me
• Everyone in car, take Emma to school (includes unloading and then loading back up E& D)
• Go grocery shopping with E & D (luckily our closest store has a double seated cart, otherwise this can be hard)
• Go home, unload groceries, feed Elsie and Delia
• Put E & D down for nap
• Go get Emma from preschool (Lonnie was working from home, I didn't just leave the babies there alone, ha ha!)
• Give Emma lunch in car while we drive to Dr.s office
• Flu mist for Emma (regular seasonal flu, H1N1 still not available around here)
• Home, get Emma to bed for nap
• Babies wake up, nurse and play with babies, do dishes
• Give snacks to babies, pack one for Emma, get everyone ready to go again.  Vote.  Do dinner prep
• Go to Emma's school conference (with Lonnie & all 3 girls)
• Drop off ballots at post office
• Home again.  Finish dinner.  Babies whiny and exhausted from only one nap
• Babies up to bed!  Lonnie does dishes while Emma colors,  then does Emma's bedtime
• Clean up living room, start load of laundry
• Sit down and chill.  WHEW!
• Fold 5 loads of laundry while watching election news
• Get ready for bed, sleep 

We had a really fun Halloween!  Things got a little rocky around dinnertime, when Emma, just like last year, considered boycotting costumes and trick or treating.  What the heck?  Eventually she got on board and had a blast once we were out. She would have loved to do a few more houses, but Elsie and Delia were TIRED!  They enjoyed themselves too, but were a bit confused at the whole affair.   

And even more pictures, starting here!  

Today the girls were having snacks in the kitchen and Delia kept dropping/spilling hers on the floor.  I'd have her pick them up and then it would happen again.  After a few goldfish had been stepped on I got the broom and swept them up. I happened to use the kid size broom, which Elsie immdiately picked up.  She then took a few things back out of Delia's bowl, and then hers, and put them on the floor so she could do some more sweeping. Ha. If only she had better aim with the dustpan...

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Emma has been really into letters, sounds, and names lately.  For months (actually more like a year?) she has been coming up with invented names, which used to be assigned to items (Kottom was our "popper" push toy, "Happia" was this big cylindrical block we have, etc).  For awhile all her names were sounding really African (Obotme, Gombome, things like that), then it became more Swedish Ikea Catalog sounding (Kottom, Junse, Lanke, Rince), and now its more all over the place and jibberishy.  She usually starts with one name and makes 3-4 that rhyme with it.  A few days ago her new ones were "Kotian" and "Vegian".  Its really quite bizarre!  When she is in the mood she also can sing a whole song in total jibberish, which is weird, fascinating and hilarious.  Sounds like she is speaking in tongues.  Gotta try to get that on tape someday!  

But anyway, clearly some interest in language and words and sounds, mostly based on names at this point.  Last week I got her some of these word strip sticky notes to make a word wall, which was an immediate hit.  We filled out a few with our names, as well as some other words she suggested (Big Bird, Snuffelupagus, Curly and Baby Bear all made the cut as well), and put them on the wall.  She now can read them all, mostly without help.  Fun fun!  The reading teacher in me is trying to Very Low Key here but she really does seem into it.   Here is a picture Emma took of the wall a few days ago.  Another post coming soon with more of her other photographs -- she has discovered the joy of photography unfortunately (for me and my camera, anyway)....  

Today the girls were all having snack around the living room play table.  Often Elsie and Delia have two separate bowls but eat out of them interchangeably -- they kind of share both (unless I am really lazy and only make them one to share between them, ha ha).  Today Delia headed over to Elsie's bowl and Elsie yelled MINE!  And moved to block Delia from her bowl (a move totally stolen from Emma, hee). I fear a new dawn has come, and it's name is Possessiveness. Oh joy.  

I guess I have seen it coming with toys, though.  Lately we've had many (generally mild) skirmishes over toys, which believe it or not is a somewhat new occurrence.  I was surprised how long we made it without more arguments (I am not talking about Emma here -- we often have major sharing/toy issues with her and the babies, which is pretty normal I think).  Hot items for the littles these days: dress up hats, necklaces, or ropes and cords to dangle around ones neck, books, especially The Current Favorite, Where Is the Green Sheep, high chairs when its anywhere close to meal time, Emma's booster seat when it is on the floor, stools, play grocery carts, and bikes.  

Speaking of high chairs, we just got a new one and we LOVE it.  It was high time, as the booster that we have been using up until now is just NOT comfortable for older kids (Emma hated it too around this age) and mealtime was becoming increasingly difficult because of it.  I've been eyeing the Stokke Tripp Trapp for ages, but the price tag on that one was just too much.  This one is spendy, too, but still 100 smackers less, and worth it, as it will be used for years to come.  Now Emma wishes she had one too!  

Holy moly Delia is talking up a storm these days.  TONS of new words, every day.  Current funny/new ones: hole (in the wall near the changing table, and also the drain of the sink), broom,  pumpkin,  okay!, rain (also does the sign for this), bye bye (had for awhile but using it a TON for all sorts of things now), Elsie (!), and tons of others that she echos me on all day long. Elsie is also saying lots of things (including her own name for the first time yesterday, woohoo!), but its just not as noticable or understandable than Delia's current explosion.  

Another thing happening a lot these days: tackling.  These girls are so physical!  Any time someone is lying on the floor they seem to be fair game for jumping on or tackling.  They both do it to each other, and to Emma if she is on the ground.  Climb On Mama has been a favorite game for a long, long, long time, but now it has evolved to leaping/jumping on Mama, which is a fair bit less pleasant, especially when its two (or three!) of them at once.  Ooooof!  I think we will have to come up with some rules for this soon, but its hard to ban it altogether since they can have such fun with it a lot of the time.  Currently whoever is underneath starts hollering if they are not happy and I pry whoever is on top off and put her somewhere else (while explaining that that hurts, interpreting for them what the other one is "saying" ).  Sometimes this is effective, sometimes not.   Here is a picture of a recent three kid pileup. They were all enjoying it but very soon after this Elsie (at the bottom) decided she had had enough. 

Today Delia fell off something (a foam climbing block? Her bike?) and was flat on her back in the living room, crying.  I was talking to her and expressing sympathy but not actually moving from my pile of laundry, heh.  Elsie was eyeing the scene and jumped off her bike and went over and gave her several big hugs and kisses, and patted her head.  SO CUTE! They do this a fair bit but its usually somewhat prompted, as in NO TACKLING YOUR SISTER, give her a hug (hug follows), or WE DON'T PULL EACH OTHERS CLOTHES AND HAIR, gentle touches only,  give your sister a hug and a kiss (hug and kiss follow).  Etc, etc, etc.   Up until recently Delia would always oblige with the kisses and hugs, even if she was the victim (which seems frequently to be the case) so its nice to see Elsie initiating the loves as well.   

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Awhile ago I posted to my multiples club forum asking for experience on older siblings being able to distinguish identical siblings.  Because at 3 years old and 1 year for the little ones, that was still not happening around here.  For more than a year Emma generally referred to Elsie and Delia as "baby" or "this baby/that baby" or "other baby".  She knew their names, and was proud to tell them to folks, she just could not tell them apart and did not try.  I was starting to worry about her bonding to them individually, or having memories of each one versus the two (thats still a stretch, I know) but low and behold....she's figured it out!  And corrects me sometimes, ha ha!  I am still not sure what clicked, or if she is using one of the tricks I taught her, but I don't thinks so.  They both have grown into their own looks that is very easy for us to distinguish, and Emma has caught on as well.  Whew!  

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Sleep is still generally going poorly, with sleeping through the night (by Delia in particular) juuuuuuuust enough to keep me stringing along and not doing the sleep work stuff.  Gotta do it though.  Procrastinate procrastinate procrastinate.  They had a week or so of awesomeness starting the day I was about to start the new regime, and so I dropped it before even starting.  Bah.  

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After an amazing amazing early fall, the rains have begun in Seattle!  Ah, familiar grey wet skies!  And drat, what the heck am I going to do with all this toddler energy?  Man these girls are CRAZY sometimes and really need to get out and do stuff.  They are climbers, runners, sliders and swingers.  They love balls and bikes and water and fun.  I think we will be heading to the community center toddler gyms a LOT in the coming weeks, but geesh, it is such a chore to get us all ready and out of the house, not to mention chasing/mediating/keeping track of three speedy busy kids when we are out in the world.  The park is now both really fun and really stressful for me, now that they Will Not Sit in the stroller.  I sometimes have to literally run after one while leaving the other in semi-precarious places.  Luckily total strangers will often look after one while I am chasing the others...

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I know some of you have seen this but here is a recent and extremely rare shot of all three girls in one picture, all looking happy at the same time!  Wow! I literally only have 5-6 of these total, and most of them look so so, with one or the other looking the wrong way, crying, etc.  They are sitting in my awesome and beloved glider, that we still use daily.  Here are the out-takes and other pictures from October...

Delia, Emma, Elsie 

I know I posted about this back years ago when I was first starting out, but thought an update might be in order.  I have been a fan of cloth diapers from the start, and have found it to be a strangely addictive (passionate?) aspect of mothering.  Maybe because I deal with them ALL DAY LONG?  Because there all these awesome new types and styles of cloth diapers, each with pros and cons?  Or maybe they just look too cute?  I don't know, its kind of crazy, I'll admit.  But anyway.  Warning to those unschooled in the current cloth diapering trends: the following gets a bit technical!  And extremely dull if you are not into this kind of thing! 

The first time around, I started with a smattering of various types at first, then narrowed the field and bought a bunch that we liked. Mostly what we went with were pocket diapers:  Fuzzibunz.  A few fitted diapers and covers too.  Most of these were sized, so we had smalls, mediums, larges.  Got most of them used, which helps a lot with the cost (these suckers are awesome, but expensive!)

When Elsie and Delia were on the way, my plan was to start with cloth for them half time once they were big enough to fit them (out of newborn sizing) OR when I felt up to managing the washing (Emma was still in cloth diapers then too!) and just do 1/2 and 1/2 cloth and disposable for the forseeable future.  That worked well, actually!  At some point, cloth just seemed easier (especially since we had lots of help for a few months there!) and was SO much better for the garbage situation.  Two infants worth of disposable diapers was causing some serious extra garbage issues.   

Luckily, Emma potty trained when the babies were 3-4 months old, which is around when we started using cloth full time with the girls (except for nights), so I didn't have wash 3 kids worth of diapers for very long.  Whew!  I found that with the Fuzzibunz, the babies could fit into both smalls and mediums simultaneously for a long time, which meant that I didn't need to buy an extra set for quite awhile! Eventually I got more mediums (passed along from a friend!) when they grew out of the smalls but were not big enough for the larges.  We had some overlap for awhile, but I had to upgrade my stash again, especially since many of my old larges were starting to fall apart (the elastic was is shot!).  Instead of buying the same ones though, I branched out a bit.  Erm, a lot!   

Which brings me to my current reason for posting:  a review of what we are using currently, and the pros and cons of each of them.

Old stash, still in use: 

8 or so old Fuzzibunz (down from at least 15, due to the failing elastic) -- Pros: love these for ease of use, dryness on baby's skin (nice wicking through the fleece to the stuffer), quick dry time.  Snaps are very adjustable and great for getting a perfect fit.  Cons -- expensive if new!  Kind of boring. Stuffing is a drag...

1 Green Acre Design pocket -- Pros:  Same as the Fuzzibunz, but also a bit trmmer, which means they fit better under clothes. Comes in cute prints, which is always nice! Cons: Too trim, perhaps, because leaks happen more than with the FB.  Also no leg gussets, which = more slight leaks.  

2 Motherease one size fitted diapers --  Pros: My favorite fitted diapers right now.  Really nice,  so sturdy, truely fits a wide range of sizes.  Cons: Needs a cover, and that second step can sometimes be a pain with a wiggly toddler.

2 Bella Bottom Fitteds -- Pros: they work fine, one has a cute print. Cons: don't like the snap placement at all -- the girls get snap marks when they wear them.  Way too much "wing droop", and the hemp one feels wierd and kind of crunchy/matted now.  Need a cover/extra step.  

2 fitted diapers of unknown origin -- pros: cute prints, velcro fasteners are easy! cons: needing a cover is a pain, as mentioned above

And now, the new stuff....

4 new style Fuzzibunz -- pros: I do love these, and the new updates are nice (though not critical).  Less "wing droop" (not that is was too bad before) and wider cut so they are easier to stuff.  Cons: same as above

2 Green Acre Design Pockets (see above -- obviously I liked them well enough to get two more!)

1 Bum-Genius one size pocket -- pros: easy to stuff, lining is very smooth and soft.  Velcro can be easier than snaps.  Cons: The girls are starting to figure out velcro so its a matter of time before they can take these off.  Also, I always forget to fasten the velcro tabs back before washing, and they either get messy or stuck to other dipes in the wash -- they also curl and collect lint.  Sometimes the pocket cover flap in the back gets wonky and I have to fuss with it

1 Rocky Mountain Diaper (pocket) -- Pros: I really like this diaper!  Very trim, and super soft lining fabric. Very easy to put on since there is only two snaps instead of 4. Leg elastic is adjustable inside the diaper -- very sneaky and cool!  Cons: a little low rise for my girls, at least it will be eventually.  I think they may grow out of this one before they are pottytrained.  

1 Drybees AIO (All In One) --  Pros: Like this one a lot. I love not needing to stuff! (unlike a pocket, the absorbent part is sewn in).  Velcro is easy and nice big tabs.  Wicks really well.  Cons: lining fabric is a bit scratchy/not as soft as I'd wish.  Girls will figure out how to take off soon.  Long drying time (I either have to turn it inside out, or run it through a second time in the dryer)  

1 Thirsties AIO -- Pros:  Love this one!!! Soft lining, excellent gussets to prevent leaks!  No stuffing! Velcro is nice.  Cons: Long drying time.   Easy for babies to remove. 

2 Bum-Genius AIO -- Pros: Love not stuffing, easy to turn inside out when drying.  Velcro is quick to put on. Cons: Long drying time.  Velcro tabs tend to curl and look bad.  

3 Swaddlebees AIOs -- Pros:  SO trim!!!  It is amazing.  Snaps, not velcro.  The lining fabric is cotton (not polyester like all the others), and very soft.  I like that the girls feel wettness (unlike the wicking of the fleese lined diapers) so they will learn to know when they are wet (for potty training purposes).  Cons:  Long drying time!  Harder to turn inside out to dry because they are so trim. On the small size (for larges) -- we are on the loosest snaps now and I doubt we will make it to potty training with these. Occasional leaks because they are so trim & not gusseted. 

4 Dream-eze AIOs -- Pros: These are funny diapers!  Two absorbent flaps are sewn into one end of the dipe, so they flap around in the dryer (or in the breeze) and therefore dry MUCH faster than other all-in-ones -- almost as fast as pockets.  For how absorbent they are, they are pretty trim, as well.  Cons: OMG, these are really hard to deal with when they get dirty!  Poop gets in between the layers and sides and is a big mess to shake off.  Yuck!  I only put them on when I expect wet diapers, and they work well for that.  

Along with getting these various new diapers, I also decided to replace all my old stuffers (inner absorbent part of pockets) many that were musty despite stripping, and just OLD.   The new ones are SO soft and fluffy!  OMG!  It was totally worth it to update these, since they don't cost a ton to begin with.  

So rah rah cloth diapering!  We really love it and find it so easy to use.  I love not sending out tons of diapers to a landfill, and don't find washing to be that big of a chore.  I wash every 2-3 days or so, but do use disposables at night and sometimes on outings.

I will leave you with my mama-of-3 pearls of cloth diapering wisdom:

• If you can, try before you invest in one brand/type of diaper.  Buy one or two of several different types (at least!) and then stock up once you know what you (or your kid) likes best.  If you are buying new, this is easy to do, it is harder when buying used because you sometimes want to snap up good deals ahead of time (I did this, too).  
• If you want to cloth diaper full time, get at least 12 diapers a day for your newborn.  You want to at least have a 2 day supply, so 24 diapers per baby is about right in my opinion (this is in addition to a stash of prefolds).  For twins, you might be able to fudge a bit and get a little less than 48, especially if you have some prefold backups on hand.  As they get older, you will need fewer diapers, maybe 8 diapers a day per kid.   
• Don't expect your newborn to fit into the small or "one size" diapers.  They are just too little at first (unless you get a preemie size)! Even my 9 lber didn't fit into many of ours for the first few weeks/months.  
• "One size" diapers may take longer to grow into than smalls for tiny newborns.  They are good once the baby is a bit bigger though.  Its nice to not have to keep sizing up!  However,  they will feel really bulky on little babies for quite awhile, and might be hard to fit under clothes.   On the other end, big toddlers may also not fit in them (but they might!  Depends on the brand.)
• Even if you buy the fancy shmancy diapers, invest in at least 2 dozen (maybe more -- I think I have 4) DSQ (diaper service quality) prefold diapers -- the old fashioned flat ones.  They can be used for SO many other things (burp cloths, rags, extra layer under baby, etc) and can be used for actual diapering in a pinch too, if you don't get to the laundry in time.  
• Laundering -- there are so many different ways to launder cloth diapers!  I think the routine really depends on type of diaper, how often you wash, and what type of water you have (soft, hard, etc).  We use a dry sack (dumping all solids) & wash every 2-3 days.  I do a cold pre-rinse, hot wash with detergent (currently back to Tide, I have tried SO MANY others though!) and then an extra cold rinse.  I occasionally use oxyclean, and very occasionally, a little bleach.  Also vinegar, either in a soak, during an extra wash cycle, or in the rinse.  I "strip" occasionally with Dawn when residue builds (we have VERY soft water which makes it hard to rinse out detergents). 

Oh sleep, remember all my sleep woes back in the day?  Oh man, it was rough.  What a difference a year makes......

....you'd think, right....?  

Ha ha, not so much, sadly!  Though after reading those old posts, its definitely not as bad as it once was!  At some point I just stopped posting about it all, because it was too dang depressing and repetitive.  But after LOTS of work, trying a million things (and waiting it out) we did get a good thing going for quite awhile -- not "sleeping through the night" but managable wakeups, easier and easier bedtime routines, eventually the ability to go down in that holy grail of "sleepy but awake" and put themselves to sleep.  They were slowly slowly SLOWLY getting longer stretches, and this spring we were down to one or two wakeups a night, per baby (many of those simultaneous, which is good, and sometimes one before I went to bed, also ideal).  

And then, for two magical weeks in June, after they turned one, we had sleeping through the night!  All by themselves, with me doing nothing to cause it!  

And then, enter molars, stage left.  Times eight.  Boo!   

And now, sleep has reeeeeeallly gotten bad again.  What the heck?  They are 16 months old! I think its been the three months of nonstop teething (those molars take FOR EV ER!), and the patterns of waking and nursing and cosleeping that came from that. Elsie in particular wakes up SO DANG MUCH, like every few hours, or even every 45 min or so for part of the night recently.  And stands there hollering in her crib (as soon as I come in she starts jumping in excitment, trampoline style) when she used to cry/fuss and then go back to sleep.  She does nurse back to sleep really well, and usually transfers well (though sometimes just won't unless I bring her into our room and/or bed).  But.  The night wakings.  Ack!  Delia also has them, just not as often, and sometimes hers are more bad dreams (she just is SO SAD and I don't mind comforting her at all in these cases).

Knock on wood, naps have been going fine.  Super super regular, easy to get them down, and while they aren't super long sometimes, they are decent, and hour to an hour and half, twice a day like clockwork.  I'll take it.   

So I've known that I needed to do something about the nighttime sleep, and have been contemplating CIO (cry it out) or nightweaning, or both, in some combination.  But procrastination has gotten the better of me, and I was managing pretty well (I really have gotten quite used to not sleeping much and feel pretty decent) until this week.  But its really time.  Emma was 16 months when we nightweaned, so that is in my head as well.  If she could do it, these little girls should be easy!  

Any kind of sleep stuff is doubly hard with two, though.  For one, if I let them cry, they wake each other up, or one passes out while the other cries, and then they switch.  Misery!  If I put one in the P & P in our room they sometimes just cry and cry because we are right there but out of reach.  And with their room right next to Emma's, I worry about it bothering her, too.  There's also the worry that if I nightwean, they will still wake up  (as Emma did until she was two years old!) but then I won't have this great super easy way to get them back to sleep.  But the biggest issue for me is that nursing them to sleep (or to sleepy, at bedtime anyway) is the ONLY way I know how to calm two crazy, riled up or fussy babies by myself.  It works like a charm.  Trying to read stories, rock them or sing to them just doesn't work with two -- they squirm and kick and grab each other (and scream) and try to stand up and climb, yada yada yada.  Its insane.  Nursing just works so well!  So I don't want to cut it out completely, thats for sure. 

Anyway, after another spectacularly bad night on Sun, I decided to start last night with the nightweaning.  It couldn't really get any worse, so why not bite the bullet and get going?  I was just going to start by cutting them off after less time, like nursing for 5 min and then returning them to bed, because I didn't want to go cold turkey after they had been nursing so much in the night -- supply and demand, you know?  I already had one plugged duct this week and don't want any more!  

So I put them to bed as usual, but talked up the sleeping thing -- that they had water int heir cribs and didn't need milk every time, that they could go back to sleep by themselves if they woke up....and low and behold, THEY SLEPT!  Elsie woke once at 11, Delia slept the whole night!  Both went down as usual at 7:30 and were up at 6 (which is actually great -- often they are up for the day by 5-5:30).  

Yahoo!!!  I keep telling myself not to expect a repeat, especially since this awesome night followed such a horrible one (and the horrible one has been much more the norm for the past few weeks).  But, it was nice to see that it IS possible, and it makes me feel like the sleep training/changes should work pretty well, if it comes to that...

Emma started preschool this week, and was so excited!  And a little nervous, but we've been talking about it and prepping her for months, and she even got to go to a "messy play day" class in her same classroom with her same teacher this summer so she was quite familiar with everything as well.  Since she has been going to daycare for 2 mornings a week for the past year or so, she has also worked through all the separation anxiety stuff so I figured this would be a pretty smooth transition.  

After a very brief circle time she immediately set to work on painting, and then some pushpin shape art.  She was totally into it.  I left after that, sniff sniff!   She apparently had a good day and even started talking some on the playground (believe it or not, she can be totally silent when she is feeling shy -- and once she warms up, you cannot get her to stop talking!!!).   

I am super excited to be a part of this new school and am hoping both she (and I) can make some cool new friends there.  Hooray! 

Elsie is wearing orange, Delia stripes.  Emma stripes too!   

I keep meaning to post but am having a hard time sitting down for long enough chunks to get my thoughts together!  Sorry! Things are getting crazy again! Here are some bits and pieces of what's happening, written in little chunks so not altogether cohesive.  Alas.

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The girls are walking so much! Elsie stands up and walks about 75% of the time now, when going from here to there.  Delia still mostly crawls but will walk on occasion spontaneously and usually will with encouragement.  This afternoon actually she started practicing all on her own and I think went totally around our "loop" (the living room/hallway/kitchen).  They are so proud and happy to be walking!

I recently had my first experience with walking a baby from the car to our destination and it was great! We had parked a few houses down from where we were going and I didn't want to lug the giant stroller just for that (we couldn't take it in the house we were going anyway).  But with my backpack and a second bag of food for the kids I couldn't carry them both!  So, Elsie walked holding my hand while I carried Delia in the other (Emma walked along beside us, of course).  It was great, but slow going!  But once we got to steps I had to shuttle them in several trips.  Luckily they are great on steps now so I can just sit them on the top and not worry.  

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We also are having tons of CLIMBING.  Which has been going on now for quite awhile but is ramping up again as their skills improve.  While I was packing last week to get us out of town, I heard squawking in the kitchen.  It sounded like normal fussing that they do with each other when someone has a toy the other wants, etc, so I didn't investigate right away.  When I walked in Elsie was IN her high chair (which means she scaled the built in tray that is always on and somehow got herself seated properly and Delia was dangling OFF THE KITCHEN TABLE with her body on the table and her legs between the table and the high chair where Elsie was.  

About a month ago I had to banish stools (which the girls used to love to push around as walkers) because they had figured out how to push them up to the fridge and get water to come out AND had pushed it up to the stove and were banging on the heating elements.  In the case of the high chair & table scaling, they had pushed Emma's booster seat over, used it to get onto a regular kitchen chair, and from there climbed onto the high chair and table.   OMG. I am pretty sure the lightbulb is going to go off very soon that they can push the regular chairs anywhere and get on the counters, which is going to be a huge PITA indeed.

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Teeth! Right now we are in Molar Land and whee, is it fun to have two teething at the same time!  Luckily they are pretty good sports about it and aren't in misery like some kids, at least most of the time.  Just a bit clingier during the day and crappy sleep at night.  What's new?  Elsie's two bottom ones have broken through and Delia's are coming soon.  2 down, 6 to go, wish us luck!  Once they are gone I am hoping the nighttime wake-ups start disappearing again, as they did for a glorious 2 or so weeks back in early July. 

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Remember my post awhile back about the biting?  Well, for awhile it had almost disappeared, but its now back, and now Delia is hip to the scene and is serving up some of the same medicine for Elsie!  Ah well.  But also now we have hitting, toy throwing and OMG bloody murder screaming and screeching at each other or me whenever one or the other has a toy or bike or chair or stool or a cup or a snack that the other wants.  They even complain about space, if the other is too close or in their way.  Holler holler cry cry cry.  It is kinda funny sometimes and often I just ignore it (especially the complaining and screaming, not the violent parts so much), but man it is exhausting too and I feel like I am mediating or moving and distracting one baby or another all day long.  Not to mention Emma, which is a whole 'nother kettle of fish I will not go into now (though knock on wood the past week has been quite a bit better...)

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But I can't complain TOO much because they are also quite delightful a lot of the time.  Here are some pics from our visit to my parents a few weeks ago.  Delia is in red and orange, Elsie in yellow.  More photos in the gallery here, in better quality than the slideshow I posted previously.   

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Visit to Grandma & Grandpa Waitt's

Check it out....