Emily in her "Hawaii Box" items sent by vacationing grandparents and great-aunt and uncle. Said people are now up to their ears in Spokane's snow...
Madeleine in her "Hawaii Box" items. If some is good, more is better.
As the previous post describes we recently entered the world of "Big Girl Beds"; this was not a successful journey. The girls were put into their beds on a Friday and between goofing around when they should be napping, staying up late (despite being put down at their normal time) and waking up early, they managed to shave about 3 hours of sleep off of their standard amount. The antics include everything from emptying our dresser drawers (including the placement of underwear on each head as a "hat") to throwing "bedtime toys" back and forth. I didn't see it, but I'm pretty sure there was some dancing involved. There was one instance where Madeleine was singing at the top of her lungs and Emily pitched her Sesame Street Ernie doll, hitting Madeleine squarely on the cheekbone with Ernie's rather large plastic eyes. Madeleine was convinced this required urgent medical attention and after talking her down I asked Emily to apologize. Emily gave the obligatory "I'm sorry" (it wasn't strikingly sincere), but then announced "Madeleine sing more, Madeleine might get hurt more." - it was rather like tucking in a member of Tony Soprano's crew.
The Monday after they were given their beds I came to the startling realization that if I was meant to be a game show hostess I would be; it was time to end my career with "Let's Make A Deal". That day the girls were given one warning and when they got out of their beds they were returned to their cribs...they napped for 3+ hours (possibly indicating they were in fact tired?). Foolishly, I thought I had it figured out, but as the days progressed and the girls became more tired it dawned on me that drastic steps had to be taken. Friday at naptime I was faced with the decision of removing the beds or pitching the girls through their bedroom window in complete and absolute frustration with the sleep-deprived lunatics who had taken possession of my children's bodies (The girls do not do well with decreased sleep and neither do I. I also, apparently, don't do well with not getting a bit of time to myself in the middle of the day while the girls nap). That day I put them down at the normal time and waited an hour - still partying. I got on the treadmill and walked for an hour, went and listened at their door - still partying. It was at that point the girls were told they were not in trouble, but that they weren't ready for Big Girl Beds and the beds were removed to the guest room. Emily was not particularly upset, but Madeleine was afraid I had sent the beds back to the store, she was told that was not the case.
I had intended for the cribs to return for only a day or two, but both girls came down with minor colds and there was no way they were going to be free-range toddlers with a humidifier and Sudafed Plugin in the room...so, we all caught up on sleep and are trying it again. The Big Girl Beds made their triumphant return on Thursday evening and we'll see. The beds are now foot to foot as Emily kept "falling" (her parents would disputer her choice of verb and choose "climbing") out of the "head part"; she now has a wall at her head. We also have bedrails that work, but frankly those seem to have just excited the girls by adding to the challenge.
Yesterday, I went in to find their entire sock drawer emptied on the floor and ended up removing their dresser from the room (Have I mentioned my furniture moving abilities have truly flourished in the past two weeks?). Complete devastation ensued and the dresser was returned on the condition it is not treated as a toy bin...so far, so good.
One member of the family, Lucy, is absolutely thrilled to bits to have two new beds to sleep on. Her only issue seems to be evenly splitting her time between our bed and those of the girls.
Last Saturday the girls got new shoes. We ventured to the Stride Rite outlet for the first time and had a fairly successful trip. (We did have to return Monday because Madeleine said her new shoes "hurt". I could in no way see where they were pinching her and kept asking questions. Turns out, "hurt" was her way of expressing her displeasure that the shoes were not "pink enough" - the shoes were exchanged for "pinker ones".) Although, I did get what I call a "twin comment" that threw me a bit. We are very used to people, as in total strangers, coming up and asking/commenting on the most amazing things related to the girls being twins; which one we love more, if they are sisters, if they were sick when they were born, general comments about personality, etc. However, a woman at the shoe store approached me and informed me that her grandmother was an identical twin. I said "Great." (standard response) and tried to move on, but she would have none of it. She then told me that the two women looked alike (shocking) and even had strikingly similar handwriting - okay. Then, she announced it was really weird to be at her grandmother's funeral and see "...one of them in the coffin and the other standing there looking at her, it was like looking at yourself in a coffin." Of all the issues related to having twins that have crossed my mind; this one never did! Apparently grandchildren of both women were upset and confused...this is when my fight or flight instinct kicked in and since you can't fight a lunatic beaming at your toddlers discussing their funerals - I just said "Well, I hope I'm not at either of their funerals. It isn't the life cycle to bury your children." and hit the road - weirdo!
Tuesday the girls and I had some "alone time". For the first hour of school Emily went to class and Madeleine and I walked to campus and had a muffin at the little cafe in the foyer of William and Mary's library. We looked at flowers and picked up some rocks. Coming back we took turns chasing each other across the soccer field. Then, Madeleine went to school for the second hour and Emily and I went to get a muffin. We also took turns chasing each other across the soccer field and saw some early spring flowers. Then both of them went to school and I got an hour without either of them! It was really nice to have some one-on-one time with each of them and be able to do things that aren't normally possible, like when Emily wanted to ride on my shoulders - no problem with one, but a bit of an issue with both of them as they are right around 31-32 lbs. each. Our thanks to Miss Deena and Miss Kim for valiantly participating in our little game of "Which one is at school now?"
Thursday, the girls and I went to Colonial Williamsburg. We visited with the sheep, but actually ended up having more fun with the ants. We found a patch of hardened dirt in the middle of a lawn and were watching the ants come out of their hole in the ground. After we crumbled a goldfish cracker we got to watch the ants carry the pieces around and noticed they were now coming out of five previously unnoticed holes in the ground; this is when a visit to the sheep was suggested. The girls decided they were big ants and insisted on being called Ant Madeleine and Ant Emily for the rest of the morning. We did stop back by the ants on our way home and said goodbye.
