{phfr} & TT

Cryptic enough title for you?  Ah, yes, I'm doubling up on my link-ups today!

 

 

{pretty}

 

Linking up with Clan Donaldson for "bodies" this week:

 

 

Perfect wrist rolls (Mary Claire's)

 

 

Chubby baby toes (Mary Claire's)

 

 

Pudgy toddler fingers (Cecilia's)

 

 

Dimpled baby elbows (Elizabeth's)

 

And the only chubby part of John Paul's body - his toes!

 

{happy}

 

This kid ALWAYS wants to take pictures together - his smile is infectious!

 

{funny}

 

Andrew was NOT amused by Elizabeth's Spock eyebrows last week...

 

But then he brought her into the kitchen wearing a tiny baby hair net???

 

Actually it's a little net that keeps produce in its farmer's market bins...

 

 I took that as permission to draw eyebrows on the twins...  Concerned Clown and Happy Clown?

 

{real}

 

Too bad they can't stand being near each other, right?  John Paul's legs are up in the air, as usual.

 

Because apparently he needs to be in various stages of head stand at all hours of the day.

 

And you're getting a nice view of his body here - see what I mean about no pudge?  Kid eats more than the entire rest of the family and where does it GO???

 

Check out more loveliness at Like Mother, Like Daughter and more bodies at Clan Donaldson!

Nursing rules for babies

Well, I've officially nursed my children for 39 months, or 45 months if the twins count separately.  Sometimes I feel like there's gotta be some sort of unwritten handbook on nursing that babies pass on to one another telepathically.   I think it's to our advantage to have this in writing, so here's what I'm guessing those babies are passing on to one another:

Newborns:

Your mom has been carrying you under her heart for the past 9 or 10 months.  She's not ready to be done being pregnant!  The way to ease her into this new stage of life is to stay attached to her as much as humanly possible.

-  Consider staying latched for hours at a time - that way when you're done sleeping, you don't have to wait at all for your next meal because you're ready to go!

John Paul very rarely unlatched for those first 4 weeks or so...

 

-  If you must unlatch, a good rule of thumb for nursing is that your next nursing session should begin 2 hours after your last began.  So if you nurse for 1.75 hours, that gives you 15 minutes to poop, stretch, spit up, get your diaper and outfit changed, and then you're ready to start again!

 

Sometimes you can stay asleep while they hold you, that's okay too

 

-  If you accidentally consume too much at one time, don't worry about that uncomfortably full tummy - just spit up all over the place (preferably down Mom's shirt, but the floor, Dad's face, the furniture, anything dry-clean only are also excellent options) and you'll be ready for another meal!

6 weeks-3 months:

Congratulations!  You've now eased your mom out of the 4th trimester of pregnancy!  It's cool to take a little break from the nonstop nursing now that you're probably gaining weight well.  Here are some suggestions for this stretch:

-  The spitting up rule still applies - if you eat too much at once, just puke and you'll feel better.  Mom and Dad might let strangers hold you, and if they've never had kids it's a REALLY excellent idea to puke on them to help affirm them in whatever vocation they feel called to.

He still doesn't have kids, but it's not John Paul's fault, right?

-  Plan your nursing schedule around convenient times for Mom - some prime times to demand to nurse are when she's about to get in the shower, when she's just gotten OUT of the shower, when she's trying to pee, when she's cooking, etc.  You're really just helping her learn how to multitask!

-  Some babies start sleeping longer stretches at night at this point - don't feel compelled to do so if you don't want to!  If you nurse often enough at night, Mom'll just bring you into bed with her and then you've got the snack bar all night long!

-  Now that you've started grabbing for things, here's a fun tip:  Grow your nails long and start clawing at Mom's chest while nursing!  She'll hold your hand to keep you from doing it, how sweet!

4-6 months:

You may be learning some good tricks these days - rolling over, playing with toys, allowing yourself to be put down for more than 30 seconds at a time.  There are MANY things to do that are more interesting than nursing and napping!

Toys!  All the toys, way better than nursing!

-  If Mom is nursing you and you see something interesting (like the light, or the ceiling, or the window, or the wall, or the book Mom's reading, or your brother jumping up and down), DO NOT UNLATCH - simply streeeeetch to see whatever it is while maintaining a firm grip on Mom.  You're helping encourage elasticity.

-  Consider encouraging Mom to try different nursing positions by attempting to kick yourself off her lap, rolling yourself over, demanding that she nurse you while standing and bouncing but only if you're completely vertical, etc.  She's looking a little chubby, she probably needs the exercise.

-  Isn't it comfortable to nap while nursing?  Now that you're an efficient enough nurser, you don't EVER have to be put down to nap!  Simply fall asleep the moment you latch, and wake up within 20-30 minutes.  That nap will be enough to recharge you for several hours, if not the entire day!

Once again, still *sometimes* acceptable to nap while being held.

6-12 months:

-  Your parents may begin introducing you to what is called "solid food" - some of you may enjoy this, but others may not.  Remember, you should still be nursing as much as possible so that Mom can keep burning calories to justify eating all those milk shakes!  Solid food is for playing, smearing, dropping on the floor, and SOMETIMES consuming.  Save enough tummy space for the good stuff, though!

Crayons are a good start - low-calorie and tasty!

-  At some point in this time period you will be learning how to stand.  Standing while nursing is ALWAYS a good idea.  Always.  Do it as often as possible, making sure to turn your head from side to side frequently to check out what's going on and maintain that elasticity.

-  You may find it's a bit more difficult to nap while nursing.  The way to help Mom realize what you need is to FREAK OUT at all times while nursing until she takes you into a dark room, preferably on the cool side, with a white noise machine running.  Then IF Mom lies down to nurse you and stays perfectly quiet, you may have a 20-30 minute power nap while nursing.  If Mom falls asleep, sometimes it's cool for you to stay asleep for longer too.  Don't make it a habit though, then she'll just get lazy.

12-18 months:

You've made it to a full year of nursing!  Congratulations!

-  Mom and Dad might decide to let you start drinking this weird cold milk that comes from a cow.  The preferred method of consumption is such:

1.  Fill mouth with cold milk
2.  Let it dribble out the sides of your mouth
3.  Raspberry it all over the place!!!

I hear it tastes great with cookies, but Mom won't give me any because she hates sharing.  The jerk.



They may be kind enough to share the magical food called "ice cream" with you - take advantage of this opportunity.

-  Now that you're walking, you can march right on over to Mom, pull up her shirt, and get yourself a snack.  Go for it, you earned it!

-  Frequent snacking is encouraged - you want to keep Mom on her toes and make sure she doesn't get it into her mind that she might be allowed to wear a dress with a high neckline or anything else "fashionable" that is really just NOT nursing-accessible.

-  It's always especially funny to go for a snack when you've just chewed up some solid food, just to see what kind of different concoctions you can make.  Chewed up carrots + breastmilk = a winning combination, plus you can leave some for Mom to enjoy later!

18 months+:

I've got nothing - I didn't quite make it to 18 months with Cecilia (we were a week shy, I was 20 weeks pregnant with the twins and still hadn't gained any weight plus my supply had dried up, so she happily weaned with Cheez-its and Craisins offered as an alternative) and John Paul was about 15 months when he weaned (same story, but with no Cheez-its).

What about you all - any tips you think need to get added to the list?

*Disclaimer:  This post is intended to be humorous - normal nursing varies dramatically from baby to baby, these are just some behaviors I've noticed that have been consistent with my babies.  Please contact your local La Leche League if you have questions or concerns!

Matchy-matchy

I'm kind of anti-dressing the twins in matching outfits...  But we were at our favorite consignment store a while back and these were on final markdown for less than $2/each.  So I couldn't resist!  Really just because I was imagining a really fun photo shoot :)  And while I still want to take them outside (once they're actually sitting up) and get some good pictures in their outfits, we got some fun indoor pictures:

 

 

Elizabeth likes to fling herself around whenever I try to position her...



Oh wait, so does Mary Claire...

Babies in motion!  Just try to catch us before we fall off the couch, Mom!

You're gonna peekaboo us?  Funny!

SO funny!!!  Mary Claire can't even keep her tongue in her mouth, that's how funny!

Gotta love the coy expressions...

Mom...  She's SUCKING my SHOULDER!

NO TOUCHING!  MAKE HER STOP!!!

Okay, let's try moving them...  Nope, Mary Claire would rather play with a toy.

But Elizabeth will smile and flail!!!

Or just smolder, that's cool too.

Aaaaand there's only so long I can take pictures these days before they start rolling away!  We'll try this again another day :)

WIW Pentecost Sunday

John Paul has been excited for Pentecost since Easter.  He's been talking about it nonstop, so when I saw Catholic Icing's Pentecost craft, I KNEW that was something I could handle. 

 

Pentecost crowns!

 

"My Catholic cake is made with a Wi-fi icing!!!" He said, looking at the Catholic Icing website...

 

He was a little upset that there was no Ascension song on the Pentecost page, so he made up his own:

 

"The Ascension Song" by John Paul (sung to the tune of "Frere Jacques")

Tra la la la, Tra la la la,
The Ascension, The Ascension!
Tongues of fire, tongues of fire,
Puzzle pieces. Puzzle pieces.
... 

 Can you tell what distracted him?

 

And last night the smoke alarm started going off so of COURSE Andrew had to start singing, "The roof, the roof, the roof is on fire!"  to which John Paul responded, "The roof is on fire!  BECAUSE IT'S ALMOST PENTECOST SUNDAY!!!"

 

Yeah, I'm raising a liturgy nerd...

 

So anyway, we had to make sure to get as much red as possible into our outfits.  John Paul suggested he wear his red sweatpants, but that idea was quickly vetoed in favor of seersucker pants and a red sweater vest.  Cecilia's dress is as close as we could come - the flowers look kind of flame-y, right?  And I have red shoes, but nothing else...

 

Picture taking was not our finest this week:

 

Ohhhhh so awkward...  But sadly, it's the best we got!

 

I was feeling gray and gloomy because the weather was disgusting...  So I dressed accordingly?

 

Skirt:  H&M

Sweater:  Express

Shoes:  Nine West

Exhaustion:  c/o Mary Claire, who decided 3-5 AM was the time to coo and blow raspberries.  And one of the lovely things about twins is that you can't tag-team this sort of thing, because Andrew had to snuggle Elizabeth in bed to keep her asleep.  Yay.

 

The kids did NOT wear those hats to Mass - I convinced John Paul he didn't want his tongue of fire getting wet and limp...  And Cecilia wanted to wear her raincoat with a hoodie, so she had to take her hat off.

 

Mass behavior?  Cecilia was pretty bad, bad enough to be sent to her room when we got home.  John Paul was pretty good, and got a lollipop from the Knights of Columbus on the way out of Mass.

 

Hopefully I'll have my act together enough to make the kids "Pentecost Sundaes" tonight after dinner.  Or maybe I'll fall asleep before we even make it that far...

 

Linking up with Fine Linen and Purple - go check out some less-dreary Mass-goers!

Quick Takes/Pinishers

--1--

 

Andrew has been gone for bedtime twice this week (for a rehearsal and a concert, I'm considering asking for 50% of what he makes as hardship pay...).  Bedtime by myself is NOT fun.  Here's how it goes:

 

- Get big kids in bathtub.  Make SURE that there's a "mystery color" (a couple of drops of food coloring in a plastic cup) ready to go so that John Paul doesn't freak out.  This actually makes him not fight bathtime at ALL, so it's worth it to me.

 

-  Get babies naked and put prefolds all over their rug to catch the inevitable pee.

 

-  Let babies play while naked, go yell at John Paul for spitting water in Cecilia's face/pouring water on Cecilia's head/telling Cecilia that he's going to push her, all of which make her sob.  Tell Cecilia to stop threatening to bite John Paul, making HIM cry.

 

-  Start a load of diapers or other laundry

 

-  Start diapering babies, who are now sobbing because MOM LEFT THEM ALONE FOR MINUTES!!!

A couple weeks ago Mary Claire got so tired of waiting for me that she just babbled for a while and then fell asleep naked...

 

-  Hear water pouring on the bathroom floor, tell big kids to drain the water (you bet I'm not washing them tonight - we'll do it tomorrow!).

 

-  Babies are crying more.  Get onesies on and swaddle them.  Put Mary Claire in the swing downstairs with lights and music to lull her to sleep (while she cries for a few minutes.  I'm sorry, Dr. Sears, sometimes I can't meet all my baby's needs when I have 3 other children to attend to...).  Pick up Elizabeth and start nursing her.

 

-  Put hooded towels on big kids and tell them to dry themselves after they take one last pee in the potty.  Hand them toothbrushes with toothpaste and let them brush & rinse themselves tonight, since there's no way I'm going to be able to do that with one hand.

 

-  Tell big kids to go get jammies on.  Balance Elizabeth on lap while still nursing to help Cecilia with her shirt. 

 

-  Read a book on the couch with the big kids while nursing.  Prayer, song, tuck in and lights out!

 

-  Continue nursing Elizabeth for another 30 minutes or so.  Put her in the crib and sit down with a sigh of relief.

 

(Then of course, Mary Claire wakes up to be nursed, John Paul and Cecilia wake up to pee, Elizabeth wakes up again...  I don't know how single moms do it!!!)

 

--2--

 

Yikes, longest #1 ever.  That could have been a post on its own...

 

Anyway, Andrew left right after the big kids went to bed tonight.  Which is normally fine, except the babies did not particularly feel like going to sleep.  So after an hour of nursing, I put Mary Claire in the swing (Elizabeth doesn't go in there swaddled, she rolls herself over...) and Elizabeth was ALL smiles!!!

 

 

Which was amazing considering how fussy she was for me all day...  But we know that babies have that special super-power to turn into the cutest, most engaging little things RIGHT when it's time for them to fall asleep!

 

--3--

 

So here I was with a swaddled baby in a great mood when I suddenly remembered a pin I had seen...

 

Draw eyebrows on a baby and then take pictures?  Yes.  Yes, yes and YES. 

 

Andrew wasn't here to stop me.  He decided to go see the new Star Trek movie in the same week that he had already been gone for two bedtimes.  So, inspired by Spock, I went to work with an eyeliner pencil.  Elizabeth was SO happy (in a non-sarcastic way - she thought this was REALLY REALLY fun!!!)!

I contemplated not washing it off and getting a hilarious reaction from Andrew when he saw her like this in the middle of the night.  But then I realized it would probably rub off on our sheets, so I cleaned her forehead.

 

And I figured, this was DEFINITELY an adventure!  An adventure in finding out if my husband thinks this is hilarious or borderline child abuse...  But really, he only has himself to blame!

 

So I'm doubling my link-up fun and linking up with Dorian's Pinisher series!

 

Let's be honest, kid's gonna be STUNNING once she actually grows some eyebrows!  And it's just not fair that her twin has eyebrows and she doesn't...  6 months is plenty of time to grow some, I don't know what her problem is :P

 

 

And how could this not be considered a success when it yields such amazing super-villain-type results as this:

 

 

--4--

 

Okay sorry, that was another really long one...

Mary Claire loves bow ties already.  Good girl.

--5--

 

I took John Paul to work with me today and he LOVED it!  He's been begging to come with me for weeks, but the schedule wouldn't work and now that we're in testing season things were thrown off enough for me to bring him in.

 

He packed his little frog backpack for me - I put two of his favorite books in and told him to pick one on his own.  His choice?  The Way of the Cross.  Of course.

 

Then he put his backpack on and waited by the door for almost an hour before we needed to go.  Kid was EXCITED!  He was SO good the whole time (except when he kept putting markers into the safe in our room...  We'll get them back eventually) and sang with my choirs and danced all around the room during warm-ups because he was so happy, and then spent a while on my laptop playing PBS Kids games (the first time he's been allowed to and he almost died he was so happy). 

 

Huge success, but not something that's going to happen often because I got VERY little done.  But hey, I made his day :)

 

--6--

Ah, Cecilia.

It seems as though the potty inspires some of our most amazing conversations:

Cecilia, in the bathroom:  Mom, COME TO ME!!!
Me:  No.
Cecilia:  Mom, COME WATCH ME POOP!
Me:  Cecilia, you don't need me to watch you poop.
Cecilia:  MOOOOOM!  HOLD ME WHILE I POOP!
Me:  *sigh*  I relented and went to the bathroom to keep her company during this difficult time.  As usual, we had a conversation about her poop.
Cecilia:  What comed out of my booty? (EVERY time.  Every single time she asks this question.  How can she possible not know the answer by now?)
Me:  Poop.  Poop is coming out of your booty.
Cecilia:  For eatin'
Me:  No, we don't eat poop.
Cecilia:  What animal eats poop?
Me:  No animals eat poop.  It would make them sick.
Cecilia:  Um.  Maybe a cow.
Me:  No, not even a cow would eat poop.
Cecilia:  Or a horse.  What do horses eat?
Me:  Hay.
Cecilia:  And pigs eat corn!  And chickens can eat corn and seeds and bugs!  And birds can eat seeds and bugs!

Yes.  Good.  Glad we had this bonding moment on the can.

 

--7--

Cecilia, screaming and almost in tears:  A BUG!!!!!!!  *runs to me*
Me:  It's okay Cecilia, it's just a big ugly bug that can't hurt you.
Cecilia:  Wike a ugwy pwincess!
Me: 
Cecilia, snuggling into me:  I snuggle Mom, it-a not hurt me...
Me:  That's right, sweet girl.
Cecilia:  Da fwy's name is Minnie Mouse!  And, da odder fwy is Mickey Mouse!  And Goofy!  And Pwuto and Donald Duck and Daisy Duck!  And...  Tootles.  And Choo-Choo...

They have a Mickey Mouse Clubhouse book.  Can you tell they're obsessed?

 

And there you have it!  I'm just going to go ahead and post this on Thursday night because I don't think anybody should be denied the baby eyebrows...

 

Linking up to Jen at Conversion Diary, the most scorpion-tastic blog I read!