Apparently, the third time IS the charm. Two weeks ago, I tried to get to the Tuesday Baby Laptime class at our library. We never even made it out the door despite my best efforts. I can’t control when the babies wake up unless I go wake them up, so we missed the class by eating second breakfast instead of heading out. Last week, we got packed into the van, arrived, the babies went into the stroller, we rolled in… and everyone was just leaving. I was running 15 minutes late but the class started 15 minutes earlier than I realized… so we were 30 minutes late. {sigh} I determined to try again!
Today, we did it. All three of us were dressed and pottied and fed (I was barely fed, but that’s not important right now), I knew what time the class started, and we got to the library TWO MINUTES EARLY! You know I brought my camera to document our success!
There are lots of nice moms and dads who come to this! I met some people last week as they were packing up to leave right when we arrived, including several girls I already knew! This week, I met new people. This is the kind of event I can go to… I might have chances to get to know these people but there is no pressure on me to get there or have it together or even to be wearing a carefree, happy face. We go if we can and we don’t if we can’t. I plan to keep trying to go and maybe we’ll actually make it for 1 out of 3 attempts! It worked today because the babies woke up at 5:30am (ick!) so they happened to wake up from their first nap just in time to get there! If they sleep until their usual 6am, it isn’t quite as possible, so we’ll see what happens next Tuesday.
I’d like to admit something that you may already know: having two babies is not the same as having one baby! We couldn’t fully participate in the songs because I can’t fly both babies during the flying parts or clap their hands with them at the same time or slide them down my leg… we just bounced and sang and tried to take it all in. They are now getting to the age where I realize that two babies is more work than one baby! I would never say that one baby isn’t hard… because any baby requires a ton of time and effort. But now that they are so active and aware and involved with all around them, they each miss out while their twin gets my time. I’m okay with this because I can’t exactly do any more than I am and they quickly learn that both of them are important and sometimes they just have to wait but it will be their turn soon. Twins learn empathy early because they DO know what it is like to walk in someone else’s shoes! And they handled it so well today… it isn’t like they are sitting there bitter that they aren’t flying during the flying parts of the songs. When they were tiny, I figured every new mom dealt with the crazy lack of day/night and the constant diapers and feedings and it was the same no matter how many babies you have. But now, it is not the same. Hauling in one 8 month old in my arms would be a heck of a lot easier than incorporating all the extra trips it requires to get them into and out of the stroller, into and out of my lap, one at a time, someone is always waiting… There is nothing easy about it! I get alot of grace from these two as they sweetly wait for each other (and sometimes not so sweetly).
I have some super cute pictures to show you, so I’ll move on to those. I’m often struck by the beauty of our children. I don’t mean that in an “oh, thank goodness they are good-looking, now they can be popular and have distorted thinking about what makes you valuable and what doesn’t” way. Of course, we do think they are good-looking kids and as their biased parents, we don’t apologize for that! But more importantly, they glow with true beauty! When they smile at us or twinkle their eyes or do something that cracks us up, I am awed over and over by who they are! It’s amazing. Check out these smiles from the past week!
Zach sits steadily by himself, as of this week! Rissa can sit great with minimal support, but she would much rather stand so she archs her back and throws herself backward to get into standing position, and somehow crashes to the ground. She has not yet figured out how these crashes could happen! She’s trying to stand, why isn’t it working? Sitting –> bouncing –> standing safely from Daddy’s knee works just fine, thank you! The exersaucer only holds one baby, but that doesn’t mean the other one can’t get in on the action! They always seem to want the same toy, even when given multiple other options! I think a toy’s value directly increases based on whether someone else wants it right now!
