Twin girls – 2 and 1/4 years old

The past few months have been a real change for the girls as they are becoming more and more independent and wanting to exercise that independence every moment they possibly can.

The most noticeable advance is in their speech which is coming along leaps and bounds and makes life so much easier. They can understand and answer questions and of course this also goes a long way in their discipline.’No, don’t touch that it’s hot, you’ll burn yourself’ and so on.

Some of their phrases make me smile and at others I burst out laughing, here’s a few that I have jotted down over the past couple of months

• Where’s Daddy gone? Where’s daddy going? What’s Daddy doing?
• My turn, your turn, my turn, your turn…this one can go on for a long time.
• My toy. No my toy! … I always have to intervene at some point in this particular conversation which gets louder and more insistent every turn.
• Sorry mummy. Used all the time even if they haven’t done something wrong.
• Don’t like it. I initially thought they were saying ‘yucky'(like it) and had no idea where they had learnt it, now they are clearer I see I had misunderstood.
• Look Babbie! (Bessie) It’s De Li (Lau Lau, Fifi, Peppa; whoever comes on the TV) Oh yes Alice!
• Ooohhhh what’s mummy got? On seeing me with anything in colourful carton, paper, wrapper etc)
• They have got the concept of hurt, hot, cold, tired, hungry and thirsty

Another major change has been nap time. Alice could quite happily go without her afternoon nap whereas Bessie would gladly sleep a couple of hours after lunch. This has changed our daily routine enormously and taken away my precious two hour gap of Me Time. I knew it was coming, I just wished I could have stretched it out till Christmas.

How do we spend our day? Well the beauty of twins is they can play together, it doesn’t always run smoothly as we have a lot of fighting over the same toy but when it does work, it’s a pleasure to watch them push a car to and fro, play Happyland together or bricks. Other toys need my assistance, like puzzles for example where they quickly lose interest and start throwing bits around the room finding it funny.

Our routine is fairly fixed, I read somewhere it helps little ones have a routine and it does work well for us even if it does get thrown out of the window occasionally. We usually get out of the house in the morning, to the supermarket, town centre or various clubs we attend (Talking Tots and Twin Club) We tend to eat lunch at midday sometimes followed by a nap but more frequently not, huge tears and shouting if I get it wrong. Afternoons can be playing with toys, playing in the garden on good weather days or CBeebies on ‘poorly days’ of which we had quite a few recently when both Alice and I went down with a horrible bug.

I have used CBeeebies far too much recently and am trying to ‘wean’ them off it but it does come in handy every now and then.

Potty Training – Haven’t re-approached this yet after last failed attempt but it’s on the agenda – God help us.

Eating – we have fads, one day something will be ‘delicious mummy’ and the next time it’s presented tears as not what they were expecting! I have tried Pasta with cooked salmon bits and cheese sauce that got the thumbs up, pasta carbonara also has finally been accepted. Roast dinner is still refused as is fish pie. Mash potato will now be taken if accompanied with gravy but not on its own. I have still failed to introduce another cereal successfully other than Cheerios but there is a new packet of Chocolate Ready Brek in the cupboard waiting…

We have tried a craft session with our Asda Rainy Day Craft Box and the glue wouldn’t stick stuff, the girls wanted to be in full control (and I didn’t want them to be) I got frustrated that they weren’t doing it ‘correctly’ so I stepped back and let them get on with it and they had great fun and I had a massive clean up. This is why I will never be a primary/pre school teacher as I just don’t have the patience.

Things to do include, potty training, reading more books together which has taken a back seat recently due to their lack of attention when I’m reading even if I have tried different times of the day and introducing more vegetables.

One of the sweetest memories I will treasure of this past couple of months is their singing; they can sing loudly ‘a squarcia gola’ as the Italians say, as I push the trolley around the supermarket ‘Twinkle, twinkle little star’ bringing even the toughest shopper to break out in a smile.They love visiting the deli counter saying hello everyone to all the staff behind and goodbye loudly as we leave and a repeat when we get to the checkout. So funny.

Alice has also gone from taking one teddy to three soft toys and dolly to bed with her now, she has to carry them all herself and stretches her arms wide to encompass them all. Bessie is still content with her teddy and her thumb which incidently is now red raw and showing signs of excema thanks to continuous sucking. Added to the To Do list.

And that is it for now – I’m entering this post into the Multiple Mayhem Carnival 🙂