Tag: twin toddlers

Mash-up

Posted on by the.indigo.hen in daily life

The boys have been a challenge lately. And by challenge I mean, whiney, mischievous, little knobs. Granted, they are getting their 2 year molars…but…I literally saw one choke hold the other. I should add they love to play wrestle, but really guys?! As a parent when you walk in to see that kinda stuff you damn near crap yourself. If it was just this type of stuff I could handle the repetitive “be nice/gentle to your brother”. Ohhh, but it’s not. They go for yelling/whiney fits, so much so that I miss the phone call from the technician coming to fix the stove. But, of course he won’t answer when I call back. Then, while waiting through the ringing for a voicemail that’s not set up I hear a thud…..suspicious at best. That thud? Yeah, it was the front curtains being pulled down from our bay windows. NOT COOL guys…NOT.COOL!!! Finally quiet. The highlight of which was my picking up the yard only to cut both of my feet on glass. And then that stove tech rings the door bell. Now, all hell truly breaks loose because jacks REDICULOUS freak out ensues. Picking him up to put him in the office, Diva, who has freshly cut nails, runs across the top of my foot. Cutting a perfect line from pinkie to big toe:) And that “nap time” I’d hoped for…yeah.right. Because,nooo nooo, we’ve decided that sleep is so unneeded for teething toddlers. That 2.5 hour mid-day nap is only a distant mommy memory now. So after just 45 min nap time is done. So, by this point in the day I’m gimping around just trying to keep up cleaning behind the twin tornadoes, plus, I now have a tech in my house and two dogs who are bent on making him their new ball time BFF, oh and the twins startled out of naps. Glorious. I drink my way to 6pm/Scott getting home. He takes over for the few hours until bed time. But this day is nicely capped by finding urine soaked sheets in the bed of a potty trained kiddo……ahhhh where’s the big gulp.
Mondays done,
Tuesdays another day…….wait it’s Wednesday already….20140618-095046-35446634.jpg

twin land ❤

Milwaukee Zoo

Posted on by the.indigo.hen in adventures

Grandpa and Nana came to visit on Saturday and treated us to the zoo! We had the perfect afternoon seeing lots of animals and even getting fresh ice cream. The boys absolutely loved the water misters, I think daddy did too 😉Adventures

But we all had fun there was a nice breeze and lots of shady paths. Plus it really wasn’t that busy since we went at 3pm and they close at 5pm.
Adventures Adventures Adventures Adventures
And after the zoo we enjoyed a nice family cookout:)

Daddy’s Birthday

Posted on by the.indigo.hen in adventures

AdventuresWell yesterday was Scotts birthday, not quite 30 yet :o, and we celebrated with a pretty mellow day and Wisconsin State Fair festivities. Scott also got to welcome baby Bennett to the world at 2:32pm! Hopefully well see more than Jon’s snapshot soon at Nicole & Jons blog. As for the fair…can I just say, thank you Milwaukee for constantly dropping the bar of standards. State Fair was about as gross as I remember, but the amount of teens prostituting around, in what I can only assume they think 23 year olds wear, was just disturbing. That coupled by the drunk 40+ year old grungy men that were already HAMMERED at 6pm and oogling said girls…keeping it classy MKE. Aside from the revolting people it was a nice cool evening and not horribly busy. We took the boys to see the animals mostly, ohh and we also had to get a cream puff for Scott and the boys (first ever!!)
Adventures

In other news Scott is apparently more of a spectacle with the twin stroller than I am! I think its because I have learned not to make eye contact with the little old ladies, for Scott on the other hand, it doesn’t seem to matter. They will come right up and touch, yes TOUCH, the boys! Luckily that’s mostly in grocery stores and when momma bear isn’t around 😉 Anyhow, we did get the stares and AWWWee’s but the fair went off without a hitch. The boys love to people watch, but they also got a kick out of all of the animals

AdventuresAdventuresAdventures
Adventures
The boys have been very interested in animals lately. Yes, I am loving it! But, we are definitely working on manners around animals…they have been known to sit on the dogs, push them, and even pull the cats hair. So, next week we will be implementing happy dog-baby training…stay tuned to hear how it goes!

What I wish I knew BEFORE cloth diapering twins

Posted on by the.indigo.hen in Eco Friendly Parenting

Daily Life
As most of you know we are currently doing Nakie Days potty training however, when we started, we used diapers…and no, not cloth diapers :0 We started on disposables. Honestly, we didn’t have the money to pay up front for new cloth diapers and since I was new to it all I had no clue there are trades, swaps and sells of all kinds. Needless to say we used what we were given as gifts and used coupons to buy what more we did need for disposables. This stockpile held us over until they were 5 months old. No joke, it was great to not have to diaper shop. By the time we were out we had gotten some Gdiapers to try, as we were told they were a gateway cloth diaper. I looked at the company and I liked that it was a company I could stand behind and feel good about buying from. In addition, we could still use them as a disposable(with the convenience of being flushable)and of course the other perks of cloth:) One problem… we had no idea what to expect, I mean who cloth diapers twins?! Well, we do, and a surprising amount of other twin mommas! Its not for everyone but here’s how we do it!
Our Stash:
We started with 24 inserts/5 covers/5 liners and soon realized that was NOT enough, even with doing laundry daily. Yes, we wash our own. We added 36 more inserts to our stash immediately and over the next 8 months we added 10 more covers and 15 more liners. This meant we only had to wash once every three days. Ours are all Larges, the boys were a little small for them in the beginning but it worked out well and we’ve been able to get more use out of them! Also Gdiapers use a paper like liner against the back of the cloth insert, but if you sew a piece of fabric on the back it works just as well:) Voila…see picture for example:)
Daily Life

Daily Life in cloth
The boys did wonderfully with the transition from disposable to cloth. Their instinctual “dirty alert” with cloth diapering became like clock work every day. It was soon after that we introduced the potty(we’re still in the process of finding the best potty for boys, and I will review them all later). The day we got the potty we decided to time our “potty breaks” for when they normally went. Instant success! Cloth Diapering reinforced the natural tendency for our boys to not like their soiled diapers on their bums. After 6 months of timing their potty needs we rarely had more than one poop mess per day and even those if caught fast enough easily “peel” off the cloth G insert, and flush. Yes, if its really liquid-y it soaks in and is harder to get out, so catch it fast 😉 Through out the day I would keep used G’s in a fabric tote (with a garbage liner in it) in our laundry room. If I was lazy I washed what was in that tote once per 3 days, if I was super mom twice per day. And hey, you don’t even have to wash, there are services in just about every major city that wash cloth diaper inserts for you. Leaks, explosions, and utter disaster? Not here, we had the expected FULL diapers and a mishandling by mommy or daddy that got poo everywhere, but things were always nicely contained with G’s. Boy parts do tend to be a little more… crafty shall we say.. about leaking. But, if you don’t want leaks …its all about a snug fit! My only complaint is about night time/nap time absorbency, we have had to stick with disposables to get the needed protection(that was without a nighttime bottle and ample potty breaks :/) oOHhh just a heads up too, cloth are BIG compared to your disposables so plan on going up a size in clothes. We “lost” a good portion of 6m clothes when we started and jumped right to 9m.
Washing Cloth
Yes this does incur a dollar amount so, remember to figure that in when you decide if its cheaper for you. As I said before, if washing isn’t for you there are services in almost every major city….and my solution to everything…just google it! We wash with homemade detergent and always do 2 wash/rinse cycles. It helps with build-up. If you do have build up you will start to notice a constant odor, possibly diaper rash;all you need to do is strip them. Pretty simple, wash/rinse without detergent over and over(5 cycles for us). We do this every 3/4 months, but keep in mind we have few poops in diapers.

Scheduling with Twins

Posted on by the.indigo.hen in daily life

Daily LifeThe one piece of advice anyone with twins agrees on is….GET THEM ON A SCHEDULE!! They both feed, nap and wake at the same times every day. As they grow you have to adjust the schedule with the needs of both children rolled into one daily routine. yea…its an art…
why have a routine
well try it without one and get back to me 😉 its chaos, and I can not stress that enough, CHAOS…as new parents the schedule of one baby can be baffling enough on an “on demand” feeding routine let alone two on opposite routines. Scott and I were lucky enough to only experience this twice, once while they were in the NICU, and once shortly after they came home. *Plus a schedule is an easy way to track baby vitals (potty times, who did what, feed times, etc.)…think about trying to remember which baby you changed last and who peed… at 3am.
from day one have a routine
Whether you are coming home from the NICU one at a time or all leaving the hospital at the same time have a plan for your daily schedule and stick to it! When we left the NICU the staff had already established a “feed-every-three-hours” routine. We followed this for 4 days and then they immediately jumped up to every 4.5 hour feeds.Daily Life
keeping them on the same schedule can be tricky
It means making tons of judgment calls throughout the day on waking a child once the other is up, feeding both when only one is hungry, keeping two tired babies up to avoid breaking the routine. It also means tight scheduling or not doing some activities to avoid breaking the routine. We did wait quite a while to begin doing outings with the boys for this reason.
adjusting the schedule
As your kids grow their needs change and you will have to adjust to them. Each child is different but ours have always done best with a “slow change.” So when we went from a bottle to dinner with milk we slowly reduced the amount of the night time bottle, while increasing the amount of “solids.” That being said, the boys from day one have been very sensitive to time discrepancies in the schedule and we have struggled on occasion to maintain sanity sometimes. No this doesn’t mean you don’t have to stick to the routine all the time, a day here or there will throw them off a bit but its manageable. So just make sure to plan any big events(that will be all day affairs) in advance and block out the days around them.
As they get a little older (12m+) outings get a little easier, they can walk, they require less “baggage” and once ours passed a year we moved to one nap a day so we only had to plan around that:)

Eco Momma

Posted on by the.indigo.hen in Eco Friendly Parenting

Daily LifeIn the last few weeks I have managed time to cross off some of my “projects” from the DIY list.
Daily LifeOur first DIY project and most noteworthy creation? Eco-friendly and family safe cleaner! We made from a few simple ingredients, vinegar and orange peels, vanilla bean and cinnamon sticks. Since it takes about a month to “ferment” we made a large enough batch to have around for a little while. (ie 5 bags of oranges worth of peels, 10 cinnamon sticks and 5 vanilla beans) The first batch is still out for review from the ladies at work, and we have just wrapped up making our second batch. The second batch we ended up doubling, since you can use the orange peels for two batches before throwing them away. Now that its all strained (we just used diaper cloth that wasn’t pre folded), we put it into canning jars to store it and some in a squirt bottle in the kitchen. Daily Life
our second DIY project was yogurt. The between the boys and Scott its hard to keep it in the fridge:0 Plus we get the organic, so the price adds up! Anyhow, after a quick recipe check we found that all it took a gallon of milk, 1/2c of yogurt and a few kitchen items, a thermometer, pot, strainer and bowl. After boiling the milk (any kind you want) and letting the temperature come back down to 100*F, then mix in your room temperature 1/2c of plain yogurt. Leave over night(approx. 8 hours) in the oven with the oven light on. In the morning, line the strainer with diaper cloth(this stuff is handy) and place the strainer over a bowl to catch the whey that will drain out. Depending on the thickness of yogurt you want leave it drain for more(thicker) or less time(runnier). We added fresh fruit and organic oats to round this out as a snack for the boys, we were also able to freeze them into yogurt drops…and yes they work wonders for our endless-teething-phase.Daily Life
our third DIY project was a fort made out of an old sheet for the boys! It was a queen size sheet and I cut it into 4 sections, sewing them all together to make one very long piece that is 4 feet wide. I then gathered the fabric to attach it to the “roof” of the fort which we attached with Velcro since the boys like to pull things down to their level. The “roof” has a serving tray from target in it and is connected with left over sheet cut into strips. Hanging it up from the ceiling we made a little rainy day hideaway with plushies and a mattress:)Daily Life
strong>our fourth DIY project was cloth diaper cleaning or “stripping.” It basically just means washing/rinsing out all of the build-up and grime. We already cloth diaper with our and have since the twins were 5 months, they’re now 15 months…so its time. (yes I’ll do a segment later on our choice to Cloth Diaper)
our fifth DIY project was to make our own deodorant! Way cheaper and it uses Coconut oil! I made a small batch from 5TBS of coconut oil, 1/4c corn starch and 1/4c baking soda (plus a few drops of whatever essential oils you like). Plus while its still warm you can pour it into your old deodorant container to re-use it! Plus, it really works:) Daily Life<

Scott and I are really happy to be finding healthier and cheaper ways to live. Stay tuned as we try more DIY like, home made bug repellant, sensory play with the boys, a few new food recipes!

Baby food Makin’

Posted on by the.indigo.hen in daily life

From day one day one the options and possibilities are endless. From store brand to organics you can find just about every food mashed and liquefied into nice little pouches or jars. Bringing me to my dilemma… I pause for a minute, getting slightly confused thinking about the organic baby food that stores for months with no refrigeration needed. Decision made! We will make our own food. Our reasons were simple 1) with twins, it cheaper to make it myself 2) the food will be fresh/not processed. Whatever your reasons are, understand that baby food makin is time consuming, tedious and messy, if those things aren’t for you I suggest you buy your baby food. We have now been making the boys food (mostly organic and from scratch) since they started eating solids at about 6m, and we use a Beaba Babycook to make our foods. Anyhow, after a few trips to the market last week we have tons of fruit that probably will go bad before we get to it. Solution, puree it down and freeze it, making easy smoothies, and baby popsicles among other things.
Let the messes begin…..
We have Peaches, Nectarines, Kiwis, Watermelon, Cantaloupe, Plums, Strawberries, Blackberries, Blueberries, Pineapple, Cherries, ohhh and we threw in some spinach, cherry tomatoes and peppers for veggies. Phweeewh. To begin, I don’t cook the fruits, but I do clean them in a vinegar soak before I puree. I chop all fruits/veggies into chunks that can fit in the processor and then blend away…this takes less time than cooking but still is tedious because we make such large batches and the Beaba cooker barely hold 4 cups (yes we will be upgrading to the 2x soon). Then some pretty pictures…Daily lifeBaby food MakinBaby food making

and then freezing. We have some cute molds for the boys foods; caterpillars, brains, shark fins, octopus, you get the point, and each “flavor” of food gets a certain mold for that batch. We store them in the freezer in a large ice cube bin. Voila, homemade, organic baby food!

Making a Splash

Posted on by the.indigo.hen in daily life

After a few days of trying to rearrange the schedule we are finally on track. Daily life, even as simple as what time to have lunch, is now chaotic. With twins some days everything seems chaotic though….BUT, were on target and were even getting a 3 hour nap in! Amazing, its given Scott and I plenty of time to pack, a luxury I didn’t have the last few times. Anyhow, we have been trying to occupy the boys when we do have to pack with them around so we ordered a play table…not just any play table a splash play table. Our little “merman” babies (think zoolander) love to stay in the tub for hours everyday splashing away and recently have found a second love in our pool. We decided to put it on the porch, which, we recently covered in bamboo grass to add a little privacy since the boys are frequently nakie :0 And…they LOVE it, every time they play by the glass patio now they try to open the door to get out there!

splash day :)
splash day 🙂
Splash time
Splash time
So, MOVING TIP # 1 pack the things you don’t use on a daily basis early (2-4 weeks before you move depending on how much stuff you have) this will save you time in the long run. Be sure to clearly mark all boxes with contents and instructions on where they should be put. This way you pack early (less stress) and can throw away/sell things you wont move with. An added plus…the pets and kids aren’t alarmed by the slow process:)

Good old fashion fun!

Posted on by the.indigo.hen in adventures

Saturday night we decided to try the Drive in movie with the boys. Scott and I had never been either, so, we went to the one in Jefferson off Hwy 18…which was kinda far away. But, we packed up the car with some blankets having no clue what to expect….Well, when we got there around 7pm we realized we were the newbies-most people had huge set ups, camping chairs, air mattresses…BUG SPRAY. I hate to say it but, yes, we were totally unprepared. Anyhow, here’s the low down on our trip and what we will do better.
For next time!
• Yes, get there early, you will get the best parking and food. Cars flooded in at around 8-9 at this place.
• When you park, DO park in the front row of where they will allow larger cars, trucks, SUV’s- this will give you the best view (and not of the truck in front of you blocking half of the screen)

our view
our view

• Make sure to look before you park! To get the best viewing I laid in the back with the boys while Scott parked to make sure we could see the movie screen easily while lying in the Tiguan.
• We only planned to stay for one movie, next time we will stay for both. Hey, we already paid! Plus, evidently everyone only planned to stay for one movie and traffic was a pain.
• Leave the car seats easily accessible and once the boys fall asleep buckle them in. This way we can easily reattach the seats for the drive home without waking the boys.
Next, what to bring with you!
• Toys! Haha, yes, we forgot toys for the boys :0 but, we thought the moving would start sooner! So, next time we will bring things to occupy the boys until bed or the movie time.
• Seats or space specifically for the kids- we mistakenly thought the four of us could fit laying down in the back of the Tiguan.
• Bug Spray or netting! Self-explanatory
• More soft stuff. We brought 4 king size blankets and 2 king pillows, still not enough! (but I also LOVE blankets)
movie night
before the movie

All in all our first drive in theatre movie experience was not too shabby! We saw Despicable Me 2…(for those of you that don’t want to know what happens don’t read this)….I was disappointed! The focus on how weird the female agent was supposed to be detracted rather than added, the plot was a little shaky and it definitely seemed like the sequel that wasn’t as good as the first, also, Despicable Me the original had much more adult humor. It was cute though, just wasn’t as impressed as I’d hoped to be.
Ps…..were still accident free!!

Potty training bliss

Posted on by the.indigo.hen in daily life

Holiday recap, anniversary, free time, graduation and moving! Wow, well, were at it again! Moving that is packing up the apartment and off to…well not really sure yet, haha. Scott is stressing about the changes, big time, but I love it. I have him home with me, I’m done with school, its summer, we have reliable back up housing, and what’s best is Scott doesn’t have to work if he doesn’t really want to! Anyhow…more about that later
But here’s what I really wanted to get to…my parents were nice enough to take then boys again for an extended holiday since the holiday is also our anniversary! Scott and I got to spend the fourth together and baby-less  anyhow, the cherry on top of all of this was that this morning when we went to get them we were told that in the last 2 ½ days they had only had one accident!!! And this was for grandma!!! We are amazed! Apparently, my parents had been able to reap the rewards of Scott and I spending a rough week with of diaper-less babies. So, if any of you were wondering if you wanted to attempt the 3 day method, see if it works, I would say Go for it! Looks like we’ll be taking things a little more seriously now!
After getting them in Milwaukee we went quickly and test drove a side by side stroller. It was one that I had ruled out early on in our stroller search because it didn’t have a twin model. Now it has a twin model or, because the boys are bigger (and this would be a second-stroller for us) we could get a single stroller and add a glider board for the other to stand on while we push. Since we still LOVE our city select and don’t plan on getting rid of it any time soon were in no rush to buy now but were definitely looking!

Tuckered out after the holiday with g-ma and g-pa!
Tuckered out after the holiday with g-ma and g-pa!

Changes galore coming up so stay tuned. Aug 2013 moving with twins from a seasoned pro …..three times and the boys aren’t even a year and a half yet!