Our CRAZY World

Life as of lately has been a little busy which explains my lack of posting. The boys are a few days shy of being 13 months old. I can’t even tell you where time has gone since their birthday. I feel like this month has flown by and next week I start training, workshops and two week of in service full time. I have been trying to spend time at the school to get things ready so hopefully it makes things a little less stressful. I wouldn’t trade my little monsters for anything, but they don’t make life easy. My mom has been helping out with keeping them mostly, as well as my grandparents and Ryan’s mom a few days here and there over the last month. Yesterday my sister went up to the school with me too and we got quite a bit done.

As for the monsters, they are ok. They have both been teething like crazy. Jason has nearly chewed off the railing on his crib. He is now at 8 teeth with more white spots showing on top and bottom. Reece I think has 5 now. It seems like every day a new one pops up between the two of them. Reece’s mouth is so tiny that you don’t usually see his teeth, unlike Jason.

Four up top, 3 fully in on bottom with one hiding

(Yes, my child has food on his shirt and looks dirty...welcome to the world of twin boys!)

With teething also comes screaming, nasty diapers and with nasty sour diapers comes diaper rash. We have gone through more Destin, Butt Paste, Dr. Smiths & AD cream in the last two weeks than we have in the last year! It's pretty awful, but this too shall pass. Luckily, they are mostly all smiles minus a few daily break downs. The other day Aunt Laurie (Lala) came over with her usual goodies and one of which included a swimming pool for the boys. Of course my little water bugs loved it. Unfortunately our outside activities take place in the evenings when its a little cooler out and after dinner when the are already an awful mess. So with that being said 9 out of 10 times I just take all of their clothes off and let them be "free". I took a billion pictures, but Ryan would kill me if their "deuter" was posted all over the internet. I suppose it is rather tacky haha.

How cute is this minus breakfast on his shirt?

I love my little goofy smiles!

Now there's the Jason that I know and love...

And of course my sweet Reece...always happy!

A Day With DADDY :)

Let’s just start this with I am not knocking Ryan’s babysitting skills, but I am glad he didn’t tell wheat all went on until I got home. This morning my sister and I had planned on going back to school shopping for me since I have maybe two outfits that are work acceptable. I got up at 7 to go shopping and left by 8:30. When I left Ryan and the boys were asleep and I left all instructions for Ryan for feeding while I was gone. My phone has been working in and out (but will be fixed soon because my warranty is good for another 9 days or so I was told).


Anyways back to my story…so when I left all was ok. I checked in and all I got out of the phone conversation was poop and he washed them off with the water hose. That was a little after 10. I thought, ok well at whatever happened I am sure is better now and at least they are cleaned up.
We got home around 3:15 and after being home for about 30 minutes I found the popp filled diapers and clothes in the garage…the same night time diapers that they slept in all night which means they had them on still at 10 this morning. LOL
So I thought that was the worst of it. As we are sitting on the couch Ryan goes “Well we almost had a really bad accident”. I said “what do you mean”. “Well I went to the bathroom and I thought I locked the gate. When I came back the gate was open and Jason was down here playing but I couldn’t find Reece.” I just sat there for a second as he paused and then he said “I heard a thumping noise and he was upstairs hitting a bottle up against the wall.” YES, he climbed the stairs and thank God he didn’t fall. I would imagine for a first time stair crawler it would take him a bit of time which means Ryan must have fallen in the toilet for them to beat down the gate and for Reece to climb upstairs.
So then I watched him crawl around for a while and sure enough he took right off the the staircase and headed up about 5 stairs with me behind him. Needless to say I now have the stairs double gated. What next.
It could have very easily of happened to me, which is why I started this with I am not knocking. As for the poopy explosion…you get what you ask for and by not changing their diapers you can expect an explosion. This is why God made sure it took a man AND a woman to have children, but at least I did get some clothes!

Over The Weekend...

I am up late and can't sleep for whatever reason...probably due to the fact that when I am in bed a billion different thought run through my head about everything that needs to be done. If I was smart I would be cleaning or working on things that need to be done now but I am exhausted...but can't sleep because the voice in my head won't turn off. Anyways this weekend was pretty relaxed. My parents had gone out of town camping again so my sister spent a lot of time over at our house which was nice. She and I rarely get time to just hang out without a bunch of other family around too. On Friday night we worked on painting some of my decorations for my classroom and then continued during the boys morning nap Saturday. When Ryan got home he wanted to go to Bass Pro Shop and offered to take both of the boys. WOW. As much as I wanted to say yes please, take them! I knew I couldn't. I know what its like to be out alone with them and furthermore how easily his patience can be tested so we compromised on him just taking Jason while I kept Reece. I honestly don't think he wanted both of them, I just think he knew that without taking them or at least offering I would not be happy with the fact that he was going to be gone the rest of the day. As it turned out it went great. My sister and I decided to go shop for Ryan some clothes for his new job. He starts in the morning at Bridgeway. He got an entry level position and I think it will be a nice change for him. Before we started shopping my sister treated me to her new love for sushi and now its my new love too. YUM. After shopping we stopped by Dollar Tree my new frequent shopping place for teacher stuff and then went to Tutti Frutti where Reece found his new love for frozen yogurt. By far a really good day...and we got Ryan a lot of stuff for a really great price! I just love TJ Max and Ross and love shopping for men because they are so easy!

Today was a little slow to start, but after my parents got home I went over there and wore the boys out with them. We did a lot of swimming and playing and by 6 they were beat tired. I brought them in and put them in the playroom while I was unloading things and when I came back in the house I couldn't hear them. They were both nearly asleep on the floor in the playroom. Poor boys...so they went to bed early tonight which means they will be up early too I am sure.

We have ECI in the morning. I really want to call the OT and discontinue services. I don't feel like Reece needs it as much as he once did when we were worried about him. Now its just a pain to get them dressed, feed and the house cleaned for her to come out and for us to sit and play and do things that I do with the boys all the time anyways. Most of the time the OT just watches him and tells me the same thing from the month before. I feel bad though saying your not needed and this isn't really helping. The one thing I have learned about Reece is he needs his own time and a lot of opportunities to explore and try things over and over. Sooner or later he will watch on and typically its about 4-6 weeks after Jason does it. Its so wild that they have had that gap between them for so long. Sometimes I wonder if they are really even true twins. Some things will never be understood I suppose.

For now I am going to go pick up the kitchen and go check on my boys. Its funny how when I am up alone sometimes I wish that just one one the boys would be awake and just let me hold them on the couch...which never happens. Oh and now when Jason doesn't want to do something or doesn't want what you feed him he shakes his head no and its obvious he is saying no...too cute but at the same time not the greatest thing in the world :) Kids, got to love them!

How do they figure this stuff out?

WOW ok so I just ran to use the bathroom for a few minutes and came back to silence. I thought oh dear what have they gotten into. And I found them like this...

Jason had climbed into the walker...notice his feet didn't make it in. So I took them off of it and\ watched what they did assuming they climbed on the bean bags and this is what I saw next...

(that would be juice on his bottom...no worries)

So now I thought ok fine if your going to climb on it to play with the toys I will unfold it and put it on the floor so you can't get in it.

WRONG AGAIN MOM! They proved me wrong again. Reece had climbed in and even got a leg in the whole...can you see his foot under it? So I put Reece in alone and then...

Had the door been open Jason would have pushed him right out...

Its a man house and I just live in it...

Until recently I never thought anything about being in a houseful of boys, but WOW it is catching up with me. There's three things about boys that I have recently experienced and don't get me wrong I love all 3 of them dearly, but there is truly such a thing as "a mans world and a woman’s world".


Where to begin? Let's start with heir appetite. Many nights I will make an entire 9x13 casserole for just Ryan and I and by bedtime it is gone. REALLY? The other day I made a vegetable pasta and broccoli and asparagus and Ryan asks "are we on a diet?" as we sit down to eat. He didn't mean it in a rude way, but truly was curious where's the meat this is chick food, while I gobbled it up! Now I am starting to see that same little trend in my little boys too. They are like bottomless pits. Last night we ate dinner in the living room as opposed to the dinning room because the boys ate early because they were yet again hungry before our dinner was ready. I knew there was no point in putting them in the highchairs while we ate because it would only result in unhappiness. So my monsters now have a new name. As I was eating they were flocking me at my feet. Reece was grunting which I believe was code for "FEED ME MOMMA" and Jason was like a monkey crawling into my lap trying to grab my bowl. At THEIR dinner time I made a sweet potato and cut it up thinking half for dinner tonight and half for lunch tomorrow with a jar of green bean baby food. Fat chance, the little monsters ate all of the potato and the beans. So while I was trying to enjoy my dinner I shoveled a jar of peas and a jar of mixed vegetables in their mouth and laid out a mum-mum cracker for them each just so I could eat.
This morning was the same situation. We got u at 9. Jason had an 8oz bottle of milk at 5:30 and Reece had one at about 8:45 consisting of 6 oz. I thought of I will make them rice cereal with apples and myself two waffles. As it turned out they ate all of the cereal and were still hungry so I gave them one of my waffles, they ate the other 1/2 of apple baby food that wasn't used in the cereal, abut 15 or 20 of the graduates puffs each and 3/4'2 of a banana. REALLY? They out ate me...
My next "man world complaint" is the mess they leave behind. I am not a neat freak by any means, but order and straightening up is always nice. If I were to clean the kitchen, the dishes would go in the dishwasher after a rinse, all the food would be put away, and I would gather the dishes from the dinning room or living room and would start the dishwasher if it was full and then clean off the counters. Pretty routine...Last night Ryan said he would do the kitchen after I went to bed. This morning when I made the bottle at 5:30 I saw just how clean it was. At 6:40 when he came in to kiss goodbye he said "what are you going today?" and I responded with "clean" and he said "there isn't much to do I cleaned the kitchen" and he did mean well. Here's where I laugh because man and woman clean differently. Only the dishes that were in the sick made it into the dishwasher. (The dishes on the counter were still there and those in the living room) The dishwasher was still open and nearly full, counters still had all the food on them from dinner. My boys are still too young to clean up after themselves, but from the times I have spent around little girls, boys are much different. Mine love to get into everything that’s messy. As I was watching them play the night before last in their sand and water table it really made me laugh and think about all of the messes that will come in the near future. Boys live for messes. Jason was getting water into the sand area of the table and literally had mud from head to toe and he was splashing it with his hands.
It's just so funny to me...well I am off to give this house a woman’s touch. Wish me luck...oh and don't worry I have no intentions of trying to balace the number of boys vs girls in this house. I would rather not take my chances haha. I love the three I have now and one (possibly two more) would be one or two many more!

Camping For The Fourth!

Over the weekend we went camping for the first time with the boys. My parents have an RV and the setup worked perfect. In the back is a storage area that air conditioned for hauling my Dads motorcycle. As it turned out the boys had their own little area in the back with toys and their pack-n-plays. We camped at Shady Creek outside of Jasper. The campsite was really nice. We next to the water, around the corner from the boat ramp and had the playground in our "backyard". The boys enjoyed being outdoors and had a great time swimming and exploring. We took their baby swim pool and set it up in the shade. They loved crawling in and out of the water. We got rain everyday, but I would rather a few showers here and there as opposed to extreme heat! Friday night we had brisket for dinner and then cooked ribs on Saturday that we ate on again Sunday. Thats the best part about camping...THE FOOD! Ryan and my Dad did some fishing while we were there. They caught several bass and Ryan also caught an alligator. The water was loaded with them! The one Ryan caught he said was about 3 or 4 feet long. We told him had the boys been a little older that would have been one of those "Dad Memories". All in all we had a great time rain or shine! Oh and Jason really likes ribs!

Reece sitting in the big chair!

Papa & Reece

Jason eating ribs!

Mommy & Reece

Boys playing with PaPa in the window.

The boys watching at the boat dock.

Daddy & the boys

Aunt Ashie taking the boys for a ride!

Its been exciting...

Well the boys have been one now for just a little over 24 hours. Yesterday on their actual birthday my Mom and I took them to Toys R Us (no we didn't add anymore toys to the collection but did get a few needed things)...My Great Grandmother use to always take us to Toys R Us on our birthday and would let us spend $100 on whatever we wanted. Mom wants to carry on the tradition in the future. After Toys R Us we went to SuperSalad. I figured it would be this great deal because the boys could eat a variety of stuff and have a little ice cream when they were done. As it turned out they weren't too hungry.

After we ate we went to Sam's to get stuff for this weekends camping trip. I stayed in the car with the sleeping babies while Mom ran in. While waiting in the car an ambulance pulled up...turned out a lady passed out in the bathroom. On our way to Target we were talking about how scary it would be to be in a store alone and to pass out. Our next stop was Target. I ran in to get a few things for our chili dog cook out (which turned out to be hot dogs in the oven due to the rain). Anyways while I was inside I dropped a can on chili on my big toe right on the joint. It hurt so bad. As I walking up to the front of the store limping, I could feel my body getting weak and a lady asked "are you ok?" Next thing I knew I was on the ground and a crowd of people were around me asking if anyone was with me and I said my Mom. Luckily the Target workers had enough sense to look in my cell phone and dial her number. Before my Mom got into the store with the boys I had stood up to get in a chair and fell right back over again. Yes, I passed out twice. So that was my excitement for the day. Apparently I don't tolerate pain or anxiety well. That evening I had invited my family and Ryan's mom over for dinner for the boys birthday. We had hoped to grill and let the boys play outside and sit on the porch but the weather didn't turn out. Plus, my Dad ended up having to work late and my sister had a deadline to meet and also didn't get home till late. Oh well...the boys had a long day and crashed pretty early.

Today I took them to their one year check-up. My Mom went with me and thank goodness she did because this time they knew they didn't want to be at the doctors office. They screamed bloody murder. It was awful. Jason went first and started screaming and then Reece who hadn't even had a shot yet started crying because Jason was crying. They were so terrified. Reece is up now and I just gave him some meds. He feels like he might have a low grade fever and is a little fussy, but seems content watching ShushieBye. We are about to head off to bed though. We have plans to go camping this weekend...please let the rain go away!

Here are the boys on their birthday...

(Always clapping)