You Can't Handle The Cheeks!

Here are my Few Good Men (two, to be exact)

Maybe I shouldn't say this, but Thomas has the cutest butt cheeks. Ever.
As my dear friend Dr Day noted - "It's all downhill from here..."

Guess what else:

• Thomas loves to suck on the thingy that opens and closes the tub drain (What is that thing called? Anna actually asked me that several months ago). He is no longer allowed to sit at that end of the tub. Not that Jack is much better; he is basically trying to swing from the faucet.
  
• Thomas learning point: No matter how loud you shout at the TV, you won't make it come on. I guess his next developmental milestone will be learning to shout for the remote control. Have to ask his pediatrician when we should expect that one...
  

Proof

- Thomas sips!
- Jack sips!
- Jack is soooooo Big!
- Jack pulls up!

Thomas can peek at you from behind the refrigerator door!

T

T is the man. He is big and he is handsome. And he is jolly. Right now he is really into rolling arond on the floor, then laying on his back, kicking his legs like crazy and giving a big smile.

He's also been banging on my walls with anything he can get his hands on.
And... when he doesn't want something, particularly food related, he just throws it away.

And he is an Olympic-class complainer. As in, we use the same remote to turn on music and the TV. Tommy is completely up on this. So, if I use the remote to put on some Sesame Street music, he lets out a string of fantastic whines and groans and moans because he would much prefer the TV. He also gets particularly upset when his refrigerator door latches and he can't get it open again.

Tommy LOVES to "read"; he spends a lot of time opening his books, kissing the pages, raising them up to near worshipful height, turning the pages and then sucking on them a bit for good measure. He particularly likes those "touch and feel" books.

And then just today he kept trying to stick a plastic carrot up Anna's butt. Sigh...

You've Been Jacked!

That's what we say when Jack:

- tries to eat our newspaper
- pulls out all the wipes in the container
- attempts to suck on the doorstop
- grabs the Crestron remote and turns off the lights in the kitchen
- figures out how to open cupboard doors -- by grabbing from the bottom.

In other Jack news, he's started singing. Which is totally adorable. He even has a song! It goes like this:

"ha ha ha".

Impressive, eh? And if you give him a plastic cup, he will put it up to his mouth and work it like an American Idol microphone. And if you make up a slightly different song, say: "ha ho ho", he will try to imitate you. And if he feels the beat, look out: he'll do his pelvic bounce thing. What a guy!

She's A Funny Girl, That Anna

Exhibit A

OK, First thought: has some renegade Sesame Street cult (sneakers on) just drunk the Kool-Aid? Note Ernie's rolled back eyes and sagging jaw, Bert's thousand-mile stare, and Ralphie's, uh, tail.

But actually... its just Ernie, Bert and Ralphie the dog awaiting a diaper change. And holding hands.
I noticed them this way one evening after getting everyone to bed.

Exhibit B

Here they are with clean pants on. Anna changed each of them every morning for several weeks. Anna is a champion diaper changer. To do this, she requires a changing pad and one wipe per stuffed animal; each stuffed animal wears a specific size diaper.
Often they do "big stinkies" (especially Cookie Monster for some reason) and sometimes she even asks for the itchy butt cream. That's where I draw the line, of course :)

When Babies Attack

...here's what it's like, courtesy of my fabulous friend & photog Vanessa.

Looking at this, I feel so, so lucky to have these guys.

This is all-time special. Thanks, V.

Imagine My Horror

Once again, the standard Wonder Pet required reading.

At any rate: Linney the Wonder Pet--known as "Winnie" in our household--is a guinea pig. I only learned this after reading the official Wonder Pet bios (see link above). I originally told Anna that Winnie was a hamster. As someone who has never owned a rodent, the wheel thingy that he runs around in seemed like a complete hamster no-brainer to me. Oh well.

Since this has now become such a huge part of our lives, I thought I should let her know the truth: Winnie's not a hamster; he's a guniea pig. She thought about this for a minute but seemed OK with it. Wow, that was easy.

If you haven't heard, in our house Jack is Wonder Pet Winnie, Anna is Ming-Ming, I am Tuck, and Thomas seems to be in the Wonder Pet auxiliary and is officialy named "Winnie to Winnie".

So later that day I am getting dinner ready and I hear (in a supremely kind and loving voice):

"Jaaaaaaack, you piiiiiig!"

And I knew exactly where she got that from.
Jack is Winnie. Winnie is a guinea pig. Therefore, Jack is a guinea pig.
The "guinea" part must not have seemed that important.

So I suppose I should be thrilled with her grasp of syllogism (or some word like that).
Now she just needs to get the adjective thing down.

Guinea. guinea. Jack's a guinea pig.

The other day

Anna dropped a box of puzzle pieces.
As the box hit the floor, we heard her exclaim:

BOB MARLEY!

I kid you not.
See previous post on fears of who is influencing my daughter. (A militant rastafarian?)

I asked her where she had heard of Bob Marley. She pointed to the ceiling over the dining room table and said "from the speaker".

Whoa.

Yep, there's a speaker there. And we do, in fact, have a Bob Marley CD on our playlist. But... whoa.

It's the Circle of Life

Thomas and Jack have made friends. Two of them, in fact: another set of twin boys one week younger than themselves. Their names are H and J, and they have a mouse ear-wearing, puzzle-loving older brother S who is a couple of months younger than Anna.

S has also readily agreed to call Anna Ming-Ming. From Anna's point of view, he's the perfect man.

At any rate, we have had several "Brady Bunch"-esque playdates with all the kids and both the babysitters (how did Alice manage it on her own?). And of course both lovely ladies (aka us moms).

Playdates are an interesting thing, especially with two sets of twin boys. It's survival of the fittest; eat or be eaten. It is just these sorts of times when laws of nature show themselves as particularly ugly, and my 1-year olds as particularly rude.

Example 1
Hugo, Thomas & Jack are sitting together in the kitchen, each munching on a different large black plastic kitchen utensil. Hugo has a ladel, Thomas has spatula, and Jack has a slotted spoon. Somehow, Jack loses his slotted spoon. He looks around. But not for the spoon, evidently--Thomas is next to him, and Jack snatches his spatula.

Thomas realizes his spatula has been swiped. He looks to his left at Jack happily muching on it. He's dealt with Jack before; he's quick and he's fast. Thomas turns to his right and spots H and his ladel. Ah-ha! An easier mark, perhaps, and certainly an unsuspecting one. Without a second thought, he rips the ladel out of H's hands.

H, thoroughly victimized, immediately starts screaming. Thomas and Jack continue munching and trying to look innocent. J hears his brother and starts crawling over to get his back.

Example 2
Thomas evidently remembers J's support of his brother. Halfway through the next playdate, he gives J's hair a good yank.

So... it's official. I'm the parent of kids who make other kids cry.

Yikes. I'm a Mom. The World Is Big.

Here is an Anna One-Liner I found mildly worrisome:
"Jack is a man. Thomas is a soldier."

I was floored. Soldier? I don't even watch CNN (eh, right Fox News) in front of her, much less talk about soldiers.
Jenny asked her: what is a soldier?
"Someone who goes to war."

I have no explanation for this.

It is one thing to know your child is being influenced by something or someone other than yourself. It is quite another to not have any clue where that influence is coming from.
And it is another thing altogether when she is only 2.

Anna One-Liners, Part II

Enjoy.

• Don't worry Jack, I'm here.
• Maybe, just maybe...
• This just might work.
• It's worth a try.
  
• It's not a problem, Tuck.
• It's much better for you, Tuck.
  
• Change is good, Tuck.
  
• Winnie's cute--can we keep him?
• Do you want to play whirlpool?
• I'm not a woman. I'm a fishie man!

Also, she has come up with several interesting reproaches to her brothers:

• After drinking his bottle, Jack coughs in his usual wet and projectile-ish way, spraying Anna.
  "No spitting on the leg, Jack."
• "I'm in charge of my bottle, Tommy."
• "I walk on my legs, don't take them!"

Words she is using in the correct context:

• suddenly
• creator
• imagine

Lovable mispronounciations:

• planet-a-tarium
• Uranist [Uranus]
  
• conti-dents [continents]

And guess what she calls a question mark? A "J-mark"!
Right now, Anna is all about J-marks.
As in: "what's that?" and "why?" and "can I have it?".

Question: Do I Do Anything Else All Day?

Currently, no. 'Specially not on the weekends.
I craft witty blog entries.
That's it.
I simply have no time to spend making up un-witty(?) ones. Or to use a dictionary, obviously.

Clearly, I was a woman in need of a creative outlet.

Jack is Back

He has regained his appetite; he is eating way more than Thomas. He will even eat creamed spinach(with strings!). Who does that??? And burnt toast! What should I try next? Email me!

He has a little tummy, too. Nothing to rival Thomas', mind you, but enough to make Tommy think twice about swiping the "Spot's Touch and Feel Day" book now.

Only one minor minus (heh) in this whole thing: at times I believe he overdoes it a bit. How do I know? Well, three times in the last three days we have found Jack quietly sitting by himself (red flag #1).
Upon closer inspection, he'll actually be sitting next to, or on top of, a little pool of baby throw up.

And playing in it, of course.
Dab, dab, dab, slap, splash! Wow! Cool!

I had a cat like that once, I think.

In other bodily function news (stop right here if you feel you need to): Thomas now laughs when he farts.

Flips

Do you know what a flip is?
Some people call them potholders.
Anna calls them flips.

She prefers to have one red and one green. She does not like the kind that look like mittens; her's must be square.
But I think she mostly likes them because when they're out she knows we're either making
(1) banana bread or
(2) chocolate chip cookies.

Generally, she uses them to clap while doing some kind of Indian rain dance in the kitchen until the oven timer goes off.

Wonder Pets, Cain and Abel and the "Uda Bruda"

First: if you haven't already, you must read about the Wonder Pets or you'll be lost.
Second: since the day the boys exited the womb, for some reason Anna has seemed to prefer Jack to Thomas.

This has gotten a bit better over time. When the boys were four months old or so Anna greeted them one morning with the following exchange:

[Anna runs over to Jack in the bouncy seat]
"Jack, how you doin'?"
"You're doin' gooooooood."

[Anna runs over to Thomas on the changing table]
"Thomas, how are you feeling?"
"You're feeling baaaaaaaaad."

I assure you, nothing that blatant happens now. Now it is more like: When the boys are in their stroller, Anna always puts Jack's sun shade down so that the sun won't get into his eyes.
She always insists that Thomas' has to remain up--not so concerned about his eyes, evidently.

At any rate, there is definitely this kind of good brother-bad brother thing going on and I'm not sure why.

Which brings us to Wonder Pets. The Wonder Pets are Ming-Ming the duckie, Tuck the turtle, and Linny (known in our household as Winnie) the guinea pig. Ming-Ming is Anna's favorite; she is Ming-Ming, and will sometimes ask you to address her as such if you mistakenly call her "Anna". I am Tuck. Jack is Winnie.

When I asked her which Wonder Pet Thomas was, I kind of hoped that I would get bumped from the lineup, Thomas would take my place, and that the three Jamison children would together live an idyllic superhero double life.

She let me know that Thomas wasn't a Wonder Pet.

So I told her I wouldn't be one without all my children, and she needed to make one up.

And that is how Thomas' Wonder Pet came to be called Winnie to Winnie. I am not sure of the spelling, nor what exactly it means. Maybe it is actually Winnie 2 Winnie, indicating some kind of rank below Jack? Your guess is as good as mine.

Poor Thomas: he's the uda bruda...

Anna on Tweezers

"What do we squish with this?"

A Strangely Simba-ish Moment

The Tongue

If you thought I was kidding about Jack, here's a bird's eye view. (see Jack's French Kissing post.)

The Finer Points of Hide and Seek

1. Don't hide in the same place every time.
2. Don't yell "I'm in here" when someone is trying to find you.

She'll get it eventually. I know she will.

Garcon!

My son, Thomas, will surely be a food critic.
For someone who gets a majority of his calories from one source--milk--and still refuses to chew, he has a remarkably discerning palate. But more than that, he has a process.

It goes something like this:

• I put food on spoon and bring it close to his mouth.
• His mouth doesn't open. The spoon hovers in front of it.
• He examines what is on the spoon (sometimes cross-eyed for effect).
• He looks up at me. Often, he just laughs outright. As in: "Are you nuts?"
• But sometimes, he will look up and not laugh. This brings us to...
  
• ... the nose butt. Thomas will take his nose and mash just the tip of it into what is on the spoon. He'll do it once, twice, sometimes even 3 times if that is required. I suppose he's smelling it.
  
• Then, and only then, he may decide to open his mouth.

But even after all this, sometimes he just gags it up anyway. Sigh.
We have had a few minor victories of late: both boys and Anna will munch on Veggie Booty and rice cakes (OK, the apple cinnamon kind but still). Jack is generally OK with the whole trying to chew thing, but neither of them is overly interested in picking things up off the tray. And certainly nothing that is wet, or cool, or squishy. Which strangely seems to rule out most fruits and vegetables...

Thomas also loves to throw Legos.

Will French Kiss For Food

right... that would be my son Jack. Who has regained his appetite. In a big way.

If you are eating something, and he is watching you, and he wants it, and you are holding him near your face, he will open his mouth and stick out his tongue and attempt to get it. Out of your mouth.

He also likes to drum to "Let's Dance" by David Bowie.

Babies Who Eat Risotto

Don't have one?
Never heard of any?
Well... let me show you what they look like:

Oh yes.

Mommy made "Summer Risotto" tonite (rice, onions, red pepper, zucchini, Parmesan). Everybody was hungry at once so I sat in front of the boys with my dish of risotto in hand. I had a few spoonfuls while their Cheerios appetizer course was served. Jack kept staring at my spoon so I gave him some. He liked it. Thomas saw I was feeding Jack and got mad. He eventually agreed to try the risotto and liked it. They ate a ton of it.

I am so proud.
Of my cooking, of course :)

In other news:

• Thomas will hold his bottle. Sort of. When he's in the mood.
• Jack and Thomas suck on biscuits (see above--you can actually see it lodged inside of Thomas' mouth!).
• Jack will hold a banana and eat little pieces.
• Jack will eat chunky avocado mush and chunky pear mush.
• Thomas refuses to chew. Even the risotto he just swallowed. I'm concerned he will need to find a wife willing to puree things 24 hours a day...

Do These Guys Look Guilty or What?

I have this strange feeling that a large part of the next 20 years will be spent trying to figure out what it is that they have done.

I also have this strange fear that the two of them together are a lot, lot smarter than me :)

Questions I Can't Answer...

... or definitely don't want to:

(1) Mommy, where do comets come from?
[OK; difficult, but doable. I can make something up.]

And then:
(2) Mommy, what is diarrhea?
[Noooooooooooooooooooooooooo way.]
[Quick--distract! Redirect! Ask her if she wants some cake! Let her dial Brazil on the cell phone!]

The Genes Made Me Do It

s·moth·er (s'muth'er)

v.: to kiss, hug, cuddle, squeeze, rub or otherwise jostle your child in an extremely animated and mildly obsessive but always loving manner.

n.: Trish.

[First usage: Steve, August 2003]


OK A bit more on Jack's biting...

Anna is, shall we say, somewhat agressively amorous. Her method of hugging "the mans" is to crawl up behind them while they are crawling, overtake them so that they are underneath her, wrap her arms around their chest (er, neck) and squeeze.
Wrestling types may refer to this as a "headlock".

At any rate, Jack has come up with a plan: he just bites her arm, and she lets go.
Basketball types may refer to this as a "foul".

I have been thinking "why is my daughter like this?". And "where did she learn to do that?"
And then it hit me: like smother, like daughter.

Milestones

Say cheese!
Anna is taking a picture of you, right now, with her camera.

Busy, busy:

• Jack bit Anna!
• Jack took his first steps behind the walker. (Wow!)
• Thomas now has 5 teeth.
• Thomas held his own bottle.
• A made her first "strings" complaint.

Do you know strings? Nearly every little kid I have ever known has had issues where strings meet food. Examples: warm mozzarella cheese is stretched-->strings. Slightly oversoft (but very sweet) mango is sliced-->strings along the edges.
A had exactly this kind of mango offender caught in her teeth yesterday. Big, big squeal. Funny, funny face.

Let's Get Physical

Thomas always sits
(1) on his but, with his legs crossed at his ankles or
(2) on his knees, in that yoga position too painful (evidently) for any of us not still drinking formula.

Jack is currently in his "single index finger" mode. Think of a cross between Austin Powers' Mini-Me and E.T. It is very funny, and very gentle.

Also: Jack finally held his bottle by himself! [cue the choirs of angels]

It Isn't Love...

...unless your eyeballs pop out.

A's Current One-Liners

• "I don't have a free hand."
• "That's the thing about [place noun here]."
  (Today's specific instance: Anna to her brother Jack "That's the thing about hats--you have to wear them.")
• "Right On, Tuck." (more on the Wonder Pets)
  

Evolution of a Nickname

Jack becomes
Jack-man-doo, which of course leads logically to
Thomas-man-doo, the last two of which Anna now refer to collectively as

the mans.

As in:
"Look! The mans are playing with their chew toys"
"The mans are eating lunch in their high chairs"
"Yikes! The mans are crawling into the bathroom"

I even find myself getting into it. Jack-Man-Doo easily becomes JMD, who sounds like some really hip downtown DJ, as in "Yo JMD! Let's kick it!"

The Holes In The Wall

So a few weeks ago Anna opened the cupboard door under her shelves and saw something unfamiliar. She noticed that inside the cupboard there is an the outlet that has 2 cable and 1 computer jacks. She didn't know what they were, of course, and so she referred to them when asking me as the "eyes [2 computer jacks], nose [cable jack], and mouth [3 "filler" pieces]".

As this eyes, nose and mouth that had suddenly been noticed seemed to be scaring the bejeezus out of her, I tried to explain. I told her that the 2 eyes are outlets so that we can plug a computer in, just like the ones in Da's office. I told her that the nose is an outlet that we can plug a TV in, just like downstairs and in Da's gray room.

This seemed to help, but she was still a bit edgy about it. She doesn't keep any of her fishie birthday party blowouts in that cupboard anymore.

And then: last night as we are putting on fishie pajamas -
"Mommy, when can we plug the TV in my room?"

I guess she's gotten over her anxieties.

Number of Times Vomited On

... in the last 7 days: 11. Priceless.

Lots of germs here. Then came the diarrhea. Yikes.
Anna is finally starting to seem better. Jack is still not. Thomas is OK but a bit irritable.

Have some great, great vacation photos and vignettes to post, will get to them soon I hope.

Beach Babe

How exactly did the facial sand happen? Your guess is as good as mine...

These Times They are 'a Changin'

(since just last week)

- Thomas crawls thru the tunnel!
- Jack claps!
- Jack and Thomas both crawl in the traditional way (not commando-style)
- Jack can now lift his hands all the way over his head and do "SOoooo Big!"
- Thomas has 2 more teeth for a total of four. But he still won't chew.

Thomas crawling is quite a hoot. He looks like a baby triceratops (very wide set) thumping towards you. Or maybe a bulldog. Either way, it's very cute.

Also lots of babbling going on, mostly over a pile of Cheerios. "Da Dee Deye Dee " and on and on. If you're counting, still no mention of mom :(