Baby Squared

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• Thankful

  I could offer up a predictable litany of things I'm thankful for -- my family, my friends, my health, my relative financial security, the results of the presidential election, etc. etc. But let's face it: that would be kinda boring. So, I thought I'd mention ten of the stranger and less obvious things that I'm thankful for this year, while attempting to stay within the topic(s) of this blog. In no particular order:   1. I'm thankful that I'm not pregnant. Right now, so many of our friends are having -- or gearing up to have -- their second child. I'm terribly happy for them, but every time I hear the news, I can't help smiling to myself and thinking: thank GOD it ain't me! I never wished or hoped to have twins, but I did always want two children, and now that I've had them both in one fell swoop, I'm really appreciating the efficiency of it. I get tired just thinking about going through the whole newborn-sleepless-nights-constant-nursing thing again, so soon. And I can't imagine having both a toddler and a newborn. Then, I guess I automatically think about what it would be like to have two toddlers and a newborn, since that's what I would have. And that would obviously be a lot crazier. But still. I'm very happy not to be expecting. (Congrats to all of you who are -- I'll bring you a casserole.)       Read More... Posted Nov 26 2008, 08:00 AM by Roper with | with 8 comment(s) Filed under: twins, feeding twins, holidays, table manners, depression, twin toddlers, snacks, Maine, parenting and depression, antidepressants, thanksgiving, sleep

• The Bean Box, and Other Delights

  Phew. Just made it through an entire weekend -- well, Thursday afternoon through today -- on my own with the girls, temperatures outside in the 20s, without going insane.   Knowing Alastair was going to be away, that the weather was not going to be outdoor-activity-friendly, and that I was fighting a cold and a potential backslide into depression (I won on both fronts -- Yahoo!) I planned out the whole weekend ahead of time. I lined up a trip to our local family network's drop-in playgroup, a playdate, a birthday party, a few hours of sitter time, and a friend over for takeout and a movie one of the evenings. It may sound a little anal and ridiculous, but I've decided that planning really is key to not going nutso over the weekends, especially when the weather sucks, and double-especially when Alastair is away. Structure, structure, structure!   I also created a new indoor "toy" for the gals, inspired by some of the suggestions you offered up in response to one of my posts from last week: the Bean Box. It is, as you might suspect, a box full of dried beans (I know; clever name, right? I'm a writer and stuff.) It's something of a variation on the indoor sandbox idea, except it doesn't take up as much room, and can be put away when playtime is over. Here's what you do: take a shallow box of some sort and put it on the kitchen floor, dump a few bags of dried beans into it (I used chick peas, kidney beans and intriguingly speckled Romas), add bowls, shovels, scoops and other containers, and you've got yourself at least a half hour's worth of toddler-tainment.    (A wine case for all seasons: it has served as toy box, stepping stool for the girls' climbing structure, and now -- the Bean Box.)   Read More... Posted Nov 23 2008, 04:29 PM by Roper with | with 11 comment(s) Filed under: twins, depression, twin toddlers, toys, parenting and depression, rainy days, entertaining toddlers, Herb Alpert, winter activities, beans

• T-I-M-E O-U-T

  You're probably all familiar with the need to spell out certain words in front of your toddlers once they pick up that pesky habit of understanding English. Woe to the parent who foolishly utters the word C-O-O-K-I-E without the intent of immediately handing one over to any small child within earshot. And don't mention that you're going to take your kids to the P-L-A-Y-G-R-O-U-N-D unless you intend to go THAT VERY SECOND.    But certain words, you would think, are safe to say aloud -- things that kids aren't interested in, like "credit card," "recycling," or "corkscrew." Or things that pertain to them, but that they don't find particularly appealing and aren't likely to start begging for, like "crib" or "time-out." Right? Well, yes. Except ixnay on that last one in the Baby Squared household.       Read More... Posted Nov 19 2008, 09:30 PM by Roper with | with 26 comment(s) Filed under: I am powerless, depression, Elsa, Clio, discipline, parenting twins, twin toddlers, parenting and depression, twin table manners, time out

• Rain, rain, go away.

  And please don't come again another day. Do you have any idea how hard it is to keep two nearly-two-year-olds occupied when playgrounds, petting zoos and the back yard are off the table? Do you know that with the exception of going to the library (30 minutes' entertainment, tops) or to someone else's house for a playdate (which requires painstaking advance scheduling and hopes that everyone is germ-free) toddler-friendly indoor activities generally require dropping serious amounts of cash?   It was (yet another) mostly rainy weekend here in the Greater Boston Area, and we were challenged accordingly to figure out things to do with the girls to keep them and ourselves from going stir crazy. It went a little something like this:   Read More... Posted Nov 17 2008, 11:09 AM by Roper with | with 28 comment(s) Filed under: Museums, malls, depression, twin toddlers, parenting and depression, rainy days, Zombies, entertaining toddlers

• I like these guys. They're funny guys!

  First person to get the title reference gets a big, virtual high-five. (No Googling allowed!)   In this post, however, I'm referring to Elsa and Clio, who -- as I was reminded yesterday -- are two very funny little girls. Exasperating at times, yes. But also extremely entertaining. Clio seems to actively try to be silly, with funny faces and noises and goofy antics. Her humor tends toward the absurdist. Last night at dinner, for example, she decided it was very funny to pretend she was asleep.          Read More... Posted Nov 13 2008, 04:15 PM by Roper with | with 17 comment(s) Filed under: silliness, depression, Elsa, Clio, Barack Obama, twin toddlers, twin individuality, parenting and depression, Sylvia Plath, acupuncture, twin table manners

• Of Church-hopping and Child-ignoring

  A while back, I wrote about how we might have found a Unitarian Universalist congregation that we'd like to join.  My background is Protestant, and Alastair is from a mixed marriage, Jewish and Protestant, and neither of us are particulary religious, but we like the idea of being a part of a spiritual community of some sort -- particularly for the girls' sake. We dig the vibe and values of the UU church, and Alastair has started getting more involved with the UU world through his music.   Unfortunately, we've become disenchanted with the church where we were testing the waters, and have started to shop around. This is the beauty of living in the Boston area -- there is a UU church in pretty much every town. Yesterday, we visited a new congregation, which we really liked. But since we're talking religion, can I make a confession? Easily 50% of my motivation for wanting to go to church these days is the free childcare. (If Unitarians believed in hell, I'm sure I would be headed there.)   Pic after the jump! Read More... Posted Nov 10 2008, 03:15 PM by Roper with | with 38 comment(s) Filed under: twins, depression, childcare, parenthood, twin toddlers, parenting and depression, unitarian universalists, guilt., church

• Tears

  On Monday afternoon, when we got back from our weekend in New York, I made the stupid (STUPID!) mistake of taking the girls to the grocery store with me. My mood had been plummeting steadily all day, to my disappointment (I'd felt much better the day before), and neither of the girls had slept much on the drive up. Given these two things, I really should have known better. Even Alastair thought maybe it was too much for me to handle, given how I was feeling. ("Are you sure you'll be OK?") But we needed milk and bread and bananas, and it was something to pass the time until dinner, and I thought maybe getting out and doing something would kick my depressed ass back into gear. So off we went.   We'd barely made it halfway through the produce section when Clio started whining and crying to get out of the cart, then yelling for milk or water or juice (which I STUPIDLY hadn't brought). Then she started screaming for a cookie. Elsa, meanwhile, kept wriggling out of the seatbelt (it was one of those shopping carts shaped like a little car) and standing up with half her body out the front window like some kind of hyperactive labrador retriever.   I was the picture of a stressed-out mom. I looked bad, I felt horrid. I could sense people looking at us, maybe in pity, maybe annoyance, maybe some in smiling, "how cute they are, but what a handful" sympathy. I wouldn't know -- I kept my eyes straight ahead, kept my head down, and told myself to just get everything on the list and get out and go home. And then what? Unload the groceries, keep the girls entertained for another hour and a half, make them dinner, get them to bed, make our dinner, unpack....(These sound like simple enough things to do, but when I am depressed, something as simple as brushing my teeth feels akin to pushing a boulder up a hill.) I half wished I'd collapse right there in the cereal aisle and wake up in a sanitorium -- maybe out in the Berkshires somewhere; the kind where they used to send ladies suffering from "nervous exhaustion." Birds singing. Clean white sheets. A rocking chair.... Read More... Posted Nov 05 2008, 10:30 PM by Roper with | with 24 comment(s) Filed under: Milestones, grocery store with twins, cheesiness, depression, crying, Elsa, Barack Obama, twin toddlers, parenting and depression, hope, change, election

• A Hometown Halloween

  Alastair's hometown, that is, here in the leafy loveliness of Westchester county. We came down for the weekend, specifically for the unveiling of Alastair's grandmother's grave monument. She died around this time last year, and it's a (very nice, I think) Jewish tradition to visit the stone a year later. We said some words and prayers, and then the girls thought it would be fun to pick up the stones that we placed on Great Grandma's grave and move them to the other, neighboring graves and back again, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.   That night, we took the girls out for their first official trick-or-treating experience. Like last weekend, at the Halloween party, Clio refused to wear her tutu, so we had one ballerina and one modern dancer -- or perhaps she was a ballerina in rehearsal. More power to her, I say. And so, we set out into the lovely, suburban twilight, our family of four (Mommy had had a low day, but managed to rally) plus Abu and dogs, Aki and Niko.        More pics after the jump...   Read More... Posted Nov 02 2008, 07:07 PM by Roper with | with 8 comment(s) Filed under: family, twins, Fall Fun, New York, depression, Elsa, Clio, Barack Obama, twin toddlers, grandparents, halloween costumes, parenting and depression