Built-in cheering section

Whenever the babies do something new—eat a new food, master a new skill, wear a new outfit—they get plenty of oohs and aahs from their biggest fans: their older siblings. I love that the awesomeness of having twin babies has never worn off for these kids. And even though sometimes I wish they would just leave them alone ("Hear her crying? That's because she doesn't want you to put your swim goggles on her head!") I'm so glad that the twins will always have a built-in cheering section.

Midnight re-decorating

Last night, I awoke to find myself standing up in my bed, taking the window curtain off the rod. Lovely. My poor husband was mumbling something about just putting them on the floor, which I did. When I woke up this morning to go to the gym, I looked over in the corner, hoping that I wouldn't see the curtain lying on the floor. Drat! My husband has no insight into why I felt the need to re-decorate the window treatment in the middle of the night, and sadly, neither do I.

Pictures from the big day

Note: These pictures don't accurately portray N's happy and flirty nature. But, she's not a huge ham for the camera like her brother.

What a ride

As I've tried over the past week or so to think about what I wanted to write on the babies' first birthday, all I kept coming up with was, "I can't believe it's already been a year." I have never had a year go by so incredibly quickly. It's been such a rollercoaster in terms of emotions—a lot of tears. There have been tears of exhaustion, tears of sadness, tears of anger and frustration, and tears of joy. So much joy.

I sat in the doctor's office yesterday as my five children played while we waited for our turn. (A2 can graduate to a forward-facing carseat. N may never get there.) As I watched N race-walk around the room and A2 get more and more confident walking on his own, I realized... this is it. My babies are growing up. And while I don't think I would ever want to repeat the last year again just because it was such a rollercoaster ride, oh, what a wonderful ride it's been.

This time last year...

During the last several months, I've done a lot of, "This time last year..." "This time last year, I found out I was pregnant with the twins." "This time last year, we found out it was a boy and a girl."

This time last year, I was doing a whole lot of nothing. Lying on the couch while my husband got the kids out of the house. Doing errands early in the morning before I got way too tired and contractions set in (usually around noon). Adding multiple pillows to my work chair so I could handle sitting for longer than five minutes at a time. Going to seemingly endless doctor appointments for ultrasounds and non-stress tests. Getting less and less sleep as it became nearly impossible to get comfortable in my bed.

As generally awful as pregnancy can be, I still marvel that my body grew two beautiful, perfect people. I'm still so very thankful that they made it here safe and sound, and that I had one of the most boring and uneventful twin pregnancies ever. And I'm most grateful of all that I never have to do it again. :)

Note: This picture is from my baby shower last May. My mother did insist that my husband take a picture of me just days before going into labor. Thankfully (I choose to see it that way), it got lost when our hard drive died this past winter.

Junk and not junk

The other day, I started up again with one of my favorite past times—de-junking. There are few things that give me more joy than taking a huge box of stuff and paring it down into just a few items. Even though I just went through my closet a few months ago, I did it again, and made a big pile of clothes and shoes to donate. I had the kids weed out some stuffed animals (I swear those things multiply on their own) and we'll tackle the toy room soon. I also ventured down into the basement. Since we did an overhaul not too long ago, I really didn't think that there would be much to chuck, but I was wrong. While sorting, I came across some high school and college mementos. A lot of it I threw away, but I did discover another thing I love about de-junking: finding old treasures I haven't thought about in years. I found some sweet reminders of when A and I were dating (including the piece of paper he wrote his phone number on), a letter from one of my best friends while she was on her mission, and old "love notes" from my family.

Even though I love getting rid of junk, it's always so nice to find precious things to remind me of the past.