Baby Performs Modern Dance

Here’s something that will start the weekend off right. A baby performing modern dance; and he’s pretty good! Made me laugh. Happy Friday.

http://www.buzzfeed.com/leonoraepstein/this-baby-is-a-contemporary-dance-genius

 

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Sunday Sketch: Twins in the Mirror

Last week I took M and E to the Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh. Most of the museum is for kids a bit older, but we went to the nursery area, which was fabulous and more than enough. When I got them out of the stroller they screeched with delight, immediately pulling up on a wood barrier and smiling at all the babies toddling around, the colors, the toys.

Their favorite thing was a very low wooden platform with a bunch of blocks on it. Attached to the wall next to the platform were two metal bins. M spent about a half an hour carefully taking all of the blocks out of the bins. E enjoyed crawling around on the low platform, practicing going from level to level and scooting off onto the carpet while holding a block in each hand.

Since it is Sketch Sunday, I thought I’d commemorate the outing with a watercolor. This is them at the museum, checking out a mirror. This is also part of my new “Explore Pittsburgh with Twin Babies” initiative. Stay tuned for the next edition.

Where’s Your Nose? A Portrait of M at One Year

I’ve been wanting to write individual posts about M and E and what they’re up to these days. I’m thinking of this as a sort of one-year portrait, though they are now 13 months. I started arbitrarily with M because I had a sketch of her I was going to include, but then I decided the photo was nicer. Stay tuned for poem of E.

A Portrait of M at One Year

M loves to walk around the house holding both your hands, leading the way to the shoe pile, to the window.

Strangers must earn her smile. Eventually she will make a subtle wave, raising one hand a bit.

She can climb the stairs, climb off of the rocking horse, climb onto boxes left within her reach, climb into the stroller, climb down from the couch.

When you are holding her and she sees something she wants she points to it, leaning her whole body in its direction, and says emphatically, “Dooh! Dooh!” until you take her to it.

Let free to explore a new place she crawls with purpose, lifting her arms high, pulling up on the nearest support. Then she turns to you with that mischievous, happy twinkle.

When eating, she enjoys rubbing her food-smeared hands all over her hair as if applying mousse.

Sometimes she waves with both her hands at once.

If you say, “Where’s your nose?” she puts one finger on her nose.

She will not sit still in the bath but insists on trying to stand and climb the walls, then cries when you try to put her back in place.

Her face lights up when she gets her hands on a light switch; the doorbell is exciting.

If you take a toy she’s playing with, she arches her entire body backward and turns red. If she doesn’t want to do something, like be buckled into a high chair, you will not succeed in buckling her.

She can often be distracted by belly zorbers, being tossed in the air, or hanging briefly upside down.

She smiles if you give her an eskimo kiss (rub noses).

When E takes a toy she’s playing with, many times she lets it go and does not resort to hitting. She does occasionally bite.

She likes handing you things and seeing you take them. Her milk cup, her sippy cup, a toy.

She can sit for an hour concentrating fixedly on a new task. Putting together and taking apart legos, moving blocks in and out of a box.

Her favorite book is “In My Tree” which is a board book that features a little felt owl finger puppet. When she sees this book she leans down and gives the owl a kiss. She also sometimes gives the rocking horse kisses.

She sleeps every night with a Snuffleupagus. When you lay her down in the crib and hand her the Snuffy, she hugs it to her chest thankfully and sucks on the trunk.

She hates having her diaper changed.

She likes holding the snack trap cup open and shaking the cheerios out all over the floor.

She laughs often.

First Library Story Time!

Today we finally made it to baby story time at the Squirrel Hill Library. I’d tried to go to the library for story time when we lived in Brooklyn, but I was a bit late and they’d locked the door. So though this was not the twins’ first visit to the library, it was our first story hour. It definitely gives me new insights into M and E’s characters, seeing them in different settings with other babies.

The Baby and Me program was at 10:30, and we arrived about fifteen minutes early. The room was already full of parents and babies, all sitting in a circle on the carpeted floor. I set M and E down and sat cross-legged behind them. They didn’t move. They sat staring at all the activity, at the babies–a couple toddling around, most sitting or crawling. A couple other adventurous babies came over to say hi, one reaching right for E’s face. Still she sat still, watching that babies’ hand come closer. When one baby came over and tried to take her toy, though, she kept an iron grip, yanking it back. Eventually M and E turned toward me and started pulling themselves up to standing using my legs as support, still not straying from my lap.

Then story time started. We sang songs like “I’m a Little Teapot” and “The Ants Go Marching,” along with some new ones I’d never heard. There was a lot of taking the baby in your lap, lifting them up, clapping, etc., so I took turns holding M or E, with the other sitting in front of me. Once, for a song about riding a horse, I tried bouncing them both in my lap, but my legs got tired. For one song, about the beach, they handed out a silk scarf to each baby, meant to represent waves. For another song, each baby got two little egg-shaped maracas. Those were a huge hit with both M and E. M enjoyed sucking on them. E managed to pick up two with one hand, smiling as she shook them above her head. After the program, the facilitator came around to collect the eggs. When she tried to take M’s, it was a no go. “She’s got an iron grip on those!” she said. “You let me know when she’s ready.”

So I guess my babies know how to stand their ground, at least with their stuff. As the program progressed, M and E were slowly inching further from my lap. By the time it was over and other parents and babies were beginning to pack up, M and E had decided the place was okay and it was time to explore…and then they were off! Crawling to opposite sides of the room, playing with a wall of magnetic letters, picking up teddy bears, and trying to drink from all the other babies’ sippy cups (they weren’t interested in their own).

All in all it was a great excursion. They definitely like exploring new places and situations, and I’m sure we’ll be back for more.

 

If Unemployment Were Like Vacation

Once, for about three months, I was unemployed. Every day during those months I woke up early, found jobs to apply to, fired off resumes, made phone calls. In social situations, strangers asked me “what I did” and I felt awkward. Friends told me to enjoy the time off, but I couldn’t because I was too stressed about finding a job.

Being home caring for twin babies (while job hunting) feels similar to my experience of being unemployed, except that at the same time as I’m “unemployed” I’m working full time, with no time to write resumes or make phone calls. Also, this “unemployed” job I have is exhausting, involves strenuous heavy lifting, intense mental energy, and no breaks. I’ve never been a procrastinator, and I think the stress of not being able to get things done is building over time.

Amazingly, though, no one else seems worried that I’m wasting my life, or that I’ll never work again. Life changes quickly, and I know these babies are going to be all grown up in about a second. Most of my problems, luckily, are in my head. This morning I had a moment where I really felt at peace, so I thought I’d capture it here:

I set up the babies’ water table in the back yard, under the redbud, taking along a chair and book for myself. It’s summer, and the humidity is thick, though not bad if you aren’t moving. When we all got down and settled, I sat in the chair with the book for a minute and watched the babies investigate the toys in the water. The neighbors have hung a bird feeder, and a few sparrows came to peck at the seeds.  The grass was freshly mowed, the plants in my newly-seeded garden looked healthy. It was quiet. And for a a moment I didn’t think about the things I wish I had done or was doing; life is good, I thought. I am lucky to be here, in this beautiful place.

Tough Life for a Twin

The other day when I was sitting in the park another mother came by with her baby. Her son was ten months old and toddling around. He was big and jovial and very interested in M’s cheerios, which he took right away and started to chow down on, at some point also accidentally hitting her in the head with her cheerio cup. As I spoke to this mother I got more and more worried. Her baby was bigger than M and E and walking. She is teaching him to drink from a cup. He goes to story time at the library, to music classes, on expeditions.

Maybe, being twins, poor M and E are missing out. I still haven’t taken them to the library in Pittsburgh because I can’t walk there from the house, and the thought of lugging them anywhere in the car is still a bit too much. I’m also not going to haul them both up to the bathtub every day to teach them to drink from open cups. And they have to take turns who gets to come out of the play area to try climbing the stairs or exploring the kitchen, or having me hold their hands while they try to walk. The photo above is exhibit B. This is a picture of some marks on E’s wrist I discovered today when we were out in the park. There can be only one four-toothed perpetrator of that crime. Poor babies. It can be tough having a twin.

But then, they also laugh together and play games, and really I’m just making excuses for all of us. I just looked up the library story time schedule, and maybe we’ll try to go this week. It would do me good to see more of Pittsburgh in any case. And while we’re at it maybe we’ll drink from some open cups.

No Good, Very Bad Day

Today was a pretty bad day. It started with a short, interrupted night of sleep. Then this morning I ran around trying to get out of the house in the one hour window between baby nap and lunch. My plan was to go to the store and buy whole milk for the babies, then run over to Penn Extension to get a soil testing kit for the backyard.

It was hot and muggy, I ran upstairs and down getting socks, shoes, carrying babies, searching for a sippy cups and snack cups, finally grabbing cell phone and keys and running out the door. By that point there were only about 20 minutes left before baby lunch time, and I basically ran with the double stroller in the ninety degree heat to Penn Extension, on a not very nice route across Penn Avenue, only to realize when I finally arrived that I’d forgotten my wallet.

Somewhere in there, too, I also got bad news about a job I’d applied for, and the landlord emailed to postpone work on our apartment for the umpteenth time.  Also, M dropped her snack trap cup somewhere on our run/walk, which means we now only have one of a very coveted and essential item. I also finally finished House of Mirth, which is partly a good thing, but partly added to the sadness of the day because 1) I felt like a bum that I couldn’t motivate to do anything but lie on the bed and read during baby nap time, and 2) It was the most depressing book I’ve read in years and I sobbed like a teenager.

So it wasn’t the best day, and the babies spent a good part of it being impatient, resentful of each other, crying. Still, we did take a walk out to the park and sit on a blanket for a while, and when I grabbed M and hugged her she laughed and then gave me two kisses. I turned for them to land on my cheek but she planted them right on my lips. They have been working a lot on kisses–E now makes something close to a kissing sound and M can make her little mouth like a guppy. So at least the babies seem fond of me, and I sure do love them.  Hopefully tomorrow will be better. Either that or I’m moving to Australia.

Who Taught the Babies How to Hit?

These babies are changing so quickly it’s hard to keep up. There are no first steps yet, though they can now walk independently using the walkers, and their words continue feeling vague, though they more often they refer to the correct objects. Still, there’s an unmistakable feeling that they are more and more present. No longer passive observers, M and E know what’s happening and react independently.

When you carry them downstairs they cling to you happily, pointing to pictures and objects along the way, and when you put them down they either scramble off to get a toy, or they start crying immediately to be picked back up. Also, they are suddenly so much more tuned into each other. They play games that involve offering the other a toy, then grabbing it away and laughing hysterically. Sadly, they also suddenly fight. If one has a toy the other wants, they grab it. Then the first fights back by hitting, and it continues. Tonight I kept putting peas on M’s tray, then eating off the ones that seemed too big and/or hard. Finally when she saw me reach for a pea she hit my hand. Hm… Who taught them how to hit? I guess we’re born with that one.

But their new consciousness really struck me the other day when I had a “conversation” with E about eating. M had finished her kiwi, so I gave her some cut-up grapes. E looked and pointed at the grapes on M’s tray and made a sound, “I want that” she was clearly indicating. I pointed to the kiwi on her tray, “But you still have kiwi. Finish the kiwi first.” She watched me as I said this, then she made a whining sound and pointed again at the grapes. “But I want that!” I pointed again at the kiwi and at that point, frustrated at my lack of understanding, she wiped her hands across her tray, scattering the kiwi to the floor. “Fine,” I said, “you win,” and I gave her some grapes.

 

Happy Father’s Day

Here’s a watercolor of D in the yard with the Bean on his shoulders. What an amazing dad.

Arty Creative Games for Kids Age 2 to 100

Here’s another arty creative game to try with kids or just to do yourself. This is in the same vein as my post on drawings from scribbles and hair.

I just came across this idea here (and in her blog she links to other really fun blogs of the same). Here’s what you do. Draw some random blob with watercolor. Let it dry. Take a pen and make it into something. Here’s what I came up with. And I’ll admit it took four pages for me to get a whole page of them I thought were okay enough to share here (I’ll spare you Elvis Donkey, Upside Down Backpack Man, Rat Dog and the other characters from first few pages 😉 ) Here’s the before and after. Hope they inspire you to a few moments of creativity! It’s pretty addictive.