--1--

Blog changes!  Just updated the "About Us" page, and I changed the commenting system yesterday, although I'm not entirely sure it's working how I want it to work...  But anyway, try commenting and see if it's any easier than before!  The spammers were getting really obnoxious, but I didn't want to turn on word verification because it's the worst thing ever in the history of the universe (not even exaggerating a tiny bit here).

What I like is that now instead of either comments being anonymous or *maybe* going to a blogger profile, it's easy for someone to link directly to their blog if they have one, which leads to a lot less clicking around.  Some blogger profiles have the author's blog listed, some end up going to a Google+ profile (which I HATE - so confusing!!!), and some don't have any information listed...

This should also make it easier for you to receive responses to your comments without having to check back here!  Sometimes it takes me a while to respond and I have a feeling many of you who don't have your emails linked to your profile don't check back for responses (because I know I don't!)...

--2--

Well, that was boring.  I promised a video of the kids dancing, but the babies weren't having it...  So I have an old clip of Elizabeth dancing and then a bunch of John Paul and Cecilia showing their stuff.  I think John Paul's "jazz" moves are my favorite - they never fail to make me laugh!

--3--

How fun is this?  I'm now taking offers for sponsorship so I can go to The Edel Gathering - let me know if you'd like to pay for my registration, flight, hotel, and someone to watch the children while I'm gone.

What, no takers?

If only Austin weren't so far away!  Who wants to plan something in DC?

--4--

I was really proud of myself this week for letting the kids help a lot with cooking, but the problem is that when I let them help, then they ALWAYS want to help!  So I start coming up with time-consuming tasks for them to do while I get the real work done so that they can spend 10 minutes washing their hands and I can prep everything for them to pour into a bowl...

"Here John Paul, throw this tiny piece of trash away!"

"Cecilia, can you find the tiniest apple in the drawer for me?"

This week they helped me make hummus at least 3 times (the last time was not planned, but John Paul started opening the pull-tab can and I already had the food processor out and washed, sooooo we kind of had to make it...), made a ton of cookies with the cookie press that we got for our wedding and finally used (I can't be the only one!), John Paul helped me make oatmeal (Cecilia doesn't like it), and they made really cute pita pizzas with veggie faces.  

I even let John Paul help crack the egg for the cookies.  He was ecstatic!

We're actually getting to the point where he can do quite a bit of meal prep - he can peel and cut up a banana for breakfast, can serve granola and yogurt, can get out the ingredients for sandwiches and he and Cecilia can make them for themselves, can wash and cut up an apple (with the apple cutter or the crinkle cutter), can serve himself and Cecilia baby carrots with salad dressing for dipping, etc.  There's honestly not much left for me to do when it comes to breakfast, snack, and lunch!  

--5--

With that in mind, what are your favorite things to let your kids make/to make with them?  On the days that I start work later, I've usually got about an hour alone with the big kids while the babies are napping, which is when we usually do a craft or read longer books or cook, but I feel like I'm close to exhausting the manageable recipes we can make together!

--6--

Speaking of cooking, a friend got us this cookbook and I've started reading it and am pretty excited!

It's all meatless, so there are tons of new possibilities for Lent, plus it's easy enough to add meat to pretty much any dish!  

And speaking of Lent, I'm working on revamping my meatless meals post from last year and adding some new options that we've grown to love - what are your favorite meatless recipes?

--7--

Sick of the snow?  Ours has mostly melted, but it looks like we'll be getting more soon...  We've made snow cream, had a disastrous science experiment, and a less disastrous science experiment:

Snow, food coloring, spoons!

She really does know how to mix those patterns...

As does he, I suppose?

Now this time I hope that when it snows it's not too cold for them to go outside and play in it!  What are your favorite snow activities?

Check out more Quick Takes over at Conversion Diary!

Comments again...

Sorry guys - I changed it and then somehow the template didn't save, so it WAS working but then it stopped...  Testing again?  I promise I'll post something cute as a reward for getting your hopes up for a real post...  Working on those dance videos!

Twin Birth Stories: A Link-Up

When I posted my list of twin blogs last week I promised to post a birth story link-up specifically for twin births (or any other multiples, if you've got a story!), and here it is!

My birth story from the twins is one of my most-viewed posts of all-time, but for some reason I just looooove me some twin birth stories, and I want to read them all!

Grab a button for your blog, and feel free to link back to this post so that all those birth story gluttons can get their fill!

Adele's natural twin birth, Part I and Part II

Ashley's happy c section, Part I and Part II

Sarah's story, Welcoming Our Twins

Rosemary's twin birth story

Hafsa's boy-girl twins

Abbey's twin birth story

The Twins These Days

I keep meaning to include the twins more in recent posts, but John Paul and Cecilia always seem to be doing something funnier or more interesting...  Here's what I want to remember right now about both of them:

Eating snow - we brought in a few bowls so that they wouldn't feel deprived because ain't no way I was taking them out in that...

Elizabeth is by far the clingiest child I've ever had.  I used to think I really WANTED one of those children who would just sit in his or her mom's lap while I chased John Paul and/or Cecilia around trying to keep them from destroying all the things.  But Elizabeth IS that kid who wants to sit in my lap all the time (mostly she wants to nurse), but she also wants to go destroy all the things and climb all the things and fall off all the things...

Despite the clinginess, she really does have some amazingly endearing traits - she absolutely knows how to make any of us smile instantly with that scrunchy-nose megawatt grin.  You'd never guess she still only has 4 teeth, because I swear it looks like about a million when she's smiling at us!

She and Mary Claire both have their own individual dance styles, and it makes me laugh SO hard to see Elizabeth dance.  Mary Claire does a pretty typical stand-and-sway that most babies develop, with the occasional bounce move.  She always looks very serious while she does it.

Elizabeth, on the other hand, likes to run in place, gradually getting her feet farther and farther apart until she's almost doing the splits.  Then she starts walking backwards (feet in normal position), and starts spinning in circles veeeeeery slowly.  When she knows she has your attention, she bellyflops to the floor and, arms and legs thrust out behind her, starts doing something resembling "The Worm" - it's maybe the most hilarious thing I've ever seen in my life.

Mary Claire talks. so. much.  About EVERYTHING.  You can tell what a good mom I am from some of her new vocabulary acquisitions:

"Nina" (Angelina Ballerina, whose books and tv shows she is OBSESSED WITH)
"Pitty" (pretty, which applies to hats, hair, bows, etc.)
"Pee-bee" (TV)
"Fee-bee" (Phoebe from The Magic School Bus)
"Wa-wee-gee" (Luigi, because John Paul found the 1989 Super Mario Bros TV show on Netflix today)
"Hopper" (Grasshopper, at least she learned it from a book and not TV!)
"Book"
"Weed-it" (read it, when she gives me a book)

And my absolute favorite is her latest phrase, "Oh no!"

Seriously, does that inflection not make you want to die of cuteness overload?

Cecilia was very proud of her new purple polka dot shirt and came up to Mary Claire saying, "Do you see my new shirt?  Do you wike it?"  To which Mary Claire responded, "Shuht.  Pitty!" (shirt, pretty) and started poking the polka dots.  Seriously, cutest ever.

Elizabeth's still holding pretty steady in the vocabulary department - much more on the normal curve than crazy Mary Claire!  Ball, Dada, bear, please, up, etc.  She was really excited to learn the word "Hair" and is always grabbing at her few lonely strands saying, "Hay!  Hay!"  "Please" is the most important, because she gets pretty much anything she wants when she points and says please!  This is important, because even though Mary Claire can say please, she refuses.  She'll just whine and then start crying if you suggest she say it.  Every once in a while if it's her idea, she'll say please, but mostly not.

They both seem to be dead-set on subsisting only on breastmilk until they move out.  Seriously.  Actually, they'll eat snow, too.  So that's something.  

But no, they must be eating SOME amount of solid foods because my period's back...  However, it seems as though I am once again spending every waking hour nursing them, only now instead of the good old "nurse the sleeping newborns on the ginormous nursing pillow while reading a book" it's more like "nurse the 20-pound toddlers while trying to keep them from poking each other in the eyes/whacking each other in the face/pulling each other's hair/picking each other's noses/bashing their heads together..."

And don't even get me STARTED with what happens when one of them happens to pull off while nursing...  Immediately the other thinks, "OH!  THAT SIDE'S FREE!" and she GOES for it, at which point the twin sitting on that side is cut off and probably sobbing, so I have to try to lift her OVER the baby who is now no longer sitting next to me, but straddling me, so that SHE can get the other side, which is now free.  Rinse.  Repeat.

Snow and breastmilk.  That's it.  Mary Claire likes to very calmly drop every. single. piece of food on her tray onto the floor, because John Paul laughs and picks it up for her.  Sigh.

I won't detail our sleep crises except to say that they don't sleep.  'Nuf said.

7 Late Takes: Birthday Party, Valentine Crafting, 4-year-old Camera Work, and WIWS

--1--

I left John Paul in charge of the babies while I went downstairs to get dressed the other day.  I returned to find that he had taken 193 (mostly) out-of-focus pictures with the camera, including at least 40 of our St. Cecilia picture.

Yup.  Soooo we had a nice chat about not touching the good camera...  In case you were wondering, here are some things a 4.5yo thinks are worth capturing:

L-R, starting at top:  Babies in the corner, messy floor, laundry basket, crucifix, blurry Mary Claire, blurry MC again, Jesus' sacred heart, nativity, icon of american saints, babies wreaking havoc, Christmas tree STILL up, Christmas candles in the advent wreath, St. Cecilia, nativity again, St. Polycarp

--2--

The great thing about planning a birthday party for February is that if your 3-year-old spies a heart-shaped cake on pinterest and decides that she wants hearts as the theme for her party, THE DECORATIONS ARE DONE!  And they can stay up for the rest of the month...

Note to self, when making peppermint buttercream with crushed peppermint, remember that a peppermint chunk will jam the piping tip and you will have to use a sandwich bag to "decorate" the cake anyway...  Ah well, Cecilia was pleased!  We kept it simple with cake, ice cream, and blackberry lemonade (with vodka for adults who cared to partake):

1 pt blackberries, muddled with 2 tbsp sugar, 1/2 gallon lemonade, done!

 --3--

I wasn't planning on decorating really at all, but then we ran to the dollar store to get balloons and grabbed some streamers, window clings, and a centerpiece (that John Paul promptly broke when we got home), so she did get a few actual decorations:  

Although they were put up rather frantically - I felt badly because we had friends over that morning and were going to have a nice relaxed play date but then I had to decorate the cake amidst John Paul trying to grab frosting and cake crumbs all over the place...  

And this heart garland I was planning on doing anyway - we have a prayer intention written on the inside for each day in February, so even though much of the garland kind of looks like teardrops, it's red and pink and festive enough for me :)  I also have heart doilies from the dollar store that we're going to incorporate somehow...

I'm never one to decorate for "holidays" and it occurred to me that maybe one reason the secular world embraces Thanksgiving, Christmas, Valentine's Day, Easter, etc. as "seasons" (at least at the grocery store) is that not having a liturgical year to focus on requires creativity in the observance of other holidays (or "holidays").  So I suppose it's a way of living "liturgically" but in a secular sense of the word, observing the "holiday" seasons in terms of crafts and decorations and cuisine.  It really makes me appreciate the fact that our calendar (and really helpful blogs!) dictates what to observe when, so we're not at the mercy of the "special" aisle of the grocery store (which has had Easter candy out since the beginning of January).

--4--

This week's posts:

Tons of linkers for this month's volume of What They Said - check them out, you won't be disappointed!

A tribute to Cecilia on her third birthday

Mom Style: Winter Edition

--5--

Cecilia asked for three little kittens for her birthday, so I spent waaaaay too long cutting and sewing these, but she looooves them and so do the babies - handmade birthday ftw!

Named (by her) as Kitty Kitty, Chalk, and Midnight

--6--

I took very few pictures during the actual party, but just to prove all the kids were there:

Mary Claire with her uncle (Andrew's brother)

John Paul sucking on a cold pack (and Cecilia's new ballet slippers in the background)

All the girls flock to their uncle!  And a lovely view of our fingerprint-ridden windows ;)

--7--

Aaaand since it took me until Sunday to finish these, here's what I wore today!

I call this look "Safari Chic" - not so sure about it, but the price was right!

"Take a picture of me doing some of my ballet moves!"

I used ThredUp credit and ended up getting both the belt and dress for free - both new with tags!  The dress ended up having some minor discoloration on the back, so I sent a picture and email to ThredUp customer service and they immediately refunded me part of the purchase price - so nice to have a quick response and resolution, because I still wanted to keep the dress but was annoyed they hadn't caught the error...

Linking up with Fine Linen and Purple for What I Wore Sunday, and Conversion Diary for 7 Quick Takes