All the things I never thought I’d allow…

My 8-month-old babies can sleep with a 3-year-old throwing a tantrum less than 10 feet away.  What can yours do?

Love at first sight?

I’m sitting in my living room contemplating starting this blog which I had the idea for earlier this morning.  My view is marred by the twin mattress thrown on the floor with a very naughty 3-year-old (sans Dog-dog for naughty reasons) laying on it pretending to take a nap.  The two babies he woke up are upstairs are screaming now in separate rooms, so as to (hopefully!) facilitate their eventual fall back into dreamland.  perhaps now is not the right time to write this post…

However, since I have limited free time and I am forced, by my sprained ankle and the need to play warden to my son, to sit here in the living room I guess I’d better put my time to good use!

There has been a spring flood of baby news in my world over the past few months including the most recent: two friends had their second babies on Tuesday night!  I’ve been texting these friends back and forth and want to ask them, “Are you madly in love?  Do you just stare at them all day long?” with tremendous excitement at the bringing of new life into the world always stirs in me.  Then I think back to my first days and weeks home with my own children…

Breastfeeding Drama and Data

I started a blog entry about breastfeeding and had to stop.  I have very strong feelings about breastfeeding and a woman’s amazing ability to do it under almost every single circumstance and the fact that in our country so few women manage to do it for any real length of time!  I decided before writing a public entry I needed some more information.

So, my audience, I’m requesting some information from you!

I appreciate any answers you feel like providing, don’t feel like you have to answer everything.  Be as brief or as lengthy as you’d like.  Right now I’m most interested in the statistics but I’m always interested in the stories behind the stats!  If you’d rather not post here where everyone can read please feel free to email me at emiliasplayground@live.com (put “breastfeeding” in the subject line so I don’t delete you by accident!).  If you email me I will NOT publicize your story with your name to respect your privacy.  Thank you so much in advance!!!

If you are a parent–  Please answer for each child:  How long was your child breastfed?  What were the reasons for stopping (you can be very brief)? How long was it exclusive breast-feeding (no formula)? Do you feel that your family/community supported breastfeeding?

Whether you are a parent or not, whether you breastfed or not– Please answer with your OPINION:  Do you think all babies should be breastfed?  What are some situations where mothers shouldn’t breastfeed?  What is the best time/age to stop breastfeeding?  At what age is breastfeeding inappropriate?  Does your family/community feel like a pro-, neutral or anti-breastfeeding environment?

When can you reclaim the non-mommy stuff that makes you, YOU?

I’ve been caring for my friend’s 3-year-old in addition to my three kids for the past week and a half.  She’ll be with me another week and a half until I go back to work.  It’s interesting having my two sets of twins, Kelcie and Dean are 3 weeks apart, I met her mom at a Mom’s group when both our kids were just a few weeks old!  The two big kids get on each others’ nerves and they bicker a bit but for the most part enjoy each others company.  They entertain each other and the babies pretty well.  We even had some friends over today (another mom from the mom’s group with 2 boys: one the same age as Dean and Kelcie and one a year younger) and had a great time.  While our friends were over the mom asked me if I still sew nursing covers and slings to sell on etsy.  I sighed…  I have everything ready but I cannot find time to sew with any regularity!  I think I’ve made 2 slings and a couple other random things in the past YEAR and not a whole lot in the year before that either. 

Napping by sheer force of will

Today naptime did not go well.  I’ll summarize through metaphor 🙂

I have been getting the girls to nap almost 3 hours in the afternoon by sheer force of will.  Today with all three kids in one room (I put one girl down, then the other, then Dean and theoretically the girls stay asleep) it was like I was a giant magnet trying to force my will down onto other smaller magnets who were the wrong-side-up and kept popping out from under my grasp!  Dean was like a magnet that was right-side-up but who kept flipping at the last second.

Argh. 

At least the girls went to bed well at night, two out of three ain’t bad.  Dean’s bedtime shenanigans were similar to what I imagine trying to get a bunch of baby chicks to stand on a line must be like.  Completely and utterly futile until everyone is so exhausted they just fall asleep where they stand. 

<sigh>

tomorrow is a new day 🙂

Rolling on the Waves of Change OR How I’m Managing My Life with Infant Twins and a Toddler

Managing my life with infant twins and an almost 3-year old… ha.  Managing is not the right word at all!!!  Surviving?  No I’ve progressed beyond that.  I think riding the wave through this period of our lives is a better picture of how we’re doing these days.

Let me begin by saying I’m happy with the way my life is going right now but knowing that it won’t be like this forever is probably why I can be so happy.  A few months ago I was frantically trying, unsuccessfully, to be happy and feeling guilty that I wasn’t.  The first two months with my girls were probably the most difficult of my life.  A combination of severe sleep deprivation, hormonal wackiness and a desperate desire to get my life back under control caused me to hover at the edge of sanity… Thank goodness that with a lot of help and support  I pulled back and settled into my new “normal” insanity!

Making the most of the little moments… even the annoying ones

I was laying in bed nursing one of the twins (Claudia I think) and catching up on some Harry Potter (trying to read them all straight through… I lost steam last time around #5, I’m on #4 now and going strong!) and wishing I could be doing a thousand other things.  I have a disaster of a house, laundry to wash and more laundry to fold, bills to pay, grocery lists to make (then buy), food to cook… all those little things that go into running a home!  Then I looked down at my fuzzy-headed daughter and thought–I’m really going to miss this in a year or so… I stopped wishing I was anywhere but there as I stroked her hair and felt her nuzzle closer to me, contentedly.  Why would I want to wish that away?