What Happens

Things That Happen The First Week You Have a Newborn with Twin 4 Year-Olds

1. The twins find your camera.

2. The twins' bedroom has a mysterious hurricane go through it...every day. 

3. They find those purple and black tights you forgot you had.

4. The twins need spectators for their fashion shows- they wear inside-out and upside-down costumes to get extra attention. They also pose and do slow motion plays in costume.

 5. The newborn poops and pees twice in his first bath- to the sheer delight of the twins.

6. Whoever can feed the newborn best is the best big brother.

 7. The newborn tries to nurse on one of the twins.

8. The newborn gets coaching tips from his three coaches while working out in the baby gym.

9. You spend all day making cow costumes with the twins in between newborn feedings.

10. One twin can't find his pool pass so he draws one on the whiteboard.

11. The No Boys on the Table rule isn't enforced.

12. Pajamas stay on until unspeakable times of the day.

13. But mostly you feel blessed to have three healthy, happy boys.

Welcome, Teddy!

I'm happy to blog-announce that our Peapod was born Friday, July 5th at 8:06am. The C-section was no fun for me, but recovery hasn't been too bad. Brian got to see the doctor pull the baby out of me, which he said was cool. He weighs 8lbs. 14oz. and is 21 inches long. He came out with a mop of thick black hair that includes at least three cowlicks, so that will be fun for him. The nurse who bathed him gave him a mohawk and it has pretty much stayed that way for three days now.

We named him Theodore John, and we call him Teddy. The John is after my dad and Brian and I both just really like the name Teddy. We figured Theodore also gives him options for when he is older if he decides he doesn't want to go with Teddy: "Theo," "Ted," "TJ, "The Odor," etc. Brian is already enjoying calling him "The Odor," actually. He isn't exactly named after the Nationals racing president, though that Teddy is dear to all the hearts in our household as well.

My sister-in-law came to the hospital when Teddy was about an hour old and stayed until he was about seven hours old, armed with her photography gear, and came again yesterday to get pictures of the three boys. So she has somewhere around 500 pictures that we'll eventually get sorted out and I'll post my favorites. How awesome to have an eager photographer in the family!

Teddy and I will be in the hospital for another day or two. We've introduced him to his brothers, his stuffed turtle that Cal and Clark gave him, lots of aunts, uncles, Gammy, Poppy, baseball on TV, and some friends. He's a very calm little fellow and has taken to nursing like a champ. Teddy also loves gazing at his Daddy while he sings him funny songs. We're all in love.

The boys are already protective. They keep telling people who hold him, "That's our baby. You can't take it home with you." They're also in love with the idea of being big brothers. It means they need to eat more meat to get big strong muscles, Clark explained. Calvin took on a baby persona and has been talking like a baby and curling up in laps sucking his thumb in order to keep up with the attention Teddy is getting.

Here are the two favorite pictures so far.

Clark in the Batter's Box

The boys love baseball. This is largely due to the fact that Brian and I love baseball and also that we're teachers, so explaining things to kids is kind of second nature to us. As situations come up, we explain them, usually in detail. And we watch and listen to a lot of the Nats games. They know way more about baseball than I did at their age.

We play baseball with them at the playground, the park, the yard (though I've been pretty slow in this department this spring), we play baseball with them in the living room, we watch them playing baseball together all the time- inside and outside- and we overhear them talking about baseball too. But they don't only talk about hitting the ball and pitching the ball, they talk about intentional walks and old school windups and fastballs and sliders and split-finger change-ups. They wonder about bad calls and ejections and pick-offs and steal signs. Why isn't there a second base coach, only first and third? They practice their bunting and their diving catches and their double-play transfers. They work out. They slam into fences (walls of the house) and rob hitters of home runs. They slide head-first and feet-first into bases. And they do each play at least twice, because there's always the slow-motion replays that need to happen. It's a little out of control.

A couple weeks ago at the pool we ran into some friends from Blastball. Clark went over to the little boy, who was busy watching other kids playing in the water and hadn't seen us. Clark leaned over right to his ear, and announced proudly in his deepest announcer's voice, "It's Claaaaaaaark Crossssssson!" I realize this will only be cute for a little while longer.

Sometimes Clark will be gazing quietly into the distance and then ask me, "Do you know what I'm thinking about?" No, Clark, tell me. "I'm thinking about my diving catch I made in Blastball." (This catch, while impressive, was at least two months ago.)

Well, as of last night we have proof that they not only play and talk about baseball every day, they also dream about it. Brian got Clark up to take him to the bathroom at about 11pm. As he lifted Clark up out of his bed into a standing position on the floor, Clark said, in his announcer's voice, "Clark's in the batter's box!"

He did go potty, so I guess he had a productive at-bat.

I'm wondering how the little ball players will include Baby Peapod in their play as he gets older. I bet he'll develop into one heck of a backstop.

Blastball-ers in a scramble for the ball

Today's Food Fables

The boys like to make up stories. Today while we ate lunch they were narrating stories to me and I decided to write them down. I bet you can't tell what we were eating.

The Carrot Who Wanted to be Eaten

by Clark

Once upon a time there was a lonely carrot who wanted to be eaten in the middle.  He asked a person,” Will you bite me in the middle?” The person said, “I have my own carrots at home.” Another person said, "I don’t have carrots at home. We were thinking of going to Costco to get some, but we didn’t, so I can bite you in the middle." So he tried to eat him in the middle but it didn’t work. Then a lady said the same thing- she didn’t have carrots at home either. She said, “I’ll bite you on the end and then eat up and up.” “No!” the carrot yelled out. Then he sat on the plate and turned into a real carrot who couldn’t talk and they all ate him. The end. 

The Ranch Dressing Gets Mad

by Calvin

Once upon a time there was Ranch Dressing. A penguin came up and said, “I want to eat all the Ranch dressing.” Ranch Dressing yelled, “No! Don’t eat me all!” And then a carrot came up and said, I want to eat you all.” And Ranch Dressing said, “No! Don’t eat me, just like the penguin.” Another penguin came up and said, “You don’t look good. I’m just going to eat the tree instead.” “Yes! said Ranch Dressing, “that’s good for me.” Then a big humongous excavator came and said, “I want to eat everything in the whole world, but not you.” “That’s good too,” said Ranch Dressing. Then a computer came up and said, “I want to come up and eat those little seeds.” No, said Ranch Dressing. “That’s a little part of the dressing too.” And then they talked a little more and someone said, you know what, we want to switch.” That was the hummus. Then a water bottle came up and said, “Don’t worry, the Gatorade is on his way now.” Then the Gatorade got there and said to Ranch Dressing, "Do you want to drink me? It's fine." Another hummus came up and said to Ranch Dressing, "Tomatoes are in me. Do you like tomatoes?" "Yes, said Ranch Dressing. And he wasn't mad. The end.

Calvin the author, illustrating his story-- this one
about a beard and a hand turkey

The Countdown: 38 weeks

It's almost time! My scheduled c-section is for this Friday, July 5th at 7:30am! Ever since I went off my medication two weeks ago and thought I'd go into labor, I've had more energy than I've had for a long time...and have definitely not gone into labor. So, everything is in place for Peapod to make his grand entrance in three and a half days!

Here's the latest picture I had taken when I was pregnant with the boys. This was about a week before I delivered them at 36 weeks.

35 weeks with the twins

Here's a picture from today:

38 weeks with Peapod

We are all poised here and ready to receive Mr. Peapod!

Thursday Thesicle

Happy birthday, dear Margo.

Waiting to Explode

As I've been waiting to explode for the past week, I've been in various places and usually the thought crosses my head, "What if I had the baby here?"

I've had contractions on three different days but they haven't lasted for very long, so nothing has become of them. So still, I wait.

These started out as places I've actually visited recently and then kind of spiraled...

Worst places to give birth:

1. All bathrooms in general, but of specific horror would be:

           a. bathroom at the pool- aided only by scantily-clad tweens and their iPhones
           b. port-a-potty at the playground- the accident possibilties are terrifying
           c. bathroom at the softball fields- stainless steel toilets and damp cement floors
           d. airplane bathroom- (would it even work?) emergency landing

2. In the middle of a quiet church service- front row

3. In the plush leather passenger seat of my mother-in-law's car as she's giving me a ride

4. In the brilliant blue-green kiddie pool surrounded by children, including my own

5. While getting a massage in a dimly-lit room with a gurgling zen fountain, naked with a stranger- only about a quarter of the way into it

6. At the hair salon with its bright-white walls, plentiful mirrors, and beautifully-clipped and manicured hair dressers in perfect clothes

7. In the slowest checkout line at the grocery store- probably when I finally found my favorite pickles and chocolate to buy

8. Old Navy fitting room while daringly trying on skinny jeans for no real reason

9. Vacation Bible School puppet show

10. Anytime when I'm out alone anywhere and forgot my cell phone (as if I ever misplace my phone)

11. On the bus with my kids, miles from home, next to a creepy man/woman/creature

12. In the stands at a baseball game- a really exciting one, maybe in extra innings (on second thought, this might be cool...eventually)

13. On my tan microfiber couch with guests visiting

14. On a carnival ride- think Ferris wheel or roller coaster

Ready or not, here we go!

Father's Day

I was hoping I could give Brian another baby for Father's Day today...but I guess Peapod is happy with his current residential situation, so we'll keep waiting for him to decide he needs more space.

Instead we had an ordinary day. The boys and I made breakfast for Brian- bacon and egg sandwiches. We went to church. We went grocery shopping. We went to the driving range for the boys to golf. I ate chocolate. Brian made yummy chicken salad sandwiches. We watched baseball on TV. I cut the boys' hair. The boys and Brian had a loud, rowdy game of a cross between tag, hide and seek, and wrestling. We called our fathers. Clark insisted on calling Grandma to tell her Happy Father's Day. I ate more chocolate. Cal drew a house and practiced drawing eights and other "beautiful things." Clark colored a motorcycle. Cal told me he wished we were having a girl so she could have my face, because my face is cute. Awww.

Here are some pictures.

Working on breakfast

a little pepper...

Assembling the sandwiches

Golfin'  with Dad

They look so little with their haircuts!

Setting up...

The lefty drives

The righty aims

Water break

"Drawing beautiful things"

Clark's Happy Father's Day sign

Cal's sign

I'd also like to say Happy Father's Day to my dad, who turned 60 this week!

 And to my husband, who I was hoping to make a father times three today, but didn't quite make it...

And I'm glad they both get along so beautifully together.

Finally Cool with the Pool

The last couple summers the boys have been terrified of the pool. I wrote about their escapades here. They screamed at even the idea of us taking them to the pool. It was ridiculous and the only way I could cope with it without going crazy was to write about it and then laugh at what I wrote. Finally last fall I forced them to take a swim class at the community center. They screamed the entire first lesson, including the 20 minutes before class, since we were accidentally early. The old ladies in the early morning water aerobics class were mostly sympathetic... but probably also annoyed by the shrieks echoing off the sterile white walls. The second class was only a little better. I summed up their hatred and tiny tolerance for the water here.

The boys, terrified of a half-full wading pool when they were two...
even when I was in with them.

But since then they've had another round of swim classes this spring and will start another round this summer. They've made strides. I wouldn't call them giant strides, but they're still much better than the days of the Pool Wars.

One of the cool things about living in Reston is that there are 16 public swimming pools in town! It seems that they each have cool features- one even has a covered sandbox area. We've met some fabulous new friends through Blastball who are big fans of the pools. Jackson is about six months older than Cal and Clark and they are in love with him. Jackson's mom Carey is actually due to have her baby any day now too, so we take our combined three boys, ourselves, our ginormous bellies, and our bulging swim bags of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and squirt guns to the pool. We get looks. One guy said to us, "Did you two come here to deliver?" Which isn't a bad idea, actually...water births are totally in right now... ha.

Yes, we're here to deliver.

Now that they have Jackson to go to the pool with and are more comfortable around water, the boys love to go to the pool. We also have a pool at our condo clubhouse that they love to go to. Cal especially is into it. He'll even jump off the sides, as long as someone catches him and his head doesn't quite go underwater. He'll plug his nose and go under with help, but I'm pretty sure he doesn't at all understand the concept of holding his breath, so hopefully his swim teacher will help with that soon. Today at the pool the boys were racing around the kids' pool as if the four corners were bases and they were diving headfirst into each base. It was great. They got their heads wet more than they ever have, all in the name of baseball.

The pool is also a great place for me, being a pregnant whale at the moment. I can sit motionless on a chair while the boys play in the kiddie pools, and I'm virtually weightless in the water where I can hold the boys up right to my face, which I can't do out of the water right now. I can cool off instantly. I don't have to wear real clothes. It is glorious. I'm so happy that the boys are finally excited about the pool! Maybe I should root for Peapod to take his time so I can enjoy a few more weeks at the pool. Nah. I need this child out of me.

Pool hunks

Discovering goggles

Fountains in the kiddie area at one pool!

Pizza break!

Thursday Thesicle

Practice makes perfect big brothers.