First shoes & first words

Ronan and Lucy got their first shoes last weekend. We went to the same shoe shop where Sean got his shoes in Tipperary. There was measuring, practising, ooing and aahing followed by photograph-taking. It was very cute but they looked alarmingly grown up. During the process, Lucy said her first word...a perfectly enunciated "shoes". They both have lots of noises and baby words (ta ta, heidi, hi, wuff, rar (as in what does a lion say) but this will be counted as the first grown up word.

The shoes themselves were a gift from Granny and were a horrifying price, but Ronan is conveniently one size up from Lucy so she'll be getting his blue boy-shoe hand-me-downs from now on. A very handy perk with my big/small twins!

First steps

My two officially became toddlers this week. Ronan took his first steps on tuesday. We think he took them by accident...he was standing up with two blocks in his hand and he took ambled forward 5 steps. He didn't seem to realise what he'd done and gave myself and Sean a blank look when we started yelping, jumping up and down and clapping like seals. He hasn't done it since so he might just have been teasing us.

Two days later, Lucy took her first steps. We think she's been practising on the quiet, perfecting her technique, cause first she took 3 steps, then 5, then 6 and a few more this morning.

Small steps for twins, giant leaps for Mammy and Daddy! Now the fun will really start.

Comprehension!

We are very excited at the latest development. A couple of days ago I said to Ronan "where's your bib?" (I say this at least 10 times every day since he keeps losing it) and he looked down at his chest and pulled at his top. This may seem insignificant for others but it is HUGE for us!

We natter to the babies and they natter back but this is the first sign of understanding. Since then Ronan has responded correctly to "where's your belly" and "where's daddy's belly". He can't do mammy's belly...he must think there isn't one! On the downside, this new development does mean we'll have to stop swearing at them!

Snail trail

The entire family has yet another head cold...the 5th since the babies were born. There's a pattern emerging where Lucy catches it first, then me, then Ronan and then (for some strange reason) the cold mutates into a flu and Sean gets it.

Lucy in particular absolutely resists having her nose wiped with a tissue, she much prefers Mammy's shoulder, leg, face, thigh. For the next fortnight I'll have a perpetual snail trail all over my clothes. Whats worse is that she has started giving us open mouth kisses which stopped being cute when the cold came along. Gross, gross, gross.

First birthday

We made it to 1...hoorah! We had a BBQ with Clo and Sean's family. The babies' first birthday presents were swings (which we actually got 2 months ago, but I justified the big purchase as birthday presents). The weather was lovely and we had 2 cakes (very important for twins).

Apart from the first excruciating 3 months, the rest of it flew. Will the next 17 years go as fast as the first? They'll be leaving home before we know it.

Back to work

I'm back almost 2 months now and there's not much to tell. I'd a few tears on the first morning which were gone by the time I got to the gates of Kilteragh. Its been a bit of an anti-climax really. People keep asking me do I miss the babies and sometimes I'm so engrossed in work that I wonder for a second who they are talking about. So I don't feel guilty for leaving my little pets, but I do feel guilty for not feeling guilty!

I think its all down to our very own Mary Poppins, aka Gillian, who is working out great, the kids seem to love her and she is much more easy-going than the original MP. I can say for definite that it is almost worth being away from them all day because of the huge smiles I get when I arrive in the door. Its pure magic!

Routines...

Change is a-coming, in the form of our childminder, who is starting tomorrow. I'm going back to work in two weeks, so the babies routines won't be my routines any more :<(

So for posterity, here's what we've been doing with our days for the last few months. It was 7-7 until the hour sprang forward...hoorah for daylight savings time.

7.30 Wake
7.45 Bottle in bed
8.00 Babies play and leave Mammy alone til she has her coffee
9.00 Lucy has breakfast while Ronan refuses breakfast
9.30 Get dressed and play
10.15 Nap
11.00 Snack and play, followed by whinging til lunch
12.30 Lunch (all finger food cause Ronan won't eat anything off a spoon)
13.45 Nap while Mammy collapses on couch to watch Spartacus, Mad Men, etc.
16.00 Podee* and play
17.00 Out n about...supposed to be a walk, but mostly shopping in the cresent
18.15 Dinner (all finger food, as above)
19.30 Yet another podee,just in case they could possibly be hungry
20.00 Bed
20.30 Mammy collapses on couch while Daddy does sterilising, tidying, laundry and pretty much everything else that needs doing.

*there will come a time in our lives when I won't remember what these are...can't wait. Where did the time go? Most days I feel like I've a day's work done when I look at the clock and its only 10.30. As Tara said, the days go slow but the weeks and months fly by.

We're all going on a summer holiday...

Actually we've been, and it was only myself and Sean. After considering (for about 10 seconds) what kind of holiday we could take the babies on we decided that the most relaxing kind would be to leave them at home and go away ourselves. So last week, for one night only, Sean and I went on our summer holidays...to a hotel about a mile away from home.

Gran and Auntie Clo minded the babies while myself and Sean had 24 hours of monitor-free blissful peace and quiet. It was heaven. I woke at 9.00, which is the latest I've slept in 10 months. The babies slept like little logs while poor Auntie Clo and Gran stared at the ceiling for most of the night, waiting for a monitor to bleep. Welcome to my life! The memory of good food, lots of wine, jacuzzis, massages and cool clean sheets will have to keep me going until the babysitters have forgotten their ordeal and come back for more. Lets hope they have short memories!

First tooth

We finally have a little tootsie from Lucy...hoorah! I thought I saw a white tip on the 1st of April (9 month birthday) but Sean thought I was april-fooling him. We've been waiting to see a tooth for a very long time! Lucy's teeth are obviously very slow-growing, because they are only becoming barely visible after 2 weeks. She's exhibiting no teething problems although she has taken to good-naturedly bellowing at the top of her lungs, which gives everyone a frighty. We fervently hope that it is teething-related and that she'll stop doing it soon.

In other dental news, we think Ronan's top teeth are on the way. Unfortunately he is exhibiting teething symptons, mainly irritability and extreme sensitivity to loud noises, i.e. Lucy's bellows. Every time she bellows, he cries. Grrrrr.

I am Spartacus

My daily guilty pleasure of late has been an episode of Spartacus: Blood and Sand (say it with a James Earl Jones voice) during naptime. Its brill...so brill it deserves a blog entry. How can something so terrible be so fabulous? "Gratuitous" is too mild a word for the violence in it and the sex scenes are practically soft porn but the plots are great. I watch every episode with my mouth open and jaw on the floor. Sadly the guy who plays Spartacus got some serious illness so they aren't making another series. Why, why, why is God punishing me?

Developments...

I know there's nothing more tedious than mammies going on about how fabulous their babies are...but its my blog so cut me some slack. Also my babies really are genuinely fabulous, so I've a lot of material to work with.

Latest developments over the last few weeks include Lucy sitting upright by herself and Ronan crawling (more like dragging) himself across the floor. Up until a few days ago Ronan wasn't sitting because he wouldn't sit still for more than a few seconds and Lucy is still only managing to crawl in reverse.

In an alarming turn of events however, Ronan has become a clear and present danger to both himself and others (others being poor Lucy). When he isn't heading for the most dangerous thing in the room, his favourite occupation is dragging himself over to Lucy (he looks like a disabled terminator when he does this), getting her in a headlock and grabbing fistfuls of her hair. Since she isn't mobile, she has nowhere to run.

The cutest development in the last couple of days is that they are starting to laugh at each other and play together. Its an incredible sight to watch and I'm hopeful that we are finally getting to the best bit of having twins...they entertain each other while Mammy reads her book!

Ronan

Ronan...aka Ro, Ronan Rogue, Ro ro ro your boat, Smiles-a-lot, Moanin Ronan (sometimes)
Likes...his bottle, soothers, getting changed, singing, having his face stroked, being tickled all over, his sister, waking up, whinging (sadly)
Dislikes...spoonfeeding, going to sleep, hearing his sister cry
Words to describe him...happy, whiney, bipolar!, adorable
Pastimes...munching on his fists and anything else he can get his hands on (except food), trying to eat monkey on the gym, smiling at his sister.

Ronan has a lovely, smiley personality but he's been cursed with lots of baby related discomfort that has him laughing one minute and crying the next. He went straight from trapped wind to reflux to teething without any break to start enjoying life...and teething can take 2 years apparently. Poor little mite...poor mammy and daddy too! If he wasn't such a great smiler he'd have been thrown out the window by now.

Lucy

Lucy...aka Luce, Lucy Liu, Lucy Locket, Luiseach, Lucifer (sometimes)
Likes...soft fluffy fabrics, touching hands, mammy's dressing gown, the bookshelf, the tv, sleeping
Dislikes...waking up
Words to describe her...independent, determined, serious, placid, a little dote
Pastimes...shouting and roaring for no obvious reason, making lop-sided faces, trying to pull monkey apart on the gym, covering her face with any material she can get her little hands on, arguing with the girl in the mirror.

Lucy spends her day frowning at everyone and everything. She's very selective about what she laughs at, and what makes her laugh one minute might make her cross the next. She's an incredibly easy baby...she falls asleep the minute she goes down, eats no bother, occupies herself, is never sick and rarely cries. When she does cry its a terrible sobbing cry that would break your heart and she has the cutest, gummy smile that melts our hearts every time.

Personalities

At 7 months, my two little aliens are feeling less alien these days, they've become part of our little family...or rather myself and Sean have been assimilated into their way of doing things. Their personalities are emerging every day. Its hard not to compare since we have two, so while they are not opposites, they are definitely as different as chalk and cheese...or maybe dogs and cats. I wrote these blogs at 5 months, then stored them as drafts cause I wasn't sure what was personality and what was just a baby phase. I haven't changed much so in the following blogs, I'd like to present to the world...Lucy and Ronan (in that order for alphabetical and chivalric reasons)!

First tooth

Since I didn't want aunties sticking their fingers into Ronan's mouth for the day, I didn't say anything about the first tooth on the day of the christenings. As it happened, a tiny jagged edge of the first tooth appeared in Ronan's mouth the day before. It and its next door neighbour are now more or less up. Not to be outdone, Lucy started saying da-da-da this week. She's also developed an annoying ability to roll over onto her front the minute I put her down and then shout like mad until I come and turn her over...its driving me mad. So lots of development this week but by far the best from our point of view is the new ability they both have to put their soothers back in their mouths themselves. Hoorah!

The Christenings

The christenings were last week and went off without a hitch. I was expecting my little angels to be demonic since the christening itself was smack bang in the middle of their main nap. They remained angelic for the whole day (until they got home at least), didn't make a peep in the church, even for the water on the head bit.

Only noteworthy moment occurred during the group shot in the church when everyone went quiet, focused on the camera and Lucy promptly let out one of her dirty old man belches for all to hear. I was just glad it was Lucy's up wind rather than her down wind! The babies then spent the afternoon contentedly in the pub like a couple of pros and happily went from aunt to uncle and lap to lap without single "where's mammy" thought for the whole day.

(Pictured above are everyone and one with proud parents plus Lucy Charlotte, her fairy godmother Clo, her godfather Fergus, and Ronan Vincent with his fairy godmother Dearbhla and godfather Liam)