have you ever had the kind of day......

in true marissa fashion my day went from left to right in 4.2 seconds. chloe woke up from her nap snotting, coughing and sneezing all over the place and colton wouldn't stop crying. i think he was cranky from making new big boy teeth. i knew mango would cheer the baby g up so off to whole foods we went.

but,

have you ever had the kind of day......

when you realized you forgot your wallet half way to whole foods?

when you finally make it to whole foods to buy mango to cheer your sick baby girl up they are out of mango?

you are trying to make it through whole foods without seeing anyone you know because you look a hot mess with one sick baby and one cranky teething baby and you run into someone you know?

you keep sipping your coffee convincing yourself that after a few more sips you will finally wake up only to realize it's almost 4 o'clock?

you buy a seedless watermelon for your kids to snack on so you can make something to eat for yourself and realize upon cutting it open it absolutely has 4 million seeds?

you're too lazy to get a paper towel to clean off the remaining tid bits of food the kids somehow smeared on your body so you just eat them?

you get looks like this:

and this:

while singing "the wheels on the bus"? apparently now that he has a tooth he is way too grown up for the "wheels on the bus".

you can't think of anything else to put in or on the bus?

you go to load the dishwasher only to realize it is full. with. clean. dishes.....

the hose in the sink gets stuck on squeezed and you spray yourself for 30 seconds straight in the face upon putting it back in the holder?

you go to feed your daughter green beans and avacado (which she likes) and get results like:

 this

 and this

 and this

 and this

 by this point even he was on my side

you feel like the only thing that will make it better is a cold, refreshing glass of white wine only to discover you only have red?

that's the kind of day i had. be jealous.

thank goodness this guy came home early as back up



now, i'm off to order pizza, do you think they will deliver white wine?

We have arrived......kinda

Whattup people? I haven't wanted to jinx myself but I think we're in the clear now.....kinda. My cousin said it best when she said

"never talk about the no hitter".

Well, I think we made it, through the no hitter, that is. These babes are sleeping!

Holla!

But not too loud because they are sleeping now! That is the other miracle goin down around here......the better they sleep at night, the better they sleep during the day. It's like the greatest domino effect ever.

So.....


Crying it out works and yes, I probably should have done it a few months ago. Just like A LOT of you told me to.


They still wake up a few times throughout the night but, they fall back asleep on their own within a few minutes.


Usually.
Last night?
Not so much for the Bubs.
Why you ask?
Because he was busy making a tooth!

Yup, it's official, he has the cutest tooth you have ever seen in your life, promise.

Last night I had a baby. Today he might as well be driving a car too fast and looking at girls butts who are wearing shorts that are too tight.

Oye vey.

You all told me this would happen but I'm just not ready.

I also wasn't ready for this.....

It truly will be a miracle if we make it another month without a visit to the ER. He fell, busted his face and got a little baby bloody nose. How cute is that?

Wanna know what else is cute? My baby girl now says Dada......it is only cute because she said

mama

first.

Yup, that girl knows who butters her bread!

The twins costumes are well under way and I have only had to unsew them once so far. Yes, you would be correct in that I will most likely be pulling up somewhere to purchase last minute costumes on Sunday.

In more successful crafting news, I would like for you to see what the twins wore to their Uncle Michael's birthday dinner.

This was probably the 95th picture and, as you can see, they were over it 95 pictures ago.

oops.

here's what happens when you don't pay attention to your kid in the grocery store.

dirt everywhere.

good thing they're so stinkin cute

this is right before bubba peed on the blanket that went through to the rug.

Mish Mash Monday

It has been an ADHD kind of day so this post will be too.

A: Thank you all for your sweet messages with your stories and/or advice. We'll get to how things are going over here in a sec.

B: For some reason a few of you who messaged me said you couldn't post comments on the blog. Annoying.
Sorry - I have no idea what I'm doing here and you people are lucky these posts actually make it on this thing we call the world wide web. I don't know if it's something I did???

C: I went to JoAnns today to buy fabric. Why you ask? Because I have taken one sewing class and feel as though that qualifies me to make the twins Halloween costume. Matt was so proud I "saved money". Little does he know I will end up spending more than the original costumes I wanted to buy. Bahahaha. It should be so interesting.

D: One of the reasons I didn't want to blog is because I didn't feel like proof reading. I just don't feel like it so let's just not focus my missing comas and semi-colons and such mkay?

E: I just got the coolest idea, what if I rambled for so long that I could make it through the whole alphabet??

F: Let's be honest, even I know that no one wants all that. And, my brother who  was the one who told me I needed to start blogging because my mouth was getting too big for Facebook has recently informed me that I am blogging too much and I should slow down? Ew.
G: I went on my first real playdate last week......here is our attempt at a group pic.....and a brief recap of the day.

The twinnies had lots of fun going down the slide even though they were fully aware of Avery's "that is MINE" stare from the sidelines. They weren't scurred.

The highlight of the day was that I finally found something to cage the wild beast! I know, how awesome is that? I so just bought 20 more minutes of alone time with this find!

 I didn't get too many pics because I was so busy chasing the twins around as they were repeatedly stealing Avery's snacks, shaking the crumbs all over the house and trying to crawl off with her balloon.

  FYI - If you go to Avery's, don't take her balloon. She doesn't like it one bit.

 This was Ave's favorite part......

 watching us leave.

 And this is just my adorable daughter in her new skinny jeans. I mean, really, she is scrumptious.

H: On Sunday we went to my Grandparents for a little family BBQ and here is what we walked into.....can you tell they are entertainers?

We had a great time until I put the babies down for a nap......Chloe started screaming and Taran informed me that she had fallen off the bed. Yes Lauren, I said fell off the bed. She had a teeny lil rug burn on her face but not enough to brag about ; ) The girl is tough, she gets beat up by her brother every day of her life.

Oh - FYI - this blog is my baby book so you all are going to have to get over the absurd amount of pictures that I'll be slappin on this bad boy on the reg.

I: Do we realllllllly have to talk about the sleep??? We do. You all sent me your suggestions and stories so I have to get you back.

I so thought we had it in the bag.

Friday night was terrible but, Saturday?

Saturday was a dream.

They woke up a few times but didn't cry for longer than 5 minutes.

I thought we had it.

That is, until last night, it was horrible. I don't even want to talk about it. However, last night was night three so you know what that means......tonight it the night "they" say we should be golden. Who wants to bet? My money is against my twins.

J: Oh, I already spoiled it on the "book" but we went to the Pumpkin Patch today. I mean my kids were the cutest things on the planet and I'm not biased at all. So I'll do a lil patch recap later.

goodnight, sweethearts

Soooooo. no, it hasn't happened.
The twins aren't sleeping any better being seperated.
I'm not happy I get to tell my sister "I told you so", I'm devastated we have to move forward with our final option.

cryingitout.

I will be the first one to admit I thought it would be cake. I remember disticntly being at my sisters house when em was a newbie and Matt and I both saying "you just have to let her cry it out". She doesn't believe in doing so and Matt and I both said "we do, and our kids will"

big fat smackinthefreakingface.


Don't get me wrong, I have made the twins cry at night and for naps but, not close the door and don't go in there for 7 hours a lot.

When they were first born we decided once we put them down, they were down. And, we stuck to that which I do believe helped them learn to put themselves to sleep. However, falling asleep isn't the problem - it's staying asleep. We followed Babywise and even a lil bit of Dr. Ferber but to no avail. They were waking up around 6 times each up until about a month ago.......that means I got out of bed 12 times a night. dhnapeuvrhewa.......that's me cussing. 

I decided getting up to get them their passy's was going to be no mas.
It was.
It helped.
But, they still wake up 3 times a night to eat.
I wake up everyday convincing myself as my 1st cup of coffee brews "I will rally, I can make it through today"

I can't anymore.


Listening to them scream like that really does cause me physical pain. I feel like they were given to me and my only job was to make them feel safe, love them, and feed them every now and them when I remember. When they are inconsolable and I am deliberately letting them cry it rips at every maternal instinct in my body and my heart hurts.

Last night was our first night. I was awake from 12:30 - 4 listening to my sweet babies cry. It was horrible and worse than I thought it would be. And, because my daughter is sleeping in the closet I couldn't escape it.

"They" say it takes three nights. Here's hoping it does because I won't make it four.

So, if my twins end up in prision it's probably because they are having a hard time coping with their troubled childhood. They will probably have felt abandoned and motherless for these 3 nights. You know what that means? It means all of you who tell me crying it out works are responsible for posting their bail.

Oh, and can you all write me comments about how it worked for you so when I am bored/crying my eyes out all night I will feel a new sense of hope? Thanks.


Please let it only be 3 nights.

Oh What a Night

No, it didn't help.

I'm not giving up hope.
Tonight's the night.

We did, however, have a little snafu.

Long story short (short for me, that is. My bro constantly asks me to tell stories in Cliff Notes)-

I'm grumpy but lots of peeps have asked how it went last night. I don't want to keep them hanging so here's how it all went down.

Chloe got really sick last night.
Throwing up all over everyone and everything.
She choked a lot and was throwing up through her nose.
We're rookies.
We were terrified.
Called mom for an emergency sleepover and Uncle Dr. Scott for a late night consultation.
Moved Colton back to the twins room.
Chloe slept in bed with mom and me.
Matt in the guest bed.
We were up all night.
And, as usual, so were the kids.
Wahhhh.

Tonight's the night.
We switched it up, Chloe is in the closet dreaming about all the heels I never wear anymore.
We're all better around here and, no, Colton didn't catch it even though I fed him with the same spoon last night.

Weird.

Oh - P.S. How cute is it that they yawned at the EXACT same time today and woke up from a nap at the exact same time even though they were at opposite ends of our house. So weird those twins are.

P.P.S - Big ups to Uncle Michael, yo. He helped my mom and me clean my whole house today.

Peace.
Until tomorrow.......

i told you so......

For the first time in my life I hope to hear the words "I told you so" from my sister. The longest stretch of sleep I've had since the twins were born has been 5 hours......and I have only gotten that once or twice.

My sister has decided it is time for an intervention.


I never thought I would welcome an intervention of any sorts.



Bring it.


This chick is ready for some zzzzzzzzz's.

The only thing we haven't tried is seperating the twins.

My sis thinks it's imperative.

I must say, even if one is screaming for 30 minutes straight, the other one very rarely wakes up.....like almost never rarely. My sis is pretty confident she has the answer so I am doing this kinda to shut her up, but, a lil bit hoping she is right.

So, Matt and I spent the evening taking apart and putting back together the crib in here.

Yup, in our closet.

So, our twinnies, who have slept together every single night for 16 months (9 in my belly and 7 out)

have been seperated for the first time overnight.

(Matt's taking it harder than I am, I promise)

So far........

So GOOD.

But, it's only 8:30 so let's hope it stays that way for the next 12 hours.

I'll keep ya'll informed.

P.S. - Cupcake wine is bogo at Publix, go on and git chu some.

P.P.S - I just talked to my mom and she wanted to know why in the closet.......the guest room is too close to the twins room and my sister said she wanted him in the closet. If I do what she tells me to, she will spend the night Friday night to better assess the situation.
I'll do anything.
I mean,
anything.

Daddy's Little Girl

One day Matty lifted Baby G up to touch her chandelier and she loved it. She would run her fingers back and forth through the capiz shells and now he does it every night after her bath. She gets so excited and the other day when I walked in her room with her and turned on the light she got so excited and lifted her arm. I thought it was so adorable that this had turned into their "thing". I have wanted to snap a pic to remember it......so here is daddy with his little girl doin their "thing".

Poison Control this is Judy.....

I really wanted my next post to be about something that would exhibit how great of a mom I am.

Unfortunately folks, it's not going to happen.

I even thought about not posting this after my mom called and said, "maybe you should rethink putting this on your blog, what you put in writing on the internet stays forever" but whatevs, I sure hope my twinnies listen to me more than I listen to her ; ).

I had my first encounter with Poison Control today.

We've all been there, right?

Right?

Maybe it took you a little bit longer than 7 months (happy 7 month birthday shoutout to my twinnies) to get there but, for me, today was the day.

Side note: I really do feel like you guys should be a little bit more open minded before you judge me because I have two and they are the exact same age. And, I'm not always going to play the twin card but, I mos def will when I feel I need it or it could help me.

I mean those of you who know my kids know my son is crazy. Like really crazy. I fully intended on buying a baby jail this week because I can't keep up with the kid now that he is crawling but, it didn't happen. Earlier in the week I found him in the fireplace with black hands from the ashes. You get the picture, he's just into everything and it's not because I don't watch him, well, today it was but that's besides the point.

I thought about changing the story a

teeny bit

and say I was vaccuuming or reading to Chloe but I decided to just go with it. If you want a blog that is constantly inspiring you to be a better mother by leading by example,

I'm not your girl.

Imma keep it real over here. I was sitting on the couch on the phone with my dad bragging about telling him how calm things were around here this morning. We woke up, had birthday yogurt and birthday bananas (for a first time birthday treat) and we were just chilling listening to some jazz. Then it hit me. Bubba had been way too quiet for way too long. For Bubba, anything longer than 2 minutes of quiet is too long. I stood up and sure enough he was making faces like this:

And this and spitting repeatedly:

I knew something was wrong and upon further investigation I realized what had happened. He took the Wallflower (does everyone know what those are? The Bath and Body Works thingys that make my house smell fresh and clean when it's really dirty?) unplugged it from the wall, unscrewed the liquid portion from the plastic portion and apparently had a lil snack. I immediately hung up with dad, called mom (who is a nurse) and she said "you need to call poison control".

 So there it is. We called Poison Control

I spoke to Judy who was very sweet but I felt like she was mildly questioning my parenting skills when I simply stated that I looked over and my son was sucking on the glass portion of my Wallflower. So, you guessed it, I played the twin card. It worked. She all of a sudden felt sympathetic and quickly went from Judgy back to Judy. I felt better about myself which is all that really matters. Well, that and my son not being poisoned. Judy kindly gave me my instructions and told me he would be fine. As soon as Judy and I parted ways I immediately grabbed the camera. Ummmm yes, I absolutely needed pictures of these faces! My mom then called to check on him and I told her she was interrupting my foul face photo shoot (that's when she told me I needed to opt out of this post) so I only got a few for you.

The good news is these faces, red eyes, red mouth, spitting and drool:

only lasted about 30 minutes and all was well with the world again.

And no, he is not like on the roof or something as I write this, they are both sleeping.....yup, I said both.

Oh, and I feel like I'll feel better about myself if I offer you all a little PSA - watch your kids at all times and here is Poison Control's phone number: #800.222.1222.

P.S. Daddy and Scotty - that onesie is for you - GO GREEN!

Happy Saturday ya'll.

And the award goes to......

When my mom called me Monday offering to take the twinks to the zoo on Thursday I was hesitant. I wanted to take them to the zoo for the first time. I wanted to get pictures, see their faces and make memories. I told her I would talk to Matt and get back to her.

Matt made me feel a little bit better about the idea reminding me that it would give me HOURS to myself and that they really wouldn't remember. Ever since I had the twins I am a lot less selfish. I know everyone says it will happen but I wasn't really 100% sure it would happen to me.

Seriously.

But, it did.

I thought about it and decided I wanted to be there for their first zoo visit and I would even compromise alone time to do it. Whether they would remember or not I knew it was important to me. That was, until I remembered what else happened on Thursday. All that went fuuuuu-lying out the window when I remembered a lil sumpthin.

Nordstrom Rack was opening the same day......

Needless to say, my mom picked up the twins, I threw on my Mother of the Year crown, and I high tailed it straight to Nordys. Not caring about the lines even though I was warned by my sister and a friend that it was pretty intense up in thurr.

Didn't care thankyouverymuch

Shopping at my fav store's outlet uninterrupted was enough to make me say zoo who? 

Plus, how bad could it be? What could 47,829 crazy fashionistas have on me? I have twins! With register lines wrapped around the store and stuff strewn about the place I snapped up my great deals braved the dressing room lines, waited in the register lines and headed home to a few more hours of peace and quiet. Yup, I am Mother of the Year unless, of course, Nordstrom comes into play.

Thank you mommy for the peace and quiet and add another IOU to my tab.

And you, don't judge!

You must have your hands full and other things I hear every day of my life....

Ok, I get it, there is something intriguing about twins. I, too, before having twins was fascinated with twins but not nearly to the extent that some people I have encountered. It really is amazing what some people ask, advise or just comment with no shame. Here are the most popular and a few of my favs.

You must have your hands full.......this is by far the most popular. I mean, I understand what people are trying to say but it amazes me that everyone uses the exact same phrase! This along with "better you than me", "is it hard?", "do you ever get to sleep" and "how do you do it" are what we twin moms hear on the reg. The truth is YES, it probably is better me than you, YES, it's extremely hard, and NO, I don't ever get sleep......but we'll get to that. They do make me want to pull my hair out and drink more than I already do but, they are really cute so today I think I'm going to keep them around for a while. Tomorrow? Could be a whole new ball game and they may or may not be listed on Craigslist.

Are they twins?: I mean people ask it more often than not. Really? Next comes - boy/girl? When I reply yes, amazingly what usually follows is are they identical?
They can't be identical.
Boys and girls can't be identical.
What makes them boys and girls is what makes them unable to be identical.

After that comes "they don't look alike" or "they look exactly alike, maybe they are identical" ummmm? A lot of times I say maybe, and just keep walking. It's a lot easier than giving them a biology lesson.

Make sure you sleep when they sleep: Ummmmm right. Like, I almost can't even comment on this one.

Side note: My dad is going to be so mad I started that sentence with like but I just feel like that's how it has to start dad so move on mkay?

I literally have probably had 15 naps in the 7 months I have had these twins. I can't explain why or how but it just can't happen. It doesn't happen. IF on the rare occasion they do sleep at the same time by the time I pee and get a cup of water and maybe get a load of laundry in the washing machine one of them is usually up. Now, in fairness, my mother says my kids are completely abnormal in the sleep department. They kind of don't, sleep, that is. I just feel like I'm done with this one so lets move along shall we? It just doesn't work.

I bet if you BLANK they will BLANK: Don't get me wrong, I am wide open to suggestions but there comes a point where I know my kids better than you and that's just how it is. A lot of times this comes from parents of singletons (yup, learned that term when I was pregnant with twins) or even more hysterically from people who don't have kids at all. Pretty funny, huh?

The following are my favorites......the absolutely inappropriate ones....
Did you have help? Meaning, IVF. Answer - no. There are no twins in either side of our families. Ok, actually there are but lemme explain. My cousins are twins but their mother has twins in her family and I am not blood related to her. Get it? My husband always says "why do you always feel the need to add that" well, because I feel like I have to even though it's not relevant because it doesn't increase my chance for having twins. My doctor described it best when she said it has to start somewhere and in your family, it started with you. Interesting side note - fraternal twins are only genetic on the mothers side. That may or may not be true, someone told me that so whatev - I'm going with it.

Did you have a C Section? No. I didn't want to and I was very clear about that with every doctor I saw and luckily my doctor was very respectful of that in the delivery room. You have to birth twins in the operating room because there is a very good chance you will end up with a C section......even after you had the first one the other way. I mean I don't want to get to gross here so you get it, right? At the last minute Colton kind of flipped sideways but my doctor literally hopped on me and worked him down??? So weird. But, it all worked out and there was no section over here folks.

Do you nurse? I mean who asks this?! The answer is yes and maybe I will address those issues in another post just because I feel like I could help some peeps. Oh a few people have actually asked me how much weight I gained!!! And one woman asked me how much I had lost when the twins were 3 months old in the middle of the grocery store. I mean, when you think it couldn't get crazier, it does.

I'm sure I have missed a bunch worth mentioning but this twin mamma is using the rest of her down time for a bubble bath and glass of wine.

Well hello there......

So I have been toying with the "to blog or not to blog" ever since I was pregnant with the twins. I blogged a few times during my pregnancy but never put it out there. I told myself I would remember all of these huge pregnancy milestones and I realized the other day I was wrong. My best friend is pregnant now and we were discussing what happened and when it happened with the twins and I couldn't remember for the life of me what happened when. That, in addition to my brother asking me why I "put the twins on blast on FB" made me pull the trigger. So here it is, I am now a Bloggess and those of you who want to join me in my Controlled Chaos, or more like Semi-Controlled Chaos or sometimes just straight up Chaos, welcome.