Multiples Illuminated

While I was away on our cross-country road trip, this book was released:

In which my essay, "Individuality, Mutuality, and a Game of Twister" appears.
You can read an excerpt of my piece here.
If you have twins, triplets, or more, or if you just like horror stories, consider purchasing a copy:

Amazon (paperback) 

Amazon (Kindle) 

Kobo 

Barnes and Noble 

Scribe 

Inktera 

Playster 

Smashwords

These Guys

Turn 12 today!!!



We already started celebrating over the weekend, as is our custom, with a movie and bowling with their BFF and an old-fashioned red velvet cake.

It's been a wild ride, twelve years of mothering TWINS. So what can I say about these guys on the big One-Two?

Z: Climber of trees and walls. Cartwheeler, flipper, rural parkour-er. Lover of Norway. Baker of scones. Eater of all things sour. Duck-tender.

E: Lover of cats. Reader and mine-crafter. Sayer of the funniest words and sentences. Baker of banana-chocolate-chip muffins. Rider of bike. Watcher of You-Tube.

We have more celebrating to do this afternoon—a hike, dinner at their favorite spot, and presents.

Multiples Illuminated, Part I

As they say, when it rains it pours. Or at least rains a little bit harder. I have several publications coming out over the next few months that I'll be excited to share with you as they hit the presses (or pixels as it were). Last week, my essay "No Fun" appeared on Manifest Station, in case you missed it. And then I had a guest blog post up on Multiples Illuminated.

Cunning little devils, weren't they?

It's called "Post-Twin Stress Disorder" and I don't really have to tell you what it's about, do I? It's part of a series leading up to publication of the anthology Multiples Illuminated: Life with Twins and Triplets, the Toddler to Tween Years, which will be coming out this spring, and in which my essay "Individuality, Mutuality, and a Game of Twister" will appear. (That's why this post is called Part I; Part II will appear when the book becomes available.)

If you're one of those people who's always wondered what's it like having twins anyway? or one of those people who says things like, I always wished I had twins, check out my post. It will have you running for the hills (or the birth control pills) faster than you can say "multiples."

Elevensies

E and Z turn eleven today, which means it's official: we are careening toward a house full of teenage boys.



In honor of our upcoming epic camping trip, I thought I'd share this a picture from their first camping trip, when they were about 16 months old. Have you ever taken two one-year-olds camping? It was like they were circuit training and their fitness stations went like this:

• try to pull the flaming Coleman stove off of the picnic table onto your head
• eat dirt
• run headlong toward the flaming fire pit, on legs that only learned to walk two months earlier
• try to pull the other Coleman stove onto your head
• barrel into the camp road every time a truck rounds the corner
• eat gravel
• stand on the picnic table bench and slip down between the table and the bench, whacking your chin on the way down
• eat leaves
• climb the six-foot high rock behind the campsite, even though you just learned to walk two months earlier
• repeat

I remember saying after we got home that running after the twins in an effort to keep them out of harm's way had been more exhausting than if we'd hiked 12 miles each day. Looking back on it now, I think that weekend must have been more exhausting than our whole upcoming six-week trip will be. I think I've got a bad case of PTSD (post-toddler stress disorder), but gosh, aren't they cute? Those jeans are killing me.

Back then, I could never have imagined that one day they would be eleven years old, and no longer walking tornadoes (well, most of the time). And now I can hardly believe that they were ever that small. Or chubby. Or blond! Parenting is such a strange trip.

The Big Cut

Z requested a haircut Saturday. After years of having it long, I admit I was surprised, but I wasn't too hesitant, either--the combing battle had become too exhausting and he and E have been going around looking like Dickensian waifs all summer.

He opted to keep one lock in a Padawan braid on the side.

At first, E did not want his cut--we were just going to let it grow into a big, nasty snarl until right before school starts.

But a few hours after Z's cut, he decided he wanted one, too--even shorter--complete with Padawan braid.

Z's hair was long enough to donate (E's might be, too, depending on what organization we send it to), so it will hopefully go to good use.

The biggest irony of all is that, during the 24 hours since their cuts, they have combed and brushed--not to mention gelled, and styled--their hair more than in the whole last year.

Ten!

These two turned ten yesterday.

Like every year around this time, I've gotten caught up in the planning and preparing for three birthdays and all of the other busy-ness that May brings and I haven't really sat and reflected on the idea that my babies are a whole decade old already.

(I always swore I would never bake them one cake to share, but Z wanted this Devil's Food Bundt Cake--he's a fan of Martha Stewart--and that was quite cake enough for both of them. They didn't seem to mind sharing. And the cake? Sinful.)

I guess I just want to remember them as they are now. Silly. Fun. Funny.

Still full of wonder and excitement over simple things, like flowers and birds.

Big-toothed. Crazy-haired.

Wholly themselves, with no concern for what anyone thinks.

The best of friends (even though they would never admit it). 

Oh, yeah, and they took second and fifth in the mile run at school today (they definitely did NOT get that from me!).

Eight Today!

Happy Birthday, E and Z!!!

Insert the usual gasps of amazement at rapidity with which time zooms by. Eight! Oh my.

(If I may offer a word of advice to new mothers: when every friend, relative and person you passed once on the street comes over to ogle your new babies, by all means take a picture of them holding your offspring, but then hand them the camera to take a picture of you with your babe. In leafing through old photos, I found that there are virtually no pictures of me holding my babies, especially these two, and I'm pretty sure I logged quite a few hours doing just that.)