Mom to Mom sale!!

My Mothers of Multiples group is having our Spring Mom to Mom sale!
This sale is BIG!
The stuff there is great, clean and such good prices.
I have gotten tons of stuff for Jack and Quent for very little $$.
I encourage everyone to come and check it out, I will be manning the bake sale table and selling yummy treats! Hope to see you there!

Mothers of Multiples Greater Genesee County
Spring and Summer Clothing and Equipment Sale

Saturday April 26th, 2008
Fenton High School Gym
9:00 am - 1:00 pm
Admission is $1.00
strollers are welcome
cash and checks accepted

**shop for spring and summer clothes, maternity clothes,
toys, strollers, outdoor equipment, and tons of various baby gear

Easter pics - finally!

We hosted Easter this year and had such a fun time, especially watching the boys have so much fun. They were spoiled and loved on by all and they loved every minute of it! Here's some shots from that day.

What a Day!!

What a nice day we are having in mid-michigan today! Its sad when sunny and 40 degrees is considered nice, but seeing that it was snowing yesterday, it is a big improvement!
Being that is was a nice day, I took the boys and went out to run errands this morning.
Here is the craziness that ensued...

First we of course took way longer to get out of the house than I had planned (or desperately hoped.) I had been encouraging Quentin to get his BM for the morning done before we left for obvious reasons. As much as I would like for him to be able to choose the time when he can do this, he really can't and I know that, but it doesn't hurt to ask nicely right?
We made it out of the house and watched the Consumers Power workers dig a hole in the street for a few minutes on our way to the van. We sang and talked happily on our way to our first stop for Momma's allergy shots.
I get Jack out into the stroller, go for Quent and - did you guess? Yep, poop. So, instead of stinking up the allergy office by changing him in one of their exam rooms (nope, they don't have a changer in the bathroom, but that's a whole other rant) I decide to change him on the reclined front seat. Which goes surprisingly well, if not kind of awkward for me. (We will refer to this as poop #1)
The trip into the office goes smoothly and is quite uneventful. While getting into the van again, Jack keeps saying, "Shopping, shopping". And given the time, I thought it was a good idea that we could get a Sam's trip in before heading home for lunch.

*I think I speak for all twin moms when I say:
THANK GOODNESS FOR SAM'S CLUB'S DOUBLE SEATED SHOPPING CARTS !!

All went well at Sam's, the boys were so good and the sample ladies loved them, although they only got to sample the fruit and cheese. It was on the way out of the store that we encountered a major glitch. The rotisserie chicken that I bought fell off the box of diapers and over onto the diaper bag! Luckily the diaper bag was closed, but still I have oily chicken juice all over my light blue (and still fairly new) diaper bag! YUCK!

Then we get home and Quent takes a nosedive on the sidewalk (while he was running away from Momma) and conks his forehead on the cement. That poor noggin of his has taken some nasty hits, one just barely heals then he gets a new one. So while I pick him up to give him some lovin' I get a whiff of poop #2. hooray.

And since this is getting to be a novel - which by the way I have had to stop 3 times and come back to - I will give you the short version of the rest of the afternoon:
- lots of food throwing and cup throwing during lunch
- screaming cuz we have to get our faces washed after lunch
- many attempts at cleaning the icky diaper bag, that will have to wait until nap time
- serious biting incident, Quent bit Jack and broke the skin through his shirt sleeve
- wrestled Quent up the stairs (Jack usually goes willingly, yeah Jack!)
- change poop #3 for Quent
- Jack gets into spare room/storage room for baby items and wreaks havoc
- finally they are in bed and Jack jumps crazily until Momma comes in to stop him
- boys take way too short of a nap because Jack poops and wakes his brother up too
- continue to cry, pick on each other and cling to Momma the rest of the evening until she bribes them into sitting quietly with the TV until Daddy comes home to assist with dinner and bed.

I happily kissed my sweet little men good night tonight ( a little early) and am now enjoying the quiet company of my husband. And if you made it all the way to the end of this long story I am sure you are just as tired as I am, twin toddlers will do that to ya :)

Just look at those adorable little guys, they are so worth it!

HAPPY EASTER!

HAPPY EASTER FROM
Lisa, Jack, Quent and Tom!!

Footprint Bunnies

We made footprint bunnies for Easter and the boys loved it! They thought it was so funny to have the paint on their feet but were excited to see their bunny done. Here they are adding stickers to their pictures!

Here are there finished bunnies, Didn't they turn out so cute!

(okay, so momma helped out a little on the painting of the bunnies, but Jack and Quent still get most of he credit)

Momma and her boys!
Gotta love those baby blues:)

My Little Fix it Man

Here's Jack and his favorite new pastime - "fixin". He uses his hammer to fix all around the house and it is so cute how serious he is about it! He just has to make sure that all the doors on his kitchen are working properly!

NO MORE BOTTLES!

This week has been a big challenge and Jack and Quent have come through beautifully!
Last weekend Tom and I had a date day out (see post from 3/9) and due to some lack of communication on our part Len and Kyle had not given the boys their before bedtime bottle, they instead just had their cups with milk. Well, they did great, had a great night and we are super grateful to Len and Kyle for getting us to get done what we have been talking about for a while - NO MORE BOTTLES! It was a happy little mistake, and so we ran with it!

(admittedly, mommy was probably not pushing the issue like she should have been because that would mean my little guys are yet again doing one more thing that makes them not my little babies anymore and I was holding onto that longer than they needed it, which by their ease of transition proves that :)

Quentin did spectacularly right from the start, took to the no bottle thing like a champ. Jack, well, Jack had a little more of a hard time giving up that bottle. After a few nights of protest and crying, I am proud to say he is doing well too. So that make one whole week without bottles! Hooray!

Now our most treasured and cuddly part of bedtime can be just reading together. The boys love to read all the time but here are their current bedtime favorites:

Thanks Lenny and Ky-Ky for that little push we needed!

Remembering Tom's Granny

Tom's Granny Feighner has sadly passed away. This was his Mom's Mom and even though she has lived in Oklahoma for a while now, he was still very close to her. He got to visit her at the end of January and had a good time getting to see her and talk with her and his Uncle Bob and Aunt Barb. She was a strong woman, fiercely independent who worked tirelessly to support her 3 kids by herself. She was one of those neat ladies who had traveled lots of cool places, remembered everything about EVERYTHING, and pretty much said what she thought. She loved her kids and grandkids and greatgrandkids and they all loved her. She will be sadly missed.


Handsome Tom and his Granny
on our wedding day,
she was never thrilled about
having her picture taken,
but this one of the good ones we do have














Granny feeding little Tommy while she was visiting in Africa. Tom's parents were missionaries in Africa, where Tom was born.

Mom and Dad's day out!

Tom and I got to have a wonderful day out on our own yesterday (saturday). Uncle Lenny and Aunt Ky-Ky (my brother Len and his wife Kyle) came to stay with Jack and Quent while we were out and about for the whole day! The boys were soooo happy for "Yenny" and "Ky-Ky" to come over and they take such good care of our boys, it makes going away to do things on our own so easy when we know the boys are in great hands of people who love them so much! Thank you Len and Kyle!!

There was some business stuff to do, like I got a haircut, we got our taxes done (Yippee!) and of course there was diaper buying. But there was also grown up clothes shopping, movies, and dinner. We saw 'Jumper' and it was pretty good, movie theater popcorn is almost my favorite part of any movie though :)
We ate at Bar Louie, which we had never been. The food was good, it was a little loud and smoky though.

**warning soapbox moment**

Okay - so you may be thinking "smoky"? um, the word 'Bar' is in the name, what did I expect, right? Well, they asked smoking or non smoking when we arrived and we specifically waited for the non smoking table and silly me, I assume that when they ask that they actually have separate sections for those.
Nope.
Joke's on me - and anyone else that wanted to eat without the cloud of smoke. It's literally just one big room and I guess the invisible line between the smoking and non smoking tables was supposed to hold the smoke back. It doesn't, thanks for nothing.

Moving on from that little rant...

The best part of the day: I had a fabulous day with my husband, my Tom. He is just so goofy sometimes and makes me laugh more than anyone can. I just love him so much and love being with him.
Thanks Tom for such a great day with you!

Brendan's Visit

So, Jack and Quent had a visitor today, their cousin Brendan. He came to play and the boys absolutely LOVED it! He is so good with them and so helpful with them and they love to have someone to rough and tumble with, although Brendan found out the hard way that even though they look little and cute, they are pretty strong and tough little men. Unfortunately Brendan was on the receiving end of some brutal head butts and bumps from the boys. But he took it all in stride and says he wishes he could come here everyday to play. He really wore the boys out and was such a help otherwise that he is more than welcome to visit anytime!
Here are some pics of them playing.

And here they are watching 'Cars' with Brendan, you will notice that both Quent and Jack are completely oblivious to the camera (or pretty much to anything else) when that movie is on.
Just a happy playing day with cousin Brendan!

To Potty or not to Potty...

Okay, so here's the deal:
Let me start off by saying that I really don't know that either Jack or Quent are ready for the whole toilet learning thing, they are only 20 months old, but I recently (after much potty chair research) bought them each a small potty.
See below:

Jack checking out his new potty

Quent checking out his new potty

Here's my reasoning for that purchase:
Jack has been able to make himself pee when he wants to while he is naked. He has been able to do this for a little while now and has amazed us and Gramma (who I am not quite sure believed me when I told her he could) with his abilities. He will pee on the floor, stand while in the tub to pee, and get you wet during a diaper change. Each time he will preface his urination with absolute stillness, laugh and a grin and say "pee pee!" He delights in his ability no matter how a small an amount he can conjure up.
So, given this amazing fascination, I did not want to waste his interest by not giving him the opportunity to try it on the potty. And I was super scared that he would lose that interest and I would have missed my "window of opportunity" (just a little shout out to my ACTS buddies who might be reading)
Quentin, on the other hand couldn't really care less. He thinks the potty is cool and all, it makes a great hat and his friends Handy Manny and Cookie Monster love to sit on it, but he has not yet made that same connection Jack has.
Both boys will sit on the potty with their clothes on, and before bath I will see if they want to sit on the potty with no diaper on. Twice now Jack has actually peed on the potty seat!

Now the dilemma:
Do I just jump into this toilet learning thing and go for it? At least with Jack? My gut tells me he is too little to really get it yet, is he? I know I used to talk to parents about this subject all the time when I was working but sometimes your job knowledge just doesn't apply to YOUR kids. I know that I do not want to push him too soon (him meaning Jack, I KNOW Quent is not ready yet) , but am I doing him a disservice by not encouraging something he obviously is interested in. I would tell someone else to 'let your child lead', and that is what I want to do too, but when do you decide to assist and encourage rather than just follow their lead?
I guess I have a lot more research and thinking to do, huh?
So, ideas? Suggestions?
I'll keep you posted...