good hygiene

its important as a parent to make sure you teach your kids a few key things in life. treat others as you want to be treated. work hard, dont quit. pay attention in school. one thing i dont have to worry about is teaching the twins how to have good hygiene. turns out, i have someone to do that for me.

enter, cooper:

"now eli, start with the face. you'll want to make sure you clean all those little bits of baby food."

"dont forget about your back! just because its hard to reach, doesnt mean it doesnt get dirty!"

"

"you must ALWAYS wash under your arms!!"

"dont forget those little creases in your neck!"

"make sure you wash your feet, even though it tickles."

see? who needs a mama when you have a labrador??

nothing new!

we havent had too much going on lately, which is why i havent posted. travis is busy at work, and has been working lots of late nights. bedtime used to be 7:30, but since travis was hardly seeing the boys at all, now bedtime is 15 minutes after daddy gets home...or until mama gives up, whichever comes first!! here are a few recent pictures...

baby food!

before the boys were even born, travis and i decided that we wanted to make sure that we fed them healthy, natural foods whenever possible. to that end, we decided to make our own baby food. not only is it A LOT cheaper than buying it, we feel like it is also better for them. we dont have to worry about the way the jar food is processed, or if it contains chemicals or preservatives. we have been doing the baby food for about 2 months, and the boys LOVE it!! last sunday, before we left for the beach, travis and i spend about 4 hours making baby food...enough to last about 1 1/2 months. we made squash, carrots, zucchini, asparagus, sweet potatoes, plums, apples, pears, and apricots. we have a lot of fun making it....it gets us in the kitchen together-hanging out and talking. thats not always easy with two children! the food you see in the picture is about half of what we made!

beach trip

last week, the boys and i took a quick trip to myrtle beach. travis' parents get a condo there a couple of times a year, and this year we decided to join them for a few days. travis had to work, so unfortunately, he wasnt able to go with us. we had a good time though...we pretty much spent every day at the pool! my good friend heidi, who i went to high school with, lives close to the beach, so she and her son dawson came up one day and went with us to the pool. we had a great time. the boys were so good! i wasnt sure what to expect with naps/bedtimes, but they were wonderful! it was nice for me to have grammy and pappy there to help with the twins too! i LOVE being a stay at home mom, but i am certainly not going to complain when i get a little bit of free and willing help! here are a few pictures from our trip...

This Means War!!

Now that the twins have become so mobile, one of their new favorite things is to crawl all over each other. To be honest, its mostly Carson who likes to crawl all over Eli! I cant tell you how many times I have left them together alone in a crib, and I come back and Carson is on top of Eli. Well, Eli finally got back at his "big" little brother...as you can see in the picture, Carson has quite a bruise on his cheek. Eli has a few bumps and bruises too. When we found out the twins were boys, I went ahead and resigned myself to the fact that we are going to have a future full of bumps, scrapes, and fights, I just didn't know the fights would start so early!! But, I guess its to be expected...after all, they inherited their macho, masculine natures from their father.

crib diving

carson has a new favorite activity....he likes to pull up. pretty typical of kids this age, right? well, it caught me by surprise, let me tell you. we knew he was probably getting close to pulling up, but i didnt know how close he was until he dove out of the pack'n'play a few days ago. we still had the bassinet tray in the p'n'p, and the boys would sit in it and play with their toys. i was on the phone last week, and turned to hang up, and the next thing i know, carson is flat on his back on the floor. he was fine, just a little scared. i am just now starting to recover from the major heart attack i had when it happened.

anyway, now that he has figured out how to do it, he wants to do it all of the time! he loves to grab on to the crib and peek at eli. he especially likes to do it when eli is sleeping. it always takes carson longer to fall asleep, so he will talk and laugh in the crib, but then he gets mad because eli wont answer him. he will fuss at eli....its like you can hear him saying "wake up and play with me!!" fortunately, eli is able to sleep right through it!! carson is definitely going full throttle these days. at least 3 or 4 times a day, i find myself saying, "oh my goodness, i dont know what im going to do with that boy!" he's just wide open, all of the time!

a nice day

last week, my mother in law called and offered to babysit the boys on saturday night. they absolutely love spending time with us (of course its us they want to see...it has absolutely NOTHING to do with our two adorable offspring). anyway, they offered to sacrifice their saturday to keep the boys. :) travis and i decided to go on a date that night, which is something we dont do enough of. at some point during the week, i got the idea of surprising him with secret plans for saturday. i planned for us to go kayaking on the saluda river, and then do dinner and a movie in the evening. will you believe...i actually kept our plans a secret??? i usually cant keep a secret to save my life, but i was able to keep this one, dont ask me how. anyway, we had a great day together. i think at one point, we made it 2 hours without talking about the boys. i know, right?? before you start giving us too much credit, i'd better tell you that we rushed home at 9pm hoping to see them before they went to bed. their bedtime is 7:30, but we figured it was worth a shot. of course, they were in bed. go figure.

today was crazy...i had two baby showers to go to after church, and im trying to mentally prepare myself for what im sure will be a very tough week. they are coming tomorrow to start fixing all of the water damage in our kitchen. im glad its getting fixed...im sick of walking on rotten plywood and doing dishes (GASP!!) by hand, but i am really dreading the actual repair/construction part. i wish i could go away to an island with a hammock and a babysitter, and when i came back, the kitchen would be fixed. and maybe the babysitter could come back with us. im just saying...


anyway, since that little scenario isnt likely to happen, i need to just prepare myself to have a frustrating week! at least i have these guys to make me smile...