Bad words

... and a new phase.

"Shut up."

Oh, hearing that drives me crazy.  They all had to get it out at dinner last night.  I told them that we don't say that at our house (because I'm 100% sure it came from daycare).

And Becca had to say it one more time.  She, of course, is the one to test boundaries.

She gets sent to her room.

After bath, she says it again.

Gets sent to her room again.

Sigh.  What am I going to do when they start saying worse?

The little things

After the Touch a Truck, we went to a moms of multiples picnic.  It was a gorgeous day, and so nice to just be outside.

What really made it special, though, was one of those little milestones that means that my girls really are growing up - - Emma managed to finally get the rhythm down and swing herself.

Sigh.

So proud.  And trying really hard to let them grow up without wishing they'd stay this age forever.

Monkey Toes

Becca can now climb over the gate across their bedroom door. I'd seen her get out twice before, but only when she was really mad. But now, when we're laying in bed in the morning, we'll hear *thunk (because she doesn't have the most elegant method of getting out)* and then *patter patter patter* and there she is. Actually, the first time she did it, she crawled right into bed next to me. I wouldn't have even known she was there, but she started trying to dig out my hand to hold it and she woke me up. I was really confused, because she was on the outside edge of the bed, and whenever we got get someone, we always put them in the middle.

And that, folks, is the exact moment when I realized that she had outsmarted us.

I've never actually seen her get out, but Greg was in there once when Becca didn't realize that he was there. He said she goes over to the gate and throws Momo over to the other side. Then she sits down on the floor and takes her socks off so she can use her little monkey toes to climb the 1 inch square mesh gate. And then I think she just kind of tumbles out.

When Becca gets out and runs into our room, Emma will stand at the gate yelling, "Becca climb the gate!"

I don't think I can punish her, but I can't quite bring myself to take the gate down yet. (There is a gate across the top and bottom of the stairs that they have not mastered... Yet.). And I don't want to let on to how much I love snuggling with them in the morning. Even having them around while we're getting ready in the morning is kind of fun.

Beds

This weekend was obnoxiously hot again, so we ran some errands, but pretty much stayed inside. I took the girls to Costco (Becca has started saying "we got that at the Costco"), and we did pretty well. We picked out some pajamas, and when I decided to put them back, they were totally fine with it. Amazing!

I did run into a fried with twins (they're ~6 months younger than mine) at Costco, and she mentioned that they were moving to Big Girl Beds that night. I totally think she jinxed us.

The girls had "made a statement" before by lifting their foot up on the crib railing, but it's always been for show, and they only seemed to do it when we were in there.

Well, they were up and chatting and giggling on Sunday morning, and when I went in to get them out, Julie was laying with her legs on her crib railing, and her hands on the side of Emma's crib. As in, she was out. All she had to do was shimmy backwards and lower herself down.

So nap time comes around. I'm passed out taking a nap, too, so Greg takes them in, puts them in cribs, and sits with them for a while. Once they had calmed down, Greg came down to eat lunch. A little while later, there's lots of giggling. And it gets clearer and clearer, until it's clear that there are 3 little girls at the top of the stairs. Somehow, all 3 of them managed to get out (luckily, without hurting themselves).

Greg spent the rest of the day taking down the cribs and putting together the Big Girl Beds. (So glad they were already in the garage.) We went upstairs to peek a few times, and they were SO excited about their beds. They didn't want to leave.

When bed time came around, they didn't even want to read stories together - they wanted to read in their beds. So Greg and I just left them alone, knowing full well that as soon as we left, they were up and running around. Fine. They needed to wear themselves out, and there wasn't anything we could do (except put the door stop on the door so they couldn't keep slamming it). Based on our experience with new sleeping arrangements on our trip a few weeks ago, we were prepared for them to not be asleep before 10.

I went back up around 9 when I heard some crying. And yes, it was about 10 before they went to bed. But they really did pretty well. Greg and I sat and held hands while Becca and Julie fell asleep, and then I stayed a bit longer for Emma to settle down. But there was no crying from the girls (except when Emma crashed into the edge of the guard rail), no screaming from us It could have been much worse.

Becca and Emma both fell out of bed the first night, and Julie woke up crying once.

The 2nd night was a little worse... possibly because they weren't tired when we went upstairs, they just wanted to play in their beds. It took a while for everyone to fall asleep. Becca fell out of bed once. And, around 1:30, everyone was up and crying. It took a while to calm them back down again. Well, not a while to calm down, more like a while before we could leave.

Wish us luck tonight! They went down easier, but it was later, and we'd been to the gym.

A thought I cannot begin to bear thinking...

How did I forget to share these?

Emma takes the wheel


"Becca, you work the pedals."


"Don't worry, Becca, I know what I'm doing. But you might want to put on your seat belt."


And this is just from last week, which reminded me that I had never posted those earlier pictures.