Dorothy and The Tin Man in Action

Introducing.....

Our first video on our blog, and it might disappoint. It's Megan's Halloween preschool parade (with special guest star Tin Man making an appearance). I'll save you a couple of minutes and just tell you that you see them make a loop about five times.

Maybe we'll put something a little more exciting up soon, like babies crawling :) Tessa's on the move now, too!

It's Starting to Feel a Lot Like Halloween

It's our first Halloween with all four girls, and I couldn't resist a theme for their costumes. Megan was agreeable, after many viewings of The Wizard of Oz, to dressing as Dorothy. Bridget decided to be the Tin Man and the babies put their heads together and picked the Scarecow and the Lion to round out the foursome. The little Tin Man costume is Mop's special creation, and Bridget loves it!!

Our first chance to dress everyone up came today, for Megan's preschool Halloween party and parade. I had no idea that all of the teachers and staff at the school had also chosen a Wizard of Oz theme, but it was perfect - there was even a yellow brick road leading into the classroom. And, Megan's favorite teacher, Teacher Tiffany, was dressed as Dorothy, too. That didn't help Megan's cause in the stalker department.

Before we left for school this morning:

This was also Bridget's first chance to see Megan's school, and she loved it. She insisted on walking in the parade, too. Here is Teacher Tiffany leading both Megan and Bridget through the parade:


They even set a plate out at snack time for Bridget:

That left Matt and I to take pictures with the babies:

We also spent some time on the circle time mat reading and exploring the classroom:

I'm at work cleaning one costume that was peed in - lovely.

And, we're looking forward to the real deal trick-or-treating!

Tessa and Her Tongue

Without fail, lately, when the camera comes out, so does Tessa's tongue.

I'm told I was a "tongue thruster," too. Can't wait for the orthodontic result in Tessa's case. On the bright side, it's an easy way to tell who's who in pictures!

Oh, and she's also saying "Dada" now. I guess she's honing her verbal skills while Annie learns to crawl. It's genius - I don't know why Sara and I never thought of perfecting different skills like this. Annie and Tessa will be the talking, crawling dynamic duo by the time they're eight months old. Watch out!

Small Talk

while eating breakfast:

Megan: "Why don't you go to work, Mommy?"

Me: "Um, I work around here, don't I?"

Megan: "You do?"

Me: "Yes! What do I do here with you?"

Bridget: "You take care of me, Mommy!" (I love that girl!)

Me: "Yep! What else do I do?"

Megan: "You do the dishes."

Bridget: "You feed the babies."

Megan: "You check things on the computer."

I guess Megan's on to me. I better get back to those dishes now.

Girls and Their Gossip

I think Tessa's the only one not in on the secret here.

Seriously, Seven Months?

Annie (left) and Tessa (right)

Has it really been that long? And, could the babies be any more serious looking here?

Two smiles, at the same time, is asking a bit much these days.

At seven months we have one crawler (Annie), one big fan of solid food (Tessa), two happy and mellow babies, two good sleepers!!!!, and two very rested parents :)

It's been a long seven months in a lot of ways! We finally started sleep training the babies a little over a week ago, and they've responded really well. They usually sleep through the night after I nurse them for the last time around 9:30 or 10pm. Every night is different, but we're working on just letting them cry if they wake up after that. Very hard!! But, not as hard as nursing basically all night long, which is what I had been doing. I'm getting used to real sleep without a baby attached to me :) It's nice.

In other sleep news: The babies are not only sleeping through the night --- they are also no longer swaddled, and they're in their new cribs! And, they put themselves to sleep pretty well, too :)

Hopefully, we have a good month of sleep before teeth start coming in. Yikes!

Putting the "P" in Pumpkin Patch Party

Pee-er #1

Pee-er #2

First off: I have a huge confession to make. I'm an occasional litterer. But, only in emergencies. Or, perceived emergencies. Either way, if you're offended by littering, I don't blame you, and you should probably not read this post. And, if it makes you feel better, I learned my lesson, and am not likely to litter again.

On Saturday, I decided to make the trek to Wheatland, solo, with all four girls to go to my friend Crystal's daughter's 4th birthday party. Lorelai's had her party there for three years straight at a huge pumpkin patch. The drive is over two hours for us, but it's so much fun, and usually we only see each other on the kids' birthdays. So, I set out on time, leaving the house by 7:45am to get there by 10am. Matt had a football game that morning, so he helped me get the girls ready before we left. Everything went smoothly, and we got all the way to Sacramento before the first, "Peepee's coming, Mommy." This is from Megan -- I am not optimistic enough to put Bridget in anything but a diaper for this drive, although she's continued to do really well.

So, we pull off the freeway and pull into a high school parking lot, where I set up out little potty and let Megan pee. All goes well, until I look around the parking lot for a place to dump my little bag of pee. No garbage can in sight. So, what do I do? I open my car door and deposit it right there on the ground in the middle of the parking lot. In my head, I'm thinking, "Why did I just do that? Something bad is going to happen today to repay me for this. This is just asking for bad karma."

We go about our day, arriving at the pumkin patch, where I got tons of help with the babies, and all of the kids had a blast!

They rode a little train, watched pig races, played on really cool slide structures/treehouses, smashed chocolate cupcakes into their faces and "helped" Lorelai open her presents.

When the fun was over, I had the dreaded task of packing the girls up and heading back to the car. Of course, this was well after naps should have begun, so we had a lot of crankiness, especially from Megan since she didn't have a seat in the stroller. I was pushing the twins in the stroller and Bridget was riding in the Ergo on my back. I gave in and put Megan on the handlebars of the stroller so she had a ride, and then just kept my head down and didn't make eye contact with any of the stares as I left. I just wanted to hit the road and have the girls all asleep in the car!! We almost made it out of there without incident, until...

Remember that bad karma I had coming my way? Well, I got to the car, took Bridget off my back, and realized that she had peed all over me, herself and the Ergo carrier.

What more can I say? I will not litter again. Well played, Karma.

What I Should've Said...

Here I am at glorious naptime, after another marathon morning out and about with all four girls. And, it wasn't even a school day. Megan and Bridget were vaccinated against swine flu today, so we all had to be at the pediatrician bright and early.

The morning started out, mercifully, with the babies waking at 6:45am after sleeping through the night - woohoo!!! We started sleep training, finally, just about a five days ago, and I'm happy to report that they've been sleeping pretty consistently from about 10pm to 7am for the past few nights. Anyway, this has resulted in super heavy diapers when they wake up, and today, they had each soaked their cribs. So, Good Morning to me with an extra load of laundry to do today :)

Anyway, we get to the pediatrician, with all of our rain gear on since it's raining, and the girls did so well getting their nasal vaccine. They've never had any medicine or spray up their nose, so I wasn't sure what to expect. Not even a whimper, though. So, they each got a Mike and Ike, and we headed back out to the waiting room, where someone I'll call Nosy Old Lady proceeds to give me her commentary on my family.

NOL: "Oh, four girls, How cute!"
Me: "Oh, thanks!"
NOL: "I had four children, too. But, I was lucky, and had a boy, then a girl, then a boy and another girl."
Me: "Oh." (as I was slightly distracted wiping Bridget's hands down after she handed me back her half-eaten Mike and Ike, and helped Megan redress in her rain gear)
NOL: Some nonsense about she invented the car seat shopping cover back in the day.

*******

Me: (in the car 20 minutes later after hauling everyone back out to the car, setting up the potty for two little girls, and buckling everyone up) "Whew! Okay girls, you were sooo good getting your medicine today. Let's go to the store to get you a special treat."

Then I started thinking about what I should have said to NOL: "Actually, I'm the lucky one. Can't you see how lucky I am to have such beautiful, healthy, well-behaved girls?" They just got liquid shot up their noses, and one of them is voluntarily holding the door open for me while I manuever the double stroller through, and the other is saying, "Bye Bye, baby fish. Bye Bye, Mommy Fish!" as we pass the aquarium on the way out.

This gets me thinking they really do deserve a special trip to Walgreens to pick out a treat, but I can't help but think about the logistics involved in this little stopover. It, of course, invloves hefting the double stroller back out of the van and.......wait just a minute. I don't really have a recent memory of hefting that stroller back in the van. I have a clear memory of dealing with the pee, and then hopping back in the car and taking off. We did not just...yes, we did. We left the stroller in the Stonestown parking lot!!!!

So, we made a loop back to Stonestown, where our pediatrician is, to (hopefully) find our stroller! Meanwhile, Megan's in the back lecturing, "Mommy, we need the stroller. We can't forget our stroller like that!" I am very aware of how badly we need that stroller, Megan.

Thankfully, it was right where we left it, and I quickly jumped out of the car and hefted it into it's home in the back of the van.

Next stop? Walgreens, where we all got out of the car and met another character I'll call Nosy Old Man.

NOM: "Are those twins? Wow, that's a burden!"

???????

This time, I responded right away, and said, "No, they're not. C'mon, girls. Let's go get our special treats."

Go Cats!

We've been mustering up some team spirit around here for football season. Matt's freshman football team is undefeated so far in league - it's shaping up to be his best season yet! Unfortunately, it'll be his last, since he was just named the head varsity baseball coach at SI!! He's really excited, but sad to leave the football program after 10 years. The new baseball position will leave us even busier than usual come spring, but we're game :)

Here, three of the girls show off their red and blue before we went to see SI beat Mitty- can you believe we have this much red and blue in a house full of girls?? (Megan was all in pink that day. I could have worked on her a little bit to get her to wear some school colors, but I use my wardrobe manipulating powers sparingly. I never know when they'll run out, so I save them for holidays and days when she wants to wear flip-flops in the rain.)

I know you're wondering where those fantastic hats came from. I guess I have a little time on my hands after all. I have to do something while we work our way through "The Wire" on NetFlix :)

Board Gamers in Training

I guess we should confess one of our motivators for wanting a larger-than-average-size family: the more the merrier for family board game nights! We're slowly working our way towards Monopoly. For now, a Fisher-Price Learning Table seems to keep everyone happy for a few minutes. At least while I was able to take pictures of the girls' new room.

I gave up waiting for it to be clean, so here's the panoramic:

Oh, and this is Annie's favorite spot in the room - underneath the bunk beds. Even though she's not quite crawling, she's getting where she wants to go by rolling. And, where she wants to be at least once a day is under the bed!

Free Lunch (and Breakfast and Dinner)

It turns out there is such a thing as a free lunch, but only if you're really into baby food.

Oh, and you need to be a multiple, too.

So, a few weeks ago, I sent a letter out to a few companies that make baby products (like Gerber, etc.), along with information on the twins, in the hopes of participating in their multiples programs. And, when I say participating, I mean getting stuff for free. I don't know why I waited so long to take advantage of this, because I definitely like free stuff. Well, I kind of know what took me so long - something about having four little monkeys hanging on me all.day.long.every.day.

Anyway, less than a week after sending out all of my letters, I started receiving all of the freebies. Everything from bibs, onesies and butt paste to coupons for free formula and free baby food. Woohoo!! I wasted no time taking advantage of the free baby food coupons this weekend when I went grocery shopping (by myself this time, at about 10pm on Saturday night, where the only other people in there were SF State students buying alcohol. I had the peace and quiet I needed to take full advantage of all of my coupons). I'm happy to report that I walked out with over $35 in free baby food!!!

Yes, that was pretty much the highlight of my week. That, and organizing it all in the pantry when I got home. I'm a total nerd.

Mission: Potty Training

Our latest challenge (whether we chose to accept it or not!) was potty training Bridget. She's 27 months today - the same age that Megan was when she was potty-trained. So, we thought we'd give it a whirl.


At this point I should remind you that Megan's potty training week put me at a stress level of about 10 (on a scale of 1 to 10) and at multiple points during that week, I thought to myself, "If this is what potty training is like, and you have to go through this with every kid, I seriously don't know if I want more kids." Potty training is way worse than labor and delivery, in my opinion, and pretty much the hardest thing I've faced as a parent so far. So, what do we do? We have twins, and commit ourselves to a double dose of potty training hell in about 2 years. Great.


But, I digress. Back to our newly potty-trained Bridget. Not so stressful this time around, amazingly. I'm slowly losing my sensitivity to stress, it seems. We did have a lot of accidents, and I definitely lost my cool many times, but just a week after we started, Bridget is doing very well. I don't think she's had an accident for the last 4 or 5 days.


Our secrets to success this time around?

**Note: Poop mentioned below, reader beware!

1. A very good little girl who is very eager to please.


2. A big sister who sets a great example and even takes Bridget to the bathroom when I can't get her in time. (Yesterday, Megan yelled from the bathroom while I was nursing both babies, "Mommy, Bridget just pooped on the potty, and I wiped her. Oh, wait, I got a little bit on my hand. Oh, Bridget, we need to get wipety wipes for our hands. Hold on. Don't worry, Mommy, we're taking care of it.")


3. A Tinker Bell Pez dispenser with lots of Pez to go with it.


4. Lots of books next to the potty.


5. Two packs of Tinker Bell undies. With eight in each pack, you'd think that would be enough. Not so much. Luckily, Bridget is agreeable to wearing "bloomers," too. I think that's the right word for the little diaper cover that comes with all dresses. At any rate, as long as Bridget doesn't have to wear Megan's undies, she's happy.


6. Of course, my little Fisher-Price Potty for the car, without which I'm not sure what I'd do. With this round of potty training, I couldn't exactly hole up at home for a solid week like we did with Megan. So, Bridget is in the car a lot, going here and there, and she and I both need to be flexible when she says she needs to go pee. Luckily, she has been able to wait while I set up the potty, which is so great!!!


7. A Piddle Pad in her car seat, just in case. No accident in there so far, but the last thing I need to add to my to-do list is washing her car seat cover. Not only do I not have time for that, but, ew.

Updated pictures of the girls' new room are on their way! They have a new rug that was waiting for an accident-free Bridget before it was unrolled. Stay tuned :)

Between the sheets

One messy baby

After an identical meal, these identical babies looked pretty different. Tessa's the one who got sweet potatoes everywhere.

Our Week in Numbers

I have so much to catch up on! We just spent a wonderful week with just half of our normal crew. Megan and Bridget spent the week with Mop and Pop, galavanting around Orange County. They went to Disneyland, Buckets of Fun (not even sure what that is, but apparently it was a lot of fun!), lot of parks and even attended "school" at Mop's kitchen counter. Needless to say, they did a lot more than they normally do in a week around this house!

Meanwhile, Matt and I stayed home with Tessa and Annie, who relished being our only kids. We even went out to dinner with the babies one night! It was refreshing and relaxing not to be outnumbered by our children. And, we took the opportunity to get some work done around the house that is nearly impossible with four kids underfoot (and still overwhelming with the twins, but much easier!!).

While they were gone, we had:

• One big girl room cleared, painted, painted again, touched up, organized, and decorated, complete with a newly assembled set of bunk beds, a newly painted bookcase, and lots of pink and green. Did I mention how spoiled our kids are??
• One nursery organized for Tessa and Annie to call home very soon. This involved the dreaded task of going through all of our little girl clothes, and taking out all of the twins' 6-12 month clothes. I think we could clothe quadruplets from birth-2T with what we have stashed in bins throughout the house.
• Zero sippy cups, princess plates or bottles to wash. The kitchen actually stayed clean. I didn't realize how much of my day was spent in the kitchen preparing and cleaning up after every meal!
• Three nice trips out shopping with just the babies. Weird to not be making little people conversation while driving in the van or pushing a shopping cart. I missed it.
• Two babies who missed their big sister entertainment. The best part about having a large family at this point is the constant distraction the girls can provide for the babies. They dance, sing, talk to, and grab toys for Tessa and Annie whenever necessary. With just me around during the day, I caught them yawning and looking around for something more interesting :)

And, since the girls have been home, we've been jerked back to reality, most notably with:

• One accident in the middle of the night that required the stripping of one of the afore-mentioned bunk beds. I don't want to embarrass anyone so I won't say who it was. But, I will say that it involved me climbing to the top bunk and stripping the sheet and waterproof mattress pad (thank god for that!!) in the dim light of a Disney Princess nightlight.
• One more load of laundry the next morning to get those sheets back on the bed before naptime.
• Three accidents on day one of potty-training Bridget.
• Eight pairs of Tinker Bell undies that will not be enough to last through this day.
• Two successful trips to the bathroom, each rewarded with a purple Pez from her Tinker Bell Pez dispenser.
• A grocery store excursion with all four girls (one on me, two in the stroller and one unhappy shopping cart rider). Yes, this involved the pushing of the stroller with one arm and the pulling of the overflowing shopping cart with the other, all while navigating my way through looks of pity and horror from fellow shoppers. Remind me to never do that again. Ever. I don't think I've been that stressed in a long time!
• Oh, and one big reveal when the girls saw their new room for the first time. We got it on video, HGTV style, but I'm not sure that video, or any other video, is going to land on this blog anytime soon. Unfortunately, I didn't spend any of my spare time last week figuring out how to edit or upload video. Let me paint the picture for you, though. Just imagine Bridget, mouth wide open, saying, "Oh my gosh, Oh my gosh." And, imagine Megan overly focused on the Princess hamper in the corner.

I took one last picture of the nursery while it was still Megan and Bridget's room. Snif sniff.

Shortly thereafter, the babies rolled in and claimed it as their own:

And Tessa met Sophie - it was love at first nibble.

Tessa and Annie are 6 months old!

It's crazy that 6 months have passed already! The twins had their 6 month check-up today - they're not quite as chunky as we thought they would be. They're in the 25th percentile for both height and weight, with Annie at 14 pounds, 8 ounces and Tessa at 15 pounds even. What a difference to bring them to the doctor today compared to their first appointments when they were so tiny and I was till getting used to everything x 2. Today they were playful little babies, rolling all over the table and giggling for the doctor. We've all come a long way!

Here's to another wonderful six months, full of more sleep for everyone, and a lot of big firsts! Crawling is coming very soon, incredibly, and we are not ready for it. Wish us luck!

Annie

Tessa

How cute are those little Baby Legs, by the way? I love those things. Thanks Sara!! Here's a closeup because I just can't resist those chunky legs right now:

Six Month Old Swingers

Tessa and Annie had their first taste of swinging in the fog today. They loved it! And, I got way more comments on the "little Giants fan" than I did on the fact the babies are twins. Go figure! Here they are loving the swing:

Tessa

Annie

Megan and Bridget explaining the intricacies of swinging to their little sisters

And, Bridget gave the big girl swing a whirl:

Lots of fun at the park, only minor meltdowns on the way home, and a solid three hour nap for everyone (except me!). A good day :)

Ch-ch-ch-changes

It's hard to believe Megan is in preschool now!! She started on Tuesday at Happy Times, and she'll go twice a week. So far she loves it, and almost seems like a different kid already. She's told us all of the rules, who she sat next to for snacktime, and that she couldn't paint on the first day. Hopefully the second day?? She's very curious about the teachers, too. Just tonight at bedtime she wanted to know what car her teacher drove and where she lived. Hmmm, can you say stalker??

Here, the girls before they got in the van. They took their bagels to go. Bridget insisted on wearing a backpack too. It's even labeled :)

And, me with our suddenly very big girl. Wait, that's just her kindergarten-size princess backpack!

And, although I can't say we really planned it this way, another big change happened for Megan right before school started. The pacifier fairy finally came to our house!! Yes, Megan is 3 1/2 years old and up until a week ago, she still used a pacifier, or a "pappy." A very specific, chewed up, newborn sized pappy with a little bear on it. The pacifier fairy eluded us for far too long - she circled our house many times, but didn't fly through the window with her princess loot until last week after Megan lost that pappy for about the thousandth time. We looked pretty hard, but Megan finally agreed that the pacifier fairy could come, find it, and bring it to her workshop to repair it before she flew it to the littlest Stecher, baby Brendan. It was a big moment :) She came for Bridget's pappy as well, but there wasn't nearly as much drama with that exchange. (Bridget's drama happened last month on the beach in Tahoe when Clara took matters into her own hands, er, teeth, and de-nippled Bridget's poor little duck pappy. This didn't help Bridget and Clara's already strained relationship!) We are officially a pappy-free house now, since the babies don't use pacifiers (for better or for worse!).

The biggest change of all is our new routine on Megan's school days. Suddenly, we have somewhere we have to be pretty early in the morning, with all of the girls fed and dressed, including me! Hopefully all future preschool mornings will go more smoothly than Megan's first day - good thing it's only twice a week!

Adventures in Dogsitting Continued

I think Davis must sense my impatience with all of the hair and all of the sweeping and all of the vacuuming. Or, he realizes that his hair loss and my massive hair loss of late are just too much for our little household to handle. Either way, he's decided to contribute to the clean-up. Last night I swept up a pile of his hair in the kitchen, turned around to get the dustpan, and spun back around to find him dutifully licking up the pile himself. Not sure if this is common - all you dog people, can you confirm?? It does explain how his own hair ends up in his water bowl.

Eewwww.

Yep, I'm THAT mom

So, Megan is starting preschool next week, and she is very excited! She's prepared, with her new backpack, new school shoes, and a list of everything she can't wait to do: painting, play-doh, reading, you name it.

This stands in stark contrast to my overall lack of preparedness for the "parent orientation" today at her school. I began by going to the orientation on the wrong day - I went with the MWF crowd when I should have gone with the Tues./Thurs. crowd. I realized the mix-up late last night, but decided to go anyway this morning. Then, it took me forever to get there. I totally underestimated how long it would take me drive there, but managed to find a parking spot and walk up to the school only a couple minutes late. I realized my third offense when I saw parents approaching the school with kids in tow. Oops. Out of a handful of parents who assumed that the "parent" orientation was for parents only, I was the only one who wasn't able to just call and have my child meet me there in a couple minutes. Since Megan was back at the house with Grandma and three younger kids, that wasn't really going to happen. So. I trudged through an orientation without my kid, meeting parents who I will never see since their kids are in a different class. Nice.

Megan's going to have to do a helluva job making up for the first impression I left there.