Parenthood training exercises!

Lots of people ask if I felt prepared to have twins.  The answer is "no."  I think most parents would tell you that they did not feel prepared before they had children.  If you'd like to do some training exercises to prepare yourself for twins (or one baby), you're in luck.  My next few posts will give you the practice you need to feel prepared for whatever comes your way.

Mealtime:

Invite two loved ones over for dinner, preferably people whose welfare genuinely concerns you.

Carefully prepare a nutritious meal and dice it into pinky fingernail sized pieces.

Arrange on three child sized plates and present two of these to your guests.

Sit down and begin eating the meal on your plate.  Do this without looking at your plate.  Instead let your eyes dart back and forth between your dinner guests, keeping tabs on their food consumption and swooping in to prevent plate throwing.

Have your guests smash their food into an abstract art composition while eating no more than 5 bites.

After 5 minutes, guests should begin tossing bits of food on the floor, at this point cheerfully encourage them to "take a taste" or "have a bite" while taking exaggerated bites from your own plate.

After 10 minutes guests should have either thrown all food on the floor or hidden it in their laps.  They should then begin pulling at your clothes and person with their sticky and drool covered hands (did I mention that your guests should drool into their plates, rendering any non-floor leftovers unfit for human consumption?)

Using a warm wet washcloth, clean guests hands and faces.  At this point guests should scream like you've come at them with sandpaper.  When hands are clean, they should pull out the bits of food they hid in their laps and smear them on their faces. After cleaning hands and faces again, guests should look at you like you have offended them to their very core. 

Escort your guests from the table.  At this point they should look at you like you just hung the moon and give you a hug of the sort people get at airports after long trips.

While the final step is rewarding, the whole process can be trying.  It is important to maintain a positive attitude throughout, especially when guests rub macaroni and cheese in your hair or try to stick peas up their noses.

Stay tuned for more exercises

Let's try this again

I stopped blogging about six months ago. My excuse is that I was too exhausted for higher functions. I managed to fight my way through the haze of exhaustion for the first six months because I assumed that at some point my angels would start sleeping through the night on their own. They did not. Instead, they went from sleeping for six hour stretches at least once per night to sleeping three hours or less at a time. Grown-ups are not meant to function like this for more than six months. I gradually became less and less capable of adult thought. Finally, at eight months I put my foot down. We were done eating at night. The kitchen of Caroline was closed from 8pm to 5am.

So we stopped eating at night, but we did not stay asleep all night. Every so often I would get a really good night. I would get to sleep six or seven hours without interruption. Unfortunately these were few and far between. Life seemed to be a series of colds, coughs, teething, visits and other things that interrupted baby sleep. Things seem to be settling out now and I'm occasionally getting a seven hour night.

Anyway, the cherubs are one year old now and I have survived the infancy period. I'm going to try blogging again. Here's a photo of the little ones...