Baby Squared

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• Earlybird Special

  Get this: on Friday night, we went out to dinner with the girls, and it was actually quite tolerable. "Enjoyable" would be a stretch, but we didn't leave feeling like we'd just undergone some kind of military stress test. (As has happened on many a past restaurant outing, as longtime readers will recall.) And we'd gotten to eat out on a Friday night without having to factor the price of a babysitter into the equation. We even ordered drinks! We felt downright European.   The main reason it worked is because it was 6:15, and there was basically no one else in the restaurant -- just one other table of people on the other side of the room, and a few people at the bar, including and older couple who beamed and waved at the girls the whole time. Either they really liked little kids, they were happily snookered, or some combination of both. So we didn't feel *too* terrible and mortified each time Elsa screamed I WANT MORE ICE! or I WANT SOME OF DAT! or WOW, I LIKE CUCUMBAS, MOMMY!!!! I WANT SOME MORE!  (The girl loves food. All of it. Loudly. She's like Dom Deluise reincarnated in the body of  blond two-and-a-half year old girl.)     Would you attempt to take this child out to a crowded restaurant?     Read More... Posted Jun 21 2009, 02:00 PM by Roper with | with 16 comment(s) Filed under: twins, twin toddlers, twin table manners, dining out with toddlers, eating out with toddlers, dining out with twins, eating out with twins, family-friendly restaurants Boston area, Full Moon Restaurant, Sound Bites

• Happy Passeaster

  When we were down in New York this week with Alastair's family, his mother (a.k.a. Jaycee) threw a lovely, abbreviated Passover seder for Elsa and Clio's benefit. It ran about fifteen minutes, total, which is about as long as the girls can manage sitting at a table these days, even when mass quantities of mac and cheese are present.   Highlights were hand-washing, the parts where they get to eat matzoh, the parts where they got to drink wine, the part where they got to stick their fingers in the wine and dab it on their plates (something they might have come up with on their own), and, in Elsa's case, haroset. The herbs dipped in salt water didn't go over so well, and we didn't even bother trying to get them to eat the horseradish. I think the finer points of the story were lost on them, but they enjoyed finding the matzoh. And eating it --- lots of it. They were also not slouches when it came to the wine. After the first couple of sips of that oh-so-fruity Manischewitz, they were calling for "More wine! More wine!"  They would have downed Elijah's whole glass too, given the opportunity.   Pics after the jump   Read More... Posted Apr 10 2009, 08:10 PM by Roper with | with 8 comment(s) Filed under: twins, unitarian universalists, twin table manners, judaism, Easter, religion, Passover, christianity

• Party Time, Excellent

  Elsa and Clio partied hard this weekend. It was non-stop cookies, apple juice and dresses with tights, with a little dancing and sugar-high stair-climbing thrown in for good measure. The revelry kicked off on Friday, for Santa's annual visit to my place of work, as mentioned in my last post.  The girls loved the cookies, the candy canes, the juice boxes, the carpeted stairs to climb on and long halls to run down. But they were definitely suspicious of the man in red. Not that I blame them. I always found the whole picture-with-Santa experience rather harrowing, even when I was much older than Elsa and Clio are now. If they never want to sit on the dude's lap or tell him what they want for Christmas, it's fine by me.         Read More... Posted Dec 15 2008, 04:00 PM by Roper with | with 13 comment(s) Filed under: twins, feeding twins, I am powerless, twin toddlers, twin table manners, christmas, santa, parties

• Table for Two

  So, yesterday, like a naughty, impatient kid, I opened one of the girls' Christmas presents early. It's a cute little folding table and chairs I'd ordered from Leaps and Bounds. I was going to wait and set it up for Christmas morning -- maybe put some dolls in the chairs, or something; the kind of thing Santa used to do at my house when I was a kid. But I didn't.   The thing is, we've been having trouble getting Elsa and Clio to sit in their high chairs at the dining room table lately. They frequently want to sit in the "big girl" chairs, but those chairs are too low without a booster seat and too tippy with. Clio is also going through a phase of wanting to be on our laps while she eats, (sit-a mommy? sit-a mommy?) which is not a pattern we want to get into. Particularly because then Elsa gets jealous and wants to sit on a lap, too.    So, I thought that maybe being able to sit at their own little table would help. Also, they woke up early from their nap and it was too cold to go outside and I was bored, OK? Merry Christmas!     Read More... Posted Dec 04 2008, 05:28 PM by Roper with | with 12 comment(s) Filed under: twins, twin toddlers, twin table manners, christmas, santa

• T-I-M-E O-U-T

  You're probably all familiar with the need to spell out certain words in front of your toddlers once they pick up that pesky habit of understanding English. Woe to the parent who foolishly utters the word C-O-O-K-I-E without the intent of immediately handing one over to any small child within earshot. And don't mention that you're going to take your kids to the P-L-A-Y-G-R-O-U-N-D unless you intend to go THAT VERY SECOND.    But certain words, you would think, are safe to say aloud -- things that kids aren't interested in, like "credit card," "recycling," or "corkscrew." Or things that pertain to them, but that they don't find particularly appealing and aren't likely to start begging for, like "crib" or "time-out." Right? Well, yes. Except ixnay on that last one in the Baby Squared household.       Read More... Posted Nov 19 2008, 09:30 PM by Roper with | with 26 comment(s) Filed under: I am powerless, depression, Elsa, Clio, discipline, parenting twins, twin toddlers, parenting and depression, twin table manners, time out

• I like these guys. They're funny guys!

  First person to get the title reference gets a big, virtual high-five. (No Googling allowed!)   In this post, however, I'm referring to Elsa and Clio, who -- as I was reminded yesterday -- are two very funny little girls. Exasperating at times, yes. But also extremely entertaining. Clio seems to actively try to be silly, with funny faces and noises and goofy antics. Her humor tends toward the absurdist. Last night at dinner, for example, she decided it was very funny to pretend she was asleep.          Read More... Posted Nov 13 2008, 04:15 PM by Roper with | with 17 comment(s) Filed under: silliness, depression, Elsa, Clio, Barack Obama, twin toddlers, twin individuality, parenting and depression, Sylvia Plath, acupuncture, twin table manners