More Pictures Posted!!

The girls started Pre-School last week. Today was the first day that they didn't have any problems going in; coincidentally it was also the same day that they first wore their uniforms.

They seem to be enjoying school, but Mommy and Daddy are having issues with worrying. This is the first time we've left them with people we don't know well. On top of that, this is a brand new school.

On the plus side, the teachers say that we have very smart kids. We definitely have to agree. :-)

Other things that have been going on:

Zella has been a Mommy's girl the past couple of months. Zella does not let Daddy help her if she can have Mommy instead. From what we have read, this is just a phase and one day she will be a Daddy's girl.

We took a vacation, and went to Colorado to visit Dustin's Aunt & Uncle. We had a great visit, and the girls loved seeing the mountains, and especially the SNOW! We have more pictures that Grandpa took, and will post them soon.

Their vocabulary has grown exponentially since we got back from our vacation. They can and will repeat anything and everything they hear. They'll even surprise you that they know what something is called, or what they are thinking.

Lila REALLY enjoys Dancing. She loves to do a little dance kind of like a cross between old square dancing and a Irish jig. I know, hard to imagine, I'm sure, but it's even harder to describe. It's her own dance. It's "The Lila Dance" (at least she doesn't dance like her Daddy) :-)

Zella also enjoys Dancing. She does more of a "Jump Around" style Dance :-0 (Jump, Jump, Jump Around!)

They do the best Lion/Dinosaur/Bear roar impression. Not sure how to imitate it with words, so I won't try. Just ask sometime when they are around :-)

I guess that's about it. Somehow, it's already midnight. Again. Time is definitely passing too fast.

ABC's

The girls are doing well, learning very fast now. They are now singing the ABC song on their own (of course, not when we ask them to in front of strangers.) They are repeating most words that we say and even arguing with each other over pronunciations (like they did tonight at the end of dinner over their names).

This seems like the hardest stage thus far (behavior wise.) I could defintely use some pointers if anyone has any for 2 two year olds. They seem to enjoy getting into trouble and pushing the limits we have set for them. They also steal toys from each other almost all the time and cause each other to cry. But, as hard as it is, they bring so much joy into our lives and we are so glad that God chose us to be their parents.

We just posted more pics, including Easter pics, so check them out!!

Pictures

Just a quick note that we (finally) made it around to posting some pictures :-)

They are in the gallery at the end of the 20-21 months folder and the new group of 22-23 months. How they are already this old is beyond me.

Exciting Times

Aside from the normal exciting life of parenting twins, lately there's been a lot of additional excitement around our house. Someone had their toy taken by Sister, someone needs to read THIS book (not THAT one), someone needs to be held NOW, someone bumped their head (which happens a LOT), someone broke the window...

Yes, that's right; someone -broke- the window. Well, I guess technically it wasn't someone so much as a chair that broke the window. But of course, the chair wouldn't have broken the window had Lila not tipped it over. :-) Luckily, it was a double paned window, and only the inside pane broke, so we aren't exposed to the environment, but we still need to get it fixed.

Aside from that excitement, Zella has recently become more aggressive - she's throwing, hitting, and wrestling a lot more than her sister. She'll run up behind Lila and wrestle her to the ground laughing the whole time. Sometimes Lila will enjoy the rough-housing, but more often than not, she will get upset (or hurt) from it. It could be because she's not been sleeping like she should lately - she refuses naps (unless we trick them with "Let's go for a ride in the car"), and she's been waking up about half way through the night, and won't go back to sleep unless you stay in the room with her for several hours. Daddy's been sleeping a lot at night on the floor in their room (his back isn't agreeing with it). Mommy's already got back issues that she's seeing the Dr. about.

The girls are becoming a lot more demanding for what they want - even if you don't understand what they are asking for (What? You don't know "DiSa" means Dinosaur? How stupid are you!?!) Whenever you don't know what they want, they tend to throw a tantrum. Lila LOVES collapsing for her tantrums, especially if you are trying to walk her somewhere, or pick her up. She goes completely limp and she slips right out of your hands. Zella just screams her head off at the top of her lungs with a "I'm in excruciating pain" cry. She knows that this cry eats at our very soul, so I'm sure that's why she uses it.

Well, time for bed, so we can get at least a little sleep before someone wakes up crying - but then we tell the cat to go back to sleep until one of the girls wakes up. BTW - if anyone who doesn't have kids, and wants a cat who -loves- attention, let us know :-)

Hi!

The new "Word of the Day" (everyday) around the Shaw household seems to now be "Hi!"

Both Zella and Lila are now constantly saying "Hi," and waiting for a response. If you don't respond within about .05 milliseconds, they say "Hi" again, and again, and again, until they get you to respond :-)

Both of the girl's are coming out with a definite Texas Twang. Zella is a little more obvious with the wonderful way she says "Dawg!" ("Dog" with a Twang, for those of you who don't speak Texan...) Not sure where they get it from, since Mommy and Daddy obviously couldn't have Texas accents (although they aren't as strong as Zella's).

We went to Daddy's yearly family reunion last weekend at Lake Murray in Oklahoma. The girls had a good time seeing all their extended family, after they warmed up to them. It was a pretty wet weekend, so we couldn't let the girls run around like they wanted, but they still managed to find plenty of mud :-)

It's always fun to put toddlers back in their beds in the middle of the night - especially when it's pitch black. You can't see who it is, where their bed is, or which bed already has a toddler in it. The best way I have to guess is weight - Zella is still a little bit heavier than Lila (by 1-2 lbs). I usually guess right, but before I lay her down, I always reach down to double check that no one is in the bed first - I don't want to wake up her sister by putting them in the same bed :-)

The girls have been doing very well in their toddler beds, but they still are taking a long time to get to sleep. So much so that they are often missing naps now. Of course, on days they miss their naps, they typically pass right out when it is bed time, but then can take an hour or more on other nights. Once they manage to go to sleep, they don't wake up too much in the middle of the night anymore, unless someone has a nightmare.

Happy Birthday Daddy!!

Today is Daddy's birthday!! Last night Mommy and Daddy had a date night. We had a nice dinner and went to see Blink 182 in concert. There were 3 opening bands including All American Rejects and Fall Out Boy. It was so nice to be kids again for the night.

I just want to take a moment to say thank you to Grandma and Grandpa Shaw for being so active in the kids lives especially Grandma. She is always willing to watch the girls when we need someone and so far she is the only one I can leave them with and not worry. So thank you.

BTW- We posted a lot of pics the other day in the 18/19 month folder and the 20/21 folder, so check them out.

Toddler Beds

So we moved the girls to their toddler beds tonight. On we go, check another milestone off the list.

Don't you wish life was that simple :-)

First off, the girls LOVED their new beds. Maybe it was the fact there were Princesses all over them; maybe it was the new teddy bears on them. Maybe it was because it was something different. Mabye it was because they weren't the same and they could chose their own.

Or maybe it was because they knew they could *GET OUT* !!!

And they did. I counted something like 50 times back to bed per girl. That's 100 pick ups and lay downs. And all in the span of about an 1 hour while Mommy was cleaning the kitchen and picking up thousands upon thousands of toys (or at least it seems that way).

I'm exhausted.

Lila thought it was the coolest game to crawl out of bed (in the almost pitch black room) and try to find Daddy. Then giggle, and go back to bed.

Zella thought up the game of "Let's find Daddy, and try to hit him in the head." Luckily, she can't see very well in the dark.

This worked well, until Zella realized that I was serious about bedtime. Then the tantrum started. The screaming. The wailing. The gnashing of teeth. The walking into walls (it was VERY dark, after all, and you -have- to try to get away from the man trying to put you back in bed). After an eternity or two, she settled down, gave up, and decided that she -was- tired. Lila decided about this time that it was time for her to go to sleep too.

That was about it. Zella just half-woke up a minute ago asking for her -new- bear friend, but when I went back in there, both her and Lila were half on the bed with their legs hanging off. I put their legs back in bed, covered them with their blanket, and gave Zella her bear back, and all is well in the Shaw household.

I guess we'll see how the rest of the night goes.

We got lots of pictures, but because of a wrong setting on an overly complicated camera, we ended up with a lot of blurry pictures. It's always good to have two cameras (plus the video camera rolling) :-)

We need to post more pictures, and hopefully should be able to soon. But until then here's some of their new big-girl beds. In case you didn't notice, the beds aren't the same. One was given to us, and we thought we had enough identical things anyways. The girls didn't fight over them, and enjoyed picking which one was theirs.