15 Months

This boy. 

This boy is FIFTEEN MONTHS. 

463 days.

He has eight teeth.

He is a big brother. Times 2.

He feeds himself and uses real silverware (most of the time).

He loves making animal sounds.

He helps change Annelise and Olivia's diapers.

He likes doing laundry.

He loves books and will sit and "read" them by himself.

He signs "please" "thank you" "more" "food" "milk" "light" "fan" and "book"

He verbally says "Mama" "Daddy" "ball" "shoes" "amen""ow" "ew" "yuck" and sometimes if you

ask him what his name is he says "Did-yun" (Gideon)

He loves giving kisses, hugs, high fives, and fist bumps.

He dances like a fiend.

His favorite song to sing is "Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes" or "Popcorn Popping"

His daddy is his favorite person in the world.

He gets sad when he doesn't see his Grandma every day and lets her know it the next

time he sees her.

He loves to splash in water.

He eats anything. Even gross things like pickles or salt and vinegar chips.

His laugh is infectious.

He is very meticulous and likes screwing bottle caps on and off, flipping light switches, and

opening anything with a cool clasp.

all my eggs in one basket...

Or frying pan 

Did I ever tell you about the twin omens?

No?

Well now you get to hear about them. All of them.

~I was born on October 18th---along with the DeMaster twins,  whose mother was my mother's friend. We were delivered by the same doctor.

 I'm the chub scout on the right

 This is Dr. Shahriari holding all of us

 my mom, doc, twin mama

~My best friends in elementary school were twins---Kalynn and Andrianna Cole. I scored big-time by having twins for best friends because that meant that I always got to have two of my favorite people spend the night instead of just one.

 Andrianna and me at my birthday celebration

Kalynn and me at the same birthday celebration

If you look closely, I have a black eye. Between that and the braces I was one hot chica!

~My favorite band in High School was comprised of twins---Tegan and Sara---here's a link to my favorite song from HS

~The twin omens were less obvious for a while but there was a hilarious incident in college where I went to a Tegan and Sarah show and danced next to an extremely handsome boy all night (yes, I said next to, not with <----that's not the hilarious part).  

Fast forward two weeks and I had finally gotten ahold of the owner of a credit card that Tiff and I had found on a morning run. The owner was coming to my apartment to pick it up. When the handsome boy from the concert walked in I almost choked, it was fate, right?? Wrong. He barely batted an eye. I obviously hadn't made as big of an impression on him as he had made on me.

We chatted it up for about 45 min., neither of us mentioning the concert, but I was dying to know if he was just playing it cool or if he really didn't recognize me. So I said "I know this is crazy, but did you go to a Tegan and Sara show two weeks ago?". 

He just looked and me blankly and shook his head.

NO?? But I absolutely knew he was there, and I had spent most of that evening trying to make sure that HE knew that I was there.

How could this be?? Had I gone insane?

Luckily he saved me by saying "Wait a minute...I think my brother, my twin brother, went to that show!"

I seriously thought he was messing with me but it turns out that two extremely identically handsome boys existed.  He promised to introduce me to his brother but it never happened. (Which I'm more than ok with because my extremely handsome husband is more handsome than both of them. combined. And that's a lot of handsome.)

~My sister Becky and I got married one day apart and shared a wedding reception. She married an identical twin! 

~Gideon and our puppy, Meisje share a birthday. We used to jokingly call them our little twinners.

~A couple of weeks before we found out about the twins I made breakfast and this happened--->

If you can't tell, that is 4 double yoke eggs! 4!?!

After which I promptly texted a pic to my mother which said "Good thing I don't believe in omens!!"

Now, I realize that not all of these things really count as omens, but you have to admit that it's pretty weird. Especially the double yokes. 

And just to add to the weirdness, this picture happened a couple of weeks ago while Rob was making breakfast ---->

It has kind of become our family picture. Please note that there is a big "daddy" yoke, a medium "mommy" yoke, a small "Gideon" yoke, and teensy twin "baby" yokes. 

never enough hours...

Ladies and Gentlemen,

There are truly never enough hours in a single day.

Never enough hours to stare into my children's eyes the way they deserve to be stared into.

     ~or to read them the stories I want them to know

     ~or to sing them all the songs that bring them such delight

Never enough hours to do the laundry and the dishes and the cooking.

     ~or to make a scrapbook 

     ~or decorate the house

Never enough hours to finish all the things on my "to do list" or to do all the amazing things not on that list. 

Never enough hours to spend with the man I've promised eternity to.

All I have are moments. Fleeting moments like this one. The house is quiet. I have one baby in my arms while the other sits in her carseat as I rock it with my foot. 

I know it sounds like a complaint---a greedy, selfish, naive complaint I want more time! I want less to do!  But what I'm really saying is this---I have enough.

I love my life. I love that my hands are full and my day is full and that my heart is full. I love that some days I spend too much time staring at Annelise and Olivia, or singing 'head shoulders knees and toes' with Gideon instead of folding the laundry. I love the time I get to spend with my mother and ask her advice and understand her perspective when I probably could (or should) be doing something else. I love that those hours disappear and leave me with sweet moments and memories from a day too quickly gone.

In yearning for more time what I'm actually saying is, I love what I have! 

The fact that there are never enough hours to do all the things I want to do means that I have an abundance of things that I am capable of doing, and isn't that amazing?

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Life is good!

finding myself

Sometimes I get a little lost. Sometimes I see all the words on a page or on a screen and I want to lay claim to one of them. I want to be one of them. I want to walk up to someone and be able to say "Hello, I'm debbie and I'm a             " and I want to mean it with my whole being. I would love to be just a writer or just a photographer or just a teacher or just a florist or just a mama. 

Sometimes in this world of social media and labels I get lost trying to find a word for myself. I envy people who are so completely something. I envy those who can throw their souls into science or history or fashion or fixing things or athletics and be so wholly content.

I'm a dabbler.

I'm not particularly good or knowledgeable at any one thing.

I dabble.

I wake up some mornings and the only thing worth living for is the words on a page.

Other days I'm not complete until I can unapologetically throw myself into a sport or climbing a mountain.

Some mornings I wake up clutching a pencil, filled with the itch to draw out my soul in charcoal or pastel or some messy mix of mediums.

There have been days where my eyes were hidden by a camera lens---so completely hidden that I had no apprehension or fear that anyone could see me and somehow in those moments I became me.

I wake up with an ache in my heart to hold my babies and shape my world around them and the only word I need is "mama" and the only voice I need is theirs.

And yet on any given day I can cycle through the need to be dozens of different "mes".

I go through stages of fighting it. I think I've been told by the world that the me that loves sports isn't allowed to coexist with the me that writes poetry and that all of these different mes are a contradiction. But I live for these contradictions. When I try to choose just one word I feel incomplete...when I try to be only one of these mes I get lost.

So today, (for the hundredth time over) I'm choosing to embrace every different me that exists.

What do you live for? Are you happy with how you define yourself? Do you feel like you are seen for who you really are?

I hope that you will choose to embrace whatever "you" that makes you feel whole and happy. You deserve it.

A boy named Sue

I am of the opinion that names are special. I think that names shape a lot of what a person will do and become.  Give a kid the wrong name and he can be scorned for the rest of his life---which can either be seriously detrimental or highly effective in building character.

Take the song "A boy named Sue" . Kind of an absurd illustration of the point, but it works.

When naming my children I felt like they needed a name to live up to. I wanted them to be able to look at the meaning of their names and know that they were special, or to look at historic figures with the same name and say "yeah! I wanna be like him/her!". But I didn't want them to be run of the mill either.

During my pregnancy with Gideon, the first indication that he was a boy was the fact that Rob and I absolutely could not agree on boy names. We had a solid girl name we agreed on but it almost came to blows about boy names---and this was from the day we found out I was pregnant.

We prayed about it a lot. Sometimes we would even try to pray for our unborn baby using a name we had chosen, but it didn't ever seem right.

Then one day we were driving to Kristy's house and we were at the Debarr/Boniface intersection when The Beatles "Rocky Raccoon" came on. It has a line about "Gideon's Bible" and at the risk of being ridiculed I turned to Rob and said "I know this sounds weird, but I actually really like the name Gideon." and he agreed! I knew that Gideon was a strong Bible name and that his story was a hero's story so it fit our requirements. You can read the Bible story here.

With Annelise and Olivia it became even more complicated. I had decided long ago that my first girl would be named Evelynn. We would call her Eva. That name was everything I wanted for my first little girl---it was beauty and meaning and love all wrapped up in one word. God named his first daughter Eve. Our first would reflect that. I didn't really give Rob a choice about that one, it was law---she would be my little Eva.

The moment I saw two heartbeats on the screen I knew that would change. How could I choose which little one to give a name so rife with meaning? These girls needed names of equal importance, but equal individuality.

Annelise incorporates two important things about our lives.

1. Ann is Rob's oldest sister's name and Elise is his youngest sister's name
2. Annelies is the full name of Anne Frank. We love the Dutch people and since we met in The Netherlands we found it fitting.  (We changed the spelling to help out with American pronunciation)

Olivia is a name I have loved for a long time. It has hebrew roots meaning "peace offering from God". It is also the name of one of my great-great relatives. Her story is a hero story in its own right but long---maybe I'll share it another day.

Who were you named after? What does your name mean? Has it changed the way you live?

They love each other 

One Month

Having babies that spent time in the NICU is a bizarre thing.

On the one hand, you know they have been alive and kicking for a full month. On the other, they've only been home for 2 weeks so it seems like they are only 2 weeks old.

But that's beside the point.

The girls are doing incredibly well. They are growing and cooing and crying and pooping and doing all the things that babies are supposed to do.  Annelise has grown a full inch and gained 1lb since birth and Olivia has also grown a full inch and has gained 1lb 5oz! It will be interesting to see how big they are by the time they reach their original due date on 11/12/13.

Speaking of due dates...it took me almost 3 weeks to realize this, but the girls were born on Gideon's original due date!! I kept thinking "who's birthday is September 27th? did I have plans on September 27th? what is so special about that date???" I'm not joking. 3 whole weeks of thinking that before it clicked. I'm going to blame it on pregnancy brain. Even though I'm not pregnant anymore. But technically I'm still supposed to be, so it counts.  

I love my little family. 

shenanigans

Annelise and Olivia are already conspiring against me...

I will be minding my own business, reading a book or looking at pretty things on the internet, when all of the sudden one (or both?) of the babies starts moving around and crying. I can definitely hear that at least one is moving and fussing but by the time I get to the pack-n-play and look over the edge to calm said baby down, they are both frozen! No signs of fussiness.

So then I sit by the pack-n-play until I am confident that the fussiness is over but as soon as I resume my activities it will begin again.

How do they know?



P.S. Annelise really loves to snuggle Olivia and occasionally things like this happen:

Yes, Annelise is sucking on Olivia's pinky. The best part? Olivia doesn't mind at all.

P.P.S. The only way I can tell them apart (if they are not right next to each other) is by their right ears. And we put nail polish on each of their big toes so that if we forget which outfit/blanket they are wearing we will still know who is who. I thought I would be able to tell them apart without looking at their right ears or their toes, but my mom got them dressed yesterday and then brought one baby in to me to see if I could tell who she was and I failed. But I knew I had failed as soon as I looked at her right ear. So as long as they both don't go all "Van Gogh" on me I should be fine. 

                    Olivia                                                                                              Annelise

See how Olivia's ear has a little kink in the top? That difference is my saving grace.