Biking & Compassion

Even if it's started to be more cold mornings and evenings now, we still have perfect temperatures in the afternoons. I love that the temperatures are finally around 80F/26C and some days even below that! Just wonderful!!! In the mornings though, we have had as cold as down to around 50F/10C!!

So now we can be outside more and more and the kids love to spend time on their bikes. I normally walk around the neighborhood with them biking, and so we did one afternoon the other day.

Isabella had an accident and fell with her bike, there were some uneven parts of the side walk and she didn't pay attention to where her training wheels went. She fell and hurt herself and was in tears. No scraped knees, but some on her hands, but not too bad. Still, after lots of tears, and kisses she started to feel better. Especially as her twin brother gave her a spontaneous loooong hug to make her feel better. I love that they despite their everyday arguing,  have that deep love and compassion for one another. I was so happy to catch this on a picture!

 Cassie's friend A came over for some volleyball!

Annual Easter Celebration With The Twin Group

Last Sunday, we had the annual meeting with the Twin Group here in Yuma. We met last year for an Easter Egg Hunt and it was great, and after that we have only met a few times, but decided that we for sure want to try to get some people together for another Egg Hunt again in the same park.

We didn't have such a great turnout as last year, and were only four families with twins and siblings (us included) and another mom that was expecting twins this summer. Still, we had a great time, and the kids enjoyed the bouncy house and egg hunt.

I wish that we would have been able to put the kids on a row next to each other with the twins in the front and their siblings in the back, but no, it was not easy to even get them all in a picture. In this picture there is only four pairs of twins, identical twin girls 5 years old (pink/yellow shirts), twin boys in stripes, 2 1/2 years old. The last twin combo is another boy/girl combo that like mine are soon to be 4 years old.

Easter Egg Hunt can begin!

One family had brought soap bubbles instead of candy, which was a MESSY hit by all!

 

The moms helped each other taking pictures, so we all could be in the pictures with our kids!

Love these pics with the kids playing with the bubbles..

Lunchtime!

After lunch, it was already time for the company to pick up the bouncer, and the kids were jumping all the way to the end. We said goodbye to the others, and while they all left, we stayed behind for awhile at the playground, while we were there. It did get hot after awhile, and we were all happy coming home and cool off after a busy day. After some relaxing inside, I filled up the water table outside, to let them cool off with some water. Always a hit!

Glowing Twins

Well, the new pj's that I bought the kids were a hit! The scary faces on the pumpkins glow in the dark, and it was a lot of fun to run in and out of their rooms, turning off the lights to see it glow. There was a lot of running around before bedtime the other night!

It's not very often, but when I get pictures like the ones where they so cute stand and spontaneously put their arms around each other- moments like this blow me away!

Rare Moments Of Total Brother/Sister Love

1. Goodnight kisses...

2. Yawn, Yawn...we are soooo tired mommy....

3. "We are actually sleeping now mommy..."

4. "Just kidding!!"

Twins In The Classroom

I came across this link the other day, and as we are a couple of twin moms here that follow each other, I thought that I'd share this with you too. The link comes out too big for the blog to copy in as a picture, but please check out the following link about  

Twins in the classroom. Together or not together? 

We are not there yet, but it's interesting to read and something to think about for the future for sure.

I think that especially identical twins might have more difficulties with this issue than fraternal twins. Identical have often a stronger bond together and might suffer more from being separated, but kept together, they might compete more, they might get compared to each other all the time, or the teachers might have problems keeping them apart.

For us, having a boy and a girl, I don't think that this will be an issue either way. They will have their own friends, their own interests etc. One good thing is though for them being kept together is that even with moving around in the military, they will always know someone in the class. They will always have each other, and never be like Cassie, the new girl...

Another plus I must add is for the family/parents and for the kids themselves, they will have the same homework. Same projects, same due dates, same reports etc to turn in. I couldn't even imagine how it would be with two different ones all the time, different homework, schedules to keep up with. Different recitals or different school trips. 

So personally, I would really want my twins to be together in the same class, but only time will tell how it will turn out. I think it's crazy though, that some states have had to make it into laws about this issue. That parents can't be allowed to make these important decisions on their own..

Yuma Twins Easter Egg Hunt

As mentioned in the earlier post, we were meeting up with the Yuma Twins Group on Saturday for an Easter Egg Hunt. It was a lot of fun, and great to chat and talk to other twin moms/dads and share some experiences. Some were older and some were younger than mine, but still always fun to hear from others.  Some kids were wilder than others, and I'm happy to say that even if mine are pretty wild and crazy here at home at times, they do behave and are to the shy side in public, which is good to know. They listen and I don't have to chase after them all the time, they don't brake things, start opening eggs or pulling down the food from the tables, like some other ones did..

The other families had both parents present, and one that didn't have a daddy present, brought the grandma along. I'm so used to bring mine alone where ever I go, and of course I have a great help in Cassie if need be, so it's normally no problem at all. But it was interesting for me to see how other families did it, and pretty much all of them had one child assigned to them, that they kept running after. The park they had chosen was great though, lots of green and open space to run around and with tables and a play area with swings and slides, where we went later after the egg hunt.

The older girls were in charge of hiding/spreading the eggs out for the little ones to "find"

Waiting very patiently for the hunt to begin..

One of the families had brought a bunny to watch over the eggs..

The orange tshirt fraternal twin boys and their younger identical twin sisters were all so sweet!

Their parents certainly "have their hands full" as one of the most common comments from strangers always is to us that has multiples...Isabella reflected over that the girls look the same, but noting more. It was only then and older girls that were identical, so it wasn't like seeing double all the time for them. Trying to take a group photo of all the kids, 7 sets of twins and older siblings, wasn't that easy. Some were sitting more still than others, but most were eager to run off and get the eggs!!

Here are also two other sets of twins with boy/girl (the boy and girl twins that are hiding from the camera) and the boy in red and his twin sister in green to the right in the picture.

Here the pretty 4 year old identical twin girls made the picture to the right!

Here another shot where I got the fraternal twin boys and their older sister in the 

picture to the right

Ready - Set - Go!!!

Taking his time picking out the pretty ones!

Same with Isabella, no rushing trying to get the most eggs, more running here 

and there to get pretty colored ones.

Ben and another boy/girl twin combo.

Such a happy girl!!

Kids going wild - parents trying to supervise/help AND take cute pictures...

Isabella in the middle.

Checking out what's inside! Mostly stickers and hard candy, but as the harder candy is normally a choking hazard and not really for little ones, Cassie was trading with them where she could. We all have learned our lesson, DON'T put chocolate inside the Easter Eggs in Arizona. They melt even after a few minutes in the heat. Haha, we had quite the mess last year in the garden, trying to take the wrappers of melted chocolate eggs..

Maximus and Aurelius (the only names of all the twins that I remember ...) 
with daddy and mommy

It was so windy, that it was nicer to sit out in the sun on the blanket than under the Ramada.

I had just taken a few pictures with another family's camera to get them both in the pictures with the kids and all the eggs, and the mom offered to take some of me and my kids. Nice, as I like to get a few of me and the kids too, as I normally always are behind the camera and not in front. As always it's not easy to get all the kids to look in one direction and the sun was really bright, so it took a couple of shots to get a few good ones - as usual!

After the pictures, we had some of the snacks that everyone had brought and while the kids were eating, the parents could chat a little more. At noon, we had to pack up as other people had rented the Ramada, but we moved the things over to a table near the playground, and where some of us had to leave, some of us stayed and played and visited some more.

One family picked up pizza for everyone, and the kids had lunch before playing some more at the playground. Most of the younger ones were then ready for their nap, and as mine don't nap anymore, they were pretty unhappy to leave the park and all the fun. But, with a little convincing and promise that they would see daddy before he left for work if we hurried up home, they did come along without too much drama.

It was a great get together. Hopefully we can do it again soon, and everyone said the same, that it's so much easier to get together like this in the parks, than to try to do it at someone's house or garden. Like this, you can let them play and there isn't too much drama, as in touching or fighting over toys and things. Just such a shame that it's soon too hot to meet outside, but we all said that we'll try. It's a shame that everyone but me, lived on the other side of town..Would have been nice to have someone close to meet on a more regular basis.

Bye bye park - we had a great time!!