Michael McDaniel’s Dawning Awareness

Congratulations to my brother Benjamin and his wife Nancy on the birth of their twins last night around 9pm EDT. They’re all doing well and names will be forthcoming.

Twin pregnancies, on average, end 4 weeks early, but they made it to 39 weeks, I believe, and the babies’ weights show it: 5 lbs 12 oz and 6 lbs 2 oz. Clearly, they’re off to a great start.

Huzzah!

Fiona created a new dinner sensation tonight: Green Bean Sandwiches. The girls had to eat two bites of veggieburger to earn each GBS, and they were really eager to do so.

Then Fiona gave “angry green bean sandwich kisses” to Nana. Hey, you can’t make this stuff up.

We’re really lucky our kids like vegetables so much. And that they’re so thoroughly strange.

Our kids love running around in our bedroom. Their imaginations are just wild. Our closet is an elevator. The tub is a boat. They like jumping on the bed and wearing Bonnie’s shoes. They easily occupy themselves while we get showers in the morning.

This morning, as I escorted the girls from their room to ours, Sophie heard the shower running and exclaimed, “the shower is watering!”

I almost corrected her, but decided I couldn’t justify why the shower should be “going” or “running” instead of “watering.” Sometimes they improve on the language they learn.

Can you believe it?

It’s been a while since “Baby Einstein videos”:http://www.babyeinstein.com played on our TV, but it’s back on tonight. Ian has been getting sicker for the past couple of days and of course Bonnie is also getting sick. Fiona has been crying for the better part of an hour; I imagine she’s also getting this nastiness.

The near perfect contagion of illness is not something I was expecting from parenthood. I figured it’d be nice to cuddle with a sick kid. Instead, it’s like an epidemic: everyone gets it (including the nannies, of course), the stress level goes up, and sleep goes way down.

Anybody know where I can get one of those plastic boy-in-a-bubble things? I’m starting to feel like Adrian Monk!

After the girls blew up tonight, I needed a glass of wine. While I’m not an alcoholic, I can totally relate to a need to escape, now. There’s something about the relentless, escalating, screaming cries that just gets down to my core. It was the longest 30 minutes I can remember. I’d have paid any amount of money to make it stop.

Which brings to mind the plight of mothers in this society. Somehow, we think that motherhood isn’t just unpaid work, it’s not work at all! But let me tell you, Charlie, it’s work. Maybe women are more natural multi-taskers, and maybe it’s just that we have twins, but that is not a job I could handle all day every day.

Bonnie, I am in awe of what you do every day.