Attempting to get out

Ok~so  4 am the girls wake up, not just your stirring but wide awake hi!  So I tried to get them settled again for another hour to no avail so woke up poor James and we got bottles into them and they fortunately went back to sleep again till about 7:3o or so.  Then...oh boy awake until 11 am with full force, finally after their 9 am feed and a quick shower for me I decide I'll take them outside, urgh is all I'm going to say to that.  I decided in my infinite wisdom to try to sit outside with a few toys round the back of the apartment, how hard can that be I ask myself...back breaking and stressful is the answer I come back with.  So I pack a bag put a few toys in it and load Abigail up into the carrier get Isabel on my hip and march off to the car and grab the picnic blanket, so far so good...then I get out back it's damp on the grass so I definitely need the blanket except I have two bags two children and nowhere to put anything until I get the blanket unrolled.  Em ok, well the bags I have with me are waterproof sorta so they go on the ground now I still have one arm occupied by a child and another hanging around my middle and I still have to unroll the blanket, I can say it's not easy.  Anyways I manage to unroll things get the kids on the blanket out with the toys and for about an hour everything went well.  They were quieter than they were in the apartment and a little more occupied at least.  

Then they get tired, will they go to sleep outside...no, and admittedly it was a bit chilly even in the shade and I didn't pack a blanket to cover them, BIG mistake I had packed bottles but not a blanket and it's not like I can run back indoors even tho I'm staring at my windows and leave the girls alone.  F#$@k this place, seriously, so that means I have to pack everything back up again and get us all back into the apartment...oh wait so I get the bags loaded the kids loaded then the sodding picnic blanket it still on the ground and how the hell do I get that me everything else back up to the apartment?!  So I just grabbed a corner and marched back up leaving the keys to the apartment in the pocket of the arm carrying a child, so now I have to somehow get into that pocket for the keys oh JOY, trying to juggle a child  with another in the middle ARGH!

Least if I was on the ground floor I could keep the push chair in the apartment load everything up into it wheel it out!  And not have to negotiate the sodding stairs what a concept that would be and a relief.

Lessons in raising twins in an apartment...

Lesson 1...if you are on the 2nd floor or higher of an apartment complex and don't have a lift/elevator move before they are born give yourself a break, first 5 months or so it's OK, after that it's a bloody nightmare so unless you have a 2nd person to help you on a daily basis go up and down the stairs MOVE!  Get a ground floor apartment or a place with an elevator / private ground entrance where I am currently it's nigh on impossible to get out.  My options amount to leaving one child in the apartment alone...go to the car strap 2nd child into car, lock car go back to apartment get other child...at all times during this operation one child is always out of sight.  Alternatively I strap one into a carrier take other and put under arm, load the bags up over the other shoulder and walk down the stairs trying to make sure we all don't take a nose dive.  Either way is this a safe practice I have to ask myself and honestly I'm not happy with either arrangement not to mention the strain it's starting to put on my back as they are getting heavier, carrying 2 children is no mean feat I can tell you, and the thought of not having line of sight on anything just scares me silly, not being able to see the car or the front door.  But the trouble is they are getting bored at home so I really do need to go out.  Any suggestions as to how to solve this dilemma would be gladly accepted at this point.

Lesson 2...if you do manage to get out after that make sure you take about a dozen pacifiers with you secreted in every handbag/diaper bag that you take with you and better yet put one in every pocket that way you will always find one and not be in a panic after struggling to get back up the stairs with 2 babies, 2 bags and trying to find one that has dropped.  Trust me someone will drop a pacifier and you will be in an exhausted panic trying to get them quiet just so you can peel everyone and thing off of your person.

Urgh I hope we can get a house...and I hope we can break the lease somehow.  I'm virtually house bound right now, it was so lovely to take the girls to the park this morning too, I got the picnic blanket out and we were laying on the grass just enjoying the lovely weather but it was such a hassle to come back home again and get into the apartment and the sheer effort of it all makes me only want to do it once a week.  I really have to be a sight to be seen and as yet I have yet to have one person offer to help me up to the apartment, not one, even if it's to carry a bag!

Ok enough of feeling sorry for myself, we still had a lovely time today at the park, hopefully on the weekend we can get Dad go with us so we can take a turn on the swings :)

How Time Flies...

Time is just flying by now at a rate of knots, we are now halfway through May the girls are almost 7 months old and growing and learning in leaps and bounds.  We are now seriously having to look at baby proofing the home as Isabel is showing signs that in a week or so she is going to be crawling, it seems like only yesterday they were totally helpless and now look at them.  Both can stand aided, Isabel will sit on her own. Ah, children.  What is amazing is how different the two of them are from each other each with their own distinct personalities.  Abigail is easily amused and will laugh at the silliest of things, Isabel is more more serious yet inquisitive yet the most active.  She wants to know what is going on she is also the one getting up and going and going....

Trials of bedtime...

So right now we are experiencing fun trying to get the girls to bed.  Recently we moved them into the nursery and their own cribs...touble is we have yet to really have a normal night.  There are a lot of new things that they are having to deal with in their such as no longer being swaddled (/cry) they are both suck with the viral infection that I have had as well.  This basically is resulting in little or no sleep for nearly all of us except Dad which is probably just as well as he has to go to work.  I'm somewhat waiting for him to have a free weekend he's not had one in awhile and guiltily praying he might take over for one night in getting up although I don't hold much hope as he just doesn't hear things like I do even with a baby monitor.  I think it's a mother's intuition half the time.

The Little Things In Life

I almost feel like writing a Dear Abi letter as I sit here at 3:30 am in the morning watching and listening to my babies sleeping.  This is the first time where either of them have been sick.  Abigail's temperature shot up to 102.8 this evening and ended up with all 4 of us heading over to the ER.  After a dose of tylenol and motrin it went back down under 100 and they deemed we could all go home again.  However!  6 hours later and the fever is back...I'm just sitting here and waiting for the tylenol to work it's magic again.  I feel like Abi needs me to just every now and then reassure her I'm there..I've spent the last hour and a half sitting on a stool with my hands through the slats of her crib just holding her hand and stroking her head trying to comfort her not wanting to pick her up and create more heat from the contact between us yet let her know I'm here.

Funny thing is as I'm sitting here in the dark trying to be of some comfort to my eldest daughter I'm also thinking and wondering how many sleepless nights are to come in the next few years trying to take care of a sick child.  Probably best not to dwell too much on that and just focus on the current crisis but hey it does have me thinking.

Oh to parenthood and to a greater respect for my Mum who must have had countless interrupted night's sleep like myself to raise my sister and I.  I really do believe this has given me a new sense of what my parent's sacrificed now.