Adventure

The big news this week, at least the past two days, has been sickness, unfortunately. If you follow Jenn on Facebook you already know the story, bear with me.

Thursday night Jenn went to bed early, and I stayed up late playing the new Cataclysm expansion for World of Warcraft reading a very dense and complicated tome of classic literature while weather-stripping all the windows. Girls had gone down at their customary ~7:30pm time, and at one point I heard an aborted cough out of one of them. I needed to sneak in and steal a laundry basket anyway, so went in and checked. I could see Kayla kind of squirming but all seemed well, and I didn't investigate further, for fear of waking them.

Fast forward to 6:20 yesterday next morning, our equally customary weekday wake up time. As soon as I walked into the room I could smell it, and turning on the light confirmed it: Both girls had thrown up in their beds. All over the sheets/blankets/dolls/etc. Aside from the coughing the night before which, in retrospect, was probably the first throw up, we didn't hear a peep out of them all night. Jenn was in the shower, I grabbed them both, stripped off the sleepers, and headed to the bathroom. About 5 minutes into the sponge bath it was clear this wasn't going to cut the mustard, so I started a full bath and tossed them in. Right about that time Jenn came out, she took over the bath while I stripped beds and wiped sick off of various cloth items.

Complicating this medical crisis is the fact that I'm involved with a major software move/upgrade at work this weekend, involving our clinics' EMR systems. It's one of those things that doesn't directly require my involvement (clearly, as I'm writing this on Saturday sitting here in the office), as our vendor is handling all the heavy lifting, but does require my attention should the vendor run into problems. It's a task that HAS to be done by 8am on Monday, and really they'd prefer to have it by 4 or 5 am, because nurses keep odd hours (says the guy who's alarm is set for 4:30am). In short, I wasn't going to be taking off work Friday, so the task fell upon Jenn.

As it turned out, both girls were fine all day, if a little manic, wavering between crabby and hyperactive. They had a short fuse from what I hear. I managed to get home about 6:30 or so, just in time for another bath and bedtime. I haven't called yet to check on things, but I imagine everyone is up by now and well into some breakfast and Nick Jr.

Keeping both girls at home by yourself all day is certainly an experience. It's by no means an impossible task, and both Jenn and I love doing so, but nevertheless it can get pretty hectic. The girls tend to feed off each other, either in their moods or level of activity. They can be sitting quietly, playing with toys or watching TV, then all of the sudden one will jump up and run into the kitchen, and then it's on. Or they'll be in a good mood, then one girl will get mildly scolded for grabbing something off a counter, and all of the sudden both are crabby, and you find yourself looking at the clock, wondering if it's nap time yet.

It ties into something I wonder about a lot: Are we "normal" parents? A day at home with twin 2 year old girls leaves you frazzled...Imagine that. But the doubt creeps into your mind: Am I this frazzled because I'm not as up to the task as I ought to be? Or is it just a natural consequence of having twins? People used to express amazement at "how we did it" when Kayla and Megan were infants, but the truth, as I expressed here I believe, is that having two at that age wasn't really that different than one. Make two bottles instead of one, change two diapers instead of one, get used to a little more crying...it wasn't that big of a difference. But now that our living balls of hunger/poop/screams have gained mobility, independent thought, and indeed, even deviousness, the game has changed from checkers to chess. And not just regular chess: the freaky 3-D kind they had on Star Trek. I knew this would be the way of things of course, but I also wonder if I'm adapting at the necessary rate as well.

It's a problem Jenn and I have struggled with, related to taking the girls to do things as well. It's beyond clear that both girls are Turbo-Powered Knowledge Vaccuums, and like Johnny 5, they need input. Yo Gabba Gabba has a live show that tours the country, and was due to swing through KC sometime in November I believe. When we learned of this some months before hand, we toyed with the idea of taking them up for the show, maybe staying a night, and doing some other kid-friendly activity on the way out of town the next day. Then we began cataloging the realities of such a trip. How long into the 3 hour drive up would the girls reach the "OK I'm done with this car seat" mark? Would we need to budget time for a nap before the show? How are we going to get them down for a nap in an unfamiliar hotel room? When/how are we going to squeeze meals into the schedule? What about the return trip home?

The logistics scared us off that particular trip/idea; perhaps it shouldn't have, but Mommy and Daddy are kind of learning as they go as well. I suppose a lot of the problem is just the age. Did Kayla really understand when I told her to not run off across the street, and she said OK? Or was that the same "OK" she uses when I ask her if she would like to fly to the moon? All part of the process I guess.