First Visit to Santa

Let’s start with my excuses for not posting anything in almost a month. I’ve been really busy in work. I had a dose of food poisoning. I’ve been snowed in. I had writers block. Oh yeah, and the dog ate my homework. Choose your favourite and let’s move on.

I actually feel really bad because they have been exceptionally entertaining of late and I have, on average, one moment a day when I think “Ha ha, I must write a post about that.” We had about twelve of those moments last Saturday so I will do my best to recount them.

We had arranged to meet Uncle Cheddar Terry and his wife Kitty Kat in the city centre to bring the boys for their first visit to Santa. We were due to meet them at 2.30 and wanted the boys to have finished their nap so we made sure to fill their morning with activity so they would fall asleep earlier than normal.

Their curls were getting out of control so first stop was the barbers. Nana had been trimming their locks thus far so this was another big first. The local barber shop is a wondrous place and I’m not talking about the boys being impressed. I spent most of the time looking at the photos and posters that covered every vertical surface, the model planes hanging from the ceiling and the various parts of skateboards, boogie boards and canoe kit that are tucked under the benches. When their turn came up, the barber selected a seemingly discarded skateboard carcass and put it across the arms of the barbers chair. Fat Chops wanted no part of it, stiffened his body and refused to sit down. There was a little bit a scene but Monkey Boy was far more pliable [once Hannah waved a lollipop under his nose]. Once Fat Chops saw his brother survive the chair he was happy to jump up and spend a few minutes sucking an increasingly hairy lollipop of his own.

They’ve had a few haircuts but I still haven’t adapted to seeing them age with each snip of the scissors. We walked into the barbers with a pair of toddlers and walked out with two handsome young men.

They were looking good and it was time to go across the road to the toddlers disco to see how the girls liked it. The toddlers disco is a great idea. Someone came up with the brilliant idea of renting the scout hall, charging a small fee for each child and teaching them dance moves to Hi-5 songs. Monkey Boy took a notion that everyone had made the journey just to see him. He went around everyone in the room and greeted them individually. If anyone didn’t respond for any reason he would just stand and smile at them, repeating “HELLO!!” louder and louder until they said “hello” back. He then proceeded to park himself in the middle of the dance floor where he was best positioned to ignore any of the instructions and dance as he saw fit. Fat Chops was considerably more demure. He refused to take off his shoes [apparently there is no minimum age for a shoe fetish] and placed himself at the back of the dancefloor. He followed instructions much better but got carried away with the spins a few times and I had to catch him once or twice.

Then home for a quick nap before the main event. In the end, it wasn’t that quick a nap. We left ourselves enough time to make the journey into town but somehow overlooked the fact that it was the second last Saturday before Christmas. Needless to say there was a little bit of traffic but on the plus side it meant that the boys got some more sleep in the car and arrived refreshed and ready to cause havoc. On the negative side it meant that Uncle Cheddar Terry and his wife got to hang around outside a children’s party with no children. Not at all creepy!!

The Christmas Party was in the headquarters of one of the country’s major banks but once you walk past the branding at the front door you would never know. Their sports and social club do a spectacular job of transforming the building into Santa’s grotto. The restaurant is cleared out to make an area for a children’s entertainer to perform and around the outsides there is a buffet, face painters, clowns manipulating balloons and people dressed up as animals.

We filled them with crisps and sweets while they got used to their new surroundings and waited for the sugar buzz to kick in. The first thing that caught their eye was a man in a dog suit that was dancing and shaking hands with the kids. The poor guy must have thought that we had quintuplets instead of twins because every time he turned around there was one of our sons facing him with hand extended. That was bad enough until they started hugging his legs like he was a long lost friend. I thought they were going to take him down and they might well have succeeded if he had tried to walk anywhere. He finally managed to escape and went to dance on the stage but it was short lived before two shakes of his tail he had Fat Chops and Monkey Boy hanging out of either arm. They were besotted.

After a while we managed to distract them with balloon swords. From cuddly animal lovers they instantly transformed into scowling fighting machines and started to battle. Their child minder must show them old Errol Flynn swashbuckling movies during the day because they certainly looked the part. They worked their way through the room stabbing, parrying and riposting for all they were worth until finally, Monkey Boy “died” dramatically in the middle of the room. He remained “dead” there for a couple of minutes, blissfully ignorant that he only barely avoided being stepped on several times.

Finally, after a chaotic hour, we queued up to see the big man in red. There was more duelling while we queued and Monkey Boy nearly disappeared after the dog [poor guy was a bank employee who thought it would be good laugh to help out at the Christmas party. He spent an exhausting couple of hours sweating profusely in a dog costume with the younger kids shaking his hand or dancing with him and the older kids beating him with balloons. I would be surprised if he signed up for next year.]

To reach Santa, you had to climb through a fireplace and up the chimney. Really. They covered all the lifts with a fireplace and you have to crawl in [adults too] where an elf brings you up to the grotto. He was still very cheerful despite us being one of the last of over 500 children to attend the party. His good mood was even more impressive because the grotto was quite small and Fat Chops had been working on his own little “present” while we were waiting. Eyes watering, he went through the routine of asking them what they wanted for Christmas [they ignored him] and if they had been good boys [ignored him and pulled at the decorations]. Then we hauled them up onto his knee for the picture [he did flinch at the smell this time] and the boys put on their best cheesy grins. Monkey Boy still had a mouthful of sweets which he cheerfully displayed for posterity!

Dinner Dilemma

My sons aren’t the worst eaters in the world but they are by no means the best. There are certain foods that they will eat without complaint but generally they are the pretty bland options. They like their Weetabix in the morning, they love toast [especially when it comes off their parent’s plate] and they will eat noodles and yoghurts without much fuss. It goes without saying that they will cheerfully tuck away sweets, crisps and chocolate until they can no longer walk and have to be rolled from one spot to the next, a la Violet Beauregard. As far as real food with actual vitamins in them go, it gets a bit trickier. They like Spaghetti Bolognese as long as there aren’t many lumps in it but you need to get the timing right and make sure that they are hungry or else you might end up wearing most of it. They will sometimes eat an apple [sometimes they will just bite an apple and spit out apple skin] and if they are in the right mood they will eat a banana, but only if you leave it in the skin and let them hold it.

After that, it’s a very short list. We always try to get them to taste new things but mostly they downright refuse and when they do acquiesce it rarely stays in their mouth long enough for them to have possibly tasted anything.

This is a longer than usual preamble but I am almost at my point so bear with me.

Aunty Lemons came over last Sunday to mind the boys while myself and Hannah went off to coach a basketball game [a glorious victory in case you are wondering, if such a thing can be achieved in the Dublin Under 13 Boys league] and arrived just as we were about to feed the boys lunch. We wanted to try and expand their menu so Hannah thought of mashing up a banana and covering it in yoghurt to feed to them. They like bananas, they like yoghurt so this was a sure thing, right?

Wrong!

One spoonful went in and before it had time to settle on the taste buds the tongue was thrust out. We were in a hurry and not in the mood for a fight so we just got another yoghurt which they ate happily and even had the cheek to look for more. The last of the yoghurt was now mixed with banana in the neglected bowls so we were about to tell them no more when Aunty Lemons suggested putting the banana yoghurt mix into the pots and seeing if we could trick them into eating it. Cue a trip into the kitchen to surreptitiously refill the pots.

I swear that Monkey Boy was looking at the pot suspiciously when I offered him the first spoonful but he must have decided that it looked enough like the old pot for him to open his mouth. It was not well received. We decided that one pot of yoghurt was enough and I went and changed my t-shirt.

To balance off Aunty Lemons clever [if unsuccessful] suggestion, I have to tell another story [if I had more time I would write a blog just about her]. When we got back from the game the boys were asleep so we got some lunch while it was quiet. I was eating some hazelnuts left over from Halloween and when she saw the nutcracker she asked what I was doing. Turns out the boys aren’t the only ones with limited tastes and she had never eaten hazelnuts straight from the shell before. I cracked one open for her and she was examined it carefully.
“Do you just eat it like this” she asked.
“Of course not, you have to peel the skin off first”.
I turned away and tried to hold it together while she tried to scrape the brown bits off the nut with a finger nail. She was at it for a couple of minutes before Hannah came in and asked what she was at. I managed to proudly announce that I was teaching her to peel the skin off hazelnuts before it all got too much for me and I broke down laughing.

Random Bullets II

• Question of the week. I was playing with the boys the other night. It was a very simple game. I put my hands up, growl “I’m going to get you” and set off in pursuit. When I catch them, I throw them up in the air and tickle them a bit. Seems easy to follow but Fat Chops keeps getting it wrong? Can someone please tell me why Fat Chops insists on running straight at me when I chase him? I like to think that it’s because he is already a talented strategist and realises that attack is the best form of defense but there is a slim chance that opinion might be tainted by parental bias.
• In a previous post I mentioned that there was a short list of words that the boys were using. That was back in June and we have been making steady, if slow, progress since then. We moved on to short phrases. We’ve got “ready, steady, go”, “more please Dada” and a few others. Fat Chops produced my new favourite the other night. His mum was trying to teach him to count when he came out with “one, two, yellow”. Looks like we still have some work to do.
• I was watching “Live at the Apollo” the other night when Ed Byrne did a sketch that struck a chord. The short version is that people become complete know-it-alls when they have kids and there are a lot of people who think that “you don’t understand because you aren’t a parent” is check mate in any argument. Thoughtful blogger that I am, I even went and found it on YouTube for you [you're welcome!]. It’s was a funny sketch but parents, through their experiences, know more about lots of things than non-parents would. As an example, I went to the playground last weekend with the boys and met their Uncle Cheddar Terry [the background to his name could be an entire post in itself, maybe another time] and his new wife. Monkey Boy headed towards the sandpit and started throwing handfuls of sand. After two years I have been conditioned to anticipate sand throwing being the start of a fight with either his brother or another child. Childless Cheddar Terry thought it was cute and admonished me for being so strict. By the time he was finished saying “what’s the harm in it?” Monkey Boy had sand in his eye.
• The boys love eating toast with a fork. That is all.
• I assume that he is copying the older kids at the child minders but Monkey Boys latest trick is doing tumbles. It starts with the thud of his head on the floor, moves on to him inching his bum over his head until his neck is bent at an angle that makes me flinch and finishes with him flopping onto the ground. Sometimes, he even manages to fall so that his feet go over his head. Our bid for Olympic glory in 2024 is underway.
• They had a bath in their Nana’s house over the weekend and since their cousin, The Big Show, was there we threw her in with them. I’m so glad that we did. She’s never found wanting for something to say and entertained us with a monologue throughout. I’m especially grateful for the anatomy lesson, pointing out the boys’ little worms [I corrected her on this and told her not to say “little”, don’t want them being insecure] and then explaining that it was their “Mary”. For the uninitiated, Mary is a term for her front bum. Never a dull moment.
• And finally…. A funny story about one of the boys hurting themselves in a way that could have been easily avoided. I feel bad about this one because I was sitting watching him. Fat Chops had gotten hold of a tea towel and was waving it about in a way that can only make sense to a toddler*. Somehow in all the frenetic flapping the towel ended up over his head. It wouldn’t be unusual for them to walk around with things on their heads [saucepans, sieves, baskets, boxes have all been worn as hats] and the way that he confidently strode out of the door suggested that he could see his way clearly enough. The loud thud shortly after his exit suggested that his vision was somewhat impaired. Yet again, I was left trying to comfort my son and suppress laughter at the same time but, as we all know, men don’t multi-task very well.



*Unless he is training for the ribbon section of the gymnastics competition at the 2024 Olympics. I won’t get too carried away with the fact that only the girls compete in that event, we’ve a few years to go yet.

Dr Fat Chops & Mr Monkey Boy

The strangest thing happened last week. Someone must have kidnapped the boys and replaced them with cranky imposters. Over the weekend we unknowingly got the originals back and normal service was resumed.

I have a couple of theories over what might have happened last week. It might have been the knock on effect from the birthday, they quickly got used to people coming in and handing them colourful parcels for them to tear the paper off and might have missed it when their mean parents didn’t hand them a bunch of presents this week. It might have been a sugar hangover, they ate their own bodyweight in chocolate and crisps and it’s possible that they were suffering withdrawals. They had a bit of a cold for a few days last week so maybe that’s the cause of the grumpiness. The old reliable excuse is teething, we like to trot that out whenever we run out of excuses for them because no-one likes to face up to the fact that they might just have cantankerous children. Maybe it was a combination of all of these things. All I know is that every evening last week I looked at my watch about a hundred times from 6.00 to 8.30 and wondered why it was taking such a long time to reach bedtime.

Everything we offered them for dinner was refused. Vociferously refused. Any attempt at interaction was rebuffed. Even when we gave up trying and just put on the TV they complained about our choice of programme.

It was a long week and after going out for a few drinks on Saturday night we were in no mood to face twins in the throes of the terrible twos. We went to my mother’s house so that she would cook us lunch and so someone would amuse the twins. We got there and the boys picked up where they left off and screamed abuse at us for the terrible crime of trying to feed them lunch. Our plan for a restful day was slowly evaporating so we settled for putting them down for a nap and getting lunch in peace. This is the point where they were switched back. When they woke up, they were back to their chirpy selves. They worked the room, sang songs, blew kisses and gave the full charm offensive. It was such a relief!

Their good humour continued on Monday night. The Huge Tumbler was over for a visit and they decided to acknowledge his existence for the first time. I think it was the juggling that won them over in the end. He did his best to ruin his good work by kicking over all the cones the boys had set up on the floor just to see what they’d do [he wasn’t at all encouraged by Hannah [!], and MB took offence and charged at the Huge Tumbler with his head]. Monkey Boy was certainly impressed with the juggling balls. I don’t know what he was thinking but after The Huge Tumbler finished and the boys cast the balls aside, MB took it upon himself to go and fetch them. Fetch is the only word for it too. He crawled around on his hands and knees and picked them up with his teeth. He seemed to be enjoying his little game so I threw the balls out again to see if he would continue. I was kind of glad when he gave me a “that game is SOOO five minutes ago” look and walked away.

After The Tumbler left, Hannah turned the stereo on so the boys could practise their dancing. On Saturday she had brought them down to a toddlers disco in the local scout hall. It didn’t start well, they refused to let go of their Nana’s legs when they first came in. By the end of the session they were swaggering around the dance floor like John Travolta in Saturday Night Fever. Their cousin Dusty went as well but his unique dancing style consisted of lying on the floor with little or no concern for his own safety. To each their own, I guess!

Hannah had selected Stevie Wonder’s greatest hits. The boys loved Sir Duke and Superstition but weren’t too keen on Isn’t She Lovely. I love the ways toddlers dance. They have a huge range of wiggle in them at that age. Their nappy clad bums swing from impossible angle to impossible angle with their little fists clenched and pumping the air. Best of all is the little pout, no point shaking your booty unless you are going to give it some attitude.

[Update: Thursday night was spent with their Nana. She has a video of Barney on the farm that finishes with a barn dance. It is some sight to see them gleefully kick their legs and shout “Yee-haw!”. My mother is a keen line dancer and is immensely proud without ever having seen it.]

So, who knows what version we get next week. Last week, I couldn’t wait to get out of the house to go training. This week, they put on a charm offensive and I don't want to put them to bed because they are so loveable. Fingers crossed for the latter!

The Birthday Party

It was supposed to be a quiet occasion. “We’ll have just the Grandparents and Godparents over and just have a cake to mark the day”. It sounded so straightforward, I mean, they are only two and have no idea what day their birthday is. Then you start to think about it and realise that Godparents includes partners and offspring, so we were quickly up to nineteen.

Nineteen people and only one other child their age to celebrate with them. Luckily, we have lots of friends with young children. Hannah’s brother has a daughter who will be three in December so we asked her over. We invited one of the girls from Hannah’s basketball team and her daughter that will be two in a few weeks. It would be rude not to invite since her mother has promised her hand in marriage to one of our boys. We haven’t decided which one, it seemed arranging her marriage when she was only a few months old was restrictive enough without narrowing it down further. While we were thinking marriage prospects we invited the girl next door. It only becomes a cliché if there is something to it. Then we invited a few others that don’t get mentioned specifically because we haven’t planned their wedding and before we knew it our quiet occasion had a guest list of about 40 men, women and children.

We had a cast of thousands, a miniature bouncy castle and enough junk food to get all of China on a sugar rush. Time to party like a toddler!!

It was a great day. The forecast was for unseasonable sunshine and it wasn’t as good as advertised but you can’t be unhappy with getting a dry day in October. I would hate to think what it would have been like if we weren’t able to open the back doors and let them play outside.

I had such great intentions of taking notes and writing a really detailed and hilarious post but I got caught up in the mayhem and you are stuck with this drivel instead. It was a blur and I only remember bits of it.

I remember that the boys got over their fear of bouncy castles and I had to pull them out of a tangle of juvenile limbs. I remember that the boy from next door tried to channel the spirit of Evel Kenieval, on a toy motorbike belonging to Fat Chops, and thumped his head off the decking after overcooking a wheelie. I saw one of the girls fall off the decking and I have a great mental image of her little legs sticking out a bush and no other evidence that a child was in there. I remember that the Drama Queen asked where we got our sofa from and then disappeared off to Ikea leaving her four kids in our house, cheek! I remember sitting all the toddlers at a table, piling it high with sweets and watching them make it all disappear. Then it was a case of lighting the candles, letting the kids blow them out, lighting the candles, letting the kids blow them out, lighting the candles, letting the kids blow them out, lighting the candles, letting the kids blow them out and finally cutting the cake.

After that, people started trickling out – most of them had the decency to bring their kids with them [yes DQ, I’m holding a grudge!]. Slowly, the house became quieter, the kids came down off the sugar rush and we swept all the debris into a couple of black sacks. We put the boys to bed, ordered a takeaway, turned on the X-Factor and started drinking heavily.

It was only the next day that we were able to take stock of how generous people had been. We tried to use the “your presence is present enough” tactic but failed miserably. Everyone agrees with the theory that there is no point buying a lot of stuff for two year olds who don’t understand what a birthday is. It is always overridden by the fear of being the only person who turns up empty handed. Needless to say the boys acquired a new winter wardrobe and a whole bunch of new toys.

The pick of the bunch was a couple of personal stereo’s from my mother. I’ve written a couple of times about how the boys love to sing and dance. We went down to my mother-in-law’s on Sunday to avoid cleaning up our house. We went and got them a compilation CD of recent hits that they sing along to in the car and plugged them in. The stereo hangs on a belt over one shoulder, there are big, gaudy headphones and a silver microphone attached. Not being able to hear what the boys are listening to only enhances the experience. They strutted around, they struck poses, they danced and they sang their hearts out. Most of all, they completely overshadowed X-Factor. Great fun!

Change is Inevitable..

..except from a vending machine.

I know I’m not breaking news when I say that having kids changes your life. It’s just funny how much it changes it and how it very often creeps up on you.
Sleeping habits take a big hit straight away. In fact, if sleeping can still be described as a habit when you have a new-born baby or babies in the house, then you are doing pretty well. This doesn’t sneak up on you. It walks straight up to you, announces itself loudly while wearing day glo yellow and slaps you in the face. I never used to get up in the middle of the night unless I’d had too much coffee and needed to empty my bladder. As soon as the boys were born I quickly got into the habit of waking up to change nappies and help with the night feed without complaint. Well, I complained a lot but I got on with it all the same. The more subtle change is that one day, you realise that you are ok with the lack of sleep. There used to be a time when early on a Saturday morning meant dragging myself out of bed at 10am. A lie in could stretch well into the afternoon. A few months back the boys slept until after nine in the morning. It was cause for celebration. It became my facebook status for a week. My friends with children congratulated me on this happy occasion [while suppressing their jealousy].
It doesn’t stop there. I have been cultivating a reputation for being grumpy in the mornings before I have my coffee for years. Something strange happened the other morning. I was in the kitchen getting the boys breakfast when the Black Eyed Peas came on the radio. I’m not a huge fan but you have to give them credit for knowing how to write a good party tune. Monkey Boy, being the music lover he is, started shaking his little booty. He doesn’t know what coffee is or what it does yet but he does know how to make his dad smile. I got the idea for this post when I found myself dancing with my son just after seven am. When Hannah came down the stairs with Fat Chops she thought that someone had broken in and was impersonating the curmudgeon she was used to dealing with.
Hannah has changed too. It’s a long held Irish tradition that, as a nation, we aren’t touchy feely and we don’t talk about our emotions unless our blood alcohol level is dangerously high. Anything other than a drunken “you’re my best friend, I love you” can put you in danger of having your passport revoked. Having children has broken down some of those barriers for Hannah. We were watching X-Factor the other night. Every year, I rant on about how it is manipulating the contestants and the viewers and how it is killing music. Every year, I end up watching it and arguing about who should be kicked out and hating myself a little bit for it. I always try to put on a brave face and maintain a respectable cynicism. I turned to Hannah the other night after one of the contestants had blown her audition and was about to make a cutting [and incredibly witty] comment. I stopped when I saw the tears in her eyes. Simon Cowell, how dare you make my wife cry!

Terrible Two's

The terrible two's officially started today and so far they are not living up to the reputation.

I have some leave left so I took the day off to spend with the boys. We have no food in the house so I went to the supermarket. Yes, they shouted at the top of their voices all the way around the supermarket but it was all in good humour. You wouldn't want to be shy. Cute twins draw their fair share of looks but they made sure that anyone with functioning ears within half a mile would notice them. As an encore, Monkey Boy sat in the trolley laughing loudly for no good reason while I put the shopping in the car. They ate their lunch with no great fuss and willingly went up for their nap. Their only act of rebellion was that instead of sleeping they talked, sang and laughed for half an hour.

If that is as stressful as their quest to establish independence gets then it should be a fun year.

Happy birthday to my beautiful sons!

Top Five

I was asked the other day if the twins are boring me. The basis for the question was that I am posting far less often lately. The twins are far from boring but we have entered basketball season again. This means that I am normally out playing two nights a week and coaching on a third. I could try post twice a week like I did during the summer but I would have to lock myself in a room away from the boys to manage. I am only barely clinging to the pretence that this blog is about them not me. If I did lock myself away to write on the nights that I am home I would never see them. Maybe I could just rename the blog, Diary of a Narcissist??
I decided that I needed to remind myself why I write the blog so I started to write a top five of the things that are great about twins. In no particular order;

1. They will always have a companion. I had a lengthy internal argument about including this one. The reason for the argument is that it is a double edged sword; the counter argument it that they will always find it difficult to establish themselves as an individual. On balance, the fact that they will always have someone to play with outweighs losing the odd clump of hair and an occasional bite-mark. The other night Monkey Boy fell and hurt himself [on my watch again!!]. I was on my way over to pick him up and comfort him when Fat Chops beat me to the punch. It was a proud and heart -warming moment to see one of my sons rub the other on the head and tell him he was ok.

2. Twice the cuddles. On one of my few nights at home last week I found myself sitting and watching Bear in the Big Blue House with the boys. It really is a superior children’s programme. I never find myself plotting the torture and death of Bear the way that I do when watching Barney or Special Agent Oso. Most of the time, the boys will watch TV standing up with their hands leaning on the TV table. Close enough that they can bask in the radiation and too close to see anything except a blur of bright colours. On this evening, they decided that they wanted to be more comfortable so they climbed up on the couch, one on each side of me, and cuddled in. I think I had what alcoholics call a moment of clarity. The tantrums, the demands of a hectic lifestyle, the fighting all melted away and I just enjoyed a brief moment of closeness with my children.

3. Less pregnancy and labour. I can only write this from a male point of view and I fully accept that I will never understand what it is like. I will still argue that if you plan on having more than one child it’s better to have them in litters! I have a theory that, somewhere in amongst the cocktail of hormones that make women emotionally volatile and increasingly flexible, there is some kind of magic potion that limits your memory of pregnancy. It highlights the ever so brief period where you feel good and the only way to describe your appearance is blooming. From my memory, this lasts about five minutes. It is sandwiched between the early horrors [coming to terms with being pregnant, constant nausea, hypersensitivity to smells, tiredness bordering on narcolepsy] and the later horrors [feeling like a beached whale, being too uncomfortable to sleep no matter how you contort yourself and of course the torture of labour and pain of childbirth]. This potion is probably more important to the preservation of the human race than everything except maybe opposable thumbs.

4. The interactions can be hilarious. They love to roll around on our bed, wrestling teddy bears and each other. I’m sure that most children will do fun stuff like this awith their siblings but it just seems funnier when they are atthe same development stage. Looking back through previous posts, very few of the stories would work as well if it was a solo act instead of a duo.

5. They will get more attention. I did a lot of research for this one. I conducted extensive interviews with my wife and, eh, well, I used my own experiences. It is a very small sample group but you can’t convince me if we only had one child instead of the boys, we would be stopped in the supermarket to comment on their cuteness quite as often. Like the first point, this is a double edged sword. Attention is like a drug and no one likes the kid that shows off incessantly to feed his attention habit. We will have to use liberal helpings of slagging and good, old fashioned, Irish begrudgery to keep them grounded!

A Thousand Words****

Memory Lane Part II

I was talking to a friend of mine about the blog the other day. He asked me where I got the profile pic from. Before I could answer he went on to say that it gave a really good impression of me as a doting father.

At this point, I want to name my friend. Only Hannah gets to use her real name on here [and that was an accident in an early post before I started giving everyone nicknames] so I am conferring upon him the title of; : The Huge Tumbler. It’s a mangled anagram of his real name. More or less. Well, less, but it makes me grin so it passes the selection criteria.

So, back to me as a doting father. I consider myself to be one but regular readers will know that this blog is not quite a fatherhood master class. I’ve been going for a self-deprecating tone and if that comes as a surprise then I’ve failed miserably. I think it’s more entertaining that way. My favourite TV programme at the moment is Total Wipeout. I enjoy when people successfully complete the course but I tune into it for the entertainment value of the failures. Who wants to read about SuperDad? “I’ve changed twelve nappies today, fed my twins a healthy organic diet and have started teaching them trigonometry”. No way that’s more entertaining than babies dropping irons on their heads or trying to run away.*

Fatherhood is a tough gig and sometimes you don’t want to hear more advice, or to hear how well someone else is doing. Sometimes it’s better to hear that other people are also finding it tough, that their kids act up too, that things go wrong and the world will keep turning. If that doesn’t work for you, you can just have a cheap laugh at my expense to help you through.

Despite what The Huge Tumbler might think of the picture, it’s self-deprecating too. I did see the potential for a good impression in it but mostly I liked it because I have my mouth closed, I’m not drooling and if I’m on my side I probably wasn’t snoring either. Considering that pictures of people sleeping that appear on the internet often involve eyebrows being shaved, genitalia being drawn on their foreheads with eyeliner or lots and lots of shaving foam, I’m happy with it.

The picture was taken on the first night that Hannah and the boys got home from hospital. We had arranged to stay in my mother-in-law's for the first while so we could take full advantage of any and all support on offer. My sister-in-law, The Wag, kindly gave up her room to accommodate us. The plan was that I would wake up when the boys were due their feed, change their nappies, help Hannah set up and generally help out. The reality was, Hannah couldn’t wake me, changed the boys herself, set herself up and fed the boys while I slumbered. Not model father behaviour!

The other reason that I like that picture is because I lived to see it. Hannah had a tough week. There was the whole childbirth thing for starters. Then she had trouble sleeping in the hospital. ** Then there was the fact that she was going to spend her birthday doing an impression of a milking machine after I had a trip to LA and Vegas for my birthday a few month s previously. Picture the scene; you have just lived through one of the toughest weeks of your life. It is 2am and you have been asleep for what seems like three minutes. You have been woken up by the harmonies of your children crying and your husband snoring. You have kicked and punched him until he stopped snoring but he is still refusing to wake up. You have so many hormones running around your body that you can’t tell up from down any more. On top of this, you can vaguely remember a story about a woman who got away with murder after claiming temporary insanity due to post natal depression. When I imagine the scene, Hannah is looking for either something sharp or something blunt and heavy but can only find her phone and settles for taking this picture and seeking vengeance at a later stage.***

*There was another escape attempt last night. Monkey Boy had been biding his time and lulling us into a false sense of security. We didn’t lock the front door and he kept his escape quiet by leaving it open behind him. Lucky for us, Fat Chops is a tell-tale and came into the kitchen to pull me towards the front door by my trouser leg, talking gibberish and gesturing towards the front door.

** There was one nurse in particular who caused the sleeplessness. She was smitten with the twins and insisted on helping with the night feeds and woke Hannah a few hours beforehand to make sure that she knew to ask for her. Then when the boys were due a feed she was nowhere to be found so Hannah asked a different nurse. Finally, at 3.30am as Hannah was just drifting off she came into the room, turned on the light and asked why she hadn’t been called. There is nothing like being woken up for a stupid reason to make sure that you are too angry to get back to sleep.

***I still don’t feel safe!

****I left the first note until last. The obvious reference is to the fact that a picture apparently paints a thousand words but I took a notion that it would be kind of cool to write the post so that it was exactly a thousand words long. It took me a couple of tangents and a little bit of padding to get there but in the end I made it and that makes me really, really, really, really, [quick count] really happy!

My Turn

Oh, what fun we had last night. Hannah was cooking dinner and I had a few errands to run so she set the boys up with some paper and crayons at a little table we have in the dining room. It’s usually good for a few minutes peace and last night was no different, when I came home they were happily scrawling on their paper and intermittently running over to the mother to proudly display their latest work of art. Then Monkey Boys creative instincts ran away with him and he decided that the table could do with a splash of colour. Green, to be precise, liberally spread over the wooden surface of the table. I gave out to him, reminded him that he was only supposed to write on the paper and set about wiping it off the table. As I reached to get the back of the table, Monkey took the same green crayon and started colouring in the spot that I had just cleaned.

“WHAT ARE YOU DOING???!!!”

He looked at me after my outburst and tried to decide how to take it. It turns out that he doesn’t take me seriously as an authority figure [gasps all around, I know]. He decided that the best course of action was to go on a charm offensive and after a brief delay, he flashed me his best I’m-cheeky-but-so-loveable grin. I did my best to keep a straight face but the best I could do was turn away and make myself busy scrubbing the table.

Clearly, he thought that the walls could use a scrub too and after a few minutes he brought my attention to this fact by decorating the wall beside his colouring table. Pink this time for those of you keeping score. Hannah was the parent on call this time and decided to try out the “naughty step” as recommended by Supernanny. Monkey Boy was brought out to the hall, admonished and told to sit on the step until he was ready to say sorry. Fat Chops tried to follow him out and proceeded to wail when we wouldn’t let him. We couldn’t decide if he wanted to go out to comfort his brother [happening quite often now, very cute!] or to join in the disciplining [loves to tell his brother how bold he is!]. It turns out that it was option C.

After we had brought Monkey Boy back into the kitchen, Fat Chops headed straight out to the hall, sat on the step and cried for a few minutes. When he was done he trotted back into the kitchen and carried on like nothing had happened. I saw it with my own eyes but was he really jealous of Monkey Boy being given out to?

Fun In The Sun

If I was smarter, I would have taken better notes of the different things that the boys did while we were away on holidays [definitely a holiday, not a vacation - thanks to Hammer for reminding me that I'm not American]. Then again, if I was smarter, I probably would have prevented at least 70% of the incidents that make this blog entertaining.

I was dabbling with the idea of writing this post in a diary style;
-Day 1- Monkey Boy fell into the pool head first and nearly drowned

The main reason that wouldn't have worked is because I tuned all the way out on holiday. It started early, I was asking people to remind me what day it is before I had fully turned pink. I take that as a good sign, one slow moving sunnt day blurred into the next.

In case you are wondering, Monkey Boy did actually fall into the pool but was never really in danger of drowning. His mother was on hand to lift him out of the pool by the ankle. I don't think that it was related to that incident but both he and his brother showed a reluctance to get into the pool. They were only too happy to play around the pool bank all day long and they were very diligent about making sure that anything and everything that was left lying around went into the pool. The inflatible loungers, the plastic cups, the few small toys we had brought with us all got dunked. We were grateful that the sun beds were too heavy for them to push in and everyone quicly realized that books and MP3 players were all to be left well out of their reach.

Bearing in mind their wariness of the pool, we probably should have realised that a trip to the beach wasn't a great idea. They loved the sand pit in their Nana's house though so we packed up and went. Apart from the fact that - they hated the heat, they wouldn't wear the flip flops we got them so they couldn't stand in the hot sand, they were intimidated by the crows and the noise, they didn't like the feel of the sand on their hands once we set them down on a blanket and the moving water absolutely terrified them - it was a roaring success. We may never go to the beach again.

The heat over there really sapped their energy. We got to sleep until nine most mornings and one day their afternoon nap was four hours long. It was only partly down to selfishness that we left them that long, we knew we were going out that evening and would be out late. It was very different than some of the struggles we had been having getting them down for their nap at home. At one point we said to them "time for a sleep"The normal reaction varies from "NOOOOOOO!!!" on a good day to a full blown screaming fit on a bad day. This time the reaction was for Fat Chops to toddle out of the room. I thought it was a bid for escape but by the time we caught up with him he was trying to climb into his cot. They must have slept for about 18 hours a day. I managed to read two books in a week and I'm not talking about picture books either!

We went away with a good portion of Hannah's family; her mother, her three sisters, her brother in law, five nieces, a nephew and the friend of her youngest sister. I know going away with your in laws might not be everyones idea of a good time but I get on really well with my wife's family. Not to mention, when you have twin toddlers and want to try and relax a bit yourself it is very much a case of the more, the merrier. Instead of Hannah and myself having to retrieve the detritus from the bottom of the pool, it became a diving game for the kids. When it got too hot, there were plenty of volunteers to sit inside with them and watch cartoons. They spent hours following their cousin around as if he was the gerneral of a not-so-intimidating three man army.

Base camp was the driveway at the side of the villa. This was on a fairly steep incline and the army's training consisted of running up and down it. Running up was just hard work. Running down was an exercise in suppressing your self preservation instincts. The effects of gravity meant that Privates Fat Chops and Monkey Boy were running far quicker than they were comfortable with. Their expression was a mixture of exhileration and sheer terror that melted into relief and amusement as the ground levelled out. If only we could have got that in a photo.

The Page Boy

It’s good to be back! Well, kind of. It’s true that there is no place like home but I wouldn’t have too much of a problem making my home in the beautiful and spacious villa drenched in the Portuguese sunshine. I’ve loads to write about after the holiday so I’m going to start at the start.

We were guests at a wedding the first Saturday of our break. I was groomsman and Monkey Boy was a page boy. From the first moment the idea was floated I feared the worst. Initially, I was worried that there was no way that he would walk in a straight line but it took him so long to start walking that there was a period when I wondered if he would have to crawl up the aisle! Giving him the rings to carry was never an option.

After a minor struggle to get him to wear a tie he was all dressed up and raring to go. They couldn’t get a children’s tie so we stuck an adult one on him, two thirds of which ended up being tucked into his trousers. Despite this he looked great in his trousers and waistcoat outfit [in the objective and unbiased opinion of his father!] We dragged Aunty Lemons along to look after Fat Chops [he sat quietly at the back of the church throughout, did us proud!] and Nana agreed to come along and bring Monkey Boy home while myself and Hannah went on to the reception.

We figured that the best chance of getting him to walk up the aisle was to convince the flower girl to hold his hand, him being a bit of a ladies man. It started very well, he was suitably impressed with the pretty flower girl and set off through the doors looking as if he would follow her to the ends of the earth. I was standing at the top of the church looking back at him feeling a swell of pride in my chest. Then I started paying attention to his facial expressions rather than his dapper outfit.

It’s a guess but my interpretation of his train of thought was;

Hey, she’s pretty.
Her hand feels nice and warm.
What’s through these big doors?
What’s with the music?
Whoa, there are a lot of people in here!
Where are my parents?
I don’t know any of these people, why are they all looking at me like that?
[By now the bottom lip was fully extended]
I think I want my Mammy.
Why are they all taking pictures?
Are they laughing at me?

Then he wailed!

At this stage the flower girl had done a sterling job of dragging him up the aisle so he was right by Hannah’s seat when he started crying. He happily received some comfort from his Mammy and then he acquiesced to sitting on my knee for the start of the ceremony. As you can imagine, that lasted all of ten minutes. Unless the happy couple were going to sing the Barney “I Love You” song as their wedding vows it was never going to hold his attention for very long. He started by exploring the pews and trying to climb over them. Nana intervened and distracted him with a book for a couple of minutes. The giggling started when he, loudly, started making the noises of all the animals in the book. He had gotten used to his surroundings by now and was much more comfortable with the people around him. So much so, that he cranked up the volume when he heard the laughing and starting playing up to it. He thoroughly enjoyed himself after that. A little bit of climbing over and around the pews, a little bit of peek-a-boo with the guys in the rows behind him and my personal favourite, a little bit of singing along to the hymns. That boy is destined to be an entertainer.

When we went outside the show continued. He darted his way between the collection of legs in the church car park until he inevitably crashed into someone. He happened to fall beside a group of girls who were very sympathetic, oohing and awing until he regained his feet and went on his merry way. The next time he passed the same group he “fell” again, eagerly accepting the attention and sympathy.

What surprised me most on the day was that when Fat Chops came out of the church and saw Monkey Boy he ran over and hugged him. I have several witnesses who will confirm that it was an affectionate hug and not a misplaced headlock. They had only been separated for less than an hour but apparently they missed each other.

After several thousand photo’s we packed him up in the car and went on to the reception. It was a great day and hopefully the first of many happy days in a long marriage for the happy couple.

Memory Lane Part 1

One of the biggest motivations for writing this blog was because my mother told me several times that I should write down the funny things that they do because no matter how brilliant they seem now, they will be forgotten. She was right, as mothers tend to be about these things, and unfortunately the boys were 18 months old before I started. So all I can do now is try to recall some of the moments that would have inspired a blog post.

First entry in the series is about one of the first times that I was left alone with the boys and regular readers will know that it was bound to end badly!!

I can’t remember what age they were but I know that they were starting on a spoon feed so they must have been about 4 months old. They certainly were still at the stage where they were very dependant.

It’s important for context to note that I hate lazy stereotypes. By this, I mean things like assuming that men should just drink beer, watch football and leave raising the children to the womenfolk. If they are the things that define a man, I fail on everything except the watching football part of it. I have a couple of friends who regularly pull me up on things like carrying a man bag, wearing lip balm and playing an indoor sport [I don’t know how they can make a case for outdoor sport with Ireland’s climate!] because it doesn’t fit their idea of manliness. I say it takes a real man to wear pink and stand out from the crowd. This is why it was important to me to demonstrate that I was more than capable of looking after my own kids for a few hours.

[Have you guessed how it ends yet? Should I throw in a red herring to keep you interested?]

Anyway, the boys were fairly set in their routine so there was nothing to it but to stick to the schedule and everything would be fine. It was coming up to lunchtime and we used to change the boys before their meal to wake them up a little. Excuse me while I remember the good old days where they slept for 22 hours a day instead of running around tearing your house apart and demanding a biscuit every five minutes.

OK, I’m back.

I had put them in little bouncers that hung from the frame of the door to amuse them while I got ready for lunch. They are great little things, it’s like a cloth seat that is supported by a large spring so that they can jump up and down without fear of concussion. The downside is that should a child have a bowel movement while in the bouncer, the poop will likely be pushed up and out of the nappy with each little hop. Which is exactly what happened to Monkey Boy. By the time I noticed the smell it was half way up his back.

No problem, I thought – I’m a capable guy and I have tidied the likes of this up half a dozen times. It took a few minutes but I stripped him down, cleaned him up and went to prepare their lunch. By now, I was running a bit behind and they were starting to voice their displeasure at my tardiness. I brought in their lunch, picked up Fat Chops and started to feed him. As the nickname suggests he was the better eater of the two. Normally, Monkey Boy wouldn’t be too bothered about it but on this day he was either very hungry or ticked off at being left to wait. I decided to switch up and feed MB leaving FC to wait. That’s when the tennis match began.

It’s a truism that the more people you try to keep happy the more you fail. I picked one up, fed them a spoon of lunch and then swapped for the other. Lather, rinse, repeat. The screaming just got louder and louder and each yell scraped away another layer of calm until I was on the verge of panic. Determined not to fail, I decided to skip the spoon feed and just give the boys their bottle on the basis that it always was accepted gratefully and would keep them quiet. Of course, this day was the exception to that rule. They had worked themselves up to a crescendo and wouldn’t be calmed by the bottle. If I put one down to calm the other he would screech until I started worrying about out next door neighbours calling the police and a murder.

I needed help.

Imagine being a college student sitting at home, lazing a Sunday morning away watching TV and texting your friends about what happened the previous night. Imagine the doorbell ringing and when you answered being confronted with a tall man with a shaved head. He has bags under his eyes and is clearly under pressure. He is holding a baby in each arm, one trying to outdo the other in a shouting match. He asks, no pleads, for you to help him feed the screaming boys. Could you say no to him? Thankfully, neither could the girl next door.

Real men ask for help too!

Aunty Lemons

Tuesday witnessed a big event in our house. Aunty Lemons, Fat Chops’ godmother, changed her first dirty nappy. I was changing my 8,453th nappy at the same time so it is difficult for me to get all that excited. It was a big deal for her though.

She doesn’t have a lot of experience with babies so she practices on our boys. It may not sound like an ideal candidate for a godparent but her enthusiasm and exuberance more than make up for the lack of nappy changing talents.

I’ve been threatening to write a post dedicated to her for a while but I have real difficulty trying to explain Aunty Lemons. She is someone who works in banking but used to give my wife her bank card so that she couldn’t get into any more debt. She is someone who has a good degree [somehow ended up with Russian Politics as her subject?!?!?] but didn’t know that popcorn was made by heating corn kernels. She is someone who barely knew what end of a baby the bottle went in but is turning out to be a fantastic godparent. She is, without a doubt, one of the most entertaining people I have ever met.

In no particular order, I present some of my favourite stories about Aunty Lemons;

• We’ll start with nappy changing. Lisa is fine changing wet nappies but baulks at dirty ones. There is a rumour that she was corrected by my eleven year old niece one day when she was doing it completely wrong but my favourite story is one day when she was babysitting the boys with another friend, she refused to change a dirty nappy forcing her friend to do it. Bad enough if that friend wasn’t three months pregnant, suffering from morning sickness and hyper sensitive to smells!
• You may wonder if she is qualified to be Godmother after the previous paragraph but she ran a very convincing campaign during Hannah’s pregnancy. Yes, she campaigned for the title and in fairness has lived up to her campaign promises [if only we could say the same of politicians!]. The clincher was the limericks she wrote;

Lisa lemon is like no other,
Not like your sister or brother
Helping naming the twins,
Watching the growth of their limbs
Who better to choose for Godmother?

Who better indeed?!
• Part of her “Lisa for Godmother” campaign included making friends with the babies early. She used to talk to the boys and sing them songs before they were even born. Sounds ok but imagine one of your friends singing to your belly and then kissing it goodbye. Have you got the mental image yet? Slightly uncomfortable right?
• Aunty Lemons has been campaigning again recently. She baby-sits quite regularly but hasn’t been left alone with them as yet. Reasonable enough since she wouldn’t change a dirty nappy and has limited experience but she does a great job of staying over and then getting up with the boys and allowing us to stay in bed. She’s ambitious though and looking forward to flying solo which prompted this limerick;

There was a young girl who feared poo,
Of dirty nappies she had not the first clue,
But she'll prove them all wrong,
No matter how bad the pong,
Or else teach him to go on the loo

Again, how could you say no?
• She is a creative type. The boys were born in October but Lisa decided that it is too long to go without a present from Christmas to their birthday so she invented a half birthday to be celebrated in May and bought them gifts and a half birthday card.
• She loves playing with the boys. She called in the other night and started a game of chasing in our open plan kitchen/dining room running after Fat Chops and Monkey Boy alternately. The boys took breathers while she chased their brother but Aunty Lemons kept going until she started getting light headed and had to sit down and catch her breath.
• The creativity doesn’t stop there. What do you do when a child refuses to eat from a spoon. Most of us would either try a different spoon or engage in a battle of wills and try and force the child to eat but not Aunty Lemons! One day when faced with a stubborn Fat Chops refusing his lunch she threw him a curveball by feeding him by scooping up food on her finger and feeding him like that. I don’t know whether he was confused or amused but the bottom line is that he ate his lunch.
• That reminds me, she wrote a song for them too. It’s called The Lisa Song and is intended to help the boys say her name. Granted she started singing it to them when they were only weeks old which is a bit over-ambitious but it’s a catchy tune. I often find myself humming it after she leaves but the boys, typically, are refusing to sing along. So far! It’s a little less sophisticated than the limericks but lyrics such as “Lisa, Lisa, Lisa, Lisa” are easy for the boys to remember.

So, based on this and many other anecdotes too numerous to detail here, I’m guessing Fat Chops is going to have a great time on Saturday. I just hope that he doesn’t wriggle too much during the nappy changes.

You can leave feedback or comments below or on the facebook page.

Halloween in August

Yup, the title isn’t a misprint. We had Halloween on the first day of August this year. It’s actually a tradition at this point. Every year my mother has a Halloween party during the summer, reason being that it’s great for the kids to get out and play games and not have to worry about the rain and the cold. Obviously, it rains every year but it’s still great fun.

There is always water balloons, whipped cream pies, eggs and the like being thrown around. This year there was a new addition when Biff filled one of his sons nappies with chocolate gloop and rubbed it in my nieces face. There was a look of pure terror, followed by the nappy, followed by relief when she realized that it wasn’t baby poop.

Time and a lack of imagination led to the boys being dressed as football players but they enjoyed it much more than last year. They didn’t enjoy when my brother filled a rubber mask with whipped cream for a can and pulled it down on my head. Nice guy that he is, he did it while I was holding Monkey Boy and feeling invulnerable [who pulls a prank on someone holding a baby? Too cruel!]. Monkey Boy took one look at my new visage and shook the windows with his screams. He wasn’t much happier when I took it off and had a halo of whipped cream. As an aside, I don’t know how people eat that stuff, I couldn’t get the smell out of my nostrils for the rest of the day.

After we left the Halloween party, we went back to my mother-in-laws for a while. She has a large trampoline in the back garden which the boys are only getting around to liking. Well, one of them likes it. Monkey Boy likes the idea of it and will ask you to put him up on it but if his cousins are up there already and bouncing around then he will take one tentative step forward and then run back into your arms. Fat Chops is a different story. He is perfectly willing to abandon himself and just bounce along with the momentum that his cousins generate. He has finally got the hang of jumping [I love when kids think they are jumping and they squat down, then straighten up and throw their arms up to help them jump higher while their feet remain rooted to the ground] but landing is another days work. He leaps, salmon-like, into the air but can’t get his feet back under himself so he just lands on his bum. Fine on a trampoline but it’s a challenge to be straight faced and sympathetic when he does it in the living room. He has no chance of a straight face when he stands up looking aggrieved and gesturing for you to rub and kiss his bum.

Highlight of the bank holiday weekend was the boy sleeping until 9.30 on Sunday morning. It would have been better if I hadn’t habitually woken at 7.30 wondering why they were still quiet, then dozed off, then woken again about an hour later and dozing off before waking at 9.30 and deciding that something must be wrong and rushing in to the room to make sure they were still breathing.

Fight of the week was also on Sunday morning. The boys were playing on the deck while myself and Hannah had a coffee and read in the sun room. After a couple of minutes quiet I decided I should stick my head out and see what was happening – it’s slow going but I’m learning! I saw Fat Chops with his hands in a flower pot and shouted at him to stop what he was doing. He ran over and stood beside me and then started shouting at Monkey Boy to show me that he was on my side and strongly disapproved of putting his hands in the pot. Piecing it together from the shreds of evidence available it looked like MB had taken a couple of handfuls of muck and thrown them over FC [MB had dirty hands and FC was covered in muck, circumstantial evidence but I know them well enough to make the assumption]. Obviously, I had interrupted Fat Chops as he was about to get his own back so he decided to take the high moral ground and berate Monkey Boy for the terrible crime of throwing muck that FC himself would never lower himself to partaking in.

Off Duty

I would normally have something to write about early in the week after the boys carry on over the weekend but we were off duty for a change. Hannah’s brother, his girlfriend and two daughters looked after the boys while we went off surfing with some friends in Lahinch. We’re very grateful but I would love to know how they got spaghetti sauce on the ceiling, there must be a story worthy of a blog post in there somewhere!

I could settle for writing a post about the fun we had over the weekend but I am trying to pretend that this blog isn’t really all about me. Other than that, the grown up adventures just aren’t as amusing. There was a lot of me face planting off a surf board and a reasonably funny story about our impromptu beach party that was rudely interrupted by a four legged gatecrasher of the vermin variety. One of the gang deserves a mention for asking me how “Fat Boy and Monkey Chops” were getting on. [At least he’s reading the blog!!!]

Anyway, we were busy enough that we didn’t have much of a chance to dwell on the fact that we were missing the boys and a far too rare lie-in will cure many ills. For their part, I don’t think we will ever have to worry about the boys being clingy or suffering from separation anxiety. The plan on Sunday was for us to have a quick surf in the morning and then get home in the middle of the afternoon to relieve the babysitters and catch up with the kids. I was feeling pretty confused when we got out after our “quick” surf and realized that we must have been abducted by aliens. How else could you explain a “quick” surf taking three hours? We got a bite to eat and hit the road, arriving home in the early evening. My illusions of the boys pining for us were quickly shattered. Not only did they barely acknowledge our return but Monkey Boy pushed me out of the way so he could see the TV when I tried to give him a hug.

Does it make me a bad parent that I would like to think that they were at least a little miserable without us? Or is it all the other stuff that makes me a bad parent?!!


P.S. The mimicry reached a new high this evening. I’m getting used to being careful about what I do because the boys copy everything. Monkey Boy scraped his shin climbing up a step tonight and was having a bit of a whinge. I gave it a rub and kissed it and thought that would do it but he wanted more comforting. My services were not required though, he displayed his youthful flexibility by curling himself into an improbable position and kissing his own shin. I nearly needed some sympathy myself as I fell off the deck laughing.

Psychological Warfare...Already??

I’ve been interviewing in work this week. Reading CV’s can be more entertaining than most of the recreational reading I do. It’s one of my favourite games to interpret a CV and try and figure out the hidden meanings between the lines. It’s even more fun when it is an internal position and you know the background to the embellishments. One of the things that amused me most is that some of the people list influencing others as a skill. To me, that implies that it is something that was learned and worked on but my recent experiences suggest that it is something innate that maybe we need to be reminded of when we get older.

Since the moment they were born, the boys took one look at me, measured me and figured out exactly how to manipulate me. Maybe it’s not as calculated as the influencing skill of the adult world but from day one they knew that a well pitched cry would bring me running and a smile would leave me as putty in their tiny hands.

They used to use their “skills” for mostly “good” purposes, getting fed, changed or getting someone to play with them. Now they just enjoy using their skills for “evil”. They don’t fight physically as much as they used to but there is a constant undercurrent of competition between them and the battles of wills wages on. It manifests itself in a thousand different ways, Monkey Boy refusing to eat his food and then performing a complete U-turn when we offer the same spoon to Fat Chops. Climbing over each other to get closest to their mother on weekend mornings is a regular event. It’s hilarious that they will clamber over their brother or be clambered upon with not as much as a moan as long as they reach their goal. But if Fat Chops foot should “accidentally” tip off his brother’s foot when they are drinking their bottles then we will have to run into the neighbours and ask them not to ring the police and explain that the screaming was just an eruption of sibling rivalry and not a case of child cruelty.

Last night the boys got into a spat over a toy just before dinnertime. Myself and Hannah managed to break it up just as they were starting to pull hair and bare teeth. She took a protesting Monkey Boy off to his high chair and I was left to take the toy from Fat Chops and bring him through. I braced myself for the inevitable protests when he was carried off but all I got was indifference. The battle was over, Fat Chops was last to hold the toy and besides, he was hungry so it was time to move on.

The quest for any slight upper hand is constant and goes both ways. A couple of days ago, Monkey Boy came looking for food yet again [they graze non stop these days, it’s ridiculous]. I gave him two biscuits and asked him to give one to Fat Chops. It’s not an untried routine and there normally aren’t any problems with it. Shortly afterwards, I noticed that he still had a biscuit in each hand albeit one of them was half eaten. I reminded him that one of the biscuits was for his brother and being the obedient child that he is, he obliged and handed Fat Chops a biscuit. The half-eaten one! I think he has been taking lessons from his cousin, Skittles.

That’s not even the worst of it. We had a spell a couple of months ago where, shortly after being put to bed, Monkey Boy would start screaming. Not the usual I-don’t-want-to-go-to-bed-yet scream but a more distressed cry. This went on for over a week and we were really struggling to understand what was causing it. There had never been a problem settling them down before and nothing in the routine had changed. After a couple of nights, Hannah waited outside the door after settling him down. A few minutes after she left the room she heard Fat Chops saying “Bold!” [or the badly pronounced equivalent that he was using at the time]. She crept around the door and saw him standing up in the bed, pointing at his brother and shouting “bold!” while Monkey Boy wailed. I can only assume that this had been going on the whole time as soon we had left the room.

My own personal favourite is the double bluff. Monkey Boy is the more sympathetic of the two and should his brother be upset he will often go over and console him by putting an arm around his shoulders or patting his head. Should that consolation irritate his brother [it always does] then the answer is obviously that more consolation is required. He manages to maintain the purest of innocent looks while he is doing this and sometimes even produces a quizzical, hurt look as if to ask, “Why is he pushing me away when all I want to do is hug him?” If you didn’t know any better you could be fooled into thinking how sweet he was being!

Identity Crisis

This is very much one of those good news, bad news posts.

Firstly, the good news. Finally, I am being referred to by my correct title. My sons and heirs have finally made the connection that I am Dada. They even pointed to a photo of me yesterday and said Dada. I’m ridiculously pleased and proud! What makes it even better was that Hannah was having a carbon copy of the conversation I had with Fat Chops a while ago trying to explain what her name is. That one also ended up with the child looking confused and pointing to his own chest saying “Mama”. Not only was she frustrated with the lack of progress but I might have made her mood a little worse by rolling on the ground laughing.

Now, the not so great news. The boys are having a bit of an identity crisis. Well, I think they are, it’s entirely possible they just don’t care about their moniker. The crux of the issue is that Monkey Boy has been calling his brother by name for a number of weeks now. When we prompt Fat Chops to say Monkey Boys name, we are met with a quizzical expression and deafening silence. Not even as much as a “nahneh”. Last night we made progress of sorts.

Hannah’s mother came up for dinner and was doing what all grandmothers are duty bound to do – spoiling them and feeding them biscuits. She handed Fat Chops two biscuits and told him to give one to Monkey Boy. Then he threw us a curveball by toddling off calling “Fat Chops” or a badly mangled version of it. Just to confuse us further Monkey Boy responded by saying “ta ta Fat Chops”. This will make for some interesting conversations. I can only guess that they have in some way equated the words to the meaning brother or baby or something along those lines. [It’s a fun game trying to second guess their thought process but it is about as useful as trying to train cows to eat grass with a knife and fork].

I know that it’s not really that big a deal but I think I have a legitimate reason for complaint here. That reason is – it’s bloody hard enough to tell them apart as it is!!!

If anyone asks if I can tell them apart, I will always say yes. Mostly, that’s true. I would say that I get it right at least 95% of the time but the converse is that I get it wrong one attempt in twenty. In my defense, they are very similar looking and because we like to make things difficult for ourselves, we normally dress them the same. I normally get the name wrongs in situations where I am under a little duress, say if one of the boys are in the process of waving a glass around in one hand [obviously a completely hypothetical situation that would never happen under my watch so there is no need whatsoever to call social services!!]. Who can be blamed for calling out the first name that comes to mind?

So, if they are both calling each other Fat Chops, I can see my percentage dropping a couple of points. I might be lucky to clear 90%. I only hope that I get it right when it is important.

My sister-in-law [DQ] has twin girls [Skittles & Cahoots *see footnote] who aren’t genetically identical but I can only tell them apart by a freckle on Skittles cheek. She tells a funny story about one day where Skittles committed some misdemeanor [I can’t remember what it was, there are frequent infractions and it’s hard to keep track]. DQ found out from their big sister which of them was guilty and proceeded to read the riot act. She read chapter and verse, loudly and at length, barely pausing for breath. Eventually she stopped to allow the blood to subside from her face. The admonished child looked up and said “I’m not Skittles, I’m Cahoots” and turned on her heel. In the end Skittles got off scot free because DQ couldn’t muster the rage to go through it all again. Another scary glimpse into my future. I can only hope that my pair don’t develop the habit of answering to both their name and their siblings.



*Skittles was so named because of something that happened a while ago while she was on a sleepover in our house. Hannah went to the shop and got sweets as a treat for her and her sister who was staying with a different uncle. We picked them up from my mother-in-laws house and Cahoots left without bringing her sweets with her. We watched some TV that night with Skittles and she ate her sweets while we sat on the couch. The next afternoon, Cahoots came in, saw her sister with the other bag of sweets and started a row. Hannah took Skittles aside and asked her if she was eating Cahoots’s sweets. Skittles protested her innocence replying deadpan “these are my sweets, I ate Cahoots sweets last night”.

Cahoots is rarely the ring leader and mostly gets into trouble when she is in cahoots with Skittles or someone else.

Random Bullets

Presenting to you, a brain dump in bullets....

• The Muppets version of Bohemian Rhapsody is an absolute gem. Go and look it up on YouTube right now, I’ll wait for you. http://tinyurl.com/37b7b4n My boys absolutely love it. I used to love sitting them on my knee in front of the laptop and watching it with them. Now I find that it is much more fun to stand behind the lap top and watch their impersonation of Animal. Hilarious!

• Happy Birthday to Dusty! The boys’ cousin celebrated his first birthday at the weekend. Can’t believe that it has been a year already. He got a great present from his grandparents – a mini bouncy castle. My boys decided that the motor was too loud and refused to get on it. Cowards!! Especially bad when Dusty, who can’t walk yet, was happy as a pig in muck sitting in on it and being bounced from pillar to post by the other children there. Update: turns out he can walk, he celebrated his first birthday by taking his first steps – two and a stumble according to reports – and then by keeping his father awake all night.

• Monkey Boy got the end of an ice cream at Dusty’s party the other day. It was a Brunch, which, for the uninitiated, is one of those ice creams covered in biscuit crumbs. He was delighted with it and perched himself on his Nana’s knee to eat it. The child is destined to be rich and pampered because every time he took a lick and got one of the crumbs he would stick his tongue out until Nana removed the little lump. He got very cross when Nana got talking to someone and was quick enough cleaning his tongue and absolutely furious when I attempted to take it off him to remove the crumbs. Precious little pet!

• The boys are over their stomach issues and are either eating to make up for lost time or are in the middle of a growth spurt. Either way, there is no satisfying their appetite the last few days. On Saturday they started off by having a few cheerios in a cup while I got their breakfast , then they ate all their breakfast, then they had some of my breakfast [and would have drank my coffee if I let them!!]. Then they had more cheerios followed by some of my toast, then they moaned until I gave them a biscuit. Then they demonstrated that they have added a new word to their vocabulary and I heard “more”, over and over and over. That brought us up to 9.30am! It was a long day trying to keep them fed.

• Tiny dancer – Regular readers will now that I have issues with child performers but my budding superstar turned his performance into a health hazard. Monkey Boy was doing the hot dog dance from the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse the other day. He was really getting into it, waving his hands in the air and working the hips. He was shaking his bootie so enthusiastically that he actually unbalanced himself and narrowly missed hitting his head off the corner of the TV unit. As usual, I was trying to get the camcorder ready instead of being on hand to catch him!

Pushy Parents

Pushy Parents

I am what they call a basketball lifer. During the season I will play a couple of times a week, I coach a local boys team and I am involved in the administration of the local club. I’m lucky that my wife also plays basketball so there is some tolerance of my borderline obsession. Still, she understands me reading books like The Jordan Rules and The Miracle of St. Anthony’s [can’t recommend it enough] about as much as I understand why she won’t miss an episode of Glee. I play in a social game over the summer and was catching up with an old team mate that I hadn’t seen in a few months last night. [We’ll call him Truck in case I need to refer to him later, he will never be mistaken for a finesse player.] He was asking about the boys and asked had I bought them a basketball yet on the assumption that I would be encouraging them to play the game.

Pushing them to play a game that I love is something that I am quite nervous about. When you read about people like Andre Agassi and how he hated his father for how he pushed him to play tennis from a young age, I would almost prefer that they never played. Then you see someone like Richard Williams with Serena and Venus and you think about all the opportunities that tennis has given them [not to mention the financial security] and you think that it would be a good thing. Yes, I am assuming that should my boys play they are going to be elite athletes! Seriously, I’ve made great friends from the sport and it has given me health, confidence and social skills that I may not have otherwise had. How could you not want that for your own kids?

Encouraging them to play a different sport that I don’t know as well might be a good compromise but I keep finding reasons to prefer basketball. Soccer seems like a good choice but Ireland does not have the kind of climate where I look forward to shouting encouragement on a windswept pitch in January. Worst part is that in order for their soccer career to reach its logical conclusion, [superstardom naturally!] they will probably have to go to an English club in their early teenage years. Somehow I can choose to gloss over the fact that basketball superstardom means sending them off to the US at some point. Rugby is the one professional sport that could keep them in Ireland but it promises a future of me shivering on the side wondering if cauliflower ears are an acceptable alternative to concussions or dislocated shoulders. Canoe Polo is very popular in our locale but Weill’s disease looms large over that. It all makes you want to wrap them in cotton wool and leave them play Xbox in the relative safety of their room except then I will fret over lack of social skills and poor posture.

The fact is that they will have every opportunity to play basketball. From the time they have been old enough to leave the house they have been dragged along to games I was either playing or coaching and I don’t see that changing while my knees are still strong enough to get me up and down the court. Hopefully they will like it and hopefully I will be encouraging and supportive without pushing them to do the things that I always wanted to do within the sport.

My other dilemma is about encouraging them to develop their burgeoning musical talent. Again, the assessment of this talent is taken through my parent tinted glasses and this post should be viewed in that context. Monkey Boy is a singer though. He can’t pronounce the words but he will sing along to The Wiggles and comes in at the right places in the right tone [so I’m told, he didn’t inherit any musical talent from me, I love music but am tone deaf]. Lately, Hannah has been listening to the song Hey Soul Sister by Train. MB loves it. He cheerfully blabs along to the song and complains loudly when the next one comes on the radio. While I am nervous about them playing basketball, encouraging them to follow an interest in singing downright scares me. The reason being that every time I see a young kid on “Britain’s Got Talent” or equivalent “talent” show, I take an instant and passionate dislike to them. I’m not even sure why I hate them but I definitely do hate them. Child stars raise an urge to violence in me that few other things do.

It reminds me of a time when I saw Chris Rock being interviewed. He was talking about how when he was young he used to look at the rich kids around him and how he hated them, mostly out of jealousy. Now, he looks at his kids and obviously they lead a privileged lifestyle and there is a bit of Chris that still hates the rich kids, even when they are his own flesh and blood!!

I don’t want to be conflicted like that. I don’t want to bring my sons to a recital and teeter between parental pride and a violent loathing of the cocky little kid on the stage. The best example, [or worst] is those kids on Barney. They are completely unbearable, the nicer they act, the more they irritate me. The quickest way to aggravate me is to say that my boys could one day grow up to be the next Jedward. The world doesn’t need the original version of these over-enthusiastic, under-talented wannabe’s, never mind a sequel.

Then again, maybe it’s just arrogance on my part to assume that I get a say in these things. The sooner I accept that my job is to support and encourage them no matter what they choose to do, the better for all concerned. This unconditional love thing is difficult to get used to!

You can follow the further adventures on the boys' facebook page.
http://tinyurl.com/27ehb8y

Mail any queries, questions or comments to fatchopsmonkeyboy@gmail.com

It Runs In The Family - part II

This time the title is less literal you will be glad to know.

Anyone who thought that the penalty shootout between Paraguay and Japan was dramatic should have been there for the battle of wills between Hannah and Fat Chops. Our presses under the sink are angled in such a way that we can't put child locks on them. That means we have to rely on discipline and on Sunday evening, before he took ill, Fat Chops felt like testing the boundaries. He opened both of them wide and made like he was going to start exploring, Hannah caught him and asked him to close the doors. He looked at her, measured what she was saying and decided to continue his exploration. Hannah raised her voice slightly and deepened her tone.

"Close the door please."

He looked up again and found himself caught in her steely gaze. What to do now? He knew that she wasn't playing around but there were a bunch of colourful bottles beckoning him into the press. They caught eyes and stared each other down. Myself and Monkey Boy were on the other side of the kitchen transfixed and afraid to make any noise. Eventually, Hannah broke the tense silence.

"Close. The. Door. Please."

I started to feel sorry for the poor child, he shouldn't have to make these tough decisions. He's not even two yet! Hannah sensed that he was starting to waiver and pressed home her advantage.

"CLOSE. THE. DOOR."

Finally, he broke and slowly, reluctantly closed the presses but in the back of my head I heard what sounded a lot like Stewie Griffin's voice.

"You may have won the battle this time wench, but the war is far from over."

As the saying goes, he didn’t lick his stubborn streak off a stone. It’s going to be interesting to see how the battles pan out down the road.

It Runs In The Family - part I

It Runs In The Family

I've been trying to do two posts a week but found it tough this week. A stomach bug is making its way through the household and myself and Hannah have been up to our elbows in dirty nappies while dealing with our own digestion issues. Hence the title - see what I did there!! Here goes a brief running diary of the week – I did it again!!

It started well, Saturday was great. We went out to visit my mother and then took her and the kids up to the local park where we met my brother, his wife, his kid and his nephew. My sister also came over to say hello. It was a glorious sunny afternoon and the boys loved running around in the wide open spaces. I’m sure that it’s a good thing that my boys aren’t clingy but it would be nice if they looked around from time to time just so I could pretend that they cared where I was.

A little aside about my nephew. The child loves food. Really loves it. My mother made us all chips for lunch. At one stage my brother was trying to cool a chip so he could give it to Fat Chops. FC took the chip but quickly handed it back because it was too hot. I had to laugh because not only did my nephew have an un-cooled chip in his mouth but he had one in each hand too. From here on in, he will be referred to as Dusty, short for Dusty Bin but he came very, very close to being stuck with Fatter Chops.

At the park I witnessed the first recorded incident of the boys bullying another kid. My brother’s nephew had brought a little ball with him that my boys quickly adopted. It didn’t seem to bother him at the time but at one stage he decided he would like to play with his own ball and had the temerity to kick it away from Monkey Boy. Well, MB let him no in no uncertain terms and at the top of his voice that this would not be tolerated. Then, in an unusual outbreak of teamwork, Fat Chops followed up by chasing Dusty's cousin off. There was no more attempts to play with the ball. As much as I was unhappy with the bullying, it was nice to see them working together for a change.

On Monday the bug got a foothold in the house and started to make itself at home. We got up in the morning and Fat Chops started to gag as I was getting him dressed. He followed it up with a NASTY nappy afterwards. And we were off and running – last one, I promise. We commenced a program of withholding food on the assumption that it would pass within 24 hours.

On Tuesday morning at about 3am I heard the porcelain telephone ringing with an urgent call for me. I ended up having a long conversation and the following morning realized that I wouldn’t be able to go to work as I couldn’t risk a forty minute car journey without toilet facilities. Being generally a positive person I tried to make the best of it. I went back to bed and caught up with some sleep in between dashes to the en suite and then settled down to watch the World Cup match in the afternoon. Unfortunately, Paraguay versus Japan was not a great contest and did little to lift my spirits until the penalty shootout. I soon realized that I was in a better place than the poor Japanese player who missed the crucial kick.

The hardest part of the whole episode came on Tuesday evening. Obviously the boys couldn't be sick at the same time so we had the joys of trying to starve Monkey Boy while surreptitiously feeding Fat Chops. I put on two slices of toast for the increasingly badly named Fat Chops without thinking and cut it into small pieces for Hannah to feed him while I tried to entertain Monkey Boy. They don’t miss many tricks anymore though. I had only turned my back for a minute and he had opened the bin and was straining on his tippy toes trying to reach the crusts that I had just thrown in there. It's bizarre dragging your son away from the bin knowing on one hand how funny an image that is while your heart is breaking that you can't give him a biscuit or a bottle to ease his hunger pangs.

There was one other silver lining from the week. The boys are at an age where they only ever remain still if the Wiggles are on TV. Since they were feeling lethargic after the bug they were more than happy to cuddle up with me on the couch and watch Spongebob Squarepants [I could probably write a whole other post about how sneakily inappropriate parts of that show are. I love it!]. It’s a rare treat as it is and soon they will be disgusted by the mere thought of sharing a couch with their parents so we made the most of it.

Who's Your Dada??

I’m conflicted about the boys growing up. On one hand, they are great at the minute and part of me wants them to stay that cute forever. That part of me is not keen on sharing a house with two smelly teenage boys. That part wants the relatively uncomplicated relationship where everything can be smoothed over with a bottle.

Then there is the other part. The competitive part of me wants my boys to be bigger, stronger, faster, smarter and generally better than all their peers. The competitive part wants them playing piano concerto’s by the time they are three and dunking a basketball by the time they are nine [I never claimed that the competitive part of me had reasonable expectations!] The competitive part certainly wants them to have more than a dozen, mostly mispronounced, words in their vocabulary by the time they are two. That is where we stand with just over three months to their second birthday though.

I know the rational arguments for not getting too bothered about it, that twins normally speak later than singletons [that word never sits well with me but they use it a lot of articles about twins so I’m going to run with it] and that all kids take their own time about developing but I do get a little impatient with the lack of conversation. I think that they get frustrated themselves too. Since they can’t say “I don’t want the blue brick you clown, pass me the green ball behind you” they just scream and gesture as I pass them every object within reach except the green ball.

The list of words includes; hello, no, bye bye, NO, more, NNOOOO, choo choo, quack, NO, Mama, bo-bo [meaning bottle] and one or two others. Then they have the master word – Nahneh. This has come to mean; mama, Hannah, nana, I want that and, most annoyingly, dad.

Fat Chops is especially fond of it and has been known to repeat it over and over and over to get your attention. Having your full attention is not a deterrent for him, he will just continue to call you and if you happen to be holding him while he is calling you, he will pat you repeatedly on the face with each “Nahneh” just to make sure you couldn’t possibly think about something else.

The other day I took a stand and decided it was time he learned how to say Dada, leading to this exchange;

Fat Chops: Nahneh [beckoning me to follow him]

Karlos: Say Dada.

FC: Dada [with an “if you insist” expression]

Karlos: Good boy.

FC: Nahneh [beckoning for me to follow him again]

Karlos: My name is Dada

FC: Nahneh, nahneh, nahneh [getting impatient that I haven’t followed him yet]

Karlos: My name is Dada

FC: Nahneh

Karlos: Dada [pointing at my chest]

FC: Dada [pointing at his chest wondering what I am rattling on about]]

I gave up soon after that, not because I’m a quitter but because I felt guilty when he started copying me as I banged my head off the wall in frustration. Guess he will get there in his own time!

Showing Off

All parents are guilty of this, we all love to show off our children. I am worst than most in this regard. I am so convinced that my boys are so much cuter and funnier than other children that I’ve felt obliged to write a blog. In my mind, I am providing a public service for those poor souls who can’t experience the daily joys of spending time with my boys [by the way, you’re welcome]. Fact is though, all parents partake in the baby Olympics and most of us try to teach them some party tricks for special occasions.

The best part is that you don’t have to work on anything complex to impress people. Any mundane task is inherently funnier when it is done by a small child and even more so when there are two matching children. A couple of weeks ago I was driving along and Fat Chops starting singing away to himself. It’s not uncommon to see people do this while this stuck in traffic and it’s only mildly amusing unless they have forgotten that other people can see them and they are belting out their favourite power ballad with much gusto. It’s funny when it is done by a small child. It’s even funnier when that small child has his finger up his nose as far as the second knuckle [another all too common sight while sitting in traffic!]

The old reliable that always raises a smile is the cheesy grin. It evolved from when they cut their first teeth and used to scrunch their face up and bare the first buds of their teeth for admiration from Aunts, Uncles and Grandparents. Now it comes out every time that someone points a camera in their direction. It’s far from photogenic but it means that I have lots of material for the slideshow at their 21st birthday/graduation/wedding.

Lately the boys are in a phase of “Monkey Boy see, Monkey Boy do” making them great students for little party tricks. Hannah was watching MTV a couple of weeks ago when Beyonce’s Single Ladies video came on. She was dancing around with the boys and started imitating some of the moves. Before you could say “wannabe”, the boys were waving their hands in the air to show where the diamonds should go. The way that the boys dance gets me every time. They love the music and have some rhythm but they don’t quite have the requisite co-ordination just yet. Instead we get a half squatting position, a nappy being swung from side to side and two little fists pumping the air.

My favourite by a long way is “The Guns”. We were drying the boys after a bath a couple of weeks ago and for no good reason I thought that it would be fun to see if the boys would do the traditional body builder pose and show off their huge arms. I demonstrated first, flexed the biceps and posed. Then I held the boys arms up to see if they would do it. Fat Chops wasn’t too fussed, he is happy enough with the attention he gets for his cheesy grin. Monkey Boy exceeded my greatest hopes though. Not only did he strike the pose but his knuckles went white, he was clenching his fists so hard. The cherry on top was the fact that he gritted his teeth, furrowed his brow and grimaced as if struggling with a heavy weight. I nearly choked with laughter!

Has anyone got any tips for other little tricks I can try teach them? You can comment below or else I can be reached on;

http://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Adventures-of-Fat-Chops-and-Monkey-Boy#!/pages/The-Adventures-of-Fat-Chops-and-Monkey-Boy/103930629654103?ref=sgm

mailto: fatchopsmonkeyboy@gmail.com

I've asked Tamba to post a link to the blog and they kindly agreed as long as I posted a return link so here it is.

http://www.tamba.org.uk/Page.aspx?pid=195

Lot's of great advice for parents of twins on there.