toddler ootd

The girls have a better wardrobe than me. Here is what they wore today:

We have had Claire's jeans for over a year- Audrey wore them at 10 months!

Sending grandma a quick text.

Audrey questioned the styling choice of leaving her shirt unbuttoned.

Claire provided reassurance that she was "so pretty".

Audrey added a hat and shoes to complete her look.

the anatomy of a tantrum: aka why the barnes and noble kids section should not be free range

Pre kids Justin and I were convinced that our future children would never act like monsters in public. Even after having the girls and with multiple successful outings under our belts we would exchange glances when we saw other people's children in full on beast mode and whisper "aren't you glad our girls aren't like that?"

Well fast forward to the terrible twos. Our outings have become brief and infrequent. The girls no longer are content sitting in their stroller as we wander the aisles of target. I should have taken that as a sign, but I thought today would be different.

So I decided to go to barnes and noble. Without the stroller.

Our outing started out positively lovely. There was only one high chair, but Audrey sat nicely in the regular chair. The girls said please, thank you, and you are welcome as we discussed if we preferred red velvet cupcakes or triple chocolate cookies.

After we finished our treats, I decided to go check out the kids section against my better judgement. 

It started out quite nice actually, with the girls showing me different books and toys and putting them back. The spent some time playing with the legos too. Then Claire decided that she was going to run. And then Audrey ran too, but in the opposite direction. I used what can only be described as a herd dog technique to get them in the same general vicinity. Then Claire decided she wanted more treats, so I was able to grab them both n their way up the stairs. Exhausted, I just wanted to put their safety harnesses on and get out the door. But Claire managed to break loose. She giggled and ran up to the front of the store. Looking like a crazy person, I positioned myself on the floor and did a bit of a tackle maneuver, got them both leased and ready to go. Mind you this was in the very front of the store. In front of everyone, high school kids; sweet old ladies, you name it. Which I why I think the kids section should be fenced in. That way the epic tantrum would only be seen by other parents. Ones who could relate. Or judge me silently. But I digress.

Now we were ready to make our way out the door. Twin toddlers, their overwhelmed mother, and two sips of a venti chai tea latte. In hindsight, I should have just thrown away my tea in the store, but that would have meant 1. finding a garbage can an 2. throwing away $0.23. So I did what any respectable mother would do in that situation and let Audrey carry it.

I'm not sure if you've ever tried carrying two tantruming toddlers, but I imagine it is akin to walking around with a 60 pound octopus. We made it out to the parking lot where a sweet man was walking in with his wife and 2 orderly children and commented that I needed an extra set of hands. Yes sir, I do... Is that an offer? 

Justin was just telling me the other night how he thinks twins are soooo much easier than two different aged kids. Clearly he has never attempted to take them out in public alone. At least a baby could be strapped to my person (hmm... perhaps I could try wearing Claire?)

We made it home, with some dignity inact (only because I'm not a yeller). After we were all inside the house, Audrey gave me the biggest unprovoked hug. As if to say "thank you for taking us out for a treat, sorry we were so wild".

Hmmm, perhaps we should go to the mall tomorrow?

my little big girl

Claire decided that she would rather cuddle with me than take a proper nap. I didn't mind one bit.

claire and audrey are 2!

We celebrated the girls' golden birthday over the weekend. We had so much fun celebrating with family. 

The girls received lots of great new toys and clothes. One of their favorite gifts was new water bottles from Aunt Katelyn- Audrey wants to take it with her everywhere, she even requests it at bedtime.

Speaking of bedtime, the girls have been consistently sleeping through the night since they transitioned to toddler beds. We did the whole cry it out thing at bedtime when they were younger, but could never really handle the whole screaming at 3 am thing. It was so much easier to just give them some milk (or cheese) and have the ordeal stop in 5 min versus crying for an hour plus. Bedtime continues to be 6pm- they seem to wake up at 6am regardless of what time they go to sleep, so the earlier bedtime works well for us.

The girls amaze me everyday with their vocabulary. Typically Claire starts the day by calling out "mommy up". We were having breakfast yesterday morning and I told Audrey that I was having an Asiago bagel- Audrey repeated Asiago. Later in the day, she was playing with her new car and she proclaimed "go for a ride in the car car".

Claire is rather talkative, but seems to have her own special language. However she certainly makes demands known. Yesterday, her first request of the day was for broccoli. Keep in mind we had plenty of leftover treats from the part sitting out, but no, the girl wanted broccoli. I have no clue where she got that from.

The girls remain adventurous eaters- we haven't encountered anything that they refuse to eat yet. They love their fruits and veggies. They received an awesome game called "Seek-a-boo"- the girls can identify what is an almost every card. They were going through them this morning and could identify apple, banana, and broccoli. They got to cookie though and were stumped. Oops.

The girls went swimming in an indoor pool for the first time yesterday. We went to visit Nanny and Papa at their hotel. The girls were definitely not impressed. We stayed in the pool for maybe five minutes. Claire cried pretty much the whole time. Audrey enjoyed it a bit more, but we decided we would have more fun playing at home.

One of their favorite activities is reading. They will bring books over and say "read to". They do a great job of reading to us. They received the book "The Goodnight Train" for their birthday and that is a new favorite. It has all of their favorite things- trains, pigs, and owls. Claire is especially enamored with the owl page- she looks at it for several minutes, says "pretty owl", and pointed out the different body parts.

five things

Claire and Audrey both love the pillows that my mom made. I store one upstairs and the other downstairs- they sit together so nicely on them.

Audrey loves her sissy.

Party prep is in full swing.

Audrey helps with laundry.

In Claire's world, potty training means no pants or shirt.

they grow up too fast

During bath time today Audrey proclaimed "privacy mommy" and proceeded to shut the shower curtain.

Let's revisit this subject in a few years.

not a total betty, but a vast improvement

I have been spending way too much time at I heart organizing lately. Not only have I started a household management binder, complete with budgets, accounts, passwords, and cleaning schedule and a meal planning/recipe binder, but I also started an overhaul of the kitchen cabinets. Because really, how else would I spend a Saturday night?

Here is the before. Now just hold your judgement and be happy that I am indulging your voyueristic fantasies, mmkay?

Basically a disaster. In shambles if you will. Here is the after, the product of 2 hours and 2 glasses of late harvest Riesling.

It is kind of hard to tell, but one of the main tasks was setting up a work lunch zone. There is a spot for our lunch bags and containers. The snacks are able to be on a high (to me) shelf because of an awesome folding stool that I got from my mom that really should have been featured on my favorite things list, but I digress.

This little pantry project set several other mini projects into action. If you have a lazy susan you should store pots and pans in it instead of food. We made this change about a year ago and never looked back. I added the colander and boil over stopper (that's the technical term) to my large stockpot because they are rarely used without each other. Remember, like with like and one home for everything.

I moved rarely used small appliances to the top shelf in the pantry which freed up quite a bit of space in the island.

The cabinet that houses my pans, bowls, and cutting boards was also looking good. The removal of the colander made a huge difference.

I was repeating my "like with like and one home for everything mantra" and had the brilliant idea to put my bread pans, measuring spoons, and cooling rack with the flour and kosher salt. We've been eating exclusively homemade bread for the past couple of months, and the only time I use my measuring spoons is for baking (I just wing it when I cook) so it just made sense.

I decided to go through my utensil drawer next. There are several items I only use a handful of times a year, so it didn't make sense for them to take up premium real estate. I relocated them to a basket in the island:

Which left the utensil drawer looking like this:

The best part of this project is that it cost $0. I had the storage basket on hand, and everything else was simply relocated.  Be ruthless when you tackle your kitchen- if you hang on to something you don't use you are paying twice, once for the item itself and again in wasted real estate.

Next up are the kitchen counters. I am in awe of people that have miles of uncluttered counter space.