Zooper Double Stoller Giveaway

One very lucky reader of Two of a Kind, Working on a Full House blog will win this stroller:

It is a 2009 Tango Double Stoller by Zooper.
Current retail price for this stroller is $499.99

Find out how you could win by visiting Two of a Kind here.

Quick and Easy Dessert

I remembered at 11 o’clock this evening that after Gavin’s kindergarten graduation tomorrow there is a potluck lunch in the kindergarten playground. I hadn’t made anything or didn’t have anything at home I could throw together. So I made a late night run up to the grocery store to rummage something together to make. I decided on my quick and easy, family favorite dessert. I call it “Pineapple Mush Cake.”  So I thought I’d do a first here in my blog and share the recipe.

Here is what you’ll need:

One 10 oz. Angel Food Bundt Cake
One 20 oz. can crushed pineapple
4-6 vanilla pudding cups
One 8 oz. tub of whipped topping

Step One: Break Angel Food Cake into bite size pieces into large mixing bowl.

Step Two: Drain crushed pineapple in colander and add to bowl with angel food cake.

Step Three: Add 4-6 vanilla pudding cups, 5 always seems to be my maximum.

Step Four: Fold ingredients together, then spread in a 9x13in pan.

Final Step: Spread whipped topping on top.

It can be served right away, but I always allow it to chill in fridge overnight or at least a couple hours. Use serving spoon to dish out.

I started making this at 12:15am and was finished at 12:30am, it’s that quick and easy. And it is soooo yummy. Very light and refreshing. You can even tweak it now and then by adding chopped nuts, or chopped maraschino cherries or crushed mandarin orange slices. If you make this for a get together, be sure to have the recipe with you because people will want it. I always bring a few copies with me.  This dessert can also be made as a diabetic dessert or low calorie dessert. Just use sugar free angel food cake, sugar free pudding cups, lite whipped topping and make sure pineapple has no added sugar.

Enjoy!

Time and Energy

Okay, after sitting here eyeballing my keyboard for the last 3 minutes, I’m finally going to make some keystrokes. Writers block sucks. I could once again sit here and type about how much of a horrible blogger I am. I could apologize again for not posting more often. And I could promise, again, that I will get better at this.I.promise.

The time I find to blog is, most often, after the rest of the house is deep in slumber. I’ll sit on the couch after having watched my tv shows I DVR’d, glance at the clock and think, to blog or not to blog. I’m so tired at that point that all I really want to do is just sink deep into my pillow and drift off. I’ll tell myself, I’ve got nothing interesting to write about. How do other moms find the time or even the leftover brain energy to get creative with what they post?

While I’m on that subject, lets go further. Moms that scrapbook, sew, quilt, you know the ones.. those crafty moms. Where the heck do they drum up the time or energy for such extra curricular activities? My boys, including twin toddlers I might add, keep me going all day long. Not to mention the laundry, the cleaning, the cooking, hell.. I can’t even remember the last time I picked up my toilet brush and put it to it’s intended use. Will that time come? Will I ever be able to even think of organizing my 1st floor bathroom linen closet? Or even catch up on the twins baby books?

I get so frustrated lately. I’m, well I used to be anyway, a perfectionist. I like things just so. No wonder I can’t get my 6yr old to do any chores, I can barely do them myself. How the heck are my children going to learn to appreciate the comfort of a well maintained home if I can’t find the time to make it that way. For pete’s sake, my 6yr old will open a snack and just literally throw the wrapper on his bedroom floor. Then he’ll take the scissors and cut it up into tiny little pieces and toss them on his floor. I can’t get him to respect his toys. It’s as if he doesn’t care. And I blame myself, because I can’t teach him. I just don’t have the fricken time!!!

In other news.. I met this woman at the last mom of twins meeting. Her art I’m dying to learn. She is amazing! Can’t wait to take one of her classes.

Brown Frog

It’s been awhile and I’ve been a bad blogger again.  We’re just getting over our 3rd round this year of the stomach flu in our house. We just can’t seem to get rid of it. As I knock on wood, I have to mention that so far, I’ve been spared. Probably because I’m washing my hands so many times a day. I’m proof in the fact that hand-washing is the greatest defense.

I’ve been twittering a lot lately. My older son gave me a wireless router and I’ve been wi-fi’ing it with my iTouch iPod. I love that I can check my email, facebook, twitter, etc from anywhere in the house.  If you have a Twitter account, there’s a link to follow me under the “Things To Do” list on my left sidebar.  Be sure and let me know and I’ll follow you back.

I’ll leave you with a funny story that happened since my last post.  So often I find myself way behind on housework. Laundry piling up, toilets looking pretty disgusting, etc. I like it when I have reinforcements here, like my mom or aunt, that way I can get some things done and not have to worry about what the boys are up to.  So with the pile of laundry touching the ceiling in my laundry room, I decided to bite the bullet, run downstairs and spend 5 mintues to throw a load in. I started the twins Elmo video and knew I’d only be downstairs for a few minutes. And I that’s all it was. A few minutes.

As I got back upstairs and headed toward the living room where they were playing, Brady greeted me in the hallway. His diaper was missing. No diaper. Bare-ass naked. Suddenly he holds up his hands saying “uh-oh”  Upon closer inspection I realize his hands are covered in poop. I let out this loud.. “Noooooooo!!!” with a desperate ”why me” tone to it.  At the end of the hallway, in the doorway of the spare bedroom, there on the floor lies a small pile of poop. Then another pile, and another pile. Apparently they had fun while mommy threw a load of laundry in. The bottom of both their feet was covered in it. Surprisingly, Brady’s bumm was completely clean. He must have lost the diaper before taking a crap on my wood floors. I’m trying to clean it up and it’s mushed in the cracks of the wood flooring. I’m forced to use a tooth pic to get it all. The two of them were immediately placed in the empty tub while I cleaned. Then they got a bath.

I tell you, I hear horror stories of the brown fish found in bath tubs.  What would you call it on dry land? A brown frog?

Memories Not For Sale

During the past week I’d been getting ready for a big Mom-to-Mom sale. Since the twins are the last children I’ll have, as they grow out of things I can get rid of them not thinking “I should probably keep this incase we have another baby.” I tend to be a hoarder with stuff like that. I come about it honestly. My mother was always one of those “we might need that one day” kind of people. But since becoming a mom of multiples, it means multiples of stuff. Stuff everywhere. We still have boxes of stuff from our move 19 months ago that haven’t even been opened. I often wonder, if I haven’t missed it in 19 months, would I ever miss it at all?

One thing I do miss, that I can never have back, is my babies. Today, while packing up for the sale, I picked up a tiny tiny pair of little baby booties. One of them could literally just fit over my thumb. I actually began to well up inside. My babies are gone. Those little tiny beings that use to curl up in a little ball on my chest are now running through the house and talking and trying to escape every saftey obstacle I put in their way.

I knew the twins would be my last. And I swear I’ve tried to cherrish every single moment. I try hard to not miss a thing. I’ve relished every milestone. And even though I know there’s so much more of them yet to come. I still miss their infancy. And oh.. oh.. oh.. that smell!!!!

They’re on-the-constant-go toddlers now. Forever investigating every little thing. They’re imitating real life things now. One of their favorite things is to help me clean. They won’t let me craddle them anymore. But they will sit on a lap for a story couple pages from a book.

I can’t help remembering how tiny and helpless they were just 19 months ago. And as I sold their baby stuff in the sale today, every article that exchanged hands, I relived the memories that went with it.

One week old in a cast of my pregnant belly.

Spring Forward, UGH!

The boys are feeling much better and back to themselves. Gavin did end up coming down with it. He was sick Thursday night and missed school on Friday. He was back to school today. He threw up so hard that he ended up with lots of petechiae (peh-TEH-kee-a) all over his face.

This “spring forward” thing is a whole ‘nother ballgame though. Who would have thought an hour lost would completely mess with my world. The twins are still on Standard Time. So everything about their day is an hour behind. And that’s screws with my day like nobody’s business. Gavin starts kindergarten at 12:25pm. It’s during his 3 hour day at school that the twins are suppose to be napping. Today they didn’t go down until after 1:30pm. Even then they were talking and playing in their cribs for a good hour before finally boring each other to sleep. I had to wake them up at 4:15pm. I don’t know how I’m going to get them back to their 8:30am – 8:30pm schedule. It’s going to take at least a week to adjust.

Friday I paid to rent some space for a Mom-to-Mom sale at a nearby Trade Center/Flea Market. Hoping to get rid of a lot of baby stuff. I’ve been going through it little by little since Friday. Tonight I was sorting and pricing until 2am.

Here’s what my sorting looked like. See that tiny little bare spot on the center of the couch? That’s where I was sitting. Surrounded by a year and a half worth of twin baby clothes. If anyone was due to have twin boys in July, they could have all the clothes they’d need for at least the entire first year.

Misery Loves Company

Last Thursday night around 2am Brady woke up screaming. This wasn’t his usual “check to see if mom’s paying attention” cry. But more of an urgent cry. As I walked through their bedroom door, that’s when the fog hit me. It was the unmistakable odor of vomit. I took him downstairs to clean him up. Change his jammies and offer a sip of water. Not wanting to wake Blake up, I just layed with Brady on the full mattress on the floor in their room. He snuggled right up and went quickly back to sleep.

That was the beginning of a long night and what was soon to be a long week. Brady continued to throw up almost every half hour to 45 minutes. Every time he’d start to whine and do his “death roll” in the bed, I knew it was coming. I must have changed his jammies 3 times. I layed a huge beach towel down under him and grabbed a stack of recieving blankets from the closet. Blake slept soundly through all of this.

At about 6am, Blake started to stir and whine in his sleep. He didn’t sound too good. I picked him up and then suddenly “BLECH!” He’s throwing up. Most of the day Friday they weren’t keeping much down. They were only getting liquids all day. Just little sips every half hour until they could keep it down. They were miserable Saturday, Sunday and on Monday, the diareah started. They were on plain liquids again yesterday and so far neither has had a dirty diaper. I’m hoping that means it’s about out of their systems.

I felt so sorry for them. Blake’s fever went up to about 103F. Both of them have been clingy and irritable for several days. They’re still not running at 100% and I miss my happy babies. This morning they were back to fighting over the same toy, even though there’s a duplicate toy nearby.

Here’s a picture from Saturday afternoon of my recuperating boys watching their favorite Elmo video.

For Lack of Better Thoughts

Because I’m at a complete loss for words tonight, and since I can’t do a Way Back Whensday on a Thursday, I thought I’d make up my own theme for today. I shall call it, “Throwback Thursday.”

That’s me, August 1973. I was flowergirl in my uncle’s wedding. I was 5yrs old. The dress, I think, was homemade. I remember the material. I remember the flowers and little white dots were raised and felt like velvet. I remember I stayed at someone’s house I’d never been too, but can’t remember who’s house it was. I do remember that at breakfast that morning, I was complaining that my milk was warm (I still hate warm milk to this day); and someone had plopped and ice cube in my milk. I thought it was gross that there was an ice cube floating in my milk. I remember looking at it melting and literally watering down my milk. I have vague memories of the wedding itself. But I remember my necklace, a bridal party gift from the bride. The silver charm was engraved with my initials. And I STILL have it. My uncle and aunt will celebrate their 36th wedding anniversary this August.

Itsy Bitsy Spider

Why is it that a tiny little spider can totally freak me out? I know I’m like a million times bigger than it. I’m sitting here at my computer, no other light but the light from my monitor and out of the corner of my eye, I see movement. To my right I see a spider crawling along the edge of my desk. Now I had recently cleaned my desk, so of course there were no napkins or papers close by. So I had to reach with my feet to grab the garbage pail under my desk right where the spider had stopped and was looking at me. I pulled out a piece of paper from the pail and went for the spider. In the 1.3 seconds it took for me to actually squash the spider, all these scenerios played in my mind. “What if I miss him and he falls to the floor. It’s so dark. I won’t see him. I’ll be afraid to put my feet under the desk. He’s right on the edge corner. It’s possible I’ll slip. Oh just go for it. He see’s it coming. What if he jumps.”

Finally I attacked head on and I won. As I’m squeezing the crumbled up piece of paper with the spider inside, again I’m wondering.. “Is he dead? can he bite me through this paper? What if I throw him in the garbage and he isn’t dead. He’ll get out and come after me.” I knew I wouldn’t be able to sleep two floors up knowing that he might be down here. So I took him to the toilet. There, he’s gone. Better flush it twice.

Dinner with the Boys

Dave was working late tonight, so it was just the boys and I having dinner. I threw a quick kid friendly dinner together (mac-n-cheese with polish kielbasa) Here’s how it all went down.

Twins are in their high chairs. I make Gavin’s plate first and place it in front of him at the table. I cut up some sausage for Blake & Brady. They each have a small plate of sausage with a dap of ketchup and a bowl of mac-n-cheese. Everyone is set and beginning to eat. I grab myself a plate and spoon on some mac-n-cheese. I sit down, take one bite. Gavin wants something to drink. I sit back down, take one bite. Brady points to his bowl and says “more.” I get him more mac and sit down and take one bite off my plate. Blake points to his bowl, “more.” Again I sit and take another bite and Brady want’s more ketchup. Then Blake wants more sausage. Then Brady wants more sausage. Then Brady wants more milk, then Blake wants more milk. I’m up, I’m down. I think I had about 5 bites off my plate in total.

I leave you with some fun video of Blake & Brady.