Sous chefs

We do a lot of cooking and baking in this household. The picture above is our fantastic five in the space where our new oven would go.

Here the oldest three are showing off the Red Velvet cake they made from scratch (someone snuck into the picture). They're on their way to becoming accomplished bakers. Then there are the budding sous chefs...

They are honing their skills in the following areas:

Testing the freshness of ingredients - cinnamon, pepper, cumin, chili powder, and lemonade powder. Here are the twins reacting to the lemonade powder.

Here the WTs are learning about portion control. Hopefully they realized that dumping a whole box of Kix cereal on the floor is not an example of an appropriate serving size.

Micah likes to test the ripeness of oranges by shouting "Boing!" and bouncing the oranges on the ground.

The WTs both know about viscosity. If you are not quick enough when washing their hands, they'll lick the handsoap and exclaim, "Honey!"

Even though James and I do not drink wine, apparently the WTs are practicing wine tasting. They enjoy swishing and spitting out their water, only they like to redrink it.

Micah understands the need to taste test your food. Thankfully when he decided to take one of my teaspoons and drink a spoonful of toilet water, no one had "created" anything in the bowl!

Who knows? One day they may become celebrity chefs. They sure look the part!

WTs go solo and earn their keep

Usually the WTs get in trouble together. Their newest tactic is to divide and conquer. They lull us into complacency by taking turns staying with the rest of the family while the other strikes out on his/her own. At some point we realize that only one WT is present. And that's when we come upon these types of scenes: Micah got a hold of our cinnamon/sugar shaker and decorated the kitchen floor. He was doing some "sand painting" when we caught him, then tried to "help" us clean up by licking up the evidence.

Kara decided to unload the rest of the bottle of Catalina dressing (which she calls "honey") onto her plate. At one point there was spinach on that plate as well. Talk about drowning your salad in dressing! When she was caught (see her very remorseful expression below), she was trying to scoop up dressing with the back of her fork.

We've decided that the WTs need to earn their keep, so here they are participating in chores with their older sibs:

Kara is in the background watching warily, she is afraid of the vaccuum cleaner.

I think Kara enjoyed dusting as it is a quiet activity that involves spraying liquid.

You'll notice the big smile on her face...look who has her hand on the spray bottle trigger...

This is how a sick kid rolls...

Micah had been running a fever, so the WTs and I stayed home from church while the 3OS caught a ride with their Uncle Mike and Aunt Pam. Now, I already know that I cannot use the restroom while I am solo caretaker of the WTs. That's just folly speaking. I had this idea, however, that I could work out in the family room while the WTs played around me. It didn't take long for me to be startled by the absence of noise from the WTs. Instantly, and instinctively, I say, "Don't get into the cabinet!" (visions of soy sauce and peppermint extract go through my head). I jump up to look over the counter and see the cabinet doors closed, so that's not where they have staged their attack. I run over to the front door. Nope, it's locked and our new security door not breached. I hear a small noise from the kitchen and this is what I found:

The WTs had taken a cooling rack off the counter. On the cooling rack were mini baked doughnuts that had (notice the use of the past tense here) chocolate icing on them. The WTs were gleefully and unabashedly licking the icing off of the doughnuts. Before I snapped these pictures, I did take a minute to scoop up any intact doughnuts I could find. I found four.

So this is how a sick kid rolls....

A different kind of blog worthy day

Do you know why this is a different kind of blog worthy day? It's because nothing crazy happened! Okay, Kara slammed the door on Micah's finger; and Micah did climb onto the toy cabinet, get to a plant, and make dirt rain on Kara's head. Still, the 3 OS and I remarked at how "good" the WTs were today. I almost took the twins' temperatures to make sure they were well.

I had a glimmer of hope today that we might just survive twin toddlerdom. Then again, the WTs might be lulling me into a false sense of security to spring a trap on me tomorrow. I put nothing passed them...would you????

Maybe I should invest in Depends...

So I made the mistake of using the bathroom again while the WTs were roaming free and no one else was around. I was gone briefly. I mean it, I didn't even bring a book with me. Oops, sorry, too much information. Anyway, when I opened the door to the bathroom, I was hit with an unmistakable sign of trouble...silence. My first thought was to check the front door. No, the child lock we placed on it was still intact. Gate to the stairs? Undisturbed. Hmmm, the kitchen! Here is what I found.I wish this was a scratch and sniff picture so you can smell what I smelled. The picture is not as impressive, but when you combine soy sauce with an emptied bottle of peppermint extract, it is an assault on the senses. When you look at this next picture, keep in mind that peppermint extract is 89% alcohol. And Kara is holding the empty bottle. I think I got intoxicated while cleaning up the mess. The smell was so potent even after the clean-up, that I had to open a window and run a fan so we could eat in the kitchen. This kind of mess is pretty standard around our house. What happened a few hours later is not so standard. Princess Kara came running in to alert me about some great danger to the kingdom.

The alert was warranted. Rogue knight Micah was depositing land mines for unsuspecting victims. Yes, there was my child doing something none of my others have ever done. He was pantless, diaperless, and heedless to how grossed out his mother would become when she caught him. I won't go into detail in case some of you are eating, but suffice it to say that "carpet cleaning" became part of the day's agenda.

To follow-up on my microwave saga, I did buy a new microwave that works wonderfully. Two words on the box really clinched the sale for me. Included in the microwave's features is.....a "child lock." Think I might need that???????

Short and quick (like the twins)

It's late, I'm tired, this is going to be short and quick.

This morning the twins and I went for a walk (I walked, they rode in their double stroller chariot) with my friend Pam and her doggie. And because this is me and I had the WTs, something had to happen. The stroller broke. Thankfully we were close to our destination when it happened. I was crossing the street, hit the little curb thing to get onto the sidewalk, and crack! One of the front wheels broke inward. This particular wheel had been repaired before, so it was already weakened.

Pam two-wheeled the stroller back while I had a twin in each hand. That was slow going. Micah wanted to stop constantly, and Kara was flipping out because Pam was taking her beloved mode of transportation away (When we were in China, she'd cry when we took her out of the stroller. We would call it the "empress' chariot.")

After the traumatic walk, I took the WTs to the grocery store (you're right, I am not a bright person). I loaded the WTs into one of those "cool carts" which is a cart attached to a plastic car. I don't know what the turning radius is on that thing, but maneuvering it was like taking the Suburban through an obstacle course designed for a VW bug.

I thought I'd try to be considerate to my fellow shoppers by keeping the Behemoth as far to the right as possible, making it easy to pass us. What I didn't think about was that it also put all the merchandise within arm's length of the WTs. Thank God (literally) we were not by glass bottles when I discovered this. I looked down and saw that Micah had piled an assortment of plastic containers into the car. A little while later, I caught sight of something flying through the air. It was Micah's shoes. Kara had removed her socks and shoes, but had been kind enough to just drop them out of the car instead of launch them. I cut the shopping trip short.

I let the WTs play outside. They found water and rocks mixed together. When I discovered them, Kara was shoeless, sockless, pantless, and carrying a load. I cut their outside play short.

Micah is into head butting. It hurts.

Micah played post office today by "mailing" three DVDs into the DVD player. I found them stuck underneath the drawer.

Micah loves playing "recycling truck" and "garbage truck." He decided to get realistic by dumping out our garbage can onto the carpet.

This time home alone with the twins...not so short and quick.

Home alone with the WTs

Are you amazed that I am blogging so often? I have a little bit of extra time for the next few days as the 3OS are on a ski trip with their Dad. So I'm home alone with the WTs. This is quite an adjustment as it has been a long time since I've had just two toddlers. And they were not wonder twins. With whom I'm all alone. Me and them.

I decided to do something every day with the WTs to pass the time. Today we went to Pump-it-Up with my friend Rebecca and her daughter. Pump-it-Up is basically a warehouse that contains a number of inflatable jumpy houses and play structures. The WTs had a great time, especially on the 17 ft. slide. Micah would climb to the top, scream at the top of his lungs like a girl, and then say, "One...two....one-two!" Then down the slide he'd fly. It was amazing to watch Kara scrambling around, looking like a future rock climber. I kept thinking that this is the same girl who six months ago could barely walk, and when she did, looked like a drunken sailor.

After Pump-it-Up, I took the twins to the store to buy a microwave. Yes, we were still without one, and I was tired of living in the stone ages. The twins did well at the store. Okay, "well" is a relative term. So a few things got thrown out of the cart, and boxes were being opened by teeth, but we left with everyone's limbs intact and Mom's sanity mostly there. Hey, we left with a microwave!

I had to hold myself back from building an altar in front of that wonder machine. I've been reheating leftovers in the oven for the last few months, so using the microwave was like putting my food in a time machine. The WTs thought it was a new television or something. When the light would come on, and they could see the food twirling around, they would burst out in laughter.

This mirth continued during dinner...at the expense of their mother. The WTs were eating their dinner, and I was cutting more veggies (Kara is a veggie addict). When I came to the table, Kara was without her fork. When I asked her where her fork was, she showed me her hand and said, "hand." Uh huh, she knows what a fork is. She's trying to throw me off the trail. I ask again where her fork is and she puts her hands up and says, "Fork. Go?" I tell her, "You're the one who should know where your fork went. Where is it?" "There," she says, pointing to the floor. It is not there. Micah gets in on the act. "There," he says, pointing to a different spot on the floor. No fork. Kara reaches behind her back, so I think that she put her fork behind her. I reach behind, feel underneath her, and finally pull her out of her chair to see if it's under her. It is nowhere to be found! I am positively flummoxed by this point (isn't that a great word?).

I give up, thinking that Kara might have flung the fork somewhere. I assume I'll find it sometime before the WTs go to college. I sit down to eat my dinner, and that's when the victory chant began. It went something like this:

Micah: "Sopo do chachi do"

Kara: "Bada" (accompanied by a fist pump, no kidding)

Micah: "Nobo dado sasey"

Kara: "Bada" (accompanied by another fist pump)

Here is the translation:

Micah: "Hail Wonder twin power, we have triumphed over the one who oppresses us."

Kara: "Hail Wonder twin power!" (fist pump)

Micah: "We have conquered, we the magnificent, the sublime."

Kara: "Hail Wonder twin power!" (fist pump).

Yes, they had gotten me. I did eventually find the missing fork. When I took Micah out of his high chair after dinner, there was the fork. Somehow Kara had "passed" the fork across the table to Micah, who then decided to put it under that chunky monkey rear of his.

BTW, my wonder machine has to be returned. It decided to run itself. It had a mind of its own. Just like two other beings in this household.

Here are the victors: