Transparent &Thankful

So much to be thankful for this year. I am a very reflective [and in, contemplative, not as in shiny] person, but I don't always feel comfortable sharing all my thoughts. Unless you're Keith, in which case I share everything, even before I've digested it all, and sometimes, just sometimes, I sound crazy doing so. My evening walk/run time is when I think about my day to try to sort through the good, the bad, and some days, the intolerable.

A while back someone commented to me that based on my blog, our life must be constantly happy and fun! Not quite. We're just a normal family getting through each day with as much fun as we can and without dwelling on the difficult. And, I've yet to get those baby books done, so this is our version of a baby book. [Momma loves you, babies!]. See? So it's important to try to remember the good. But I thought I would make an attempt to be more transparent with all of our goings-on, good and bad when I share what we are thankful for.

Belly Momma, or "the carrier". Can't start the list without her. Here she is with C, then G, last October.
And with all the kids from her belly, last ....hmmm...last October?

We're running a 10K together Thanksgiving morning [not really sure who talked who into doing that], and we're both a little nervous about completing the race. I've done a few races before so I'm pretty sure I can struggle through it as I've done in the past. Karen, all I can say is that if you can raise three kids while being pregnant with our big boys and injecting yourself in the leg and hips once a day for 10 weeks, you can do this race. It should be a cakewalk compared to 2 years ago. As we were going through the in-vitro & subsequential pregnancy, I never really understood what it would entail for Karen. How could I? I did not have kids yet, and as much as any person who likes kids or have been around kids a lot thinks they know what its like being a parent, they just don't. Being on this side of the parenting fence really gives me a deeper appreciation for the effort Karen put into growing us our boys. We love you, carrier! PS. This sentimental stuff in no way indicates that I am going to let you win at the end of the race. It's a race, dammit!

The Grands. You can't beat having two sets of involved grandparents.

The boys get to develop good relationships with them, and we get to have our baby-free vacations.Win-win. I am sure that I feel as sane as I do now because Nana and Oupa give us a night off every few weeks, and Gran GG and Grampie come for a weekend at a time so we can fly to some exotic locale, like Wisconsin!

Sleeping. I'm a sleeper. Always have been. I know some of you can get by with just a few hours of sleep, but I'm not one of you people. That's for sure. I can't tell you how we made it through the first few months of twin care, I've either blocked the memory or sleep deprivation caused me to not be able to file those memories away. I do remember sitting at the front window waiting for Nana or Gran to show up so I could just go take a 1-2 hour nap, and I also remember walking into the closet one night around 3Am when I could hear the boys crying. Why the closet? I'm not sure, I was so tired I just randomly stumbled around trying to find the source of the noise. Turns out they weren't crying at all, I was just hearing crying because I had heard it so much that day while they were awake. Now I am grateful for every full night of sleep I get in our comfy bed with the blackout curtains. It's heaven.

PeePee in the Potty. No, we're not potty trained yet. We're on a slow path towards it, with nightly peeing and sometimes #2-ing in the frog potties. I expect it to take a few more months, and I am perfectly happy with that. What I do love, and what the potty training is an example of, is that the boys are changing and growing and with each day and new quirky personality trait they expose, I become more infatuated with them. They're funny, very goofy, and stubborn. Each new thing they do makes me realize that the coming years are going to be so fun. Challenging? Of course, we're not slow learners, we've figured out the parenting thing is hard. And yes, we have naked sitting on the potty pictures, but I'm not sharing those here.

Dada. Love that guy, and not a day goes by that I don't congratulate myself for landing this catch.

I'm an optimist, so next year I hope to be grateful for:

Outgrowing strong-willed moments. I sometimes still have temper tantrum at 30, so it's unlikely they'll be over it by then, but a girl can hope, right?

Both boys eating the same foods consistently. Today we love grilled cheese, tomorrow we throw it on the floor. Yesterday we loved sweet potato, today the mere sight makes us have a fit. Yogurt? At least we'll always love yogurt.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!