Max and Charlotte on the Road Again (Again)

We were accompanied by Max and Charlotte on our recent trip up to Chico, California, to visit their new baby cousin Natalie, who was born earlier this month, and her older brother Patrick.  This was their second trip to Chico and their third plane trip; they're becoming pretty seasoned travelers (for 11-month-old babies, anyway).  As you can see, Max is a pretty cool flyer.

20 October 2011

But Charlotte is even cooler.

20 October 2011

Actually, poor Max had a pretty hard time on the final leg of the trip home.  (While Charlotte slept soundly in my arms during the entirety of that flight.)  But it was understandable; plane travel is pretty hard, seeing as how they don't let you crawl with impunity all over the cabin.

While we were up in Chico Charlotte and Max got to play in Grandma Judy's kitchen, 

21 October 2011

Charlotte went shopping for a new set of wheels (as Max napped in their stroller),

22 October 2011

and they hung out with Tio Johnny.

23 October 2011

We also picked pumpkins and visited the animals at a local farm.  Max loved hanging out with the donkeys and the calves; it was a little tough getting him away.  I think we're looking forward to all four cousins being able to have fun together in the future, to say nothing of when their cousins from Indiana can come visit!

And, no, Charlotte and Max don't have frequent flyer accounts ... yet.  But if you know me, you should be confident that they will as soon as we have to start paying for their tickets.  I definitely plan on giving them a leg up on their million-mile status!

--- Shawn (for Jenn and Charlotte and Max and Lucy and Rufus)

Games People Play Charlotte Plays

Charlotte and Max have this funny habit of waving their arms somewhat ... er, spastically when they get excited.  So when Charlotte starts flapping her arms in this video, you can interpret that as her being very excited and very amused!

Max plays this game, too.  (You can hear him "talking" and banging his spoon on his tray in the background while Charlotte plays peek-a-boo.)  I think their particular twist on peek-a-boo got its start as a result of our cleaning their faces with a wet washcloth following meals in their high chairs.  And it's still a lot of fun.  I love the fact that Charlotte has started covering her own head with the washcloth!

(This would be another example of a large file that was too large to share over e-mail, but which can be shared via a blog!)

--- Shawn (for Jenn and Charlotte and Max and Lucy and Rufus)

Reminiscing

Once upon a time our babies were very young ...

13 November 2010

 ... and so were our puppies.

9 May 2009

--- Shawn (for Jenn and Charlotte and Max and Lucy and Rufus)

An Unforeseen Development

Getting used to Max and Charlotte being mobile was one thing.  Their talent for crawling has us worried about how chaotic things will be when they starting walking (and running).  What we hadn't considered was their developing ability to climb.  It is now clear that we're just going to have to get used to falls and the attendant bumps, bruises and crying.  Sigh.

Max and Charlotte love to climb into their toy boxes baskets.

14 October 2011

Getting in is easy.  Climbing out is hard.  It is also when heads tend to hit the floor.  You'd think this would dissuade them from climbing in in the first place, but …

15 October 2011

 And they're getting pretty good at standing up unassisted.  Walking can't be far behind.


--- Shawn (for Jenn and Charlotte and Max and Lucy and Rufus)

Prologue: Am I 11 Months Too Late?

Perhaps this is not the right foot on which to start my very first blog.  Nevertheless, I would like to apologize for not starting this sooner and not keeping more of y'all abreast of the adventures of Max and Charlotte (and Lucy and Rufus).  I suppose that T minus some-months-and-days before Charlotte and Max came into our lives, I decided that someone starting yet another blog about someone else's children was a bit cliché and borderline narcisstic.  And I decided to do my part in keeping our hallowed, sacred Internet pristine and useful and not cluttering it up with more information that was valuable to no more than a handful of people on the planet.

Then I realized, as all new parents eventually do, that so many of the things we've seen other parents do -- some of which we swore we would not do ourselves -- are done for good reason.  In particular, it turned out to be more challenging to routinely send out pictures of the twins via e-mail than I anticipated.  Such e-mail messages were often so large that my e-mail server refused to send them.  Then I had problems because people often felt as though they were being intentionally left off "the list" (as though I had been carefully grooming and maintaining any one list of e-mail addresses); in reality, I just didn't want to be stuffing people's e-mail inboxes with e-mail they might not have wanted.  And, of course, sending out pictures of your children via e-mail is no less narcissistic than posting them on the Web.  Finally, starting your own blog has the added benefit that people can choose to visit your blog's website, thus alleviating any worries about whether or not they want to receive pictures of your darling offspring.

So I decided sometime ago to start a blog … and, of course, it took me a long time to get around to actually doing it.  (Publicly acknowledging the embarrassment of it having taken so long was yet another reason for my delay.  I mean, in this day and age who starts a blog about their kids when those kids are 11+-months old?)  But we have twins and life is crazy.  That is why it took me longer than I'd hoped to start.  And this brings me to one of the cooler things about having twins: you can blame almost any personal shortcoming or flakiness on having twins and people almost universally accept that excuse because who in the hell can imagine taking care of two babies at once?!!?  But there are many even more awesome things about having twins (and twin Airedale Terriers) that I hope to discuss as this blog unfolds.

So without further ado, I introduce you to Two Toddlers and Two Terriers: Life with Max and Charlotte and Rufus and Lucy!  I hope to update this blog more frequently than I'd been sending out pictures.  And I'll try to clear the backlog of old pictures I never sent out as I think of them.

Oh, one more thing: though I will try not to favor one child (or puppy) over another when I post pictures, I am not going to try make sure that there is one picture of one child (or puppy) for every picture I post of the other child (or puppy) 'cause that kind of shit'll just drive you (i.e. me) crazy.  (I know; I've tried to do so elsewhere.)  So even in the unlikely event that one of my children should show up significantly more frequently than the other, everyone should rest assured that we love our children (and dogs) very much and in equal measure … not that we feel compelled to prove that on the Internet.


--- Shawn (for Jenn and Charlotte and Max and Lucy and Rufus)