As John Lennon once quipped: "Life is what happens while you're making other plans."

Coming March 22nd: 365 Days of Twins + 1.

Hello my baby, hello my darling, hello my ragtime gaaaaal....

sdf

A few weeks ago I got a message on facebook from someone and I couldn't figure out who. I was intrigued and stymied; try as I might, I could not place the name, and there was no picture. To add to this crazy enigma, the message mentioned missing Abby and Lily; this person obviously is close in some way to us...but who!?? A few weeks pass, and I get another one, this time with a photo. As it turns out, this mystery person was the girls' primary daycare carer person. I felt kinda bad not responding, but I don't think I ever did know her last name...maybe that lets me off the hook?

We'd always liked our old daycare, liked the people, but were never over the moon for it. The girls had seemed to enjoy it for the most part, so we had no complaints. But it was really nice of her to write, so Jen decided to stop in today for a wee visit.

Apparently the girls are quite fond of the place. Lily went nuts, tearing around the joint and nosing her way into all the classrooms, and generally throwing anarchy into their routine. Abby asked to be held by almost everyone. All the people working came out to see the girls and say hi and tell us they missed them. Lovely.

What makes us feel quite bad about this is that we're considering leaving that place for a home daycare. We have a few reasons, but primarily we're concerned about Abs and how she'll function in a group toddler room situation. Good? Bad? Who knows?

Regardless, it was a very worthwhile visit. I wish I could have gone.

Tonight, we met up with some old friends for a little get together. Most people were toting kids with them, so it was constant motion and difficulties conversing, but in a good way.

I clearly remember a Looney Toons skit where some guy finds a singing frog...you've likely seen this or maybe know what I'm talking about. He sings and dances to "Ragtime Gal" when alone with the befuddled protagonist, but when others are around he only croaks. Hi-larity.

This cartoon made me laugh as a kid. It now serves as a frustratingly apt metaphor for how our girls act in public.

They weren't exactly tyrrants tonight, but they didn't pull out the stops either. I don't think any enemies were made, but they probably stopped short of melting any hearts.

As soon as the car started moving for the trip home, they started babbling and babbling and laughing to each other and to us, incessantly and darlingly. Where were these morons a half hour prior? Nowhere. Croak.

Even tomorrow, while alone with us, they'll laugh and respond correctly to our "What does a cow say?" type questions, show us their BeeBo on command, all that stupid crap that makes the kids perfect in our eyes. It'll be great. Next time we have them out...croak. Never fails.

Day one hundred and eighty.

Beans in a box! How great is that? Abby loves the hell out of this activity.

Lily at Brittany's house, surrounded by the adults she spent the evening underwhelming.

My gratuitous vanity shot. A still from a video taken during high school as I (second from left) and John Grombacher and someone else (Moses?) ready to jump off the Lester River bridge in Duluth.

Many happy days we spent hurling ourselves off that thing.

Treats a-plenty.

Loungin' in the heat.

To the vast constellation of things that I thoroughly enjoy about the girls, I'm afraid I must add another little star. This is one of those dastardly things that may, over time, become exasperatingly tiresome. It is: Lily giving the dog a treat.

She hasn't gotten out of hand with it yet (oh, how that time shall come); it is still a sickeningly cute little girl-dog transaction. Normally, this happens when we leave the house, as we always give the pooch a snack when we go. Lily picked up on this a while ago, and started asking for the treat so she could act as middleman. Or middlegirl.

Lately, we've advance to a point near total autonomy. I can be standing by the door with both Olly and Lily at my feet and the treat in my hand. "Olly, couch!", I speak, and off he scampers obediently (which is rare). I give Lily the treat, and - I smile just thinking about it - she trots off after him, rounds the corner, and sticks her arm out. In a feat of physics-laws-breaking, she is able to stretch her arm farther than it actually is long...amazing...with the treat clutched at the very tip. She inches closer, until the dog closes his beagley jowls over her hand and takes the treat.

Yesterday this happened, and it was followed by Lily running back over to me in order to be scooped up and send us off on our merry errands. She runs like a moron, of course, making a monkey face and monkey sounds to match, ecstatic over having given the dog his yummy nugget.

Today, the same exact thing happened, only she ran in the opposite direction - away from me - after the exchange. "Hey!" I yelled after her. "Ha ha ha!" she retorted. I had to chase her down while Olly watched us warily, smacking noisily on his morsel.

Day one hundred and seventy nine.

Some random recycled photos. Here's one of Lily up in Duluth.

This is a cast off during a Powderhorn365 shoot, but I always liked it, despite it being a piece of trash. I liked the grass colors.

How many feet could a woodfoot chuck if a woodfoot could foot feet?

(try it. It's hard. And nonsensical).

It's not quite a nationally recognized holiday

Sploosh.

Today is National Keep Your Blog Entry Short Because You're Exhausted Day. Hooray!

Jen says it was a good day. She blew up the kiddie pool, and a ball was had. Both kids were in lovely moods. I saw the kids for all of about 29 minutes.

Day one hundred and seventy eight.

Kersplash

Bloop

Squirt.

Random facts from the day.

Vanilla bean.

I have a great idea that would make a ton of money. Please somebody alert the appropriate person at Nokia or Erickson or whoever else makes cell phones.

Why not make a cell phone geared towards the needs of parents? My kids enjoy playing with my phone, and I certainly don't mind letting them mess about with it (I ignore those lingering hypothoses about cell phone usage and tumor growth in the brain). However, as would be expected, my kids push a dizzying array of buttons on the phone, and I'm normally left with 19 blank photos and a new Hannah Montana ringtone. Why can't they make cell phones with a feature that locks the keyboard and turns it into a kid pretend-phone? How awesome would that be?

The phone should also be able to double as a whitenoisemaker, monitor, projector, pacifier, and possibly a nanny. Simply holding the phone would also add 2.4 hours to the day.

Abby stayed up late tonight, which turned out to be a blessing. She had given Jen a hard time all day, constantly whining and crying and in a generally foul mood. As is her normal technique, though, she was an absolute riot when staying up late. I think she successfully erased a day of bad memories for Jen by being a stitch during the last hour of it.

According to Jen, Lily had a super day. She was delightful indeed during the evening hours, until we made her stop pushing a chair at the global market. Then she wailed almost the entire way home. I have no idea why, but she wanted so badly to just push a chair around by Mapps coffee, over and over again. That's her idea of fun.

Jen did a bang up job teaching the girls animal sounds today. When I came home, they both were able to do "moo", "meow", "woof", and sometimes "baa" by asking, "What does the ___ say?" There's a lot more vocalization happening for both of them. I'm cautiously optimistic.

This entry is terrible.

Day one hundred and seventy seven point seven.

I never did find out what these people were looking at during the art fair.

Art fair head-on collision.

Cocoa bean.

Abby.

With the exception of our families, not a lot of people ask us about Abby. Maybe you want to; maybe you don't know how.

I can only speak about the experience of being a parent with a developmentally disabled child. That's all we know, and believe me, we don't know much. From the first moment of her being born, we've known only what she demonstrates for us. I've seen online that lots of kids are referred to as being their diagnosis: a Down's kid, an Opitz kid, etc. Since she has no diagnosis, she is only Abby.

I can't speak for her. But I can write here all about what it's like to be us. Here is a rough list of what goes through my head on any given day:

Will Abby ever look normal?
Does Abby look abnormal right now?
Do people think she's handicapped?
Do people look at her right now and know?
Did the people I just pass in the mall give me that cute look because they're proud of me?
Will Abby ever walk?
Can she go to school?
Can we afford the school she may have to go to?
Will she ever move out or are we going to have to care for her for the rest of her life?
Will she become autistic?
Do I even know the warning signs for autism?
Why does she arch her back all the time?
Is she more emotionally distant than Lily?
Will she ever be able to have kids?
Or get married?
Or enjoy music? Play guitar?
How hard will it be for her?
How hard will it be for us?
Will other kids play with her?
Is she going to be invited to things?
Will she ever go to a sleepover?
What does she think of us?
Should I not have recognized any of this earlier?
What goes through her head?
Is there a normal version of Abby somewhere in the universe?
Why have I not done more to help her?
Why is she so obsessed with picking my nose?
Did she get that from me, or is that abnormal behavior?
How can I quantify what "abnormal" is?
When will she be diagnosed?
I hope she'll never be diagnosed.
No, that's not a good thought.
How utterly and completely evil am I for being happy that Lily is "normal"?
Can I feel any more guilt than that?
She smiles a lot. And laughs. That's good.
I should feel better when I look at support group websites online, but I don't; they make me feel miserable.
Should there be a support group for support groups?
Why is there no support group for people with kids who have no diagnosis?
Why is the perfect daycare for her so damn expensive?
How long can she go to a normal daycare?
When is Lily going to suspect that her sister is different?
Are we going to have to tell her that someday, like, have a little talk about it, or will she just know?
Should I appreciate her more?
Do I favor her over Lily?
Will I ever be able to be impartial to my kids?
I punish Lily so much easier than I do Abby.
Why is Abby so sensitive?
I was pretty sensitive as a kid, so maybe that's not so bad.
She laughs a lot.
And she's been giving lots of kisses lately.
Will her bangs ever grow in?
Will her soft spot ever go away?
I feel like a total jerk, there are kids with much worse disabilities out there.
She's so close to normal sometimes.
I let myself go so long believing she is.
Is she?
She might be.
Some kid recently said she "looked funny".
She might not be normal.
Why is there no diagnosis yet?? How worthless are these doctors?
How many doctors does she have now, anyway?
I know all her doctors love to see her, though.
Why?
Because she laughs a lot.
But she shakes her head, too, like she's having a tantrum, for no reason. Will that stop?
Maybe.
When will we know anything?
Maybe never.
What do we DO until then? Nothing? Everything?
Whatever we feel like.
That's not an answer.
Hrmph.
(sigh)


She loves to laugh. I can picture it now, and I can hear her clear as day.

Day one hundred and seventy six.

Moist! There, I said it.

There is no right way to protect your kids from the sun. When I say "your kids", I mean Lily. She hates hats (despite them looking fantastic on her). The only other option is sunscreen, but here's something we've started to find out: sunscreen ends up in eyes, almost invariably. When that happens, there is a severe case of the unhappies. Maybe it's our application technique. Maybe we're morons. But it's happened a couple times now. Somebody should do something about that annoying yellow ball of fire that is a complete nuisance to us.

Today was Sunday, and we did a bunch of crap that I could tell you about, but then you'd have to go find your socks because they will have been bored right off of you.

I can summarize easily:

Art fair, couple purchases, very fast, little free time today, humidity, moistness (funny aside: I just heard a thingy on "Wait wait don't tell me" about 'moist' being the least favorite word in the language, which is funny because Jen's always hated it, like, a lot. Come to find, she was not alone in her hatred.), Dad's house, kids everywhere, screaming, food, chaos, confusion, Abby almost walking but not quite, a/c in the car, sleepiness.

Sleepiness is the key word there.

Day one hundred and seventy five.

Two peas.

Abby was playing peek-a-boo behind the coffee table.

Sunday morning. Quality time.