Two Two Year Olds!

Today is Liberty and Nehemiah’s second birthday.  Who would have thought that two years with twins could go so fast?  This day two years ago is easy to recall…when my water broke at 4 am and we headed to the hospital in anticipation.  As soon as I was admitted and prepped we headed to the OR and Liberty was born at 8:30 a.m.  Nehemiah was a little more comfortable inside, so it took him an additional 35 minutes to make his arrival!

Both twins love to swing!

Now that we’ve been through several stages with twins, I would say in a heartbeat that two newborns was a piece of cake!  Once they became mobile, life changed.  Did you know that it’s possible to lose two toddlers in 800 square feet?  It happens regularly!  The approach to age two has been more challenging, but more rewarding at the same time.  Strong wills and sinful attitudes are rampant, and harder to deal with when they come in doubles!  But watching them interact as a team, start to speak words, and discover their world has been exciting.

Little movie bugs!

Liberty.  She is a bundle of mother-ness to Nehemiah!  She tattles when he is messy, in trouble, or doing something she doesn’t like.  “See!  Mommy!  See!” tells me that she thinks he is doing something wrong, and she wants me to know it!  But at the same time, she joins Nehemiah when what he is doing looks fun or exciting.  She says, “No!” and “’top” (stop) to him regularly. 

She has quite the entourage behind her – and they all have to be in just the right spot for her to go to sleep!

Liberty loves baby dolls.  She is always toting one around, especially when she is moody.  She speaks well in sentences and phrases.  “Let me go” is a phrase we hear a lot – usually because she is supposed to be holding our hand, but doesn’t want to.  Everything usually starts with “I” instead “me” or “my”.  “I juice” means she wants her juice – and she does know which color cup belongs to her!  Another phrase we hear a lot is “bite me!” – yes, Nehemiah is a biter, and Libs gets the brunt of it.

She hates to have anything in her hair.

She is more pouty than her twin, but also very cuddly.  When she wakes up in the morning, she wants hugs and snuggles.  She seems to prefer Grandpas over Grandmas, but she snubs Ben in favor of me.  She is a comfort eater, and her “fat little belly” shows it!

Nehemiah is a total boy.  He loves balls, cars, and especially trains.  Any truck, bus, or heavy equipment that we see on the road is stared at until out of sight.  Everything is a sound, and we regularly hear “Neigh! Moo!  Choo-choo!” and other announcements from the back seat.  He is starting to put words together very clearly.  Yesterday it wasn’t enough to say that he had juice to drink, it was apple juice. 

He’s all about hats right now!

He is very attached to balls, and especially loves to kick them.  I think he might be a soccer player!  Nehemiah takes after Grandma in that he is left-handed, and Mommy in that he is a klutz.  His forehead usually has at least one bruise on it!  Falls and bumps hardly phase him anymore, and are usually greeted with “a bump!” and fixed with a kiss.  He doesn’t like messy fingers or grass between his toes.

Learning to play billiards!

Everything liquid has been “juice” for quite a while, but last week Nehemiah told us emphatically he wanted “milk”.  He likes just about anything that has to do with food, especially if it starts with cookie or ice cream.  Amazing how it doesn’t take them long to learn those words!  Another new word is “nack” – snack!

Nehemiah loves to sing the B-I-B-L-E too!  To him it goes, “B-I-B Bible!” announced in a deep voice.  His favorite books are Brown Bear, Brown Bear, and Go Dog, Go!

Perhaps the cutest thing Nehemiah does right now is call his sister by name.  To him she is “Dobadee.”  This has given him the nickname “Dobadoo” from Daddy.  He is known for bopping her on the head with a toy when they are squabbling over something, but he regularly crawls into Liberty’s bed to sleep with her.

Liberty LOVES the water but Nehemiah hates it!  It took a lot of coaxing to get him to go in the water slide at the hotel in MI.  But he did go in for a closer look!

This is how Nehemiah passed most of the evening at the water slide!

I often get overwhelmed with all of the requests that come my way, at the same time.  But I also often just sit and watch these two play, interact, and live while I smile and take it all in.  They are so busy, so curious, so much fun.

We haven’t taken two year pictures yet, but hope to do that this week!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TWINSIES!