traveling with twins

Home is where the heart is. Home is also where the bouncer is, the playmat is, the rock-n-play is, the swing is, the changing station is, ... etc.

A minivan can pack in quite a bit, but not the whole nursery and living room.
Although I tried.

Traveling can be exhausting. Traveling with almost-4-month-old twins gives "exhausting" a new meaning.*

We're fortunate the boys are such good travelers. However, they do let their opinions of their carseats be known from time to time.

Two weekends ago, Nate & I and the boys traveled to my brother's place in OK. My parents were there for the weekend too and would be traveling back home to TN. So the boys asked if they could go to Papa & Gram's in TN for the week. I agreed to it. Poor Nate had to come back to Iowa in a minivan with no wife or babies and then spent the week alone. He did get several projects done around the house without anyone underfoot though! Mom brought me and the boys back to IA yesterday. The vacation away was fun, but it sure was nice to be back in the familiar environment and routine with the boys.

This is how many hours Thing 1 & Thing 2 had to endure their carseats:
IA - OK  ... 7 hours (drove through the night while they slept the whole way)
OK - TN ... 14 hours (normally 11, but add a couple hour and a half stops with babies)
TN - IA   ... 15 hours (normally 12)

So, 36 hours on the road in a week and a half. Now my question is, if we spent that much time on the road, why didn't we spend the hours going to FL instead?? Just kidding. It was wonderful to see family :)

Speaking of FL, my sister and her family were headed there last week and they stopped at mom & dad's in TN on their way down. We didn't tell them that the boys and I were there at mom & dad's, so they were in for quite a surprise!

On a side note, the boys have been sleeping through the night for quite awhile now!! WOOHOO! This means sleep for everyone :):) They go to bed between 10 and 11 and wake up between 7 and 8. Brayden is always the first one to wake up in the morning and he "sings" to wake the rest of us up. It's not crying, it's cooing. And it's the most beautiful alarm clock I've ever heard.

I've been saying for some time now that we need to separate the boys soon and put them in different cribs. Well ... tonight's the night. My mom is here with us this week so I'm going to put Cooper in the crib in the nursery with her and keep Brayden in the crib in our room. It's going to be hard, but it's just an experiment tonight and we'll see how the night goes.

*The asterisk is tied to the sentence above. I feel the need to include a footnote that gives a shout out to parents that have multiples beyond 2 at a time. I often find myself saying things similar to the comment above about how difficult and crazy things can be with twins. And while it is, there are many parents out there who have triplets, quads, and beyond. They are amazing. Many people who've had singletons tell me "I can't imagine having 2." Well, I have 2 but I can't imagine having 3! Or 4! When I remind myself that there are higher orders of multiples out there, it helps me stay level-headed when I get a bit stressed with just 2.

ROADTRIIIIIIIIIP!

Uncle Eric w/ C

she looks a lot more excited about this than he does...

Ryker w/ C

Uncle Eric hogging the babies!

Papa getting Brayden squeezes

storytime w/ Gram

this silly-looking fellow turned up to the birthday party!

little did we know the silly-looking fellow had a silly-looking sidekick

this was when we told them they were going to Papa & Gram's ;)

smiling in his sleep :):)

little mischief maker, stealing brother's pacifier

Brayden & I checking out the building site of mom & dad's new house!!

going under cover for the surprise

sneaky surpriser

"I wanna hold him first" ...

"No I get to hold him first!"

sleeping baby snuggles

4 on a couch ... er, chair

"I can't believe you stuck me in this carseat again ... "

"I love my carseat!!!"

tired of traveling