From me to you..

Dear Nath and Tom,

Recently you turned 3 and it has been such a great experience that I am struggling to remember the dark moments when it wasn't all crazy stories and new adventures. It isn't that I want to hold onto the dark times but I want to remember the moments when it was tough because they make these ones so much sweeter.

It feels as though you have grown up overnight. Suddenly you are in big boy pants and you've given your dummies away. Your legs have grown and your chubby cheeks are disappearing before my eyes. Every photograph captures a different aspect to your personalities and offers glimpses of the little boys inside as you discover new things that you are capable of. You have lost much of your earlier anxieties about change and are becoming more independent but I love that you still prefer to be together, even if it means sharing what could have been yours alone. You both make us laugh so much and I constantly wish that I had a little tape recorder going to capture the differences in your sense of humour.

Tom, you have picked up so many of my traits and I now know why your grandad was as he was because the early morning questions are a killer ;-). This coupled with the tendency to tease means that you are destined for a life filled with equal amounts of laughter and reprimand but don't fret about it - those who get it will love every second of it. Your enthusiasm for music and singing is so adorable that your dad and I stop every night as you join in with the Tigger and Windy-Pooh song, slap your cap and recite your super sleuth oath. I honestly think that if we could bottle that cuteness we would bring about world peace in a second. Your fun loving personality is not without flaw, the stubborn resistance to coercion may bode well for the future but it makes it a little tough for us to get you to do some things and you can get really over excited which almost always ends in disaster but you're also so charming and affectionate that you're always forgiven quickly.


Nath, the last month has seen you blossom and grow into such a great little boy. You're absorbing things so quickly that we are constantly amazed by what you are aware of! I know you don't get it from me but like your dad you're going to be the brains in the outfit and this coupled with your good looks will take you a long way. I am so glad that you've suddenly started taking chances, I was a little worried that you would be a more anxious child but here you are jumping, running and tackling your brother with complete abandon. Although you're not as lyrical as your brother you certainly make up for it with enthusiasm and your giggles are so completely unique and infectious that we all crack up when you do. I think that you will have a more serious nature than Tom which is a good thing because I suspect he will need to lean on you from time to time.

It has been a long and sometimes difficult journey but I am so very glad that I have taken it because you have brought such joy into my life that I couldn't possibly wish for anything more.

Happy Birthday my twins,
Your mama

Wherein I admit some personal shortcomings...

So I have suddenly noticed a weird pattern here at the homestead and I am not liking the picture that it paints.

It seems I have developed a strange and alarmingly annoying habit of being grumpy on a Saturday. I'm not sure when this started, or why but looking back over the last few weeks (as far back as my poor, challenged memory goes) Saturdays are the days when I am most likely to zip on the doberman suit and develop fish-wife like tendencies.

It seems that despite Saturdays being the very best day of the week when I was in my twenties, it is now the day when I want to get the most done and am most inclined to become irritable with those around me. Of course this general grumpiness carries over to the kids as well and I think that may be at least part of the reason why Saturdays are so much more tiring and fraught than Sundays.

Yesterday the boys and I kept bumping heads. We had several potty accidents (read: crappy pants *sigh*), complete selective hearing and some very confrontational 'moments'. This, added to my desire to get some shit done meant that even nap time was disrupted and we were all completed exhausted at the end of the day.

Today started out so much better with no potty accidents and we even left the house for 2 hours to go to a birthday party! Despite copious amounts of chocolate, sugar and other party specific junk food we still managed to get home, have a nap, play in the garden and go to sleep with no hitches at all. Not only that, I also managed to get a couple of the chairs repainted so it wasn't as if they had my undivided attention.

The childminder was at the party and we were chatting about it and she thinks that it may also be that they find Saturdays a bit weird because they're between routines but we'll see because the childminder is on leave this week so between us, the RO and I are SAHP's. Watch this space folks 'cause who knows what this week will bring!

VP

IComWeLeave May

Hello and welcome to all the ICWLers, please remember to leave a link to your blog if you're not on blogger so that I can follow you around ;-)..

I had already composed a decent introduction post for a previous month but things have moved on since then and so I can't in good faith use it so I shall try again.

I am the Villagepig, so named because it is the English translation of the Welsh name for our house. I am not trying to be self deprecating although sometimes that does happen anyway. I am a mother to twin boys. I had a horrible and very difficult pregnancy, post natal depression and have only recently actually started to enjoy parenthood in the conventional manner.

For a large proportion of you the above paragraph will probably be a bit like chewing and swallowing glass because for you, pregnancy is the prize, the difficult and elusive culmination of years of failed conceptions. I really wish that it wasn't so and I wish that I could do more to try and help alleviate some of the pain. I tried to become an egg donor but it seems that it wasn't to be and I have recently been told that I have low ovarian reserve and am a candidate for early onset of menopause. Oh joy doesn't that sound like fun?

I have chosen not to dwell on the future because I am more of an 'in the moment' kind of gal but I needed to say all this because I had so hoped to be able to provide an example for other fertile's to follow and I didn't want anyone to feel that I had made claims that I wasn't ever going to fulfill.

Thank you for visiting and for (hopefully) commenting. I will do my very best to visit all of you as well and have no doubt that we will all find some new inspiration along the way.

Happy ICWL!
VP