7 months!

Eli and Roby are 7 months and just as predicted last month, the "honeymoon" is definitely over.  No more leaving baby in the corner.  These guys would prefer to be front and center.  Only there are two of them.  So it's hard to be in the center.  The difficulty of being a twin. 

This month has been the month of teeth.  We've been working and working and working on them but sadly have very little to show for all of our effort except a lot of empty Tylenol bottles.  Eli's third (top left) finally popped through today.  He celebrated by taking an hour and forty five minutes to fall asleep.

Despite the teething drama, these guys are still pretty easy going kiddos.  Their world is one big entertainment center, and they can't get enough.  Our little guys LOVE their big sisters and can't do anything but watch them when they are in the same room.  That includes eat.  There is NO eating (drinking) when Sarah Jane and Anna are around.  SJ and Anna dance and sing and coo and chitchat and deliver toys and lovingly dole out hugs.  The boys are either watching because they are massively entertained, or because they are waiting to be torpedoed by an Anna bomb.  Probably a little of both.  Everything is hilarious to them.  Especially Roby who can be convinced to laugh at just about anything.  Eli is particularly susceptible to tickles. 

Other things of note about this month:
1) I went back to work but neither kiddo seemed to notice.  They are very satisfactorily happy to see me when I come home though.

2) Neither of them have any hair.  I keep saying I think it's growing but those around me seem to disagree.

3) Neither kiddo seems to have any interest in learning to sit up.  Roby seems a bit more balanced than Eli when propped up but neither of them seem to care very much.  Being on their tummies is much preferred. 

4) They are both entirely mobile and can get anywhere through a combination of rolling, scooting and magic as far as I can tell.  Both of them like to wedge themselves under things, particularly their cribs.  When they roll, the flop their heads first.  Seems like it would hurt but they don't seem to mind.  Now that they can move they no long seem interested in crawling. Unnecessary effort?

5) Roby has stopped the TRex-banshee-screaming.  He has replaced it with belly laughs.  I'll take that trade any day. 

6) Neither of them seem remotely interested in food.  They occasionally eat from a jar but mostly they just make raspberry spitting noises and smear food all over everything.  Very little seems to be actually making it into their tummies.  Elizabeth and Juli seem to have more luck feeding them than I do.  

7) We think they look pretty different at this point but if you don't see them all the time, they are tricky to tell apart.  Roby has redder, apple cheeks.  Eli has a longer face and is a bit less tan.  Eli still has veins in his right temple that Roby doesn't have.  And Roby still has a red toe nail (just in case...)

8)  They LOVE to jump.  They do not love to nap.  They still are good (teeth drama not withstanding) at falling asleep at night.

9) They still get a bottle at 10pm.  We are anxiously awaiting the day we can stop the "dream feed" as we would prefer to be dreaming.

10)  They get about 50% formula and 50% breast milk.  Our formula bill is intense.  So is our diaper consumption.  We might be diapers.com's best customers.

11) They occasionally notice each other but mostly just chew on whatever limb or head is directly in their path.  Roby likes to take Eli's toys.  Eli just rolls over his brother in response.

6 months!

The boys are six months today and are doing great.  They are such wonderful, easy little kiddos.  As I type that I know I have just jinxed us.  They are about to start crawling and I think the "honeymoon" will be over.

We had our six month weigh in earlier in the week.  Eli continues to surge ahead at 19lbs 8oz and 27in.  Roby is a slightly less robust 18lbs 9oz and 26.5in.  They are 85th/75th percentiles for weight and 60th/50th percentiles for height moving up from the 20th percentile at our last check-in.  I'm fairly certain that nearly all of Eli's extra pound is residing in his additional chin.  (Which is really cute by the way.)

Roby continues to be very focused on the outside world, he loves looking around, taking everything in and flirting with anything in sight.  He is very smiley and easy going.  He has started to roll over more but is still not that interested in moving. 

Eli on the other hand only wants to move.  He has entered into a serious training regime and flips over on his stomach within half a second of being placed on his back.  He's starting to get his bum up in the air but his upper body/head/chins are weighing down the front portion.  When he gets tired of trying to move forward, he rolls over until he has wedged his head under something at the edge of whatever room he is in and waits patiently for someone to come release him.

They are both very easy going - the other day I came into a room to find Sarah Jane kissing a baby's head, Anna lying on the baby's body and the baby looking at me with his eyebrows raised like he was saying, "I'm not freaking out mom but you have my back, right?"  Don't remember which baby but they are equally likely to roll with the accidental abuse (mostly overly enthusiastic hugs) that their sisters dole out.

They are both very easy on the eating/sleeping front.  They eat whatever you put in a bottle for them and are getting much better about consuming "solids" putting away a healthy amount of cereal and banana every day.  Next step, veggies.  They also puke up about 95% of what they consume.  Looking forward to that coming to an end.  On the sleeping front, they are not yet consistent nappers but getting them to go down at night is eerily easy.  I take them upstairs at about 6:40, change them and toss them in bed at 6:45 and after a few minutes of cooing, grunting and (in Eli's case) flipping over, they are passed out at 6:50.  We wake them up at 10 for a bottle and then they are back down until somewhere between 5:30-6.  Roby usually wakes up once during the night and needs to be shushed but all it takes is one trip in, a passy insertion and he's good to go.  About 50% of the time after I feed them in the morning they go back to sleep until about 8 but that trend seems to be coming to an end. 

They are starting to look pretty different.  Eli has a more rectangular face, Roby's is more heart shape.  Roby's cheeks are more pronounced and are usually apple red.  Eli has the aforementioned extra chin.  Eli seems also to be generating a bit more hair though they are both seriously lacking in that department.  As soon as they open their mouths, it's apparent who Roby is.  Despite the subtle differences we are still reminded often that they were once the same person.  Last week Elizabeth felt Eli's mouth and noticed he had just got a tooth.  I was holding Roby and checked, no tooth.  About 10 minutes later I checked again and low and behold, a tooth, the very same one, had popped out.  So insanely weird.  Eli has since pulled ahead in the tooth department with a grand total of two. (Breaking news: Roby got his second this evening after this was written.)  This picture (taken by Zeke) makes it clear that they still look pretty much the same.  Roby is on the left - red cheeks!

They have not noticed (as far as I can tell), that I'm back at work and no longer around.  That might because there are a LOT of people in our house at the moment.  This morning when I left for work there were (no joke) 10.  Four kids, Elizabeth (nanny), Juli (au pair), Maribel and Sandra (cleaning team extraordinaire) and Nana and Papa (our grandparent saviors this week.)  Dave and I got pushed out the door and by the time I turned around to blow a kiss, everyone had disappeared back into the chaos.

Five months

Eli and Roby are five months and truly lovely little guys.  We are so lucky.  They are nearly always happy and jolly.  They are consistently sleeping through the night - down at 7, dream feed at 10 and then sleeping through till 5:30 or 6 (with an occasional all the way to 7 bonus.)  They are still not consistent day sleepers but I would trade day time sleep for a good nights sleep anytime. (On that note, I got my first un-interrupted 7 hour stretch in at least a year last Tuesday.  Gloriousness.) 

While Roby rolled over first, right around 4 months, he has now quit and is more than content to lie on his back and giggle at the world.  Things that make him laugh are his sisters, blowing raspberries on his tummy, singing songs and funny faces.  Actually, he'll laugh at just about anything.  He will also do his signature screaming banshee pretty much anytime.  We thought it was cute when Sarah Jane used to make the same noise.  It's less cute the second time around.  Also, when I can't hear anymore, we'll all know who to blame.

Eli might have been slower to roll over but once he got it (about five days after Roby) he really went after it.  That kid wants to move.  He rolls clear across the carpet and has just started inching along, commando style.  He's too busy and determined to smile quite as much as his brother but he's got a belly laugh too which comes out with some prompting. 

We are getting much better at telling them apart - and as soon as they open their mouths, it's pretty obvious.  Eli likes to sleep on his tummy and Roby sleeps on his back.  Roby squawks and Eli moves.  Roby is still sporting his tan and Eli has two veins on his right temple that conveniently look like an "l" and an "i". 

We celebrated five months with attempting to feed them real food.  I started with Eli.  As the picture indicates, he was not a fan.  In fact, he totally disapproved of the whole idea.

Two days later he was still simply affronted by the idea of rice cereal.  I mean, come on mummy.  I love you, but really?

Roby did a better job rolling with the project.  He particularly liked holding the spoon.  Food went in, food came out, he was cool with it.  Whatev.

Eli, not so much.