My Leap Day Resolution

I will stop drinking soda.

I've been trying to break the habit, or at least get it under control, for some time. But lately, I've been off the wagon in a big way, chugging glass after glass of Dr Pepper or Cherry Coke all day long. At last, I think I've managed to convince myself that it's time to stop, with a little help from this article:

Coca-Cola, Pepsi, Dr Pepper and other dark-colored soft drinks contain phosphoric acid, which has been linked to brittle bones and osteoporosis. Phosphoric acid leeches the calcium from bones.

I knew that already, of course. We all know that. But the recent revelation that as few as four sodas a week can cause serious damage was eye-opening, to say the least. It's not uncommon for me to consume four a day, let alone four a week.

So it's time to stop. Who's with me?

Eclipsing

I engaged in a little amateur astrophotography tonight -- stress the amateur. Hope you saw the totally awesome eclipse yourself!

Twinspeak

You hear talk about twins developing their own language, communicating with each other in a secret code that the rest of us can't break. I was skeptical about twinspeak, until now.

As babies, the girls would often babble at each other with tones and cadences that closely mimicked conversation, as if they were practicing the sounds they heard adults make. I don't believe any actual information was communicated during these sessions -- they just liked the way it sounded.

These days, however, the girls really do seem to have, if not an entire language, a collection of words that are a complete mystery to me. Comboling, poimbing, wending -- the words sound like they're straight out of a Dr. Seuss book, or perhaps as if the girls picked them up from Jabberwocky. (And why do they all sounds like gerunds? What's up with that?)

I most often hear these words when someone is complaining or upset. I think most of Evie and Sophie's twinspeak vocabulary is meant to describe things that annoy them. (Ah, so like their mother.)

An example: A few mornings ago, during breakfast, Evie dripped some syrup on her pajamas and cried out, "Look, Mommy! My shirt! It's very wending and toymbing!"

Before I could formulate a response, Sophie piped up with, "That's not wending. Look at my wending!" while pointing to her own syrup-covered jammies.

As near as I can tell, wending can be defined thusly:

wending \ˈwend-iŋ\ (adj): splattered with syrup; an unpleasant, syrupy state

Evie has an entire lexicon to describe uncomfortable socks. (Much to her dismay and mine, I'm never quite able to figure out exactly what's wrong with the offending socks.) Sophie's invented words generally focus on injustices perpetrated by her sister, and are often sobbed out through tears of sorrow and rage. While the girls don't always use the same words in the same ways, they don't seem to have any trouble understanding each other.

Is this twinspeak? Or just a couple of preschoolers making up words to fill in the gaps in their vocabulary? Whatever it is, it's entertaining and inventive, and I hope to record as much as possible for posterity. I don't think these twinspeak words will last long.

Canterbury Dreams

After a bit of sleuthing on one of those ancestry sites, my mom discovered that we are direct descendants of Geoffrey Chaucer. To be specific, he was my great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great- great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather. (That's 17 greats, FYI.)

So here's what I'm saying: Public domain be damned! I should be getting royalties for every copy of The Canterbury Tales out there. Pay up, people!

Happy Valentine's Day

Eat Your Vegetables

Yesterday, I was a pureeing fool. I pureed the following:

• 2 cups of butternut squash
• 3 cups of carrots
• 3 cups of cauliflower
• 2 cups of sweet potatoes
• 1 cup of beets
• 1 cup of spinach
• 1 cup of red bell peppers

I've decided to join the legions of parents who trick their children into eating vegetables by hiding them in kid-friendly foods. Well-meaning deception for the win!

Our first attempt: I assisted the girls in making these delightful muffins this morning:

Peanut butter and jelly muffins (with carrot puree) from Deceptively Delicious. Yum!

I'm excited about this little experiment. I'll let you know how it goes.

Happy Darwin Day!

Lots of fun Darwin Day graphics here.

Sagan All My Love

Check out Ironic Sans for more awesome scientist valentines.

Damage

Public service announcement: This is what happens when melting snow pools on your roof and seeps into the walls.

Feed Me!

It seems to be a universal truth that former NICU parents are obsessed with food; specifically, obsessed with getting our kids to eat. As. Much. As. Possible. More than two years after we escaped from the NICU, I am consumed, so to speak, with monitoring how much my kids eat and finding ways to convince them to eat more, more, more.

In the NICU, a preemie has to do three things in order to be discharged: breathe without assistance, maintain her own body temperature, and eat sufficient quantities of food. For my girls, and I think for a lot of NICU babies, that last one is the real trick. Not long after they were born, the girls broke free from their baby incubators and moved into open-air cribs, where they stayed at a cozy 98.6 all on their own. A few weeks later, the final breathing apparatus were disconnected and the girls sucked in room air with no assistance.

But eating. Ah, eating. That took weeks. Long, long weeks. Hospital staff would say, "As soon as they can consistently eat 55 ccs every three hours, they can go home!" Do you know how much 55 ccs is? It's less than two ounces. It's a tiny, tiny amount. And yet it was a nearly insurmountable obstacle. Day after day, they'd fail to meet their goal. Every feeding session, we'd try every feeding trick we learned during our NICU tenure (and there were many) in a desperate attempt to get them to empty out those tiny bottles. This was the point in our NICU stay when I became totally psychotic and considered a) committing violence against the doctors and nurses and b) kidnapping the girls.

But we made it through, somehow, and even when we were home, we kept meticulous records of how much the girls ate round the clock, down to the nearest milliliter. We were totally obsessive, thanks to our NICU training. It took us more than a year to give up on logging every meal. The girls' pediatrician did his best to help us let go of the food obsession. "They'll eat what they need to eat," he insisted, and told us not to worry about it. So we tried not to worry about it.

But even now, I hover over their plates, cataloging each bite and sip, celebrating every empty plate, wringing my hands over each meal left untouched. I've become obsessed with finding new ways to get the girls involved with the cooking process so they'll feel more invested in their food, and thus maybe they'll be more excited about eating it. One of their favorite activities these days is pulling chairs up to the kitchen counter so they can help me chop vegetables, stir batters, and assemble sandwiches. Meal prep takes about three times longer than it used to, but I don't mind.

The thing is, my obsession is baseless. These girls eat plenty. Their weight is totally normal for their age. They're perfectly healthy. If I were successful in shoving as much down their throats as I'd like, they'd be obese. Most adults probably shouldn't eat as much as I try to feed them. I take some comfort in knowing that this food frenzy is my problem, not theirs. It helps me get over it and move on when the girls reject the food I was sure they'd devour.

Still, even if I don't need to worry about the twins, I have my own neuroses to combat. So if you have any recipes guaranteed to tempt toddlers, send them my way. My nerves will thank you.