Lego Bonsai Tree & A Frame Cabin

 

Sarah and the girls got me a Lego Bonsai tree for father's day. I typically build cars and buildings with Legos, so this was a completely different Lego experience. I enjoyed the change in pace. After building the very cool but somewhat tedious Lego F1 car, I was ready for something different. This set had approximately 800 pieces, but 200 of them were loose pieces that sat at the bottom of the plant. Most of the pieces were for the pot and stand and were quick and easy to put together. The tree was a bit tedious but not hard to assemble. I could've finished this in one sitting, but decided to space it out over two days. The tree looks nice, and is sitting in my office in front of the window for easy viewing. It came in two versions, the one seen above, and another version where the flowers have bloomed pink. I decided to go with the pink bloomed build to give it some color.

Around the same time, the family got the cabin A-frame house seen below. It is a massive set, with 2,000 pieces. We have an entire winter village of Lego buildings and we plan to make this cabin apart of that village at Christmas time. Since the Lego section on this blog is new, I haven't featured any of those buildings on the site, but I plan to do so moving forward as we add to the village. We've even talked about ways to add snow to the roof of the house. The house is currently about 2/3rds finished, and admittedly I haven't built any of it. Elle (with some help from Sarah) has done the entire build thus far. I initially wasn't as excited about the A-frame as the rest of the family, but I will say it has some really cool accessories in the house, including a record player and a typewriter. It should fit right in with our winter village, surrounded by Christmas trees.

Holiday Candies

 Starting with Halloween and extending past New Year's, the 3 months from late October until January is by far the time of the year when the most candy is consumed in our house. We live in a neighborhood where Halloween is a big deal. Subsequently, our girls get a ton of candy.  We limit how much they eat each day, and thus their Halloween supply lasts until Christmas (or beyond).  Thanksgiving is slow in terms of candy, but Christmas supplies ample amounts of candy in terms of stocking stuffers and Aunt Pamela. The kid's candy overflow commonly ends up in my (and Sarah's) mouth. Otherwise we rarely have candy in the house. This isn't the concern I have, however. The candy that is sold during the holidays is commonly packaged in special holiday attire. Here's where the problem starts.

I have found that with a lot of candy, when the size of the candy changes, so does the taste, often times for the worse.  The best candies have a ratio of chocolate to chocolate/nugget/caramel or whatever that is perfect.  I'm sure it follows the Fibonacci sequence. Most holiday candies are larger in stature, and as soon as that candy ratio is changed, it alters the taste. Considering this season is the peak of candy consumption, I wish the candy sold during this time remained in its regular packaging and size.

Christmas Toys

 Christmas 2020 has come and gone.  In this modern era of electronics, the toys my kids got for Christmas amazes me.  They got some Barbies and Legos, both classic toy staples.  But they also got some simpler toys that they enjoy. I'm talking a magic eight ball, a slinky, and a whoopee cushion. These are toys that were classic when I was a kid and probably existed when my parents were kids. Additionally, they got a couple of card games they love too.  No video games, no tablets, nothing electronic except for a couple of animatronic dolls.  For whatever reason, the simplicity of their toys, and the fact that they truly enjoy them, makes me happy. It goes to show you that kids are kids, and even though technology changes, they still like the simple things as well.

Sul, Sul: The Sims 4, DLC, and Chasing Off Boys

 

This situation appeared way sooner than I expected.  The classic scenario of dad chasing boy who is chasing his daughter.  My girls are only in grade school.  This time the story is occurring virtually, which is so 2020.  Let me explain.

I've always enjoyed The Sims games.  They are the ultimate putzing around game, with no clear goal but there is always a carrot dangling.  I played Sims 1 and 2 when they were released, but skipped 3 and thus haven't played the series in many years.  I came across an Origin sale for the Sims 4 for $5 and I couldn't pass it up.  Between myself playing and my girls playing, we have logged over 40 hours and counting, which is pretty good for a $5 game.

One of my biggest complaints of the original games was the cumbersome requirements for friendships to advance in your career.  Eventually the requirement to have and maintain friendships would always become so cumbersome to manage in addition to all of your other activities that I would get stuck in a middle of the road career.  Oftentimes I would give up and start using cheats for Simoleons to advance my lifestyle.  This was fun but always felt a little cheap.  The Sims 4 fixes this issue by making the Sims much more social naturally and removing the requirements for maintaining friendships to advance your career (at least in the two career paths I've explored: chef and tech guru). I've been able to advance my main character's career to the end of the path and since have retired, gaining a nice pension.  My wife's career path is advancing nicely too.  This allows me to maintain a nice household without using cheats which is more satisfying.

The character's naturally occurring social skills is where we circle back around to the introductory paragraph.  The city features public gathering spaces - the gym and the juice bar are particularly popular hangouts in the neighborhood - for Sims to mingle.  Simply having your character in those spaces will encourage them to be social without button clicks.  The characters also have cell phones to communicate with other sims, who will call you unprompted.  Keeping this in mind, sometimes my girls will play this game for their weekly video game time.  Along the way one of their characters went on a date with Giancarlo, the main trainer at the gym.  As I was watching her play, I noticed there were now romantic options to interact with the character, including a "kiss hand" option.  She's pretty into the idea of hanging out with Giancarlo, so I'm concerned that the "kiss hand" option will progress to "woohoo with Giancarlo" and so now I have to figure out how to prevent this from happening.  I don't want to have to explain what that means at this point in her life.  I don't know if there is an anti-woohoo option or if I'm going to have to play her game and sabotage her relationship while she's asleep. More to come on this in the near future.

A quick comment on downloadable content.  Despite paying $5 for the game, I have spent an additional $40 on downloadable content for the game.  In the era of online games, DLC has become commonplace.  I think there is some controversy to this as it can be seen as a money-grab. I'm OK with it, however.  I think it is a great way to expand on games that you enjoy. In my entire gaming history, I have not purchased many DLC packages, but the few times that I have they tend to give the game a little boost of extra playability. For the Sims 4, I purchased the seasons pack and the Star Wars pack which both add extra playability and fun to the game.

Picture: Sims mainstay character Bella Goth, fitness guru and government spy, as well as town hottie.

3 Months Summary

We're already one-third of the way finished with 2017 and I'm just now getting around to my first post of the year.  Obviously the future of this site is in jeopardy.  Regardless, below is my summary of 2017 thus far, in no particular order.

• Breath of the Wild, the first Zelda game in years, was released to critical acclaim.  Although I was disappointed with the last game which also got great reviews, this game looks revolutionary for the series and I would love to play it.  Trouble is, the new Switch system looks like a bit of a mess and otherwise I don't have much use for it.  My plan is to keep an eye out for a good used Wii U discounted or wait long enough for the price to come down.  This also allows me to replay Twilight Princess in HD and Wind Waker HD, a game I've never played before.  In the meantime, I'm enjoying Uncharted 4 on the PS4.
• Spring is quickly approaching.  As previously discussed, as a home owner I have a love-hate relationship with spring.  Warmer weather, the approach of May, and baseball are all positives.  New home projects are a negative.  However, this year we have some exciting projects (translation: $$$) lined up, including a landscape transformation and a new patio.  Should be good stuff.
•  Kate Upton was on the cover of the SI Issue again, which I thought was a bit lazy.  On a positive note, Playboy re-introduced the nude playmate, which ends a situation that was confusing to begin with.  Additionally, we saw Ariana Grande in concert which was cool.
• I bought a humidifier for my home.  It does shoot out mist but otherwise I can't tell that it really does much else.  Alas my hands and floors continue to suffer.
• 2017 has been the warmest Indiana winter I can remember.
• Work continues to be a mixture of good days and bad days, though mostly good.  Same is true with the peanuts.  Nothing too new to add on this front.

There you have it - the first quarter of 2017, summed up in 6 quick bullet points.  I'm sure there have been other news stories to discuss.  These were just the first few to pop into my head.

Losing My TV

I told myself that I wouldn't allow this to happen.  I told myself that I wouldn't allow my toddlers to take my TV hostage.  And yet as they now approach 3 years old and can ask for what they want, the seemingly inevitable has happened.  I remember being at Sarah's sister's house when her kids were younger, wondering why all of the adults were allowing the kids to watch kids shows all morning long.  I can now tell you why.  Because it is much, much easier to just give in and allow them to watch their shows than listen to them fuss about it all day long.  Don't get me wrong, if there is something on TV that I really want to watch, I'll watch it.  But generally speaking, especially early in the mornings, I will let them watch their shows first.  Subsequently I've seen Frozen, Shrek, Sesame Street, etc, seemingly hundreds of times.

My kids aren't the only ones confiscating my TV this summer.  Dish network has been in battle with the Tribune Company over channels for months now.  In central Indiana this affects both the Fox and CBS affiliate.  Additionally, Dish had been in negotiations with the NFL Network for months, but that dispute has seemingly ended, unsurprisingly just before the NFL preseason began.  As a casual football fan, I honestly couldn't care less about the NFL network.  It's a channel I rarely if ever watch.  Generally speaking, I don't care much about Fox or CBS either.  However, NFL season is starting soon and I'm going to be a bit frustrated if the channels don't return in time.

I don't remember channels being removed from cable due to contract disputes being an issue growing up.  It is certainly becoming an issue with increasing frequency.  It's to the point now where I'm not surprised when it happens.  And this CBS/Fox - Dish dispute is lasting longer than usual.  Seems like they usually go on for a month or so.  This one has been going on for several months.  Obviously times are changing fast in the TV business right now as more and more people are using streaming and other means to get their entertainment.  I just hope this dispute ends before the real NFL season kicks off in a couple of weeks.

Coming Back To Reality Is Always The Hardest Part

While the warming temperatures of spring are always welcome, spring is not my favorite season.  That distinction would go to fall for me.  Since becoming a home owner, spring is littered with numerous house projects that need to be done year after year.  This year is no different, with a laundry list of landscaping and mulching and various other outdoor projects that need to be done.  Throw a full time job(s) and two young kids into the mix, along with weather that frequently doesn't agree with your plans, and spring time becomes a bit stressful for me.  I think this in addition to the fact that work has been a bit stressful lately led to me not even thinking about our trip to Puerto Rico much until we landed in San Juan.

Puerto Rico is beautiful, a tropical island in the middle of the ocean that averages 80 degrees year long and has 340 days of sunshine per year.  It's a US territory, meaning you don't need a passport, and yet has its own distinct culture and values.  I'd recommend visiting at some point.

When we landed back in Indy, we were greeted with gray skies and nearly freezing temperatures.  We made it home, and I was happy to see our kids for sure as it had been nearly a week.  They acted a bit indifferent.  Within a a few hours they both had dirty diapers and were fighting back and forth.  Welcome back to reality.  Paradise can't last forever - I don't have the cash.

Great Time of the Year

One of our girls is in complete mimic mode right now.  She's saying several new words per day which is fun but at the same time scary.  We have to censor our selves a bit around the house now to avoid an "F" bomb slip from the toddler at just the right time.  Generally speaking they're both at a great age - just the right time to develop their own personalities and be pretty interactive, while not quite old enough to argue.

Despite the days getting shorter, generally I love autumn.  The weather is cool enough to wear a fleece, but not cold enough to snow.  You've got baseball playoffs (which sucked this year), the start of football and basketball, and the changing of the leave colors, making for a scenic trip to work.  Something else I absolutely love about autumn in Indy is the literal 100s of Indy Scream Park billboards they put up around town.  I just love driving by 40 of these signs every day on my way to work.  Also, it would be great if they took them down shortly after halloween, but they don't.  They usually leave them up several weeks after the season is over.  It's really the icing on the cake for one of my favorite times of the year.

We've Lost Control Of This Ship

Since day one we have tried and have been wildly successful at putting our twins on a schedule.  The reasoning is simple - to allow our babies to eat, sleep, nap, and play simultaneously so that they get used to a routine and know what to expect day to day from us.  This works in both directions too.  Placing our kids on a schedule also allows us to better predict our kids' behavior and what to expect from them.  Some people scoff at this idea, but most of those people (a) have never had twin babies and (b) are amazed at how easily our girls go to bed and take naps, etc.

I would say we started to derail a bit a few months ago.  Sarah may be able to give a more accurate timeline as she is with them everyday all day.  Regardless, in the past when we said "no" they would look at us with fear and then stop what they were doing.  Something changed this spring, however.  Now when we say "no" we are usually met with no response as they ignore us, or even worse, an absolute tantrum, sometimes involving head hitting and other outrageous reactions.  As if this wasn't bad enough, things went further off course a few weeks ago when tantrums began being thrown for no apparent reason at all.  One of them would just start screaming completely out of the blue.  Then a few minutes later she would be completely fine.  And this rapid cycling bi-polar like behavior occurs several times per day.  Their mood swings have become so frequent and extreme I would need a journal to keep up with them.

This has nothing to do with them being on a schedule and the schedule has not failed us.  They still eat, sleep, nap, and play in a predictable fashion.  They still go to bed and sleep well.  The mostly predictable nature of their moods, however, has gone out the window.  Hopefully it is just a short phase.  Time will tell, but I have a feeling we are entering the "terrible 2s" a bit early.

A New Year Means I'm Getting Older

Welcome to 2015!  I worked a half day yesterday so I decided to pick up some wings on my way home.  Generally after I get off work I proceed directly home to avoid fighting with all of the traffic.  I got 10 boneless wings and some fried pickles which were fantastic.  However I knew before I even started eating them that I would pay for it for the rest of the day.  Over the past 1-2 years anytime I eat wings or pizza or similar type foods I have a predictable and unpleasant response to the food.  It mostly involves feelings of being bloated, belching, and generally feeling disgusting, i.e. dyspepsia.  I used to be able to hammer down food like this and not think twice.  Not anymore, however.  The symptoms extended into the evening.  I tried to have a few beers to celebrate the New Year but I couldn't even stomach that.  I developed a headache around 10:30 and ended up in bed at 11.  What a pathetic performance on my part.  I talked to a few of my friends this morning.  Both of them made it past midnight, though one of them was already in bed when the ball dropped and promptly fell asleep he said.  Obviously everyone is aging every second of the day, but the fact that I am showing physical signs of aging can be somewhat depressing if I really think about it.  But honestly, who has time to dwell?  I woke up this morning feeling great, helped take care of my kids, and moved on with life.

Overall 2014 was a great year and I expect 2015 to be great as well.  I hope everyone enjoys their holiday weekend.

Keeping Calm and Carrying On

October ended with a trip to Seattle which I would classify as an interesting place and a place that I'm glad I visited once but also a place that I'm not planning on returning to anytime soon.  The surrounding area is beautiful, however.

Trick-or-treater's never came to see us in our apartments and unfortunately we weren't able to participate in Halloween last year so this was our first year as a home owner where we could hand out candy.  Sarah bought some but the weather was crummy, in the upper 30s/lower 40s with rain and sleet.  We had very few trick-or-treaters.  Sophie and Elle dressed up as the monsters from Monster's Inc. (see Sarah's facebook page) and they had fun crawling around in their outfits, probably confused about the situation.  We have a lot of leftover candy.  I've had more snickers bars in the past week than I've had in the past several years.  I forgot how good those things are.

I think I'm finally used to using a Mac over a PC.  That didn't take long, maybe a few days.  I'm pretty happy with the switch thus far.  I'm also switching computer systems at work, which is a major hassle.  Luckily I already use the new system at one of my other jobs, but the rest of my office staff isn't so fortunate - it is brand new to them.  Hiccups are expected in the upcoming weeks.

Learning To Crawl

I've been around a lot of babies throughout my life because of my job.  One of the things that I honestly don't think I've seen before having kids on my own is how they progress from starting to crawl to full crawling.  Our kids haven't started full crawling yet but everyday they seem to get a bit closer to doing so.  It is fascinating to watch them progress each day through these steps.

Our hospital recently got absorbed into a much larger hospital system.  This comes with many benefits but also has costs.  We have to do yearly health screenings to be part of their health insurance (we had to do this in the past too).  I find this moderately irritating because they screen for stuff that per guidelines I shouldn't be screened for and I go through it every year.  But the point of this rant is that one of the downsides to joining a larger company is that things that used to be simple are now much more complex.  Case in point.  I need to schedule my wellness screening.  In the past they would just send out an email giving a few available dates to get the screening.  Now you have to register online and I cannot figure out how to do this (keep in mind I am at least somewhat tech savvy).  I've spent probably 20 minutes trying to figure this out today and keep running in circles.  Making matters worse is in the past I would just call someone and get an answer but now I don't even know who to call and even if I did the chances of me actually talking to someone on the phone is rare.  It is very frustrating.

The US Open started today so I will be putting my TV shows on pause for the next couple of weeks.  It is probably my favorite tennis major.  Sadness that Kirilenko is out already.

Carrot Monster?

I heard rumors about this some time back but never saw any evidence of it (I don't watch Sesame Street.) until Sarah pointed out this picture on one of the girls' diapers:

I realize that we have a major child obesity problem in this country (It isn't uncommon for me to see a kid in clinic who weighs more than I do) but this is ridiculous.  It doesn't even make sense.  His name is cookie monster, so why would he even want a carrot?  If they want to create a character who has a story that is based on he/she enjoying fruits and vegetables, then fine, so be it.  But leave cookie monster out of it.

Making Plans

Having a social life as an adult male can be pretty challenging.  Throw two young kids into the mix and the challenge escalates exponentially.  The first challenge is finding someone to watch the kids while you go do what it is you want to do.  Sure, you could take the kids with you but sometimes you want to go someplace where the kids aren't welcome, such as the local beer fest.  Luckily, we do have some family nearby and this weekend Katie was nice enough to watch our young twins for several hours on Saturday.  Challenge passed and great gratitude to Katie for accepting the challenge.  Sarah volunteered to be the DD this weekend so challenge number two was passed easily.  What follows, however, is a cluster of planning trying to determine where we were going to pick up our friends (their house or their parent's house because they too have to come up with a plan for their little one), which vehicle we are going to take and preparing the vehicle to be able to handle adults in the back seat who don't require baby seats, what time we are going to leave the festival and where we are going to eat to be able to get back home in time to resume responsibility for our kids.  We literally had to start planning for this afternoon event weeks before it happened.  And it all worked out because we had a baby sitter, our friends had a baby sitter, we both were available to go to the festival and had interest, and Sarah was willing to drive.  It takes lots of variables and planning to pull something like this off.  Long gone are the days of doing something on the fly.

As for the beer festival itself, it was just OK.  I had a good time but it one of those things where I can say I've been there and done that and can check it off my list of things to do in the city but I don't think I really have much interest in going again.  At least not in the near future.  It was basically like a big carnival that only contained concession stands.

New Music Please

I had a great first father's day.  We went back home and I was able to spend some time with my own father before heading over to St. Louis to watch the Cardinals play.  The girls got me a nice card featuring one of my all time favorite characters the Cookie Monster, as well as a picture of them as little cells and a classic "World's Best Dad" coffee mug for me to use at work.

For the past several months we have played this album of classic music that is designed to be soothing while the girls are sleeping.  They seem to like it and there are several songs on there that I like too.  I decided to jazz up their music experience while they were sleeping by adding some songs from one of my all time favorite video games - The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess.  The Legend of Zelda has some of the most iconic and well known music in video games and Twilight Princess has a fantastic soundtrack that is quite memorable.  However Sarah says some of the songs are a little too loud for their sleep routine.  We will have to discuss this further in the future but for now the girls will be dreaming of saving Hyrule!

Finally A Refund!

For the past several years we have left the accountant's office owing both for their services and for taxes due.  I always left feeling like I got screwed because invariably I would see commercials or here co-workers discussing how they were going to spend their refunds.  This year we got a refund.  Finally!  It was a large one too (in my opinion). 

We had a couple of things going for us this year.  One is that we had not one but two kids.  The other is that we bought a house.  I know that getting a refund just means I over payed throughout the year but it still feels nice to join the conversation about what I'm gonna do with my refund.  Plus I pay a lot in federal taxes each year so I feel like I deserve a refund.  I was in a much better mood this year after leaving the accountant's office.

Epic Fail At Hanging Curtains

Our big house project for the weekend was to hang some curtains in my home office.  The curtains were going to hang over bay windows.  Bay windows add some extra challenge to hanging curtains in that you have extra rods in close proximity so getting everything to fit properly can be tough.  Sarah bought some fancy curtain rods that have connectors that bend so that you can bend and mold the rods to the shape of the bay windows, an idea that I thought was pretty cool.  Doing this should help with the problem of having too many rods in a small space because you reduce all of the rods to one long rod that bends.  You also decrease the number of panels and tie-backs that you need.  Unfortunately, the rods were way too long for our windows and so we weren't able to hang them.  They will either need to be returned or used on other windows.  I'm a bit of a procrastinator when it comes to home projects so any delay such as having the wrong equipment compounds that issue.  Hopefully we will get them hung before summer.

An update with the girls - they're big thing now is that they are actually producing tears now.  So if we let them cry too long before feeding them (like just a few minutes...) when we go to pick them up they actually have tears in their eyes.  It adds an extra level of sadness to the whole situation.  They especially don't like it when Mr. Blue comes around (see below).

 Mr Blue:

Living In 3 Hour Intervals: An Update at 1 Month

I've got a few small house projects going on right now, one of which (the broken window in a prior post) has been delayed a few times.  It was initially delayed because I couldn't find replacement material for the window.  I think I've found the replacement material now but it has been delayed again due to the weather as I haven't been too excited about standing up on a ladder outside with several inches of snow on the ground.  My job has always delayed home projects, especially outdoors projects.  This weekend I was able to get salt for our water softener and get that up and going again.  I also attached our carbon monoxide detector to the wall and finished painting a few dark spots we had on our ceiling from the shower leak.  And I shoveled the driveway so that we could easily get our vehicles in and out of our garage.  Between those chores and all of the sports this weekend I stayed pretty busy. 

The girls are still in their eat, poop and sleep phase.  That is mostly what they do.  I will say that they seem to be settling into a routine and I think they are getting used to being here at home.  I will say that we as parents are getting into our routine and getting used to them being here as well.  As far as at-home tasks go (either chores/projects or fun activities), I've found that I can pretty much still do everything I used to be able to do.  The big difference is that I might have to wait until the girls are fed or I may get interrupted to help them out.  Their eat, poop and sleep routine takes about three hours and then the process is repeated.  The eat and poop phases take between 30-60 minutes, leaving the other 2-2.5 hours for us to get what we need or want to get done.  So I can still do projects and watch sports, I just have to schedule my activities around their eat, poop and sleep routine.  After living like this for a month I have pretty much become used to the routine as my new life and things seem to be going pretty well at this point.

Surviving The Polar Vortex

I've never been one to get too nervous about the weather.  I figure there is nothing you can do about it and fortunately I've never been face to face with a real weather emergency.  People around here get bent out of shape about snow (living in the Great Lakes snow belt really changes your perspective on this) and thunderstorms.  I don't take shelter unless I can visibly see a tornado coming towards my house.  The polar vortex we had this past week changed my attitude towards weather a bit.  We got 12 inches or more of snow last week in one day, followed by temperatures in the minus teens with windchill around minus 40 degrees.  The snow itself didn't make me too nervous but the cold temperatures sure did.  Things (including humans) just aren't designed to work in those cold temperatures.  There were a few days where I was quite concerned that either the power would go out or a pipe would freeze and break.  Part of this new nervousness is because I own a house and am now responsible for any damage that occurs.  Most of the nervousness, however, comes from now having two little ones at home.  I couldn't imagine what we would have done if the power would've went out when it was -15 degrees outside.  We do have a kerosene heater my parents bought us but luckily we didn't have to use it.  Needless to say I am now quite happy the weather is back to normal for winter.  Our only real casualty from all of this was a window in our porch area that some how broke.  My dad did a temporary fix (see below) until we are able to order a replacement part.  Doesn't it look nice?  Right up to code I am sure for our HOA.

Being A Father: An Update At 2.5 Weeks

I've been a dad (still feels weird saying that) for a little over two weeks now so I thought I'd update everyone on my take of the pros and cons of being a father for two newborns.

Pros

• They provide occasional comedic relief, usually in the form of Elle's goofy old man faces or by passing loud, raunchy farts.
• We should be getting a decent little tax break since they were born in 2013.

Cons

• The biggest con by far is that we are up at all hours of the night attending to their fussiness.
• Having to deal with other people's poop is a big turn-off.  Sometimes this is an isolated event, but frequently it also involves them urinating on themselves and ruining their outfits, which is a bonus.
• Not being able to do things you want to do or having to frequently pause things you are in the middle of doing to attend to their fussiness.  Not nearly as big of a deal as the lack of sleep, but still inconvinient.
• Having to answer numerous questions regarding their status.

Cons 1-3 are typical baby stuff that I pretty much expected and was prepared for.  Con 4 however, having to answer numerous questions about them, was something I was not prepared for.  Behind the lack of sleep this is my second least favorite aspect of being a father for two newborns.  When I go to work I want to focus on my job and what needs to be accomplished for the day, not answer 14,000 questions regarding the status of the girls that are asked by every individual I encounter.  I am thinking about holding a press conference stating that unless otherwise noted, the kids are doing the above aforementioned things (i.e. eating, sleeping, pooping, fussing) and that I will update everyone as soon as their status changes.  One of my favorite questions is "How are you sleeping?"  What a stupid ass question.  I have two newborns at home.  How do you think I'm sleeping?  And by the way thanks for reminding me of the situation.

The comedic relief is amusing and I anticipate that as they get older the pros will start to outweigh the cons.  Time will tell!