This post is part of a series titled "Twinmama's Lifestyle Challenge". For more information about how the challenge works, please visit related links here and here.

Week Eleven: How Did It Go?

Sorry, folks! The girls and I went to visit my mom this week and we are just getting back into the swing of things here at home. (Twingrandma does not have internet access so it was truly a vacation!)

Last week's challenge is very difficult! I will just need to keep working through limiting my sodium intake.

Week Twelve...cue Mission: Impossible music...

Category?: Personal

What?: Eliminate a stressor! It's that time again to pick another stressor for the list and take steps to tackle it!

Why?: Stress is a nasty little thing that corrodes our physical and mental well being as well as causes strife in our relationships.

How Do We Go About Doing the Challenge?: Like most people, I have some things that just make me crazy. I will pick one and concentrate on fixing it. Instead of being on the defensive, I will go to the source of the problem. I will pick something that I have the ability to control or cause change.

Who Does the Challenge Include?: Me

Resources to Help:

http://www.stressbook.com/eliminating_stress.shtml

TLC Weekly Challenges start on Mondays and continue indefinitely. I will post my results along with the following challenge next Sunday. Remember, you are invited to participate in my weekly challenge or create your own and tell me about it! Also, if you find better ways to accomplish a weekly challenge, please drop me a comment. Good luck, fellow TLC-ers!

Ah, Dinosaur!

There are a couple dinosaurs running around my house these days. No, they aren't the dogs. They are two cute, little two year olds who have discovered that imagination and play is really, really fun. I may be a little guilty for starting it, but Peanut and Jelly Bean have embraced it.

And it is so cute.

The girls have been pretending more and more. Of course, we have several toy phones the girls like to walk around with and pretend they are talking. Jelly Bean will have pretty in depth conversations with her pretend friend on the other end of the phone and I have heard mommy, dadda, sissy, grandma, papaw and nana mentioned on several occasions. She is talking about us and I sure hope it is all good stuff since I don't know everything she is saying. She is so good at mimicking that even her mannerisms sound like me when I am on the phone...scary.

Also, they really like to mimic everything that twindada and I do which is cute and unnerving all at the same time. Do we always want them to do what we want? (Well, that all depends on if we are doing good things of course.)

One day, it became clear to us that Peanut really had a thing for dinosaurs. I don't really understand why because we don't have any toy dinosaurs and we don't talk about them often. The only time she has seen dinosaurs is on cartoons and in her coloring books, but she has really taken to them. (I asked her the other day if she wanted to watch Jurassic Park and she nodded her head, but I will spare her. She doesn't know what she is agreeing to watch! That movie still scares me and I have seen it several times!)

As Peanut began to point to dinosaurs and say, "Si-saur", I would ask her what dinosaurs say. "Errr!" she would chime back. I thought it was cute. Now we know what dinosaurs say, along with cows and dogs and chickens, etc. Cool.

But then, the unimaginable happened. I was playing with the girls one day and I turned to Peanut who had transformed into an actual dinosaur. Her face was all scrunched up and with her laughing eyes twinkling, yet serious, she started "Err-ing" at me. I shook with fear and asked, "Are you a dinosaur?" She wouldn't let up and her growling got even worse. "Errrr!"

I ran. Jelly Bean ran. I shrieked, "Ah, dinosaur!" as Peanut chased me all over the house. I couldn't believe it. My sweet, beautiful baby was now a ferocious dinosaur...what was I going to do? She had me cornered when she spotted her sister and ran after Jelly Bean. Jelly Bean ran around yelling, "Ah, di-saur!"

This went on for a few moments until suddenly Peanut caught up with Jelly Bean and Peanut ceased being the dinosaur and was now running away from Jelly Bean yelling, "Ah, si-saur!" Jelly Bean's eyes showed all the dinosaur fury that Peanut once had and began chasing us around giving us her best growling dinosaur interpretation. She chased us all over.

Finally, Peanut and I were safely away from the dinosaur. However, things weren't quite over. Suddenly I felt myself transform into a Tyrannosaurus Rex and I started going "Errrrrr!!" while I walked around the house looking for someone to chase. And I found what I was looking for.

Two sweet, little girls were in my sights and as I chased them around the living room, they screamed, giggled and shouted, "Ah, si-saur!" Finally I caught up with them and grabbed them both and preceded to tickle them into a fit of belly giggles. As soon as I was holding my little duo in my arms, the dinosaur in me departed and the mom emerged once again.

Ah, I love being a mom.

This post is part of a series titled "Twinmama's Lifestyle Challenge". For more information about how the challenge works, please visit related links here and here.

Week Ten: How Did It Go?

Wow, what a difference a couple weeks can make! Two weeks ago, I thought I was on my deathbed. Finally by this past Tuesday, I started feeling better. It was amazing to feel the combination of feeling better and not drinking caffeine not only made me feel better, but it lifted my mood and I was racing about this house getting stuff done. (Which was good since the house was looking a little rough.) What a difference. I have to admit, the caffeine withdrawal was super tough on me. I felt weak, irritable and sluggish, but once I got through it (it took a few days) and got rid of the cold and cough, too, I am a new woman!

So, what else can I tweak in my diet? Let's see...

Week Eleven...cue Mission: Impossible music...

Category?: Personal/Family

What?: Consider sodium. It is time to get serious about lowering my sodium intake. There are many complications that can occur by consuming so many salty foods on a daily basis and I need to be aware of what my family is consuming, too.

Why?: Sodium is tricky. There are so many types of food including so-called "diet" foods that have high levels of sodium in them. (You know, remove fat and well, taste, they have to add something to make it edible!) Frozen, diet meals are notorious for this! The USDA (see resource link below) recommends about 2300 mg or 1 teaspoon per day and suggest that most Americans consume an average of 5000 mg a day! Too much sodium can cause high blood pressure.

How Do We Go About Doing the Challenge?: According to Mayoclinic.com (see resource link below), 77% of our sodium intake is estimated to come from processed or prepared foods. Um...do you want to start there? We will limit the amount of processed foods - sauces, pre-packaged "dinner kits", frozen meals and processed snacks (this includes "sweet" items, they have salt, too.) Also, we will consider doing some research about our favorite places to dine out and see if we can obtain nutrition guidelines. We will still allow the occasional treats out to those really yummy places, but by eating healthier at home and regularly, we can enjoy the occasional trip to our favorite Texas BBQ restaurant (it's sooo good) and not feel guilty for it.

Who Does the Challenge Include?: The whole twinfamily.

Resources to Help:

http://www.health.gov/DietaryGuidelines/dga2005/document/html/chapter8.htm

http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/sodium/NU00284

TLC Weekly Challenges start on Mondays and continue indefinitely. I will post my results along with the following challenge next Sunday. Remember, you are invited to participate in my weekly challenge or create your own and tell me about it! Also, if you find better ways to accomplish a weekly challenge, please drop me a comment. Good luck, fellow TLC-ers!

This post is part of a series titled "Twinmama's Lifestyle Challenge". For more information about how the challenge works, please visit related links here and here.

Week Nine: How Did It Go?

This week was filled with lots of illness, so I didn't quite get this challenge off the ground completely. I did manage to drag myself out of bed most of the days to do at least one load of laundry since we would have been in trouble and twindada was much too busy doing everything else plus trying to manage his business. I say the laundry challenge is definitely a keeper though - I did one load a day and it is quite manageable. I also like how it eliminates some stress not seeing the laundry basket start to overflow and running out of essentials like wash clothes (we have a lot of dirty faces around here), shirts and pajamas.

Week Ten...cue Mission: Impossible music...

Category?: Personal

What?: Step away from the hard stuff! No, I am not talking about beer or liquor. I am talking about my nemesis - caffeine. Much to my dismay, I can't consume it. It is time to eliminate caffeine from my daily liquids.

Why?: Much like medicine, when taken daily our bodies start to crave it and need it to function. This not much different than alcohol, too. Caffeine makes me jittery and active for a few hours and then I crash from its affects and this slows me down throughout the day. When I crash, I will often look for ways to boost my energy level again and this includes more caffeine or eating sugary foods. Since sugary foods add unnecessary calories and fat, this can be a real problem, too.

How Do We Go About Doing the Challenge?: I will not have any caffeinated beverages in the house whatsoever so that I am not tempted by them. Also, I will choose to order drinks that do not contain caffeine when we are out eating. I will also read labels before consuming certain food and medicine products that may contain caffeine. (For example, Midol contains enough caffeine to be the equivalent of one cup of coffee. That is how the drug fixes the fatigue symptom.)

*I am going to eliminate it completely from week one, but others who choose to follow this challenge may need to phase it out in baby steps. Also, keep in mind there is a withdrawal period for caffeine that usually lasts between 2-9 days and includes symptoms like fatigue/sluggishness, headaches and depressed mood.

Who Does the Challenge Include?: Me!

Resources to Help:

http://www.medicinenet.com/caffeine/article.htm

TLC Weekly Challenges start on Mondays and continue indefinitely. I will post my results along with the following challenge next Sunday. Remember, you are invited to participate in my weekly challenge or create your own and tell me about it! Also, if you find better ways to accomplish a weekly challenge, please drop me a comment. Good luck, fellow TLC-ers!

March Came in Like a Lion

And I do not mean the weather. Today it is a mild day here in the Midwest and the weather is supposed to be quite pleasant this weekend.

But inside Twinland, a storm started brewing last weekend and it came down upon us with all its fury and no remorse.

First Peanut's nose started running. No big deal, all I had to do was chase her around with tissues and wrestle her to the ground. Wash my hands like crazy, wash her hands like crazy and spray things down with disinfectant. All in a day's work. Then, by Sunday, she started going quite hoarse and my once, high pitched squeaky voiced Peanut (it's really a sweet little voice, if you ask me) was now ready to belt out some Nat King Cole number. Though it wasn't "A Wonderful World" when...

Monday, Jelly Bean's nose started running. Okay, now I have two little princesses to chase around with a box of royal tissues. I am at your beck and call, your highnesses. No sweat, we just went through this a couple of months ago and survived. It will be okay. But, wait! There is a twist this time...

Tuesday morning, I wake up and feel like I was hit by a car. I spent several hours in the wee hours coughing and congested. By the morning alarm, my throat was sore and swollen, coughing, congested and had a headache that made me want to pull my eyeballs out of their sockets. (Okay, I know you didn't need that visualization, but we try to be quite real here at Bringing Up Twins.) I could barely stand up from all the congestion and so I stumbled upstairs to twindada's office and said, "I am very sick. You have to watch the girls so I can go to bed."

I haven't laid in bed since I was on bedrest over two years ago. It was a very strange feeling.

Twindada did not grumble or try to argue with me which was awesome. He immediately filled in and took care of the girls the entire day so that I could rest. Peanut was doing better, but we decided to be on stand by as to whether she could go to the doctor to have her ears checked. Jelly Bean seemed to be doing fine with just a minor runny nose. I just thought that tomorrow would be a better day, but...

Wednesday came and I felt even worse. Peanut was doing okay, but had a meltdown in the afternoon. She is usually a very happy-go-lucky little girl, so for her to be so moody, made us concerned that she could have infected ears. We made an appointment for her to go the doctor the next day. Things would be definitely better tomorrow for all of us...right?

Thursday came and twindada took Peanut to her appointment. He came home saying that she was fine and just needed to ride out her cold. I continued to feel bad, but decided to ride this virus out, too. Okay, we would just have to suck it up and everyone would be better in a week or so. Just when I thought that all of our questions were answered, Jelly Bean woke up from her nap with watery, gooky green eyes and a dark welt under one of them.

I decided to call the phone nurse instead of making an appointment. After all, we had just been there that morning with Peanut. Here is the jist of the conversation...

"My daughter has green, gooky stuff on and around her eyes and was wondering at what point should we bring her in?" (twinmama)

"Is her eyes red?" (phone nurse)

"They are a little bloodshot, but not too bad. However, if looks like she was punched in one of her eyes. There is a dark spot under the eye." (twinmama)

"There's your answer, then. That sounds like conjunctivitis. We need to see her." (phone nurse)

Jelly Bean has pink eye in both eyes. The phone nurse connected me with the appointment desk and within twenty minutes twindada had Jelly Bean at the pediatrician's office and they saw the same doctor as him and Peanut. She was prescribed an antibiotic - they are eye drops that we have to put in her eyes three times a day for seven days. Ever put eye drops in a two year old? It is kind of like putting eye drops in an octopus. As I am holding her arms down at her sides and holding her head still, twindada has to pry open her tightly squeezed eye while quickly putting a tiny drop into the eye without missing all while trying to dodge the feet that are trying to kick him. It's a lot of fun. Really.

Now, a tired twindada came home and got the girls settled while I helped the little I could and then he made dinner. I managed to get the dishes washed while he took care of the girls and then I crashed and he put the girls to bed. I was exhausted and I could only imagine how exhausted he was. Friday we will all be on the mend, we just have to be...

Well, I am happy to report that the girls seem to be doing great today. Both of them have been running around playing like crazy on their toy cars, coloring and running around the house being active toddlers. Twindada has continued to do everything for them and they have learned to really rely on him like they do with me.

As for me? I woke up with a fever and have been dealing with a cold "breaking up" all day. It isn't pretty, but I hope it means I am on the mend, too, as I am tired of being away from my girls and my husband. I really miss them and I don't like lying in bed while my family is bustling around the house.

March has definitely come in like a lion here in Twinland! It has been a crazy week of illness, doctors appointments and hand washing, but there my hero came through for me and my creator made it all possible. Twindada has been an absolute rock this week and he is SuperMan & Mr. Mom all wrapped into one awesome package. The Lord sustained him and kept him healthy through all of this and we are so grateful! Twindada has never complained once about all the work he has been doing and he has been doing everything! I sent him an email from my bed thanking him for all of his hard work and he wrote back while the girls were napping. Here is a snippet...

"Thanks for being such a rock this week. I seriously don't know what I would have done if you hadn't been home. It was really a blessing." (twinmama)

"You're welcome. That's what I'm here for. A husband and a father. Signed up for the good and bad ;)" (twindada)

I think I married pretty well...

This post is part of a series titled "Twinmama's Lifestyle Challenge". For more information about how the challenge works, please visit related links here and here.

Week Eight: How Did It Go?

It was interesting to see how long it really takes me to perform certain tasks and how just a little bit of a commitment on a daily basis really helped to reduce much longer weekly chores. I plan on continuing to time my daily and weekly chores and put them into a schedule so they can be done on a regular basis and not interfere with my time with the girls, twindada and my job.

Week Nine...cue Mission: Impossible music...

Category?: Family

What?: Tame the laundry beast! After timing my chores last week, it has come to my attention that one of my time wasters is laundry. I need to focus on doing a little bit every day so that it doesn't pile up causing me to spend a large amount of time on it later in the week.

Why?: Seeing laundry piled up in different spots is stressful! Plus, I am tired of going through a clean basket of clothes looking for something in particular. I have gotten myself into a bad habit of getting overwhelmed by the large amounts of laundry every week.

How Do We Go About Doing the Challenge?: Every morning, I will wash one load of laundry. I will do the laundry as early in the day as possible so that I do not wait until the afternoon when things get busy. I will wash, dry, fold and put away that one load of laundry and will not be tempted to do more. Eventually, I will only have one load of laundry every day and will work in towels, sheets and bedding as appropriate. Also, I will be mindful of clothing that doesn't have to be washed right away and hang up anything that can be worn again before washing.

Who Does the Challenge Include?: Me! (And the washer and dryer.)

Resources to Help:

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/organized_forever/90326

TLC Weekly Challenges start on Mondays and continue indefinitely. I will post my results along with the following challenge next Sunday. Remember, you are invited to participate in my weekly challenge or create your own and tell me about it! Also, if you find better ways to accomplish a weekly challenge, please drop me a comment. Good luck, fellow TLC-ers!