8 Months Old

I had an idea for our 8 month photo shoot which for various reasons didn't materialize, but in the words of Douglas Adams:

"I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be." 

In the end things worked out – if not better than I had intended – then certainly more interesting. It all started with the arrival of the boys' first shoes:

SHOES!!!

I was (clearly) pretty excited about this since I spent time taking pictures of said shoes while I should have been vacuuming the nursery in anticipation of our very first playdate guests. As it turned out, the boys were a little less excited than I was about their new shoes, and maybe a little too exuberant about our guests, but in the meantime...

The vacuuming: I did get to it after all.

I knew Seth didn't particularly like the vacuum. He's been known to cry on occasion if I've been at it too long (hey, so have I!), but I sincerely had no idea that said vacuum is actually the stuff his nightmares are made of. Or at least they are now. I brought it into the nursery (everything was OK), I plugged it in (still OK) and turned it on (very much not OK) while Nate and Seth played happily in Seth's crib.

Seth's body left the mattress he jumped so high. He couldn't have cried harder. Cue mommy guilt.

I can never vacuum within his earshot again. Never. Ever. Again. Seriously, it was a bad scene and just moments before our playdate guests arrived no less.

One of the mommies from our Preparing For Multiples prenatal class series kindly offered to come for a visit that day and brought her sweet girls, Victoria and Caitlin. I don't know what either of us was expecting, but clearly we are (or perhaps were) very optimistic women.

The girls were understandably upset by unfamiliar surroundings, Seth was still crying from the vacuum trauma and after a few minutes Nate decided to cry too because he felt left out.

Oh dear.

Mommies of twins really should come equipped with an extra set of arms since 2 mommies + 4 babies = a scenario that is bound to end poorly at times, especially when two of those babies are getting pretty mobile of late. And by two of those babies I mean mine, and most especially Seth.

Oh, Seth.

He got over his vacuum upsets in time to snake his way across the room at lightning speed (this is his only speed lately by the way) and greet poor Caitlin with an open palm on her sweet face as she lay there innocently contemplating the jungle gym.

Ouch. 

And cue more mommy guilt. 

So after our morning and afternoon with the new shoes, the vacuum "incident" and a 90 minute visit that took days to coordinate with many crying babies and some violence it's not really a surprise that our cute photo shoot got bumped – especially since we three had to head out ourselves after all was said and done. I got the boys bundled up in their new fleeces and shoes and everyone was looking so cute I decided to grab the camera for a few quick pics even though we really should have been on our way, and I will forever be glad I did.

Not just because they looked so cute:

... but because something a little magical happened. It's a moment I've seen before but never thought I'd get on film. Perhaps this was Nate's way of showing Seth how to properly touch someone on the face:

Of course, after a few minutes things took a turn for the interesting:

You can catch the whole show on video, including Nate's reaction to his first pair of shoes and Seth's take on "Nate flavor" over on our YouTube™ channel – although if you have a weak constitution you may want to skip Part IV. Don't say I didn't warn you.

- L.