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A portrait of my babes once a week in 2014 (13 months and 2 weeks - 58 weeks)

My mom told me that she loved the feeling of her babies on her hip so much that she carried us everywhere.  I know what she means - that perfect weight on your hip bone, a little arm around your back, sometimes playing with the hair at the top of your neck, sometimes tightly gripping the fabric of your sleeve, little legs swinging freely, face close and engaged in conversations about random sights around you, your arm wrapped around firm waists, warm skin, beating hearts. 

And I get to have two.  

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A portrait of my babes once a week in 2014 (13 months and 1 week - 57 weeks)

You've been taking little steps. Incidental, uncertain stumbles. But I am going to say today, Florence, you took your first steps. Wobbly, gleeful and full of pride.

Update: Anna took her first steps two days later. Not quite ready, but spurred on by watching Florence's achievement, it broke my heart to see you do it. The curse and blessing of being a twin.

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A portrait of my babes once a week in 2014 (13 months - 56 weeks)

Oh the juicy, sweet delights of strawberries. Florence you are very precise eater when it comes to these delicious winter fruit. And right now they are your absolute favorite thing to eat - you request one every meal. You delicately hold the short, green stem and take small bites until, savouring each mouthful (silent and serious in this endeavor), there is nothing left but a stalk and a few leaves. Anna, you prefer a hands-on method. You dig your fingers into the flesh which provides you with more joy than the taste of the strawberry. You too take the task at hand seriously, although it's hard to look passed the red stains on hands and babybgros and bibs and face. Touching, feeling, tasting, discovering. It makes me want to try strawberries for the first time again.

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A portrait of my babes once a week in 2014 (1 year and 3 week - 55 weeks)

That milky baby smell has all but gone. I catch myself smelling it now and then, perhaps late at night when I am rocking you back to sleep and my face is nestled in your hair.  My milk was the last thing you drank and your warm breaths against my shoulder take me back to a time when you were tiny. But I love this new, constantly changing smell. The smell of sweet, damp stickiness when you awake from your nap on a hot summer afternoon, the smell of peanut butter, bees wax and baby powder. The smell of Kimmy's perfume from riding her hip all morning. The metallic smell of chewing keys and holding onto to wagon edges. The faint hint of fresh herbs we've been picking in the veggie garden. And underneath all those transient smells, the smell of you forming and attaching and making me burst when I breath you in.

Nostalgia

I'm also talking about nostalgia. The speed at which babies grow and change means it's always lurking there - fresh nostalgia just beneath the surface of a smile.

{from here}

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A portrait of my babes once a week in 2014 (1 year and 2 week - 54 weeks)

A few mornings ago, just before the crack of dawn, you awoke at the same time and we snuggled you into bed for your morning feed, one in each arm.  You were both upset and it was taking a while to settle you back to sleep. It seemed that Anna was trying to console Florence as she gentle tapped her back and you eventually drifted off with hands entwined on my chest. Watching this warmed my heart and I want to write these moments down so I one day tell you stories of growing up as twins.

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A portrait of my babes once a week in 2014 (1 year and 1 week - 53 weeks)

Right now you are almost standing. You blow kisses and wave. You play catches with each other and read stories together, you can make animal sounds like lion growls and snakes hisses, you can clap and you know where you nose is, and where your toes are. You can climb on and off the couch. You have fantastic dance moves - Florence with your bouncy legs and head shakes, Anna with your wayward knee pop. You have learned a lot this year but I have learned more. I have learned to to change a nappy while dancing in order to entertain one of you sitting at my feet, I have learned to put a baby back to sleep while breast feeding another, I have learned to get two babies out of a car (it is harder than it sounds). I have learned of a patience I didn't realise was in me, I've discovered a calmness, and yet a fierceness as I watch over you like a mama lioness, I've learned of a depth of love only a parent can feel, and I've learned a lightness of heart that makes me sing and dance and play and laugh and feel like a child again.