Cat got your tail...

ok so,

Its just so incredible how much the girls are progressing lately. Lily is standing BY HERSELF. She has even taken a few steps by herself. She has also started dropping objects inside bins. That was a skill that the preemie doctors said would be a milestone. She can also say "duck" when you hold up her bathtub rubber ducky. I can't believe that Lily is finally doing things before her sister.

Bella has been clapping, waving, pulling herself up and shaking her head "no" for a month or so now (although she shakes her head at random times). Augie says the girls understand "no" quite well because when you say "no" as they are about to grab the cat's tail or something, they will pause, look at you, smile and then proceed in pulling the cat's tail. With that, they are ready for adolesense.

Both the girls have been drinking real milk instead of formula and eating table food exclusively now for a month and both girls are almost completely bottle-free. We've had to increase our supply of sippy cups. Very soon, we will eliminate the evening bottle altogether. Both girls sleep rather well through the nights since we started to enforce "sleep hygiene" (strict 7pm bedtime and no picking up crying babies in the night) about a month or two back.

Last Friday was snow day at their preschool. They blew machine-made snow onto the playground and apparently, Bella and Lily were the only kids from the infant room that loved the snow and didn't want to leave. I wish I could have seen them play in their first experience with snow! Here are some snow day pictures taken by their teacher Miss Shannon.

1st Inauguration...

ok so,

Last weekend we went to the Santa Barbara Zoo. It is supposed to be one the best zoos around the SoCal area. But, I am just not that into zoos at all. I never really liked them as a child and now as an adult, I find them exploitative. Maybe I take the animal rights thing too far, but I just imagine what it would be like to be one of those caged animals. At times, I have known the feeling. I would like the girls to know and be interested in animals but I am conflicted about visiting zoos. I was so distressed during our time at the zoo, that I only got 1 pic the entire day...and that was quite a struggle.

On a lighter note, today was the girls' first inauguration of the new president of the United States Barack Obama. Both girls went to nursery school wearing their new "Obama" t-shirts that their Aunt Judy picked up for them. They were the toast of the toddler room. How exciting that the girls should be born in the era of our first black president. Their future looks bright already...and so did their shirts after their berry breakfast.

Oh, and reading the latest copy of my guilty pleasure People Magazine, I heard about a man with a baby daughter 3 months younger than the girls. He lives here in the San Fernando Valley and is raising his daughter Madeline by himself. Just a day after his wife had given birth, she succumbed to a fatal blood clot in her lung. The story breaks my heart because it hits close to home. Just a year ago after giving birth to the twins and hommoraging afterward, I lay for weeks in the hospital fighting for my own life, hoping with all my might that the girls would not grow up without a mother!