I’d just moved into my first flat, with my ever glowing sister of the soul, Cookie. And by twenty? I was in my fourth and final year of university, living in the same flat but with two gay boys and a sometimes girlfriend. And a sometimes TMD. I was the fucking boss of that place, man. Never mind that both boys split the rent – it was MY apartment. It’s just how it was.

And while I never ever cleaned, I was in charge of bills. I was a grown up.

At twenty-two or twenty-three, I was the director of a large summer camp. Yeah. The lives of 60 staff and 2,000 campers were in my hands, and I never blinked. That shit was like breathing. Easy peasy.

So here I am, some ten years later, and I’m probably not going to be able to sleep as my brain explodes from worry. We’d be better off financially if we’d never bought this place and just rented for the last four years. Yes, renting is throwing away money. But you know what else is throwing away money? Buying a flat when you’re going to be there for a short period, especially when it’s worth less than it was when you bought it. All the solicitors fees, estate agent fees, decline in housing market – ah, yes, it’s the wonder world of hindsight.

Except I love this flat. Really, really love it.

Now if only I could grow some courage and manage to figure out how to choose which estate agent to go with.

On a related (?) note, I am striving for the life I/we want. I’ve entered a ‘I just don’t give a shit’ phase of my life that allows me to donate clothes that I have been holding onto for memory’s sake for about fifteen years. Including my first peach coloured negligee. Yes, I just don’t give a shit.

I do give a shit in the worry stakes – is it the right thing to move? Are we going to lose all our money? How can we possibly afford this mortgage once we have moved?

In the big picture, though, Snort discovered Mr Potato Head tonight and thinks it’s the greatest thing ever. And we took the kids into the city today, and Coconut danced to live classical music. So on the family front, things are good, gooder, goodest. I have to remember that, even as we try and try to be grown up enough to handle negotiating fees, dealing with keeping the place clean(ha!) all the time for viewings, and getting rid of even more stuff we don’t need.

Weird how I long for those days when I was dealing with a camp van being stolen, the office being broken into, a camper being abducted and taken into a neighboring country. It all seemed much easier.

It’s a fairly major move, to another part of the country. All of TMD’s parents live there – though FIL (my father in law) is basically giving us his house and he’ll be moving about an hour and a half away to live with his partner. He’ll come spend the night once a week or so. I’m not an ungrateful sow, but I do wish he’d sell his house, invest his money for his future, and give us a bit so we can buy a house we actually want. He is redoing his house – new carpet, windows, paint, bathrooms, etc – and it is a nice house. Four bedrooms, big garden! I am just so not a city/suburban woman.

We might live in a small two bedroom flat now, but our back garden is expansive, with a path leading down to a huge park, woods, and yet more countryside. I’m all about the trees, yo. All about the trees.

Still, the area we’re moving to is nice, and there is lots of green space nearby – just a bit bummed that we’ll have to drive to it rather than our back door opening to it.

We plan to move pretty fucking soon – end of March. We have a lot to do before then. Step one was getting our wobbly toilet fixed yesterday, which necessitated both adults in the house pooping in children’s potties today before dumping it in a big bucket which is currently covered with cling film and in the bathtub. It’s all glamourous here.

(Sidenote: for some reason, my grandmother essentially lived in her basement – as most of my extended family does. Not in a weird ‘put the lotion in the basket’ kind of way, but in a cozy, comfortable ‘this one giant room is all we need, sod the rest of the house’ sort of way. When we were little, she showed us how to pee in a special red pot (like the sort you boil water and cook things in!) rather than walking all the way upstairs to pee. She did it, so we did too. Might have had something to do with her arthritis, or maybe  my family are crazier than I think. So ANYWAY. The point of this sidenote was to say I felt perfectly happy peeing in a bucket last night and this morning.)

Our new house – I have to try to start thinking of it that way, rather than as FIL’s house – has a bathroom downstairs and upstairs. So we can all pee without climbing stairs or resorting to using kitchenware to help us void our bladders.

I have the feeling I got off topic somewhere…

‘Are they twins?’ she asked, nodding at Snort and Coconut. When I said yes, she continued, ‘Boy, do I feel sorry for YOU.’

I said something about how we had a lot of fun, and she said, ‘Fun?’ like she’d never heard the word before.

I left there thinking that I feel sorry for her. Sorry that she isn’t really enjoying her child (at least on this particular day), sorry that she imagines having another to be a horrible, hard thing to deal with.

I’m tired, yo. I’m tired and achy and am trying to figure out how to claw back some time for me. But I do have FUN. And I love my kids; I stand by what I’ve said since day one of knowing I was going to have twins. Twins are fucking awesome.

Sorry for scarcity of normal blog posts. I never have time or energy to open the laptop. I’m unwell now, so may spend the whole weekend in bed and if I do, you guys and my blog will be the first ones to know it.

Promise.

How do you all get a break? I need to write a longer post about this, about the specifics of why I ask. I think I need the actual laptop for that though; my phone just won’t cut it.

I’ve had this on and off since childhood. A white tongue that then gets ‘holes’ where the pink flesh shows through. Is this thrush?

On a side note, I only noticed my freaky tongue tonight because I have a very side throat, and I don’t just think it is from my uncontrollable slug related screaming this morning.

Sorry you had to see this picture. Hope it did not make you sick. But WTF is wrong with my tongue? The one time I had accupuncture they looked at my tongue. Any of you people tongue doctors?

The doctor suggested the problem is probably the chronic exhaustion of caring for twins. Judging from how excited I am to have a big solo trip to the doctor AND the hospital – I’m positively perky – she may be correct.

I thought I lost Snort at the pool today. Turns out he was in locker 18.

We were getting undressed, I put my backpack in a locker (number 3, since you ask), and when I turned around he was gone.

I’m all, ‘Snort? Snort, where are you?’ My eyes scan.

I then end up jogging to the pool and scanning the water while still calling for him, when a merry little voice says, ‘Here he is! I found Snort, Mama. Here he is.’

I go back to Coconut and she still appears to be alone. She grins and points at the locker.

Yeah, dude. I applaud your stealth and speed.

We have an Elmo DVD entitled ‘Kids Favourite Songs 2.’ It’s a bunch of kids and muppets singing a bunch of random songs; the common thread in the video is, though, a ‘sketti ball.’ Snuffleupagus begins the DVD by singing ‘On Top of Spaghetti’ (aCHOO, Snort says at the appropriate time). His giant ass sketti ball rolls off the table, and onto the floor. In fact, it rolls right out the door.

So, this sketti ball features in a few songs and sketches, rolling around and creating mayhem as sheep, bears, and Snuffy try to catch its wily meatball ass.

The finale – a truly dramatic moment – is when the giant sketti ball picks up speed and rolls RIGHT AT ELMO!! Holy shit!! Move, ELMO!! For the love of god, get out of the way of the skeetttttiiiii baaalllllll!!!!!

The kids like it. Snuffy steps in at the last moment and stomps on the ball, rendering it mushy.

Now, sketti ball. Snort randomly invented it. It began with a stuffed yellow dog from TMD’s childhood and two footballs. He makes me hold the yellow dog so I can make it scream and run away from the sketti balls (football!) that he pushes after it. Okay. He does proclaim that it has turned to mush if it gets too close to the dog, so I guess I have that fact to comfort me when I get freaked out by games involving repeated violence.

The game now also involves a one-eyed alien (eye monster) that goes, ‘Eee, Eee,’ instead of screaming. I have to hold the dog in one hand (AHHHHH!!!) and the eye monster in the other (eeeeeeee). Mayhem ensues.

Coconut invariably joins in, but she doesn’t do any pansy mush stuff. No, while Snort kisses the dog and lovingly invites it to eat the mush, Coconut screams like a fucking warrior and pushes the sketti ball over the dog with no mercy. He’s lying on his back saying, ‘Ahh! You’re smushing me!’ and she’s laughing like a manic.

This very specific routine happens a few times a day. Now it goes on with me making my arms into a hoop because Coconut asks for basketball (and Snort communicates quite clearly his sadness at having no high hoop in their room), and going ‘do do, do do do’ – I think it’s the Mission Impossible theme. After they throw heavy footballs at my chest for awhile, Snort then leaps and throws his body, head first, through the ‘hoop.’ Coconut does the same. AGAIN AND AGAIN AND AGAIN.

So. That’s where our routine is at now. It’s like a perfectly scripted play in which no one ever forgets their lines. The sketti ball/basketball game is so choreographed we could perform it every night to different audiences and the only way people would know it was a live show would be beacuse we were wearing different clothes.

I wonder how it will evolve. I hope it doesn’t involve another stuffed animal because contrary to popular belief, I only have two hands. Though my right arm is certainly getting longer from Snort yanking it as he asks me to come to his room for some sketti ball. If I try to put him off in any way he just begins to sob.

What can I say? We like PG rated violence. It’s exciting.

In a previous life, I was a ‘camping professional.’ I lived in the woods all year round – alone in the winter. Yes, I scared myself shitless with my overactive imagination, but that’s a different story.

*This* story is about the fact that while I hate kitchen cooking, I can make just about any meal over a campfire. This morning I combined a traditional campfire dessert with the oven….and this is a fantastically easy and fun recipe for toddlers.

Get a banana, take off the bit of skin facing the ceiling when its lying down, cut a slit in the flesh, shove chocolate chips or buttons in, slam into the oven. See? Easy.

*insert public safety announcement* This is also tasty with mini marshmallows, but I don’t classify them as a safe food for young children due to the huge choking risk – the impossibility of getting them out of a throat while they expand from contact with saliva? No. A family friend sadly lost their child in this way, and on a recent baby/child specific first aid course, marshmallows were mentioned as the number one unsafe sweet. *end public safety announcement*

We weren’t patient enough to let the chocolate fully melt (despite the camp inspired entertainment of learning how to balance spoons on noses), but this morning snack was still a huge hit. Yum.

As my friend Plex the robot says, ‘Try it, you’ll like it.’