Life with twins 3

[GibberingGinger]

Like some sort of film sequel, or a royal dynasty, welcome to Life with twins III, a thread for general discussions and sharing experiences of having (or expecting) twins.

Wow GG well done on the consistent weight loss. You've inspired me. I don't know if I knew you had loads of twins in the family either.

I will need to get on this wine bandwagon before I launch into an analysis of how well or otherwise mine get on... totally fascinated by all your accounts.

Yes have watched Peppa a grand total of once - it was about why we have rules at the playground and was most amusing, I must get organised and get it on series record as the girls did actually seem quite interested in it, which is rare...

Splashsuits - I got Regatta ones which are doing the trick nicely although I sized up and even the bigger size are not massive, especially around the waist. Not sure they will last until late spring, which was the idea especially with my fatties

Lottie at your FiL (again...). I love those Lottie shoes. It would be rude not to with free delivery to Switz.

Congratulations Lottie, I am of your weekend sans girls.

I have a friends hen night planned next May that I am already looking forward to as it will be my first free whole night, might possibly get some sleep!

My mum is up this weekend we are off to the luxury wedding show, I think the plan is now to get married in 2013, but it's good to get some ideas.

How are you feeling now LVB? Hope the antibiotics have kicked the arse of the mastitis. The wedding show sounds fun.

Your hotel sounds really nice LL snigger Have you dug out your chaps and 10 gallon hat? But I bet you can't wait to get cracking with some viewings and sussing out the area. We seriously considered buying a place in TW but we ended up staying in Saarf London. It was really lovely, had an Aga and everything. In the end we felt we weren't ready to leave all the galleries, museums and theatres that we haven't been inside in 4 years but on the upside we do have more fried chicken joints than you can shake a stick at.[hhmm]

Well done with the weight loss GG. I am completely static at one stone over my pre-conception weight and nowhere near back in my trousers but then I am doing zilch to try and lose it, unless you count eating like a student at lunchtime (tea and toast).

I love your Mallory Towers-esque colour scheme for the girls tarti. I wish I were so cunning as to have a plan of action for clothes buying. How did you manage to find such things in Sainsburys? All the stuff for girls I find in there is very much in the candyfloss pink vein.

More colds here. Funny how instantaneously they seem to start - S was fine one minute and then pouring snot and crying the next. Both have 40-a-day smokers' coughs but seem more or less alright. Still, it means another week of very unexciting outings to avoid infecting anyone else. Poo.

Re lunchtime naps, I tried a ridiculous scattergun approach to fixing it - more food, shorter morning nap AND a little bit of milk after solids. Still wasn't flawless (waking after an hour but fortunately resettling) so am trying a slightly more methodical approach and just giving more solids instead, which seems to be broadly working. Having dropped the milk element I'm loathe to resume it again.

Have fitted the footmuff contraption in the buggy and am hoping that fixes the need for thick coats for a few weeks at least. My problem is not that I am unclear on when to put them in warm clothes, it's in physically manhandling them into them. When wearing a long-sleeved top, it's really hard to get them into a thick, lined coat sleeve and they don't exactly help by making a fist or pushing their arms through. I end up sweating cobs, they're crying and it tacks a good 5 minutes on an already time-consuming process of getting us all out of the house just to go to the shop. Perhaps capes/ponchos would be a good bet. (I also think I am completely over-thinking this...can't be beyond the wit of woman!)

Quick question - drinking from cups. Did it take yours a while to get the hang of it? Mine don't seem to get it at all and S hates it to the extent that he now has a Pavlovian reaction to the cup being brought anywhere near him. Any tricks for how/what time of day to introduce it, whether to use it for milk at first etc?

Waiting impatiently for an iPad to be delivered here. Currently my only surfing opportunity is at lunchtime (hence why I am so keen for them to sleep) as computer is upstairs. The iPad will greatly enhance my opportunities to neglect my children stay up to date with parenting tips.

Ooh, exciting times LL. Hope you find somewhere lovely to rent.

CB I've not got much advice about cups, H took ages to take to a spouted cup and was on bottles until about 18months as she just refused cups. I just couldn't get liquid into her any other way than a bottle. D and J though have loved having a cup from about 9 months. I think with H I tried a tommee tippee straw type cup in the end. The straw was really soft and made of the same material as a bottle teat so she quite liked that. I also used to put diluted (about 1/4) fresh orange juice in it I think.

Good luck at the wedding show LVB. I'm going bridemaid dress shopping sometime before Christmas (wedding in April). Other bridesmaid is 30, size 10 and childfree so my twin haggard body is extra awful in comparison. At least the bride is also a twin mum so hopefully will have sympathy and choose a dress that will flatter (ie hide) my saggy tum.

Hullo . The convo has moved on somewhat, but just to say Lottie, I hadn't thought about the dominance issue in that way before, but now you mention it, I do agree. Ds1 is def the dominant twin physically & in other ways (advanced jigsaw puzzler / crayoning / technophile) but ds2 is almost certainly the more emotionally advanced & has `friends' at nursery - and knows how to use his cuteness / curls / eyelashes to his advantage. Maybe I just focus on the physical stuff with them being boys & not wanting ds1 to be labelled a thug? Not sure if they love one another yet. Ds1 seems to look at ds2 with such disdain at times (while poor ds2 is trying to snog him...) but they do have lovely giggles together too, which is lovely. I too just hope they grow up being friends despite their differences.

I can't believe I'm about to give birth either . It seems a very abstract concept & I still forget I'm pg most of the time. Last day at work tomorrow & that hasn't really sunk in yet as my brain is still firmly in work mode. They're having a formal goodbye once lessons end - eek. Rather wish I hadn't been told that. We made a half-arsed effort to go cot shopping on Sunday after my parents left. Bad Idea. We've had some v rough nights & had already fallen out cos we're so tired so just.... fell out again and again and again about dp's reliance on giving in to the boys' every whim and making my life more difficult as a result.

C&A - now there's a blast from the past! Will get on with some research when I'm on leave . Do you have the lined or unlined Regatta suits Tarti?

Car seat battles - we can do that too . Only one here though. Ds1 seems fine but ds2 does like to do the back-arching / screeching like a banshee thing. Getting them out to the car can be interesting. I usually just lob one into the front seat and let them loose on the knobs and levers while I strap the other in & (surprisingly) it works OK. We have some toys & books that live in the car & can serve as a good distraction along with my car keys til I get sorted but I reckon that won't fool them when we're at your stage either. It is wearing though. Luckily we don't really have stairs to negotiate at nursery & the staff are great and will come out to help if I ask when I buzz though a big pg belly and twins does appear to get me extra sympathy points.

Hmm, spose I should get to bed & get a bit of shut-eye in preparation for the inevitable wailfest later. I keep saying I can't keep doing 4hours per night, but seem to have to. Had almost 5 hours last night though & woke up feeling vaguely human today. Dunno what's up with ds1 at the moment.... hopefully just a bit of a clingy phase that he will come out of very soon!

Aaargh no time to catch up properly but ALL - lined ones, very pleased with them although deffo on small side round the middle (though they are elasticated so it's not a disaster).
And Lottie your description of nursery mornings had me in stitches (I know it's not funny at all...). How you can concentrate on anything at all at the moment is beyond me. You will look back and marvel at yourself once you're settled in your lovely new home (wherever the hell it will be!).
Must get to bed I've been marking all night and am seeing double.

Hello - I need HELP! Haven't posted for ages, things have been ticking over nicely. Been enjoying reading what everyone else is up to though.

We're in some trouble here with sleeping... twins 33 weeks (27 corrected), DS always slept really well, DD not so good but often sleeping through. But I've had 5 nights now of her waking EVERY HOUR on the hour. DH is away and I can't take much more of this.

She's not hungry, windy or particularly teething, just awake - sometimes upset, sometimes not. But it's relentless. I can get her back to sleep without too much difficulty usually, with a bit of hand-holding and shushing, but she just doesn't stay down. Please somebody tell me what this is and how to manage it before I lose my mind...

Routine is pretty much this:

7am - up, milk
9am - nap, 45 mins

11am - solids
12pm - nap, 1 hr or longer if I'm lucky

1.30 - milk
4pm - nap, 30 mins

5pm - porridge, fruit
6.30pm - milk
7pm - bed

10.30 - milk

Naps getting increasingly difficult too, both go mental nearly every time they're put down. If anyone's got any better routines for 7 months, I'd love to see them. Worried we're just getting all wrong, I'm getting really down and crying way too much...

Foxtail Big hugs from me too & some &

Routine sounds about right but agree about dropping the afternoon nap, occasionally my 2 might have a 5 min doze in the pram in the afternoon if we are out and about but otherwise I keep them awake from 3pm. I also had a nightmare around this time and remember feeling like it would never end and that I was doing something wrong. I was giving them milk in the night and it did get better. How many teeth do they have? I didn't think it was teething but both girls ended up with 6 teeth within the space of 2 weeks a few weeks after the terrible nights.

I still struggle with daytime naps, the girls absolutely fight them, bed time is fine though (although I also did a bit of CC when we had a bad period) but they are up at 5.30am most days. Pop in more often foxtail we can all moan together!

LL YEE HAW! so funny can't wait for the update, good luck with the house hunting. I think you are better off out of London, think we will make the move within the next few years.

Tarti Jealous of your matching clothing combo's I am nowhere near that organised!

GG Wedding fair tomorrow, I'll let you know how it goes.

ALL Good luck for your impending maternity leave, put your feet up (is that possible with twins to look after?)

Cerubina I'm now off to buy footmuffs for my pram I can't believe I didn't think of footmuffs!! in regards to cups, as I'm bfing I started with an open doidy cup for water and persisted with it and now they are very good with it. Then for afternoon milk (as I'm trying to stop BFing) I use a Nuk learner cup like a bottle but with the beaker teat but although they drink a bit of milk they bite on it more than suck it but again it's getting better (been 3 weeks)

MM How did you drop your breast feeds? I need help!

Hi Foxtail. My two are a very similar age to yours (33 weeks/25 weeks) and on a very similar routine. A few questions sprang to mind when I read your message:

• How much solids are you giving them, and how much milk?
• Do they seem hungry at every feed?
• Do you give them anything else to drink apart from milk?
• Do they seem tired and ready to sleep at all the nap times (especially the afternoon one)?
• Have you tried dropping the late night feed at all?

My thinking is that she may not be getting enough calories so waking through hunger (hence asking how much you're feeding them and how hungry they seem - I notice you also don't offer them solids for breakfast, which you might want to try doing to help them last until lunch), she may be thirsty (hence whether you're giving them any other drinks), or may be getting too much daytime sleep.

With mine I try to push them a little later for morning sleep (so far have only got them as far as 9.10am but am trying to head for 9.30 eventually), and don't give them a 'formal' afternoon sleep - as LVB says, if they want to have a nap in the pushchair, this is their opportunity, but often they stay awake all afternoon. (By bedtime wind-down they're often fractious but it's moot whether this is hunger or tiredness by then). They may require less than 45 mins in the morning and it could be worth seeing how things are after a 30-35 minute sleep.

And finally I dropped the 10pm feed a couple of weeks ago when my daughter was being awful about taking her milk - fussing, fannying about, lots of crying. We'd been having to really push to get them to wake up for this feed for weeks, and once we experimented with dropping it, her feeds corrected themselves - she's now hungry at the right times, and sleeping from 7pm until 6am - though not generally the holy grail of 7am! Possibly yours are ready to drop this too? (Actually from memory I think GF suggests you can cut down on night-time waking by doing the late night feed a little later and keeping them awake for longer when you do it - might be worth a try, although I'm hazy about whether this was suggested for babies as old as 7 months).

Hope this is some help. It must be awful when you are sleep-deprived to try and see the wood for the trees, and figure out what needs changing. It's also a bit scary to change much about the routine in case it mucks everything up, I know.

LVB - being thick, what's a doidy cup? Glad I have contributed one useful idea on here with the footmuffs!

GG at least having a bottle for longer rather than cup doesn't seem to have been a disaster for H...maybe some children just take longer to 'get it' than others? I know S just loves his milk so probably doesn't want to be parted from bottles generally.

LL the morning routine of car seats and drop-off sounds hellish, no wonder you're ruined for the rest of the day. I can only imagine how frustrating it must be, wanting to get so much househunting done and stuff organised but no time or energy to do it, or even certainty over whether it's happening. Sympathy from this corner.

As for London/not London, in the end we have committed quite heavily to staying here. We bought a house that was already fine but decoratively pretty awful, and spent £££s and 3 years doing it up - a top-to-toe renovation project with floors up, plaster off walls, new plumbing etc etc. It's now finished (bar hanging a few more pics/photos) and is so lovely (though I say so myself) we don't want to live anywhere else, even though the area we live in is really quite grim. I cling to the hope that eventually it'll get gentrified but for now we are where we are for the house - sort of in spite of the area rather than because of it. And as I said, we don't exactly make much use of London's huge wealth of attractions so in a way we could be anywhere. The question of schools is one I'm burying my head over, because I'm just not sure what's good round here but I suspect there's nothing good in our postcode, private or otherwise.

Not sure if that helps...I suppose looking at the question now that we have twins it might well have turned out differently if deciding now. At the time we bought, we were trying unsuccessfully to have children and could well have remained childless, in which case being in London would have been hugely better for us than going out of town.

Sorry for long and inarticulate ramble - no time to fix, got to get the little snotty cherubs up from their nap!

Wotcher - thanks so much for the quick replies. You people are just lovely! Thinking about changing routine to include porridge at breakfast and drop the afternoon nap... they're always spangled with tiredness at 9am, 12pm and by 4pm (hence napping then, not because GF says so!) but maybe we've just got to push through it.

Cerub hello! I remember we're roughly the same stage. Got any teeth yet? DS has two, DD none yet but really hope they're through soon in case it's that. Quite big bowls of veg etc lunch and teatime porridge (eat till they've had enough, no portion control here!), and as much milk as they want at the milk feeds (she has approx 180ml 4 times a day). Also water to drink as and when. Can't drop her late feed unfortunately as she has to take medicine at that time with food.

I know we'll get through this but OMG nobody tells you just how hard it is with two, do they! So many people say "oh, why don't you sleep when they sleep"... yeah, cheers, genius advice that, why don't I just sleep in the 10 mins between getting them both settled, clearing up, and one of them waking...

I guess I've got two problems - one is that she's waking so much, and two is that she's not settling herself. Going to do spaced soothing and (oh the shame) Calpol tonight. Goodnight y'all!

Thanks Tarti.... I think Regatta are looking like front-runners at the mo. I've seen some other ones I like too but £30 each puts me off for the wear they'll get.

Good luck tonight Foxtail. The dread of the night ahead is wearing in itself when things are really tough - and even more so when you know it's all down to you and then you still have to function the next day. Given our boys still don't sleep through, I don't have anything desperately useful to add. We didn't drop pm naps til waaay later but they'd always be awake by 4pm for at least a 3hour stretch til bedtime. I always struggled getting ds2 to sleep (he usually needs hand-holding / hand on back even now at 18months) but resorted to the buggy for naps after 6months. Not ideal, but easier and they were both asleep in minutes which bought me 20-30mins or so. They now nap fine in their cots at lunchtime bliss.

I think I've finally gotten through to dp about stopping cutting back on gallons of night time milk - woo hoo! We're offering toast on wakening (OK, so not ideal, but a compromise). Ds2 not interested (& did have to resort to the bottle to calm last night) but ds1 will have half a slice or so. Then they've slept from 1am-5am for the last 2 nights. That is progress. Says she knowing dp is going away at some ungodly hour in the morning & that always means a bad night in the offing....

I'm giving in & seeing a dr tomorrow about my stupid mouth (yup, not even just my tongue now). It's so painful I can barely eat - that's not doing much good in terms of my chances of increasing my iron levels! Not surprised thrush causes so many feeding problems for babies, poor things! Sucking must be hell.

Hope last night was better foxtail. I'm not sure what to advise. Your routine sounds fairly standard at this stage. In this house H (3yo) sleeps really well as long as she has a nightlight on. I think it was about 1 year old she started getting scared of the dark, before that she slept in the pitch black. Maybe worth a try? Alternatively it might be she is getting cold? In the last few nights I've increased the boys (17m) sleepwear to vest, sleepsuit, sleepingbag and blanket (before it was no sleepingbag but a fleecy sleepsuit) and they have slept better. Normally J, who loves a manky old muslim cloth to suck on, will sleep through the night fine. D, who is a dummy fiend, normally wakes a few times, but it only takes a dummy replacement to get him to fall asleep again and the last few nights being cosier he has not woken.

All, had forgotten about your tongue! Hope the dr sorts it out. Last thing you want when the new one arrives is feeling under the weather yourself.

LVB, how was the wedding show? Find any magic dresses for me - ones that will make me look size 10 when I'm a 14!

Enjoy your day tomorrow with dh Lottie - sounds great! I think we're going to join Costco - oh we know how to inject a little excitement into our lives (tho sadly, I am quite excited at the prospect).

The dr gave me some anti-fungal stuff - yey! Could have cried with relief. She was more than a bit that the pharmacist I spoke to weeks ago said I couldn't take anything & reckons I might have a secondary infection as a result of it getting so bad & might have to go back next week to get antibiotics. The more I think about it, the more I agree & wish I'd pushed just to have them today but hey ho. I think thrush is sposed to be itchy (she asked me that) & although it's def there, my whole mouth just feels like it's been badly sunburned. Thanks GG. Imagine between that & potential chickenpox. Joy. Invested in some Pregnacare & a shedload of broccoli/sprouts/spinach/orange today in my mission to make sure I'm at least nutritionally healthy.

Haha, toast was dp's suggestion & given he'd already moaned about me not wanting him to have any input into decisions I figured he could have that one. I don't mind so much giving in to bottles on occasion - sometimes it is the only thing to settle them, especially ds2 but really, some nights it was just a constant feeding frenzy when we knew they couldn't be hungry. & then ds1 throws up. One night he had 4 bottles between 7-12. Ridiculous! Or that dp thinks he can just stick a bottle in ds1's mouth, leave him to it & get back into bed. That was the cause of our row at the weekend. I knew ds1 wouldn't resettle... but that dp is physically incapable of staying awake if he just goes for a lie down when he's knackered so it'd be down to me to get up when the milk was gone. Ds1 slept from 7pm-5am last night while ds2 woke once at 3am. That is a total first. Our previous (rare) sleeping throughs have only ever been from 11pm -5am or similar

Oh no - poor Eve, & poor you (& babysitter..)! How is she now? Glad you managed to have a lovely day on Saturday though - I bet you needed it after a lonesome week. Nothing v exciting here (unless you count Costco, which we loved). Swimming yesterday then we all watched Gnomeo & Juliet, followed by cooking for me & then gardening (well, tidying & weeding) for dp. Twas all OK though.

Glad we're not the only ones with the milk. The teeth thing is one of my worries with it too. We decided against a dummy from the outset though I think we would have had an easier time with ds2 had we used one. & I think we might as well have done it given dp's use of a bottle being exactly like dummy use. I have a dummy as part of a nappy cake my students gave me last week & am tempted.... but then hope I can just feed new baby myself so dp has no need ever to go near it with a bottle!

We implemented a similar regime to you a while back. After bath we bring the boys downstairs for their milk & now do a cuddles / ITNG wind down & then straight to bed (with the intention of getting round to doing teeth-brushing on the way). Ds1 pretty much always flops straight down to sleep. Ds2 still takes a while longer & often needs a reassuring hand in order to settle. I have (finally) started leaving the room as soon as we put them down (figuring it's dark anyway). Some nights ds2 will just go off to sleep but more often I need to go back in to him but the whole thing generally takes 10mins or so unless they're unsettled for other random, unknown reasons. Then they both sleep til 10-11 and it's that wake-up we really struggle with. Ds1 cried til he threw up again last night (no milk). I'm sure he's doing it on purpose?!?! Eventually fell asleep on my lap (& I fell asleep cuddling him...) & put him in his cot / got to bed at 1.15am. At least they both slept til 5.30am after that....

You've got me browsing Rightmove again........ god luck with the trip planning!

Hi all. House of pain this end - the colds they have had for more than a week turned into a chest infection for S at the weekend and we ended up ringing NHS Direct (who were ace and got us an emergency appointment with the out of hours GP within about 2 hours) and then took him to A&E. Poor sausage. He seems brighter now, but his zest for food is down and he is waking in a distressed state around 5am every day. At least last night I managed to get him back to sleep with a bit of milk as I don't fancy starting my day that early, thanks. Was also having a bit of a problem with puking up milk after a coughing fit so our carpets look a bit vile now but hopefully that particular phase is past!

It doesn't bode well for the winter ahead though, I'm clearly going to be paranoid about mixing with anyone who might be ill and might go stir crazy with too many more days confined to home!

R seems to be more or less better and is thankfully eating properly again. It always makes things so much harder when you have to fight them with both spoon and bottle.

ALL how's your tongue feeling now? It must have been so painful. Hope the doc's stuff is doing some good. How was your send off from work? I was thinking about the night time bottles...have you tried gradually diluting what you give them until eventually it's just water? Might be too boring for them to bother with then. Or could they possibly be getting more daytime sleep than they need now? Sorry if these are things you've already tried/considered and ruled out.

Foxtail hello, hope the night wakings are getting fewer too. No teeth with my two despite confidently predicting they must be on their way about 2 months ago.

LL hope there has been no recurrence of Eve's upset and that it doesn't put you off using a babysitters for escapes nights out. We have just had an offer of babysitting from a neighbor which I'm gagging keen to take up but suspect DH may be hard to persuade, especially after S's illness. Also hope you've got a couple of potential viewings on the cards now.

We're off on hols at the end of this week - going to the south west for a week self-catering and it looks like a lovely place so fingers crossed not too torrential rain and two healthy children are on the cards!

Apologies for that "neighbor" - I'm not American, blame auto correct.

Eek, Cerub that's rough. I'm completely paranoid about colds and flu this winter - MIL turned up with a chesty cough (which it turned out was an infection she was on antibiotics for) the other week and I was NOT amused. She's a selfish old cow anyway bit that's a whole other story...!

Nights have been much better, thanks so much for all the tips and questions that made me rethink what we've been doing. Dropped afternoon nap - hard going but definitely time to do it - and started porridge and fruit for breakfast so they're on three lots of solids and two naps a day. Little bugger now wakes in the early hours wide awake and shouting, wanting to play (MUMMY! MUMMY! IT'S ME! IT'S ME! MUMMY! HELLO! etc etc) but we're going to have to get tough about that - at the moment we do hand holding and shushing, no talking or cuddles, but I think ignoring her is going to be the way to go if she's just messing about... I do worry about her waking up the other one though, as they're in the same room. He sleeps 7 - 7, lovely little sausage.

People have started asking me what I'm getting the twins for xmas... er, no idea, thanks! Wasn't going to go mad as they don't know what's going on anyway - or am I just being mean...?!