If I was picking nicknames based on their current quirks, these are the ones I’d choose.

Daniel is obsessed with coins right now. Doesn’t much matter if they’re pennies or quarters, he simply must have at least two in his possession at all times.  He holds them, he balances them on his fingers or his knees, he sticks them in between the tines of a fork (or the crack in the windowsill, or the floor heating grate, etc.).  I think, if given the choice, he would swim in a pool of coins like Scrooge McDuck.

The down-side, of course, is that he puts them down, drops them, or otherwise loses/misplaces them.  So, roughly 900 times per day, I hear “Mama, where’s my co-oines?” “Mama, I need more co-oines!”  I fricking HATE coins right now.  It’s all he talks about. He throws them, he plays with them instead of eating his meals. Yes, I take them away at times like that. But oy, it’s constant.  I’d find it a lot cuter if he wasn’t asking me to find them every six minutes.

[As a random aside, both kids have started calling me "Mama" in the last few weeks, and are sometimes calling M "dad."  We've been "mommy" and "daddy" since they started talking. I have no idea where this came from.]

Otherwise, though, I feel like Daniel’s behavior is moderating a little bit. Or, maybe my reaction to it is changing? A huge thanks to all of you for your input on the potty situation.  We had a successful weekend in underwear for him, and then a disastrous Monday morning. During which, I made my peace with putting him back in Pull-Ups. Clearly, now is just not the time for him, and I’m doing my best to back off.  And I think we’re both less stressed for it.

Rebecca, for her own little quirk, feels compelled to sing along with everything. EVERYTHING.  TV theme songs, bedtime songs, songs on CD in the car.  This is not a brand new behavior. She’s long shown a love for singing. But it has definitely ramped up, and I’ve noticed an interesting twist.  While it’s not unusual for a two-year-old to want to hear the same thing over and over again, Rebecca seems to be doing it with a clear purpose: she’s trying to memorize it.  She will request the same song several times in a row, and attempt to sing more of it each time.  She can now sing most of the first half of the Barenaked Ladies’ Snacktime album.  Particular favorites are Polliwog in a Bog (“I want the froggie song!”) and Popcorn, but she really loves to sing the entire album. As a big BNL fan, I’m so proud…

The funniest part of this, for me, is that it is exactly something that I used to do.  As a kid and a teenager, I would listen to the same song over and over and over again. I’d mentally memorize every little tone.  I’d pause and rewind and write down the lyrics or try to transpose the chords with my barely passable guitar skills.  Who knew I had managed to pass along that kind of obsession to my daughter at such a young age.  Of course, my mom talks about listening to her Joni Mitchell record over and over again, so maybe it’s just straight genetics.

Right. So. Remember when I said my kids were potty trained? Well…

Rebecca is doing great. A superstar. I can think of only one accident in the last week. She can hold it, she tells me when she needs to go, she isn’t freaking out about poop the way some kids do, and she is perfectly willing to use the travel potty when we’re out and about. No problemo.

And then, there’s Daniel.  Oh, Daniel.

Sigh.

If you follow me on Twitter, you’ll know we’ve had a very, very difficult week.  Daniel has gotten hit HARD by the terrible-two-and-a-halfs.  Much like when he went through this phase back in October, he feels the need to be contrary AT ALL TIMES.  He pitches a fit that he doesn’t want breakfast.  Then he pitches a fit that he wants oatmeal. And raisins. NO RAISINS! I WANT RAISINS! NOT ON THAT SIDE OF THE PLACEMAT!  And this is all before 8:30am.  It goes on all day long.  If I ask him something or offer him something, he has to say no. I go to put it away, and he demands whatever he just declined. He claims to not want to play outside, not want to go to a friend’s house, not want to go to Starbucks. Riiight.  Sure ya don’t, buddy.

Worst of all, this has spilled over into potty training.  He did so well the first week.  Not perfect, but really well. He’d have a tiny accident (like small enough that a change of undies was not really necessary), stop himself, ask to use the potty, and finish. Brilliant.  No longer.

For one thing, he seems to have tuned out from listening to his body.  Now he has a full-on accident, and THEN tells me he needs to use the potty. When we’re at home, when we’re out. All over the damn place.  And, of course, if I ask him if he needs to go or ask him to sit and try before we leave the house… well, you can guess what the response is. “I don’t wanna! I don’t need to use the potty!”  Five minutes later… new pants. Again.  And did I mention he’s a notorious incomplete-emptier? The kid goes about a tablespoon at a time. Ugh.

The kicker is that sometimes he does well. Sometimes he asks to use the potty before he goes in his pants. Sometimes he poops in the potty.  He is very capable.  But much of the day, he tunes out and/or refuses all suggestion.  And those who have been through this will understand how it simply brought me to tears on Thursday night. Exhausted. Defeated. Broken. Sobbing.

So, friends, where do we go from here on the potty front?  Re-boot-camp?  New incentives? Back off and put on Pull-Ups for my own sanity?  As a general rule, I want to be as consistent as possible and don’t like going “backwards.” But I would also like to not end up in the looney bin.

And as for the behavior – pick my battles and ride it out? Be extra strict and nip the attitude in the bud? Start drinking heavily?

Two weeks after the big potty boot camp weekend, and Rebecca is doing very well. She is asking, unprompted, to use the potty with great regularity, and it’s almost never a false alarm.  I can think of only one single pee accident this week.  She is even willingly pooping on the potty, though that seems to be the main accident culprit.  Alas, it’s a work in progress, and it’s going well.  We are back to our normal level of outings, and she is more than willing to use the travel potty when we’re out of the house.

Enter, the twin dynamic.

Daniel has always wanted to do whatever Becca was doing (sometimes much to her chagrin, and leading to many fights over toys, etc.).  Once he realized she was getting an M&M for successful potty usage, he wanted in.  As it turns out, the kid can pretty much pee on command for candy.  I suspect that skill will come in handy.

On the flipside, Daniel has most certainly noticed that any time Becca mentions anything to do with “potty,” we drop everything for her.  By necessity, she is getting a lot of attention and a lot of praise.  And I think it’s driving him bonkers.

Oh my lord, has he been whiny this week.  Whiny and clingy, with a huge helping of attitude and sass.  On Monday, I thought it was just that he was punishing me for leaving for the weekend.  But the more I think about it, combined with a whole lot of extra “pick me up” and “can I sit on your lap?” and clearly the kid is feeling starved for attention.

I feel bad, of course.  Especially when home by myself with both kids during the day, it’s next to impossible to give quality one-on-one time to either of them.  And, since we’re still in a somewhat fragile state of potty-trained-ness, I do have to pay pretty close attention to Rebecca.  When you add in that her behavior has been much better than his, you can do the math on who’s getting the lion’s share of positive attention from mom this week.

Well, buddy, all that is about to change.  This weekend, it’s your turn.  You and me, one-on-one, all weekend long.  All the attention, all the praise I’ve got, is going to you.  Potty training boot camp, take 2.

I’m pretty exhausted just in anticipation, but I have reasonably high hopes that at least the pee-on-command bit will come in handy.  And here’s to hoping all of that attention will help to turn his behavior around.  Either we’re going to have a great weekend, or I’m going to want to kill him.

About two weeks ago, the inevitable happened.

We had gone to visit my in-laws in Florida.  It was a late-night arrival, and while the kids stayed awake pretty much the whole flight, Daniel passed out while leaning on me as we made our descent.  I pulled him up to carry him, and he didn’t wake up. I picked up various carry-ons from the floor, slung them over my shoulder, and made my way out of the plane, and he didn’t wake up.  I put him into his cold, gate-checked carseat and buckled him in, not a peep.  Latched the seat into my mother-in-law’s car with him in it, nothing.  Took him out of the car, brought him inside, put him down on the bed, and pulled off his shoes and jeans, and still, he slept.

We plopped both passed-out kids into the mini-cribs that always await them in Florida, plugged in the GoodNite Lite, and hoped they wouldn’t freak out when they woke up in a strange place.

At the appointed hour of the nightlight wake-up, I heard happy chatter and got up to retrieve the kids.  The door was cracked open, and I could see a light on, much brighter than the yellow sun we brought with us.  “That’s weird,” I thought. “Maybe that light is on a timer? Or maybe my mother-in-law heard the kids before I did and is in there?”  Then the light turned off.

I opened the door, and there was Daniel. On the couch. Turning the light off and on (much to his grumpy sister’s chagrin).  I asked Daniel how he got onto the couch, and he happily described that the blue moon was on (the nightlight), but that he had a poopy diaper and he climbed out (blessedly, said diaper was still intact and latched to his person).

I had long suspected the kids had really outgrown these mini cribs, and was amazed they made it as many trips as they did without the self-propelled exit. I was glad he hadn’t tipped it over, with its somewhat high center of gravity.

But hey, we made it to almost 2 1/2 before our first incident of climbing out of the crib. And we haven’t had another one.  Here’s why:

1. Luck.  Not just luck in that my kids aren’t super persistent climbers, nor particularly mischievous as toddlers go, though that is certainly lucky.  And I’m not naive enough to think that they’re really listening that well when I say that climbing in and out (as Daniel still sometimes talks about) is dangerous.  No, we’re lucky that we bought the right cribs.

They’re from Babies R Us, nothing spectacular. As I recall, they were about the least expensive ones we could find that we didn’t hate.  What makes them awesome is that, at the lowest mattress setting, it’s so deep that the crib rails come almost to my 2.5-year-olds’ shoulders.  Other cribs we’ve used while traveling, even the full-sized ones at my dad’s house, come barely past their belly buttons.  No wonder most kids climb out so much younger: the mattress just isn’t deep enough!  Did I know this when I bought these cribs? Of course not. Dumb luck.

2. Engineering. You notice I said we’ve used other full-sized cribs (as well as pack & plays and mini cribs) before, and this was still our first (and, so far, only) climbing incident.  There was one other unusual circumstance when Daniel made the literal leap.  In his passed-out state, though I did manage to get his shoes and jeans off, I didn’t bother to put on his sleep sack.

Yep.  My kids are still in sleep sacks.  Have been pretty much every nap and every night since they were six months old.  Even when the cribs would seem to have made climbing easier, they still can’t quite swing that leg up, or get the traction on their feet.  And to that, I say, Hallelujah.

I’ve heard people say they stopped using sleep sacks because they worried about restricting the kids’ mobility, but I can assure you that my kids can do just about anything (except climbing) in those things.  Walk, crawl, whatever.  There’s a little bit of luck in this one, too, as my kids have never made any kind of consistent effort to get out of their sleep sacks, though I suspect they’d be quite capable of it if they tried.

Of course, this will all be coming to an end.  Sometime this year, we will bid farewell to our beloved sleep sacks (which don’t appear to come in a larger size than the XL they’re currently wearing).  We will pull off the front rail and turn those cribs into toddler beds.

But for now, they have warm toes, and there are no suspicious thuds coming from their bedroom. I’d better enjoy it while it lasts.

You remember how, just a few weeks ago, I talked about what a challenging phase Daniel was going through?  I wrote about it on HDYDI, too, how I feel crappy to have times when I prefer one kid over the other.

And, as predicted, they have now done the great twin personality switcheroo.

This is not to say they are suddenly fundamentally different kids, of course.  But the dial has been turned up on one and down on the other.  Daniel seems to now be spending more time as his happy, silly, engaging self.

Rebecca, on the other hand…. Hoo, boy.

The girl has always been capable of epic tantrums, even at two days old.  Much of the time, she’s fairly even.  Independent, easily entertained, pretty chill.  Until the RAGE reappears.  OMG, the RAGE.

The RAGE has been making extraordinarily frequent appearances as of the last week or so.  This morning she had her first tantrum before getting out of bed.  There was not really a marked improvement for the rest of the day.

Her tantrums seem to have a subtly different underlying theme than Daniel’s.  His was all about grasping control over his environment, over other people.  Rebecca’s fits are nearly all set off by something having to do with “Becca do it by self.”  It’s all about independence.  In a way, that is still in the same theme as “control,” but a slightly different side.

And, yes, before you even say it… I know she totally gets this from me.

Naturally, she and I are butting heads in a major way right now.  I try to pick my battles. I try to let her do the things that she is capable of doing, and try things that she probably can’t do.  But she gets set off at the drop of a hat.  I so much as look at her the wrong way at the wrong time and it’s all over. I spend a lot of time ignoring her and hanging out with Daniel when she’s in the middle of a screaming fit.  But sometimes we just need to get out the door and in the car, and she is just not having it.  Yeesh.

One way in which I’m grateful for having twins is the way they do seem to alternate a lot of these phases.  It helps to know that it will pass.  That my sweet kid will come back, and that they’ll likely trade places again, so I don’t have to feel too guilty about the fact that I’d rather spend time with one over the other at times like these.

In the meantime, she still has her shining moments of funny phrases and expressions that she’s picked up from me and M.  She initiates games with her brother, she gives hugs and kisses to the dog (and everything else), and tucks her “friends” (stuffed animals) into bed.  She has that perfect toddler giggle fit down pat.

But she has also mastered the phrase “No, Mommy!  Leave it alone!”

So, you know, I’ll just have to put my head down and get through the rest of this phase.  Good times.

There is a major power struggle going on in my house right now.  Daniel has hit that most delightful stage of toddlerhood where he feels the need to exert his independence/power/control at every possible opportunity. And let me tell you, it’s a blast.

He has his favorite tactics.  Oh, sure, sometimes he just straight up says “no.”  But he tries to get more creative than that.  If I say we’re going upstairs (or out to the car, or whatever), it’s almost guaranteed that I will hear a sentence that starts with “first I…”.  “First I gonna wash the hands.” “First I gonna play with the toys.”  Et cetera, et cetera.

Another favorite phrase when he’s in a defiant/delaying mood is “I no like (yike) that.”  “I no yike dat snack.”  “I no yike the blanket.” The one you have refused to sleep without for the last 20 months? “I no yike it.”  “I no yike the bed!” Et cetera, et cetera.

He nearly always tries to pull something at bedtime, now.  Bedtime, which has been darn smooth sailing for over a year and a half, is now when Daniel likes to assert himself.  “No sleep sack!”  “More stories!”  “I no yike to lie down!”  [Yes, we still use sleep sacks. The times I've let him have his way and not wear the sleep sack are the times that he has skipped his nap. No thanks.]  I pretty much ignore all of the bedtime delay tactics, but M has a tendency to get sucked in when Daniel pulls out things like “more hugs, Daddy?”  Sucker.

I know that the desire for control is normal for this age. I know that they are having this sudden realization that the world is kind of big and overwhelming and that they don’t  have much control over what goes on.  I try to diffuse some of the situations by offering him choices, or letting him think it was his idea, all along. But I can’t always do that, and it doesn’t always work, so there are a lot of highly dramatic meltdowns with hysterical wailing and giant tears.  Man, does it grate on what little patience I have.

Oh, but when he forgets about that struggle for power, he’s so incredibly sweet and funny.  The things that he remembers, the phrases he parrots back to you, the stories he tells.  He shares with his sister, he asks me to play catch and read a story.  He says things like, “it’s de-wicious in my tummy!”  He sings songs on demand. He says “thank you” without prompting, and bids farewell to the women at the gym with an enthusiastic “have a good day, lady! See you later!” He really is just about the sweetest boy you have ever met.

When he forgets.

Daniel has a new obsession: washing his hands.

It kicked into high gear a few weeks ago when I bought an IKEA stepstool from a friend and put it in our downstairs bathroom. A bit of kid-friendly soap, and he was off to the races.

He goes in there at random times of day.  He can spend 10-15 minutes playing with the faucets, the soap, and the light switches.  Any time we are going to do anything, you will hear him say: “first I wash the hands.”

And while I think a lot of this is a delay/control tactic (a topic on which I will expand soon), I shouldn’t complain too much about this obsessive-compulsive tendency as we head into flu season.

It was a little more than a month ago when we decided to implement a sticker chart for bathtime.  What had been a longstanding and enjoyable part of our bedtime routine had turned into a major source of stress and aggravation.  It started as a slow increase in whining and crying when hair was washed.  It turned into a full-blown tantrum any time the washcloth came anywhere near the head.  And always at the end of the day, when I was at the end of my rope. A lovely way to end the day.

So we did stickers.  If you could make it through bathtime without crying, you get a sticker.  A small amount of protest during hair washing was deemed acceptable as long as it was minor and over immediately. Rebecca had an immediately positive response, while Daniel (characteristically) dug in his heels.

So, where are we now?

And yea, verily, I say unto you: BOOYAH.

All day long, they talk about getting stickers. “At bathtime. No cryin’.”  Rebecca washed her toy crocodile and proclaimed that it, too, could have a sticker, because it didn’t cry when she washed his hair.  But it’s even better than that.  Are you sitting down?  They have started washing their own hair.  They have started washing each other’s hair.  They ask for shampoo. I kid you not.  Even Daniel.

At this point, my only concern is when to wean off the stickers.  I mean, the chart itself is the only reward. There is no “get 10 stickers and you get a treat.”  The stickers alone are enough.  And you know what? If two stickers a night gives us peace at bathtime 9 nights out of 10? Yeah, I can live with that for a while longer.

Sitting on my to-do list for the last couple of weeks was to finally take the kids to the childcare room at my gym. M and I have belonged to this gym almost since we moved into our house (*cough* four years ago *cough*), as a couple/family membership, and it includes use of the childcare room. I went regularly for a while before I got pregnant, did some personal training, etc.  Then miscarriage fears and a higher-risk pregnancy got me out of the habit and… well… a few years passed.

Anyways, I decided that today was the day. I told the kids we were going to the gym and there was a big room with toys and kids where they could play while I exercised.  I barely had them signed in when they took off exploring.  A castle over here, a big play kitchen over there.  A lego table, a play-doh table, a craft table.  Door open to the fenced-in outdoor play space since the weather was cooperating.  I could barely get their attention long enough to tell them I was going to go exercise.  Told one of the caregivers it was their first time, just in case, and off I went.

I decided to make it a short stint for our first time.  20 minutes on the elliptical.  I was anxious most of the time (though it helped that many of the cardio machines had TVs and I could just watch an episode of Cash Cab), and kept looking over my shoulder, waiting for someone in a red shirt to come looking for me with an annoyed and/or apologetic look on their face.  No one came.

I cooled off for a minute and went back to the childcare room.  Daniel was at the Lego table, Rebecca outside on a rocking toy, content as could be.  I got their attention, and they seemed happy to see me.  I asked if they were ready to go home. “No.”  Did they want to stay here and play some more? “Yes.”  Should Mommy go do some more exercising? “Yes!”  And off they went.

Seriously.  My kids essentially sent me away so that they could play some more.  So, away I went and did another 20 minutes on the elliptical and some stretching.

When it was finally time to go home, Daniel shed his first tears because he didn’t want to leave.  He was maybe a touch on the frayed/defiant side after we got home, but hard to pinpoint whether that had anything to do with our gym experience, since it was on the spectrum of his normal behavior.

I was hugely, pleasantly, awesomely surprised by how well they did.  I know there will be days when things don’t go as smoothly, and my turn will come when the red-shirted lady comes to tap me on the shoulder. But in the meantime, say hello to our new Tuesday/Thursday activity!

I feel like this is yet another door opened in our world.  While I could have dropped them off there at 6 months (they have a little gated-off area for the littlest ones with someone tending to them full-time), I don’t think I could have done it at 18 months when they were at a peak of clinginess.  But two? Perfect.

It also is a great way to feel like I’m getting a great benefit for myself (alone time, exercise), while not “taking anything away” from the kids.  They’re in a fun environment, lots of things to play with, other kids, and some time away from me, all of which I think are positive things.  So, there you go.  For an hour or so, we all get something good.

And I may have stashed some fruit snacks in my bag as a reward for spectacular behavior.

I can be kind of judgmental sometimes. I know, I know. You can pick your jaws up off the floor now.  But I do try to temper some of my immediate reactions to people and situations. Who knows? Maybe the kid or the parent is having an off day or going through a really rough phase.  There could be any number of things going on.  And I do believe that kids are just plain temperamentally different from one another, so we moms can take neither all of the credit nor shoulder all of the blame.

There are exceptions, of course.  I will judge the crap out of you when you stand next to the baby’s stroller, smoking a cigarette.  I will feel all up on my high horse when you watch your kid run away from you at the playground and practically into traffic while you lamely plead, “no, sweetie, don’t do that” but stand still.

But today, we started a new class. I will happily puff out my chest and say that I think my kids were among the most well-behaved in the group, and I don’t even think that’s 100% bias.  Don’t get me wrong, they are far from perfect children. Daniel can lose it with the best of ‘em, and Rebecca is going through a charming phase of grabbing toys straight out of other people’s hands if she wants them (believe me, she’s past knowing that it’s not the right thing to do).  But they were generally very cooperative in class today, followed instructions, took turns, sat nicely when asked, etc.  It was good.

And then there was the kid who spent almost the entire hour-long class shoving each of the other children in turn.  And the other kid who continuously gave his mother that “I dare you to make me” look every time she tried to keep him from hogging the slide.  The one who kept stealing other kids’ shoes at least didn’t seem malicious.

Lots of this stuff is on the normal spectrum of toddler behavior.  And, like I say, you never know what kind of a day (or week) someone has had.  My kids and I have certainly had our share of bad days, and I’m sure I have been looked down upon when that spills over into the public. I may very well be living in a glass house, here.

But, still, I see people at the playground or in some of these classes, and I’m amazed at the things that their kids do that don’t get some kind of correction.  Just a half-hearted, unenforced, “hey, don’t do that!”  And again, I’ve had my halfhearted days, too, so maybe I’m just thinking of people that I see on their bad days. But man, it bugs me, and I have to really work to keep the judginess to a minimum.

And I have to be careful where I throw my stones. You never know what they’re going to hit.