Sleep and EASY support for twins and multiples

[babybarr]

Gorgeous pic kayra

So lovely to hear from you Beth. Do we get a pic?

[kayra]

Great to hear from you Beth, how is Beatrice now? Yes piccies would be lovely

These days I'm trying to get out the habit of calling ds and dd 'the twins' or 'the babies'. I'm feeling that especially with ds1 it detaches him from them or them from him, so I'm trying to say their names or 'your brother and sister' to him. I remember talking about addressing them like that in the first months, does anyone else still refer to them as 'the twins' or sthg? Hard habit to break unfortunately but I'm doing better.
Lena is doing more walking now and her babbling is a lot more like talking, not so much with ds, tho he does say baby and down properly, dd doesn't say any real words yet, but is better at signing. Definitely emoting this stage more
Hope everyone is well xxx

[babybarr]

I was quite insistent in the beginning about not calling them the twins so fortunately they're usually called by their names. Sometimes called the little boy but I will call o my big boy so that feels ok yk? My siblings will often call them the twins and I try to remind them they don't call their other niece and nephews the boy or the girl! Isn't always met with a smile

[Uglybethy]

Hi ladies
Beatrice is absolutely fine now, thank goodness. We recently had their two year well-visit and there was nothing wrong with either of them . I can't help but wonder though, looking back, whether she was a 'textbook baby' with regards to the easy routine and her sleep because she basically had glandular fever the whole time... I'm trying not to dwell on it too much though!!
I commend you ladies for managing to think about whether you refer to your children in the plural sense or not.. I can honestly say I've never ever thought about it. Sometimes I do call them 'girls' or 'the girls', especially if I want them both here right now... Whoops!
We are in full-on discussion/negotiation phase ATM... Everything and I mean EVERYTHING is a discussion and times two can get very interesting indeed!
The challenges with two vocally communicative children at the same stage developmentally tend to be around differences. For example, b wants a particular song on a cd and p wants a different one or b wants the door closed at bed time and p wants it open. We spend a lot of time practicing 'patience'!!!!
With regard to sleep we are in a great place. I am fully recovered from the first 12/18 months and no longer dream about or long for sleep all day long... Yes you will all get there too... Just hang in there, it's coming very soon!
The girls take one deliciously long afternoon nap and sleep between 10 and 11 hours at night. We feel like we can have a life either side of nap too.. It really does get better and better!
Talk soon!
Beth

[kayra]

Argh negotiating! Sounds fun are they talking quite a bit now then? Wonderful that they are both healthy!! Lovely about sleep! We're doing pretty well on that front, still ot properly on 1 nap though belive it or not, they seem to still be ok with 30min the morning and then 1.5-2hrs in the pm. They'll probably move to 1 over the next couple of months though.
Laura are your sleep troubles a bit better?
Reg, referring to them in the plural I wonder if the fact that we have an older child comes into play as then it the older one bathe twins iyswim? I don't mind the girls/boys so much-which we obviously can't do though

[Uglybethy]

Ladies, I keep thinking of things that, if I had my time again, I wouldn't do or worry about... Wanted to share them with you in case they're useful to you at all!

I would not get rid of sleep sacks! Suck it up and buy the really big ones from amazon, even though they seem expensive! We moved to big girls bedding several months ago and it made it really difficult to manage individual needs as one kid likes the duvet on and the other kicks it off so I never know how to set the temperature of the room right, or how to dress them for bed. Sounds tiny but it's a nightmare! Also, once they start talking it just adds to the chaos and requests at bed time or in the middle of the night....

Keep the number of comfort items low. So we have duvets, bubbas (pacifiers) and water. And those are the only three things happening at bed time. Add to that the fact that one baby screams for the door closed and the other one screams for it to be open (my touchy angel baby who has a hard time settling unless she feels like she's close to me) and it can feel like utter carnage at bed time!

Buy WOW cups instead of sippy cups. Can get on amazon! You tube them.. They are amazing! I did so much sippy cup searching for ones that don't leak but still seem like you have to 'drink' from them, not suck and then I stumbled on these and they were all we needed. Helped us to wean from bottle too as they can be drunk from whilst lying down. Also great for water in the night as they don't leak at all and like I said, can be drunk whilst lying down!

Those are the items at the forefront of my mind but I will add more as I remember more mistakes that I made!

Hope all of you are well and happy!

[kayra]

So sweet of you Beth! Yes I love sleep sacks, ds1 used them till he was 3so I still have my mammoth sized ones
Will look into those wow cups, sounds interesting.
Yes, it will be interesting times when they want different things at bedtime, right now they don't get much choice

These days we're getting a fair bit of trying to push eachother of my lap when reading a book, it's kind of funny and also not, dd especially will try and wedge herself between ds and me! Do you guys have that at all?

[babybarr]

Beth I'm definitely going to look up those cups. My boys are still having bottles (ssh)

Kayra I get that all the time. Also if one falls and gets a cuddle the other one will pretend to fall and hurt themselves!

[babybarr]

So I've got a question. My mum just commented on how my boys lived in babygros (sleepsuits) till about 6mths I mean what was the point in getting them dressed for them to be sick on and if we went out it was cold and they had coats on. What did you girls do?

[kayra]

I don't think it's a big deal, I did get mine dressed just to make life more interesting also it was summer here so I was dressing them differently in the day than in the night,  I guess for me it helped get Ina rhythm of now it's day now it's bed time rather just round the clock babyness if you see what mean. Try not to let it bother you, its not like there's a right or a wrong.

Well I'm finding twin toddlers quite challenging, I can't seem to produce calm offspring, they are all over the place, climbing etc. plenty of squabbling and grabbing, hitting sometimes too. On top of it all it turns out dd has a sever case of lazy eye so has to wear and eyepatch and glasses which she's constantly pulling off so even when they are playing nicely I can't leave them to it as I have to be vigilant about what she's doing. It's extremely frustrating. Anyone found a solution to squabbles and hitting etc?

[babybarr]

Well believe it or not my two are just learning how to take turns!! V short turns but even so.  We've modelled and practised for ages and now j will say Harry's go, my go, etc. They still have their fair share of squabbles but not too bad. I reckon two boys or two girls must have a different dynamic though. My two are CRAZY though so feel for you on that one. They get each other into mischief too!

[kayra]

Well that's encouraging, thanks! We model taking turns and signing please to eachother but can't be on top of them all the time of course would be so fun -or not - to get them all together!

[charlenek]

Hi,

I have two 4 week old dcda twin girls... I am starting the EASY routine from today. Any words of advice...  in terms of cluster feeding, is this two feeds or one feed that is split into two?

Any advice welcome.
Thanks

[kayra]

HI congratulations! Not sure what dcda means sorry..

I think cluster feed is basically 2 feeds close in succession rather than in 3hr intervals. You'd need to follow their lead though. I don't remember systematically cluster feeding, it just sometimes happened with the way they would feed or short nap iswim? The main easy boards might be more useful in helping with advice about the routine as the principle is basically the same for singletons or twins. Are you trying to sync them? If it works that's great but I found it 'easier' to let the, do their own thing till about 6 months when they were both on 2 naps when I synced them.
Xx
How is everyone else doing? We're busy! It's fun to seem them interact more and more both are wearing glasses now (supposed to be at least dd's in denial ) so the new trend is to swap glasses which unfortunely isn't any use as their prescriptions are completely different. Trying to get dd to keep her glass and patch on is my biggest battle-even more so than getting ds1s homework done believe it or not

[babybarr]

Dcda means two sacs two placentas meaning fraternal. Like mine. Although I'm not sure mine are fraternal but that's a whole other story!

Ditto to what kayra said. Just go with what you can. I would say it's virtually impossible to get twins on the same routine that early on. So just play it by ear.

Mine are quite funny Now. They tell me if they want to go first but also will volunteer the other one for things like bed or nappy change!