This past month and a half has been C – R – A – Y guys. Jane and Emma are into everything right now. We bought our tree, put it up, and put lights on it, only to have the twins tear down half of the lights and anything else at their level.  Our tree wasn't pretty, but it was ours, and it was in our home.

Time has really gotten away from me.  The girls are keeping me on my toes every day, and they are talking up a STORM.  This week Janey started putting simple sentences together (most of them consist of her pointing out what's Emma's -- "Emma's socks, Emma's seat, Emma's potty"...), and their vocabulary triples daily.   Jane has also started adding an A to any word that ends in an N ("crownA, JaneA").  Not sure where that came from!


It's also pretty cool that they are finally starting to understand context.  They know when to use certain words and phrases, when to nod or shake their heads, and sometimes they say things and I cannot figure out for the LIFE of me how they figured it out.  Other times, they mimic exactly what I taught them ONE TIME, which I can't believe they pick up so fast. Every time I say that someone in the house is sleeping, Jane or Emma (or both simultaneously) puts her pointer finger to her lips and says, "Shhhh..." and looks VERY concerned.

The highlight of them learning to talk so far was when Janey pointed to the bottle of champagne in my shopping cart on NYE and told a random stranger that this was "Mama's sippy".  Yup, Crowning Mama Moment. Luckily the stranger had a sense of humor.

And then there is the potty training.  At our 18 month check up, the doctor informed us that since Jane and Emma can tell us that they have to poop, that they are pooping, and that they have, in fact, pooped, that it's ok to start really trying to potty train.  I didn't get much guidance on it, so I just brought the potties back out to the bathroom and started putting them on them before changing them into nighttime diapers.

The other night, Janey had a successful pee pee on the potty, complete with saying "Bye-bye pee pee!" and waving as we flushed the contents of her Baby Bjorn down the actual toilet.  I then later asked her if she had to go poopies on the potty, to which she responded by running to the bathroom and opening the door.  I got her all undressed (she is, apparently, a NAKED pooper), and she sat there and smiled at me, and then jumped up to look into the bathtub.  In that time, Emma seemed intrigued, so I started to undress her and get her potty-ready.

As I turned to sit Emmy on the potty, I heard a splat on the floor and turned to find Jane pooping on the floor NEXT TO the potty.

I screamed and threw her onto "Emma's seat" and started yelling frantically for Hershey.  He disappeared for 5 minutes (or long enough for me to wipe it all up with toilet paper, flush it, and proceed to start cleaning Jane off) and finally came back with a roll of paper towels and 2 gallon-sized Ziploc bags.  Not quite sure what he was thinking....but thank GOD that my mom bought me a Shark Steam Mop for Christmas this year.  That thing has been a miracle.  Great for removing/sanitizing food-fling stains AND poop.  Awesome.

Aside from all of that excitement, we had a fun November, a busy Thanksgiving, activity-filled December, and 2 blissful and also sickly weeks off from work/daycare for Christmas and New Years.  The girls were spoiled ROTTEN for Christmas (I'm still not sure that Hershey and I bought them enough, but our families def. did!), and we had a quiet NYE at home with our closest friends and their children.  I have to say, it has been an eventful 2 months (you can follow our adventures on Facebook and Instagram), and I am ready for 2015.

Without further delay, here are some of our favorite highlights from the last 2 months: