I may as well be talking about drinking because when I think, five years after their birth, that I have twins! My next thought is that I need a drink.
Shockingly enough, a lot of people say “Oh I want(ed) twins!” when I tell them I’m a twin mom. Â My first thought is, these people are insane. Â My second is along the lines of “oh bless their hearts, they have no idea what they’re talking about.” Â It’s like anything else – running a marathon, getting married or having kids – you don’t know what kind of hell you’re in for, until you’re in it.
Now, yes of course I love my kids (and my sweet, sweet husband!).  And yes, there are twin moms out there who haven’t a clue what I’m talking about when I whine and complain about how hard it is to raise them.  I don’t know who those moms are and, moms with twins plus other kids or moms with multiple sets of multiples (I’m looking at you Shannon!) deserve some sort of award.  But…I digress.
Miles and Vaughn will be five years-old this Sunday. Â I’ve stopped wishing that there’s a magic age they will turn and will suddenly sit and play quietly and nicely. Â It just ‘aint happening. Â If I want to have a pleasant experience at Target or the grocery store – I leave them home. Â I’m sure this will be the same now and 10 years from now. Â I’ve come to terms with that, and I love them for it. Â How can they be calm when I’m their mother?
In celebration of my boys turning five, I give you the gift of reality X2 (of course):
Pregnancy
What people say: Â Oh you’re lucky! Â One pregnancy and two kids!
The reality: I felt very lucky to gain 45 pounds, have to stop running, go to doctor appointments 15 million times over the course of 37 weeks and be scared shitless that they would be born weighing 1 pound each and spend eternity in the NICU. Â It was really a dream come true.
I am not feeling lucky.  And this was only 34 weeks….I think?
Baby Shower
What people say: Â It didn’t really hit me that you’re having two babies until I looked at your registry and saw that you had two of everything.
The reality: Â I really need some smarter friends and YES, it hit me that I needed two of everything when I was at Babies R Us for 15 hours and got carpel tunnel from using the f**king scan gun to tag everything I was going to need for these two! Â Luckily we just built a new house, otherwise we would need to rent one of those trailers you see at schools just to store the diapers!
I was crying my eyes out when this was first put together. It was HUGE! Â Luckily I only had to use it for a few months, and we didn’t get out much.
Toddler Twins
What people say: Â Other then “double trouble” and “how do you tell them apart?,” next on the list is “they have a built in playmate.”
The reality:  We have a built in WWE match in our home. Constantly. They cannot so much as pass each other in the hallway without throwing an elbow or a smack upside the head!  They are drawn together like two magnets and literally have to be pried apart in all situations!  They have also always shared a room (splitting them up for bedtime is considered to be the worst punishment) and they often sleep in the same bed.  After they wrestle one another to sleep of course.
My Reality:
Though it all, I consider myself to be one of the luckiest women on the planet to be their mom.  To bear witness to the miracle that is Miles and Vaughn is something to be cherished.  The bond they have is like nothing I have ever seen and surpasses even what they feel for me at times!  Can you imagine spending almost every moment with someone from before you were born?  It’s not something most people can understand, or worse, will ever know even with a spouse or partner.
This pretty much says it all!
I’m lucky because I see them growing together, yet independently, every day. Â I see the little funny and wise men they are turning into and most of all, I get to hear their little voices calling me “Mom!” Â What could be better then that? Â Happy Birthday boys. Â You’re the best thing that ever happened to me!
Did you ever want to be a twin mom or are you one? Â Do your twins make you crazy?
How do you feel when your kids have a birthday? Â
OMG – laughing so hard at the WWE reference. I can only imagine. I have always wondered about being a twin mom. Not that it is easy but the advantage of getting it all over at once. Diapers – double the diapers but after about 2-3 years, you are done. Diapers lasted a little longer with The A Team being 2 1/2 years apart. Again, not easy just different. My kids birthdays are usually a little emotional for me. I tend to over analyze how I am doing as a mom and realizing that time is more finite than I want it to be. Can’t wait to eventually meet you and those wrestlers! My daughter is turning 6 and I know she would love playing with them. Tomboy all the way 🙂
It’s all hard no matter what, right? Parenting is just HARD…if you do it right, I guess.
I agree with the emotional aspect of birthdays and mom analysis! I do the same thing!!
I think ALL our kids would have a blast together. Cannot wait for that opportunity 🙂
You stole this from my brain, huh? Insert my head on all your pics and it was me almost 4 years ago. Really – we had the exact same car seats and stroller. I remember the first time I pushed it (even without kids in it), I freaked out. It was a bus! How the hell was I going to maneuver this thing in a store or outside??? Happy Birthday to your babes!
Oh it makes my heart SOOOOO happy to hear you say that Angela because I know you TRULY understand. That horrible stroller was such a wake-up call for me. I literally BURST into tears when my dad and brother put it together b/c I was like “How the hell did this happen? How did I get here?” At least we have other twin moms to lean on, right? Thank you so much for saying this!!
Not technically a twin mom, but with my girls being 16 months apart, I thought many days in the beginning I was going to lose it just slightly and will be honest I love my girls, but happy that they are not that small anymore. Just was a lot of work and definitely had its good and bad, but at least at this age that they are they can play and entertain each other for the most part. that said, Happy Birthday to Miles and Vaughn 🙂
I agree with the newborn/early baby stage – it was ROUGH and I would not want to go back to it. I have so much more fun with them these days – and they have a blast with each other. Thanks Janine!
Oh, Happy Happy HAPPY birthday to your sweet Miles and Vaughn!!! Five is such a big and wonderful year!! They are adorable!
You made me literally laugh out loud with “those people are insane”…so much so that my dog jumped up and ran out of the room. But I LOST IT with the “I need smarter friends” OMG…I AM DYING.
Funniest post EVER. I am too easily flustered to do well with multiples. One at a time STILL overwhelms me. I bow down to the awesomeness of moms and dads who get it done at twice the pace!!!! You rock…and so do your little guys!! —Lisa
Lisa – the highest compliment you can give me is you laughing out loud (and scaring the dog!) at something I wrote. To me, you and Ashley are the queens of funny so I do not take your comments lightly!! Thank you so, so much. And, any mom with more then one kid is amazing!!!!
Couldn’t be anymore true! Twins are the best and hardest thing I have ever done. All the things people say are just plain insane. Yes twins are awesome and yes twins are HARD and yes I am lucky they are now out of diapers but it is still the hardest thing (wait did I already say that?). I think we twin Moms are a breed apart, in a good way! Happy Birthday to two little boys who, hopefully, will grow old and best friends with mine! Congrats for making it 5 years!!
They will have no choice!! Thanks so much Shannon. I swear I could not have survived 5 years without YOU. The other best thing that happened in my life 5 years ago was you crossing that street to introduce yourself! Here’s to birthdays and besties! xoxoxo
Happy Birthday to your little WWE fighters! And a HUGE bottle of wine to you for surviving another year! My two rugrats run me ragged, and they’re 2.5 years apart. Seriously, nominating you and Angela for badass mamas of the century!
Thanks so much Nicole and I will be drinking plenty of wine this weekend – not to worry 🙂
Hilarious! Thanks for the sneak peek into reality… I am not one of those moms who wanted twins. One was overwhelming enough for me, and I’m still in denial some days that we’re doing it all again! So I don’t know how you do it! But I know you are an awesome mom and your boys are adorable. Happy birthday to them!!
Thank you so much Laura! You such a great mom and I’m sure you ail tackle baby number 2 (whatever gender it turns out to be!) with the same fierceness and love in which you do everything.
All of this: I need smarter friends, built in WWE match and your whole “reality of pregnancy” statement. This was hilarious Allie, although the “reality” was so real for me too. Lots of fear and doctors appointments. I have it a little different with boy/girl twins (we can tell them apart easily – ha!) because they don’t wrestle so much but they are super competitive…and everything is a competition. Happy birthday to the boys and congrats to you!!
Thanks Stephanie!! I know you totally get it and I’m sure have had plenty of people ask you if they’re identical!!! That is really the best, isn’t it? Glad to know yours are super competitive too 🙂 It makes life exciting.
HA! So freaking cute. I am not a mother but my sister has a daughter and a set of twins [as I think you know from reading her posts] and I was able to pull things out of this post and apply it to things I’ve seen or things she’s told me. Happy Birthday to them!!
Yes I do! She’s one of those “in the major award category” moms. Thanks Cori. Who knows? Maybe you’ll be doubly blessed someday 🙂
First off, your boys are adorable. I know that to you they are whirling dervishes but to us in the online world, they are always cute and still in pictures. I am the mom of two teenage boys who are high school wrestlers. They have wrestled since they were in 2nd grade and kindergarten. Their coaches are identical twins. What I have noticed is that there are many, many identical twins in the wrestling world. This and your WWE reference are no coincidence. Although my teens’ physical aggression toward each other has mellowed out a bit, I spent many years telling them to “Save it for the mat!!”
OMG that is way too funny!!! OF COURSE twins are natural born wrestlers. It starts in utero! Thank you so much for this. Now I know where to sign them up – forget t-ball and soccer – do they have pee wee wrestling??
This was such a cool read, I have always wanted twins…but in the way you say it……but realistically you would be absolutely terrified if it happened, looks like you handled it well. They are pretty darn cute, and it was really interesting to read about things that I would have never considered! Such a blessing though, I hope they have a wonderful birthday 🙂
Thank you so much Tina. They TRULY are a blessing and I wouldn’t want it any other way.
How can they be 5 already!! The wwe went on for years in the PA Fogg household…..they turn 27 this month!! And it still goes on when they are together!
Of course it does!! I bet Big Red wins a lot of those matches 🙂
You got that one right. Big Red just moved from ND to WA.just sent new clothes…cost $65.00just to mail the stuff.
Living that twin mom life has gotta be hardcore. But the happiness I see in all these pics is just making my heart melt with joy. Squeeeeee!!!
So true. It’s pure joy mama!
Sorry, I thought their bday was today…well, Happy bday to them on Sunday!!!!!!!
You are a total supermom!!! I love this post 🙂 I have a mom at my church that has 6 kids ages 7 and down! I have no idea how she stays sane :)!
My girls both had birthdays this week and I feel like I have no idea when they got so big. You are always told to enjoy your kids time goes by so fast and I am always kinda like yeah, yeah…..but it really does!!!!!
That’s ok – it’s only a few days away!
Six kids that close in age? Yeah, I would be in the looney bin.
It really does fly by. I hate to admit it, but it’s just so true. Thanks Jen! Have a great time celebrating with your girls!!
I am under no illusion that having twins is easy, but if anyone can do it, you can! Happy, happy birthday to your boys. I am personally loving watching my baby boy grow up, even though it makes me a little sad. I just hug him whenever he will let me!
Thanks Dana!! It’s definitely so sad and so great at the same time. As a mom, it’s hard to watch them become independent but, of course, that’s part of our job. Go get those hugs mama!!
Killing me, here! So funny. And let me just say that when I went through the newborn phase with my first, all I could think was “how the hell do people with multiples do it?!” Kudos to you, mama!
Thank you for saying that Amanda!! It’s ALL hard but, I found with newborn twins, we had to outnumber them whenever possible 🙂
I don’t know if we discussed this yet, but Cassidy’s birthday is Sunday too! Yay for April 13th, I say!
Twins run heavily in my family so I thought it might happen to me. It didn’t. My older sister is next. She does want twins because she feels like then it’s one pregnancy and done. And she’s like you – very active – so she doesn’t want to devote 18 months to having two kids. Of course she doesn’t know what she’d be getting into, but I guess it’s probably that way with anything.
I get weird about birthdays – mine and theirs. Even Cassidy’s because..maybe I should be making it a whole birthday weekend and I should be baking a cake right now. And hiring a sitter. And baking a cake while wearing lingerie?
(that last one was a joke)
I’m sure he wouldn’t want that last one to be a joke 🙂 And NO I didn’t know that!? Hooray for April 13th indeed.
I know what you mean about birthdays. I always go big but I always end up feeling unprepared – like I feel right now!!
As for you sister, well – there are good points but, once you’re in it, I don’t think it matters much. As you know, all kids are 100% consuming.
Quite a difference between idealized perception and fact, isn’t there? My first son was a twin in-utero for a short time. The twin was ectopic and I had to have my tube removed in emergency surgery. I’m so lucky to have ended up with one. And now I know that if I had the twins my second son never would have been born. So I would have loved to have had them and yet I’m glad this turned out the way it did.
Happy 5th birthday to your boys. Hope you all have a great celebration!
Oh Karen, I’m so sorry you had to go though that! That’s just awful. But then – the bright side of having your second son! Life works in mysterious ways, doesn’t it?
You’ve definitely got it going on for a mom of two rowdy boys. Happy birthday to your kiddos!
HA HA HA thanks Kate! Most days I feel like the only thing I have going on is sleep deprivation 🙂
You are too funny! I can imagine (or can’t) how challenging it must be. I hope they have an awesome birthday! I can’t wait to read about it.
Thanks Kris. It’s sure to be a rocking’ good party!
This is SO beautiful Allie! My kids don’t have to be pried apart (all the time) but they fight over everything and that is just SO much fun! I hope they have a great birthday — 5 is such a great age (I speak from exactly one months of experience LOL!)
I’m laughing at your “one-month of experience!” I know you so get it when it comes to rowdy boys. The huge ups and downs!!!…but ultimately all worth it. Thanks Nellie!
First of all, happy birthday to your boys! Second of all, that is really really sweet!! Your boys are adorable and I love that photo of them as babies with their arms criss-crossing! I can’t imagine what it would be like to have a twin. I always wanted one when I was a kid. I think I just wanted someone who looked like me? But it is a pretty amazing bond and probably very cool to witness!
Thanks so much Britt. The boys are just fully starting to understand what it means to be a twin. They had no clue what it meant at first. I only hope they stay as close as they are forever!
I can’t imagine having twins, a girlfriend of mine had twin girls and it rocked.her.world. I have my hands full with two boys as well, but can’t imagine having them the same age! You are a rock star! At first I was excited for birthdays but now it just reminds me that they aren’t babies anymore and growing up and it’s kind of scary!! Happy 5th to your boys!!
Thanks Sue! Yes – rocking the world – is a perfect way to put it!
I feel the say about their birthdays. It’s pure joy with a side of sadness, but I’ll celebrate through it!
Before I had kids, I used to think I wanted twins. Hah. I had my hands full with one at a time! Your boys are adorable though!
I’m so surprised at how many people think the same thing Michelle! I should offer to have them take the boys for a few hours 🙂
Thank you 🙂
This is the sweetest post ever!! You are a rockin’ mom and those boys are lucky to have you as their mom!!!
I have a twin (brother) and NO – I did not want to have twins. Chris did and had the nurse convinced there were 2 heartbeats when I was pregnant with Hunter (who almost turned me into an alcoholic when he was 3!!!) – thankfully that was not the case since I spent a lot of his early years (while also chasing a 2 year old) by myself since Chris was off doing the military thing (9/11 was 5 months after Hunter was born – our world changed forever – personally as well as the country).
I love celebrating my boys on their birthdays but all the planning and prep drains me – I feel selfish saying that but coming off of a birthday week it’s the truth!!
Thanks so much Kim! I can’t imagine having a newborn right after 9/11. That must have been really tough for you mentally and emotionally – since your emotions are out of control after you have a baby anyway!
I completely agree with the planning and partying for their birthdays! Plus, we have a family party AND a kids party. At least I have two weeks in between to recover and get my strength back up!!
This is hilarious and poignant and beautiful all at the same time. I love that image you painted of being together even before you were born. That is so powerful! Happy Birthday to your boys!
Thanks so much Lauren! It truly is so powerful. The bond they have is like nothing I’ve ever seen. It’s really a beautiful thing.
Oh Allie. I was one of those silly girls who wanted twins and thought, how cool! Then I had my first child, and wondered, HOW ON EARTH DO MOMS OF TWINS DO THIS? Then my second, and thought, gosh, singletons for this gal, thank you very much!
And when I got pregnant this time and started feeling pukey in WEEK 4, there were SO many jokes about oh, maybe you’ve got twins, and I laughed and went hell no.
So, we’re now getting ready for twins. With two kids already. Can we say scared shitless?
But also freaking excited!! I still can’t get my head around it. Twins. OMG.
Happy Birthday to your boys!
I STILL can’t get my head around it! You are going to have such an amazing, incredible experience bringing those two into the world, and then having them be part of your already beautiful family. It’s going to be a crazy ride for sure – but the best one of your life! I couldn’t be more excited for you.
Wow did this make me laugh and I can relate!! My twin boys are 5 1/2 plus I have a 7 year old son!! Yes he was 18 months old when I had them, somtimes I still don’t know how we got through it!! It helps to hear I’m not alone in what I’m going through!! 🙂 They are an incredible blessing though and I wouldn’t have it any other way. Thanks for sharing.
You are a queen mother in my book! I haven’t a clue how you pulled all that off.
Yes, they are definitely an incredible blessing and just such a cool thing to be a twin mom. Thanks for reading and commenting!
I have so much respect for twin mamas. When I think of all the times I felt (and feel) stressed, or overwhelmed with one, then imagine that times two – just, wow. It’s funny, when you wrote about the reality of the comment ‘They have a built-in playmate,’ I thought you were going to say they conspire together, rather than wrestle and fight together. Sometimes my little guy is just so sneaky, I can only imagine when two of them get their little boy minds together, only bad things can happen. 🙂 Being a boy mama is super fun, though. Happy 5th birthday to your boys!!
Oh they do their fair share of conspiring as well! Vaughn is usually the instigator and we’ve caught him plotting a few times. Oh yes, never a dull moment with boys – but oh so fun!
Loved this post! I am not a parent of twins, but I am a twin myself – and that bond just lasts and lasts! My brother and I are 28 now, and live in different cities, but he’s my best friend and I can’t imagine ever being that close with anyone.
Oh that makes me infinitely happy!!! I so hope my boys stay as close forever as they are now. Thank you so much Simon!