Happy 11 Month Birthday!

Today was a big day! It was Aunt Sarah’s birthday, the girls’ friend, Maliyah’s one year birthday, and Samantha and Amelia turned 11 months old today! I’m officially in full-on freak out mode and plan on spending the next month pretending like they are already one year old so that I’m not a complete emotional wreck on their actual birthday. Who are we kidding? I’m going to be a complete wreck anyways, but maybe taking the next month to prepare myself will soften the blow a bit.

The girls had the best 11-month birthday gift EVER yesterday when our favorite high school senior and the girls’ personal mentor, Marisa, took a few hours out of her busy schedule and three-day weekend to hang out with us. She even brought us lunch, which was like manna from heaven as I pretty much survive on peanut butter honey sandwiches eaten standing up while wiping up food the girls fling all over the kitchen. Feeling like an actual adult for three hours = priceless.

The fastest way to Samantha’s heart is with food, and thus she quickly attached herself to Marisa’s side after figuring out she was the bringer of croissants. Amelia, on the other hand, took a little bit longer to warm up, but after a few minutes, became a little koala clinging to Marisa for the rest of the afternoon.

I took advantage of Marisa being here and ~~dragged~~ brought her to the park with us. Our outing was made 1.5 billion times easier with Marisa’s competent helping hands there to chase after the girls and grab leaves/rocks/sand out of their mouths.

First stop: the swings (duh). There are only two baby swings at this park and one of them was occupied when we arrived, so we gave Amelia the first go while Marisa held Samantha and all of us glared rudely at the baby occupying the swing next to us until she and her caretaker finally left.

Amelia set a new land-speed record for destroying her monthly sticker. This time, she grabbed it out of a ziploc baggy which was inside the diaper bag, pulled the sticker out and started eating it before we even left the house. I swear that thing gives out a radar signal or something.

Amelia begrudgingly allowed me stick it on her, wrinkles and all.

Silly Goose, on the other hand, was having way too much fun to care about eating any stickers.

I have a lot more pictures of Samantha because she makes the funniest faces while swinging!

YOLO/slightly terrified face.

Peeking tongue face.

Neener neener face.

WAAAAAAAAAAAA face.

Neener neener face with added claw.

Ironic face.

The baby annoyingly taking up the swing next to us while the twins CLEARLY wanted to swing at the same time, turned out to be really nice, as was her nanny. Samantha and Amelia quickly took a liking to their new friend, 10-month-old Linden.

Could be the angle here, but look at the size difference! This is the first time I’ve looked at Samantha and thought “You’re not a baby…THAT’S a baby! You’re a TODDLER!”

While waiting for Linden’s swing to free up, we took a detour down the slide.

Amelia had the concentration of an olympic ski jumper.

Finally, there was a vacancy in the other swing so I could take pictures of the girls together (the real reason I wanted both swings freed up).

More silliness.

Pure joy!

Escape!

Linden’s nanny informed me that this was Linden’s first time in the sand. I didn’t know it was possible that there was someone out there more paranoid than me! The girls had fun playing with their new friend.

All of a sudden, Samantha made a run– er– crawl for the stairs. Up she went.

Sister! Come join me!

Samantha had the time of her life atop the play structure. I think it’s safe to say she’s not afraid of heights.

Well, maybe a little afraid.

The girls also met some new twin friends, 20-month-old Owen and Sophie. Their mom told me they were born three months early and had many developmental delays, which made me even more grateful the girls were born right on schedule (36 weeks) and had zero time in the NICU. The girls weren’t shy at all with their new friends and barreled right by them, making poor Owen cry as he was squashed by Samantha.

Samantha’s little adventure wouldn’t have been possible with Marisa’s help. While I was busy preventing Samantha from diving off the slides, Marisa held on to Amelia. A two to one baby to adult ratio whilst climbing at high altitude? No thank you.