Oscar Night

For the first time since we were in Kenya, we haven't seen any of the leading Oscar contenders - No Country, There Will Be Blood, and Atonement. I didn't think Michael Clayton or Eastern Promises offered much that hasn't been done before. Marion Cotillard was overrated (enough of the musical biopics already - how did Edith Piaf, Ray Charles and Johnny Cash all end up with the same lifestory?). I was impressed with Casey Affleck in Jesse James and in his brother's movie Gone Baby Gone.

My favourites of 2007 were Once, Juno, Away From Her and The Wind That Shakes The Barley. Plus, funniest movie was Superbad and best action/sequel was Bourne Ultimatum.

My Dad's Not Like The Others

Here's a little kids' story I wrote on the weekend.

Click here to get to my new documents website and then click on the title, My Dad's Not Like The Others. It's not illustrated yet because, frankly, my drawing is even worse than my writing!

It's my first effort, so it's obviously not The Gruffalo just yet.

Who Needs To Crawl?

Using the slither and the rollover, Molly makes her way over to Jacob and the much-treasured stacking cups. Who needs to crawl when you've got this kind of mobility?

Domestic Crisis

What's the worst thing that could happen in a twin household?

- Internet going down, thus cutting me off from the outside world? Nope, I'm still connected.
- Running out of baby food? Not in our 24/7 shopping universe.
- Snow going unshoveled leading our postal worker to miss our house several days in a row and then leaving me a nasty note? Not really a problem - what, I'm supposed to be sad that my pizza flyer and bank statement got delayed? Please.
- Washing machine breaking? Yup, that's our crisis du jour.

We had a washing machine induced flood at the beginning of the week. Then, due to my unflagging and irrational belief that technical problems will just go away, we had a second, more biblical flood a couple of days later. And the laundry pile grows higher.

Who knows how many loads of laundry get done per week around here, but it's a lot. Orders of magnitude more than when I was in undergrad and did a few loads per semester at mom's house. Is that why we all wore Drakkar in university - to cover the delicate odour of underwashed clothing?

So I trekked down to Barrie this morning and bought us a new washing machine. Delivery next Friday. Crisis averted. We're off to Parry Sound for a weekend of cottage life. And I'm bringing lots of dirty laundry.

Video Reaction to Kate Dancing

In this video, the kids are watching their mother dance back and forth, performing spins and leaping arabesques. They're clearly impressed and amazed with her balletic genius.

Okay, in truth Kate was at work and they're just watching my hand waving. But the video is far more amusing if you picture Kate dancing.

Thirteen Hours Away

Friday night was our first time away from the kids together - we went out to Horseshoe Valley resort, complete with fancy dinner, jacuzzi, fireplace, pay-per-view movie, blueberry pancake breakfast in bed, etc. It was fantastic. The challenge was to talk about subjects other than the twins. So, we worked our way through: remembering what life was like before twins, wondering what life would consist of now without twins, and how unfortunate everyone is who doesn't have our twins. Having made our best effort, we returned to the most fascinating topic - how great Molly and Jacob are.

Here are a few photos from my folks' visit (they seem to have survived the night of babysitting):
- Dad keeping Jacob away from the hot tea

- Molly seems to have developed quite the giggle during Grammy's visit. Who knows what shenanigans transpired while we were away.

- Strained peas, glorious peas

- My dad earning his supper - crazy amounts of snow

- Kate's homemade object permanence/ball-drop toy

- Dad appears as transfixed by the chandelier as Molly is

The Secret Lives of Twins

Maybe this series of photos is only of interest to me, but I love it (for the uninitiated, Molly is on the left, telling the secrets and delivering the kisses)...





Apparently we had 40 cm of snow today. I say "apparently" because my parents are visiting and they did all the shoveling. Score. We didn't make it out for coffee this morning though, as even my intrepid stroller couldn't brave these snow mounds/drifts. Kate's on call again tonight, but tomorrow is our first night away from the twins together. We're heading to Horseshoe Valley resort for a night in a hotel while my parents keep an eye on the little ones. Our challenge is to come up with topics of conversation that don't involve the twins. I think we can do it.