Archive for the 'Twins' Category

Apparently my earlier post on this subject was fairly popular with most of my family members, who occasionally read this blog (about as often as I update it). I salute you all, and thank you for sharing that I am not alone in my hatred of the voice of the infernal one herself, as captured and embodied in these otherwise-tolerable toys which have been presented to my twin children.

Let me be the first to share the good news: the “Three Little Monkeys” book is starting to detoriorate due to heavy use from the twins. At this point, I believe only two of the five “pages” are still in working order. This makes this toy about 60% better, in my opinion.

Furthermore, I am pleased to report that my twins no longer play heavily with this toy, as they have moved on to bigger and better things, such as having informal spit-up distance competitions and repeatedly slapping each other about the head. One hopes that this is a positive trend.

However, we still have more of these foul, vile toys nearby. One is a similar adaptation, which plays the names of various animals, including the first stanzas of nursery rhymes associated with these animals. I’m fairly certain that the grating, sickening female voice encoded into this horrific object is by a different woman than the other toys which are so annoying.

Other toys include some Fisher-Price monstrosities, one of which resembles a lawn-mower (without the spinning blades) and the other reminds me of a small Hammond organ. Both are encoded with a female voice that’s syrupy, quavering, and wholly grating to the ears. To top it off, the words are totally insipid. I’m told that some of the sounds produced from these devices are singing, but it sounds like the vile screechings of a demon hell-spawn.

I stand firm by my comment that I ever meet any of these women in public, they had better be wearing armor to cover their throats, otherwise I will be aiming for the root of the noises which torment me so.

On the other hand, I would like to commend Baby Einstein toys for making battery-powered toys that don’t sound like a demonic banshee and using sampled human voices as little as possible. My parents have some baby-toys which involve 4 cubes, with different colors and patterns on each face; when the cubes are arranges properly and touched together, various pleasing sounds and words are spoken to the baby. This, in my opinion, is a far more sensible approach - make toys that babies like and that parents can tolerate. Kudos to Baby Einstein.

I suppose it’s arrogant of me to state that I don’t subscribe to the “children’s music” produced by recording artists such as Raffi. I wasn’t raised on that crap, and I can’t tolerate it. My idea (and nobody has disproven me so far) is to play a nice selection of diverse genres (such as jazz, pop, progressive) for the kids, and trust them to listen to music that doesn’t pretend to be dumb or simple for their sake.

But maybe I’m alone on this front.

Since I’ve been a daddy for just about a year now, I’ve learned how to deal with most of the various aspects of babyhood and parenthood that I once thought I would never deal with. I’ve dealt with the worst and messiest explosions of baby shit, cleaned up and washed some of the most horrendous spit-up episodes, and generally cared for a lot of disgusting things.

(three little monkeys jumping on the bed)

Yet, despite my fears, I have found a new class of annoyance, which I have gradually found that I cannot tolerate. It has taken a lot, but I think I have found my nemesis. I would like to share this with you.

(one fell off and bumped his head)

It seems that, due to a lack of creativity or design skills, many baby toy manufacturers have taken to creating toys that require (and often times include) batteries, which are used to power a small audio device. Far from useful, this nightmare creation is often programmed to play some of the most annoying sounds known to humanity.

(mama called the doctor and the doctor said)

And furthermore, the creators of said devices, these engines of damnation and accursed hell-creations, have recorded samples of what I surmise must be the voice of the MOST annoying woman on earth, and they have programmed these devices to replay her feeble attempts to sing nursery rhymes. The effect is nothing short of sheer, excruciating terror.

(no more monkeys jumping on the bed)

Apparently there are a wide variety of these devices, but one particular company is the most guilty of creating these damned abominations, which are not only wastes of perfectly good petroleum and semiconductors, but cause parents around the world to suffer from the proximity to the toys, having been mentally scarred by the curses of the Great Beast himself, as recorded through his tone-deaf minions.

(no more monkeys jumping on the bed)

Let’s not name names here, but this particular company’s name does rhyme with “Gassy” and starts with the letter “S”.

(no more monkeys jumping on the bed)

I generally do not consider myself to be a violent person, but I swear to you that if I ever meet this woman in public and identify her by her voice, I shall promptly and repeatedly punch her in the mouth and throat.

(no more monk…..) *CRUNCH*

Parents around the world, consider yourselves warned. Avoid these devices like the plague which they are! Save yourselves while some fragment of your sanity can still be rescued! If you receive one as a gift, burn it on sight!

Thank you.

Both twins have now learned how to take off their socks!

We usually put the socks back on to keep their little toes warm, but it’s fun to watch anyway.

So we’re having our first snow of the season, here in lovely Hillsboro. It’s sticking to the ground, and I expect it’ll come down pretty heavily tonight.

This winter has been absolutely frigid so far. The air has been so dry, inside and out, and we’ve had to use our puny humidifier pretty much every night since the furnace is running just about all time. I think we need a humidifier for the whole house. Dry air affects my whole family.

My daughter has a favorite toy - it’s a small rattle with Piglet’s head and arms, from the Classic Pooh series of baby accessories. We got it at Target when the twins were very young, and she’s taken it as her companion. She plays with other toys and rattles, but this one is her favorite. When we give it to her, she’ll drop her other toys and give us a squeal of pure joy, take the rattle and cuddle it, chew it, and shake it around until it slips from her grasp. Then we give it to her again, etc.

She’s such a cutie. I’m smitten. She even has my eyes!

My precocious and beautiful daughter, who has just passed 6.5 months of age, has a habit of laying some really impressive solid waste into her diapers. (Her twin brother has the same gift.)

Tonight, whilst I was cleansing her nether parts with warm water and soap, I composed a poem for her, and for every other baby in the world. I hope you enjoy it!

Every time you pee
A golden bell in heaven rings

Every time you poop
A baby angel gets its wings

In this post and in all future posts, I will use the identifiers ‘Wife’, ‘Girl’ and ‘Boy’ to refer to my lovely spouse and our twin babies, whose genders are listed respectively. I do this to protect the privacy of my family. Unless you know me well, you don’t need to know my family’s real names anyway.

Last weekend, Wife and I decided to take our 4.5-month-old twin babies to the mall. We spent a few hours in the nice, air-conditioned mall, pushing the twins around in their posh dual stroller. Fortunately, they decided that today was one of their good days, and they were (mostly) little angels for the whole trip. Girl and Boy took turns sleeping in the stroller (they love being moved around, and seeing new sights) while Wife caught up on some long-delayed shopping for clothing.

We brought along two sets of bottles, containing the twins’ formula. Unfortunately, the formula was still rather chilly (since we had stored it in a cooler) and Girl was absolutely not into drinking cold formula, at all. She put up a bit of a fuss, and it took a while to get her calmed down to the point where her hunger overrode her discomfort at drinking cold formula. Meanwhile, she yelled and screamed in the courtyard of the mall, and got quite a few looks from passers-by.

Later that evening we decided to eat dinner at a nearby restaurant, and got a table with some free space for the twins’ stroller. However, by this time they were getting hungry again, so we had to feed them in the middle of the restaurant while food was being delivered to our table. Feeding hungry, fussy babies while trying to eat chunks of flaky seafood is not the easiest task. At our request, our waitress brought a small basin of hot water, in which we rested the bottles of formula to warm the contents. This time, Girl was a bit less fussy about the lukewarm formula, but Boy decided that he would spit up all over everything and everyone within aiming distance. Ah well.

We managed to finish our dinner and take home our leftover food. Taking twin babies out of the house is a lot of work, but it’s worth the effort, if only to hear the compliments of the passers-by: “Your babies are so cute!” Because, frankly, they are. And that’s what being a daddy is all about.