New Vocabulary

From the Twin-Daddy:

Spending time with two newborn boys you start to develop parenting shorthand which leads to creative uses of the English language.  Here are a few new words or phrases we have been using lately:

Baby-Wrangling

Baby-Wrangling

The art, science, and practice of handling a baby (or babies).  Baby wranglers can be identified by their sleep-deprived faces, their tendency to rock anything they are holding to sleep (babies, backpacks, grocery bags, the neighbor’s cat), and their desire to feed milk into whatever nearby orifice is convenient.  This may lead to the burping of the DVD player, and the family dog may promptly sit whenever she sees a bottle nearby.  In order to keep a baby-wrangler at rest, place a baby on the wrangler’s chest, and the wrangler may drift off to sleep.

Baby Coffee

Baby Coffee is like regular coffee in many ways.  It is served hot and then allowed to cool over a period of time as the parent waits for it to reach room temperature.  In order to pass time as the coffee reaches the correct temperature, the parent will probably engage in baby-wrangling.  I have speculated that iced coffee drinks were invented by parents whose children are grown and no longer get to enjoy Baby Coffee.

Father Food

Father food is prepared in the same way that Baby Coffee is prepared.  Like revenge, it is typically served cold.

Yours and Mine

When the mother is holding a baby, it is **her baby**.  By definition, the other baby is **your baby**.  When the Twin-Daddy is out of eyeshot and a baby shrieks, he knows if he needs to come running when his wife yells, “That’s your baby!”  The Twin-Daddy certainly does not suspect that the Twin-Mommy quickly trades the noisy-shrieker baby for the quiet angel-baby when the husband steps out of sight.

Her Baby

My Baby

Butt Surfing the Mustard Wave

This activity brings each of our children a special joy coupled with intense expressions and grunting.  Their joy is so manifest that they often wish to share the experience with you by producing butt mustard in such a quantity as to exceed the load capacity of a regulation-size dumptruck.

Milk Vampire

The milk vampire is a creature that awakens and immediately and spontaneoulsy shrieks at 200 decibels.  When presented with a milk source, the creature will briefly wave his head from side to side and then vigorously attack the nipple (plastic or otherwise).  While feeding, the milk vampire will make contented and happy noises after each swallow.  They also like to look up at you with their big blue eyes, and sometimes they even hold hands with the other milk vampire across Mommy’s tummy.  Really, milk vampires are pretty cute.

The Cuteness of a Milk Vampire

The Countdown to Grumpytown

This is the time interval during which a baby’s desire to eat is initially expressed in friendly and cute ways up to the final and dreaded shrieking and wallering.

The Holding Pattern

When a boy wakes up hungry but Mom isn’t ready to feed yet, he goes into the holding pattern.  This is a heightened form of baby-wrangling in which the Twin-Daddy practices all his most hardcore soothing tactics to reassure the hungry child that his parents are not intentionally starving him, warm milk is coming soon, and his mother has not been kidnapped by aliens.  This may be accompanied by irrational pleading with the child.

The Pit Crew

Breastfeeding two newborns at the same time is much easier with a helper we call the Pit Crew.  When the boys get hungry, the pit crew grabs boy-1, strips him out of his clothes, changes his diaper, and then may enter the holding pattern (see above) while Mom gets ready with her nursing pillow and various boob-related tools.  When Mom is ready, the pit crew drops off the first boy and repeats the pattern with boy-2.  When both boys are latched, the pit crew then brings the mom water or food as needed and checks on her needs.  Then the pit crew will burp boy-1 followed by boy-2.  When he is finished, boy-1 is burped again, has his diaper checked, and then is dressed for sleeping and put down.  We repeat that with boy-2.  People laugh at us when we say, “We are going to breastfeed the boys,” but the laughing ignorati don’t typically have twins.

The Code of Silence

Rather than an actual admonishment towards secrecy or quiet, this actually refers to the precautionary practice of keeping your mouth closed while changing the diaper of a newborn boy.  The Code of Silence is typically paired with the Code of Cover up the Dangerous End of the Winky, and the suddenly remembered Code of Hit the Deck if you forgot the other codes and are about to get sprayed.