Woven Babywearing

One of the things that has saved my sanity while having twins is wearing one of them whenever we go shopping or on a walk together. Any mom reading this knows how heavy and awkward those baby car seats are. Imagine two of those. Seriously, they are horrible.

When they were tiny I could put them in the Moby together and wear them that way. Then they got big enough for the Ergo, and I love carrying them in that. But, I recently found woven wraps. These are, to quote Robert, “really expensive bolts of cloth”. They are hand woven cotton, linen, silk, hemp, bamboo, ect pieces of cloth that are used to carry babies either on the front or the back. I have wanted to get one….or a few for a long time, and with our tax return money I used my portion to do just that. I bought 5 of them! Why so many? I wanted to get a bunch of different ones and find a few that I really really love. I plan to use these with the twins as well as with any other babies we have or any that I happen to babysit.

After I bought them came the learning curve. I am still in the midst of it in fact…..it is a HUGE difference from the Moby. The material acts and wraps different than the Moby, and most of the carries are wrapped while the baby is on my front or back rather than wrapping and then putting the baby in.

When I got my first wrap it took close to a dozen attempts before I got all the way to the end of a wrap job without bailing out in the middle. That one wasn’t exactly pretty, but it worked:

The next one was significantly better:

I promise I don’t only wrap Alexis, she is just the more patient of the two.

This was my first front carry, with the second wrap I got:

Only Alexis is wrapped here ^ I am holding Courtney so both could be in the picture.

I went to a meeting with a bunch of other moms who babywear and it was great! I got some help wrapping up both babies though Courtney wouldn’t cooperate at all being on my back. They showed me a new carry, one that has now become my favorite. I am planning to get really good at this carry before I try any others…..at least any other back carries. If anyone is curious what it looks like to get a carry wrapped like this HERE is a video.

The Half Jordan Back Carry in what is probably my favorite wrap:

After getting Alexis up on my back several times successfully, and getting a freakishly long wrap, I decided to try both babies at once. It was pretty interesting lol! I put Alexis on my back and Courtney on the front. It worked, but if I’m going to do it again I will be doing a different carry on the front for sure. Courtney kept leaning back and the wrap would just part down the middle so she could have easily fallen out.

Haha! Both babies in one wrap!!

Courtney on the front:

Alexis on the back:

She kept trying to stand up on my back:

I have a total of 5 wraps! I am only in love with two of them so far, but I haven’t even used one yet, so I might end up loving that one too!

Here they are up close:

One of my favorites:

This is the one I haven’t used yet. I love the colors and the geckos though!

This one is my very favorite!

I love that one so much I even was brave enough to wear Alexis at church! I got many compliments on it, and the best one came from a little older hispanic woman. She came up to me very excitedly and said she was very happy to see me carrying my baby this way! She said “The women in my country always carry their babies this way, but I don’t see it very much in this country. It’s very nice to see a baby this way!” It was so cute how excited she was about it. I even made a new friend who was also wearing her baby at church!

These two are probably not going to stay with me. I am just not in love with them.

The first wrap I ever bought and used:

This is my really long wrap, but I am not in love with the colors or the feel of the wrap. I am going to keep it for a while and see if I like it more once it is a little more broken in, but if I find a different one I love in the same size I will be selling it.

A Half Year!

Seriously?!?  Can they really be half way to turning 1?

I am sad and excited at the same time. Sad because they are getting so big, and I have loved having two little babies to snuggle. And excited that soon they will be mobile and be able to more easily entertain themselves.

Things have been crazy lately, which is why this is almost half a month late!

Thinking back to how Kaylee was a 1 year, I am blown away a how much the girls will be changing in another short 6 months. Kaylee was on the verge of walking, was eating all sorts of solid foods, was consistently sleeping through the night (though she started that at 2-3 months) and was beginning to say some little words! I can not wait for that with Alexis and Courtney!

Both girls are getting a little more mobile during tummy time. It is interesting that they do it in different ways. Courtney is very confident rolling. She hasn't figured out how to roll all the way across the room, but she will roll once to get closer to something she wants. Or, she can scoot in circles, but not go forward or backwards much yet because she lays on her stomach with her arms and feet up in the air…I think she is hoping she can fly. Alexis’ mobility has exploded in the past week! She now rolls a lot, and is getting pretty quick at scooting her way across the room to get something she wants. She doesn’t try to get up on her knees yet, but I am sure that will come soon enough.

Courtney has become our smiley girl this month! She smiles all the time, and is such a happy girl. She is going through a little bit of stranger danger, which Alexis is starting to get over, but with her it is pretty slight. When she is worried about who is holding her she quietly whines and whimpers rather than screaming bloody murder. She is so happy to be a little more mobile, and gets frustrated that she can’t figure out how to be MORE mobile. We put her back on reflux medicine this past month to see if it would help her to sleep better. It has made a bit of a difference, which I noticed especially this past week when I missed a few doses. She was miserable! I’m hoping that the reflux will resolve soon so she can be med free. This poor little girl’s hair can’t seem to stay on her head. I think it is starting to fall out for the third time since she was born! It grows a bit and then falls out, grows in, and falls out again. I am pretty sure that what is going to grown in is pretty dark brown with even more curl than Kaylee’s hair! Her eyes are SO blue! Dark DARK blue! I love the color of her eyes.

Alexis is becoming pretty demanding. I think she has finally decided that waiting for Courtney to be patient is pointless so she is voicing when she needs something. She has started screeching......like the sound that tom cats make when they fight.....it is fabulous. She screeched for three or four days straight.....it was "fabulous." She isn’t quite as social with people anymore since going through some major stranger anxiety. She is slowly getting more comfortable with other people again, and I am hoping she will be quick to smile again soon. Her hair is starting to thicken up and is still pretty red! Some lights it is a little more of a brown, but in bright light and especially outside it is RED! Her eyes are interesting. Some days they look like they might turn green and other days they look more blue like mine and Kaylee’s. I am excited to see how they turn out.

A big milestone we are reaching for is sitting independently. On Sunday (I think) we had them both on the bed and they were both sitting for about 10 seconds on their own. I ran to get the camera, but after that we couldn’t get them both up at the same time. So, here is the proof that our girls are close to being sitters.

Miss Alexis

The closest we got to both at the same time….Courtney is on the way down!

Miss Courtney

And the bloopers:

I love these girls so much, and love watching them change and grow. Hopefully I can get a couple more posts up before their 7 month-day sneaks up on us!

Heber Creeper

This post has been sitting in drafts FOREVER!! Lol, every time I write or type forever like that the line from Sandlot goes through my mind. Anyways, Robert and I took Kaylee on a parent/child date so she could have some one on one time with us. We first went to our local Sheels store and Kaylee rode on the Ferris Wheel inside the store. That’s right, they have a Ferris Wheel inside the store! Kaylee loves this store just for that so we made a point to go there. We also got sleds so we could take her sledding.
Then we headed up the canyon to ride the Heber Creeper. The train is a REALLY slow, old fashioned, passenger train. Kaylee LOVED it!

















She was so excited!!


She made friends with this little boy right before the train started going, and they had a great time for the first few minutes of the ride.





The whistle was a bit loud for her, but she got used to it eventually.



It was a bit cold outside of the train at first, but after a while we were able to open the window and Kaylee stuck her head out the window.