Happy Birthdaymonth
Twin Daughters!

It is official!

They are seventeen years old today.

Here’s that “bday plan” I told you I’d share. As if this very neat and tidy written plan gave them permission to plan TWO MORE DAYS of birthday festivities.

Huge sigh…

Here are those tiny babies I had seventeen years ago and was sure I would die while birthing two babies…

Luckily I had PhilBillPaul to remind me that while I was having two babies I needed to relax and these were his exact words, “Because they don’t come out at the same time.”

That made me feel sooooo much better.

5 pounds 13 ounces and 6 pounds and 1/2 ounce still adds up to TWELVE pounds of babies and NO ONE in my family had twins.

Lucky for us and for them, they were pretty darn cute…

And it was nice to have a next-door neighbor who had her first baby eight weeks before I had the girls. We were both rookies at this parenting gig and we helped each other in those early years. Thanks Elizabeth for helping me with my three even when you just had one. (Who would have ever guessed we would both have four now? Neither of us!)

All through my pregnancy, one of my closest friends in my life was back in Tampa, calling, checking on me and cheering me on. She was so excited that I was having twins. Because she is a twin. She thought it would be really cool if I could have them on her birthday. Since I was due in late July, I told her I probably couldn’t schedule that for her.

Until my blood pressure spiked and the midwife said, “We need to induce labor and deliver these babies today.”

“WAIT” I might have squealed in the doctor’s office that day. I didn’t have my little bag packed for the hospital that they tell you to have ready. I had no childcare for The Grunter. I was huge and uncomfortable and high risk and delivering twins in the heat of an Atlanta summer is an added bonus but I wasn’t ready that day!

She gave me no choice and said she’d meet us at the hospital. We had only lived in our neighborhood for four months but southern hospitality was alive and well when neighbors we barely knew pitched in and took care of The Grunter who was not yet two.

As we got off the exit for the hospital, I called Luci and said, “I have until midnight tonight, right?” You would have thought she was having the babies. She screamed and was so excited and added another request…which I thought was a little greedy… since I was trying to comply with the birthday request…”If they’re two girls, name them Luci and Lori, okay?”

Because up to this point, we only knew that “Baby A” was a girl so “Baby B” was going to be a surprise.

I delivered twin daughters 4 weeks early on Luci and Lori’s birthday.

Because that’s the kind of friend I always strive to be.

In Tampa near their first birthday Luci and Lori got to hold the twins that were born on their birthday but are not their namesakes! As you can see, Luci and Lori are as fraternal as my two lovelies.

Last year for their milestone 16th birthday, they got to spend the week with Luci and Lori and their families in Tampa. This was, of course, before I knew we’d be having this Birthmonth Party this year for their 17th year.

I did have one special request for Luci. I asked if she could “recreate” as best she could, the picture of her and Lori with my twins. It’s a big deal for them that Lori, the firstborn, was paired with Roger Leroy and Luci was paired with the younger (by 18 minutes) Wizzy.

Being one of my funny friends, Luci not only complied with my request…they actually woke up the girls before they were leaving early on the last day my girls were flying home. Not such a great picture of the girls but I still framed it and it always makes me smile.

Luci is the friend who brought PhilBillPaul to the hospital after the car crash. She and I were roommates before I got married. She has been there through the best of times and the worst of times and continues to be one of those lights in my life and we have loved each other through some giant life milestones.

It is a double birthday today in our extended family.

Happy birthday to Luci (and Lori) too!

Okay, I’ll wrap up this double long post (that’s what happens when you have twins) with a photo tribute to these daughters of mine who continue to tempt me to start drinking alcohol. Stupid mom #2 pointed out that the reason we have baby pictures is to remind us of how cute they were when we’re not feeling the cute during these teen years. Sage observation!

They were pretty darn cute kindergarten girls.

Basketball at church at age seven was darn funny to watch. This was Roger Leroy’s boy haircut stage and she loved it.

Daddy really loved having twin daughters. In the early days, they were “chick magnets” if he pushed them in the stroller at the mall. Looking back now, I guess I should have been more concerned about this…but I was too tired to care.

5th grade uniforms made me very happy! Roger Leroy’s hair growing back also made me happy.

A giant growth spurt in 6th and 7th grade made Wizzy very happy.

In the early years, they actually let me (okay, it was a rule) fix their hair. And they wore girly colors like pink and purple. I obviously did not win on the girly shoe or sandal selection.

Apparently I traumatized them because they will wear nothing in any shade of pink or purple now unless it has a basketball or cross country logo on it.

As you can see, they have also been traumatized by a mother who took pictures incessantly. Some day they will be grateful for this. Some day they will understand the historical value of a picture like this one taken in 1997…

And they will forgive me for insisting PhilBillPaul take them out last night to pose for this one…

Look at the joy on their faces. It is so sweet that we have that moment captured on film.

In spite of all the ups and downs of parenting them, we couldn’t imagine our life without them. We are very proud of the young women they are becoming…

And every single day we tell them we love them. Because we do.

I love you baby girls…