The Twins Eat Solids & Get New Nicknames!

In case you've just started following along, every Sunday and Wednesday (6pm EST) I post the twin blog.

Last July, my husband and I got a call asking us if we would consider adopting twin girls. We had 24 hours to make our decision (which you can read about here Part 1: Babies can be victims of human trafficking too and Part 2: Bringing home the twins. For our full story, you'll find a "Table of Contents" at the bottom of my post.) Needless to say, we said yes!

Nicknames

Thank you to all those who gave suggestions for the twins' nicknames: @opti-mrs, @healthy-home, @nortjenn, @thankgodikkc, @haiyen2901, @public-eye, @insideoutlet, @imsteinsbrother, @emmyem84

I really liked your ideas and had a lot of fun reading through them!

In the end, I went through the list with Matt to see if he had any preferences and then with the girls, looking to see what they responded to. Inconclusive.

And then the other day, I caught myself calling them "Squirt" and "Squish". So, that was it! I think it was almost harder than choosing their real names! 😅

^{{Squirt & Squish}}

Solids

When the girls turned 6 months old we tried to start them on solids, but their tummies just weren't ready for it (not unusual for preemies). So we waited a few more weeks and then started with sweet potato. They loved it!

Since then they’ve branched out to:

• Bananas
• Spinach
• Carrots
• Apples
• Blueberries
• Green beans
• Persimmon

A little background ...

I grew up on processed foods. My dad had a garden and preferred a healthier diet. On the other hand, my mom was a boxed-foods kind of person, so that's what we ate. After a concussion in college, I started having major health issues, which led me to examine my diet. With help from a massage therapist (who I was seeing for my concussion), I became more aware of how foods affected my body and started to make healthier choices.

Back to the present ...

When we first got the girls, we were thankful for whatever food came our way, and especially grateful to eat a hot meal (versus one that sat waiting for us while we took care of the babies). But it started taking its toll on our health.

At the end of the year, after Matt had been down for 4 weeks with back-to-back sicknesses, I decided that cooking better meals for us needed to be a priority.

It's a lot easier now that the girls are older. They can entertain themselves for longer, and they enjoy watching me in the kitchen.

Homemade baby food

To help with our budget, I make the girls’ solids too. We are doing a cross between baby-led weaning and purees. With baby-led weaning, the girls learn to feed themselves pieces of soft foods. I like that they get to learn about textures and “chewing” (gumming in their case) with baby-led weaning. But it's not always the most efficient method of getting the food into their bodies ... at least not yet.

Since they're drinking fewer bottles, I want to make sure they’re getting the nutrients they need so I spoon-feed them too.

^{{Squish eating solids} ......... {Squirt eating her foot instead}}

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Next time

I've been putting off writing Thursday's topic for awhile, but I'm saying it here, so that I'll stick with it. Every adoptive relationship is different, but one of the common difficulties is attachment. Some parents might not realize it when they adopt infants or really young children, but the struggle is still there. I'll share more about my own struggles as an adoptee and what we've observed with the girls.

If you're interested in reading the beginning of our story:

• Intro: Surprise, we have twins! The story behind why I fell off the face of Planet Steemit...
• Part 1: Babies can be victims of human trafficking too
• Part 2: Bringing home the twins
• Part 3: They don't come with a manual | Taking care of twins
• Part 4: Two love stories and understanding the twins' loss
• Part 5: Feeding the twins, feeding ourselves, and working full-time
• Part 6: Twins, not twins & going out with preemie babies
• Part 7: Taking a family vacation with twins to Cameron Highlands
• Part 8: Night intruder | Our vacation to Cameron Highlands continued
• Part 9: Ending the year as parents and celebrating the twins' first Christmas
• Part 10: What it takes to be the Superdad of twin babies

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