Reader’s Poll say It’s A Wonderful Life

This was one of the most interesting reader’s polls we’ve done. Nearly every Christmas movie received a vote and the oldest movies were the most popular in our survey. I was sure a more contemporary movie, like National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation or Elf, would have been chosen. The selections we used came from several internet polls, and we had never seen many of the older movies. In fact Sandy saw “It’s a Wonderful Life” for the first time last year and loved it. Given the national economy’s condition this year, the winning movie is as relevant today as it was 62 years ago. For next year, Santa brought us many of these movies on DVD so we can enjoy them with the boys every year.

The Temperamental Tourists

We left after Christmas to visit Sandy’s family at her parents’ Florida home. It was more difficult traveling with the boys this time. They didn’t like being strapped to car seats all day and preferred their freedom of movement to play. Who could blame them? Even when we stopped, they were confined by being strapped into roadside diner high chairs. We didn’t want them toddling around dirty public areas, so they had no outlet to burn off energy. The result was a lot of fussing and whining in the car. The toys Sandy handed them provided only temporary amusement. While they can’t talk yet, they were clearly communicating their displeasure with the situation, and when the babies are unhappy, everybody is unhappy. Our only relief came when they napped.

The Starter Baby

Pamela Paul coined the term “the Starter Marriage” in 2002 to refer to first marriages that last five years or less and end before the couple has children. The term is a play on the expression "starter home”. A spin on the term was used to title a new TV series called “The Starter Wife”. Extending that idea, one may label Uncle Steve as Daddy Dave’s “Starter Baby”. What little Daddy Dave knew about baby boys prior to the twins’ birth was garnered from his involvement in his little brother’s childhood development. With his big brother’s guidance and encouragement, baby Steve quickly picked up crawling, walking, running, throwing, catching, counting and more. That was many years ago, but judging by the fine man he is today, Dave has been prepared well to be a good daddy for Benji and Trey Davey.

The Edds’ Annual Christmas Party

Rarely do you find a room filled with 20 people who all share the last name Edds, but such was the case Saturday night at the Edds’ Family Christmas party. For Benji and Davey there were parents and grand parents, an Uncle and Aunt, two sets of Great Uncles and Aunts, one of their first cousins, four of their second cousins and three of Daddy’s first cousins. Pictured left to right are Aunt Erin, Cousin Levi, Mommy, Benji, and second-cousins Logan, Taylor and Abby. The annual party’s location rotates around the senior-Edds homes. Great Uncle Gene Ray Edds hosted this year’s party and it will be Granddaddy Edds’ turn next year.

Happy Fifth Anniversary Sandy and Dave

In the holiday movie The Family Man, Nicolas Cage plays Jack Campbell a rich, single Wall Street hot-shot who thinks he has everything he needs, but an angel gives him a glimpse of a parallel universe where he married his college sweetheart, settled down in the suburbs with children and worked an ordinary job. Living just a few weeks in this new life, he discovers the real happiness and unconditional love missing from his old life. I used to wonder where my career would be now if I’d gone to Tulsa in 1997 or Houston in 1998 or 2000 or Salt Lake City in 2002, or where my life would have been had I not returned Sandy’s e-mail in 2003. Luckily for me, God’s guardian angel guided me to a path away from my own where I found the most wonderful wife imaginable and two beautiful boys. Thank you, Sandy, for making me a family man.

Pirates of the kinder bin

As children Mommy and Daddy both remember the joy of building clubhouses. This was usually done by draping blankets over tables and chairs to create tike-sized hiding places. Grandmother and Granddaddy Edds thought the boys might enjoy a club house for Christmas and searched extensively for just the right kind. They choose a pirate theme because Daddy Dave loved pirates so much as a child. In fact, his room retained its buccaneer-themed decor until he left for college, but that’s another story. This pirate fascination has also been rekindled by the recent movies “Pirates of the Caribbean” staring Owensboro’s own Johnny Depp.

Merry Christmas

Grandma and Grandpa Edds said it was the best Christmas day they could remember because it was so joyful and lasted all day long. The boys don’t yet understand the concepts of Santa or Jesus’ birth; they were just excited by all the guests and activity. After a sticky-bun breakfast, we began opening presents. Each grandparent took a twin and opened gifts for them. Some children are more interested in the boxes than the gifts, but not ours. After opening each present they wanted to play with it, which was nice. Rather than tearing into the next package, they savored and appreciated each one. After a couple of hours, we took a break and the boys took their morning nap. Then following brunch, we resumed the unwrapping and playing. They went bonkers when we opened the giant stuffed puppy dogs that Grandma and Granddad Roe gave them, and couldn’t have been cuter toddling around the room entertaining everyone. When all the gifts had been opened, we took another break. Daddy took the boys for a country road ride so they would take their afternoon nap. Later, Al and Lisa Bell joined us for the amazing Christmas dinner Sandy prepared. We are so blessed.

Twas The Night Before Christmas

We have attended Christmas Eve services at First Baptist Church for as long as I can remember. They used to have these absolutely adorable Christmas pageants. The pastor would read the Christmas story while the youth group still-posed each scene. It was very cheesy, but charming in its simplicity. One year I played a shepherd and another year brother Steve played a wise man. The service has changed over the years to a much more spiritually focused presentation. We took the boys to their first Christmas Eve service last year when they were just 20 days old, showing them off to all our friends. This second year, they played in the nursery and missed Granddad’s first year singing carols in the choir. After dinner he serenaded them with his favorite Christmas songs.

Escaped naked babies taunt parents

Tonight the boys became very cross around 8:30 p.m., so Mommy warmed their 9:00 'bottle' and got their pajamas a little early. Real milk seems to have an energetic effect on them and this night was no exception. After they finished their bottles, I stripped off Benji’s clothes and changed his diaper as Sandy did the same with Davey. Suddenly they both escaped our holds. Wearing only clean diapers they began running around the room dancing naked. They seemed absolutely exuberant in their freedom and actually began beating their chests with their fists while screaming joyfully. It was such a bizarre scene that Sandy and I fell over laughing. They paraded around like peacocks for about 15 minutes and then allowed us to place them in their pajamas and put them to bed.

Pretty Lights Night

Like many places, Owensboro residents love to decorate their homes with Christmas lights, and certain neighborhoods emerge as showcases for spectacular light shows. It has always been our family tradition to spend at least one evening touring the lighted city while listening to an all-Christmas music radio station. Last night we introduced Benji and Davey to this ritual for the first time. They seemed to enjoy the entertainment and didn’t go to sleep in spite of the darkness, music and comfortable ride. We saved this house for the finale. Like Clark Griswold in the movie “Christmas Vacation”, this family’s lighting efforts are so over-the-top that you can’t capture it in a single photo.

Handmade Christmas Heirlooms

We recently received a package in the mail from Great Aunt Roberta and Uncle John Hand. Inside we found Christmas gifts with instructions to open now. The reason became obvious when we opened the presents. Each boy received two hand-made embroidered Christmas bibs, one decorated with a Santa and the other with a Nutcracker soldier. Also included for each boy was a Christmas ornament hand-made many years ago by their Great Grandmother Louise MacLaggan. The decoration features a cross-stitched green train engine. Sandy immediately recognized her grandmother’s work and cherished the heirlooms’ significance.

The highest form of flattery

Carol and the boys watch Elmo on Sesame Street every morning, and she was very excited to give them an Elmo Live for their birthday. This astonishing toy features the furry, bright-red character performing complex actions that give him a life-like quality: His mouth and head move while he talks, sings, and tells stories; he gestures with his arms, and he moves his legs. He even crosses his legs when he sits on his little stool. Yesterday we noticed that the boys were sitting on their toy-boxes waving their arms while gibbering happily and realized they were impersonating Elmo. Right then and there Sandy and I made a pack to blame Elmo for any bad behavior they may mimic of ours.

Spiderman Kisses

In a scene from the movie Spiderman, Peter Parker, aka the Spiderman, while hanging upside down from his spiderweb kisses his girlfriend, Mary Jane Watson, who is standing in an upright position. Inspired by that fun, Daddy Dave loves to give Spiderman kisses to his boys. This activity usually results in screams of joy from the inverted child. It is frequently used to refocus a baby that is crying or into mischief. Once a simple procedure of holding up an infant by his ankles, the exercise has become increasingly challenging as the boys have grown longer and heavier.

I’ve got to be me

Each boy’s individual particularities are interesting to observe. Benji explores almost all new objects by first poking them with his index finger. He doesn’t like to recline and has even gone to sleep in the swing while leaning forward on the tray table. He’s athletically fearless but cautious with strangers. Davey will quickly engage new people with his easygoing smile but will process a physical act thoroughly before trying it. He prefers to sleep on his belly with knees bent under him making his butt stick up in the air. And for reasons unknown, he prefers sitting in a half-full toy box better than an empty one.

Santa, meet the Edds Twins

Santa is still largely a stranger to the boys, but we wanted to introduce them, so off to the mall we went. Davey and Benji were in an excellent mood for the event. Their tummies’ were full, they were freshly changed and outfitted, and they were well rested after a long afternoon nap. The mall was as busy as you would expect one week before Christmas Eve, but the line for Santa wasn’t too long. When it was our turn we placed each child in Santa’s lap without protest. As this was a new experience, the boys attention was understandably focused more on the jolly old elf than on the camera. When we did get their attention, Davey’s smile came easily, but Benji boy wouldn’t be hurried. After the photographer got her three shots Davey was ready to go, but Benji wanted to stay with his new friend.

Peek-a-boo, I see you!

Peek-a-boo is just the greatest game ever, and it cost nothing. It’s ‘hide and seek’ for babies. Someone hides behind something then pops out to the babies’ amazement and delight. As they get older, the babies hide then pop out to surprise and entertain adults. On a higher level Peek-a-boo can demonstrate an infant's ability to understand object permanence, an important stage according to developmental psychologists. Young children are completely unable to comprehend object permanence, which explains why they do not cry when their parents are gone. For them, out of site is out of mind. As children begin to understand an object’s permanence, they move to the separation anxiety stage. Our boys are in that stage now, but still enjoy a good game of peek-a-boo.

Give the Gift of Gibberish

If you’ve been searching for a special gift for that certain someone who has everything, look no further. Give them the new CD, Davey Baby’s Christmas Gibberish Duets. Only Davey can add just the right gobbledygook to Mommy’s version of “Frosty the Snowman” and Daddy’s reading of “Blue Christmas”. He gets all jabberwocky with Granny on “Jingle Bells” and delivers the poppycock big time when babysitter Carol sings “Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer”. And as a bonus, brother Benji adds his own ‘click, click, click’ to Grandpa’s crooning of “Up on the Housetop” with the Treyster contributing his own mumbo jumbo touch. There are thousands of Christmas recordings, but none deliver the holiday joy of gibberish like Trey Davey Baby’s does.

Everybody’s doing the Locomotion

Four weeks ago, the boys began free standing. Both would attempt steps, and then fall. They practiced constantly by either holding someone’s hand or using a walker. Each clearly had the physical strength and coordination to walk but failed to grasp technique. Where Trey Davey was hesitant and lacked confidence, Benji was fearless and determined. He repeatedly attempted walking only to loose his balance and fall. It was reminiscent of learning to water ski. You know what you want to do, but struggle to master the technique. Recently Benji walked after hundreds of failed tries. First he took a few, then many unassisted steps. Benji’s success gave Davey the confidence to literally follow in his brother’s footsteps a few days later.

Open Before December 25

Some gifts need to be opened before Christmas. For example, last year’s big gift (other than the twins) was a recliner. The boys’ early birth meant Davey and Benji would come home from the hospital two weeks before Christmas. We needed the chair early to rock those babies. Similarly, this year’s big gift, a video camera, needed to be opened early too. Had we waited, we would have missed filming their first birthday party and Thanksgiving. We’ve wanted a video camera for long time but hesitated making such a large purchase until we understood the technology better. We chose a Cannon digital video camera recorder. Rather than using tapes, the movies are recorded directly on the camera’s 30GB hard disk drive, which can easily be transferred to storage drives for safekeeping or copied to DVDs for sharing.

Checking It Twice

Last Christmas Santa had only 20 days of twins’ behavior to evaluate, and in those few early days their actions were limited to just eating, sleeping and pooping. However, this Christmas is a different story. Ol’ Saint Nick has collected daily notes for the full year, and he’ll soon be reviewing them and placing their names either on the naughty or nice list. Trey Davey and Benji are still too young to understand this, so it has had no effect on their behavior. Their goodness comes solely from their pure hearts and any mean streaks appear to be minuscule on these sweet boys. Either might earn the naughty hat occasionally, but overall you’ll never find two nicer boys.

Forward Looking Passengers

The manufacturer suggests facing the infant seats to the car’s rear until the child surpasses 20 lbs and one year of age. Even though we reached the weight threshold some time ago mommy wanted to wait for the age goal as well. In fact, since children in rear facing car seats are better protected in collisions, some parents keep their child seats reversed for years. Those people must have small children because our boys’ long legs were getting pretty cramped in that configuration. In the forward facing position their legs have plenty of room, and they can see where we’re going rather than where we’ve been. Additionally, it’s nice to see those smiling faces in my rear view mirror.

Parting is such sweet sorrow

Now that the boys have turned one year old, it is time to say goodbye to their bottles. We introduced them slowly to sippy cups over time and have been gradually substituting them for bottles. Beginning this week the replacement is complete, and the bottles are retired. Each boy’s reaction to these feeding changes illustrates their individual personalities. Bottle weaning has been more difficult for Trey Davey. He’s been on them longer. Too impatient to nurse, he started bottle feeding on day one. He’s always drank very fast, usually finishing in half the time that it took Benji. While Davey loves bottle feeding and has resisted the sippy cup change, his brother Benji has embraced it thoroughly. He had always been a slow feeder with both the breast and bottle, but the sippy cup has transformed Benji into a speed eater. He now wins the dinner races.

Time to Buy a Cow

As we transition from infants to toddlers, one of the change s is switching from formula to regular milk. Enfamil formula has provided balanced nutrition along with whole proteins similar to breast milk, but now the solid foods in their diet provide those vitamins adequately. We are hoping the twins will tolerate this change all at once rather than gradually. So far their only complaint has been the temperature difference of cold milk compared to the room temperature of mixed formula. Warming it slightly helped that issue. The price of formula runs about three times more per gallon than regular milk, so there is a cost benefit to this change. This is significant when you consider that each boy drinks about a half gallon of milk a day. Add the milk used on mommy and daddy’s morning cereal and we project purchasing eight gallons a week.

Oh what fun it is…

Great Grandmother Martha Embry had a fun-loving personality and a great laugh. The oddest things would really tickle her funny bone. I remember her buying a novelty Christmas wreath that was motion-activated. Each time someone walked by the ordinary looking wreath it would suddenly come to life with blinking eyes and moving lips announcing “Merry Christmas” then singing Jingle Bells. It never failed to give her a smile. Our first Christmas together, just two days before our wedding, Sandy and I gave Grandma this Christmas toy. When she would push the button the snowman and his dog would sing “Jingle Bells” and dance. She loved it and laughed freely. This Christmas her great grandsons have discovered the toy, and another generation is overjoyed.

Blog Number 400

Today marks our 400th blog entry. This approximately 53,000 word effort now rivals a medium-sized novel by word count. An average blog takes about an hour to produce. Each story is written, and then edited down to between 100 and 140 words. Writing the blogs isn’t always the hardest part. Each blog generally features a photo or more. A significant amount of time is spent conceiving a photo layout, taking dozens of versions of each photo concept, downloading, photo-shopping and then posting the finished product. We have taken 100 photos in just a few minutes attempting to get one with both twins looking at the camera and smiling. Thank goodness for digital photography. In this first year we have taken over 7,000 photos to yield the 500 or so we’ve published.

A Christmas Tree-mendous Idea

Sandy and I knew that Christmas decorating the house this year was going to be a challenge because we now have four little hands touching everything in the room below 34 inches. As our older home has tall ceilings, we considered placing our Christmas tree high on a table, but this would be inconvenient and limit the space for presents. Baby gate-like fences are sold that go around Christmas trees but are cost prohibitive for this short phase in our twin’s lives. No problem because our brilliant mommy suggested the perfect solution; putting the tree in the entry hall. This works because it’s visible and accessible to the living room, guests can easily be detoured to the side entry door and there’s already a baby gate protecting the area. It’s a solution ideal for looking, but not touching.

Birthday Benchmark Photo – 1 Year

Trey Davey and Benji’s birthday party last Saturday was wonderful. Unfortunately, their one year birth anniversary day was less fun. We went to the pediatrician’s office for a checkup and vaccine shots. Something interesting happened during the weigh in: as we anticipated, the boys’ weight this month was essentially the same as last month, despite their each growing another ½ inch taller. Sandy believes their substantially increased activity level has contributed to their slimming and strengthening. Statistically, they are still very tall for their age with Davey at 32 inches (95 percentile) and 24 lbs 14 oz (86 percentile) and Benji at 31 inches (85 percentile) and 24 lbs 10 oz (83 percentile). These vaccine shots usually zap their energy and cause them to sleep quite a bit, which they did all afternoon.

Tunnel Vision

Grandma and Granddaddy Roe special ordered a nine-foot nylon tunnel for the boy’s birthday. A similar tunnel had been a favorite toy of mommy and Aunt Susan’s. The big blue toy was an immediate hit with the boys, and they attacked it with glee. Seeing them play brought back vivid memories of one year ago today. Sandy was very uncomfortable all day. In retrospect she now realizes she was in labor. Finally we agreed to go to the hospital about 10:00 p.m. Because she was five weeks early, her doctor wanted to stop the labor to allow the babies to grow more before birth, but the boys were having none of that. After fighting with them all night long, everyone agreed to deliver the boys the next morning. The blanket and Cookie Monster came later.

Vote for your Favorite Christmas Movie

Everyone has their favorite Christmas movie. You know yours by heart, but need to watch it again each holiday season to complete your annual yuletide ritual. So what if it’s sappy, your favorite Christmas movie never fails to send your Christmas spirit into full throttle. The movie’s characters have become like family members, who may be more than a little eccentric, but are loveable none-the-less. After a year’s interval, you forget all their past transgressions and look forward to seeing them again. You know they’ll warm your heart, restore your faith in humanity and generally bring joy to the world. Vote in the right-hand column for the Christmas classic you recommend the boys view annually.

Slipping Free

We have such smart boys, and their knowledge grows daily. With their increased mobility, we have introduced them to the game of chase. They adore being pursued and scream with joy as we follow just behind them around the room. Evading capture has become increasingly sophisticated. They learned early on that our pursuit would be temporarily thwarted by them crawling under the dining room table. After observing that we would go around rather than under the table after them, the boys began reversing course causing us to circle the table repeatedly while chasing them. Now they’ve learned that by crawling under the sofa table and through the gap between the couch and fireplace that Mommy’s pursuit can be stopped. Florida deserves a 15 yard penalty for taunting his opponent.

Elmo’s World Joins Ours

Our babysitter’s children are a little jealous, because their mother so often talks about the adventures of Davey and Benji. It’s obvious to everyone who’s met her that Carol Cox loves our twin boys, and they love her. She’s been watching them nearly every weekday morning since they were eight weeks old. She gives them their bath, dresses them for play, feeds them their 10:00 meal and puts them down for their morning nap. Carol reads to them, sings to them and plays games with them. She also introduced them to the world of Sesame Street, which they love. So it was only fitting that she would chose to give them a talking Elmo and Sesame Street answering machine for their birthday. We opened the presents on Monday morning and haven’t stopped playing with them.