Celebration of TWINS!

Sometimes I feel bad for Benjamin that he doesn't have a twin. Then again, he's sort of a spotlight stealer. Therefore, I will put TWINS at the forefront today!

Wendi and Hailie have a friend their age to play with any time. They laugh and play together every day; they have this sort of understood give-and-take that no other sibling or friend relationship can ever compare to. For example, there is none of the big sister-little sister tension.

Hailie and Wendi are constantly re-equating as far as leading the way goes. One crawled first, the other walked first; one spoke first, the other fed herself first... I could go on forever.

Some days, they can't stand each other and others they can't be together enough. This is from one of their "need each other" days.


Often the question is posed to me, "Would you have twins again?" The undeniable answer is "YES!". I would have loved for Ben to be twins (although two Ben-similar boys running around may have done me in by now...) and I would love to be having twins right now. There is something special about two babies and their unspoken bond that I don't think I'll fully understand because I don't have a twin!

(We are grateful that a grandpa has an identical twin brother and so he understands pretty well. And, there are three aunts and an uncle that are twins -- doing the math, that's a set of girl twins and a girl-boy set of twins -- and our twins recognize and appreciate these family members quite a lot!)

I tend to discourage them being overly dependent on each other - for heaven's sakes, they are going to grow up and have friends that don't even know they have a twin! There has got to be some individual identity, right? (Both girls wholeheartedly embrace this idea, too.)

Sometimes, though, all you need is the person who understands you better than all others, and for these crazy girls, that person is never too far away.