Being a Twin

Most of you know that I have a twin sister. I am older by 4 minutes and we are the 6th and 7th children of our family. A few ultra sounds were performed while my mom was pregnant. Each time our heart beats were right on, so my parents never knew they were having twins. They learned the shocking news of twins when she was in labor. Her initial reaction was tears. My mom had twin boys 9 years earlier and was not sure she could do it again. Now that I am a mom I feel a glimpse of her pain. I have no clue how she did two sets of twins.

We have grown up being asked some pretty silly questions. Some of the questions were:
- Do you love being a twin? Well we did not know anything different than being a twin. How would we know if we liked it or didn't. When I got older and in college I finally got a bit of a glimpse of it. Lisa was married and moved to Texas. Because of this not many people that I met knew I was a twin.

- When you look at each other do you feel like you are looking in a mirror? Really- where do people come up with these things. No I never felt like i was staring at myself in the mirror. Although we have our similarities we definitely have our differences.

- If I hit her would you feel the pain? Ok really again. No that has not happened with us.

- We even had people ask if we were born the same day and same place? I wish we had a more interesting story but yes we were born the same day and in the same hospital.

Maybe some of these questions seemed so silly to us, we were so used to being twins and there did not seem to be anything weird about that. Now that we are 35 people still look at us weird. This time it is a bit different, usually it is because they know the other and we did not say hi to them. Or they think that it is weird we are with a different man (no we are not cheating on our spouses). That part is the hardest, knowing who the other knows and saying hello if it applies. I am glad that Heavenly Father knew we needed to be sent down together.

The Sorry Syndrome

About a month ago I was in Winco picking up a few groceries. When I was checking out the cashier, a complete stranger, said "You sure say sorry a lot." I kind of blew her off thinking what-ever she does not know me- I don't say "sorry" too much. Well as the days have gone by and other things happened I have realized I really do say sorry way to much.

I believe it is a good word and a great ability to be able to say sorry (not all people can do that). But I do think that word has been embedded in my brain for so many years that I use it more than I really think. There are other issues than that as well.

I do have to admit I am that person that worries if I inconvenience anyone. I don't want anyone to have to go out of their way for me. Nor do I want to put them out with the things I may need help with. For some reason I really do worry about this a lot. Because of these worries, I do say sorry a lot. It is hard for me to realize that people truly do want to help out and actually let them.

I know the sorry syndrome is not a real thing, but it is my self diagnosed issue. It is something I need to work on. Hopefully admitting it will be the first step. Next step will be to try not to worry about it so much. Since with help I diagnosed myself, we will see if I can end up curing myself!! Ha ha. I am sure this will be a work in progress.

Basketball

When basketball sign ups started Max wanted to be signed up to play. He loves being involved in whatever sports he can. We let him sign up and Nelson is his coach. Max has enjoyed playing but just let us know on Saturday he thinks he is done. We talked about not quiting in the middle of the season. He will finish playing but is not sure he wants to play again. He has decided it is not one of his favorite sports. This is fine with us- we will let him experience what he wants and then he has the choice. We have had fun watching him play and learn the rules of the sport.

Banana Bread

One of Max's all time favorite things is homemade banana bread. One of Asher's all time favorite things is Bananas. This can cause a bit of a dilemma in our house. Because of their love for bananas we buy our fair share of them. Asher has been eating them so much lately that we rarely have any brown bananas for bread.
Yesterday was one of those days we had a few ripe bananas so we decided to take advantage of it. The kids were able to help out. Max did the mixing and thought the mixer speed needed to be turned up to 6. As we can all imagine it did not turn out too pretty. Here is a picture of some of the results- this does not show the counter I have had to wash 5 times to get the sticky gummy flour off of. Asher is covering his eye because he swears he can't see from all the flour that went into his eye.


I decided I am so grateful for a blog. When messes like these occur it helps me to view it differently. For one moment I did think "oh man" but that did not last because I realized I had better hurry and grab the camera. I think next time we will leave the control of the speed to someone else other than Max (ha ha)

It has been awhile

It has been awhile since I last updated on the blog. We have still been busy but just did not feel like we had a ton to post on. Here are a few random things that have been going on:
I am coming to realize that before I know it my little buddy that runs errands with me is going to be gone. He will be in all day school in the fall and I will be doing errands on my own. I am 100% sure Asher will be grateful for this day, but I on the other hand am going to be super sad. We have enjoyed some great conversations. In fact just this week I learned that he can't wait to be in 3rd, 4th, 5th of 6th grade. I asked why and that is when he told me- in those grades is when you meet all the way cute girls. Then he later proceeded to tell me all the girls who are in love with him in Kindergarten. I know you are the thinking the same as me- oh man I am in trouble. We did have a little chat that no one should be in love with him now- they are all just friends. I sure enjoy my little chats with Asher and am never surprised at the things that come out of his mouth.
Asher- playing with his fuzzoodles


About a week ago Nelson has the opportunity to buy some lockers from work. We decided to buy them and turn around and sell them for a little profit. Our garage was soon filled with 24 banks of lockers. It has turned into a bit of a project cleaning them etc.. The kids have loved it. Yes they do have to do their share of cleaning but these have turned into a great toy for them. They have had many hours of hide and seek. They find great joy in locking each other in the lockers. When one is in the locker the other gets a metal rod and sticks it through the latch. Making it so they can't get out. They just laugh and then eventually let the other out. They have mastered how to get out from the inside. Hope this skill won't come in handy in Junior High- hope they are not ones that are locked into their lockers (Nelson was when he was younger).

Habits

For some reason the word "Habit" has been on my mind the last couple of days. I can't help to wonder how and why I in a way submatoge myself by getting out of good habits. Why I at times fall out of decent work-out routines, ok scripture reading, eating habits, waking up early and the list goes on and on. I only know when I do fall out of some of these habits I feel the big blah!! So why do we do this to ourselves and how do I get out.

I decided since the word habit was on my mind a bit I was going to read a few things about it. A lot of what I saw was breaking a bad habit. I am sure there are plenty of those I need to work on, but that is not what I have been thinking about.

Something I just read says " Work. Work. Work. A habit—good or bad—is something we have practiced over and over until it becomes second nature. It will take work. So I guess I will just go to work on some of the things I need to improve. So when I run 7 miles, or when my alarm goes off at 5:30 A.M. I don't feel like I am going to die. Or when I want to shove a ton of junk food in my mouth I can work on doing better. This will not be something that will just be instantly conquered and then wiped off my to do list. I am aware it will just be a constant thing I need to work at.

Mind of his own

At the wise age of 6 Asher knows what he does and does not want to wear. He always wears things backwards and says "It is the new style." I think he is convinced he is going to set his own new trend.
He knows what length his pants need to be. If they are what we would consider normal then he would think they are way too short. The pants have to be long or there is no way he is going to wear them.
Asher is lucky enough to have a brother and a cousin (Brandt) who are older than him. He is able to get their old clothes. On New Years his cousin Brandt passed down some more clothes. Asher decided to wear one of them. Max was pretty disgusted at his selection. On the way home from school Max said "Asher did anyone say anything about your outfit?" Asher replied No. Max said "I am surprised about that because you look like a dork." The good thing is Asher has a mind of his own does not care at all what other people think!
I just hope when people see him out and about they realize he has a mom that lets him have his own opinion and does not get much of a say.

(this is his outfit- keep in mind it is January and pretty cold out. He did wear a bright blue shirt under the sweater for school)

New Years

This past week has been fun. Nelson had the week off between Christmas and New Years. It has been fun to do things together with our little family. We are completely off of a routine. We have spent lots of time playing with friends, sledding, being pulled behind the truck on sleds, playing dodge ball, having wii competitions etc.. It has been fun getting to spend so much time together. Our bodies may be in shock when we have to start eating better and actually go to bed at a decent time.

For New Years Eve it is a tradition for our family to go up to Huntsville to Nelson's Aunt Darla's house. The Shurtleff family gets together to ring in the New Year. We usually end up doing something outside, this year was no different. We all headed over to the park. Each year the park is turned into an ice skating rink. Luckily we planned ahead for the freezing weather. It was 4 degrees. We were bundled up and ready to play. We spent sometime out there skating and playing hockey. I was amazed how well Max and Asher did. They were skating all over the place. We had a great time and luckily did not freeze to death.

Our family hanging out on the ice:








Asher- being himself and enjoying every minute of it:








Max- He really surprised me, he was skating all over the place:









On New Years we have a tradition to go shopping with my sisters and then meeting my whole family at ABC Mandarin for Lunch. At lunch my parents said this was their 49th year of celebrating New Years by going out to lunch. I did not realize my family had been doing that for so long. What a fun way to start the New Year, spending time together with the family.

We have had a great year and are ready to see what 2011 has in store for us.