Last night we went out for a raucous night of pizza and candlepin bowling with some friends. There was an extremely talented balloon animal artiste named Jungle Jim who was going table to table making balloon animals for the kids. This guy could make anything. Clio requested a ladybug, Elsa wanted a pink and purple unicorn with heart on his horn (?!), and our friends’ daughter Marlie wanted a butterfly. Done, done (?!) and done.

A little while later, a six- or seven-year-old boy from a nearby table came over to our table, brandishing his balloon creation. “I have a dragon!” he said. “What do you have?”

“I have a unicorn with a heart on its horn!” Elsa told him with her trademark enthusiasm. “And my sister has a ladybug and my friend Marlie has a butterfly!”

“Boring!” the boy said — in a very rehearsed sort of way. And retreated to his table.

Elsa told me what had transpired, even though I’d heard the whole thing. And we agreed that it wasn’t very nice of the boy to say that. I told Elsa that she could to go over and tell the boy that if she felt like it. (I guess I was feeling confrontational.)

She did, and reported back: “He said girls like girl stuff, and boys like boy stuff. And dragons are boy stuff.”

Laura's incredibly adorable twins

I am most excited to welcome Laura Rossi Totten to Baby Squared today for my intermittent “Ropering” feature, in which I subject other twin parent bloggers to invasive questions about their personal lives.

I met Laura via some social media channel or another when it came to our mutual attention that 1.) We both have twins and 2.) We are both originally from Fairfield, Connecticut (hometown of John Mayer, Justin Long and the guy from the Geico commercials!) In fact, Laura’s younger sister was a year ahead of me in high school, and she was a good friend of the niece of my mom’s college roommate. So Laura and I are, like, practically sisters. And, therefore, I had no choice but to Roper her.

Also, I was very curious to know more about what it’s like to have one twin with special needs.

I know, I’m totally jumping on the sh*t-people-say bandwagon. But not exactly. Because this isn’t sh*t kids in general say. This is sh*t my kids say. And it’s probably entirely different from the sh*t your kids say. But perhaps you’ll find some similarities…

1. I made number 2!!! (Speaking of sh*t….) For some reason my girls feel compelled to announce when they do their business. I guess it’s a legacy from when our hygienic assistance was required. These days we leave them to their own devices, for the most part (with varying results) but they can’t kick the habit of telling us what they’re up to. Or maybe they just like saying it. Which is fine. I just wish they wouldn’t do it in public bathrooms.

Like many of my mom friends and acquaintances, virtual and otherwise, I am in the throes of addiction to the Hunger Games trilogy.

I don’t usually read YA — I didn’t read the Twilight series, and I only read the first Harry Potter book. (Which I loved, but didn’t feel “hooked” enough to keep going.) But I’d heard great things about Hunger Games from one of my besties, and I do have a weakness for dystopian and post-apocalyptic fiction (I know, weird, right?) so I gave it a shot, and hoo boy. I devoured that first book like a bag of chocolate covered pretzels. I’m on the third one now, and I think I’m going to be seriously grief-stricken when it’s over. Until the movie comes out in March, anyway.

The basic premise, if you don’t already know, is that in a totalitarian North America in the far distant future, every year two dozen kids between the ages of 12 and 18 have to compete in a televised contest to the death. It’s The Lord of the Flies meets reality TV. And it is dark, dark stuff.

Easiest Kids' Valentine Craft Ever

If you’re a regular reader, you know that I’m not what you’d call a DIY kind of gal. I mean, I’m pretty resourceful and all. I made rice canisters by washing out some old plastic coffee containers, slapping some blue painter’s tape over the labels and writing “Brown Rice” and “White Rice” with a Sharpie. But you’re not going to see them on Pinterest. (And you know about my love hate relationship with Pinterest…)

But I do love to come up with the occasional half-assed craft activity to do with the girls, especially if it involves no advance planning or purchasing. As far as I’m concerned, the point of crafts with kids shouldn’t be to make something gorgeous and precise, but to do something that’s fun, keeps them occupied, and allows them some freedom to be creative and make it their own.

The gals are EXTREMELY obsessed with Valentine’s Day, and have been basically since the day after Christmas, so I wanted to come up with something Valentine-y for them to do. I had this spool of pretty pink and red decorative string leftover from an activity that a friend did at my baby shower (yes, over 5 years ago), and I tried to figure out something to do with it — string paper hearts on it? Cut it up in to little pieces to use as part of a heart collage? Wait…wait….Eureka! I had an idea.

We are pretty selective about what we let our girls watch on TV. Most PBS shows get a big thumbs up, and we’re OK with one or two specific shows on Nik Junior and Disney Junior.  Thanks to the wonders of DVR and DVD technology, we can largely control what the girls do and don’t see.

But occasionally they watch one of “their” shows on real TV, and we have to leap for the remote if something objectionable comes on afterward, lest they beg to watch it. I am speaking, specifically, of The Fresh Beat Band. The other day, it happened to be on when we turned on the TV to put something else on for them, and they begged to watch it.

Alastair said no, and when they protested he said, “Sorry guys, the Fresh Beat Band sucks.”

“No it doesn’t!” they said.

Alastair called to me in the kitchen, where I was making dinner. “Hey Jane, does the Fresh Beat Band suck?”

I am always hesitant to disclose this, because it makes people angry and jealous, and those aren’t fun or healthy emotions, but my daughters — now five years old — still nap. OK, not always. But every day we have a 45 minute “Quiet Time” after lunch, and about one third to one half the time, one or both of the girls actually fall asleep.

Even when they don’t sleep, though, Quiet Time is pretty awesome, and if you don’t do it, I highly recommend it. (Although it’s probably hard to implement if you haven’t been doing it all along, as an evolution of naptime). It works like this:

Exhibit A: Friends in bed

So, in the vein of my post about how Pinterest makes me feel inadequate, I have a question: Does any any kids’ room actually look like the rooms in, say, the Pottery Barn Kids catalog? Or Pinterest, for that matter?

And, related questions: are your kids’ rooms as irredeemably messy as my girls’ is?

I would love for their room to look adorable and cozy and neat, and occasionally (like, maybe once every other month?) I go in there and do a real number on the place. And it’s never actually dirty. It’s not total bedlam (ha ha, get it?) either. But with two five-year-olds and all of their five-year-old quirks and possessions, maintaining lasting, picturesque neatness is just not a realistic possibility.

At any given time, if you walked into Elsa and Clio’s room, you would see:

1. Unmade or only partially made beds. I try to at least pull up the covers in the morning if I’ve got time, but lately that’s been difficult because (see exhibit A, above) the girls are going through this thing where they put TEN THOUSAND “friends” in their beds (so that they themselves end up sleeping in, like, a six inch-wide space) and insist that they stay there all the time. Clio, in particular, gets really bent out of shape if anyone moves them. Sigh.

The other day I was at the bathroom sink, putting on my makeup — foundation, specifically — when Elsa, who was sitting on the toilet (lid closed!) watching, as she likes to do, asked “Can I put on some of that?”

“No,” I told her. “You know that makeup isn’t for kids.”

“Why not?”

“Because,” I said, “It would look funny on you. You’re beautiful without makeup.”

“But I want to be extra beautiful!” she said.

Gulp.

Pin this inadequate graphic I made!

Apparently in the past several weeks EVERYONE in the world has discovered Pinterest. I joined up a few months ago, because I’m just so ahead of the curve in these things. (Not.)

Basically it’s a virtual pinboard: a place where people can post pictures of cool stuff — food, shoes, beautiful home decor, craft ideas, pictures of celebrities, funny stuff. Anything. Kind of like your locker in Middle School, except instead of pictures torn out of Teen Beat it’s pictures from all over the web and other people’s pinboards.

It’s a lot of fun, although — like all social media — kind of addictive, and kind of a time suck.

But every time I go there, I end up feeling just a touch inadequate. Because Pinterest inevitably reminds me of the various ways in which I am not good enough: