Los Mellizos, the Twins

So now an update on the best part of our lives -- Nuala and Bran! They've adjusted wonderfully, of course, to being here. They had fun exploring the new place, and meeting lots of new people, especially children. They've been a hit everywhere, as babies tend to be :) Everywhere we go, it's "Oh, son mellizos?!" Which, as I suppose is obvious, means, "Oh, are they twins!?" They LOVE other children and animals, Nuala just goes crazy squealing and laughing and smiling. At one church activity all the "big" boys (5-ish to 8-ish or so) were playing with Hot Wheels, zooming them around and all. And Nuala was right in the middle of it all, laughing and talking and grabbing, it was so cute! Bran was tired, it was past bedtime, so he was being snuggly, which is wonderful :) A little later, Nuala had pulled herself up onto the stroller that another tired little guy -- 3 years old -- was in, and she was just jabbering away at him. Poor little guy was just staring at her. Finally Zac asked him, "Would you like me to move her?" and he nodded his head -- it was just a little too much for him!

Nuala has her two top teeth poking through. It's such a novelty that she feels she needs to click them and grind them with her bottom two all the time, it's really funny! She has also became an out-of-nowhere-tantrum-thrower. She'll fling herself forward on the ground, usually from a sitting position, and lay on her stomach with her arms stretched out screaming away. I think she's picked up some habits from cousin Brigit ;) She also likes to stick her tongue out now, and will mimick us if we do it. I know, model parents, encouraging the tongue-sticking-outedness, but it's awfully fun.

Bran, not to be left behind, also has two top teeth emerging. Actually, they're farther out than Nuala's, but we didn't know he even had them till they had already broken through because they're not the two front ones, they're the two on either side of the so far non-existent front ones! Kinda funny, huh? They're little vampire teeth, with no sign yet of the front two. He can't really click those on his bottom ones, but he has made up for that by learning to click his tongue. He does it all the time! He's really very good at it. No real tantrums from him, but he does contribute to his sister's by pulling her hair. Just in the last week or so he's picked up this habit. I can't blame him much, Nuala's hair is very straight and fine, but there's a lot of it and it sticks out all over her head like a baby bird's. I can see how it would be hard to resist grabbing a handful. He also likes to kinda grab her clothes (or skin, if there are no clothes available) and pull, another trick she's not fond of. I really like this picture of him, because his eyebrows are raised, a little expression he often pulls.

We don't have any of our household effects, we get the main shipment at the end of this month, along with our van, and our smaller air shipment we should already have received -- oh well! It's supposedly coming at the end of this week. Anyway, the twins had been getting a little bored with the toys we had packed for them over a month ago, even with the addition of some other fun items, like an empty soda bottle, paper towel tubes, and one of those unrippable mail envelopes. Thankfully, this nice family in our ward, the Powells (the husband also works at the embassy), let us borrow their baby toys that they don't need right now. Phew! Bored babies are not happy babies.