From the moment she brought her precious twins into my house I was in love! They literally took my breath away. So tiny, so precious, so absolutely adorably perfect in every tiny little newborn way. As we made ourselves comfortable, they slept in their car seats covered in blankets, one hand on top of the other, clutching onto their covers. The older sister stirred, eyes peeped out and took in her surroundings, her friend for life blissfully unaware.
My house smelt of that delicious new baby smell for a long long time after they left, I wasn’t expecting that of 5 week olds, I’ve never experienced anything like it.
But when you have two 5 week old babies a single pair of hands is never enough, so grandma aka Babbage came along to lend a helping hand and what a glamorous lady she was too!
We shared birth stories as I am always more than willing to talk about mine, but I was intrigued to learn how a mummy deals with 2 newborns at once, the answer as always is “we just do, we find a way”. As a mum of an almost 3 year old, I have a vague recollection of how difficult the first few weeks and months can be, I can’t begin to imagine what it must be like to have two. Mummy said she didn’t want to be in the photos, I took some anyway and reminded her that if she didn’t like them she could always delete them, but if I didn’t she wouldn’t have the choice. You see the days and nights blur into one in the early stages, you look back and wonder where the years went. She needn’t have worried she looked as fresh as a daisy and glowed with love anytime she made contact with one of her cubs.
We relaxed over a cup of tea or two, enjoying the sleepiness of the babies, then it was time to prepare them. If like me you’re wondering if they are identical, the answer is we don’t know, we’ll find out when they grow older. Mummy and Babbage gently gently removed the sisters from their car seats and cuddled them. There was a silence in the room, teas forgotten to get cold. Newborns have a magical ability to make entire rounds of tea cold, incase you weren’t aware!
I was surprised to find that the crying of one baby didn’t wake or disturb the other. Babbage’s experience with 3 children of her own was obvious to see, but mummy with only 5 weeks experience was already an expert, an expert at knowing that each baby had her unique own needs, mummy was already expertly flitting between the two babies, changing her technique without even realising. She was a natural mum. Babbage looked on quietly watching her own cub, with a kindness and beauty that was a pleasure and a joy to photograph.
