Twin Teenagers

The saga continues. The twins turned 14 in May and I am struggling to complete this post about it by the end of June. That pretty much sums it up. Things are fast and furious over here now that all kids are teenagers. We anticipate the speed to pick up even more when the twins hit high school in September! But before all that, we had some birthday parties.

Adam, in a burst of independence, organized his own party. He sent out invites that he made himself. Set up the date, time and venue. (Bowling). I really was not sure what to expect but when Royce and I dropped him off there were kids there waiting. Everyone seemed happy, especially the newest 14 year old. After bowling, the group ended up back at our house for pizza and running around in the back yard. All in all, easy and just what Adam wanted.

Royce had a murder mystery party with her friends coming over and then following a script from a murder mystery party pack. The mystery was at points obscure but the girls went with it, hamming it up with accents and costumes. The overall theme was the 1950’s so we had lots of girls bursting into song from the movie Grease (which was oddly reminiscent of one of my own pre-teen birthday parties…)

Royce made a few appearances at Adam’s party and Adam did the same at Royce’s. But, unlike other places we have lived, they don’t really seem to be known as twins. Or perhaps their friend groups are sufficiently far apart. All party goers seemed genuinely surprised and pleased to see another 8^th grader (said twin) pop up at the other’s party. The other notable absences; Tori and MaryKay. Tori was at Disneyworld on a high school band trip, but called and texted with more regularity because it was the twins and my birthdays. MaryKay, a many year twins’ party attendee and last minute cake helper, was away this year. She earned a break and we stumbled through without her.

The twins’ gift this year was a phone. While we are already regretting it, we caved to the inevitable. We now have multiple phones dinging at all times, fights for the charging station and low grade worry that someone has lost an expensive device. But we also have a family group chat (at one point titled “Sienna’s Fan Club”- Sienna is our dog). Somehow communicating with the group irons out individual fights. Our group chat messages look so nice and loving it gives us parents hope for tomorrow, for high school and even beyond.