People have asked me since before the girls could talk if they have their own language. And my answer has always been a pat "no." They don't. They speak English and a smattering of Spanish words. That's it. The end.

Except lately I've noticed as their play has become more and more imaginative that their vocabulary is going down that same path. I chalk it up to the fact that they play together and not that they're twins, but they do have some stuff that is entirely their own language. Four examples immediately come to mind.

The first two are games they play. I don't even know how the games are played (and when I've asked, they refuse to tell me), but they are called rockabolly and podidot. When one says "let's play podidot" to her sister, she knows exactly what that means.

The other two are food names. These seem strange to me because they decided to change the names, knowing full well what the rest of the (English-speaking) world calls them. Shrimp are not shrimp. They're beginnies. And red bell peppers are peescents. I made a shrimp stirfry for dinner the other night and Buggy asked, "Are these beginnies?" I told her no, they were shrimp. She said, "Right. Beginnies. Belly! We're having beginnies for dinner!" Belly was pleased. She loves beginnies.

That's all I can think of at the moment, but I wanted to make sure I got it down somewhere so I won't forget. These are the things with which I will have great fun embarrassing them when they are older.

In non-sporting news....

We survived Christmas in Wisconsin. It was cold and white and the girls had the best time ever. They were SO into the holiday. We had gone over what would happen Christmas morning a zillion times: "When you wake up, wake me up and ask if it's morning. If it is, then we'll get up, walk down the hall, peek around the corner into the living room, and see if Santa came." Oh you shoulda seen their eyes light up when they saw full stockings, a giant pink dollhouse, and a pile of musical instruments. It was the absolute best! And, of course, as we moved into the opening of presents, they ripped the paper off with wild abandon. Between us and Santa, they got everything they asked for and so much more. Way more. Way too much more. Maybe they're too young to fully appreciate that, but I'm not. I'm very thankful that it didn't cause us any hardship to spoil them this year. As they get older and want bigger, more expensive stuff, this will not always be the case. I'm enjoying it while I can.

Then we came home. Back to the routine. But I had a little ace in my pocket - a wedding in California that I could look forward to. A quick trip by myself to see old girlfriends, wear a sexy dress, drink too much, dance and dance and dance and dance. It was all I had hoped it would be and more. I hadn't seen some of the other wedding guests in 10 years or more and there was something very gratifying about a) picking up right where we left off and b) being told that I looked better than ever. Shallow? Why yes! But who cares? It was fun. And a nice little ego boost. But the best part? Just hanging with some of my best girlfriends, including the bride. In the limo on the way to our post-reception-but-continuing-the-party party at the hotel, the bride insisted that everyone should sing "To Be With You" loudly and proudly. It's the corny stuff like that that I love - not only that she wanted to sing it but that we all knew all the words. We're dorks. And we celebrated that.... with a lot of booze. The morning came, um, a bit too quickly. Back to reality.

But you know what? Reality is pretty cool these days. Dude and I are doing well. Belly and Buggy are cool kids who keep me on my toes in more positive ways than negative lately. Could life be better? Well sure, but I'm trying to be focused on finding the joy in the little things. Sometimes thinking too hard about things leads to over-thinking which leads to seeing every last nugget of what's not "right." I'm just rollin' with my homeys for now.