Guest Author - Kris Bigalk

1. They Can Clean One Plate

Yes, toddler twins can usually clean ONE plate. That means that they leave half of their own meal lying on the high chair tray most days. My twins each like different foods. One will eat the meat sticks, the other will eat the corn. One likes cheese, the other likes crackers. In the end, both get fed, and less goes to waste than when I had just one baby.

2. They Learn the Value of Cooperation – Early!

I will never forget the day I saw my twins cooperate for the first time. Together, they pushed over the diaper pail and decorated the nursery with diaper contents. What a proud day for me and their dad. Or, who could forget the day both of them pushed a heavy box over to the kitchen table, and then used it to climb up and help themselves to all sorts of forbidden goodies?

Of course, the twins cooperate in positive ways, too. They often hand one another tidbits of food, or trade sippy cups if they like what the other is drinking. Once, I even caught them "reading" a book together. My firstborn didn't do those things, even in a daycare setting. It's been really fun to watch.

3. They Tag-team Their Parents

With my firstborn, I ascribed to the theory of attachment parenting, carrying him with me wherever I went, co-sleeping, and feeding on demand. With the twins, all of that went straight out the window. If one was asleep, the other one wanted to be awake; if one wanted a bottle, the other one didn't. Creating and maintaining a schedule was the only thing that kept me sane in those early days.

Now, my twins still are put down to nap at the same time. They are served meals at the same time. If one's not tired, he hangs out in his crib and plays. If one's not hungry, he doesn't eat and makes up for it at a later meal or snack. I'm a much better mother if I've slept through the night and eaten three square meals a day—an impossibility when the twins were not on a schedule.

4. They Attract Attention in Public

Twins attract attention, usually positive, especially if they are looking and acting particularly angelic. I know these days are numbered. I have twin boys. Soon they will be running up and down the aisles at Target, terrorizing senior citizens with their super-hero impersonations (that is, if they're anything like my 6-year-old).

5. They Compete

I often joke that my firstborn twin stopped doing anything first the minute he was born. After that, his more feisty, competitive twin out-grew him, out-ate him, out-crawled him, and, until recently, out-walked him. Sometimes I wonder if Twin A would have done any of those things without the goading of Twin B. Eventually, it just bugged Twin A that Twin B was always getting everything first, because he was faster—so he learned to crawl, then walk. Now Twin B is starting to talk, and Twin A is still not all that interested—until recently, when he noticed that Twin B often gets what he asks for. Hmmmm. In this case, competition is a good thing.