The most difficult thing to get accustomed to (besides the financial burden), was dealing with all the equipment. Between the car seats, portable cribs and high chairs, triplet stroller, diaper bags, and changes of clothes not to mention toys, it was necessary to trade in the family car for a family van. The added convenience of having a TV and VCR in the van made long driving trips possible.

Baby proofing your house is very important to do before your children begin to crawl. A good tip is to lie down on the floor to gain your child's perspective. Remember no matter how hard you try you will never be able to keep a careful watch on all three of them at once! We fenced off our living room, blocking access to the TV etc. and considered the room theirs.

My wife and I never referred to their age as the " terrible twos", but rather the "terrific twos". You become accustomed to a high noise level and constant activity. Every minute is a new discovery . Like any other two year old, everything must be touched and tasted, but with three, everything must be shared. We soon learned that the thing they each wanted most was whatever their sibling had at that moment. The only thing that would tag an object as off limits to the other two was if there were three of the same item in three different colors. The color coding that we began in order to separate their bottles and pacifiers is still held sacred by them today.

Whenever one of them would get sick, their pediatrician would tell us that we should separate them. This never worked for us. The children were only happy when they were all together, and trying to keep them from sharing a cold was impossible.

Most of the landmark occurrences were just typical two year old times three, and then they began to speak. My wife noticed that they had their own names for each other. When we began to make note of the particular sounds that they would say to each other, it was apparent that they had their own language. What at first sounded like gibberish, began to make sense!

If we had to pick an age that we have the fondest memories of, it would have to be two.

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