SHANA is retarded.
just checkin to see if you really do read…muahaha!!
Weary.
It’s one of those days. One where I’m convinced I’ll be struggling with naptimes, crankiness, and whining for the rest of my life. One where it feels like I’ll be nursing a baby forever (and it already seems like I have been). One where it seems I’ll never be able to spend enough quality time with my firstborn, or manage to get a presentable meal prepared by dinnertime (without spending the entire afternoon working on it). Most of all, it’s one of those days where I feel like I’ll never be free again, never have an afternoon—oh heck, just an HOUR—to myself again, to simply read a book that I enjoy, without constantly having to put it down to go do something else.
I am weary.
God, please give me the strength to get through the next two months, one week and 4 days. (Because as of this kid’s first birthday, I’m turning in my rented pump and NEVER setting my alarm for 4am again! I think an uninterrupted night’s sleep would do wonders for my constant state of misery and bone-tirededness.) (And yes, I still get up and pump at 4am. While Des sleeps away. I’m not crazy, just determined to breastfeed him for a year, and pumping is necessary because he sleeps for so long overnight. Well, maybe I am a little crazy, but I just have to do this for him—he deserves the best.)
But ohhh, am I weary.
SAD
G, like most other boys his age, loves to build elaborate towers with his blocks. We let him keep them up for a while, but eventually he has to be told to take them down; if we didn’t make him take them down, he’d leave them up indefinitely and in doing so, he’d never get to make new towers.
Recently, this happened. He’d had a tower up in his room for a few days, and it was a clean-up day anyway, so I told him it was time to put his blocks away. I was met with the usual drama: horrified gasps, whining, and much complaining. Being the mean mama I am, I stood my ground and sent him to his room to perform this daunting, oppressive task. He did what he had to do, I went on about my own cleaning, and the day went on.
A couple of days later, he got his blocks out again and started building. I was sitting with him, just kind of looking at the blocks—most of them are my blocks from my childhood, so I like to look at them and remember all the fun things I used to do with them. On this day, one of the blocks in particular caught my eye. There was writing on it, and it wasn’t one of my own works from ages past. This was fresh writing, without years of wear:
I held it out to G. “G, did you write this?”
He looked over at the block. “Yes,” he answered.
“When did you do that? And why did you write ’sad’?”
“I wrote it when you made me put my blocks up yesterday. I wrote ’sad’ because I was sad because I didn’t want to put my blocks up.”
Can we say, DRAMA? Haha…
I love that he wrote that, though. It is so much like the things I used to do as a kid, when I was feeling misunderstood and oppressed by the ‘rents. I’m glad he feels free to express it, and I hope as he grows, he continues to express his feelings in writing.
I have discovered
Google Reader.
This is just inexplicable awesomeness for a blog-obsessed girl like me. No more awkwardly navigating through my dozens of bookmarked blogs with my left hand, while nursing the baby. Now, I can awkwardly navigate the Google Reader list with my left hand, while nursing the baby. LOL! But really, that’s a huge help. The biggest plus is that it shows me which of my favorite blogs have new posts, and which ones don’t. This saves me from having to visit each one, over and over, checking for new posts! And, I get to read a lot more blogs this way. I actually had a few of them that I’d forgotten about, which are now in my Reader for me to catch up on. Many thanks to Angie, who enlightened me with her informative post for people like me who are sooo slow to catch on to all these fancy internet things!
He did it again
G went and lost another baby tooth!
(How’s that for modeling the new smile? He gets that from me. 
)
It happened Friday morning. He’d just awakened for the day and on his way to the bathroom, he stopped and spit his tooth out into his hand. 
“Oh!” He said, rather matter-of-factly, “I just lost my tooth.” It had been loose for weeks, but over the previous couple of days it had been hanging by a thread, so it was quite expected. He said he felt something “crunchy” in his mouth when he got up out of bed, so he spit it out, and there was his tooth. What fun! (Sort of. I’m still on the fence about this.)
So we have a smile with a very large gap now, and two permanent teeth peeking up through his gums. Both of those teeth are coming in diagonally. Philip’s mom said that sometimes they will come in crooked but then straighten up once they’re in. Let’s hope so, otherwise, we’re in for some years of awkwardness until it’s time for orthodontics. Genetically, it’s a toss-up. I have perfectly straight teeth—naturally—never had braces. Philip had horrendously crooked, extreme buck-teeth until he got his braces when he was 11 or 12. He never smiled with his mouth open. Heck, he still doesn’t. See how scarring it is? LOL
Anyway…here’s G on his way to Sunday school, showing off his new smile. He is looking quite scrappy, which I think is the perfect look for a four year old boy.
Little update
The boys are fine. I thought I’d give a little update before I go into all the other stuff that’s been going on.
We have teeth appearing and disappearing all over the place lately!
G is growing up too fast. He lost his first baby tooth two weeks ago. WAY too early, in my opinion! I wasn’t expecting this to happen till at least age five, but he did it before he was four and a half.
Nice little gap, huh? The permanent tooth is now poking up a little bit…it is also very crooked! I was hoping he inherited my straight teeth and not Philip’s horrendously crooked ones, but it looks like orthodontist bills will probably be in our future. And the tooth next to it is very loose now; it’ll probably fall out in the next week or two. He’ll have a big ol’ gap then. Very cute, but I don’t like this one bit. I really, really am having a hard time with my baby hitting this milestone. It just came so fast. 
He didn’t even have that tooth for four years before it fell out.
In contrast, while G is losing his baby teeth, Des is getting his in! He’s had his two bottom teeth for a couple of months now, as you can see here:
Two bottom teeth is my favorite look for a baby! But things are changing because I discovered yesterday that he’s about to get his top two teeth. One has just broken through the gum, and the other is causing quite a bulge. There are even a couple of tiny blood-filled spots where the one is bulging. It looks so painful! He has complained a little bit, but not much. The little sucker bit me for the first time while he was nursing yesterday. OUCH. That’s what made me look to see if he had teeth coming in, and sure enough, he did. Hopefully that will be the last bite, because I was sore all day long after that incident.
Anyway, it’s hard to miss the irony of one child losing his baby teeth, while at the same time the other child is acquiring them. I probably think too much, but this has been causing me to wax sentimental during these past weeks. Bittersweet times. Half the time, I don’t even know what to feel, because I don’t like the baby stage and I want it over as soon as possible. But at the same time, I want to savor all the good parts. And as for G, I want him to just stop getting older from this point on!
Des started combat-style crawling about two weeks ago. He still won’t get up on all fours and crawl for real, but he’s gotten very adept at dragging himself everywhere with his tough little arms & elbows. I forgot how busy this new time is, what with him trying to get into everything and us having to teach him what “no” means. We’re not “baby-proofing” parents; we prefer to teach him right away what he can and can’t touch or play with. It worked really well with G; we never had to put anything away or lock anything up. Not a single thing. He just learned what was off-limits and eventually he stayed away from those things. It does take a lot of work on our part in the beginning, and a lot of (tiring) consistency. Old-fashioned, but effective. These are fun times. I must be weird because I really mean that—I love this stage (speaking of savoring the good parts, this is one of the best IMO!).
Not a whole lot else going on. We are still looking for land so we can start the house-building process. It’s hard when we’re so picky. We MUST have trees and we MUST have a half acre. But we can’t (or won’t) pay over a certain price. We must be near town, but we also have to be in a quiet, safe area. Around here, that’s an oxymoron. We’ve actually found a wonderful lot or two in a great area very near the bay. The only problem is that during Ivan in ‘04, the lots nearby did have water inundation from the bay, meaning that if we ever got another cat 3 or higher storm, flooding from storm surge would be a possibility. I don’t know if I can deal with that risk. I want to be able to hole up and stay in our home for any future storms, and I don’t think I’d feel safe doing that so close to the bay. But that land…oh, is it beautiful! It has Live Oaks, Magnolias, and tall Pines. All my favorite trees. And it’s a short walk to the bay. It would be perfect, if we never had another major hurricane. Ha!
Speaking of hurricanes, since I have a baby this summer, I am SURE this is going to be the year we get hit again. We were slammed in both ‘04 and ‘05, our first years with G. It was AWFUL going through major storms and long-term power outages with a baby! Scary, hot, miserable, and it really screwed up his sleep (which is a big issue in our house!). Then, the last two years were quiet—not that I’m complaining, but it at least would’ve been easier to deal with hurricanes with a preschooler than with a baby. But now that we’re in baby-land again this year…I’m more skeered than usual.
Guess I’ve rambled enough. Better go now so I can go to the store and get some food. Tomorrow is my birthday, and Sunday is Father’s Day. We have a lot of celebrating to do this weekend! Actually, we’re low-key with stuff like this and don’t have any plans, but we do make sure we eat lots of good food on special days. I think I’m getting a cheesecake. 
Ahhh…
I’m back, and the blog is back.
We’ve just come out of a very stressful couple of months.
But all’s well now, at least regarding that situation.
Details forthcoming, email me or leave a comment in order to obtain the password, if you don’t already have it. It might take a while for me to get it all written & posted; we’re working on finding a new home and we’re also dealing with a newly mobile 8-month old! He’s about to be 9 months old. And I’m about to be 35, come Saturday. So it’ll be a few days…
Des’ half-year birthday
Little Des turned 6 months old on Tuesday the 18th. I wanted to post this then, but this is the first chance I’ve had. Busy times.
I’m amazed at how fast six months can go by, but I’m also glad that those months are behind us. The best part of the first year is definitely the second six months, so I’m looking forward to a baby who is becoming more and more fun, responsive, and social.
He’s had some big developmental milestones over the past few weeks. He is reaching out and grabbing anything that catches his fancy, and he’s good putting it right into his mouth when he gets it. He’s scooting around and I won’t be surprised if he’s crawling in a month or so. He’s this close to sitting up unassisted. He can definitely do it, but if he doesn’t pay close attention he just topples right over. I give him a week to have it mastered.
Socially, he’s coming alive. He loves to interact with us, but he seems to enjoy G the most. And of course, G loves interacting with him! G’s favorite times are when he’s playing in his room and I bring Des and lay him on his tummy in front of whatever G is doing. I can go get some work done, and they get some great quality time together. G loves explaining all about his towers (or train tracks, or parking lots, or his coloring, etc.) to him, and Des just lays there happily watching the entire time.
One thing he recently started doing that I find both funny and maddening is that when he’s nursing, and he’s done with his down-to-business eating and is just “hanging out”, he begins blowing raspberries. On my boob. Like I said, cute, funny…and maddening! LOL! I say his name as seriously as I can and tell him he needs to finish eating or we’re done, and all I get is a full-of-boob smile and more raspberries. Silly little boy!
The biggest news is that after six months of exclusive breastfeeding, he started solids this week. Nothing drastic, just little bites of our food while we’re having dinner, but I’m amazed that he took right to it! Gray was resistant to any solids at six months, so I waited longer with him, and he ended up having serious issues with anything that wasn’t liquid consistency…he was 9 months old before he could gum on any type of mashed table food without gagging, and he was a year old before he could eat real table food without gagging on it (and often, he would throw up—he just couldn’t figure out what to do with that chunk of food on the back of his tongue). I remember on his first birthday, we had to have an ice cream cake because he couldn’t handle chewing and swallowing real cake! Ah, memories.
But to my surprise, Des had this eating thing mastered the very first time. I started with pinches of bread, and was amazed that he gummed it right down and then fussed for more! So far this week he’s had rice with teeny bits of beef, bread, and turnip greens. He loved it all and kept popping his little mouth open for more, even fussing when I wasn’t fast enough getting it to him. I’m wondering if he’ll even be interested in commercial baby food at all, since he’s taken so well to bits of table food right off. I’m wondering how his weight gain is going to play out now. He’s still teeny tiny at 13 lbs (something like 5th percentile for his age). I guess we’ll see what happens!
Recently, we had pizza for dinner and I let him suck on my crust. He loved it! Watch the video to see him going to town and then what he did whenever I’d take it away:
The next day we were so mean that we tried it again, just to see if he’d react the same way. He was cool at first, but man, did he ever get mad! In my defense, it was time for him to nurse & go for his nap, so I had to take it away anyway. He was picked up at the end and taken and breastfed, so don’t trust him when he’s acting like we’re starving him. The lighting is also much better on this one since it was daytime:
But, I don’t feel old
A couple of weeks ago I got a chance to go see my favorite indie rocker play a live show in town. It took a lot of planning and things were required to go perfectly in order for me to be able to go. He was slated to play at 9pm. The routine here is for me to nurse D at 8pm for bed and then while Philip puts him in the crib for the night, I spend a few minutes snuggling with G before he goes to bed at 8:30. So the plan was for me to be ready to go by 8:00, then do my usual routine with both boys, and it went off without a hitch. I was done with both boys’ bedtimes and ready to leave by 8:30.
It was just me going by myself, since Philip would be staying home with the boys. We made arrangements for a friend, who was going to be there helping to host the show, to meet me in the parking lot and escort me in. Oh, I forgot to mention the show was at a small bar downtown, hence me wanting (and probably needing) an escort! I always have problems with creepy guys hitting on me at bars, and with me being alone this time and this bar being downtown in kind of a weird part of town, both of us felt like it was a good idea for me to have him get me safely in and out of there.
The whole reason for explaining all this is coming up. So I got there a little after 9pm, called said friend from the parking lot, and waited for him to come out and walk me in. He did, and I stopped at the door to pay the cover charge and get ID’d. I had put my trusty driver’s license in the back pocket of my jeans, and as I reached back to get it, the guy doing the IDing stopped me and said,
“Eh, you definitely look old enough,” and proceeded to stamp my hand.
OUCH.
I looked at him deadpan and gave him my most sarcastic,
“Thanks.”
He just chuckled and waved me in.
I am old.
And apparently, I officially look it. I mean, he had no question I was old enough. That stings a little!
Aside from that painful dose of reality, the show was good and I’m glad I got a chance to go. Of course, in my oldness, I left at 10:30 so I could get home and head to bed by 11:00. I guess in reality, it’s not so much oldness, but motherhood that required my early exit. Not much incentive to stay out late when you know you have to be up at 4am for a date with the breast pump. LOL!