1. I still wear my maternity pajama pants because they are so.darn.comfortable. I don't know that they're really all that different from normal pjs except for the fact that they sit low but I love them.
2. I'm in full swing for prepping for Emersyn's first birthday, but I'm kind of in denial that she's actually turning one in 6 weeks.
3. I want to wear a bikini this summer, but I STILL have the linea nigra, and lovely stretch marks. The hubs assures me I'm the only one that notices them, but I think he might be lying. I've thought about using Mederma, or some other product that promises to get rid of stretch marks, but they're all so expensive and I feel like none of them will actually work. Anyone out there try any miracle drug?
4. My ultimate goal with nursing was one year, with a personal cutoff of 18 months. However, the hubs and I are hoping to take a vacation without Emersyn in either late May or early June, so I've been hoping to have her weened by then. Now that it's getting closer though I'm not sure I'm 100% ready to be done, and I feel guilty rushing her for a 5 day vacation. Pumping is an option, but she usually refuses bottles, so I'm not sure how that would work.
5. Our dog now spends his days outside (we have a big fenced yard), and only comes in in the evenings. It has made a HUGE difference in being able to keep our house cleaner (he's a shedding machine). The hubs is still a bit of a softy and will let him in more often if he's home, but umm, he's not the one cleaning the floors.
Friday, March 22, 2013
Monday, March 18, 2013
Wednesday, March 13, 2013
Dear Emersyn: 10 Months
Sweet girl it feels like each of these letters begin the same- surprise over how quickly time is passing. It is hard to believe 10 months have passed since you were born, but on the other hand, it feels like you've always been a part of our lives.
You love your paci, your crib, Gus, eating, bath time, mama and daddy, your toys that make noise, and window latches. You're not such a big fan of bottles, drinking very much in general, pooping, getting a new diaper or getting dressed, and being told no.
These days you are crawling like crazy, following me from room to room whenever I have to leave your side, and also pulling up all over the place. You can pass from place to place while standing, though you're still a tad wobbly, and in general you're able to get back down from standing, but you occasionally get stuck and I have to come rescue you:)
You got your top two teeth in this month, bringing your total to four. You can often be found with a finger in your mouth, so I suspect you're working on a few more too. Let me tell you, that toothy grin is the most adorable sight in the entire world. You scrunch up your nose, squint your eyes, and just beam at us. I melt. A strange thing with your teeth- we realized your top teeth had come in when we heard you grinding them, and you haven't stopped since. I grind my teeth in my sleep, but I've never heard of it starting this young. Ughh, it sounds awful. You also now like to chew on an even wider assortment of things, including our coffee table.
You love music, and anytime your toys play a song you bounce along to the tune. You also nearly constantly keep a leg moving- I think you've got a tune in your head and your little legs are just keeping up with the beat.
You are an expert at waving, and whenever we say hello or bye bye you're quick to wave. You also have a good understanding of No No, and you're not a fan. For example, you love to play with the window blinds, but you're not allowed, so after a few times of being told no, you'll start to reach for them, stop yourself, and begin to cry. It's honestly hilarious, and we have to hide the fact that we're laughing when trying to discipline.
Eating is still a favorite pasttime of yours, and we have a great routine down. You nurse at 8am, noon, 4pm, and right before bed. I think you may be getting close to going down to three sessions a day, but Mama's not quite ready for that. You usually nurse on both sides now, but only about 4-6 minutes each side, sometimes less. You have three solid meals a day at 9am, 1pm, and 6pm, and you can pack away the food! We've introduced several new foods this month, such as mac n cheese, peanut butter, green and red peppers, mashed potatoes, roast beef, hummus, corn, spinach, ice cream, tomato, french fries, mandarin oranges, waffles and strawberries, but you also often just eating whatever we're having (with a few exceptions) so you've probably had even more food than what I've listed. Watching you eat and experience new tastes is a lot of fun for us, and Gus also appreciates meal times.
I don't want to jinx myself, but sleeping is finally going really well! Crying it out lasted about a week and was tough on all of us, but I know it was the right thing for our family at this time. You wake for the day around 7:30am, nap at 10am for 1.5-2 hours, nap again around 2:30 or 3pm for 1-2 hours and go down for the night between 7:30 and 8pm. Glorious, glorious sleep. Looking back I have no idea how I survived so many nighttime wake ups for so many months, and really have no idea how I did it when you were only napping for 20 min at a time. This is my very favorite month so far if for no other reason than we're all so much better rested. Even your dad said if we could have a baby come out at 10 months old he'd be on board with having another one tomorrow haha.
This month you and I took a trip just the two of us to Florida to visit mama's college roommate, Rebecca! You were a great baby, but traveling without your daddy was still quite the adventure. You had flown before to Maine when you were 5 months old, but you're a lot more active and curious now! We still had a great trip though!
You love your paci, your crib, Gus, eating, bath time, mama and daddy, your toys that make noise, and window latches. You're not such a big fan of bottles, drinking very much in general, pooping, getting a new diaper or getting dressed, and being told no.
Emersyn Grace we love you more than words could ever express. You're so happy, you babble constantly (though your only consistent word so far is still Dada), you giggle easily, and you love to snuggle with us.
Love,
Mama
Love,
Mama
Monday, March 11, 2013
E (and Mama Loves):10 Month Edition
Seven months have passed since I last did a blog post like this, so I'm sure I've actually already forgotten some things that were handy in that timespan, but here's what we are loving now.
We used a lot of different bibs when E started solids (we have some SUPER cute personalized ones that Blake's great aunt made us), but now, this is the only bib we use. It scrubs clean after every use, and now I don't have loads of bib laundry to do each week. Plus, this bib does a great job of catching whatever E drops, and we waste a lot less food. She's even been known to reach in the pocket herself and get the food she's dropped. We tried several "crumbcatcher" bibs, and this one is by far our favorite. The others were a waste of money.
2. Fisher Price Deluxe Booster Seat- $29.99
First of all, this is fairly inexpensive for a high chair, and it straps directly onto a chair, so it doesn't take up a lot of extra room. It's also pretty portable. With a solid seat it's easy to scrub down (or lick down, in Gus's case), and the tray is dishwasher safe. It doesn't lean back, like some fancier high chairs, but I personally wouldn't try solids until a kiddo was sitting up on their own (though that's a personal decision every parent gets to make for themselves).
3. Disposable placemats- $8.99 for 18
The hubs and I like to eat out, even though we don't do it nearly as often now as we used to, and E is really easygoing at restaurants, so these have been awesome. We even take them along when we go to friend's houses, to protect their tables and give E a surface to eat from. Along the same lines, we really like...
4. High chair cover- $20, but can be way more expensive too
This is great for restaurant high chairs, and shopping carts. Helps keep germs to a minimum, and also, in E's case, makes the seats fit a little more snug, so she's not turning around constantly and freaking her mama out. Between this and her bib a lot of the food she drops get caught, so we don't make as big of a mess when we eat out too. We just leave this in our truck, so it's always available, since its bigger than we want to keep in our diaper bag
I got this carrier specifically for my trip to Florida, knowing I would need to be handsfree in the airport and realizing that after around a half hour of wear with the Bjorn, my back would start hurting. I had this carrier recommended in a babywearing class at MOPS, and spent about 10 minutes researching the original Ergo, the organic Ergo, and the sport. The organic was reported to get pretty warm, so I ruled that one out, and as I said, this one was majorly on sale, so that made my decision easy. I could not have flown without this carrier. Also, it now gets regular use around the house when I have stuff to get done and E is begging to be held. It is SO much more comfortable than the Bjorn- I can wear it for hours with no back pain. The baby can not face outward, but it can be used to hip carry or back carry.
6. Progressive International Microwaveable Steamer- $10.99
7. Teething Necklace- $26.00
I definitely feel like this has helped E with teething. We very rarely have to use ibuprofen (maybe once every couple weeks), and we haven't dealt with the extreme fussiness or crazy drool I've heard is common with teething. Our first hint that any of her teeth were coming in were feeling them poke through in her mouth. One night this month she had multiple wake ups (which is now very rare for her, yay!), and I had tried ibuprofen and her paci, only to see in the morning that we had forgotten to put her necklace back on after bath. I will say, my SIL has one for her daughter and hasn't noticed it helping a lot, so it may be on a case by case basis, but it was worth the $26 to us.
What we're still loving 7 months later:
From my first edition of this post, we're still using everything but the Snugabunny bouncer, because she outgrew it, and the nursing pads and cream, because there is no more pain or leakage. I'd still definitely recommend all of those things to a brand new mama.
From the three month edition, we're still IN LOVE with our Bob. I'm very glad I didn't get a bigger breast pump, since I rarely pump, though now that E is refusing bottles I wish we had kept up with giving her a bottle on a more regular occasion, since she took them really well at the beginning. We no longer swaddle, and we moved, so we don't use that grocery service anymore. Now I would recommend the Ergo carrier over the Bjorn, as it's SO much more comfortable.
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