A mother's anxiety

On Saturday night, I'll be spending my first night away from William. A friend is getting married in January and she's having an overnight "girls' night" at the beach. While I know it will be fun, and the prospect of an uninterrupted night of sleep seems like heaven on Earth, I'm sure I'll do nothing but think about William and Ed and miss them both terribly. I have total confidence in Ed and know that they will be fine without me. But still. I'm just dreading it a tiny little bit. Hopefully, I'll write a post on Sunday about what a great time I had, and how I slept for 10 hours straight, and how William was great and Ed didn't have any problems.

William had a much better day today. I gave him Tylenol in the morning and at lunch time, so I guess that helped. I didn't give him any before he went to bed, so we'll see how he sleeps. He also didn't drink his bottle before going to sleep, which means he might wake up earlier than normal. He did eat a lot at dinner though. He ate 2 cubes (2 oz.?) of the homemade peas I made for him last night, and 2 cubes of homemade pears, and 3 tbsp. of oatmeal cereal, and almost a whole jar of squash and corn. That's a lot of chow! No wonder he didn't want his bottle.

I also managed to cook a good dinner for us tonight. I made chicken tenders with this really tasty (and easy) brown butter, lemon, and caper sauce, baked sweetpotatos, salad, and biscuits. And to top it off, I made PB&J sandwiches for us to take to work tomorrow. AND I started a load of laundry, which I'll hopefully get into the dryer before I go to sleep. Just trying to be more productive after work so that I have to spend less time doing chores on the weekends.

Speaking of sleep, I'm going to try to go to sleep now. Tomorrow night I need to get ready for my trip to the beach, and try to make sure Ed has everything he needs while I'm gone. There's so much to remember! It's tough for one person to do it alone--that's for sure!

Oh--I almost forgot. I wanted to note that William is pushing himself onto his knees now! I was just mentioning to his daycare teachers that he's been trying to pull up on things, but he doesn't put his knees under him. And they said to just give it time. Well, when I went to pick him up at the end of the day, they said sure enough, he'd been working on getting his knees under him. And then he showed off his new skill for me! I guess it won't be long before he's getting into the sitting position by himself.

Home Sweet Home

Well, we made it! We are home, although definitely worse for wear. William's sporting a lovely yellowish bruise on his forehead (which he got by falling off a bed) and a double ear infection. But other than that, we had a good trip and a fun Christmas. It was great to see my family and especially my nieces. But I think from now on, our Christmas tradition will be to spend the holiday at our home. Our families are welcome to visit us!

William did remarkably well on the flights home, considering his ear infections. He fell asleep on both legs, and only got a little fussy on the second leg because we had to sit at the gate for 45 minutes while we waited for luggage to get to the plane. Once we took off, he was fine. I was surprised that he has an ear infection because he didn't cry during the flights at all, and he didn't really drink his bottle during take-off or landing. Go figure. He is such a trooper. He was pretty clingy as our visit wore on, but he still managed to sleep pretty well. At least I know I can put him down in a pack-n-play and he'll go to sleep. One of the best moments was when my brother's step-daughter-in-law, who has a 4-year-old son, expressed her amazement that I could just put William down and he would go to sleep. Considering all the "trauma" we felt during William's early months, it felt so good to be able to say, "Yep--we just lay him down and give him his pacifier and he rolls over and goes to sleep." I was grinning from ear to ear on the inside.

William got weighed at the doctor's today, and he's 15 lbs., 13. oz. He's gained over a pound since his 6-month appointment! This is more validation that weaning him was the right thing to do.

Okay--enough talk. Here are some pictures:

This is William with my best friend's daughters (Madison on the left and Lauren on the right). We visited them in Georgia on Friday. The girls are just precious, and as always, I left their house inspired to be a better mother, wife, and person. Tina is awesome--so completely on her game. If I were one-fourth as organized as she is, I'd be doing great!

Here are some pictures from Christmas morning.
Checking out stocking stuffers with Daddy:

Hanging out with Melanie (and her American Girl doll, Kit):
Showing off his pop-up toys. (Check out the bruise on his forehead!)
With Melanie (left) and Katie (right)
Mom's showing off his Christmas outfit. Thanks to Florida's balmy weather, we had to trade the red turtleneck for a white onesie. He's still pretty cute!It's off to bed now for me. I'm planning on taking William to daycare tomorrow, unless he has a terrible night. His doctor told me to hold off on the antibiotic for 2 days to see if the infection will go away on its own. If he's still super fussy after two days, then I should fill it. In the meantime, I'm giving him Tylenol. So we'll see how he does tomorrow. It may be a short day for me!

Blogging from sunny Florida

Well, we're here in sunny Florida, and so far, so good. William seems to have caught a cold, but it hasn't really slowed him down. Our plane ride went pretty well. The flight left at 7:15, which is William's bedtime, so I had visions of giving him his bottle as the plane took off, and then he would fall asleep and sleep in my arms the whole way. Well, that didn't exactly happen. He was way too interested in what was going on around him. He drank some of his bottle, tore up the Sky Mall magazine, played with the tray table, "played" with the people sitting behind us, and checked everyone out as I walked up and down the aisle with him a few times. Then he FINALLY settled down a little as we started descending and hit some turbulence, and then he fell asleep right as we touched down. So I got to carry a sleeping baby off the plane, all the way to baggage claim, and then hold him while we got our bags. He woke up when I put him in his carseat, of course. But he slept pretty well in the pack 'n' play, and took two good naps yesterday. So things are good. He loves his cousins. And yesterday we got to visit with two of my best friends and their families, and he was very well behaved for that. So I can't complain!

My only complaint is that I don't have the right kind of clothes for him. His 6-month clothes are cold-weather clothes, and it's 70-something degrees here. I found a few things before I left, so I guess we'll just recycle those.

Okay--I may or may not be back before Christmas, so Merry Christmas everyone! I'll try to post pictures when I do come back.

It's official. I'm insane!

It is midnight and I have spent the last hour making a scrapbook page for William's daycare teacher. She is retiring after 15 years as the lead infant teacher, so one of the moms thought it would be neat for everyone to make a scrapbook page for her. So here's my page. Keep in mind that I've never done this before. I'm actually pretty proud of it!


Well, we are partially packed, and I managed to get through the laundry. So that's progress, right? We have a ride to the airport. And mom bought us formula, baby food, diapers, wipes, a booster seat/high chair, and even an umbrella stroller. So we should be all set. I just need to pack the diaper bag tomorrow and remember our toiletries. I'm feeling good because we fit everything in one huge suitcase! (Clothes for me, William, and Ed!) I can't say I was thinking clearly when I packed, though, so I will probably get there and have nothing appropriate to wear. Oh well. I'm going to bed now. I'm insane for staying up this late the night before our trip. But what can you do. I guess it's adrenalin. Here are the pictures I was trying to post yesterday:

Catching up

We had a crazy busy weekend, and here it is, already late Monday night. On Saturday, I left the house around 10:00 a.m. to go run errands, drop by a friend's house (who had a baby in November), and go to a bridal shower. Meanwhile, Ed took William over to his parents house. I met them there after the shower, and we celebrated Hanukkah/Christmas with his family. We had a really good time, and William was sooo good, as usual. William and I spent the night, while Ed went to his gig and then back home. When William woke up in the middle of the night for his bottle, however, he decided that he wasn't too crazy about going back to sleep in the crib, so I brought him into bed with me. He went to sleep, but for a few minutes, he kept looking up, checking out everything around him, and then he'd put his head back down. It was pretty funny. He must have done that 4 or 5 times before going to sleep. I guess he was just trying to figure out where he was. When he woke up in the morning (7:15! Yay!), I was still asleep, so he banged on my arm and face a little. When I opened my eyes, he had a huge grin for me. What a great way to wake up!

Anyway, I'm feeling a little panicky about our trip to Florida in TWO days. I'm trying to get through laundry (which I didn't finish because we were so busy this weekend), and I've made lists of what I want to bring. I just need to remind myself that we can buy anything that we might forget. It's not that big of a deal. We're trying to figure out our ride to the airport. We may just have to call a cab.

Well, I'm sure there are lots of more interesting things to talk about, but I got an iPod Nano for Christmas, and I want to upload some tunes before our trip! I feel pretty hip now. Of course, the sad thing is that I will probably upload Sesame Street tunes first, since I can connect the iPod in my car.

Well, I wanted to post pictures, but Blogger is being weird for some reason. I guess I'll try tomorrow.

School pictures

I just want to post William's school picture today. I'm tired and way past ready for bed.


It would have been great if William had smiled for his school pics, but this expression is priceless, too. Apparently, after a few minutes of the camera flashing and the photographer trying to get William to smile, he went into full crying mode. Poor William!

Daycare woes

I think I have expressed before how much I love William's current daycare and how I'm happy to be a working mom knowing my child is well cared for. That still holds true, but today, I'm a little irritated with the center. When I went to pick up William at 4:45 today, his classroom was empty and one of the teachers was cleaning the room. It turned out that they had some kind of epidemic this morning, and 4 babies went home showing signs of rotavirus (projectile vomiting and diarrhea), and the rest of the babies' mom's just happened to stop by and took their babies home early to prevent them from getting exposed to the virus. AND NO ONE CALLED ME!!! William was the only baby left there. He spent the afternoon with the mobile infants. (He, of course, had a blast, and the mobile teachers loved him, which makes me happy because he'll move to that room in just 2 short months, but that's not the point!)

Now, they don't know for sure that it's rotavirus. It could be norovirus, or some other kind of stomach virus. But still--when that many babies come down with the same thing, I just think it should be protocol that you call all the parents and let them know what's going on, and give them the choice of picking up their baby. And furthermore, if I was one of the mobile infants parents, I'd be mad that they put an exposed child in their classroom. It can take up to 24 hours for the symptoms to show up. So far, William seems fine. But still. It's just a little irritating. And I plan to say something tomorrow about the policy. I'm still happy with the center, though, and hope this is just one dumb choice on their part and not a preview of things to come.

I'm also disappointed because today is William's 7-month birthday, and I forgot to take pictures of him. I wanted to take pictures of him with a string of lighted Christmas lights. I've seen other people do it, and it makes such a cute picture. But they probably would have turned out blurry anyway. I can always try tomorrow night. I did, however, make some homemade baby food pears for William tonight. I pureed them and put them in an ice tray to make individual portions. I think each cube is about 1 ounce. When they're frozen, I'll take them out and put them in a freezer bag, and then we'll see how they turn out when they thaw. It was really easy and much more economical than the store-bought kind. But that's because we received the pears as a Christmas gift! I'm not sure how the math would work out if I had to buy the pears. I think the baby food containers hold about 2.5 ounces, and a pack of 2 sells for $1.19 I think. So that's almost $.24/ounce. So I have 14 cubes of pears, which comes to $3.36. And I think I used 5 pretty big pears. But since I don't know how much the pears weighed, this is a useless effort right now. I'll have to come back to it after a trip to the grocery store. I have a sweet potato that I want to puree, too.

Anyway, last night, William slept straight from 7:00 until almost 4 a.m. Then he drank his whole bottle and went back to sleep, but woke up at 5:30. So I put his pacifier back in his mouth and laid down on the bed in his room, and we both slept until 7:00 a.m. But then I was running late, and without thinking, I walked out of the house without my house or car keys. Aghhhh! But luckily, I remembered that our kitchen door was open, but our back patio is surrounded by a 6-foot fence. So I knocked on our next-door neighbor's door and asked her to watch William while I ran around to the back and climbed over the fence (ruining my pants in the process) and let myself in the house. What a morning!

Time to go to bed now. I started my list of what we need to bring to Florida, and what I plan to have my mom buy for us there. That's progress, right?

Chillin' with Santa

William got to sit and visit with Santa a couple of weeks ago, but I never posted the pictures. So here they are. We got lucky and got an excellent Santa, and William was enthralled. It took us a while to get his attention so he would stop looking at Santa and look at the camera. Too cute!


We have one week until our trip to Florida and I am woefully unprepared. But I did manage to send out our holiday cards today. And I have mostly finished our Christmas shopping. We are doing the gift exchange with Ed's family on Saturday (Hanukkah), and I had almost all of the gifts for my family shipped to my sister's. So I just have a few odds and ends that I'm hoping to take care of Thursday night. What I really need to do, though, is make my list of what we need to bring on our trip, and what I need to get my mom to buy, and what I need to get my sister to borrow. Ugh. I hope traveling with William ends up being like everything else with him--so much easier than I expected.

This morning, William woke up at 6:00 a.m., and I was sooo tired and wanted to sleep a little longer. So I got William out of his crib and laid down on his bed with him and he went back to sleep! He actually slept in the bed with me! I put him back in his crib after about 10 minutes because I wasn't very comfortable, but it was so nice to cuddle with him for a few minutes. I thought he might never be a cuddly baby. But I'm glad I was wrong. I certainly don't want to start the habit of him sleeping in the bed with us (and since we sleep in a full-size bed, we don't have room anyway), but every once in a while, for a few hours, it's really nice.

Add one more to the "I love it when . . . " list

Back in September, I posted an entry titled "I love it when . . . ." I have one more thing for that list. For the past several nights, William has started doing something new that I absolutely love. Every night after his bath, I sit with him in the glider in his room and give him his bottle, and then I put him in his crib. Sometimes he falls asleep drinking his bottle, but usually he turns his head to let me know he's done and then gets antsy, so I burp him and put him down with his pacifier and his blanket. Well, for the last several nights, after he's had enough of his bottle, he twists around in my arms and lies on my chest and puts his head on my shoulder. It is just about the sweetest thing I have experienced as a mother. He spent his first 6 weeks of life sleeping on my chest (and only on my chest!), and since then, he hasn't been a very snuggly baby and he hasn't slept on my chest or even in my arms. He loves to be held, but usually wants to be face out, and rarely sits still for very long. So I am loving it that we have started this new ritual. I snuggle with him and rock for a minute or two before reluctantly getting up and putting him in his crib. And I am hoping that this ritual lasts a long time. I just can't describe how much my heart swells with this one little gesture--just a baby resting his head on his mother's shoulder. I also want Ed to experience this, too, so I will try to make sure he gets a few turns at putting William to bed. But again, it will be reluctantly.

We've hit a groove

This is by far my favorite baby age/phase. William has become so easy and so fun. He's crawling (well--dragging himself actually) everywhere and entertains himself. He's great when we take him out. He's sleeping great and falling alseep by himself--even for naps. I couldn't ask for anything better right now! Of course, I know everything is just a phase, and this, too, shall pass. But I am going to enjoy every minute of it!

Today he took a morning nap for an hour and a half, and then this afternoon, he slept for an hour. He probably would have slept longer, but he was sleeping face down in his crib, and it made me nervous, so Ed went in to check on him and he woke up. But still--an hour is really good for him! And last night, and tonight, and for his second nap today, I just put him in his crib, gave him his paci and his blanket, and he went right to sleep without any fussing at all. Ahhhhh---progress! And he's been waking up just once in the night for an entire week. So keep your fingers crossed that our good fortune continues!

We're having a busy weekend so far. Our friends came over today with their daughter who is two weeks younger than William. William showed off his scooting skills and shared his toys. We enjoyed socializing with another couple who have a baby the same age as William. Tomorrow is my Goddaughter's 4th birthday party. I'm looking forward to watching William interact with the older kids. I hope he gets another good morning nap so that he'll be in a good mood. I'm sure he'll sleep on the way home. Other than that, I'm trying to get a handle on the laundry, and working on our holiday cards.

Here are some pictures of William eating peas. So far we haven't given him anything he hasn't liked. He's eaten peas, green beans, sweet potatos, squash, applesauce, pears, and prunes. And oatmeal cereal, and rice cereal. He also loves his Zweiback toast. Although he drops them on the floor and they end up with cat hair on them and I have to throw them away. He also likes ice in his mesh feeder.


Well, I have laundry to fold and envelopes to address. I promise to update this more often. I can't believe I haven't posted since Tuesday!

Playing

William had a very good day at daycare, and was still in a good mood when we got home tonight. So after I changed his clothes (he had to put on a new outfit at daycare and the back-up outfit they pulled out for him was WAY too small. Oops!) and changed my clothes, we sat down in the living room and I pulled out a few toys. Not too long ago, I bought some Fisher Price plastic balls that all have different noise-makers inside (one has a little bell, for example, and another has tiny beads). I pulled some of those out tonight and he got ahold of one and sort of threw it and it rolled across the hardwood floor. Well William thought this was the funniest thing he had ever seen. He started cracking up and immediately chased after the ball and threw it again. He just laughed and laughed and thought this was the best game ever. He dragged himself all over the living room and dining room chasing after the ball. It was the cutest thing I've ever seen. I think that's the first time I've seen him crack up at something other than me or Ed tickling him or making funny noises or faces. He was actually playing a game by himself. I wish Ed had been there to see him. Maybe he'll do it again tomorrow night.

I swear--every day is something new with him now. I am loving this age and phase of his life, though. His teachers at daycare said every time he saw the rear door of the classroom open today, he'd try to make his way toward the door. He's on a mission I guess. I think he's finally realized that he can actually get places now. He's moving around a lot more at home, too. We still have a lot of babyproofing to do!

He has been sleeping pretty well, too--only waking up once during the night to eat, somewhere between 2:00 and 3:30. I think he's pretty hungry when he wakes up, because he sucks down the bottle really quickly. But maybe he would suck it down regardless. I might try to gradually reduce the amount of formula I put in the bottle and see if that has any effect. I'm not going to worry about it, though, until after we get back from Florida.

Well, I'm going to try to get a little shopping done before I go to bed tonight. Thank God for the Internet!

Teeth!

This will be a short post because I'm tired and want to go to bed soon. But I just had to report that William got his first teeth! That's right--not tooth, but teeth! There's one on the bottom and one on the top. I think they literally poked through today. In fact, I think I know the exact moment they poked through because right before we left to go to Ed's parents, William got super fussy, and he wasn't hungry and nothing seemed to placate him. So we went ahead and put him in the car and I tried giving him my finger to suck on, and that's when I felt his teeth. Pretty crazy. He's definitely been chewing on a lot of stuff, and drooling a lot, but I thought he'd be a lot fussier for a lot longer when the teeth actually worked their way through. What a trooper! And it doesn't seem to be affecting his sleep any.

Last night he woke up once, and this morning, he took a long nap. And tonight he fell asleep by himself (after having fallen asleep in the car on the way home from Ed's parents) and I didn't even have to give him his pacifier. So life is good right now. Ed and I enjoyed out afternoon shopping. I think we were gone for about 3 hours. Felt a little bit like old times. Except that my boobs were like rocks. I pumped tonight, and he nursed this morning when he woke up for a few minutes. So tomorrow I'll go all day again, and probably pump tomorrow night. But no pumping at work tomorrow. Woo-hoo!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas . . .

We had a really great day today. To begin with, William had a great night. He only woke up once, at 2:30, and I gave him a formula bottle (6 oz.), most of which he sucked right down, and he went right back to sleep and slept until 7:00 a.m.! The whole bottle thing was much less hassle than I thought! My boobs were killing me though, so I didn't get much sleep. Plus I think I'm just so used to getting up so often in the night, so I wake up anyway. Hopefully I will get used to sleeping for longer stretches of time!

I'm officially weaning, by the way, which is why my boobs were killing me (and still are!). I pumped once yesterday at work, and then pumped last night. And this morning, William nursed for a few minutes when he woke up. He also nursed for a few minutes when he woke up from his afternoon nap, so that helped a little. I'm going to try not to pump tonight and see how it goes. I feel really sad that I'm letting my milk dry up, but I think it's the best thing for us.

Anyway--after we woke up, William and I went to the grocery store while Ed cleaned up the house and vacuumed. And when William took his morning nap, I went to Babies R Us and got a couple of cute outfits for William (not what I went for, of course, but that's okay). Then we packed up William and headed downtown to the Mall (where all the monuments and museums are) to take pictures for our holiday cards. It was a beautiful day (although a little cold) and William did soooo well. After we got our pictures, we went to Union Station and ate lunch, and again, William was so good. I don't know why it always surprises me that he is so good when we're out and about, because he always is. Then he fell asleep right before we got home, and took a good long nap at home. (He woke up, but I nursed him back to sleep.)

While he slept, Ed and I made and ordered our holiday cards, so check that off the list! And I think I'm in such a good mood because I've gotten a lot of our Christmas shopping done on-line. And I even put up a few Christmas decorations. I'm starting to feel much less overwhelmed and a little more in the Christmas spirit. Tomorrow we're going over to Ed's parents, and we're leaving William there for a few hours while Ed and I go shopping and out to lunch. Yay--alone time with my hubby! I'm really looking forward to that.

Well I can't post the pictures we took today because that would give away our holiday cards, but I'll post a few others instead. Ed learned how to take b/w photos with our digital camera:

And here's the best picture of the ones I tried to take with Baba (my mom). It would have been so cute if it wasn't blurry: