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Today Sophie napped for 3 WHOLE hours. I don’t know what came over her, but she would not wake up. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining, I just don’t understand what triggers those nice long naps. I know that babies change their schedule all the time, but I mean they have to settle at one point? As soon as I think that I have her figured ot she goes and changes on me again.
We were working on her going down for bed byherself and sleeping well at night, and that turned out well. At first She would wake up after 40 min and scream, but eventually stopped doing that. During that time she would sleep very long stretches of sleep (8-12hours), then eat and go back to sleep for another few hours. Now that she falls asleep right away she wakes up 2-4 times during the night. I just don’t get it. She doesn’t wake from hunger, she just wants to play. Can you tell I’m tired? I thought that by this age they get into a better sleep routine. I blame Brad for the bad sleeping habits, I was a good sleeper. If the naps are good, night time sleep is bad, and if the night time sleep is good, naps are bad. I guess i can’t have it all.
Sorry for the huge rant, I just feel like I don’t get my own kid most of the time. Ireally do think that they should come with instruction manuals. There would be way less messed up people. Parenting is hard…
Today Brad and I went out on hunt for boxes. As you may know we are moving back to BC next month, and we have a lot of stuff to pack. When we both came out here (Edmonton), we each had a car load of stuff, now we need a U-haul to get all the stuff out. Shows how much we stuff we’ve accumulated over 2 years. Anyway, you’d think it would be easy to find boxes, but no, we had to go to three different places.
So now I’m in the process of packing up our bedroom. Sophie and I are flying out to BC on April 2oth, and I’m coming back on the 23rd to finish cleaning up. I’m leaving Sophie with my parents, seeing as how I don’t think she would enjoy a 12hour driving trip with 2 howling cats in the back.
We are going to stay with my parents for a couple of months, and then try to fond our own place. Not sure where we’re going to be living yet, but I’m sure that will be figured out soon enough.
Ok, that’s it for today, sorry no picture. I woun’t blog everyday from now until we move, too busy, too many things to get done.
Yesterday I was waiting for Sophie to wake up from her nap to write a new post, but she kept sleeing and sleeping, and as soon as I opened up my computer she woke up. You’d think that after a 2 1/2 hour nap she would be happy, but no, there were crankies up the ying yang. So after all that I decided that instead of a blog I would take a nap. I like naps, they make me happy.
In one of my previous posts I talked about Sophie being obsessed with standing, so this is a follow up of that. I couldn’t hold her up all the time, so Brad and I decided that maybe we should get her an exersaucer. I wasn’t sure if she would like it, since she pays no attention to her boucer. Most babies get excited and jump in those, not mine, she just sits and stares at me. I went to Toys “R” Us and picked one up for her hoping that I didn’t waste a bunch of money for nothing. At first she looked at me with that blank stare, “what is this thing you put me in?” But after a little while she figured the whole thing out. When the exersaucer is rocked it plays music, didn’t take her long to figure that one out, and oh my does she get excited about that. Today she learned that the chair twists and she dosn’t just ahve to stare at one toy.
I am sooooo glad that I got it for her, now My hands are free and I can actually get some things done around the house.
Onto another note, Brad found out that we are able to move next month so I am not in the process of going through our stuff and trying to organize and pack. i’m so excited to come back home. Ahhhh no more Lakeless Edmonton summers…More on that later, monkey has to go take a nap.
I have a picture of her in the exersaucer, but I can’t find the USB cord to download them. Check back later, I’ll have it up sometime today.
I Love Looking At Myself !!!
What IS This???
Today I had my appointment with the Lactation Consultant. It went pretty well, she gave me some very good pointers. I also got a bunch of stuff to help me with breasteeding, nipple sheilds, pump stuff, and some suringe things. All the free things that she gave me added up to good $80.00, and I didn’t have to spend a cent. I really appreacited all the help that provided.
The LC checked sophie out, she weighs 13lbs 12oz, still little but doing well. She also got me to try to breastfeed her, and of course Sophie threw a fit. Basically what I have to do from now on is refuse to give Sophie any bottles and make her breastfeed. The LC told me that it might take a day or two of alot of protest crying, but a hungry baby won’t starve herself and will eventually eat from the breast. I have to wait until I have full supply, otherwise it will all be pointless. She upped me from 10mg of Domperidone to 20mg, and said that withing a month or so I can stop taking it and should be able to nurse without supplementing. I’m really hoping that this will all work out, but if she ABSOLUTLEY refuses to take the breast I can alays continue pumping. I’d rather do that then give her formula.
So, I’m the boss and I have to make my baby listen to me. If only it were as easy as it sounds. I’ll let you know how it all worked out. Bye Bye….
Here’s my little fatty
Since I don’t have anything new to write about Sophie, I thought that I would dedicate today’s blog to marriage. For those of you whom are considering getting married, here are a few reasons why it’s great to be married.
- You get to be with the person you love all the time. I don’t mean that you have to be attached at the hip, but you get to spend time together knowing that it is not just a fling. That you both vowed to be true to one another and that your love for each other is the reason that you are together.
- You know that no matter how angry you are at each other, the fight will eventually resolve and you will be happy again. I say this because yesterday Brad and I got in an argument over nothing, and we were both pretty ticked, but about 10 min later it was like it never happened. Our fights never last more then a few minutes, and we do not hold grudges. We know that it’s stupid and try to get over ourselves and move on.
- You always have someone to cuddle with. If you’ve had a bad day, when you come home you get to see your favorite person and have a nice cuddle. That always makes that bad day a better day.
- You no longer have to have those irresponsible roommates that drove you nuts. You know the ones that never paid rent in time and stole you clothes. And you no longer need to have 4 ketchup’s in your fridge because you can’t decide how to split the price of groceries. Now you live with someone whom most likely wont fit into your clothes, can’t be late with rent, and won’t need to buy 4 ketchup’s.
- You get to use the phrase “what’s yours is MINE” (visa versa). Unless you’re the one with all the good stuff, then you don’t get that on your pros list.
- You get to make wonderfully beautiful babies and know that what you’ve created are the best parts of you. That little baby will always represent the love that you had for one another.
- That’s it… There are many more reasons, but I’m tired so I will stop here.
GO GET MARRIED!!!
I have a weird family. I just asked Brad to charge the battery to our digital camera, and on his way to the outlet he managed to fall and hurt himself. The distance is about 2-3 feet, see, weird family. And now that he is sitting on the floor Twiggles (the obsessive cat) is already on top of him.
Anyway, that’s not what I was going to write about, I am going to tell you about my little addict. Sophie has this really weird fascintion with computer/TV screens. She could be happily playing with one of us, but as soon as she spots one of our computers or that the TV is on, her head turns that way and there’s no way of distracting her from it. It funny because when she is really cranky, all we have to do it open up a computer screen and all is well again. I keep thinking that she’s going to turn out to be a computer geek, just like her daddy. 
Her new thing that has discovered is standing. The little stinker wants nothing to do with sitting, she MUST stand at ALL times. Her poor little legs can’t handle her weight for that long, and when she crashes she just gets mad and wants to go up again. I’m really shocked how well she can do it though. I don’t even have to hold her, just give her my fingers for balance, is that normal for a 4 month old? I thought they re supposed to learn to sit unassisted first? Nope, wants nothing to do with sitting, standing is the “in” thing now…
Anyway, back to the computer screen thing. I know that kids watching TV is a controversial topic, and I’m not for them spending countless hours infront of the screen, but is 10-15 a day that bad? Sometimes I like to watch certain shows, and she is up at that time, is it bad for her to watch it with me? This parenting thing looked easier then it is. I have a really cute picture of her and the computer, but I can’t upload it right now because the battery is charging. Check back in couple of hours, it will be up.
My little computer geek
Anna Quindlen, Newsweek Columnist and Author
All my babies are gone now. I say this not in sorrow but in disbelief. I take great satisfaction in what I have today: three almost-adults, two taller than I am, one closing in fast. Three people who read the same books I do and have learned not to be afraidof disagreeing with me in their opinion of them, who sometimes tell vulgar jokes that make me laugh until I choke and cry, who need razor blades and shower gel and privacy, who want to keep their doors closed more than I like. Who, miraculously, go to the bathroom, zip up their jackets and move food from plate to mouth all by themselves. Like the trick soap I bought for the bathroom with a rubber ducky at its center, the baby is buried deep within each, except through the unreliable haze of the past.
Everything in all the books I once poured over is finished for me now. Penelope Leach., T. Berry Brazelton., Dr. Spock. The ones on sibling rivalry and sleeping through the night and early-childhood education,all grown obsolete. Along with Goodnight Moon and Where the Wild Things Are,they are battered, spotted, well used. But I suspect that if you flipped the pages dust would rise like memories. What those books taught me,finally, and what the women on the playground taught me, and the well-meaning relations –what they taught me, was that they couldn’t really teach me very much at all.
Raising children is presented at first as a true-false test, then becomes multiple choice, until finally, far along, you realize that it is an endless essay. No one knows anything. One child responds well to positive reinforcement, another can be managed only with a stern voice and a timeout. One child is toilet trained at 3, his sibling at 2.
When my first child was born, parents were told to put baby to bed on his belly so that he would not choke on his own spit-up. By the time my last arrived, babies were put down on their backs because of research on sudden infant death syndrome. To a new parent this ever-shifting certainty is terrifying, and then soothing. Eventually you must learn to trust yourself. Eventually the research will follow.
I remember 15 years ago poring over one of Dr. Brazelton’s wonderful books on child development, in which he describes three different sorts of infants: average, quiet,and active. I was looking f or a sub-quiet codicil for an 18-month old who did not walk. Was there something wrong with his fat little legs? Was there something wrong with his tiny little mind? Was he developmentally delayed, physically challenged? Was I insane? Last year he went to China . Next year he goes to college. He can talk just fine. He can walk, too.
Every part of raising children is humbling, too. Believe me, mistakes were made. They have all been enshrined in the, “Remember-When-Mom-Did Hall of Fame.” The outbursts, the temper tantrums, the bad language, mine, not theirs. The times the baby fell off the bed. The times I arrived late for preschool pickup. The nightmare sleepover.
The horrible summer camp. The day when the youngest came barreling out of the classroom with a 98 on her geography test, and I responded, “What did you get wrong?”. (She insisted I include that.)
The time I ordered food at the McDonald’s drive-through speaker and then drove away without picking it up from the window. (They all insisted I include that.) I did not allow them to watch the Simpsons for the first two seasons. What was I thinking?
But the biggest mistake I made is the one that most of us make while doing this. I did not live in the moment enough. This is particularly clear now that the moment is gone, captured only in photographs. There is one picture of the three of them, sitting in the grass on a quilt in the shadow of the swing set on a summer day, ages 6, 4 and 1. And I wish I could remember what we ate, and what we talked about, and how they sounded, and how they looked when they slept that night.
I wish I had not been in such a hurry to get on to the next thing: dinner, bath, book, bed. I wish I had treasured the doing a little more and the get ting it done a little less. Even today I’m not sure what worked and what didn’t, what was me and what was simply life.
When they were very small, I suppose I thought someday they would become who they were because of what I’d done. Now I suspect they simply grew into their true selves because they demanded in a thousand ways that I back off and let them be. The books said to be relaxed and I was often tense, matter-of-fact and I was sometimes over the top. And look how it all turned out. I wound up with the three people I like best in the world, who have done more than anyone to excavate my essential humanity. That’s what the books never told me. I was bound and determined to learn from the experts. It just took me a while to figure out who the experts were.
News update on the breastfeeding mom II:
I went to see my doctor yesterday and she prescribed me Domperidone, which is technically for stomach issues but works really well for people with low milk supply. I’ve been taking it for only one day and can already see a huge difference. Yay to the tiny white pills!!!
Yesterday Brad was playing with Sophie, tossing her in the air, doing airplane, and then all of a sudden a HUGE white Spit-up drool toppled right on top of him. I was watching it happen in slow motion, and luckily Brad’s reflexes were fast enough to move her away from his mouth, that would’ve been hilarious!!!!
I only laugh because it had happened to me before. Sophie doesn’t spit much, in fact I can count on my fingers how many times she’s spit up, but when she does it big. It was all over his shirt, pants, and even got some on the couch. Hahaha, I’m still laughing.
Oh, Brad is finding out soon if he will be graduating this semester, I’m really looking forward to coming home. I just want to go to the movies really bad, and we have no family to babysit here….
Stinker is up from her oh so long nap…jk..bye
She is 13 1/2 pounds now… My baby is growing up
P.S. Here are my weird search engine terms for today (the internet is full of very odd people):
- old lady sex
- watching mom pees
- swaddler made to look like moms hand
A couple of posts ago I had written how sad I was about Sophie refusing to breastfeed. After a couple of days of moping around and feeling sorry for myself, I decided to take things into my own hands. I had done some research and realized that it was quite normal for babies to go on nursing strikes around 4 months, I am not alone. The only problem that I had though is insufficient milk supply. Seeing as how I’ve never done this before, I have no idea how to get it back and start nursing again. So, I did some more research and found myself a breastfeeding clinic. I have an appointment on Monday with a lactation consultant, meanwhile I pump every 3 hours. It had been working, I’m slowly seeing an increase in m supply, now I just have to figure out how to get the little kid to latch and not freak out. I guess that’s where the LC comes in. I’m really hoping that this is going to work, I just CANNOT give it up. Babies are meant to be breastfed!!!! (I’m not chastising mothers whom don’t, because I KNOW hard it is).
On another note, Sophie is sleping a bit better. I think the soother had something to do with it, once I took it away she learned to sleep without a sleeping aid. Still working on it, but atleast I found the problem. But, I always think I’ve found the proble, only to figure out that it was not it. Babies and their daily changes…..
Daddy and Sophia doing “SOPHWEEEEE”
Maybe I’m crazy for wanting another baby seeing as how this one likes giving me a hard time, but I can’t help it. When I first had Sophie I swore that I wouldn’t have another kid for years, but now that the newborn craziness has passed and my body has healed I could really see myself being pregnant again.
Brad said that we have to wait until he graduates next month, and then we can try to have another one. So I’m pretty excited about this. I think I’d like to wait until June so that my next baby is not born middle of winter. That was one of the downfalls of having a baby in the winter, I could never go out anywhere, even now we don’t get out all that much. I’m a firm believer that kids should get outside for a while each day.
Update on Sophie:
I think that she has begun teething again. Her cheeks are getting all red again and she’s chewing on her hands like crazy. I just want those teeth to pop through. They seem to be really bothering her, and have turned my little smiley girl into a cranky cranky kid. I know it will be while before she gets all her teeth, but I’ve heard that some teeth are not as bad as others. I hope she feels better soon, poor baby.
All done for today. Did everyone have a good weekend? 
She’s getting so big for her car seat, and her coat made me laugh…look at the short sleeves
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