Rollin', Rollin', Rollin' Rawhide!!!!

Just a quick lil' update because it's momma's bedtime....after she folds the laundry. I'd like to announce that we have liftoff....in the form of rolling!! It's true, TJ can now roll effectively and consistantly from his back to his tummy!! He's so pleased with himself he'll just keep rolling back and forth and back and forth, even in his crib, while he sleeps! Momma's so proud and daddy actually got to see it today as well- BONUS! Now if only he could sit by himself for longer than a minute......

Happily, Acy has tomorrow AND Tuesday off so we're planning something hardcore- like cleaning the whole house (looooong over due and I hereby officially apologize to and thank those who've been kind enough to visit us in our pigsty of a house.)

Lastly, today was the day Cissy's remains were buried. Oddly enough she was buried over our grandfather Norman's coffin (I didn't even know you could do that.) I wanted to be there with all my heart but unfortunately the day and time that was chosen was the least available to me as I had to take care of baby and there was slim to none possibility of driving four and half hours one way by 11am then four and a half hours back in the same day. So instead, I've put on "Your Beautiful" (the song that was supposedly played the most on her Ipod) and am having a glass of red wine, flipping through her a photo album of her in Japan that her mother gave me (I'll do the laundry later.) Here's to you 'ster.

'Ster at my wedding: 10/16/10

Lucky Number 7!!

You've survived more than half a year baby! Believe it or not, that IS something to celebrate in mommy's eyes. We've had our challenges this month, that is for certain and it seems that they're not over just because you've hit that special number.

Although you started your seventh month of life fantastically; You were sleeping through the night, simply pleasant during the day and it looked like things were really starting to get into the groove of things between mommy and you. Then, like a horrible horror movie plot, your bottom two teeth started to rear their ugly (secretly adorable) little heads >_<; At first it seemed like you didn't even notice them really. Sure, you were drooling so much that a bib became a permanent fixure and we really had to watch anything withint your arm span for fear of it being shoved into your perfect little mouth, but overall you were still a delight night and day.

Then mommy and daddy went on their little Babymoon to Duluth and you were knocked off your sleeping schedule a bit. Normally, I think you would have taken it in stride, but either the sleeping interference made you wake up to the fact that you were in pain or it was a coincidence that you chose that moment to become a little shi-ummm....monster because the night we got home you were awake and screaming you head off like someone had just killed Mr. Penguin- I'd like to point out that he's right there by your shoulder every night.

So the moral of the story is, that you have two shiny new teeth halfway through your gums and you're awake and crying almost every hour- and mommy's right there with you....crying.... So here's where you readers can input your advice and experience...please...for the LOVE!! Is he in pain still from teething though the teeth have already cut through the gums? We're giving him 1.5 ml of children's Tylenol but he's still crying....what do you all out there advise us to do next?

Ok, back to the more positive growth you've had.... You are now a ROLLING MACHINE! You are gracefully rolling from your stomach to your back (almost so well that mommy's considering putting you on your tummy for bed) and you are thisclose to rolling from your back to your stomach. In fact, if I just support your back you can throw that leg around and get enough momentum to roll that gut over!


And this wasn't even your BEST attempt!

You're also semi-sitting by yourself. You're cool if you're leaning forward almost folded in half but the moment something catches your fancy off to the side and you sway that 97th percentile head, you start to fall. You're definitely getting there though and I have no doubt that you'll be a pro by the end of the month!

It's also so fun to put a toy just out of your reach. You can tell that you reaaaaaally want it and sometimes you can semi-crawl/roll/scooch/rake your hands out enough that you can finally get to it (seriously, you do a really funny combination of all of these things.) It's definitely an improvement to only being able to spin in a circle on your tum tum!!

So you ARE developing despite mommy's constant worry that you're lagging and mommy loves to hear your shouts of encouragement (in the form of babbling, raspberries, and what looks to be an actual cheer when you grab both of your feet and kick them up) and though she's sad that you renigged on the deal to get dentures later in life rather than grow teeth, your smile can still light up the room and life the fear in mommy's heart every time (even in the middle of the night when you should be sleeping.) Keep growing young grasshopper and we'll keep doing our best to get you to where you need to go! Love, mommy (and daddy)

"Can I See Your ID Please"

No, I did not get arrested or carded (not recently at least...carded) but these last few days I've been struggling a little with an identity crisis. Something I feel like is probably pretty common with new(ish) moms but that doesn't really make it any easier. While I love being a wife and mother and I wouldn't trade it for anything in the world, I'm feeling like I lost a little of myself in the year-ish transition.

While some people dream of being a stay-at-home-mom, it's hard for me. I never thought I would be and I completely miss the social aspects and self-confidence booster that comes from working. Unfortunately I haven't been able to find anything (work-wise) that would allow us to be in the financial situation to put TJ in a daycare that I'd be comfortable with. Nor would I consider asking my mom and dad to take TJ like so many people I know- I feel like that's too much of a burden on them and they're done raising kids (paid their dues if you will) and now they should be able to have the freedom that they deserve in retirement. Besides, they help quite a bit as it is and need to spread their love and time between three grandkids!

I envy those who either had the ability to take their time and enjoy their marriage for a few years before diving into having children as well as those who fell into parenthood like it was a familiar, warm, cozy bed. It amazes me to see some of Acy's friend as well as my own two friends that have babies, seemingly navigate their first born with ease while I constantly feel like I'm struggling to keep my head above the water and my baby alive and looked after (he wants for nothing though people!)

I realize that I should be writing about how amazing he is (because he really IS a genius) and all of the growth he's gone through and not whining about how I cringe when I hear him crying at night because his teeth hurt (I think), but I can't help but look myself over as a parent at this juncture in time and grade myself. But how do you grade yourself in parenting? Technically he's still alive, thriving- has more chins than a Chinese phone book- and developmentally seems to be doing well. I just feel as though that's all a fluke of his own accord and not anything that I've really done to get him there. So, how do you know when enough is good enough? How or WHEN do you manage to just KNOW what your baby needs and when?

Save Me!!

I was checking out one of the seventeen thousand cloth diaper/green living blogs that I follow (only a slight exaggeration) and stumbled upon this cloth diaper savings calculator. Inputing the cost of the diapers I've bought and the cost of doing laundry- soap and power usage- and subtracting it from the cost that I would have spent on disposables and it spit out these statistics:
You will break even in 26.94 weeks or 6.2 months. You will save $346.9 in 10 months. You will save $529.54 in 1 year. You will save $1077.43 in 1 1/2 years.
Not too shabby eh?! That's not even including the fact that I'm using reusable wipes. Although the savings are nothing to sneeze at, I know I could've saved a bit more had I been a little smarter about my first purchases. I love love love my BumGenius 4.0s, but I'm also finding that I really enjoy the prefolds and covers. The snappi and flats are great backups but definitely not my go-to diapers. The flats dry so quickly and wash so well, but they also are a little difficult to put on a squirmy baby. The Cutey Baby's have been put in the far back part of the changing table as a last resort even after the flats. Some people like the all-in-one factor that keeps things easy to stuff, wash and keep track of, but they're a bit of a hazard when baby poops- too often the poo goes between the cracks where you tuck the main insert into the middle opening so it oozes and actually soils the cover and good luck getting that rinsed well. All poop aside, I feel pretty good about my purchases thus far! I'll have to recalculate things in another couple of months though as see how the savings are then.....dun dun DUNNNNN!

Off to Grandma's We Go!!

Well, we're all back home safe and sound (though some of us a little worse-for-wear than the others.) Acy and I decided to take a little Babymoon and go up to Grandma's Marathon in Duluth (northern Minnesota) while baby stayed with Nani and Bapa at the cabin in Alexandria (along with his Auntie Beth, Uncle Jim and cousins!)

Acy's alive after running 26.2 MILES at Grandma's Marathon and finished with a very respectable time of 4 hours and 20(something) minutes, though I think having only run about four times this year before hand is taking a bit of a toll on him- he's walking kind of like he just got off a horse after riding a day. But he finished and in my books, that's amazing! Overall, I think he actually really enjoyed himself, despite his disappointment in his time. We were able to have some yummy appetizers the evening of the race with some well-deserved beers (at least on their part), we had breakfast at our usual coffee/pancake house (The Vanilla Bean) and Masa and Acy had some time together after the race and that afternoon to happily rehash the individual times for each mile, where they struggled, etc. Ahhh, the bromance continues.

I, happily, decided not to go to the finish line this year and stayed at the campsite where I caught up on my sleep, read half of my book (The Magicians) and listened to my music while having a gentle breeze pass through my tent and over my bare feet. It was perfect- much better than having to go through the stop-and-go, one-lane traffic to get into Duluth, find a parking spot and successfully park, walk about two miles myself, see them finish (hopefully) only to lose them in a crowd of about 15,000 people and have to find them again after they exited the runner's area= HEADACHE!! So it all worked out; I got to relax and enjoy my day alone and Acy and Masa got to be the crazy fools they are and run in 50 degree, slightly rainy and windy weather.

Instead of spending the last day relaxing and recouperating from the race, we had to drive back that morning after a delicious breakfast to attend a wedding at 2:30 Sunday afternoon. So we got home around 12:30, jumped in the shower, threw on some decent clothes and jumped back in the car (where I proceeded to poke my eyes with my mascara as I tried to put on makeup) to drive to downtown Minneapolis and hop on a boat that would take us on a little "cruise" up and down the Mississippi while we saw Acy's friends from Origami get married!! It was a lovely wedding and the weather held up perfectly for it- a little cloudy and humid but the sun peaked out and there was a gentle breeze off the river.
When we got home last night at 10 we were ready to crash but couldn't help but sneak down to see our baby (who was awake and crying actually) and smother him with kisses. There really is no feeling in the world like seeing your baby, your heart again. I missed him and today he's spending time with daddy (daddy even took him to his work for a little while so he could put in an order for fish) but tomorrow he's all MINE again- and I'm very happy about that for once!!

And, as always, I must speak about my cloth diapers- I had to run over to Peapods again after I dropped baby off at Auntie Beth and Uncle Jim's house (they were super sweet and took TJ to the cabin with them so we didn't have to drive two and half hours out of our way) because I had to pick up some more Bac-Out and Rockin Green laundry detergent. I was intrigued in hearing that Rockin Green is now a "remix" and that their formula is slightly different so we'll have to see how that compares. I also couldn't resist the Econobum trial-pack in green that comes with a shell and three pre-folds. I also, then, had to pick up another Duo cover in Bluebird, a Duo set that comes with two pads, and a Thirsties hemp insert- all just to try them out, ever the explorer in this world of cloth diapering.

Now, I need an opinion! How do you feel about someone putting a drying-rack out on the deck on sunny days (bringing it in after the day and not as a permanent fixture) to sun-bleach their clothes? What if said deck was in view of the road?

El Cabino

You all may know that my parents have a cabin up in Alexandria and that I've already spent a ton of time up there, but it's great to get out of the citys, be around other people/family and even have a little help with TJ since I'm basically a single parent five out of seven days. Last weekend I carted TJ back up to the cabin after being home only a few days to celebrate my dad's birthday. As usual, we had delicious food, TJ got his Nani and Bapa fix and I was able to get a few more hours of shut-eye while they watched him for me. The weather really couldn't have been any better- it was sunny pretty much all three days I was up there and the weather was warm but not terribly humid which allowed me to go for walks every day and we also took TJ on his first boat ride!

Not especially happy about this...

I think we need to take him out a few more times before he'll feel really comfortable (and maybe get him a bigger life jacket as this one crowds his face too much.)

We both really love it up at the cabin (I mean, who wouldn't really) and I'm looking forward to a fun summer, especially because Jimmy and Beth will be up there fairly often as well with my adorable little nieces! Hope everyone else got a chance to get out and enjoy the beautiful weather before it got smoking hot (103 here I believe.) Thank goodness for air conditioning!

Thanks for stopping by!

He may not have liked the boat but he loves the swing!

Growing The 'Stash'

So....since starting cloth diapering, I've become a bit of an addict. I check at least three of the cloth diaper online stores every day to see if they have anything on sale or any great deals or new prints that I just can't pass up or, if I'm to be completely honest, pretend to add things to the virtual shopping cart but not checkout and actually spend the money but still get the pleasure of having purused everything and picked out my wants. It's bad...really bad.

We now have our stash of 24 BumGenius 4.0 snap one-size pockets, 1 Flip cover, 1 Bummis Super Whisper Wrap cover, 4 GDiapers (in medium though so we really will have to upgrade those sooner rather than later) 2 Swaddlebee's econosnaps, 2 prefolds, and 12 birdseye flat diapers. You may have noticed that I've left out the 6 CuteyBaby diapers but that's because they're my least favorite of my lovely stash and will only be used in emergencies I think (the velcro keeps poking baby no matter how we try and secure it- he's too squirmy.)

In addition I've also built up a nice supply of accessories- two wet bags, two pail liners, two sticks of GroVia, 3 dozen cloth wipes, and 3 regular snappis and 1 toddler snappi. This kid wants for nothing beacuse I just want it all!!! More specifically, I want to try/collect them all!! That's where I feel a little awkward...has cloth diapering become my hobby?

I also would like to note that hubby has been completely supportive but weary of how much money we're actually saving (not unjustifiably admittedly.) Although I'm using the savings toward buying more (and so not really saving a whole lot) I am trying to compensate for using more water/running another load of laundry by line drying all the diapers so that we're still conserving some energy if not water.

I did read taht the more of a stash that you have, the larger the likelyhood of it lasting through another child because you're rotating between so many diapers they don't get worn out as quickly. That helps ease my conscious a little...