Family

July 5, 2010 By

So we had another baby!

I’m so sorry it’s taken me so long to introduce her, but here she is!


Cali
June 8, 2010
7 lbs., 15 oz.
20 inches

Two girls! I’m over the moon! That is to say, I’m completely and utterly exhausted. I’d like to publicly thank all the people that didn’t laugh in my face when I used to say things like, “It will be so much easier when the baby’s on the outside. Babies are easy!”

Yes, I really did say things like that! I will blame it on the delusions of pregnancy. I’m not a good pregnant woman. It hasn’t been the easiest three weeks for sure. The c-section was much harder this time than the first. It all started when they couldn’t find a good spot for my spinal. 87 spine tingling pin pricks later, I ended up with an atypical spinal headache that started the day after the baby was born and lasted a good five days. It was horribly painful, but not painful enough that a patch was required (or requested.)

I missed Meli terribly while I was in the hospital (I only stayed three nights. I figured if I was going to be miserable, I might as well be miserable at home. I was right – it was much better being home.) She freaked out when she visited me there, so we only tried it once. When we got home, it took her a few days to warm up to her new sister, but everything is good now. Unless the baby cries.

Meli does not like it when the baby cries. She gets all upset and starts barking orders at me. “She doesn’t want your booby!” “She doesn’t want her diaper changed!” The baby has a GREAT set of lungs on her and can go from 0 to 60 – meaning full out hyperventilating screams – in about 2.3 seconds. When Cali gets going with her screams, Meli has taken to screeching at the top of her own lungs. This usually happens when we’re in the car. Just the three of us.

Yes. We’ve been getting out. If there’s anything I learned the last time, it’s that staying in the house makes me crazy! I’ve started my walks again – my family gave me this fantastic (HUGE) stroller that I LOVE – and we go to all of Meli’s classes and the mall and anywhere else that isn’t our house. I’m really bummed because we’re having a tremendous heatwave this week and I’m not going to be able to walk in the park.

We’re getting to know our Cali slowly. Right now we know she likes to nurse – a lot! – and burp and fart and spit up. She’s not so into the sleeping. But that’s okay! We love her anyway!

She looks a lot like her big sister, but different too. Her nose, for one thing, and her long skinny fingers and toes. She’s a lot bigger than her sister was, which works out well clothes wise. All of her sister’s summer clothes will fit her! Yay for same sex siblings!

All in all, it’s quite an adjustment, one to two. Especially when one IS two. But we’re getting along and learning and changing and looking forward to what tomorrow brings. Unless it’s more heat.

I’m not sure when I’ll be back to the blog. It’s tough to do anything that’s not kid related right now – although I did knit a few rounds the other day and instantly felt the possibility that sanity is attainable! I’ve actually been dreaming about future knitting projects. Man, that feels good!

Meli will be starting school in the Fall, a couple of hours a day three days a week – who knows? Maybe I’ll get back to this thing on a more regular basis. Hopefully I’ll have a kid that naps then. Meli gave up the nap a million years ago. Yeah. My kids don’t sleep. But they sure are loves!

Hope you’re all doing well and enjoying life! Thanks for reading!
L, C

Filed Under: Baby? OH BABY!, Life

Night

August 11, 2009 By

Today is Meli’s 17 month birthday and I want to get this down.

So we started night weaning last Thursday night. Georgie had Friday off (for his birthday – sorry honey!) and I thought it was a good night to start because it gave me three nights where we didn’t have to wake up early. (I link to a site on night weaning which I basically used as a guideline – no nursing between the hours of 11PM and 6AM – otherwise we’re kind of doing our own thing but I think it’s a great resource, so I link.)

The first night I nursed Meli to sleep right before 11PM and honestly fell asleep so she was on the boob for awhile after 11. But then we settled in. She woke up around 4AM and cried and cried but I didn’t nurse her. I tried to hold her and comfort her but she’s a stubborn little girl so she pulled out the big guns:

“Pease! Pease! Pease!”

BOING! CRASH! That sound you heard was the arrow piercing my heart and shattering it into a million pieces. I’ve been trying to teach her please and thank you and here she goes and uses please CORRECTLY and WITHOUT PROMPTING and I can’t give in. Yeah. Mommy breakdown moment. I’m still picking up the pieces of my broken heart.

That first night we ended up being up from 4AM until 6AM, with 5:50 to 6 being the longest 10 minutes of my life. Thank god for Sprout. I nursed her the minute the clock hit 6 and she was asleep within thirty seconds and slept until like 10AM. I was bone tired and felt like I had totally given in at that 6AM mark.

The second night I was a bit better prepared. I had her milk and her water close at hand and was fully prepared for a night of Thomas the Tank Engine. She woke up around 1AM and wasn’t as fitful and angry as the night before, but still had some ammunition. This time it was a plaintive wail of:

“I know, I know, I knoooooowwwww!”

She says this because this is what I say to her when she’s upset. I hug her and pat her and say, “I know, my love, I know.” So when she’s upset, she tells herself the same thing. Only it sounds so much more sad and pathetic when she cries it than when I say it. “I knooooooooooooooowwwwwwwww!”

Luckily, this only went on for about ten or fifteen minutes before she trailed off and went to sleep. I think she woke up again around 3AM and did another round of “I knows” but all in all it was MUCH more successful than the night before.

The third night it got even better. She would cry and complain but quickly go back to sleep. She was never up for more than five minutes at a time, although it seems to me she was sleeping a lot lighter than she usually did. For instance, most times I can move her around in bed without waking her (like when she’s turned sideways and is kicking me in the back) but that night any time I moved her the slightest she woke up. So I stopped moving her and woke up with a sore back from trying not to move all night.

The fourth night I don’t remember so well, although I think it was a little bit worse than the third night. The fourth night became about her sippy cup, which I gave to her and she clung to like a talisman. I tried to take it away from her once. ONCE. Yeah.

Last night was the fifth night and I really didn’t have many high hopes that things would be better than the fourth or third night. She was doing okay and NOT nursing and honestly that’s really what I’m weaning her for – the NOT nursing. If I have to go without sleep, well, sleep is for sissies anyway.

The fifth night I was armed with her current favorite stuffed animal, dog. I nursed her to sleep around 10PM and while I was nursing her I told her that we were going to say goodnight to nursies and then sleep all night long and that in the morning we could have nursies again. I told her that Mommy would be next to her all night and that I would hold her if she was sad but that everything would be okay.

Wouldn’t you know it? She’s still asleep. It’s 6:26 AM and she’s still asleep and she hasn’t nursed ONCE all night. Not only hasn’t she nursed, but she hasn’t woken up at all either. She tossed and turned a lot and she seemed to need to be TOUCHING me the entire night, but she didn’t wake up. In fact, at around 5:45 AM she laughed in her sleep. Nothing better than the sleep laugh.

I know the kind of night we had because I didn’t sleep. I waited for her to wake up. I alternately panicked over all the stuff I have to do and all the stuff I haven’t done and was completely proud of my little girl for being so big and was devastated that she’s so big and I tried to sleep but it didn’t really work. Even when I moved her around a bunch – she still didn’t wake up.

I’m prepared for the fact that tonight she might wake up every hour on the hour demanding to nurse, but if she can do it once, she can do it again.

We move a week from today and I’ve already run out of small book boxes with still more books to go. Yipee!
L, C

Filed Under: Baby? OH BABY!

Victory Shall Be Mine!

July 28, 2009 By

Here’s the color of today:

It’s really not the best representation. If you want to, go here and see it. (Although I think the color is actually a bit more blue and a bit less gray on my wall.)

This gorgeous color (trust me – it’s beautiful!) will grace my bedroom walls. It matches perfectly with the great carpet we got which changes between a gray/blue and a deeper midnight-ish blue depending on how you look at it. The carpet is pretty neat: it’s made from corn. Besides been kind of “green,” it’s super soft and cushy. We’re doing the bedrooms, hallway and stairs with variations of it.

They started working on the house at the end of last week. (And by they I mean the tradesmen that will make my life hell for the next couple of weeks. We’re three days in and already I’m ready to quit.) The electricians are gone and the floor guys started today (we’re having the first floor wood floors refinished. Figured it was good to get that done while the house is empty.) Then paint, then finish the floors, then carpet then MOVE! I’ve packed a total of…TWO boxes. Books. I’m not sure you’ve ever seen my house, but my book collection makes my yarn collection look like I started knitting two weeks ago. Truly. The really sad thing is that I have barely any wall space in the new house for all the bookcases. There are a TON of windows – literally walls of windows, which is wonderful and makes our Tudor home bright and cheery, but doesn’t leave a lot of wall space for bookshelves. For sure a lot of them will end up in storage. Anyway, I’ve packed two boxes of books. Only 58 more to go.

Another thing about the new house: I have my own yarn/fiber room! There is a really lovely sun room off of the main entrance/hallway and it’s ALL windows (except for the doorway wall) and it’s got a slate floor and I’ve bought a lovely area rug (the pattern is the same as the gorgeous one I bought for the dining room – only it’s a different color scheme.) Eventually I’ll get a nice chaise chair and some other seating but as soon as we move in my fantastic yarn cabinet (it’s worth it to click on all the links – in the order linked) will go in there and my wheel! I’m going to make sure my wheel has a special place in the house. The poor thing has been in storage for forever!

The victory in the title is the whole reason I can write this post. Weaning Meli continues on with the usual ups and downs. One of my biggest problems is that I nurse her to sleep and I can’t NOT nurse her to sleep. Other people, like my mom and dad, can get her to fall asleep without nursing, but unless we’re out and about and she falls asleep in the car or on a walk, I have to nurse her to sleep. She just won’t let herself go. Welp, today, after a long day of tantrums and play and general clingy-ness to the point of exhaustion, she let me sing and rock her to sleep. SANS BOOB! I was even able to put her down on the bed and she stayed asleep! I can’t tell you what a triumph this is for me. There’s hope that we won’t be nursing forever! (Especially since I have to be DONE COMPLETELY AND TOTALLY by the first or second week of September.) Full disclosure: while I was writing this blog post she woke up and I went into bed and nursed her back to sleep. Otherwise she would never have stayed sleeping and she wasn’t ready to wake up and I wasn’t done writing. See what I sacrifice for the blog?

So, small victories. I really shouldn’t be blogging at all. I should be working or packing or folding laundry. But no, I’m blogging and it feels really good! Thanks!

Filed Under: Baby? OH BABY!, Home Sweet Home

Mommy Says

July 16, 2009 By

Here are some Meli tricks. She’s my rambunctious 16 month old now – no more a baby!

A Command Performance from January One on Vimeo.

Meli and the Jets from January One on Vimeo.

Thanks for watching!
L, C & M

Filed Under: Baby? OH BABY!

If you don’t have anything to say

June 9, 2009 By

show a picture! I realize I haven’t posted any recent pictures of my baby – excuse me – BIG GIRL – in a little while so here you go:

These were all taken May 29 after a few mishaps – scraped chin, black eye, egg on the forehead. And two days later she skinned up her knee pretty bad. She’s quite the adventurer. She definitely keeps me on my toes. We’re a bit under the weather this week (just a couple of colds) so we’re hanging low, but three weeks from today we close on our new house! I can’t believe it already! On Saturday we’re going in again to check things out and do some measurements – it feels like forever since we’ve been there! We aren’t going to physically move, probably, for another six weeks, but still we’ve started to panic. We’re moving! To a HOUSE!!! Our own house! YAY!

Okay. Now I have to go measure stuff.
L, C

PS – Thanks for all your kind words about my monkey socks. Sadly, things have slowed down, but they’re all past the picot edge and the first repeat. I’m about five repeats in on one of them. S.L.O.W.

Filed Under: Baby? OH BABY!

HAIR!

April 23, 2009 By

The last time we visited my sister, I took one of my niece’s hair clips and stuck it in Meli’s growing hair. Oh my god she looked so freaking cute (and OLD!) that I totally plotzed and came home and bought a gazillion barrettes for her.


The one she’s wearing in the picture above is from Lil Chatterbox. I bought this one and this one. (I specifically bought the purple pansy one with Vicki in mind. I just know how she’s loves pansies.) I also bought barrettes from Baby K Designs, Tiny Sweets, and ElleBowsAndMore. I loved these from Baby K Designs so much I went back and bought a ton more from her store. And these wonderful birds from Tiny Sweets are so adorable I totally cried when I put one in Meli’s hair. And my absolute favorites these days are the dragonflies from Lil Sugarplum. They stay in Meli’s hair super well and are too too cute. (By the way, I found Tiny Sweets and Lil Sugarplum because they were recommended on Cool Mom Picks, a very nice product blog I follow. I’ve bought a bunch of interesting things through this blog and haven’t been disappointed yet.)

Meli totally has my hair. Or at least it’s a lot closer to my hair than G’s hair. It starting to flip up in the back and she’s got these really short bangs because her hair hasn’t grown over her forehead yet. Just like mine was when I was her age. I’m going back to my sister’s tomorrow and I’m going to have to take all the barrettes so I can show my niece. I just LOVE having a girl! I’m so not girly, not really, but my baby can be (and my niece is very girly so my sister, who’s more like me, are living vicariously!)

It’s been a really really rough week on all kinds of fronts. Personal, professional – you name it. We’ve barely had anyone come see our house which is really starting to stress me out. My husband works for a bank – although he’s NOT a banker (he works in corporate services) – lest anyone want to egg my blog – but really that’s all I have to say about that. Add to all this the fact that they start drilling outside every window in my house at 8AM and don’t finish until 5. Even when they’re not right outside my windows, the house reverberates with the noise (basically because they’re either above or below me.) I have a headache by 8:30. So we’re out of the house all day a lot of days (they don’t work when the weather’s bad, but that has it’s own stresses – like they’re never going to finish if it doesn’t stop raining!) and by the end of the day I’m so tired I can barely move.

Even with my complaining, I know things could be so much worse. Trust me. Stress still sucks. So I’ll be hanging at my sister’s for a while and there might even be another great date with my husband which would make us happy to no end. Cross your fingers we get some tickets. I’ll be back next week. L, C

Filed Under: Baby? OH BABY!, Life

The Cure for the Taxman Blues!

April 15, 2009 By

I hope the tax people were kind to you this year! To make the medicine go down a bit easier, I’ve got some new video of my crazy girl! There’s no stopping her these days, that’s for sure. She’s like a little old lady behind the wheel of an Oldsmobile. WATCH OUT!


Lost in the Supermarket from January One on Vimeo.

And here’s a kiss from us to you:

Filed Under: Baby? OH BABY!

Limbo

April 9, 2009 By

Well, the house is on the market. Now we get to wait and see what happens. Can you say INCREDIBLY STRESSFUL? I am by nature a messy person. There’s nothing I can do about it – it’s in the genes – but now I have to live on the edge. Anybody can call at any moment to see the house and it needs to be PERFECT. I’m trying really hard, but the truth is I feel like no one’s going to buy our place (not really any reason to think this – except maybe the economy and something my realtor said: when you’re done with a place, you don’t think anyone else is going to want it either) and that no one’s going to come see it and yet I STILL have to live like anyone could walk in at any minute. It’s a weird feeling.

Also weird is the fact that when we leave here this summer (fingers crossed we sell the place!!!) we will have lived in our building for EIGHTEEN YEARS! Can you believe it? That means that G and I have lived together for eighteen years. I only lived with my parents for seventeen years. Weird might not be the right word. Surreal? I think about it and I don’t get sad or nostalgic really, just incredulous. It doesn’t feel like 18 years.

I am getting nervous about the move. Not the actual physical part of moving, but being a new part of an existing community. Will I fit in? Will people like me? Will there be knitters? (Actually, the neighboring town has at least THREE yarn stores. The town we’re moving to has almost NO commercial activity, so you have to go to the nearby towns for everything.) I must admit I’ve had fantasies about teaching all the local moms how to knit and hosting knitting days at my house. See? I’m going crazy.

I’m also trying to work through some stuff with the baby. Nothing wrong exactly, but I’m seriously thinking about having to wean her. Not because she wants it and not because I want it either but because we’d like to try to get pregnant again at the end of the summer and that means hormones that are not safe to take while breastfeeding. I’m incredibly torn – I don’t feel like it’s an option to wait on another baby (I will be 40 in January and if the frozen embryos we have don’t work, we could be looking at an even MORE difficult time conceiving) and I am also absolutely HEARTBROKEN about having to wean my baby girl. I’ve read a bunch of stuff and talked to my sister (who nursed three kids until each was two) and I’m going to start slow – trying to cut out nursing sessions during the day offering up lots of snacks and distractions and eventually, later, when it’s not as trying because we don’t nurse so much during the day, I’ll tackle the nights. I dread night weaning. Pure dread. I feel better now, though, because I thought I was going to have to start with nights and last night I tried not to nurse her once, at around 2AM and it was a DISASTER. So day weaning for now – or cutting out sessions that are just habit – and the really hard stuff later on. Still, though, it’s been really sad for me even just thinking about it. We’ve been so fortunate to have had a fantastic time nursing – it means so much to our whole family – G included – that to end it feels so terribly sad.

I’ll ask you this – please be kind in the comments. I’m in a fragile state as it is. Thank you for your support. It’s really great that I have this place to come to and vent. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate it.

PS – Thanks to everyone who voted for Gale. She made it into the top 20 which means she’s into the final round. Now it’s up to the powers that be. GO GALE!

Filed Under: Baby? OH BABY!, Life

Walk This Way!

March 14, 2009 By

Nothing like that toddler goose step!


Walk This Way from January One on Vimeo.

We’re home. Chaos has ensued. Basically, the last Tuesday in February I found a listing for a house that on paper looked perfect. On Thursday I found out that it really was perfect (perfect town, perfect location IN perfect town, perfect number of bathrooms (a real sticky point with us), perfect perfect perfect.) On Saturday we filled out all our paperwork and on Tuesday we found out they accepted our bid. (We beat out three other bidders – fortunately or unfortunately the section of the country I live in hasn’t really been affected by the housing crisis all that much.) So a week from start to finish. Before Meli’s party on Saturday, we were out of attorney review and had the inspection (still pretty much perfect.) Had her party, left for vacation and now I’m home blogging instead of getting my current house ready to sell. And they start the dreaded drilling on Monday (the drilling/jack hammering on our balcony and the outside of all the windows that will force me from my home – the one I’m currently trying to sell – for most of the daylight hours, six days a week.)

Things are CRAZY. I’m exhausted and the hard work hasn’t even begun. Oh and I’ll refer you to the video above – the one that shows the TODDLER.

I AM NOT COMPLAINING. Just stating facts. Things are very good, but still crazy. And exhausting.

I might be scarce, you know with the craziness. But I still love you.

Filed Under: Baby? OH BABY!

ONE YEAR

March 11, 2009 By

WE DID IT!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BABY GIRL! Mommy and Daddy love you more than anything!

Lots to report, LOTS, as life has been incredibly hectic the last ten days. In VERY good ways, but I haven’t had a minute to breathe. We’re actually in Florida right now on a lovely vacation. All we’re doing is eating, sleeping and beaching it. The weather is a fantastic 80 degrees and sunny and as soon as Meli’s feet hit the hotel room floor, she walked straight across the room. Trying to get to the beach no doubt.

This has been the most tremendous year of our lives. The ups, the downs, the in-betweens. Thank you all for sharing this journey with us. We so appreciate the support we’ve been given in the first year of our daughter’s life. I, for one, can’t wait for the next year!

Thank you!
L, C, G & M!

Filed Under: Baby? OH BABY!
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