Playground Fun!

Yesterday I wanted to do something fun with Colin, but didn't know quite what to do. Midway through the day I thought, I'm going to take him to the playground. There is a school just down the road from our house and I use to walk Bailey there all the time and let her run around the track. We don't really have parks with baby swings here so I've yet to bring him to a park here....

 Long story short, we went to the playground and had a BLAST. I soo wish I would have brought my nice camera because the lighting was perfect and it was fun watching him explore the sand and some of the equipment for the first time! Enjoy the pictures!

Trying to eat sand. That is my hand trying to catch him! Lol

Typical boy tyring to climb UP the slide!

Mom's flip flops... always more interesting than anything else!

Give a little and then take it all back!

I was feeling very optimistic this week that we were starting to sleep a bit better. He had a few nights with some good long stretches and I was like, YES!  Then... NO SLEEP.  Sigh.

Last night and the night before were pretty terrible. The night before last he was up every 15 -30 minutes. I am NOT joking. I thought it must be teething. Even though I gave him teething meds.  So last night I gave him Tylenol before bed and we were both super tired from the night before so I had really high hopes that he would sleep. Nope. He was up every hour. Which I suppose is better than every 15 -30 minutes... but still... that SUCKS.

Ok, enough bitchin'. I am just tired and would give anything for some darn sleep!  I promise to have a happier blog later! :)


Anyway, new plan is to keep him in the crib until midnight. I know that doesn't sound like very late, but lately I've been so tired that when he wakes up and cries, no matter the time I just bring him to bed. Obviously that isn't working since we were up all night the past 2 nights. So, if he wakes up before midnight... which he most likely will. I will try the crib all over again. My goal is to do this for a week or two and then change my time to 1 or 2 and change it later and later. Now if I can just stick to it and not bring him to bed out of exhaustion, this might work!

*****UPDATE****

Colin just cut 2 teeth today! No wonder he didn't sleep last night, poor buddy was hurting!

Top Mommy Blogs

Sooo... I got a wild hair and decided to put my blog on the Top Mommy Blogs. I don't really know why... but I did! :)

I don't expect to be like a top 20 blogger, by any means. In fact I think I'm like 256 or some really super high number! But all the blogs I follow religiously are linked to the Top Mommy Blogs, so I thought, why not.

I know it sounds silly, but I am tired of writing and blogging and not getting hardly any views or comments, so I thought maybe this would help? I guess in the end it really doesn't matter... in fact I think I mostly write this for myself and to look back on it for Colin's sake since I've failed at his baby book! (Haven't updated it since he was a month old I think! Eeek!) 

So in the end, if you happen to read this and would kindly click the link, then maybe I'll move up to like 200 instead of 256?! :) Lol

http://www.topmommyblogs.com/directory/rate.php?id=jaclynwags

Sleep update

After reading *most* of the no cry sleep solution I have some new plans when it comes to Colin's sleeping.

Unfortunately while he was sick it seems like we backtracked a bit with sleeping. That night he was sick he literally would wake up and throw up and then go right back to sleep... so naturally we were a bit concerned about how he slept and making sure he wouldn't choke on his throw up. So he practically slept on us the entire night.


After that night he was very clingy... although part of me thinks he still didn't feel well for a couple days... and slept with us for most of the nights, even though before any of this he was sleeping his first stretch in the crib.

Yesterday I read the crib section of the No Cry Sleep Solution book and came up with some more things for us to try. Last night he actually slept 4 hours in his crib... which around here is pretty epic and his next stretch was 3 hours... equally as epic!! Of course after that I thought I smelt something funny and sure enough he had dirtied his diaper... I don't think the kid has pooped at night since he was just a few months old, which also makes me think he isn't 100% better from his tummy bug!  Of course as soon as he got naked...er changed he was WIDE awake for the day. But at least I got 2 decent stretches of sleep!

I am hopeful that this week we will start to see some changes with some of the new things I've learned and am trying when it comes to his sleep. Although, Ryan is working out of town, so hopefully I won't just give in and let him sleep in bed all week! Lol

Food Fun!

 

 

 

 

 

Meal time is probably one of Colin's favorite times of the day! Lol This kid loves to eat! My 14 year old sister in laws didn't believe me when I told them that he loves his veggies, so I started taking pictures of him chowing down on yummy food!  So here is our food is fun blog!! :) Enjoy!

 

 

Crop pot dinner, Chicken and veggies! He LOVED it!

He blinked! Lol  Eating peaches from our yard!

He loved to be able to take bites out of the peach himself!

Blueberry pancakes!

Avocado face!

By the blue streak on his chest, I'm going to go with he had some blueberries too! Lol

Mom, stop making me laugh and taking pictures so I can eat my veggies!

Yummy broccoli! Lol

Phone Dump!

Eating an apple from our tree... I am in love with those tiny little bites in that apple! Lol

My mom would prob kill me if she knew I posted it! lol We were shopping for her birthday and her best friend from NY called her... she told her we were shopping and she didn't know if she would get that shirt, so I took a picture and sent it to her and she told my mom to get it! Ha!

Guess my camera was dirty... but not as dirty as that little blueberry avocado face!

New Carseat smirk

I was feeling especially hot and skinny that day... so I took a picture. I ended up having a bad day at the doctor, but at least my weight dropped! Lol

Colin's snack. Peas, carrots and blueberries!

Bad mommy teaching colin bad things! :)

Cousin Aurelia was in town! They are sharing yogurt snacks... I LOVE their faces in this one!Lol

AND this one! Ha! She would make her eyes all big and stare at him!

First trip to Chick-Fil-A.... Ryan's favorite! Colin was equally impressed, loved the chicken nuggets, but not the waffle fries.

I wasn't sure if he would like this thing... but man, the kid was in love. What is with it with Boys and Cars?

Look at those top teeth! First picture I could get of them!

Sick little boy

Yesterday was Ryan's birthday.

I had grand plans for an awesome dinner. I made homemade cheesecake, pico de gallo, gaucamole and pasta and meatballs. I cooked most of the day. Ryan's brother was in town so they went out shooting while I finished up dinner. I had the pasta in the oven, the sauce and meatballs on the stove and I was setting the table with the pico and gauc and chips, while Colin was playing with balls from the pool table. He was sitting down playing with several balls when he looked up at me and then just threw up everywhere. I ran to him and picked him up and cleaned up, changed his clothes and then he threw up again.

Rinse and repeat like 10 more times. I was a wreck! He's never been sick before. I know that it is the first of many sicknesses, but it was so scary the way he kept throwing up. I had this fear that maybe he had swallowed something he shouldn't have and it was stuck and he couldn't get it out... but he got everything else out!!

I had Ryan stop by the store and get Pedialyte on his way home... Colin HATED the pedialyte at first. I was worried about him being dehydrated so I nursed him... and 2 minute later it ALL came up. I'm not going to lie, I was very super close to taking him into the hospital. Luckily he passed out around 9 after about 3 hours of being sick. When he woke up at 1, he chugged the pedialyte like it was nobody's business. I was worried he'd drink too much to fast so I kept having to take it away from him. Thankfully he hasn't thrown up since 9 last night and I've slowly started letting him nurse more and more today. Hopefully it was just a nasty stomach bug and that was the end of the throwing up.

I also managed not to ruin dinner, but none of us were in a mood for celebrating because we were all worried about poor little Colin. This morning, Ryan took off a couple hours from work and we all had cheesecake for breakfast and sang happy birthday while Colin helped open all of Daddy's card and presents!

Poor Ryan, his first birthday as a daddy... and he got covered in throw up! Lol :) Welcome to parenthood!

Starting something new

Well, we haven't left Colin in the crib to cry since Thursday night.

Friday we had a long busy day. I had a fabulous girl night and Ryan took Colin up the mountain. They didn't get back until a little after 10. He had fallen to sleep in his carseat and i took him out, nursed him and put him in his crib. He slept I think 3 hours, I nursed him again and put him in his crib where he slept another 2 or so. His next wake up was 4 and he wasn't feeling his crib. This has been the time of night/morning that we've had the worst time with the CIO, so I brought him to bed. You should have seen the joy in his face. He kept looking up at me like, REALLY? I get to come in bed again?  Lol He slept until 7.  I woke up feeling much better that day.

Last night was a bit of the same. I think he had a 4 hour stretch in his crib, marvelous in my book and then I took him to bed... he actually slept until 8:45 this morning and I was up at 7!

I also received a copy of the No Cry Sleep Solution. A book that gives other options to the CIO method. I am on page 136 already and I LOVE it. I feel like I could have written parts of it myself. It gives some good advice to teaching your child to sleep well on his own without crying. One of the things that we are going to work on is Colin's nursing to sleep. Yup, he still nurses to sleep most nights. The book says to unlatch them right before he falls asleep, when he starts flutter feeding and then pat his back. This teaches them that they don't need to nurse to fall asleep. That is one main thing I am going to work on with Colin because I swear he would spend half the night asleep... nursing and glued to my boob. I got so tired from his wakeups, that I resorted to just side laying nurse all night long.

Another thing I am going to do is try not to snuggle him as much when he is in our bed. Put him next to me, but not holding onto me and me holding onto him. I did that this morning at 6... he wiggled around a bunch, but never woke up. It will teach him that he can sleep independently, even beside me and also he won't smell me and want to nurse as often.

I'm only about half way through the book and I think I already have some good ideas to work on to try and get him to sleep better.... with out crying in his crib for hours.  I am really hoping I can raise an independent sleeper without both of us crying all night long. I just can't handle that emotionally and physically right now.

So wish us luck in this new process. The author of the book had a baby that woke up EVERY hour for his first year of life. Out of pure frustration she did a ton of research on other methods to fall asleep besides CIO. I forget the time frame she said, but she got her son to sleep 10 1/2 hours every night... while breastfeeding and cosleeping. I know every baby is different, but hearing her story gives me hope, in a good way that I haven't felt in awhile.  :)

CIO, Fail.

Last night Sucked. Bad. Very Bad.

I cried. A lot. So Did Colin.

I think I've failed at CIO. I think I might be a cio quitter. But I have no idea where to go from here.

Last night started out normal, got him into his crib and asleep without a fuss... and then 30 minutes later he was up and NOT happy. He had 2 naps at the sitters house and they were both only 45 minutes long. He was tired, which is why he went down so easily. He cried and cried for about an hour or so... until I nursed him again, almost to sleep and patted his back in the crib. But that hour was brutal. I was VERY tired yesterday and just wanted to sleep. Going into his room every couple of minutes to calm him, only to hear him scream when I walked away was just wearing on me and I had a major cry session... but it was nothing compared to what I had later. Lol  I finally got him to sleep and prayed and prayed that he would be out for a LOONG time so I could rest because I had a feeling that if I didn't get some sleep I was going to break.

He woke every 2 hours last night.

I nursed him back to sleep in his crib the first time and then the next time I tried to let him cry it out. It did not go well. I went in and out of his room so many times and each time he just screamed harder and harder. Then I thought, maybe I am making it worse going in and out and let him cry for a long time. Nope... he still screamed forever. I made Ryan try and that didn't work either, in fact made it worse. When he cries for so long he doesn't get sleepy, he gets wide awake. Ryan actually took him into the living room for awhile to rock on the rocking chair and I could hear him talking. Ryan said he wanted to play, but Ryan had to go to work, so back to the crib screaming he went.

About 3 hours after he'd been up I freaked out and had the worse emotional breakdown I've had in awhile. Totally ugly cry, sobbing. It was bad. Really bad. I didn't know what to do.  I felt like I was at such a loss. I hate hearing him cry... especially for hours. If it was 15 minutes, no problem. But hours is so tiring on you emotionally. I wish there was a simple solution. A sleep button you could press when you want them to sleep! Wouldn't that be nice??

I kept thinking I am not tough enough for this. I can't do it. I could have had him in bed with me, getting up every 2 hours and I would have gotten more sleep than I did. Maybe it is too much too soon? He's spent 9 months snuggling me for at least part of the night, then all of the sudden no more. Maybe I should have done it more gradually? I have no idea. I wanted nothing more than to bring him to bed with me.

I didn't.... BUT I did lay with him on the bed in the nursery and he snuggled right up against me and went to sleep. Of course it was like 6:05 in the morning and my alarm goes off at 6:09.  Needless to say I didn't get up til 7 something this morning and I layed with him for awhile.

Poor kid had big dark circles under his eyes this morning, but was as happy as ever playing before we left for the day. The babysitter had even given me some lavendar oil to put on his bedding. She swears by it for helping them sleep. But I don't think it did any good.

I don't know where we'll go from here.The first night when he slept 6 hours, I was so excited! Then it just got worse and worse. I'm not sure I can handle many more nights like this. I was thinking just trying the crib for part of the night and then going back to the bed for the other part, like we were doing and then slowly increase the crib. There has to be some solution where we aren't all miserable, right?

I know everyone has an opinion on this. I of course put it all out there and sometimes I shouldn't because it is hard to hear it all. Some say I need to stick with it and it will get easier. Others say obviously this is the wrong choice for us and we need to go another route. Maybe the answer is a little bit of both? Maybe we need to do a modified method that doesn't involve hours of crying and maybe not all nights will go smoothly and maybe we'll end up back in the bed a few nights? I dunno all I know is last night sucked. I think I cried to Ryan as he was leaving, All I want is some sleep... for all us... is that too much to ask for?! Lol

Night 3 of CIO

Night 3 of CIO should be called Nurse him out.... because that is what I did.

He usually always goes to bed easy... but last night he must have known that if he fell asleep in that crib, he was stuck there the whole night, so it was a bit of a battle. After about an hour or so though, I got him down... by nursing. 

He actually slept 4 hours, which for him is pretty fantastic. When he woke up, I let him cry for several minutes, to see if he'd go back to sleep on his own. When I was pretty certain the wailing wasn't going to end any time soon, I went in and nursed him. I figured he'd slept 4 hours, might as well. He nursed right back to sleep and went right back in his crib and slept another 2 hours.  The next time he woke up, I didn't want to nurse him, because... he just ate 2 hours ago.

I went in, laid him back down patted him and then left several times. I think Ryan went in several times as well.  The last time I went in, I noticed he was doing something with his hand (I don't think I was wearing my glasses.) I looked closer and poor kid was making the sign for milk.  How could I deny him of this? How smart that he knew that if he did it, he would get milk. Lol. If I denied it, maybe he wouldn't ever do it again! Lol  So of course, I gave in and let him have milk.  He nursed, went back into the crib and fussed for a minute or two and then went right to sleep... until I had to wake him up again at 7:30.

So... I guess it was a successful night. We nursed 2 times which is better than 6 and got a fair amount of sleep and in 3 nights he hasn't been in our bed.

Night 2 of CIO

Well last night went fairly well.

Colin slept 6 hours straight in his crib... for the first time in MONTHS!  The last time I can remember he's slept that long was when we went to South Carolina and he slept 7 hours in the hotel there. He was almost 6 months old... soo it's been at least 3 months!

Honestly, I think it was a fluke. He was super tired from the night before, only got one nap in yesterday and we stayed out late working/hiking. I think it was a fluke because when he woke up, at 3... he did NOT go back to sleep easy.  2 hours later at 5:15 I finally got him to sleep.  I actually *thought* we were going to have an easy night because when he woke up, I nursed him and then put him back in the crib. He seemed like he was going to go right back to bed. BUT after I was over my awe of how long he slept and how I could get up once a night to feed him no problem, then he started crying. Sigh. I feel like I went in and out of his room a million times... but it was probably more like 5 or 10. He had the most pitiful cry... and it sounded like he was saying "I want my momma"... for 2 hours!  You better believe I almost cracked!

He would be fine as long as we were standing next to the crib. He'd start to dose off and then creepily open his eyes to make sure we were still there. I guess I need a life size cutout of me to just stand next to his crib. The second I'd walk away and he'd notice we weren't there... he'd freak. Poor kid.

Once I got him back to sleep, he was OUT. He slept until I had to wake him up to go to the sitters. I turned the light on in his room and even then he just rolled over  and tried to go back to sleep. I think he's going to be tired today. :( I felt bad waking him up.

I've decided this is so hard on me because before now I've catered to his ever little whim. Any time he'd cry a tad, I'd run and scoop him up. I never really let him cry. I just thought that in time and with love and comfort he'd eventually learn how to sleep on his own. I hate that I have to do it this way, because I just don't enjoy hearing him cry. I hate knowing that all it would take for him to calm down and go to sleep would be for me to hold him and snuggle with him in bed. But the truth is, I miss him in bed. I miss snuggling with him. Waking up and watching him sleep. Having him hold onto me while he slept. I didn't expect to stop co sleeping so soon. I feel like I wasn't ready and wish I would have given myself just another day to hold onto him tighter at night and appreciate his closeness... because it is like... I can't go back. It is over... and I miss it. He is growing up and won't need me any more. Sigh. Lol

That being said, I am excited to see if last night was really a fluke. Having 6 hours of sleep... STRAIGHT... is miraculous. Unfortunately... I was up every couple hours checking on him.   But if he made that a habit, maybe eventually I would too. 

Wish us luck again!

Who Am I?

So after my doctors appointment I talked it over with Ryan. He agreed that I needed more ME time. He said I needed to do more things for me and fun stuff that I did before the baby.

The problem.... I don't know who I was before the baby.

I know that sounds horrible, but it is true. I eat, sleep and breathe Colin. Everything I do, I do for him. I feel bad having people watch him so I can do stuff. And I can't even remember what life was like before him.

I sat there and tried to think of things I did for fun before the baby and I couldn't think of anything. Was I THAT boring? Lol.  On my days off I watched trashy tv and cleaned the house and then I worked and went to zumba a few times a week. I did coach soccer, but there is no way I want to take that up right now because it is a lot of time and energy that I don't have.

The only thing I can think that I did before that I don't do now is lunch. I used to go to lunch with my friends about once a week. It was a nice girl chat session. Now that I have the baby, I go feed him during my lunch breaks instead.

I know I am Colin's mommy, but I guess I need to figure out who Colin's mommy is.

I did tell Ryan I enjoy going to Zumba. Hopefully I can figure out how to do that without a babysitter... they are starting up 4:15 classes and I was thinking of bringing the baby with me on Mondays and Tuesdays and just keeping him in his stroller... He loves his stroller and I think he will be pretty entertained watching crazy ladies jump around! Lol  And I am going to schedule a hair cut... haven't had one in awhile and I will go during work so I don't have to bring the baby with me.  And maybe I will skip a few lunch feedings so I can hang out with my friends again.

Night 1 of CIO

Well I can happily say it wasn't a complete fail. I can honestly say, I was scared. Very scared.

We started off the night off like normal, put him down in his crib. He woke up 2 hours later, like normal, but instead of bringing him to our bed I had Ryan go in and pat him and lay him back down. It didn't go well. We waited several minutes, then I went in and vice versa. He was WIDE awake. I swear this kid... it is like if you let him cry for more than 2 minutes he just wakes up more.  I even rocked him once and nursed him (I know.. I know... I shouldn't have) But it didn't help. He stayed awake after that first wake up for 3.5 hours! But he wasn't screaming the whole time... thankfully. In fact he went long stretches where he was quiet. I would go peek at him and he was sitting up playing!!!  He eventually fell asleep and then woke up again in 2 hours. When he was crying during that 3 hour stretch, it took pretty much every fiber in my being to not get him and bring him to bed with me. So hard for me to break my habits too. I just wanted to cuddle him and go to sleep. But I know in the end this is whats best.

The second time he woke up I fed him, mostly cause I was full. I know the doctor said to cut out feedings, but I figured instead of going cold turkey, maybe I would just do a couple feedings. We did 2 last night... which is better than like 5 or 6 which we were doing!!  But as soon as I fed him he fell back asleep and I put him back in the crib.  Again he woke up in 2 hours. I laid him down and rubbed his tummy and he fell back asleep... until 8:30! Latest he's ever slept in! 

So even though he was up for three and a half hours, I still got some sleep cause he ended up doing like four 2 hour stretches.

I think it was a good first night, although I'm going to need LOTS of caffeine for the rest of the week because tomorrow is my Monday!  Blah!  Wish us luck!!!

Colin and I both had checkups today and while his went great and mine went... not so well.

Also I'd like to note that we spent 2.5 hrs in the doctor's office. YUCK. And she had a goober medical student come take care of us first and I swear the guy had never held a baby before and he was having a HELL of a time trying to check my kid who is wiggly and squirming and all he wanted was to grab the stethescope! Lol


Colin is 17.9 lbs and 28 1/2 inches! He has really grown in height! I knew he'd gotten longer!

 Me, well, my blood pressure was ok, not great, but I've lost weight and changed my diet so she liked that, I just need to find a babysitter so I can exercise regularly because that really seems to be the final straw in my blood presure. When I exercise it is low, when I don't it is higher. Tonight I convinced the neighbors to watch Colin for an hour so I can exercise. I am soo excited! lol

While I was there I wanted to bring up his sleeping habits. I've brought them up before she always dismissed them. Today however was different. I explained how frustrated I've been and how hard the past couple of months have been on me. She always seems to make me cry and of course I lost it.  She was VERY concerned and almost put me on depression meds... THAT I was not expecting.  Lol Pretty much she told me that Colin is ruling the roost and if I don't get him to learn how to sleep soon I am going to have major problems.

She said I need to let him cry it out. So tonight is night one of we will try CIO again. I'm not looking forward to it. But hoping it works better than the last time we tried when he just cried for several hours straight and didn't ever fall asleep. We are doing something similiar to start bedtime, some nights I let him cry a few minutes, Lay him down and then pat him and he falls asleep. So hopefully we can continue that throughout the night and he will start sleeping better. I did it once after bedtime last night and he slept almost 6 hours in his crib last night (getting up after 2.5 hours each time). So I hope it won't be too hard on any of us.

She also said I need more ME time. She said I am essentially with the baby 24 hours a day and I need breaks. She said I need to exercise more and have girls nights.... HA! Easier said than done. But I did start off this week ok, by having the neighbors watch Colin while I exercise tonight... I am excited about that!!  And I think I will try to get my crazy hair cut while I'm at work this week too.

After giving myself time to digest our apt. I think it was a good wake up call. I hope I can change things up a bit. Although I'm not going to lie, our first cio nap has been going TERRIBLE! lol

Car seat shoppin'

Yesterday we went carseat shopping. Can I just say... I loathe carseat shopping. It is like worse than buying a dang car! Ok, well maybe not that bad... but close!

I had researched car seats all week. When it hit me that they aren't as easy to transport from vehicle to vehicle. What was I going to do at the babysitters house? We always left her with the infant car seat and she took him to pick up her daughter or drop her off at piano lessons  or even to come visit me at work <3 about="about" began="began" car="car" i="i" more="more" nbsp="nbsp" needing="needing" one="one" p="p" panic="panic" seat.="seat." sigh.="sigh." so..="so.." than="than" to="to">
Saturday we went to Albuquerque to buy a seat.  I went there thinking we were going to buy two. When I told the husband this idea, he about had a heart attack. He was not into buying TWO! I of course wanted one of the most expensive ones (Britax) But they didn't have the color I wanted.  I thought maybe we would settle on, not the cheapest carseat and not the most expensive, but one in the middle.... that way maybe I could later convince Ryan to buy a second one!  We spent maybe an hour staring at carseats and debating between ALL of them!  We finally ended up taking home a Graco my ride 70 carseat. Not going to lie we were both pretty skeptical about whether or not it would even fit in the back of our car!

Colin LOVES it.. mostly because he likes to play with the cup holders! Lol

When we returned home we immediately tried it and low and behold, it fit... Even with the seat ALL the way back the Ryan likes to drive! Hooray!

We will probably give the babysitter our infant one for the time being. I don't think he has ENTIRELY outgrown it. (Although we are going for his 9 month well visit in an hour so I will find out then!) And we can recover from this purchase before we get another cheaper one for the sitter.

Rough couple of sleepy days

I thoroughly enjoyed having 3 days off with my little angel, but man those next couple days were rough! Maybe because we are adjusting to a new schedule? Or maybe because Ryan has been working on projects like a mad man at work and has been away for awhile? Who knows?

I think it all started when, after having a few days of not very good sleep I decided to look online about sleep help.  I read somewhere that if the baby is waking up a lot to nurse, to instead rock them for 2 minutes and they will usually just fall back asleep.If they are still hungry after the 2 minutes then feed them. Made sense to me, so I tried it... the night before my first day back to work... MISTAKE!

He fussed  a bit for food, instead of nursing, I stood up and rocked him, because he was so fussy there is no way I could rock him in bed. And boy did that make him angry. He was NOT happy. I nursed, I rocked, I nursed, I rocked and he was STILL AWAKE. It took me almost 3 hours to get him to go back to sleep. I cried, he cried... it was a disaster. I haven't been so overwhelmed and lost my cool like that since he was very young. I had to just put him in his crib and let him scream, so I could collect myself as I cried in the other room. I finally rocked him in the rocker in the living room until he fell asleep and by then it was about 20 minutes before my alarm clock went off. Sigh. Frustration was all I felt.

When you are that tired and that run down and soo very frustrated all of these terrible thoughts run through your mind. What am I doing wrong? Why won't my kid sleep? Am I a terrible mother? Have I ruined him from EVER sleeping again? Is it because I'm nursing him? Should I stop for my own sanity?  It sucks when you start to question your parenting and everything you've done thinking that maybe you went wrong somewhere.

Luckily I've had a couple days to sleep on it think about it and I feel a bit better. I understand that being a mommy is very hard and you won't always have perfect days. I understand that I need to ask for help from my husband when I am at a breaking point and I need to not stress out and take more deep breaths.

Somedays I feel like Colin has come along way in sleeping. He will go a few weeks with a few good stretches of sleep like 4 hours and I will feel wonderful in the morning and think, YES, he's finally got it. And then he will relapse, like this past week and get up every 2 hours again or even every hour.  I'm sure you are thinking, how is that coming a long way with sleep, well I feel like he's come a long way because every night now for weeks, he has started off his night in his crib. He is usually awake and will fall asleep in his crib. To me that is progress, because he went through a stage where he wouldn't sleep in the crib at all, so starting off there and falling asleep there is pretty good. Granted, as soon as he wakes up he wants out... but we will work on it.

I am not a fan of Cry It Out. I am sure it is harder on me than on him, but we've tried it and my kid can cry for hours.  He gets himself so worked up he can hardly breathe. I hate it and practically cry just as hard.  So instead I put him in his crib almost asleep and pat his back until he falls asleep, sometimes I don't need to and he will just fall asleep. But it is after that first stretch when he wakes up that we have problems because I bring him to bed with us. I like cosleeping because it is easy. When he wakes up every few hours I just roll to my side and he nurses and goes right back to sleep and then I feel rested in the morning because I'm not really waking. Seems like a good plan to me... but then I worry that he is waking to often because he has an all you can eat buffet right next to him all night and just wants to snack or nurse for comfort.


I think what I need to do is when he wakes up from his crib, instead of bringing him to bed, try to lay him back down in his crib. If he isn't having it, nurse him in his room and then put him in his crib. That might be a new plan to start on my WEEEKEND and not the day before work! Ha! Then maybe he will get more used to his crib and less used to having me right next to him.

Although, I'm not going to lie, I will miss waking up with him every morning in my arms and watching is perfect little face sleep. I would gladly continue to cosleep... if he actually slept! But hopefully someday... after a nice nights sleep... I can go watch that perfect little face sleep in his crib, all I want! Lol

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Well its taken me awhile to get down a pound, but I honestly feel better than I have in a long time!  I gave myself 9 months to get my pregnancy weight off.... It takes 9 months to put it on, Gotta give yourself 9 months to take it off! Well, I am happy to say, 9 months after baby and I weigh 8 lbs LESS than when I got pregnant! My goal weight is still 2lbs away.  Lately exercising hasn't been happening with my husband's work schedule. BUT, I've hiked for work and gone on evening and sometimes morning walks with the baby to make up for it as well as doing situps and such in the mornings and trying to eat healthier. Oh yeah and I'm pretty sure breastfeeding plays a HUGE role! ;)   My work pants that I was worried about fitting into before I went back to work... are officiall big. :D

9 months!!!

9 months is kind of an epic month... It means he has been out of this world as long as he was growing inside me. Tear... my baby is growing up!

At 9 months according to my at home calculations he is 18 lbs and 27 inches long... but we go to the Dr. next week, so we shall see. I'm always waaay off from my calculations so we'll see, but now that he can sit on the scale by himself that I think will help in our accuracy!

He wears size 3 diapers and 9-12 month clothes

The big news thi month is that he has 5 teeth! FIVE! 4 more than last month!

At 9 months he eats EVERYTHING!  His favorite foods are still avocados, blueberries, bananas and now pasta! He would eat pasta every meal if I let him... that inner Italian is coming out... Mama is soo proud ;) !! He also hardly eats purees anymore. Mostly just finger foods or whatever we eat.

His sleep is just horrible again. He started sleeping better at 8 months and I was soo optimistic. He was giving me 2-4 hours stretches every night... then the past week or so its all gone downhill and he gets up every 1- 2 hours. Sigh.... and Yawn. I'm so dang frustrated and tired when it comes to his sleep!

Anywho, he pulls himself up onto EVERYTHING, he's balanced with one hand, but yet to balance with no hands, although I think he will walk within the next month. (Ha! I probably said that last month too, I will have to check! ) He is a crazy speed crawler, if it was an olympic sport he'd have a good shot at winning!!

He waves and/or makes the sign for milk, says: Mama, Dada, Yeah Yeah, and his knew sound is Oooooh. He jibber jabbers and yell off and on ALL day!

He loves his dog and looks for her when you ask her where she is.

Loves to read books, sing and dance and be outside. He will it in his stroller even in the house if he thinks it means he might get to go outside on a walk ;)

He is still very social, but that darned ole separation anxiety has kicked in and he has gotten very clingy. Luckily when he says good bye at the babysitters she brings him outside and he gets distracted waving and watching my wheels spin/birds fly or other cars go by that he forgets I am leaving!

And now, picture overload... I still don't know why they are posting sideways. Oh and I am pretty sure by 10 months I am going to get a billiard ball thrown at my head. He was picking it up and then dropping it behind him... all he was missing was that forward motion!

Zucchini dinner

So I am not one to post food blogs... but today I couldn't help it!  My boss gave me a GIANT zucchini from his garden and so I went to down on zucchini cooking today!  I made a chocolate zucchini cake and my signature recipe that I call, zucchini garlic shrimp pasta.


Not going to lie I got the zucchini cake recipe from the Internet...
http://allrecipes.com/recipe/chocolate-zucchini-cake-iii/

But I made some changes, I split the oil in half with applesauce and instead of grating the zucchini (too much work) I pureed it. :)  I also didn't add nuts (Yuck!) and put chocolate chips in instead... mmm!  It came out very good! I was nervous cause my electricity went off half way through its cooking, but it still turned out scrumptious!


Next is my signature dish that I typically make once a week.

Brown Zucchini and garlic

I saved some puree from the cake to use as a sauce for the pasta and added some garlic powder

Boil pasta as zucchini is cooking

Add salad shrimp to zucchini and garlic... I use salad shrimp cause it doesn't have to be peeled and is already cooked

Combine the two and I put some grated cheese on top and Serve!

 Colin also had squash and turkey... but he had FOUR servings of pasta and zucchini and then some apples for dessert!