Quitter

Thought I quit, didn't you? I did too for a bit. My self fulfilling prophecy of rarely finishing anything I start.
The process of moving and renovating has been consuming my life, as one can imagine. Through all of this I have been shipping my child off to whoever dares to take him so I can participate in the renovations. After all of the progress we had made in the way of napping, that is the one thing that has been lost.
Oh the nap. The time in any parents day that they look forward to more than most things. Time to themselves to do what they please. Nap, pay bills, frolic through a dewy meadow. The world is your oyster when that baby finally naps. Mason was on a pretty regular routine until we started this endeavour. Now he is down from about 3 hours of napping a day (cue the angelic choir) to barely over one. And for every one hour of napping there is about one hour of crying, fussing, rolling around, singing show tunes, etc. We are home (apartment home) for a few days and I am trying to get the routine back on, but it is not working out so well.
With the last few days comes the concerns of what is going to happen when I go back to work. How on earth will a daycare provider be able to maintain the naps that I have worked so hard for? And how will this affect our home life? Then comes the thoughts of, should I go back to work? At what capacity? What can I do to make money if I don't?
So much to obsess about, so little time.

The S word

None of us are getting enough of it, and those who say they do are lying. It disappears from your life about the same time your feet do in pregnancy, and you hope and pray it will return to your life one day. You daydream about it, wonder daily when you will get it again, and compete with your parent friends to see who is getting less of it. Clearly I am talking about sleep, so get your mind out of the gutter. If you are able to squeeze the other S word into your new life with baby, kudos to you.

Sleep is always not far from my thoughts, and every night when I fall asleep I say a little prayer to Mason asking him to sleep one hour longer, not wake at 5:30, not poop himself awake, etc. I am now also blessed with the bladder the size of a marble, and the thirst of an elephant.

Last night Tyler and I were doing our ninja stealth dance into bed when Ma$e dawg decided to wake up. This dance takes place nightly, as when sharing a bedroom with a baby you are always trying to be more quiet than your partner. That way you can point and scowl at them for causing the baby to rustle. At least that's how it rolls here.

So when the baby woke up last night at 9:30, we were caught a little off guard. He will usually shimmy shake a bit, but not wake. So here we are, me crouched behind his change table trying to change into my pj's, and Tyler hiding under the covers pretending to sleep. Who's in charge here? I then slink into bed hoping he won't notice me. Hoping the child on hands and knees screaming bloody murder while making direct eye contact with me will not notice me. Now I don't know if you've tried crying really loud and having your eyes wide open, but it is a real challenge, and he has mastered it. We tried ignoring him, but again, loud baby, 4 feet away does not go ignored for long. So he won the battle, got a boob, and all was silent again. All except for my mind and bladder. Those are always running on overdrive. This house can't come soon enough!

Moving with Baby

As if moving weren't stressful enough, throw a 7 month old in the mix and it's a whole new level of mind bending.
We are taking possession of our first home on March 8, and the countdown is on. We are really welcoming this change, as we are and have been living in a one bedroom apartment with Mason since he joined the fam. It wasn't so hard at first, as I would have had him in the bedroom with us anyway for the first few months. But now this kid has an agenda of his own, and it really interferes with my sleeping. How rude is that? Let him live rent free, doesn't have to do any chores, gets whatever he wants, and thinks 5:30am is a good time to start rocking out 4 feet from my bed.
It was also so much easier when he was a little lump, as little lumps don't come with a lot of stuff. His favorite things in life were my breasts, and they were already residing here, so they only took up a little more space than usual. We made pleas with family and friends to hold off on all the toys and everything else that comes with baby until we moved. But Baby's first Christmas plus Grandparents first Christmas with a baby (I am an only child) equals a house full of toys, books, play mats, blankets, and so on. I now understand why whenever Auntie Tif showed up with another toy for my nieces and nephews, parents would give me stink eye.
So now not only do we have to move all our stuff, but his giant collection of things that have a sole purpose of collecting drool.
The moving is not even what's causing the sleepless nights, it's the renovations we are trying to complete pre-move, and the concern about where and who I am going to donate this baby to. My biggest concern is not how our house is going to look (although that is probably number 2 or three on the list) but how I am going to keep Ma$e on a regular schedule.
Gonna try and live in the moment (not good at that) and not stress too much about the future (professional at that). I'm sure everything will work out, and a few more sleepless nights will only get me closer to that Scout Badge I am going for.

Advice Junkie

I am the queen of advice. Getting and giving. I will seek out information whether it be online, in books, or from friends or family. I will listen to whatever anyone has to tell me, especially if it's about child rearing. This has come to bite me in the ass several times.

Take sleep habits for example. When Mason started having poor sleep (and when I say started, I mean never stopped) instead of looking to my doctor or reading a book, I read 4. 4 books, all very different from the last, and all working against me. One says let him cry, never let him cry, pick him up, leave him alone. . . So with all this floating around in there, I bombarded myself with info, and questioned everything I had read, done, believed. I asked mommy friends, supportive family members, randoms on the street, and dug myself deeper into the hole of mixed messages. Eventually we found a solution that made sense for us (he still doesn't sleep through the night, so hold the fan mail) and it seems like an eternity ago (keep in mind he's 6 1/2 months old).

Now that I have gone through that, I have deemed myself an expert and will gladly share my knowledge with anyone that will listen. I try not to be "that gal" that says something that the listener will smile and nod at, then walk away shaking their head. We have all been in that conversation, and it's not fun to be on the receiving end. But I do want to share the knowledge, mistakes, and lessons I have learned with others. Fortunately for me, most of the people I am talking to do want to listen or are asking me because I am really good at pretending I have it together. Betcha didn't know motherhood turns you into one heck of an actress, among other things