What I Like About You

I have taken much in over the last few days and weeks  I am trying to enjoy life with a baby as much as possible before I go back to work and my time with him is limited.  I recently read a blog post from a friend that she had written and thought "That's exactly what I have been feeling."  http://reidkids.blogspot.ca/2012/04/enjoying-moments.html
That's not uncommon for she and I, as we seem to roll though the ebbs and flows of babyhood together.  Every time Mason is acting like a jerk I can call her and sure enough her kid is up to the same drama.  It's nice to have someone suffering with me.
So I have really been trying to listen to all those people that say to sit back and relax, enjoy the time, they are only babies for a short while.  I have tried throughout my boy's short time on earth to live in the moment and enjoy each and every day.  But let me tell you, there are some days when I am not enjoying much and if he wiggles away from me one more time while I am trying to strap him into his diaper I swear I will sell him.  And not even to the highest bidder.  Just for a tank of gas or some groceries.
But no matter how much of a dick he is being, all that baby has to do is smile or laugh and he has me wrapped around his little finger.  Below, a list of some of the things that make me smile about my baby.
1) When he is nursing and puts his fingers near in my mouth and smiles so big that my breast falls out of his super suction hold.
2)  He laughs likes the word Booger is the greatest joke ever.
3)  He will never say no to a dance party around the living room to old house music.
4)  He eats like a champ.
5)  His super soft spot (there's only one left, the excema is still bad) under his chin that when it is kissed he laughs like a hyena.
6)  He loves his mama, and when something happens to make him cry, no one else will suffice.
7)  He would rather read, eat, or rip a book than watch tv.
8)  He likes to play music for me (of the pots and pans variety) while I clean.
9)  He enjoys the great outdoors, and when in a foul mood, a little air makes him (and I) feel better.
10)  He's friggin cute!
So it's these things that keep me going.  When the dishes are everywhere, I am in my pajamas at 3 pm, I have just had a spoonful of mush thrown at me I will focus on the awesome and not the awful.  I will call my friends when I need to vent and have them talk me down.  I will say yes when someone offers to watch the baby so I can nap (anyone, feel free to jump in and offer).  Mostly I will savour this boy that is a little piece of me.  Try and remind me of this when I have mush in my hair.

Life at Home

Time is not on my side as of late. Looking back at this blog, my last post was almost a month ago, and it feels like yesterday!

We have been in our home for almost 2 weeks now, our baby is almost 9 months, I have been with Tyler almost 9 years. It must be aging, cause time really does fly as you get older. Or maybe it flies by when you have more things to live for.

My darling son has made some big leaps in the last month, so moving into a house has come at the right time. He has been army crawling around for awhile now, but the speed in which he can drag his little body has increased dramatically. We have been baby proofing the new house as we go, so it's really nice to let him have free reign of his room and not worry about eating clumps of cat fur, kleenex, etc.

Here is an older video while still at the apartment of Mason harassing Maxx pre bed time.

https://vimeo.com/39576497

He has started swimming lessons with his little buddy from up the street. He is the big kid in the class, which I think is something he is going to have to get used to. He is also having some very elaborate conversations (mostly at us, not with us) and learning new sounds and facial expressions daily that make me almost pee my pants. With all of these new developments I am realizing that he is moving into toddler hood and will soon be off and running.

It's funny how things that I used to take for granted are things that I am longing for now. I miss when Mason would only nap when we were in bed together. I miss when he would fall back to sleep when I nursed him in bed and we would get an extra 30 minutes of morning sleep. I miss when he was a useless little lump that I could leave in the middle of the room and know where he would be when I returned.

But times they are a changing! I am now planning a birthday party (not legit planning, just thinking about it) for a one year old! Today I had a meeting to discuss my return to work. Arranging childcare. Planning for other babies. All the things that seemed so far away are now creeping up on me and they are not being stealthy about it.

With all of life rushing by, it makes me want to take time to stop and smell the baby heads.

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.

Oh, you still breastfeed?

Yeah, I do, and plan to continue as long as I can. I am often surprised, and I don't know why, when people ask me this question. The moment you become pregnant you are on everyone's radar for unsolicited advice. Prenatal nutrition, type of birth, what type of shoes you wear, what type of job you have. Everyone has an opinion. Then when your baby is actually here, it only gets worse. All of a sudden your breasts are the hot topic among strangers. "Do you breastfeed? Oh, good for you." I feel like I got an A on my report card or something getting that kind of congrats. At no other point in my life did random ladies ask me about my bits. The congrats only last for the first three months or so, and then the questions change to "Is he on formula yet? Well that's why he doesn't sleep you know." I know plenty of formula fed babies that ruin their parents dreams of ever sleeping again.

I think my biggest surprise about the "do you still breastfeed" question, is that my son is 7 months old. Now if I had an eight year old hanging from my breast while waiting at the bus stop, I can see why one may be curious. But even if that was the case, it's our choice. The global average age of weening from the breast is 4 years, and the World Health Organization recommends that babies be breastfed until at least two years old.

It's humorous when I hear people saying that breastfeeding is so inconvenient, and they are so surprised I have done it for so long. Yet I have never had to sterilize my breasts, measure how much I am giving him, or worry about how much breast milk to pack for a trip. I believe there is a time and a place for formula, and if you have not been able to breastfeed, or choose formula because that works for your family, then by all means use it. But please do not look at me like I am the oddity because I am breastfeeding him at 7 months. And yes, I still breastfeed while he's teething. It only took one nip for him to learn that if he wants to keep enjoying the booby snacks, there will be none of that.

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!

Baby go Boom

I guess I have been lucky to make it seven months without injury to my kid. He has been in 2 car accidents in his short life, but was fine health wise (they took his license away though). So when we have 2 head injuries in 2 days, I feel like a total ass.

On our way to a coffee date with our friends Marie and Carson we took tumble number one. I say we, as we were both involved in this one.

Marie is a dear friend who I met in prenatal class. We got fat together and have a similar view on parenting which is delightful. She is a funny woman who doesn't judge me when I tell her I pinched Mason and swore at him for not sleeping. She listens and sympathizes when I bitch about life with a baby, but also reminds me about all the awesome stuff. It's great to have someone like her around. Our kids are a week apart in age, so they tend to reach milestones around the same time, which is good and bad. We share the Baby Mama Drama.

So on our way to coffee time, walking down the massive hill near our apartment I did a header on a patch of ice and fell to my knees. Masonite was in his carrier on me, and came for the ride, hitting the back of his head on the sidewalk. I'm not sure how severe this blow was, as he had on his toque and 3 hoods, but he screamed like I had ripped his toe nails out. I also started crying, and called my husband to see what to do. He reminded me that he was also new to the parenting thing, and had no idea. I watched for signs of concussion, and we continued onto our play date, everyone feeling fine.

The following day, while packing up some clothes in preparation for the move (just the mention of the move makes me light headed) he decided to work on his moves by rolling off our king sized bed onto the floor. He made sure to make a pit stop with his head on the giant rubbermaid on the way to his destination. Now I know at this point you are thinking a lot of things like "watch your damn kid", "why is a seven month old alone on the bed", etc, and believe me, I thought it too. Truth be told, I was 4 feet away from him, and his quick moves took place while I was reaching for a shirt in the closet. He is fine, I'm pretty sure I was more damaged by the fall. I know it's early in the year, but keep me in mind when the nominations for Mom of the Year come out.

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.