6 months

nicknames: dax, monkey, munchkin, and tyke. matt's been calling him daxy-poo, too, which is kind of ridiculous but it's adorable that he's so cute with him.

likes: playing peek-a-boo.  yelling, squealing, and screaming.  rolling over.  splashing in the bath or baby pool.  trying to grab padfoot.

dislikes: being hungry.  getting out of the bath.

milestones: we are officially mobile - daxon is completely rolling over now.  he's been rolling front to back for several weeks, but pretty much could not care less about rolling back to front.  but just within the past week, he started completely rolling.  he is really good at lifting up his head, and recently started kind of pushing up his butt.  he really found his voice this month - yells, squeals, screams, and talks.  and he is sitting on his own for longer and longer periods of time.  but the biggest milestone is that we've started solids!  more on that below. 

clothing size: all 3-6 month or 6 month.  and a pair of old navy jean shorts that are 6-12 month.  

sleep: sleep has been weird this month.  all of a sudden he is having mid-night wakeups.  he doesn't need to eat, but he wakes up and fusses, so i go down and give him his paci and his lovey, and usually within a few minutes he falls back to sleep.  he is also waking up much earlier than usual - like 5-5:30, when it used to be that i had to wake him up at 6.  he is also a bit more difficult to put down at night, which may because of adding solids to his nighttime routine.  and really, he's not difficult, per se, but he's not falling asleep nursing consistently like he had been.  several times i've had to put him in the crib awake.  but usually i just give him his lovey and after fussing/playing for a couple minutes, he falls asleep.  once or twice we've had to go give him his paci.

naps: i am trying to be more consistent with his naptime, especially his big afternoon nap (1-3).  daycare marks that he naps from 1-3 every day, and though i doubt that he's actually sleeping that whole time, i'm sure he is at least getting quiet time, so i am making more of an effort to do the same thing.  i take him upstairs, close his blinds, turn on the white noise machine (sometimes i'll play music instead of the white noise), and close the door.  again, sometimes he'll lie awake and play for up to 20 minutes, but eventually he'll fall sleep, and then he'll pretty consistently sleep for at least an hour, and very rarely he'll go close to 2 hours.  i usually try to get him down in the mornings, too, around 10, which is what they mark that he does at daycare.  sometimes he'll also take a quick catnap after our evening nursing session (like 15-20 minutes).

eating: we started solids, you guys!  so far, he's only getting about an ounce once a day.  i'm waiting to send something to daycare until after we see the ped to really figure out exactly how to schedule adding solids to his routine.  at exactly 5.5 months, we started off with egg yolk, based on this information. i hadn't really intended to start when we did, but he was sitting at the table with me one evening when matt was working late, and he was so interested in what i was doing, so i took a hard-boiled egg, scooped out the yolk, and mushed it with some breastmilk.  it went well, so our next step was bananas, and only because we ran out of eggs and happened to have some bananas.  he didn't like the bananas so much at first, but we tried again, and he took to them on the 2nd night.  after that was sweet potatoes, then avocado.  we also tried green beans, but they didn't puree very well - the hulls didn't break down, so it was kind of chunky, and he didn't like the texture.  after doing it, i read that using frozen green beans is actually better than fresh, so we'll have to give that another try.  we try each food 3 times to monitor for reactions.  for the bananas, i just mushed them with a spoon/fork in a little ramekin.  for the avocado, i put it in the food processor.  and for the sweet potatoes and green beans, i used my baby brezza, which steams and purees all in the same bowl, which i love cuz it's less mess.  i am basically following this guideline on when to introduce what foods, minus the grains.  i'm still not sure what i'm going to do about grains and wheat.  from what i've read, a baby's guts lack the enzyme to properly break down grains until they're much older.  however, i am concerned that putting it off puts him at higher risk for developing a wheat/gluten allergy.

so our feeding schedule looks like this: i nurse him first thing in the morning (usually around 6-ish).  during the week, he is then up for the day.  he gets 3 6-oz bottles at daycare (and i pump 3 times at work).  i nurse him when we get home (right around 6).  he eats dinner with us around 7.  and then at 7:45, it's bedtime and he nurses to sleep.  i sometimes worry that he's eating too much, but then i have to remember that he's not getting a whole lot of nutrition yet from the solids - "food before 1 is just for fun!"  my plan is to start sending an ounce or so to daycare and having them give it to him before his afternoon nap.  he gets a bottle at noon and then goes down for nap from 1-3. 

we are having so much fun with him.  his little personality is definitely starting to show through.  so far, we know that he loves to smile, rarely cries (unless he's hungry...like daddy), and can entertain himself just fine.  he likes to sit back and watch what's happening around him (again, like daddy), but if you get him chatting he will talk your ear off (like mama).  he's pretty outgoing, and will flash his big smile to pretty much anyone.

mmmm....sweet potatoes

look, ma, no hands!

crazy hair day at daycare

petting mama while nursing

milk coma

playing on mama and daddy's bed

rsvp rage

why do people not respond to invitations that specifically ask for a respone?  there is a reason people ask for a response, so what is your reason for not doing that?  i'm not asking you whether you're coming so that i can feel more popular.  i'm asking so that i can make sure that i have enough food for you.  i hate nothing more than people who never respond but then show up and eat.  or who never respond, but i go ahead and assume they're coming, and then they don't, and i've wasted a shit-ton of money on food that won't get eaten. 

not responding to invitations is so rude.  i can't.fucking.stand.it.  we sent out an evite, so literally all you have to do is click your mouse like 3 times - once to open the email, once to choose your response, and once to close the email.   it is not hard.  it does not take up more than 15 seconds of your time. 

i seriously want to send out an email to everyone who hasn't responded and say, "since you have not responded to our multiple requests for an answer, we are going to assume you're not coming.  there will not be food for you.  please do not show up and expect to eat."  is that rude?  yep.  but so is not clicking a little box. 

sometimes, i really hate people.

survivor guilt - mommy edition

i read enough to know that at some point from the moment i saw the word "pregnant" float up on that pee stick until inifinity, i was going to experience feelings of mommy guilt.  you know, i'm-not-spending-enough-time-with-my-baby....i-should-be-at-home-and-not-at-work...why-did-i-lose-my-patience...  all that good stuff.  i expected all of that and therefore have been able to contain it and reason myself out of it when it surfaces. 

what i didn't expect were these feelings of survivor guilt.  at almost 6 months in, i really have nothing to complain about regarding motherhood or parenting or newborns.  dax was an easy baby.  aside from cluster feeding, i really had very few issues during his super-young newborn period.  he is a happy baby.  we can take him anywhere and he adapts quickly and easily.  he can entertain himself.  when he's fussy, it's for a reason, usually because he's hungry, so it can easily be resolved by sticking a bottle or my boob in his face.  i am - we are - insanely lucky.  i am well aware of this fact.  i count my blessings every single day.  many many mothers before me struggled - with breastfeeding, with babies who don't sleep, with colicky babies.  i truly think it is not something that we are doing "right."  i think we just have an easy baby.  matt and i were both easy babies, and we are both laid-back humans.  i think daxon just has those traits from us. 

so when i see my sister struggling with quinn, i feel guilty.  quinn is a biter, so their breastfeeding relationship has been difficult.  he has terrible reflux (far worse than daxon ever did).  the medication he's on for the reflux makes him gassy.  he fusses a lot.  it is hard to be around for more than a few hours.  i don't know how callie does it for days/weeks on end.  especially because anthony travels for work, so there have been times when she's been alone with quinn for days.  they have tons of family around, but i get the impression that she doesn't reach out for help all that often.  so i feel guilty that i'm not closer by to help. 

and then beth, matt's cousin.  liam is now almost 10 weeks old (almost 36 weeks gestation).  he is still in the nicu, and still on the vent.  they have trialed removal of the vent several times, and each time he fails and needs to be reintubated.  apparently the doctors are now saying there is a chance he may never come off the vent.  he still has a pda (a hole in the pulmonary artery and the aorta that hasn't closed, so blood is not getting oxygen from the lungs).  they tried the medication given for pda, but he had a bad reaction to it, so they are basically just bidign their time to see if it closes.  my heart aches for them.  i feel guilty that i have this healthy, happy, full-term little baby, while they are struggling so much in the nicu.  

when daxon was fussing yesterday (because he was hungry) while i was trying to get one more thing done for dinner before taking him up to eat, i got frustrated and snipped at him.  then i thought about beth and how she probably wishes liam could fuss and express his needs so that she can attend to them.  and i felt terrible.  terrible that i yelled at dax, terrible that i didn't appreciate that he's healthy enough to have the lung capacity to yell for his needs, terrible that i'm not appreciating all of that.

i know that none of this can be helped.  i am doing nothing right anymore than they are doing anything wrong.  this is simply the way the cards fell.  babies are different and that's that.  there's nothing that i can do about it.  it is what it is.  i know it's silly to feel this way, but there it is. 

don't forget!

in case you haven't heard, google reader is set to disappear from the world on monday.  i migrated all my current google reader subscriptions over to bloglovin, and i am happy with it.  the app is great (i do most of my blog reading while i'm nursing and/or pumping).  it makes is super easy to follow new blogs.  and, if you sign up before google reader goes away, it will automatically migrate everything for you.  easy-peasy, lemon squeezy! 

follow me over at bloglovin!

in vino veritas

on saturday, my sister and anthony and quinn came for a visit.  it was quinn's first time traveling, and the little guy did pretty well!  saturday night after the kidlets were in bed, the 4 of us sat out back on the patio and had some drinks and talked about parenthood and all that comes with it.  we swapped delivery stories (my labor and subsequent vaginal delivery and callie's scheduled c-section, since quinn was breech).  and then the boys started talking about the first time they saw their sons.  and, you guys, it was the sweetest thing.  i'll keep their words to myself, because it was private emotional things that were said in the sanctity of our back porch, but i nearly cried listening to matt talk about those first few moments.  i could cry now just thinking about it. 

watching matt be a daddy - playing with daxon, trying to make him laugh, feeding him a bottle, giving him a bath - is my greatest joy in life.  on saturday night, when we were in bed, i told him as much.  i told him how much i love watching him be a daddy.  i told him how proud i am of him.  i told him how my heart swells at the way daxon looks at him.

we said things that night that we simply hadn't gotten around to saying to each other yet.

in vino veritas...

playtime

daxon and i got some quality playtime in this evening.  i could not possible love this kid more.

5 months

nicknames: dax, d, bubbers, munchkin, and tyke.  uncle dan calls him d-man.

likes: putting everything in sight into his mouth.  talking and yelling.  kicking his legs like he's training for a marathon.  playing peek-a-boo.

dislikes: being burped in the middle of eating.  getting into his car seat.

milestones: he is really starting to talk now.  he mostly talks with his mouth closed, using his tongue to make "sounds" inside his mouth.  it's kind of hard to explain, but it's hysterical.  he loves to shriek and yell.  he is laughing a lot more.  and of course we had our first hospital visit, which was a milestone i could have done without.  he's able to roll over back to front and front to back, but he struggles with it.  i kind of think he just doesn't care enough.  he can sit assisted, and can tripod sit for a few seconds if he's really concentrating on it.  and he's doing better with tummy time.  he loves to pull his blanket or burp cloth over his face, then pull it down - playing peek-a-boo!  he is using his exersaucer a lot, now, too.

clothing size: mostly into his 3-6 month or 6 month stuff.  we just gave a big bag of 3 month stuff to cousin quinn.  we also graduated to medium size sleep sacks.  

sleep: we are still feeding to sleep, and i kind of don't care anymore.  we attempted to change up the routine, and it didn't go so well.  the first night it actually went great, but the second night was an enormous disaster.  he started to fuss and we let him go for 3 minutes.  i went up, gave him his paci, and stayed with him till he calmed down.  a couple minutes later, he started to fuss again.  we let him go 5 minutes until matt went up.  he would not calm down.  after another 5 minutes of matt trying to comfort him, i finally gave in and nursed him to sleep.  we talked about it, and since he doesn't need to nurse (ie, he doesn't need me), we're ok with him eating to sleep (boob or bottle).  occasionally he wakes up in the night, but we just give him his paci and he's right back down.

naps: still napping pretty regularly.  if we miss a naptime, or if the schedule gets thrown off on the weekend, he doesn't meltdown.  it means we can be pretty flexible, which is really great.

eating: right before his 5-month birthday, i started increasing his bottles to 6oz.  he was finishing every bottle during the day, and sometimes on the weekends we thought he seemed hungry after finishing a 5oz bottle.  so he now gets 18oz in bottles, plus 3 nursing sessions. 

i know i keep saying this, but we really are lucky with him.  he is so good, so happy.  we are having so much fun with him.  he definitely has a little personality and we love seeing that develop. here are a few pictures from our 5-month photo shoot...

and a few other random shots from the month...

he loves to pull that blanket down over his head

saturday morning naps with daddy are the best!

exersaucer time!

first time in the pool!

piggies!

first father's day

first trip to the e.d.

yes, folks, that is a hospital bracelet with my baby's name on it.  this morning, at 6am, there we were, taking daxon to the emergency room.  not exactly the way i'd hoped we'd start off father's day weekend.

dax woke up around 5:45, so i went down to nurse him with hopes that i'd be able to get him back to sleep.  he nursed for about 4 minutes then fell asleep, so i placed him back in his crib.  as soon as i put him down, he woke up, and rather than fight with him, i picked him up to continue feeding him.  before i had the chance, though, he spit up all down my back.  i laid him down on the footrest of the glider and started to clean myself up. i looked away for a split second, and then i heard it: thud.  i looked back to see his body hit the floor and heard a second thud.  he immediately started to scream, and i ran to get him.  he was face-down on the hardwood floor.  i picked him up and started to comfort him, trying to remain calm myself...and failing miserably.  i was hysterical.  matt came running out of the bedroom, and i handed daxon over to him because i was shaking so much i was afraid to hold him.  he had already stopped crying and was smiling and laughing, but i called our pediatrician to see if we needed to take him to the emergency room.  she reassured me that he was probably fine, but said we should take him in, just to get him checked out. 

so off we went, with daxon smiling away.  he got all checked out and within 45 minutes, we were on our way back out the door.  the doctor told us that the only way to ensure that he is ok is to give him a head ct, but there is a lot of radiation exposure, so he would only do it if he was exhibiting concerning behavior, which he wasn't.  he said that if daxon starts acting strangely, we should bring him back in and they'll do the scan.  our discharge instructions were basically just to keep an eye on him.

i'm not entirely sure what happened, but i think he basically pushed himself backwards off the footrest, landing first on his head, then flipping backwards and landing on his belly.  it was absolutely terrifying, but the doctor and nurses assured us that he'll be fine.  they also all told us that their own kids have fallen on their heads and they're all fine.  but that just reinforces that you can't take your hands off them, even for just a split second.  from now on he either goes on the floor or in something secure.

he still seems fine, and in another hour we're out of the danger zone.  but it's certainly something i don't need to experience ever again.

exploring faith

i know i've mentioned before that religion and church were never a big part of my life.  i was baptized at about 18 months old.  my parents took my sister at around the same age, and the pastor at the church told them that she would go to hell since she hadn't already been baptized.  so my sister was baptized when she was 15, when she asked for it.  i never had a formal first communion, and i never was confirmed.  i just one day started going up and taking communion.  i have absolutely no idea if that is even legal, but the way i look at is that jesus simply doesn't seem like the kind of guy who would care about formal ceremonies.  from the little that i've read and heard about him, he seemed like a pretty laid-back, accepting kind of person.  i doubt he cares whether or not i went through some ritualistic thing to receive the sacrament.  at least i'm doing it.  who knows, maybe i'm wrong.  but so far, i haven't been struck down, so i guess it's working ok for everyone involved.

despite all of this, i felt that it was important to get daxon baptized. we scheduled it at the church in hershey where we got married.  pastor cindy gave us a bunch of reading materials related to baptism: a book for daxon about the magic of water, a copy of the baptism program, and a book about baptism for parents and sponsors.  we have asked my sister and anthony to be daxon's godparents (sidenote, are they even considered godparents if they're not catholic?).  i started reading the book about baptism and it really got me thinking about my own faith.

in all honesty, i'm not entirely sure of what exactly i believe in.  i'm not really sure that anyone "answers" prayers.  i think that you can say a prayer and someone hears it, but the ultimate ending to that story is that fate is already decided.  what is going to happen is going to happen, no matter how many people pray for a different outcome.  despite that, i have found that when things are feeling particularly bleak, saying a prayer brings me peace.  i find peace in attending church and putting my concerns and fears and hopes into the universe.  so i think that i believe that there is a higher power that is driving our life, but the direction that it takes and the events that happen are already predetermined. 

and with confessing of sins and all that, i'm not really sure that i believe that confessing my sins to a higher power truly absolves me of that action.  what's done is done.  but i do believe that in the end, all of my indiscretions will be forgiven.  forgiven, not forgotten, which is how i live my own life.

i am still weeding through my thoughts on jesus and being the son of god and the second-coming.  in fact, i am still weeding through a lot of it.  but for now, matt and i have found a local church that we like and we are hoping to attend more regularly and get a bit more involved.  if not for our sake, then for daxon's. 

news notes

when trends die - i am so over mustaches.  can we move on from them, please?

21 kids who sold out their parents - omg, this is hysterical.  i wonder what daxon is going to come up with some day?

to parents of small children - i found this the day after i had a particularly tough night with daxon.  i kind of want to print it out and keep copies of it all over my house.  it's absolute perfection.

ncaa bans hastags, social media urls on football fields - the ncaa proves once again that it sucks.

the courage of teachers - this is so true.  i mean, you look at these teachers from the schools in oklahoma.  and the teachers at sandy hook, or columbine, or....any other school.  they aren't paid to protect our children.  they are paid to teach them.  that is all.  and yet here they are, laying down their lives for children who aren't their own. 

mars, nestle, hershey accused of chocolate price-fixing conspiracy in canada - while this looks bad for hershey, i secretly hope that mars and nestle are both found guilty.  hershey's outright admission of guilt and cooperation in the investigation will look a lot better compared to 2 companies who lied about it!

brad pitt surprises local fans at world war z screening - son of a bitch.  this is 20 minutes from our house.  why wasn't i there????

4-month appointment

we had daxon's 4-month appointment on tuesday evening.  he's a big boy, growing like a weed!

weight - 14lb, 10oz
height - 24.5"
head circ - 16.5"

he had 5 vaccines again - 1 oral and 4 shots.  he handled it like a champ!  he barely cried and then was fine all night.  he felt a little warm before bed, so we gave him some tylenol and he was fine.

we got the green light to start solids from 5-6 months.  i am anxious to start, and he is definitely interested in food, but i think we will wait until 6 months.  we will also start with fruit and veggie purees rather than rice cereal, and i actually may wait to start any grains until closer to 12 months to help his gut develop the right enzymes to break down grains.  i am really interested in baby-led weaning, but i think with him being at daycare, that will be difficult.  so we may do a sort of modified blw and puree combination type of thing.

by his weight, his zantac dose should be increased.  he's currently getting 1.25mL 3x a day.  he's doing ok on that dose for now, so we decided to keep him there and see how he does.  the ped said that most parents see that the reflux gets much better around this age, and many wean the medication themselves.  hopefully, we'll be able to add ourselves to that group!

and since i just took this this morning and i think it's adorable, here's a funny picture of dax in his bebepod with a little bit of bedhead and my favorite toy (from my own childhood) stuck on his foot. 

#donormilk

today, i packed up 200 ounces of my frozen breastmilk and gave it to a family in need. 

after matt's cousin declined my offer of breastmilk for her preemie, i went back to thinking i'd just continue stock-piling my milk and figure out some way to use it.  so one day when i was in the lactation room, i overheard the lactation consultant telling a new nicu mom that if she was having trouble pumping enough to feed her baby, she could always get donor milk from the milk bank.  so after i finished pumping, i ran into the lactation consultant in the hallway and asked her about the milk bank.  she told me to look into the human milk banking association of north america.  you have to call your nearest milk bank (ohio, for me), go through a screening interview, and then complete an application, along with paperwork that gets signed by your physician and your pediatrician.  if you get approved, they send you a cooler and you ship it to the milk bank, where they take care of donating it to someone.  holy process, batman.

so then i remembered that one of the moms in the new mom support group that i went to while home on maternity leave had mentioned that she found recipient moms on a facebook group.  so i googled "human milk" and found human milk 4 human babies.  i found the pennsylvania facebook page, and posted that i had about 200oz to donate.  within a few hours, i had a message from a local mom who was in need.  she has twins and isn't able to keep up with their needs.  we arranged for her husband to come by tonight to pick up the cooler.

i placed everything in an old styrofoam cooler, stacking them up with newest milk on the bottom, oldest on top.  her husband dropped by our house tonight and picked up the cooler. 

i have to tell you, it felt pretty awesome.  i'm hoping that i can build up a big stash again and donate some more in the future!

4 months

excuse me?!  how did we get here so quickly?  ugh, slow down time!  we have an appointment on the 28th, so i'll update his stats after that.  i'm so anxious to find out how big he is!  he definitely looks like a monster.  we met a 10-month-old the other day and dax looked almost as big as her!  yowsa!

nicknames: dax, d, bubbers, munchkin, and tyke.

likes: grabbing at everything in sight, followed by immediately putting it in his mouth.  playing on his harry potter blanket on the floor.  laughing at his goofball parents.  sleeping on his side.

dislikes: taking zantac, being hungry, being overwhelmed.

milestones: oh, man, this month has been fun!  daxon is grabbing at everything.  if it's in front of him, he will try to grab it.  and if he gets it, he will try to put it in his mouth.  if it's too big, he will work on it to try to figure out a way to get it in his mouth.  like, he really concentrates on it!  baby boy is able to sit up, assisted, and has definitely started trying to pull himself up to sit when he's propped up on our legs or in the boppy.  i seriously think that all his "workouts" with daddy have something to do with that - his ab muscle are really strong!  he is laughing, smiling, and talking a lot!  he rolled over - once - from front to back.  and lately i'm finding him sleeping on his side when i wake him up in the morning!

clothing size: still wearing 3-month stuff pretty well.  they're starting to get a little snug, but i think we've still got a couple weeks in them.

sleep: we had a week of nighttime wake-ups, but seems like we are back on track with sleeping through (*knocks wood*).  i do think we need to move bedtime up a bit, cuz he is getting kinda cranky by around 7:30, when it used to be he could go till 8.  i think after our 4-month appointment, we will also start changing up the bedtime routine so that he is not being nursed to sleep.  nursing him to sleep works so well, but i'd really like to break that sleep association before it becomes too strong.  i'm already worried, though, because i'm noticing that when i take him upstairs for bed, as soon as i start his massage/lullaby, he starts smacking his lips.  so breaking that association could prove to be a bit difficult.  although the other night i was out with friends after work and matt had to put him down.  matt put him in his crib after a bottle and he wasn't sleeping, but he didn't cry or fuss too much, and eventually (after kicking himself around 180-degrees) he finally fell asleep on his own.  so maybe it won't be too bad?  guess we'll find out!

naps: naps are much more regular, now!  at daycare, he typically sleeps 8:30-9, 10-11, then 1-3.  those times change a bit every day, but for the most part it's fairly consistent.  we try to stick to that on the weekends, but it's hard, and so far he doesn't seem to go into full-on meltdown mode if he misses a "naptime."  hopefully that continues.  

eating: he is still eating well.  he gets 3 5oz bottles at daycare.  he nurses once in the morning, once when we get home in the evening, and once at bedtime.  he is doing this new thing now where every morning he spits up.  every.single.morning.  i've tried burping him 3 or 4 minutes in, and still - instant puke.  we are soaking a burp cloth a day from it.  i'm at the point now where i don't get him dressed until after we finish nursing, because i always had to change his clothes!  so now i wake him up, change his diaper, nurse him in just his diaper, then clean him up and get him dressed.  i think he's probably just eating too much too fast, because it doesn't happen at any other feeding, and daycare says he's not doing it for them.  i've tried hand-expressing a bit before nursing him but that doesn't really seem to help.  he definitely isn't in any distress from it.  he pukes, then looks at me and bursts into a big grin.  stinker.

in general, we have a really good baby.  he is very quiet and content.  daycare again commented that he really doesn't cry much at all, just for the "necessities," like when he's hungry.  they said he loves to just sit and watch the other kids.  i took him out for dinner the other night with a friend of mine, and he behaved so well that other diners were commenting on how good he was!  we really are super lucky.  i think the most exciting thing for this month was meeting his new cousin.  and let's be honest - that was more exciting for mommy than it was for daxon!

matt's a homebrewer, so i could not pass up this awesome "assistant brewer" onesie

from my first mother's day

bigfoot

all smiles

 if you follow me on instagram, you've seen these pictures already....

sunday morning storytime - this is our favorite book

phillies day at daycare!

mommy and daddy were being silly, recreating fear and loathing in las vegas.  with our 4-month old.

how funky is your chicken?!

  happy 4 month birthday, baby boy!!

sound.

i don't know if this is weird, but i'm just going to say it.  my favorite sound in the world right now is daxon enjoying his meal.  the little gulps and sighs of satisfaction just melt my heart.  knowing that i'm responsible for that happiness, for filling his little belly, for satisfying a hunger he doesn't really "get" quite yet?  

love.

news notes

man, it's been about a hundred bazillion years since i've done a news notes, hasn't it?  well, i'm going to try to resume them.  i always liked collecting weird, random, fascinating stories from around the interwebs, sharing them with you, and telling you what to think about them.  so...here ya go.  the first news notes of 2013.  i can't promise they'll be weekly, but they'll be here.

the wake n'bacon - seriously?  poor michael scott.  if only he'd known about this, he could have avoided that whole, awkward, foot-wrapped-in-bubble-wrap debacle.  poor michael scott.

source

have american parents got it all backwards? - in a word?  yes.

the man behind abercrombie and fitch - ugh, doucebaggery at it's finest.  everything i am thinking could not possibly top jen's reaction, so i'll just let you read (and love) her thoughts on it.

'girl's gone wild's' joe francis convicted of assault - i mean, this was almost a guarantee.  the man has clearly never had any respect for women.

big 10 announces football division alignments and move to new 9-game conference schedules - well, this is well-balanced *rolls eyes*  the east division of the big 10 will dominate every year.  the big 10 championship game will basically be nebraska vs whoever plays better out of michigan, ohio state, michigan state, or penn state.  ridiculous.  also, why is it still called the big 10?

so god made a mother - spoiler alert: you'll need tissues!

hugs

this week, i am hugging my littles a bit tighter, grateful that they are healthy and happy.

matt's cousin gave birth on April 24 at 25 weeks.  she had had some bleeding around 22 or 23 weeks, and was put on bed rest.  at 24 weeks, the bleeding started again, and she was admitted to the hospital.  she began having contractions, and they were unable to stop them, so they decided to deliver her at 25 weeks.  little liam was 1lb,15oz at birth.  he continues to fight in the nicu, and is doing pretty well.  they have had a few setbacks, but for the most part he is making decent progress.  it will be a long road ahead for them, full of ups and downs. 

i reached out to matt's cousin to offer her some of my frozen breastmilk, but she is pumping enough to keep up with liam's needs, so she doesn't need it right now.  i put together a care package that includes a preemie outfit for liam, some luna bars for beth, and a book for big sister called, "my brother is a preemie." 

i think of them everyday, and look at my little man, fat and happy and full of smiles, and am so thankful that he is healthy.  it makes me appreciate how truly blessed we are. 

i'm also giving padfoot some extra snuggles.  my sister sent everyone an email yesterday telling us that they had to unexpectedly put their cat, brady, down late monday night.  callie woke up monday night to the sound of something dragging down the hallway outside their bedroom, only to find poor brady unable to use his back legs.  anthony rushed him to an emergency clinic, where they discovered that he had thrown a blood clot that lodged in his spine.  the clot was also causing pulmonary edema, so by the time anthony got to the clinic, brady was in essence drowning.  the vet offered to give him medication to dissolve the clot, but his lungs were already so bad, it most likely would have been a futile effort, and brady would have suffered.  the entire thing happened in less than 2 hours.

i feel so so so badly for callie.  brady truly was her first baby - she got him right out of college.  i just cannot imagine how scared she must have felt monday night, and how sad she must feel now.

so hug your babies and your pets extra tight.  i know i am.

this picture is of brady and baby quinn.  callie sent it to me on monday afternoon. 

this life

i'm sitting here in the pale light of early morning, rocking daxon in the glider in my brand-new nephew's nursery.  he has just finished nursing, and so now we're just snuggling together.  as i sat here breathing in this moment, it dawned on me that my sister is probably downstairs doing the exact same thing.  and i was suddenly overwhelmed with such a love for this life that i could not contain it, and the tears just started to spill.

how absolutely blessed we all are...

i'm an auntie!

my sister had her baby!!!  she ended up having a scheduled c-section because at 38 weeks, that little sucker flipped and went breech! 

baby boy was born yesterday, 4/25 (my dad's birthday) at 12:10pm.  7lb even, 20".  pretty big for a week-early baby!  mama and baby are doing great, and hope to be home by sunday. 

pictures and name to follow if she lets me!  what i can tell you is that this little one is a FIFTH!  daddy's the 4th in a line of men with his name, and though they weren't sure they'd go that direction, they ultimately did!  his full name sounds very distinguished because of it.

matt, daxon, and i are headed to hershey tomorrow to meet the little guy.  i am so stinkin excited, i can hardly stand it!

3 months

 

our baby boy turned 3 months last week (oops i'm a little late)!  i feel like my past month updates have been a little scattered so i'm going to use a little bit of a prompting thingie (very technical term, you know) to help me organize my thoughts.

nicknames: dax, d, bubbers, and munchkin.  i also was calling him pasta fadrool one night because matt was talking about making pasta fagiole, and daxon was drooling like a maniac (like he likes to do), and mommy's a huge dork.

likes: dancing and singing with mommy, drooling, working out with daddy, practicing grabbing at things, laughing at his goober parents, bounding on the yoga ball, and baths (finally, yay!)

dislikes: the nosefrida, taking zantac, my car seat, being hungry, and tummy time.

milestones: the social smiles are coming a mile a minute, mostly because mommy and daddy are probably two of the biggest weirdos on the planet and will do anything they can think of to make him smile.  he also started grabbing things, just within the past 2 weeks, i'd say.  he loves the o'ball, especially.  daycare tells us he's starting to lift his head more during tummy time.  i know they work on it with him a lot at daycare, so i tend to not do it in the evenings (it makes him so cranky!), so i look forward to seeing how he does this weekend.

clothing size: officially out of the 0-3 month stuff.  most 3-month stuff fits well, though some of it is a little snug due to the extra bulk of the cloth diapers.  3-6 month stuff is a little big.

sleep: still sleeping like a champ.  he typically sleeps from about 8:30-6.  most mornings i have to wake him up at 6.  he goes down easily after falling asleep nursing.  part of me worries about nursing him to sleep, but then he also will go down if matt gives him a bottle.  eventually we will probably try to start putting him down without having him fall asleep eating, but for now it works, and i think that is part of why he's sleeping through the night - he goes to bed with a really full tummy!  daycare reports his naps to us, and they are still kind of sporadic.  sometimes he naps mutliple times in the mornings, then is awake all afternoon. sometimes he doesn't sleep at all in the morning then takes a 2-hour nap in the afternoon.  

now that i've been back to work for 2 weeks, we have a pretty good schedule figured out.  i get up at 5am (ok, my alarm is set for 5:07, but i snooze once and then actually get up at 5:17).  i shower, do my makeup, and dry and straighten my hair.  this usually takes me about 45 minutes.  when i finish that, i go wake up daxon.  i wake him up, change his diaper, and get him dressed for the day.  then i feed him for about 20 minutes (that's usually all he'll eat).  once he's done eating, i either put him back in his crib if he's fallen back asleep (which has only happened 2x in 2 weeks) or i bring him up to our bedroom with me.  i pump off the other side while talking to him, then matt takes him downstairs while i finish getting ready.  the one morning that i tried to let him sleep in a little and nursed him after i got dressed, he had a massive spit-up and i ended up having to change.  so now i nurse him before i get dressed!  i am out the door by 7:20 to catch my 7:28 train, and matt drops him off at daycare around 7:45.  i catch the 5:07 train home and pick him up around 5:45.  we get home and i nurse him, then hand him over to matt while i cook dinner.  daxon plays on his playmat while we eat (unless he's being fussy, then we eat in shifts so one of us can be holding/entertaining him), then matt takes him up for a bath while i get his bags and bottles ready for the next day.  after his bath, i take over the bedtime routine, and we are back to our normal thing: lotion massage, singing "lullaby," and nursing to sleep. 

we started cloth diapering 2 weeks ago (the saturday after my first day back to work).  so far, we love it.  no blowouts, and only a couple pee leaks (i think because the diaper wasn't put on correctly).  he stays comfortable enough that it's not waking him at night, so i don't feel like we need to add any inserts or use disposables at night (yet).  it probably is only about 1 extra load of laundry a week.  his bum hasn't had any issues (we never had a full diaper rash in the 'sposies, but his bum occasionally looked irritated - i would start generously applying diaper rash cream as soon as i noticed it to catch it before it got worse).  and they are so stinkin cute.  i'll do a more detailed post on it in the future.

the zantac seems to be helping his reflux issues.  eventually we'll have to increase the dose, but for now 1mg seems to be working just fine. 

i am pumping 4-5 times a day - first thing in the morning (i pump the side he doesn't nurse on), then 3 times at work (9:15, 12:15, and 3:15), then once right before bed (so that i don't wake up engorged).  my supply is great, and i usually am able to pump enough in one day to fill his bottles for daycare, plus have some extra to add to my frozen stash.  he gets 3 5oz bottles at daycare, though he doesn't always take the whole thing at each feeding.  they dump anything that's left, which freaked me out at first, but now that i know my supply can handle it, i'm not so upset about it.

he seems to be adjusting great to daycare.  he eats well while there.  and they are doing the cloth diapers with us, which i love.  we get reports at the end of every day, and they always say how smiley he is.  even though he is in the infant room,i think he's the only infant there, so he gets to hang out with the big kids a lot, and they seem to love him.  this might concern some parents, but i happen to think it's great - the more people he's around, the better his language development.  i'd be more worried about him sitting all isolated in the infant room with just him and the teacher!

and, of course, gratuitous pictures of the little stinker for you...

He is pretty much always this happy when he wakes up

plotting his next evil deed...puking all over mama!

helping mama put away the laundry

snuggles

looking like such a little man in his striped polo

sunday morning storytime - our favorite book

lovin the wubbanub (aka, wubby)

and from our 3-month photo shoot, a few silly outtakes...

i am not impressed

c'mon, mom...seriously?!

my feet are far more interesting than this stupid photo shoot

can i please get back to wubby, now?

fine...then i'll just eat my hands