Class starts in 45 minutes, and my stomach is killing me. Nerves, nerves, go away!

Excellence

I sometimes like to think about how committed to excellence I am, and here is what I have come up with. I am not committed to excellence. I am committed to "good enough to get the job done well, but not waste time with things that will not make a big difference." I get really tired of hearing how everyone is committed to excellence all the time, but then has just so-so products anyway. I really think that if I was committed to excellence, I would be able to do far less than I currently do. In my job, If I was committed to excellence, I would get probably half of what I get done, done. In leading worship, if I was committed to excellence, I would probably spend 10+ hours on picking out music, practicing, and finding just the right scripture to go along with things. In my school work, if I was committed to excellence, I would spend that full 12 hours a week on homework that they recommend. In my piano lessons, if I was committed to excellence, I would spend time each week coming up with new and exciting ways to teach my kiddos what they should be learning each week. In my housework, if I was committed to excellence (aka a clean house), I would spend 2+ hours a day on making sure things are clean and tidy. The only thing I think I am truly committed to excellence in is my relationships with my husband and baby. They are pretty much the only things I think are worth the time and effort to be truly excellent for. My students will get by with 90%. My job will get by with 90%. My church will get by with 90%. My family needs 100%, and by golly, I think I'll give it to them!

A New Semester

On Thursday I start my next semester of classes. Today I wrote the check to pay for it. Bleah. I really, really hate writing those checks. That same check could have covered my mortgage for the next 3 months. Not to mention my back is killing me and I really need a new mattress. Oh well, I will greatly appreciate it all when I am able to call myself a nurse!

Meth House

Sometimes I marvel at how lucky I am to live in such a nice neighborhood. For instance, a meth house nearly blew up just a couple blocks away. Across the street from us is a nice lesbian couple who I'm pretty sure are also drug dealers. Or maybe prostitutes. Either way, their apartment gets a lot of traffic. About a block away is the block of liquor stores and casinos. With a hispanic thrift store right smack dab in the middle. Our best neighbors just moved to Minnesota, so their house is now for rent, and I hope a nice family moves in. I hope they keep the lawn mowed, don't pound music from their cars, and keep the front porch from getting cluttered with junk. I'm tired of the "economic diversity" that makes my neighborhood stinky.

Tired

I want a nap. But not just any nap, I want a nap where no motorcycles drive by and rattle my windows. I want a nap where I don't wake up every time my baby makes a peep. I want a nap where my feet don't get cold and my head stays cool. I want a nap where my hips don't hurt and I don't feel like rolling over. I want a nap in a room that is dim but I can still see everything. I want a nap on fresh, clean, soft sheets with fluffy down comforters. I want a nap where I dream of beautiful things and wake up with a smile. I want a nap...

Grey's Anatomy

I started re-watching all of the Grey's Anatomy a few weeks ago, and am impressed that I am now 3 episodes away from being clear through the show. Well, at least as much of the show as is available on Netflix. Apparently I need to spend a lot more time focusing on keeping my house clean and on studying for my Chemistry classes. BTW, my bio/organic chem class starts in 14 days. I kicked butt at intro to chem, so now I can kick the rest of this chem stuff to the curb! As much as I hate to admit this, I got a C in college Algebra. The biggest reason for the C is that I am lazy and waited to take about 1/2 the class in a 10 day period of time. I took the first half of the class in a normal classroom setting, but as I was in my first trimester, I vomited at least once a class period, and by halfway through just didn't think I could do it anymore. My very kind professor allowed me to take an incomplete and finish the class the next semester, but I procrastinated and waited until 10 days before the deadline to start working through it. I have no idea what my actual grades were on those last 3 exams, but I'm guessing they weren't pretty. The first half the semester I was getting A's. Anyway, I now have this blemish on my college transcripts, and I really don't want it to prevent me from getting into nursing school. So this past semester I got an A in my general Chemistry class, and this semester I will get an A in my bio/organic class. I must, I must, I must! Anything less is just not acceptable. So now I have put it out there in internet land, so I have accountability. But if anyone in real life ever mentions it and I'm not getting an A, be prepared for lots and lots and lots of excuses. If mistakes are made, others will be blamed!

Single Mom

I'm so glad I am not a single mother. Mike has been out of town for just 2 days, and I'm already looking forward to his return so that I can have a bit of a reprieve. I think, mostly, I am just too lazy to be a single parent. I like my slacking off time, and when caring for an infant, there just isn't any of that to be had unless someone else spells you off. For instance, last night John woke up every 90 minutes pretty much on the dot. I had to get up and help him fall back asleep every single time. Normally Mike would have had to take over at about 5:00 am, but this time I got to do every single occurrence. I got to change every single diaper, and feed every single feeding. I got to rock John to sleep, even when he screamed at me for 15 minutes, where normally Mike would come and spell me off after 10 minutes or so. I got to do every load of laundry, and every load of dishes. I got to answer every phone call, and make every decision. On any given day, I will do most if not all of this anyway, but it is just so much more fun to have the choice to do any of it. To be able to do it with the knowledge that I'm letting my husband relax after a long day of work. Doing it because I have to is just not nearly as fun. I love my baby, but boy, do I ever love his Daddy too!

Stuffed

Who knew that Fenugreek, and herb that is taken to help increase milk production, increases your appetite. So while I want to lose weight, feed my baby, and be healthy, it makes it pretty hard. So today for lunch, I had a HUGE plate of rice and vegetables and now I feel like my stomach has exploded. hmmmm, maybe I won't need dinner. :)

Exercise

Mike bought a Kinect for our xbox, and it kicks my butt. Also, our living room is not big enough to use it very well, so we are going to be moving some furniture around. Bleah, I hate moving furniture! But I like the Kinect so I suppose it is all worth it. Bubba is asleep and has been for an hour or so, and I think I'm going to crash soon too. Ha, I think I mostly just like typing my random thoughts.

Waiting for Mike

Mike had to go to Pierre, the South Dakota state capitol today. The weather has been very rainy and windy, and he is about 30 minutes later than I would have expected. It is so easy to worry that something has gone wrong and that he is somewhere hurting or cold. While the rational part of me knows that if something were to happen to him, I would get a phone call telling me to come to the hospital, I still worry. Its weird that love makes you feel both the most wonderful and the most horrible things in the world.

Mixed Blessings

Bubba sounds so happy when he wakes up. He babbles and squeaks and coos and sometimes grunts in the most adorable possible way. There is only one real problem with this. He often starts between 5:30 and 6:00am. This poses quite the dilemma; do I get up and enjoy my happy baby? Or do I sleep as best I can right through it? Mixed Blessing.

sleep Training: Day one

Last night was my first night of sleep training, and considering we weren't able to do it perfectly, still yielded pretty great results. The idea behind sleep training is to help teach John to do a couple of different things. #1 Sleep through the night, or for at least 6 hours straight. #2 Take his naps in his crib or co-sleeper and not in my arms and (eventually) #3 Sleep without his pacifier

After quite a bit of reading on how I should proceed, I basically learned that there are two separate camps when it comes to sleep training. The first advocates a Cry-It-Out method where you simply let the baby cry until he or she falls asleep. This can be punctuated with the parents going in to momentarily comfort the baby, but not pick up or cuddle the baby. This method was not one I thought I could do so I've decided to go with a second option.

The second option basically says lay your baby down while still awake, but tired, and let them put themselves to sleep. If the baby begins to cry, go in and pick him or her up and provide cuddles, kisses, or whatever kind of comfort your baby likes until your baby is calm, but not yet asleep. Then you lay your baby back down! Some people have said that they have had to go through this process 126 (literally) times before the baby has decided to go to sleep. One important part of this process happens a little before bed, and that is establishing a bed-time routine. Mike and I have decided that the best routine for John would be at 8:00 to give John a bath, give him a massage, nurse him while Mike reads our devotions, and then lay him down for bed. We actually started the bedtime routine a couple weeks ago, and John seems to have adapted to it. He really likes his baths and massages!

Last night was our first official night of sleep training. We were at a birthday party so by the time we got home and had finished his routine, it was 10:20. But I laid him down, and he went to sleep within about 10 minutes. I didn't have to pick him up and comfort him even 1 time! He slept until 6:00 this morning, so he already met a milestone of sleeping for more than 6 hours straight!

This morning I had the privilege of trying out the sleep training technique for naps. I decided that instead of a set nap-time, I would go for 1 hour after he is fully awake for the morning. Since he went back to sleep after nursing at 6:00, he didn't really "get up" until about 8:45. Or at least Momma didn't. So, at about 9:45, I changed his diaper, gave him a few kisses and laid him down in his co-sleeper. Five minutes later I heard loud wails, and went in and picked him up and cuddled him. I rocked and sang to him for about 5 minutes and laid him back in his bed. Success! He has now been asleep for 25 minutes straight, and I have not been holding him. It feels so wonderful to type with both hands instead of with just one as I have been doing for weeks now. If I post tomorrow, I will let you know how long he napped before waking up. But now I'm off to sweep and do dishes and laundry and all the things that I haven't been able to do for so long!

Ok, so it only lasted 3 more minutes from the time I finished this post, but still, 28 minutes is progress!

Facebook comments

Last night I read an article that really bugged me. This lady got fired from her position as an EMT and it is thought that it was because she made some inappropriate comments about her boss on her Facebook page. Everyone was jumping to this lady's defense saying that she has the right to free speech. But seriously, she posted it in a very public place, and it would have been easy for someone to find it, print it, and give it to the boss. Was the boss then supposed to just sit there and say, "Well, she said it on her own time, so it doesn't matter."? My thought is NO!!! Come on, seriously, take some responsibility for the fact that in a moment of anger, you wrote something really stupid, and you got fired over it. Also there was this little matter of the fact that she had been written up a couple of times already that week, which is probably why she was mad at the boss in the first place. Good grief. Let's all just sue the world for everything!

On a house note, things are going pretty well. We still haven't found Mike's dress shoes, so a run to Target to get some was necessary yesterday, but otherwise things are going great! The cats love this place, but I think they run so much that they make themselves hungry. It seems like we have to feed them more to keep them from yelling at us. Today was the first day of trash pickup, and apparently they come at 6:30. They grabbed them from the side of the house for us, but next week we'll have to remember to put them out Tuesday night instead of Wednesday morning. I'm certainly not getting up that early to put them out!

Anyone out there ever made curtains? I need to sew some for our bedroom as I can't find anything I actually like, and I'm pretty sure I don't want blankets stretched over my windows for the rest of my life. If anyone has any mistakes to avoid or tips, I'd love to hear them!

Updates

So the day after my last update, I began a month long "vacation" from regular internet usage. Meaning our neighbors, who's internet we had been borrowing, security encoded their account. And since we were moving in a month and didn't want to pay for two installation feeds in one month, we just used our phones to access the internet until we moved into our new house. I love all my faithful readers (that means you, Sydney) but there is no way that blogging was going to occur on my phone.

So, a newish month, and a new house. I've managed to find my sweatpants, my toothbrush, and my shampoo, so I feel like I'm doing pretty good. A crew of amazing ladies have unpacked 95% of my kitchen supplies, so I can even make myself some breakfast! Also, I'm just going to say that I love having a washing machine IN my abode. And it is so quite I don't even know it is running until it sings me a little song when it is done. Ahhhh, this is the good life!

Starting tomorrow

I am going to attempt to blog every day for the month of October. Let's see how it goes! Lots will be happening, which should make it a little easier! We will be starting baby birthing classes, which will be a lot of fun! Mike and I will hopefully be helping out with the Children's Christmas musical, which should also be a lot of fun. We will be waiting and waiting and waiting to close on our house, which will not be so much fun, but will be very exciting at the end of the month! And of course our little baby will be continuing to grow. Hmmm, I may even post weekly pictures of how the baby bump is progressing.

Cruddy Day

So yesterday when I said that morning sickness was getting better, I spoke optimistically and far too early. Today has been the day from hell. I wasn't able to keep anything, even water, down until about 4:30. I had a chicken burrito from Taco Bell and then fell asleep. I got to keep it until about 7:30, but then it too departed from me. I'm laying in my bed now trying to fight the urge to go do what is now so normal for me. Is it bad that I've actually turned a five gallon bucket into a stool so I don't have to sit on the floor in the bathroom? It really does make throwing up much less nasty. Firstly, your face is above the bowl, not right smack in it. Also, it can be very helpful when you want to just sit there and feel miserable. I also think it helps clear everything out easier. I'm working with gravity, not apart from it. I have placed a hand towel over the bottom of the bucket, so I even have a slightly padded seat. Today I have been using a dark red towel. I feel like royalty! Anyway, all this to say, today has sucked. If tomorrow is not at least somewhat better, I'm going to just cry. But! I have an appointment with my OB tomorrow. Should be exciting!

Pregnant again

So I have felt like I couldn't blog adequately until I could freely admit that Mike and I are expecting again. We hit 12 weeks this past week, so we are pretty much in the clear as far as first trimester difficulties. This pregnancy has been as different as night and day from the last one. Firstly, I've been horribly morning sick. Luckily this has been getting much better. Its pretty much just settled into throwing up some time after dinner. I can handle that! I'll chronicle more of the differences soon, but for now, I'm going to go visit the porcelain throne and see if I can maintain my raspberries and grilled cheese.

my dinner

I feel the need to blog about my dinner. I am going to have baked potatoes with chili and it will be delicious.

Waves

Does anyone else ever feel like their life is just a series of waves? Sometimes the waves are slow and long, and sometimes they come so fast you feel like you can't quite catch your breath. Yeah, me too.

Ever since I lost the baby, it has been so weird to be around people who have little kids. I feel one of two things. The first is an intense jealousy that they are parents. This one I feel even for parents with kids up through early elementary school. I see a little boy running across the room with a toy in his hands and I just want to swoop him up and take him home with me. I see a little girl with pigtails in her hair and I wish I was the one who had put them there. I see parents who's kids are driving them nuts so they send them away, and I just wish that I had one to drive me nuts.

The second thing I feel is a desperate fear. Before I got pregnant, I wanted a baby, but I don't think I had a fraction of an idea of how much I wanted one. Now I sometimes catch myself playing the age old game of "What IF?" What if I can't get pregnant again? What if I lose another baby? What if that brief 10 weeks is all I got? What if I never get to see another heartbeat on the monitor? What if I never see another plus sign on a pregnancy test? I know these are all fairly irrational fears; if we got pregnant once, it will most likely happen again. But the fears are still there. When I see a little kid, the fears can come crashing in around me. Definitely not my favorite.

So these are the waves that threaten to overtake me sometimes. They come fast and hard, and then they go away again almost as quickly. I'm just looking forward to having them go away completely. When I'm holding that little one in my arms, I'll get to have a whole new set of waves. Bring 'em on!

Ouch

Mike took me to the gym today, and since I asked him to, he put me through the paces with the weight machines. Now I hurt. And tomorrow I will die when I fall down the stairs because I cannot support my own weight. And then many people will cry. It is very sad.