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!