SIX MONTHS ALREADY!?!?!

Tomorrow my baby boy will be 6 months old! I can't believe it's already been half a year since he was born. He's more than doubled and almost tripled his birth weight. He started rolling over last week and is starting to be able to sit up fully on his own! 

Last night he woke up at 2am with a horrible wheezy cry! I ran into his room (flew is more like it, I don't think I touched the floor) and he had a horribly runny nose! OH NO! What do we do? Do we take him to the ER? Okay, let's think about this...is he running a fever? No. Is he breathing funny? No, he's just snotty. He was smiley and happy to see us. What do we do? Call Nana in the middle of the night and ask her what to do. Thankfully, she is a voice of reason.

After describing his symptoms, we narrowed it down to possible food allergies or teething. The food allergies were ruled out since his tummy actions seem normal. No funky rashes and food allergies likely wouldn't present as cold symptoms. So, we factored in his age, developmental milestones and the past 2 months of drool and hopefully he'll just cut his first tooth in the next few days. We're very excited for this!

We had two sets of 6 month photos taken today. We had our friend Jen take some at the pun'kin patch. We got some great shots with his buddy Sara and they're just so cute together. We also had some done with the Boston skyline in the background. Those were incredibly cold and hopefully came out well because I'm not sure I want to relive that particular moment. Jack did fantastic through both--leading me to believe further that he's just cutting teeth and not sick. Besides, his feeding hasn't cut back and isn't the saying "feed a fever, starve a cold"? I always lose my appetite when I'm super stuffy and Jack appears to be in excellent eating form!

I love babies in black and white

Happy boy!

Learning to sit!

DIMPLES!

Sly face

I just can't seem to get over how much more in love with this boy I get everyday. He is the epitome of happiness and just warms my heart every time he flashes that toothless grin. I hope we have enough toothless photos because it's the best smile ever!

I love you Buddy!

I went back to school and all I got was this stupid brain ache

I always knew I wanted to be a teacher. It seemed perfect, I love to teach little kids things and am amazed at their willingness to learn. I can stand them-I very rarely get impatient with small children. Once they start getting mouthy-around 3rd grade-I can take 'em or leave 'em, but first and second graders, wow...they're like little sponges. So, I decided to go back to school.

Three years later...I cram assignments into Jack's 30 minute naps (of which he takes 3 during the day) and then stay up super late trying to cram more thoughtful information into a two hour window before my brain dies. Why? So that I can one day (sometime, I can't even envision this particular part of my life at the moment) I can say "I'm a teacher" I spent more on my education than I will ever get paid. Why? Because it's fulfilling...well, yes there's that. Also, my husband has a pretty good job so really I can do whatever I want for work.

Then I stop and remind myself...had I never gone back to school, I could be a stay at home mom. Like, full time. I would love this. However, getting halfway through school just to drop out and stay home with my son kind of sounds like a cop out. So for now, I am not so happily slaving away in the dead of night to attempt some sort of degree so eventually my son won't be embarrassed of me. You know, when I drop him off at school with curlers in my hair or slippers on my feet. Well, maybe slippers but curlers don't really work for my hair. But you get the point, right?

Taking 4 online courses is really hard to keep up with. I'm 2 weeks behind in my science class because I can only do that homework when Todd is entertaining the boy. Lately, Jack has not been wanting to be held or entertained by anyone but me. This presents a problem when it comes time to get work done. Next week, we're instilling a "Daddy comes home an hour earlier so Mommy can go to the library and get some work done" regime. Because, I really, really, really need to get caught up with school.

Take this: I have completely run out of creativity. I can not make up names or produce any original thoughts lately. Why? I think my brain has left. Oh, it still hurts, I think that's the separation pain though because it's definitely run away. Sometimes I sit there and just stare at Todd for words that used to be a part of my expansive vocabulary (look I'm smart, I promise!)...you know like "touch football" (I swear to frickin' jeebus-ask me about the time I forgot the word "cheese").

How do people do this? How can I devote all the necessary time to school when all I really want to do is snuggle with my baby? I can't withdraw again. That would be silly...besides, we'd have to start paying back those stupid loans.

Can I be a painter? I swear I can be as good as that guy that just splatters the paint on the canvas. Imagine making $$MILLIONS$$ on ink splatter. Only, I can use spit up and baby poop as my medium. It's innovative, right?

Jeez, no wonder I'm having insomnia. Stupid stress. I hope you die some day and that it's a horrible, bloody, violently messy death. Take that.

You know what else is bugging me lately? Oh, that would be Mt. Eckert. There's a mountain growing in my hallway. A mountain of LAUNDRY. Why!? I just did ALL of it before we left on vacation. HOW can there possibly be MORE? It is a mathematical improbability that there would be that much laundry. There's only two people. I consider Jack a separate laundry entity. He has his own bubble that rarely overflows. I stay on top of his. Lucky little dude.

On the other hand, I've developed some sort of yummy gooey casserole. It's sort of like Shepard's Pie, but has stuffing...and corn...and gravy. OMG if we use ground turkey, it would be Thanksgiving dinner in a baking dish. I'm pretty sure Rachael Ray has already done it and that's probably where I got the idea from.

Now why can't I take all this and write like this for my classes? Who knows...I sure as heck don't.

One of "those" moms

I'm one of "those" moms. The mom that shoves pictures of her kid down your throat every 2 minutes...I'm not necessarily proud of this, however it is what it is. In my defense, my kid is REALLY cute. To prove his cuteness and forever remind you that I am "that" mom, enjoy some of his eternal cuteness:

Mommy and Jack at the family reunion

Jack is totally awesome!

Well hello there pretty eyes!

First plane trip

Happy boy

Little monkey stole Mommy's cracker-I guess he enjoyed it

Of course, this post is ridiculous because it's not accomplishing anything. I, also, am failing to accomplish anything. I really need to get caught up on homework. Taking a weekend off for vacation was not really the brightest thing to do...go Molly!

BIG NEWS!!

A couple of firsts these past few days:

We had our first plane trip. Jack was AWESOME. He wowed the flight attendant and had she not made a big fuss over him, you wouldn't have even known he was on the plane. He flirted with the lady across the aisle and let the flight attendant snuggle him as he tried to rip her earrings out! She even gave him a "first flight" certificate and TWO sets of wings that will fit in his scrapbook! He was so good, I'm so proud of him!

To combat baby ear pain: bring Boppy (OMG THIS IS A LIFESAVER!!), book an empty flight, bring the BINK! Jack sucked his bink on takeoff and landing and was just a pleasant little monkey. He got a bit fussy so somewhere over Long Island I nursed him and he was happy again! Mommy was in extreme pain (I forgot my gum...) but he just did so well! I only wish our stupid camera didn't break so I could post pictures of how super smiley he was!

!!!BIG NEWS!!!

JACK STARTED ROLLING OVER THIS WEEKEND!!!!

He can roll to tummy and then back to his belly! Since this new development, however, he will only sleep on his side. This freaks both Todd and I out just a bit. Last night, I sat for a good 5 minutes trying to get him to go back to his back, but he kept rolling to his side. THEN every time he would roll onto his back, it scared him so much he would wake up! We were at Grandmom's so he was in our room in the Pack and Play and woke us up every time it happened! By this morning, he seemed to be an old pro though and was on his back WITHOUT waking us!! YAY!

We tried desperately to get him to roll over for the video camera, but he's just too stealthy!

Tonight on the flight home, he was even more wonderful than the flight to Grandmom's. He was awake and distracted with his bink during takeoff and then he decided he was hungry so we nursed and he nodded off. Daddy took over baby duty and I wrote some paragraphs in my paper. He was awake during the landing and seemed to have a good time throughout the flight. There was a little old man that sat in front of us that gave us wary eyes when we boarded, but I'm sure he's happy that the only noises Jack made were of pure joy. Man, that kid is a social butterfly. We stole Grandmom's camera so we do have pictures of the flight home. I can't believe he's MY baby-he's so calm and happy :) :)

Both flights were empty, so we got to bring the car seat on with us. Even though we didn't use it, I'm glad we took it with us because it was a catch all for Jack's various "things" that we brought with us and we didn't have to worry about them flying all over the plane. Really, we could not have asked for better conditions! Southwest FTW! Their crew is just awesome. I don't think I've been on a Southwest flight where I was unhappy with the flight attendants.

What's "her" name?

While shopping at JoAnn Fabric today, some lady in line asked me all sorts of questions about Jack. Our conversation went something like this:

Woman tries to walk past me in line
"Oh, you're not waiting here are you?"
"Uh, yeah actually I am."
"Oh how cute! How old?"
"5 1/2 months."
"Oh that's precious. What's her name?"
"HIS name is Jack."
"Of course I chose the wrong one. Did you say Josh?" (note that there's no apology-she didn't even sound apologetic)
"No, his name is Jack."
"Oh, I like that name." (spoken as though she had control over his naming)
"Thank you (thinking "as though I need your approval")"

My son is wearing one of the most boyish outfits..he's wearing a sports onesie with basketballs, nets, footballs and cleats along with dark blue pants and white and blue socks. Now, granted girls can wear blue and sports as well, and their carseats can be black along with all other accessories, but people don't normally do that. I really don't think my son looks anything like a girl. Might be biased of me but I've been told by other random strangers that he looks boyish as well. I've never had someone mistake him for a girl. I've had people ask "boy or girl?" when he was dressed fairly gender neutral but never has ANYONE ever referred to Jack as a "she" or "her" so yes, this bugged me a bit. I wish he hadn't grinned at this idiotic woman...

Homework and stuff

I haven't really updated. I'm working on a big assignment for my creative writing class that is all about how our "quest" to get pregnant. It's a work in progress and I'm editing it down as I go for blog usage.

After nearly two months of classes, the work is finally beginning to get difficult. That, mixed with our crappy router is really making keeping up with schoolwork difficult. Thank goodness I only have one semester left at QCC before I officially move onto my elem. ed. program. Well, one semester and a big ass test. Despite all of my grumblings about school and the fact that I swore I'd never do all online classes EVER again, I'm really enjoy school. I don't know why. One class I'm taking (American Lit) I actually took a year ago and withdrew because I couldn't keep up. This semester, I'm really enjoying it. Well, except the poetry. Sadly, I'm just not a fan of poetry. I don't like things that have hidden messages. How am I supposed to know that a cold winter's night is symbolic for potentially suicidal thoughts?

However, I am enjoying Charlotte Perkins Gilman. I appreciate that she (among others) came out and wrote about controversial topics. I think it's horrible that within just one century, women went from being hysterical to having a recognized condition (postpartum depression). I was worried about postpartum because I had PMDD. Considering it's a type of depressive disorder, it's one of the concerns for developing PDD. I can't imagine anything that's made me happier than the birth of my son. I think it's sad that even to this day, men overshadow women and undermine their complaints (Andrea Yates, anyone). Unlike my condition, which is miraculously cured by getting pregnant (balances out the hormones) and giving birth (don't know why, perhaps because the body goes through a complete metaphysical change?) PDD is consistent throughout pregnancy.

I never expected this blog to be so down. I also didn't expect my schoolwork to hit so close to home and have the impact that it does on me. It's very strange how just a year ago, I had no interest in reading these stories and now I can't get enough of them. It's true camaraderie. Or I'm just going nuts like the woman in the story. Anything is possible.

Bad Drivers

If any of the following pertains to you and or your driving, I demand you relinquish your license:

1. When it rains and you leave your headlights off. Especially at dusk-that's the best.

2. If you're going to turn LEFT (or really, any turns, changing lanes, etc, but especially LEFT) and fail to use your turn signal.

3. If you miss your turn yet continue to turn anyway and then decide that you really don't want to turn and instead want to come back to the original lane of traffic-when people have already passed you due to your moronic turn.

FOR THE LOVE OF JEEBUS PEOPLE, LEARN TO DRIVE!

And that's my rant for the day.

Ran a million errands. Got my hair cut (very, very short), went to the bank, got my oil changed, bought diapers and zyrtec, met Todd for lunch, got our Christmas outfits at Old Navy and last but not least: got peed on FOUR times today.

Let's just say that Jack is not a fan of driving around all day and will let me know. Haven't been peed on for months and today, every time I removed his diaper WHAM he starts to pee. One change, twice. I turned away to grab a wipe, turned back and realized he was peeing. He laughed at me, stopped and as I started to wipe the pee off him, he peed on me again. I love being a mom :) Did he pee on Todd? No. Little butt!

Having Tons of Fun!!

I've not been a huge fan of playing around with photos. However, my cousin Lindsey introduced me to picnik.com and I also found paint.net. I like paint.net. I found it has some features that picnik does not...or at least that were not as readily available to me. This is what I've been doing (instead of homework...of course!)

Yes, I have finally learned how to omit all but the fun colors that I want. I've always liked the look of photos like these and now I've figured it out! (you can see the original photo in my header, in all it's colored glory)

Wow. I really need to start working on the two papers that I have due this week.

My Heart is Broken :(

As we're all quite aware, I'm VERY new to the whole blog world. I think it's both neat and creepy that I can read about other people's lives.

Today, using the "next blog" button, I stumbled upon this blog and my heart breaks for this family.

I can only imagine how impossibly hard it is to lose a child mere months after he or she is born. What makes this horrible tragedy 10x worse is that the baby was lost to SIDS. Ever since the moment I found out I was pregnant, I researched until my eyes bled on how to prevent SIDS from happening. We do it all: we sleep with the air on, Jack wears jammies that are light and airy, but will keep him warm if the temperature drops low. We use a fan to oscillate "stale" air and ensure that there is good air flow in his room. Most importantly, we keep him on his back.

But what happens when babies start rolling over in their sleep? I am thankful-despite my secret worries that my child is "stunted"-that Jack has not learned to roll over yet. How can a mother prevent tummy sleeping at night? I certainly can't stay up all night if I'm to be expected to actually care for said child in the morning.

After reading Ayden's story, I feel so much more love for my family. This family has reminded me that the most important thing in this world is love...and the human ability to learn and grow from even the most unpredictable, unpreventable tragedies.

Pretzels and Sunday Dinner. YUM!

Every week, we join our friends for Sunday Dinner. It's almost never (twice) hosted at our house because we don't have the room for our growing clan. It's a potluck where everyone brings something. This week, I'm going to attempt to make pretzels.

I have never made homemade soft pretzels from scratch. This is going to be an interesting experiment. It's not too humid out, so it should be good. Or is humidity better for making dough? See, normally I use my bread maker for this.

So, we made pretzels. OMG they were delicious! So warm and soft. Mmmm. I am definitely making them for dinner tomorrow. I made a parmesan garlic powder topping for mine and Todd just had salt. We dipped them in salsa con queso and marinara, respectively.

I overheard some gossip at the local grocery store (second stop today, forgot something of course!) I overheard the manager and district manager talking. Well, it was more the district manager yelling at the poor store manager-IN FRONT of customers. He was telling her that if he had any more, ONE more customer complaint, he'd be shutting the store down. Now it might be possible that he was sharing with her an anecdote of something else, but she got pretty defensive. They're also implementing a policy where you have to sign up for their store card. This ridiculous store already removed their phone lookup for the savings cards, so I can imagine that this new policy will only lead towards MORE complaints, not less.

I hope they don't close the store. It's very convenient to home and despite always having a lot of cars in the parking lot, always seems empty. I love that I can avoid yet more human-to-human interaction when shopping there.

Although, I did pick up a package of expired baby food...I complained to a manager and have yet to see another incident. Of course, I only bought baby food at this store once and the manager was very considerate and immediately took all of the expired baby food (yes, there was more than one pack) and agreed that his stock guys should be more observant. It was a situation that was taken care of quickly and with sincere remorse.

On a separate, unrelated shopping trip at a different store, we picked up an expired box of crackers. I have never thought of checking expiration dates to ensure that things AREN'T expired at the damn grocery store.

This next bit of information should probably have it's own post, but I'm lazy...

Yesterday, as I was feeding Jack his lunch of prunes, we held the following conversation:
Me: Mmmmm! Momma likes prunes *Jack smiles* Well, Momma doesn't really like prunes, but YOU like prunes.

Jack-while looking directly in my eyes, not babbling at all says: Mama.

Me: OH DEAR GOD YOU SAID MAMA! SAY IT AGAIN! SAY MAMA!
I ran and grabbed the phone and called Todd. Of course, he didn't believe me. In the meantime, you might wonder what is going on with Jack while I'm freaking out...well, he got mad that he was no longer being fed and smacked his hands on the highchair to show me his displeasure. I promptly fed the little traitor (remember, he wouldn't say "mama" again!) and we were happy once again.

However, today Jack has said many forms of the letter "M" and at least half of them that came out sound like "mama" and it just makes my heart grow 10x it's normal size.

I also heard horror stories upon waking up that Todd let Jack grab Zelda's leg with his death grip. Todd was worried that Z would bite Jack...of course, she did not! But it's nice to know that Daddy and Jack can have such a good time without me. Or maybe it's not so nice to know. Now I'm a bit sad :(

Teething bites...literally.

Last night was...well it wasn't really BAD. We rarely, if ever, have BAD nights, but it wasn't good either. Normally, bedtime is as follows: Around 9:30-10ish, when Jack shows signs of being tired (rubbing eyes, mild fussiness) we mosey upstairs, get him changed and put his jammies on him. I settle into the rocker recliner while Todd sits on a folding chair. Todd reads a chapter of Harry Potter while Jack pleasantly nurses and nods off to sleep. Then, we put baby in his crib and recite (no longer needing to read) Goodnight Moon. Jack stays asleep and we back out of the room. This whole teething thing sucks. Jack doesn't want to nurse because he's not hungry, but he wants to nurse for comfort but gets mad when there's milk coming. What's my solution? The Bink.

I fully believe in the binky (or pacifier for you that don't know what a bink is). Babies have an ingrained need to suck. Studies have shown that using a bink at bedtime reduces the risk of SIDS. It keeps babies calm and quiet at things like meetings with the head of the education department or shopping.

When Jack gets mad that there's milk coming often he shows his displeasure by choking, gagging, pulling away while still attached to me and growling while his little face turns bright red and mommy tends to get grumpy. Well, it's painful and I get upset that he's not eating, he gets upset that he IS eating and it's a vicious circle. Hey, I never said I was perfect. I get frustrated.

Well, last night this was all going on so I gave him the binky. This went over well until he pulls out the bink to chew on the sides. I'm all for this, as he is not chewing on me. However, he gets mad that he can't suck and chew at the same time. We have the Soothie bink teether and he likes this, but once again, he cannot suck and chew at the same time! So, every minute or so, I'm pulling the bink out of his iron death grip to replace it properly in his mouth. Finally, he wouldn't take the bink or the boob, so I let him scream for a minute and then attempted to walk around with him. It worked!

One thing about parenting that no one tells you is that it's really hard on your back. Babies are dead weight. Jack is 17+ pounds of dead weight. So, despite lifting with my legs, my back inevitably starts to hurt (also, this doesn't happen often, so I don't think to use a sling). So, I sit down again. BIG mistake. Jack screams, I get mad and hand him off to Todd. Todd, the love that he is, hands me Harry Potter (we're reading The Prisoner of Azkaban right now) and we swap places. Somehow, thank the maker, Todd gets Jack to sleep.

Apparently he woke up at 3:45 this morning. I don't recall this. I only remember Todd getting back in bed sometime later. Why, you may ask, doesn't the mother that stays home not get up with the baby? Well, to answer you, I didn't hear him and it's what works for us. Todd functions at near 100% capacity on lack of sleep. Me, not so much. I turn into a raving bitch. And that's putting it nicely.

Todd took Zelda to the vet this morning. Simply put, she's not a fan. He managed to get her into the carrier with little fight. I'm very impressed. This afternoon, Jack and I will pick her up from the vet. I haven't maneuvered baby and cat up the stairs yet, so this will be very interesting.

Thank God It's Friday

Two posts, one day

So, now that I've figured out how to edit my background, I'm going to attempt adding photos. Well that was easy! These are some pictures from our vacation to the Jersey Shore this summer:

Jack's first pool experience

Obviously, it wiped him out. This is him in a kid sized lounge chair

Family photo on the beach 

Jack LOVED the ocean!

This semester, I'm taking a creative writing class. I'm a sporadic journaler, so I figured this might be a good way to journal my thoughts and random activities that are being done. Surprisingly, this class is requiring me to examine some of my childhood. A lot of the exercises somehow play into memories of my past. I mean, I'm only 26, my past isn't that huge and there are key moments in my life that spark to memory-no matter how unpleasant they may be.

Now, don't get me wrong. Most of my life has been pleasant and without complaint. Most of my bad memories come from my early life. But that's a story for another day...and possibly a private blog. I don't want to depress my readers! After all, it took all of my Facebook connections to get you both here!

It seems as though I spend an absurd amount of time online. This may be true, but mostly I stay connected throughout the day. Sometimes, I will leave the internet open to take care of my child. His screams don't always allow time to close windows and shut down laptops. As you can see from the above photos, my child lacks for nothing. I'm not one of those moms that neglect their children to raise a Sim family. 

So...what exactly is a blog?

After spending days "discovering" blogs online, I have been talked into starting one.

I just became a mom. Jack was born on May 1, 2010 and simply put, he is the center of my world.

I am also a full time student. Currently, I'm taking all online courses. This is awesome as I didn't really want to put Jack into daycare. Actually, I REALLY didn't want to subject him to the torture of being away from mommy for 3 hours twice a week. Yes, that's it. Sadly, this means that we are stuck in the house all day with little human interaction. I rely on Facebook to ensure that I get an adequate amount of social interaction with real people. This blog is either going to become a life-sucking entity that further draws me into my own personal bubble or it'll be a great outlet of my inability to "get out there" and befriend random strangers.

I feel that since I only have a limited time to enjoy my first born's baby days, I should try not to leave him with perfect strangers. I don't know if it was because it was so hard to get him here, but I know that being away from me for 6 hours every week would be the end of the world and I just couldn't fathom how I was going to be able to focus on school knowing that he was suffering all sorts of abuse (i.e having fun without mom) at the hands of his caretakers. These next few months are full of all sorts of important milestones that I was broken hearted at the mere thought of leaving my baby and letting someone else "raise him" for 6 hours a week. I realize how silly this is, but ask any new mom and I bet they have the same feelings.

Before Jack was born, my cats were the center of my world. While they've taken a backseat the last few months while Todd and I were adjusting to parenthood, they're still an important part of our family. Sure, they've been banned from the bedrooms at night and we don't have 20 minutes to play fetch with the boy cats everyday, but we still focus on taking a few minutes each day to snuggle them. Thus far, they've been pretty good about not torturing the baby. In fact, they've surprised us in their welcome of the baby by completely ignoring the fact that anything has changed. Perhaps they're in denial...there I go again, anthropomorphizing the animals.

In recent news, Jack says "AHMA" when he cries. It's the only time he says something that resembles "mama" that I jump up from whatever I'm doing to rescue him from his turtle-stuck-on-his-back existence. He's also starting to teethe. I'm just waiting for the day when those little pearly whites cut through the gums. Sadly, it will be the end of an era and will force me to recognize that my baby is doing something awful--growing up. Part of me can't wait, because it means that the unusual fussiness will go away and he will revert back to his super happy self instead of this awful "mostly" happy self. By mostly happy and fussiness I refer to the 20 or so minutes a day where he can't be tempted into a smile. Overall, I have the world's happiest baby.

Now, I need to figure out how to put pictures and videos up. And learn how to change the font and background of my new blog. I should probably be putting this much focus into my homework, but let's face it, this is way more fun!