Merry Christmas

It's Christmas Eve!!!  Hard to believe, but it's here!  We are in Mississippi with my family spending this holiday.  I'm loving the relaxing and time with my family, even if a part of me is missing being in my own home with my little family enjoying our own traditions.  


One of my favorite Christmas songs (although I'm not sure it was intended as a Christmas Song) is "Count My Blessings".  What a great song for anytime of the year!  The songs says:


When I'm worried and I can't sleep
I count my blessings instead of sheep
And I fall asleep counting my blessings
When my bankroll is getting small
I think of when I had none at all
And I fall asleep counting my blessings

I think about a nursery and I picture curly heads
And one by one I count them as they slumber in their beds
If you're worried and you can't sleep
Just count your blessings instead of sheep
And you'll fall asleep counting your blessings

And now, here are a few pictures of MY blessings!  The ones I'll close my eyes tonight on this Christmas eve thinking of :) 

Merry Christmas everyone!  Count your blessings this holiday and everyday!

"Those people"

For 7 weeks now, we have been trying to adjust to life with 2 children.  And what an adjustment!  Going from Carter, who was the 'perfect' baby...slept like a pro, happy all the time, would take any bottle, any pacifier, etc.  I mean...I had it made with him!  Then along came Shae'....my sweet princess, who just happens to be more difficult (I guess as a girl, she has to be, right?)  I will not lie....the last 7 weeks have been the most challenging, exhausting, frustrating weeks of my life.  Having a baby the cries almost everyday from 3p.m.-10 or 11p.m. is draining!  Oh..she doesn't cry the entire time...just fusses....and is not content....she'll be happy in the swing for 10 minutes, then cry....we hold her and she's good usually...sometimes she still cries even then.  She doesn't nap well at all the second half of the day.  Her doctor says this is caused partly from the reflux and partly from colic.  COLIC..ugh...I had been refusing to use that term with her...but after the last 2 days and the way she's been, I've been forced to face the facts:  I have a colicky baby.  There...I said it.  Now, the bright side to this is that colic usually disappears by 3 months.  We're only 5 weeks away from that.  5 weeks.  Needless to say, I'm praying daily that it goes away sooner!  


I don't want to make it sound like everyday is pure misery...that's not true at all.  For every 2-3 bad days, we have 1 really great day.  And it's that 1 great day that gets me through. :)  It also helps that she is SO stinkin cute!  I still lose by breath sometimes when I look at her...she gorgeous!  I'm very proud :)  She's at that stage now (even with the colic/reflux) that she smiles a lot and coos...talk about sweet!!!  I'm proud to say Mamma gets the biggest smiles too....as it should be, right? :)  Here's a couple of pics from this last week.  She's gorgeous, huh?

Ok..so as for my title.  "Those people".  Have you ever been out shopping and seen parents struggle with their kids?  You know...the ones who's kids are running through the store like hoodlums (whatever a 'hoodlum' is)?  "Those people" who's kids are screaming and making a scene?  Yeah...well, last week I realized something:  I AM 'those people'.   I've officially joined the club.  So what made me realize this?  Well...it could be that trip to Target we took one night last week.  I had waited for Tom to get home so we could go out and run a few errands. (I have yet to leave the house with both kids by myself!)  Here's what happened:  We enter Target.  Tom puts Carter in one cart, I put the car seat with Shae' in another.  All is well to begin with.  We split up to look for things.  As soon as I get into the store good, Shae' starts crying.  Well, screaming actually.  Tom finds me (all he had to do was follow the sounds of the screams!).  He takes Shae' out of the car seat to try and calm her.  We continue through the store.  Oh, at this point Carter is fussing wanting out of the cart.  I'm in a hurry to get out of the store.  Tom takes both kids and tells me to go ahead and get what I need.  I leave them to finish my shopping.  I'm down one aisle when all of a sudden I hear a crash and Carter crying.  Yep...he was standing in the back of the cart and fell out!  In the middle of the main walkway of the store.  Tom is trying to get him up with Shae' on his shoulder at the same time.  People are staring. Shae' starts crying again.  I take the baby so Tom can deal with Carter.  We then go checkout and while standing there waiting to pay Tom says he realizes why I won't leave home with both kids by myself yet. 


On to the following evening.....we go to the mall to have dinner and see a Christmas parade they do every night.  All starts out well....baby is sleeping, Carter is happy.  We go sit at the restaurant to eat dinner before the show.  Amazingly, Shae' sleeps the entire time and I'm able to eat my meal without rushing too much.  Then we get ready to pay and she's awake and ready to eat.  I have a bottle.  She refuses it.  We then are sitting in a busy restaurant with a screaming, hungry baby.  We pay and work our way out the door and into the mall for me to find somewhere to feed her.  She eats and we go outside for the parade.  Now this is the best 30 minutes of the whole evening.  Shae' sleeps on my shoulder while Carter dances on the sidewalk to the music.  It was a wonderful 30 minutes!  Maybe we should have called it good and went home after that.  But no.  We have a little shopping we need to do.  It's good for a little bit then baby gets fussy.  Tom sits in the middle of the mall holding her so I can run into a few stores.  I decide to take Carter with me so he's not stuck with both kids.  We go into Bath and Body Works and Carter tries to take the big candles off the shelf.  Then as we wait to check out, he tries putting a quarter into an outlet, plays with the displays and I find myself saying "Carter, no!" about 50 times.  Onto the next store.  Victoria's Secret.  Yep...I took my 2 year old in there with me...what was I thinking?  So, I'm on the hunt for pj's, a gift for my niece.  As I'm looking, I hear Carter say, "Mama! See?"  I turn around and he's holding a yellow bra up for me to see.  Yeah.....I about died.  To cut this story short (there's so much I could tell you!) that store experience ended with my trying to get Carter out from under a display, then chasing him around the display several times trying to catch him.....picking up the shoes he was kicking off as I went.  Pretty much one of the worst store experiences.  That entire evening ended with us about 3 miles from home and having to pull off to the side of the road because Shae' was screaming SO hard.  We had to just sit in the car and hold her to calm her down.  As we sat there, Tom makes this statement: "We're never leaving the house again." 


SO...all of that was to say this:  I have become one of 'those people'.  After all the looks I got between those two evenings, most from people without kids probably, I realized what I had become.  And I ACCEPTED it!  I used to look at 'those people' in disgust and think, "why can't they get a hold of their kids?"  Now, don't get me wrong, I am not dismissing the need for discipline and training your kids to be well behaved..even in public.  But I also have come to the understanding that they will not be perfect.  They're KIDS!  And when you have one colicky baby and one active 2 year old (that is probably just as tired from the crying baby as we are!), you just can't expect things to always go smooth...especially when out and about.  I will be working on Carter and his public outing 'skills'...and of course working with Shae' is an ongoing project, but I've decided not to stress too much about it.  I'm done with that.  I refuse to be embarrassed by my crazy kids.  So people might give disapproving looks...so what?  For every one of those looks I get, I also get an 'I've been there and know what it's like' look from an understanding parent.  Will I never get frustrated again when I'm out with my kids?  Of course I will!  Probably almost every time I go out actually...I'll just have to remind myself not to let it get to me.....they're only little once after all.  I'll forget all of this when they're older.  So my fix for being one of 'those people' is to just relax and enjoy the ride.  To try and find the fun in all the craziness.  And to stay home. HA.

And the winner is......

Reflux.  Yep...SILENT reflux to be exact.  


After a MISERABLE week...no sleep for 4 nights straight, and a baby who was only fussing at night starting to fuss during the day too....I finally gave in and called the doctor.  Over last weekend, I started to suspect reflux (after all, Carter had it too at her age and I knew what the symptoms were: frequent waking; congestion; wet burps; crying when lying flat; hiccups, lots of spitting up, etc.).  I just wasn't sure because her symptoms were different than Carters.  For instance, she hardly EVER spits up!  Carter was a projectile vomiter.  So I started researching the symptoms of reflux again and discovered there's a thing called 'silent reflux'.  With silent reflux, they rarely do spit up...instead when they start to spit up, they swallow it back down causing even more pain because the acid burns the throat coming up and again back down. (ok..so when reading this I was TOTALLY feeling bad for my sweet girl!) :/


Anyway....it was a terrible week to say the least.  She got to the point that she wanted to be held almost all day up on our shoulder..to help keep the acid down, I'm sure.  So I finally took her in Friday afternoon and told the doctor her symptoms.  He said if it wasn't reflux he'd turn in his license!  We started her on Zantac that afternoon and last night she slept 6 1/2 hours straight!  And I ended up waking her then to feed her...she likely would have slept longer. :)  Needless to say, I think I heard angels singing this morning :)  She's been great all day today too....totally content in her swing or car seat or wherever!  And needless to say, after getting a full nights rest (FINALLY!) I feel like a new person.  Here's hoping it lasts and tonight she does just as good (or even better).


Through all of this I'm learning to trust my 'mommy instinct' more and more.  With Carter, I was right every time he had an issue and we took him in.  With her, I feel like it's taking me longer to find my groove with her and figure her out.  For awhile there, I was beginning to doubt myself.  I mean, there's NOTHING more frustrating than not being able to figure out your baby's needs.  Talk about overwhelming!  Throw in the hormones and it's just a mess.   I think I'm starting to get there with her, though.   I'll admit, it's taken a little longer to really bond with her...I guess it's the 2nd kid thing?  Or maybe it's the fussy baby thing?  Not sure...but I'm glad that I'm really starting to feel I 'know' her and am close to her.  I hope I'm not alone in my feelings...any other mommy's out there that have gone through this?  I've certainly felt guilty at times about it.


We had a busy week in spite of all the craziness....friends over for dinner one night (the day she was SO fussy too....I cleaned and cooked most of the day holding her...it was interesting to say the least!  And it's a miracle we even had food on the table that night), then we had our church banquet last night.  The kids wore their first matching outfits!  It was so fun, and they were so cute :)  I've added pictures from the week...a few of her and then some family ones.  Enjoy! :)


Signed, 
One happy, well-rested Mommy ;)


                                                                       


Isn't she a doll?

                                  
This picture makes my heart melt!  LOVE my babies! :)

                                                    
             Our family shot :)

                                                        

                                                            


  My sweet little 'present'

                                                             


 In her Christmas dress

                                                  

 Shae' and Mommy before the banquet

"Enjoy the Process"

The last 4 or 5 days have been ROUGH to say the least......I'm talking no sleep kinda rough.  This sweet, wonderful, precious baby girl has been having some MAJOR tummy issues....it's really been giving her fits at night. (poor thing)  It seemed to come to a head over the weekend when I spent most of Friday night up with her then Tom spent a lot of Saturday night up with her.  She has just been in SO much pain from gas and who knows what else!  (ahhh, the life of a parent...when you can write an entire blog about gas! HA!)  Anyway, all of my fellow mom's out there understand where I'm coming from.  :)
Thankfully, Carter stayed at G'ma's house Sunday night so Tom and I (and Shae'!) could do our Christmas shopping and go to dinner.  It allowed me to nap more on Monday morning when she napped (and I would normally have Carter to take care of at those times). 


 And speaking of Sunday night....we were so excited about our 'date'.  I mean, dinner out withOUT a toddler to deal with=BLISS, right?  Well, I didn't anticipate the missy being cranky...uggh!  Our wonderful PF Chang's dinner was less enjoyable because one of us had to hold her through most of it (makes it kinda hard to eat!) and then we were rushing to get out because she was screaming wanting to eat as we waited for the check. :/  Not to mention our 'too large' stroller that was NOT made to fit through the aisles of Changs....what a night!  But I had forgotten how many comments you get when out with a newborn.....the attention is fun...sometimes.


Ok..back to my original story....last night....Oh my....what a night!  She was awake every 1-2 hours in pain.  Broke my heart to see her hurting.  I gave her EVERYTHING trying to help, but nothing seemed to work.  By the time her first feeding of the day rolled around, she was hurting to much to eat for more than a few minutes.  She did better the rest of the morning until after lunch when all of a sudden I couldn't lay her down awake or fully asleep without her crying.  Clingy?  For some reason today, yes.  And it's lasted up until now...10:30p.m.  Tom or I one have had to hold her all night.  Here's PRAYING our night tonight is a better one!


So, what does all of this have to do with my post title?  Well....I've been thinking through all of this about something I read in one of the GFI books (if you don't know what GFI is, you MUST look into it!)  In the infant book, they are talking about your baby's routine, etc.  The discussion is about when to move your baby from a 3 hour routine to a 4 hour feeding routine.  They make this statement: "Many Mom's make the mistake of trying to transition to a 4 hour routine too quickly.  Don't rush it.  Enjoy the process."  This statement has really stuck with me.  I don't know...maybe because my firstborn is 2 1/2 already and I feel like he was born yesterday? (seriously...his birth is more vivid in my memory than Shae's...which is SO crazy to me!)  Because of that, I realize how quickly it all goes by.  How easy it is when I'm going through the sleepless nights to wish that we could hurry up and get to the next phase instead of taking the time to enjoy this one.  I know...not a lot to enjoy about being up at all hours of the night, right?   But it IS time I get to spend all alone with my sweet girl....holding and rocking her and bonding.  During the day I'm often too busy with Carter  to really be able to take that kind of time alone with her.   And so often I do find myself wishing we would hurry and get to that 4 hour routine...OH the 4 hour routine!  But then I won't have that special time of nursing my baby and enjoying that special togetherness as often in the day as I do now. 


My point with all of this is that it would do us all good to "enjoy the process".  Whatever that process might be for you.....it could relate to anything, but there is something about taking the time to enjoy where you are NOW and what you are going through NOW.  There's beauty in the process.  There's joy to be found (although you may have to really look for it!) in the process.  And for me....as I type this and my sweet girl is sleeping right beside me and I wait for her to wake for her last feeding before I can get some sleep, I'm reminding myself to enjoy this...every bit of it.  Because tomorrow when I wake up, she'll be 2 years old and I'll barely remember this part of it all. :)


Enjoy the pics....they are all of my sweet baby girl (no Carter pics this post!)  And were all taken over the weekend.  I LOVE my Shae' Shae'! :)

Kidding myself....

So my last post talked about how smooth my first day alone with 2 kiddo's went. Well, I've realized in the last few days that I was SO kidding myself when I believed I had this! Yes, Monday was a good day, however, Tuesday and Wednesday made up for it (today isn't far enough along yet to tell). Thanks to my precious, sweet, adorable baby girl, I have never felt more sleep deprived in my life...ugghh! She's a champ the first half of the day, but due to a tummy ache that is going on 4 days, our afternoons/evenings have been rough to say the least. Now I am a HUGE fan of the GFI program (ask me about it if you don't know what it is---it's FABULOUS!) and through the program I have a 'contact mom' that helps me with issues as they arise. Well, I spent 35 minutes on the phone with her yesterday (all while Carter rearranged the nursery, might I add...and I couldn't stop him because I was on the phone and feeding the baby at the same time). Wendy, my contact mom, gave me some great advice and as of today I'm trying to take the necessary steps to get this little girl on track.

So in dealing with Shae's fussiness, working on her routine, TRYING to give Carter the attention he needs (I admit I have failed at this lately, unfortunately) and keeping everyone fed (including myself) I have realized that I'm kidding myself by thinking my house will stay perfect all the while. Now, don't get me wrong...I am still trying to keep it as clean as possible...but yesterday dishes sat in my sink the entire day *gasp* This is SO not me! I am the perfectionist who thinks it all has to be clean ALL the time...and even though Carter makes a mess, I make sure it's all picked up before Tom comes home. I do not think he should come home to dishes in the sink and a messy house. But, to my despair, this week dishes have sat in the sink unwashed until the end of the day, laundry has been piling up, and me AND both kids have spent entire days in our pj's up until the afternoon/evening when it's bath time and we all put on another pair of pj's. HA! Oh dear....and I want 3 or 4 kids?

I know this is all temporary. I WILL be back to my house-cleaning, crazy, O.C.D. self soon....I just need some sleep first! Anyhow, among all the craziness, Carter is becoming more and more attached to Shae', which is SO sweet to see!  The picture is him being his sweet self with her. :)

Well...time to wake the princess to eat, as I look at toys scattered all over the living room and feel like crawling back into bed NOW for the rest of the day :/ Oh well, at least the dishes are done. :)