We are coming off a beautifully busy summer weekend, now both boys are sleeping soundly and I'm stealing a moment to post here about some special firsts we had over the weekend.
Last night Jacob slept in his crib all night long! I mean, he woke up for his midnight and his 3AM feedings, but he spent the sleeping part of his night in his crib. I hadn't planned on him moving out of the bassinet in our bedroom until he was around 4 months, but it looks like plans have changed. Here's the story of how that came to be:
I've shared previously that Jacob fell into an eat/play/sleep cycle which is what some experts say is ideal, but I assure you we had nothing to do with him choosing to go that route, he did that one all on his own :) Lately, when the play is done, Jacob has been having a rough time transitioning to sleep, unless I put him in the Moby wrap. That is A-OK with me for the most part, but then it is hard to get him out of the wrap and down for sleep if I want to do anything else, like shower or cook or perhaps go to sleep myself. He hated swaddling as a newborn, preferring to have his hands clenched under his chin instead.
A friend recommended I try swaddling again, citing the 5 S's (shush, swaddle, swing, side, suck) of The Happiest Baby on the Block. I had great success with all these S's with Kaleb, and was golden with 4 of them for Jacob, except the part that Jacob didn't like swaddling as a newborn. I was pretty sure it wouldn't work, but I've made some recommendations to her that I know she thought wouldn't work and she still tried them (mostly with success), so I went for it.
She was right! I swaddled Jacob up tight, popped in his paci, and sang to him (my version of the shush) while rocking him. He was out within 3 minutes! I put him in his crib and he took a 2 hour nap! Since the swaddle turns him into a baby mummy/gloworm, he won't go very easily into the bassinet (which is really just a Boppy Bouncy seat) in our room with his swaddle on. So, I decided after his 9PM feeding last night to put him in the crib instead of the bassinet. He slept straight through to his midnight feeding, I rocked him while feeding him in the glider in the nursery then put him back until his 3AM, which actually stretched to 4AM last night! He slept great in there, all swaddled up and cozy. I'm excited to see him falling asleep easily and happily, and also a little sad that the co-sleeping phase has ended 2 months earlier than I was planning on.
Another first of the weekend for Jacob was his first consonant sound, a perfectly adorable little "uhh-GUH". I adore his little voice, it is deep for a baby, only squeeky when he screams or cries. But his conversation voice is low and deep and a little breathy and I just love all our little talks. He gets so excited when he makes noises, his whole face breaking into this beaming grin. He really is a sweet and cute little monkey man!
Kaleb also had a first this weekend, our first time playing baseball in the backyard! Yesterday, we got him a foam bat that came with a plastic baseball. Today, while a snuggly swaddled Jacob slept in the crib, Kyle and I went outside with Kaleb to play. Kyle drew Kaleb a home plate on the driveway with sidewalk chalk and taught him how to hold, and choke up on, his bat. I taught him how to stand with his toes lined up to home plate and how to keep his eye on the ball. Then I threw him pitches for at least 20 minutes, and he connected on quite a few of them! Kyle served as catcher and coach. It was a great family moment, the kind I started looking forward to when we first found out we were pregnant with Kaleb.
It was a fun weekend for our family. On Friday, the boys and I met up with Laura and her girls at Java Gym. It was nice having Analyn there because she helped Kaleb climb up the bigger levels that he hasn't been able to do on his own. He was completely worn out after that! Saturday morning we were up early to wear Kaleb out so he'd take an early nap. We went to play at Riverside Park, then home for nap, and then it was off to celebrate with our friends for their super cute son's first birthday. It was an excellent party, perfectly kid-friendly and Kaleb had a great time! There's something so magical about that first birthday party, I'm happy we were there to join the celebration :) Then it was a quick stop home and back out the door to a picnic at Townsend Park with Brent and Eddie. They spoiled Kaleb with a new leaf blower bubble machine, which he thought was awesome, and had other toys for him too! The toys are great, but the best part was that they then spent most of the rest of the night playing with Kaleb. He really loves those two, talks about them all the time. The other day, Kaleb said to me "Mommy, I'm taking Jacob with me to go see Brent and Eddie, we'll be right back!" awwww!
Today was baseball outside in the morning, nap time, then over to Ben and Laura's to celebrate Father's Day with my dad early, since Mike and Kerry will be at camp next weekend. I love seeing Kaleb play with his cousins and aunts and uncles. He adores them all and it is very special to me to be able to raise my kids around cousins, aunts, and uncles since we didn't have any of those close to us when we were kids.
Busy busy weekend, full of firsts for both kids, fun times with great friends, and a chance to spend time with family. I say this a lot, because it is true, I Am Blessed!
About Me
- Miss Madly
- My husband, Kyle, and I are the proud and busy parents of two little boys, Kaleb and Jacob. Kaleb joined our family in December 2009 and we welcomed Jacob in April 2012. We both work full time outside the home, I am in the field of Learning and Development. I have a passion for studying the brain and how we learn, which translates beautifully to watching my boys grow up and discover their worlds. I'm also into learning about nutrition, herbalism, food-as-medicine, natural alternatives, and homeopahtic remedies. I hope to provide an uncut view of what life is really like as a working mom, minus the instagram filters and facebook bragging...I'll save that for facebook ;)
Sunday, June 10, 2012
Sunday, June 3, 2012
Back to Work: The 'Me Too Crew' and 'What's the point?'
I start back to work tomorrow, and I'm both excited and sad at the same time.
I'm emotional over the part of going back to work that means I have to be away from Jacob. At this point, a little too emotional to capture in words. For now, suffice it to say I am squeezing him a little tighter when we rock at night and that tomorrow morning will be one for waterproof eye makeup.
I'm looking forward to getting back to my "real life" again. My leave has been wonderful, but I knew it wasn't a permanent thing and I'm looking forward to getting settled into a weekly routine again. (the actual figuring out of this routine is causing me some crazy stress, more on that soon)
The thing I'm looking forward to the most is getting back to what I now consider my "Me Too Crew" (probably missing some critical punctuation there...deal with it). I have great friends at work, and many of them are parents of young children. I have seriously missed seeing and talking to them daily about the joys and struggles of parenting. There is something so very powerful in sharing what you think is this crazy story, or this major parenting fail, and having someone else (or sometimes an entire group of people) nod their head and say "Yeah, that happened to me, too!" or "Oh man, I've so been there!".
I recently had the wife of one of these friends comment to me on Facebook about how crazy it can be with a 2 year old and an infant. This "me, too!" made me feel so much better about the many times I've felt completely overwhelmed with my boys. I am very happy to be re-joining that conversation with my work peeps, and I know it is going to work wonders on my stress levels!
On the not-so-excited front, I'm definitely stressed about how I'm going to manage my full-time schedule with both kids. I know that there are a lot of women who have done this, and who do it everyday, but it is my first time juggling an infant, toddler, husband, home, and career. Trying to picture how I'll swing work, menu planning, grocery shopping, family dinners every night, quality time with the boys, nurturing a marriage (or at the very least maintaining basic civility towards each other with all the stress!), breast feeding and pumping and storing milk and all the washing and packing of bottles...it is overwhelming to say the least.
This obsessively trying to figure out the perfect arrangement and ordering of tasks each day to ensure that it all gets done has reached a fevered pitch the past few days, as I get closer and closer to going back to work. I was literally pacing the floors the other day, with Jacob in the Moby wrap, trying to work out how I would make family dinners still happen every night. With Jacob here now, I don't have time to menu plan during Kaleb's Friday nap. And in the summer we go to the cottage a lot on the weekends, which means I won't be able to grocery shop on Saturday, or if we go on Sunday I won't have that time to prep dinners for the week. And, I'll need and want to nurse Jacob right when we get home each night, so I won't be able to work on dinner. And so on and so on, I had myself worked into quite a stress-frenzy. And then, a thought came to me: "Why are you doing family dinners in the first place?" I'd like to say it was the still, small voice of God, but I fear He had to use a louder and more persistent voice to break through my incessant worrying over the details. But, the question came through and it stopped me in my Moby-wearin' tracks.
What IS the reason I wanted to eat dinner as a family every night? I can tell you it didn't have anything to do with playing with new recipes, and it wasn't about planning elaborate menus and spending hours on Pinterest looking for new ideas. No. The point of family dinners is to spend time as a family every day. The food on the table is no where near as important as the people around it. So what if we have sandwiches for dinner? Who cares if it is cereal even, some nights? If my family spends quality time at the cottage or the park on a weekend, that is a GOOD thing, not a nuisance! I can't believe how far from the goal I got, letting myself get stressed and worried, trapped in the details.
I want to be the kind of mother who smiles and laughs, I want my boys to look back on their childhood and see a happy mom who delighted in being with them. I know I will always have stress, raising a family is hard work, juggling career and marriage and children and home is tough for anyone. But, when my boys are grown and we look back over these years, I know it isn't the "Mom always had a balanced nutritious colorful meal" memory that is most important to me that they carry. That will happen some nights, eventually it will happen most nights. What I want my boys to remember when they are grown is more along the lines of "Mom had family dinner for us every night. We talked and laughed and I never once doubted that my parents loved me and wanted to hear about what was going on in my world." Or something like that. THAT is the point of having family dinner every night, and I'm very thankful to the Lord for the reminder this week, I needed it! :)
I'm emotional over the part of going back to work that means I have to be away from Jacob. At this point, a little too emotional to capture in words. For now, suffice it to say I am squeezing him a little tighter when we rock at night and that tomorrow morning will be one for waterproof eye makeup.
I'm looking forward to getting back to my "real life" again. My leave has been wonderful, but I knew it wasn't a permanent thing and I'm looking forward to getting settled into a weekly routine again. (the actual figuring out of this routine is causing me some crazy stress, more on that soon)
The thing I'm looking forward to the most is getting back to what I now consider my "Me Too Crew" (probably missing some critical punctuation there...deal with it). I have great friends at work, and many of them are parents of young children. I have seriously missed seeing and talking to them daily about the joys and struggles of parenting. There is something so very powerful in sharing what you think is this crazy story, or this major parenting fail, and having someone else (or sometimes an entire group of people) nod their head and say "Yeah, that happened to me, too!" or "Oh man, I've so been there!".
I recently had the wife of one of these friends comment to me on Facebook about how crazy it can be with a 2 year old and an infant. This "me, too!" made me feel so much better about the many times I've felt completely overwhelmed with my boys. I am very happy to be re-joining that conversation with my work peeps, and I know it is going to work wonders on my stress levels!
On the not-so-excited front, I'm definitely stressed about how I'm going to manage my full-time schedule with both kids. I know that there are a lot of women who have done this, and who do it everyday, but it is my first time juggling an infant, toddler, husband, home, and career. Trying to picture how I'll swing work, menu planning, grocery shopping, family dinners every night, quality time with the boys, nurturing a marriage (or at the very least maintaining basic civility towards each other with all the stress!), breast feeding and pumping and storing milk and all the washing and packing of bottles...it is overwhelming to say the least.
This obsessively trying to figure out the perfect arrangement and ordering of tasks each day to ensure that it all gets done has reached a fevered pitch the past few days, as I get closer and closer to going back to work. I was literally pacing the floors the other day, with Jacob in the Moby wrap, trying to work out how I would make family dinners still happen every night. With Jacob here now, I don't have time to menu plan during Kaleb's Friday nap. And in the summer we go to the cottage a lot on the weekends, which means I won't be able to grocery shop on Saturday, or if we go on Sunday I won't have that time to prep dinners for the week. And, I'll need and want to nurse Jacob right when we get home each night, so I won't be able to work on dinner. And so on and so on, I had myself worked into quite a stress-frenzy. And then, a thought came to me: "Why are you doing family dinners in the first place?" I'd like to say it was the still, small voice of God, but I fear He had to use a louder and more persistent voice to break through my incessant worrying over the details. But, the question came through and it stopped me in my Moby-wearin' tracks.
What IS the reason I wanted to eat dinner as a family every night? I can tell you it didn't have anything to do with playing with new recipes, and it wasn't about planning elaborate menus and spending hours on Pinterest looking for new ideas. No. The point of family dinners is to spend time as a family every day. The food on the table is no where near as important as the people around it. So what if we have sandwiches for dinner? Who cares if it is cereal even, some nights? If my family spends quality time at the cottage or the park on a weekend, that is a GOOD thing, not a nuisance! I can't believe how far from the goal I got, letting myself get stressed and worried, trapped in the details.
I want to be the kind of mother who smiles and laughs, I want my boys to look back on their childhood and see a happy mom who delighted in being with them. I know I will always have stress, raising a family is hard work, juggling career and marriage and children and home is tough for anyone. But, when my boys are grown and we look back over these years, I know it isn't the "Mom always had a balanced nutritious colorful meal" memory that is most important to me that they carry. That will happen some nights, eventually it will happen most nights. What I want my boys to remember when they are grown is more along the lines of "Mom had family dinner for us every night. We talked and laughed and I never once doubted that my parents loved me and wanted to hear about what was going on in my world." Or something like that. THAT is the point of having family dinner every night, and I'm very thankful to the Lord for the reminder this week, I needed it! :)
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