Losing It

You know that commercial on TV with the cartoon couple where the wife talks about losing weight?  And she talks about how she & her husband give up carbs together and he loses like 20lbs and she loses 3?

This is my real life.

It's not like I expected the baby weight to melt off right away, I've done this before and I'm older now.  I know that it takes time and some effort.  But I also know that breastfeeding should be helping this journey.

I've been trying meaning to work out but it's hard with 2 kids.  I get home from work, after picking up both girls and feed/entertain them while we wait for C to get home.  IF he gets home at a reasonable time and IF it's not my turn to make dinner and IF the girls are cooperative, then MAYBE I'll have time to run.  And you ladies know that getting ready to run takes time to change into workout clothes, remove make-up, and stretch all before you can actually get moving.  Add in finding your water bottle and headphones and finding something that you can actually listen to, while, most nights it just doesn't even happen.

C always says that if I want to work out then I'll make it happen.  He certainly does.  He runs 2-3x per week with one of those being a long run on the weekend.  I admire his dedication and the fact that he truly does make it happen.

Back to the commercial, weight is like melting off him.  He complains all the time about his pants being too big or shirts ballooning on him.  I only feel a little sorry for him.

I've actually told him not to lose any more weight, not because I'm jealous (mostly), but because I don't think it's healthy for him.  He weighs something like 165 and I think that's low for his frame.

In the mean time, I lost 20lbs in 5.5 months but those last 10 seem determined to hang around.  And it's not that I weight a horrible number (142) but it's more than I'd like. 

I managed to run 3x last week, including one family trip to the Y.  I'd like to keep it up and see if I can get the scale moving again.  I'd like to at least set a good foundation before the holidays hit.

Unlike the commercial, I won't be taking supplements.

You Get What You Pay For

JC Penny is running a promotion right now with their photo studios where you get free sitting fees, a free 8x10" picture and a free (low resolution) digital image just for coming in.  Their hope, I assume, is that you'll spend lots of money buying pictures from them to make up for all the things they waived.

One of the things I wanted for my birthday was to do a nice family photo shoot to get an image we could use on a Christmas card.  My thought was that we'd get a photographer to come do a family shoot and end up with precious photos of our family and the girls to put in our home.

Instead, after seeing the promotion, we decided to give jcp a shot.

I had misgivings because they're a corporation after all.  It wasn't at my home, it was a big studio.  But I expected that the photographer would take time to ask what we wanted and have creative poses for us.

I told them that we wanted to get some good family photos and some nice pictures of the girls.  We all wore our Converse shoes so I thought it would be fun to use them in some way.  We brought cute hats for the girls to wear as well.

Now, I understand that children are unreliable.  That they don't always co-operate and that they don't understand what's being asked of them.  Especially a 5-month old.  But, given what I asked for you would think that I would get ONE useable picture of both girls together.  I did not.

Don't they look thrilled??

I wish that they had had the multiple shot feature where it would have taken 3-4 shots each time the button was pushed.  This one could have been good.

I don't even know what Addy is doing here.

And here are some good ones:

This will likely be our Christmas card picture.

I cropped this from the above photo - it was the only way to get a good shot of the girls together!

I think we ordered a larger one of this size for our wall, though I feel like she framed it poorly.  There's a lot of empty space above our heads.

So now that you've seen them - here's my thoughts.  The photographer did not suggest any poses other than us standing and holding the girls and seating Reese in a basket with Addy next to her.  I suggested we sit and it was like she'd never thought of that.  I mentioned our shoes and she apparently thought I meant I wanted them cropped out (which she did anyway).  Why would we ALL wear the same shoes if I didn't want them in a picture?

All-in-all, we got what I wanted which was a nice-ish family shot plus a Christmas card photo.  Plus, grand total spent was $12 for the entire thing - sitting fees, digital copy, 2 8X10", 1 5X7", and one 10x13".

We'll try again next year.

The Day of My Birth

Was yesterday.  I turned 33 yesterday and woke up with a sore hip.  I joked to C that perhaps I was turning 60 instead of 33.

I love my birthday.  I always have high hopes for it to be a special day and now that I'm older and have kids and everyday life to deal with maybe the expectation should be lowered.  I mean, other than a few family members, friends and my own husband, who really cares that it's my birthday.

That said, I did expect a little more than what I got.  I should start with a disclaimer though.  C is a wonderful husband and I consider myself lucky every day that he chose me.  He is thoughtful and kind and absolutely the love of my life.

However, I did expect him to do something special for me.  He ended up buying me a present because I never made up my mind about what I wanted.  And that's fine.  He bought me something that I've wanted that have never bought for myself due to cost.  But he gave it to me 5 days early, in the bag from the store, unwrapped with no card or fanfare.

And yesterday turned out to be just another day.  Nothing special for dinner, no flowers or special dessert, just a typical evening at home.  It wasn't a bad evening at all, it just wasn't special.

For his birthday I not only bought him a present but snuck a card into his lunch and made him a special dinner followed by a homemade dessert.  The dinner was not on his actual birthday but I planned it and told him in advance that I was doing it.

And the other thing that sucked?  I made cookies to bring to work for my own birthday and not a single person even asked why I did it.  The guys all just grabbed cookies and ate them without even questioning why they showed up. So not a single person in the office even knew it was my birthday - not that I wanted it to be a huge deal but it would have been nice to at least hear a few Happy Birthdays.

First world problems, I know.  But it's been bugging me.  I suppose it's time to lower my expectations.

Starting Solids

Reese turned 5 months on Oct. 21 and she has seemed more hungry lately so I decided it was time to start solids. 

When Addy was ready (also around 5 months), I followed everything by the book.  Started with rice cereal then moved to jarred purees.  I did sneak some mashed up avocado in there but she pretty much ate jarred purees for months.  Veggies before fruits to avoid a sweet tooth.  Addy was our first, so of course we didn't question anything.

With Reese, I'm more interested in getting to the good stuff and doing as few purees as possible.  Right now, she's getting oatmeal once a day (we're only on day 5) but I want to do things differently this time.  I want to be able to give her things that we're having for dinner instead of making her a seperate meal.  I want to put some cooked mushy pasta on her tray and let her go to town instead of spoon feeding her everything.

I know it takes time to reach that point, but I think we'll move a little faster than we did with Addy.

One thing that I did with Addy that I think helped her develop a wide palate was to give her chewed up bites of our dinners.  If we were having chicken, I would chew some of the chicken and then give her the mush.  I know it sounds gross, but other than pureeing it (ew) or buying the chicken in a jar (double ew), it was the only way she would get to taste it.  And I like to think that is why Addy is not a picky eater today. 

So we will see what actually happens with Reese and solids.  I've heard it called Baby Led Weaning (BLW) but I need to do more research into it.  I don't actually want her to wean until a full year has gone by so I need to see what it's all about.

Birthday

My birthday is in less than 2 weeks and C told me that I needed to make a decision.  He said that I could either have a gift, or we could do something.  But it's up to me to decide what I'd like to do and I for some reason can't.

Do you do the thing where you won't buy things for yourself but you'll allow them for your birthday or Christmas?  Like right now I want some boots.  I always want boots in the fall.  But I think that spending money on boots that, let's be honest, I won't wear that much anyway is kind of frivolous so I won't actually buy them for myself.

But my birthday??  Perfect excuse to spend $50 on some boots!

But then again, there's something to be said for a night out with my hubby.  C & I kind of got thrust into this life.  I would absolutely not change a single thing but it all happened so quickly.  It's so important for us to take some time for ourselves, to remember why we're in this.  That it's more than kids and jobs and obligations.  We chose this.

I think it's easy to get bogged down in every day life.  To focus on what the kids need or getting dinner on the table or to focus on some problem or project at work.  And those things need to happen, absolutely.  But every once in a while, its nice to get dressed up, to compliment each other, to walk hand in hand with no strollers in the way and to spend some time together.

Well, this post didn't end up where I thought it would.  I still don't know what to do for my birthday but I know C will make it a great day no matter what I choose.

Sleep Training Break Down

No, I didn't have a break down.  I thought I'd break down how it all went.

We almost didn't start on Thursday because we were having a rough evening at home.  I had at least one clogged duct (I suspect it was 2 or one really big one) and starting to have body aches and not feel well.  Addy isn't napping at preschool which makes her extra... pleasant when we get home and C had to work late.

Fortunately, Reese was able to help with the clogged duct issue and Addy cheered up and C got home eventually and we ordered a pizza for dinner. 

I took Reese upstairs and got her in her pjs.  I nursed her in the glider in the nursery with the lights off and only a night light on.  She was pretty tired, having been awake for 4+ hours so she actually passed out when I put her in the crib.

She woke up 3 times that night and each time I went through the 5-10-20-40 method, though we never actually made it to 40.  Each time I went in and rubbed her back while making the Shhhhhh sound.  The first few times it actually seemed like it was pissing her off more than helping but she eventually gave in each time.

The next night we did the same thing (though I think she had a bath first) and she fussed while going to sleep but didn't last long.  She only woke up once the entire night, around 3:30am and fussed for a few minutes and then fell back asleep.  I never even had to get out of bed!

Saturday night was the same story.

And the kicker of the whole thing, Sunday night she never woke up (that I know of)! 

I should also point out that each morning I've had to wake her up.  So she's sleeping around 11-12 hours each night which is amazing.

She did wake up this morning at 4:45am or so and I did go in and shush her and she eventually went back to sleep.  She also woke up again before I was ready, around 6am but basically around when I would have gotten her up anyway.

I joked that I feel like a new woman with the uninterrupted sleep I'm getting.  In reality, I'm still tired at night but I think it will start to feel better the more she sleeps. 

So we are officially moved into the nursery with a baby who is mostly a great sleeper (knock on wood)!

Tonight We Dine In Hell

In reality, tonight we sleep train.  God help us.

We were probably ready to start sleep training weeks ago but put it off for various reasons.  I wanted to see the doctor for her 4-month check up and make sure she was at a healthy weight and that there was no medical reason for her to nurse 2-3 times during the night.  I also wanted to get his take on our process.  With the trip we made over the weekend, I didn't see the point in starting before completely disrupting our schedule.

Mentally, I'm torn.  I have been ready for this for at least a month.  Ready for a full night's sleep.  Sweet baby Reese wakes up 2-3x per night and even though I go right back to sleep, it is most certainly taking a toll on me.  (Most evident by my crashing on the couch around 9:15pm last night...)

But listening to my baby cry in the middle of the night?  That's going to be a challenge.

Our doctor recommended we do a modified Ferber method.  Tonight we will put her in her crib and come back at 5-10-20-40 minute intervals.  He said that we are not allowed to even pick her up and if we must make physical contact that 2 quick pats on the back or rump will suffice.  We are to say in a firm but soothing voice, "Reese, it's time for sleep.  Mommy and Daddy love you very much.  Good night."

She will evenutally pass out and will wake up again probably around midnight if she follows her schedule.  We follow the same pattern as above, and again when she invariably wakes up around 3am.

If all goes well,she won't get up for real until 6:30-7am, but we'll see.

The next night, we repeat but do 10-20-40 instead.  The third night I think we do 20-40-60 (if she makes it that long).  Hopefully there won't be a fourth night.

We chose tonight because I'm off tomorrow and can recoup and then its the weekend.  I suspect this will be harder on me though we did it with Addy.  It's not that C doesn't care, but he's more practical about how this is not a selfish move, she is ready too.

After this weekend, assuming it all worked, there will be no more baby stuff in our room!!  Bye bassinet!  See ya changing pad and diapers!  Hello our room, back to the way it was.

Wish us luck!