Busy Bee

I have felt so crazy busy lately! I am easing into the role of high school counselor at the online school that I work for, but while doing that I'm still doing the data entry that I've been doing all school year. Add to that a toddler, exercise classes, a house to clean, my friend's upcoming wedding, various appointments, and the newest bundle of joy in our family, and you've got one hectic mama.

Mikey was a big helper during one of my conference calls this week.

Somehow I managed to squeeze in making it to the picture appointment that my mom had set up for Amelia. Here she is trying to rearrange the seats at the studio in order to make them a proper toddler jungle gym:

 See the intense look she makes when trying to accomplish something? Cracks me up every time.

I was also able to go help my cousin with Mr. Max a couple days this week and it was, of course, terrific. I love his baby cuddles and his round head covered in peach fuzz. I could just eat him up!

Amelia was my little helper and was generally very good. She had a bit of a rough time the second day, but right before we left the house, I discovered why-- her first molar has finally popped through. Well, most of it. There is still a bit of gum tissue that it needs to push through and it seems to be causing her a fair amount of pain. Generally she has no problems when teething except for a bit of difficulty sleeping or a little whining, but she had so much discomfort Tuesday night that we had to give her a dose of Motrin and a popsicle before bed. It did not, however, prevent her from practicing her chess moves while we were helping with the baby, which I think thoroughly pleased my husband since he is a big fan of chess.

My favorite, the 'cheese!' look :)

And that pretty much concludes my week! So glad tomorrow is Friday. I'm looking forward to trying out my new kayak Saturday afternoon and celebrating my friend's upcoming wedding at her bachelorette party that evening. Good times! :)

Germs and the Verbal Explosion

Germs have struck again in our house, but this time they've attacked Mama. I had big plans this weekend to clean and play with Amelia lots, but then woke up yesterday morning congested and feeling like I'd been hit by a truck. I'm pretty darned disappointed. Nothing big happened this week to get me down, but it has been one of those weeks where little things have frustrated me and work has left me feeling like I'm constantly pushing my daughter's needs to the side. I couldn't wait till the weekend to turn my computer off and have some quality play time together. I did manage to drag myself down to the floor to help her with her farm puzzle and play ball, but generally it has been a snotty tissue and cartoon fest at my house, especially since my husband had to work yesterday.

Thankfully, although I think my cold is reaching it's peak today and I almost feel worse than yesterday, I did get to sleep in and Amelia got lots of play time with her daddy. This evening she is heading to my in-laws with him and I will get a lot of guilt free rest. Originally I had hoped to catch up on some sewing and writing projects, but as I sit here sniffling, I know that it would be best for my health and sanity to sit on the couch and watch a movie instead.

Meanwhile, in the land of mommyhood, Amelia has been learning new words at a dizzying pace. Tomorrow is her 15 month check-up (and shots-- UGH) so I'm interested to hear what the nurse practitioner says about how many words she can say. She was saying about 10 words at a year and we were told that is generally the 18 month expectation. Now she is up to about 25-30 words. Some of them are more sounds than words but we count them anyways. I had to write them down to figure out what the count is. Amelia can say: ball, book, keys, shoes, Daddy, Ma, dog, kitty, water (wa wa), done, up, down, Dora (duh-duh), backpack, belly, hands, hot dog (for the hot dog dance during Micky's Clubhouse), cookie, banana (bani), please (psss), hi, hello, bye, see ya (SEES!!), bird, and juice (which is actually the pedialyte we give her when she's sick), roll, peek-a-boo, choo choo (for trains), ta da! and beep beep (for cars-- sometimes she will say vroom vroom and car too).

As someone who used to work in a preschool through first grade school building, I mostly feel like this means she will be put on red a lot for talking when she starts school. However, I am also grateful that she seems to be developing as she should be. Although I think feeling proud of your child's developments is a good feeling to have as you watch your child grow up, I always try to reflect too on how grateful I am that she is happy and healthy so far.

Other than talking, Amelia also has been trying to figure out how to do things all by her big girl self, like brushing her teeth. So today I leave you with a picture of her in her big girl chair, maintaining her oral hygiene:

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Keep 'Em Laughin'

Posting recently has been a little bit of a challenge for me. I'm still loving working from home, especially since my boss told me that I could work from the office just one afternoon a week rather than three days-- therefore avoiding the whole babysitter issue. It's great and makes me wonder how I survived four months of working a traditional job with the whole rush in the morning and struggling to keep up with household tasks in the evening.

Since I (generally) have time to keep up with the house during the week, you would think I would have time to write on the weekends. However, it's Fall, and therefore time for baking, drinking Octoberfest beer, and watching football. This past weekend I made some apple toffee bars and for dinner one night we had jalapeno popper grilled cheese sandwiches. Both were as good as they sound (thank you, Pinterest. If you'd like to see what else we will be stuffing our faces with in the near future, you can see my boards here.) We watched all my favorite college teams lose on Saturday and then I ran in a 5k on Sunday. Who has time to write?

Along with the time challenge comes my scattered mommy brain. It seems as though when I wasn't working, I could use my free time to come up some coherent themes/topics of mommyhood, or share my opinions on recent current events. But apparently concentrating all day, along with staring at a computer, drains me of any cohesive thoughts for a blog.

I'm not complaining. Just justifying my absence from the virtual writing world.

As I sat down this morning with a plan of writing a scattered list of various events in my life, I thought of these pictures:



Mom, I don't want to wear the hat.



No, seriously. Come closer and let me tell you how much I hate the hat.

Sigh. Fine, I'll wear the damn hat.

Puppy gym! Crawled right over her, poor dog.





Our daughter has been quite the little comedian lately as you can see. Our favorite gesture that she does right now, which I have yet to catch on camera, is her touchdown pose. It is just what it sounds like, her throwing her arms up as if your favorite football team just scored.

She also has had a third tooth come in this past week, and while my nipples are living in fear, she has been more interested in biting my shoulder. She leans in for what looks like a sweet little hug and then bites down on my shoulder with her little baby fang, which surprisingly hurts quite a bit for a nub of a tooth. I have a theory of parenting which entails saving your really dramatic/loud voice for when it is truly called for, and since she is only 11 months old, I reserve that voice for when she attempts to draw blood.

You would think I had smacked her if you could see her face. She pouts out that bottom lip and starts this pathetic little cry. All I say is "No! No biting, Amelia!" and you'd think I had torn apart her whole little world. I have to turn my head, for fear she will see me laughing and think this is a game.

If only discipline would be so easy during the years ahead. Ah, well, I'll just enjoy it for now.

Pre-toddlerhood

You've probably never heard the term "pre-toddlerhood", but frankly, I don't know why it's not a distinctly noted stage of childhood development. I would define this as the time when babies are not truly toddlers yet, but are getting that annoying independent streak to them. I am pretty sure I am twice as screwed. Amelia has always strived to be a little bit more independent than most babies and has been shaking her head 'no' for months now. Last week, I was reading some moron's lady's comment that parents who ascribe to attachment theory and co-sleep with their babies are setting themselves up for needy, dependent children (wait, aren't they still supposed to be dependent? Should Amelia be doing her own laundry yet?) who can't do anything for themselves. I literally laughed out loud and coffee almost came out of my nose. Clearly, she needs to meet my daughter.

For example, during the past week, my daughter has decided she is not so thrilled with baby food anymore. I should point out, she doesn't even get jarred food. I make all her food, it's like a gourmet baby grocery store in my freezer right now. Yet, given the choice between what's on my plate and what's in her bowl, she'd prefer my pasta with feta. That's right-- feta cheese. Pureed green beans? Eh, she is not so thrilled, despite the fact that she enjoyed them a month ago. So basically, I have a nine month old who won't eat baby food and won't take a bottle.

And then there's the determination. She has discovered the dime sized hole in our couch within the last couple days. Now, I am a big believer in the beauty of distraction with kids. Redirection can definitely be a sanity saver for mommies. So, when she found that hole, I tried to show her a toy and then put my hand over the couch's blemish. I was hoping that she'd forget about how fun it is to stick her fingers in there and dig around in the cushion stuffing. Instead, she wrinkled her nose and furrowed her brow while grasping my fingers and grunting with effort. SIGH.

When you top this independence and determination with her bodily issues this week-- cutting a new tooth, thrush for the FOURTH TIME, and being mildly constipated-- you have one fussy little girl. It has been a challenging week for sure. Thankfully, her tooth is almost all the way through, we have medicine for her thrush, and she is pooping again, so hopefully things will be looking up for the weekend.

Here she is with plums all over. Her favorite thing to do when she doesn't like her food is to smear it all over her face and in her hair. Lovely.

CHOMP

Lately, things in the world of parenthood have been very up and down. As Amelia nears nine months, she is desperately attempting to make her little body go. She rocks back and forth on her tummy grunting and whining. She pulls herself up using my arms and shoulders as if I'm her personal jungle gym, often until 10:30 at night when I beg her please, please just go to sleep, doesn't bedtime sound fun? For right now, gone are the days where I can get her to bed by 8:30 or 9:00 and have a couple of hours to myself. But on the other hand she is currently taking longer naps during the day and even letting me lay her down in the crib for them. It never ceases to amaze me how I will think I know my daughter and her patterns and then, in a blink of an eye, she changes everything on me.

Little Miss Vampire Tooth

In the midst of juggling all these changes, Amelia has also gotten her first tooth. It's still just a nub on the bottom of her mouth, but definitely there, hard and sharp. Generally, as a breastfeeding mom, I've been terrified of this moment. I've done the research and I know that they are supposed to still be able to nurse without doing any permanent damage to mommy's nipples. Occasionally, they may bite down while teething or simply to see what will happen, but they should learn pretty quickly not to bite. I desperately hoped that Amelia would love breastfeeding so much that she would not hurt mommy.

I was WRONG.

It happened in the middle of the night. I anticipated rolling over to feed her and we'd both drift back off to sleepy land as she nursed. Instead, she CHOMPED DOWN, leaving me yelping with pain. Stunned, but thinking it was a fluke, we fell back to sleep until she woke again an hour later. Surely she is hungry now. I offered her the other side as I was pretty sure my right nipple was bleeding.

CHOMP.

Oh, and I should mention here that we aren't talking a bite like you bite a cookie and then cease. No, we are talking let's bite down on Mommy's nipple like it is a tough piece of meat and not let go. So, this forced me to tear myself away from her knife-like little tooth.

First I was stunned all over again. Then I became angry. Now, many of you are saying "Oh, Amanda, she's just a BABY, you can't get MAD at her." Well, first of all, being bitten at 2 a.m. does not lead to a lot of rationality. And second, OMG the searing pain. The rest of the night was a lot of tossing and turning, waking up every hour. I'm not sure if it was because I was so upset or because she was restless, but the dawn definitely brought a bad morning. Tired, frustrated, and anxious about having to let her nurse for her breakfast, I had to cry before before I could change her diaper when she woke.

And then I cried in the afternoon. And again before bed last night.

I could get all psychologically deep about why this upset me so much, but that's no fun. Let's discuss instead how I plan on holding this and her epidural free birth over her head for the rest of her life. "What, Amelia? You want to move across country to go to college? Did I ever tell you how much pain you leaving my womb caused me? And that I sacrificed my comfort because I was concerned about your ability to successfully breastfeed? AND that when you got your first tooth you attempted to bite both my nipples off?!? You change your mind, you say? You'll go to BGSU? Well, if you think that's what's best..."

Or let's talk about what God was thinking when he decided that women should provide nourishment to their babies through their breasts in the first place. Now, sans teeth, I have no objection to this. But babies get their teeth anywhere from 3 months of age to a year. For the determined woman who is hoping for no formula feeding AND has a baby who gets teeth at 3 months, we are talking 9 months of at-risk nipples. No good. My suggestion would have been lactating fingers. Much less delicate.

It's been about 36 hours since the traumatic event, and so far, so good. No more biting, although I am still tensing up each time she latches on. I'm spending my mental energy praying that she will not get her top 2 teeth in at least until November.

In the meantime, I guess I should start shopping for nipple piercings. If she's going to make holes, I might as well put some kind of ornamentation in them.