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Catching up

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Once again, I am WAY behind on updates. The past few weeks have been a whirlwind, and I just cannot seem to find the time to blog. I guess I should pick back up with an update on my brother – he got out of the hospital on Friday, July 24, and immediately drove out of town to go to a Dave Matthews Band concert in Hershey. Paige and Peyton came to stay at my parents’ house, and we had a great time. On Friday, we took the girls to a singing story hour and playspace time at Kidville. Kidville is this wonderful play and learning place for children. They offer all kinds of music, gym, education, art and language development classes. All summer, they have been sponsoring free story times and playspace events (almost every week), and Little Maestro Concert, pizza and playspace events. Micah loves going (we are enrolled in a class there this Fall), and it seemed like a perefect thing for Paige and Peyton. They had such a good time!

Saturday was a day at the pool – another fun day with the girls. They pushed Micah around in his floaty, played with toys, and it was a wonderful afternoon! I’m amazed by how much Micah is developing – he now prefers to “walk” around the pool in his floaty – feet on the ground and standing tall. Saturday night, Elliot and I went over to Niki and Eric’s house for dinner and hanging out. We picked up Indian food along they way. It was the first time in a few months we tried putting Micah to bed while we were out, and it was a smashing success! He fell asleep in their pack and play, transferred easily to his car seat, and did not wake up when we transferred him into the crib!

On Sunday, my cousin Trenna arrived with her 4 year old son Zander for a week-long visit. We all gathered at my parents’ house on Sunday afternoon/evening for dinner and catching up. Micah went to bed in the pack and play, and again transferred easily back home. On Monday, I did not get to spend any time with Trenna and Zander – they went downtown with my father to do a bit of sightseeing. Zander loves the movie Night at the Museum, so they spent the day visiting all the museums and following a map of movie highlights. My babysitter Christin was with us all day, and I tried to get some work done. I had mah jong on Monday night, so Trenna and I made plans to meet on Tuesday. She was hoping to take Zander to the zoo. They were predicting rain most of the week, so she decided to just take him down on the first clear day. Tuesday brought some oppressive heat, and I was totally stressed about work and worried about exposing Micah to the heat. I needed to give a webinar in the afternoon, and I did not think I could go out and get back in sufficient time to do my work. Unfortunately, I bailed on the trip to the zoo, so Trenna and Zander had to go alone. When they returned, Elliot made dinner for us. We ate together and Micah and Zander played. It was so sweet to see the boys hanging out together – Micah was totally enamored of his big cousin! While Trenna was here, I began working on my shoe cake for my friend Jamie’s birthday.

On Wednesday, we hosted playgroup at our house. I got a bit of work done in the early morning and in the afternoon, then went off to my parents’ house for dinner. Once again, Micah fell asleep in the pack and play and transferred without any difficulty. This new discovery has completely freed us! We now know we can go out a bit more at night and bring Micah along. When we got home Thursday night, I finished making the shoe for my cake.

Thursday, Micah went to Christin’s house for the day while I worked and decorated a cake. I got all dressed up and went out for dinner with my friends, and we had a blast! It was our first real girls’ night out without babies and husbands, and it was just a fun evening – lots of laughter, a little too much wine, and some good food.

On Friday, Trenna, Zander, Micah and I drove to see Jen, Jeremy and the girls in Baltimore. We went to a pirate story hour in Fells Point, then took a ferry ride across to Tide Point to visit my brother’s office and have lunch with him. We got back to our house just in time to attend a Little Maestros concert and playspace event at Kidville. Once again, Zander and Micah had a great time! Zander loved the music, so I bought him a CD so he could remember this trip. After the concert, we went for dinner at my parents’ house again, and spent the rest of the evening together.

Saturday was another pool day with the kids. It was a beautiful, fun, relaxing day. We went out for dinner at Noodles & Company, ran a few errands, then called it a night. I spent most of Sunday recuperating from my week.

Monday and Tuesday I was back to the grindstone with work. Christin was out of town, so her friend Lauren came to babysit Micah. She was great, and she will be available in the Fall to cover Tuesdays and Thursdays when Micah is not in daycare.

In the middle of all the insanity the past few weeks, we bought a new coffee table! It is just a basic one from Crate & Barrel, made of wood, two drawers and an open shelf on the bottom. Micah loves to try and crawl onto the shelf, and today he managed to pull the stack of papers off the shelf. He loves to use the shelf for pushing up – it might become his favorite hiding space in the very near future. We did have one emergency bath today – the babysitter was changing Micah’s diaper, and he had a double pee explosion, sans diaper. He needed a bath because he managed to pee all over his hair!

What else can I say? Micah turns 8 months old in 10 days!! He is growing every day by leaps and bounds. Sometimes, I think he is saying “hi.” He is definitely a crazy waving machine, and he even knows it means “hi.” Every time he sees someone new or a familiar face, he breaks into a big grin and starts waving like crazy. Micah uses his entire arm to wave – it kind of looks like he is trying to fly away. I really do need to catch some video of that this week! He is standing all the time now, and getting pretty close to pulling himself up. He is going to be all kinds of trouble as he grows. He definitely has a stubborn streak (wonder where he gets that from?), and he seems to grab and get into everything. He is now sticking his hand out of the crib and stealing stuff off the night table. I either need to clear the night table or move it. Changing his diaper is an exercise in dexterity – he is definitely a moving, rolling target. He loves to eat, and he now enjoys three big meals each day. He also gets a snack in the afternoons – he loves MumMums and cereal or puffs. He is just now starting to get the hang of picking up small pieces of food and putting them in his mouth. We’ve slowly started to try some chunkier food, and he has been handling it all well. He is slowly learning to play “So Big” and he is army crawling/rolling/pivoting all over the place. He is desperately trying to crawl. He likes to move from a sit to all fours, he usually does one crawl, and then he collapses to his belly.

We just started changing his closet over to the 6-9 months size. My little guy is finally outgrowing his 3-6 month clothing. I have a feeling we won’t be in these clothes too long – he’ll be ready to move up to 12 months within two months, I would guess.

As for weaning…well, that is not going quite as quickly as I expected (which is totally my fault). Micah is down to nursing about 4 times a day (sometimes 5). I no longer pump at night before bed, but frankly, giving him a bottle and pumping is much more hassle than nursing him when we are both at home. At this rate, I probably won’t really commit to weaning him until he is in daycare 3 days a week. I am hoping to be able to quickly drop the pumping session at that point, start using up my freezer stash of milk, then slowly switch over to formula. I’m not sure when/how I will drop the morning and night nursing sessions, but he needs to be willing to take the bottle for all of his meals by mid-September as I am going to be in Atlanta for work for 4 days, and I have decided to leave him behind with my parents (since Elliot will be attending the conference, too). I guess that week will be a good time to begin cutting back on the pumping.

As for my diet – well, let’s just say “what diet?” I fell off the wagon, and hard. I think I started to diet prematurely – it was causing issues with my milk supply, and while I was thrilled about that at first, Micah was quite unhappy and dissatisfied, and it made him grumpy and unwilling to take a bottle. I added some carbs back in to help the supply, and Micah finally seemed contented, and he is back to taking his bottle. But once the carbs started sneaking in, it was all downhill!
Okay – I’ll have to add some more descriptive pictures and video when I have some free time. I will do my best to stay on top of blogging this week!

Everything goes in the mouth

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Lately, everything goes in Micah’s mouth . . . remote controls, Daddy’s glasses, the dog’s foot, towels, the rubber duckie – whatever he can get in his cute little hands. Ironically, the one thing I cannot get him to stick in his mouth and enjoy . . . solid foods in the mesh teether! I bought this great little mesh contraption that is designed to safely allow babies to experience bigger chunks of solid food. We’ve tried watermelon and blueberries so far, and Micah goes BALLISTIC if that mesh bag gets anywhere near his mouth. His playgroup friends all love it, and I know Micah likes to eat watermelon and blueberries pureed, so I guess it must be a texture thing. I’m not sure if it is the bag or the food that he isn’t liking, but I’m going to keep working on it.

Recently, Micah has started drinking water out of a sippy cup. He is getting pretty adept, as long as we use the Born Free sippy cup and he is leaning back. Unfortunately, he does not understand that pool water is not good for him. Since he discovered he can drink water, all he wants to do at the pool is drink the water. I think he might have had a gallon the last time we were there. Perhaps the beach is better – I think sand is healthier than pool water, right?

Speaking of everything going in the mouth, I started South Beach diet on Monday. This week has been rough – I’ve been dying to eat all kinds of carbs and junk since they are now off limits. I feel like Micah – every bit of food I spot I just want to put in my mouth. The good news is that I’m behaving and I do think I’m already seeing results. I keep asking Elliot if I’m thin now – he thinks that is a trick question.

Prunes are not our friend

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Months ago, when we began to feed Micah fruits and veggies, Elliot picked up a container of prunes. Prunes (or plums, depending on the marketing) are one of the basic stage 1 baby foods that most babies can (and should) try. As everyone is aware, prunes are well-known for their laxative qualities. Since Micah is a regular pooping machine, I have maintained a healthy fear of prunes this past few months . . . until yesterday. On Monday, Micah did not poop the entire day (unusual, since my little pooping machine usually poops at least 2-3 times each day). When he woke up on Tuesday, he still had not pooped. We were due to start a new fruit or vegetable, so I decided to try the prunes – it seemed like an opportune time.

I decided to proceed with caution. I think the rule of thumb with prunes is “a little bit goes a long way.” I normally give him about 2 ounces of fruit with his oatmeal, and we often mix fruits for breakfast, so I usually give him about 1 ounce of a new fruit to test the waters. Because it was prunes, I decided to only give Micah 1/2 ounce of prunes, and I mixed them with 1 1/2 ounces of apples (which are known to cause constipation). My hope was the two fruits together would result in “zero impact.” All went well yesterday. Micah pooped 2 times, and much to my surprise and amazement, it was pretty mild.

Feeling emboldened by our raging foray into the land of prunes, this morning I decided to just give him the rest of the prunes in the container – about 1 1/2 ounces. He ate them up, and I topped him off with a bit of a pear-apple-mango mixture. He took a nice long morning nap, and off we went to playgroup. While there, I heard a loud scream, and when I went to Micah, I realized he had pooped. It was *just* barely a SUB – something I haven’t seen in almost 2 months. I cleaned him up, wiped down the clothing, and we went back to playing.

After playgroup, he napped on the way home. I sent him upstairs with Elliot, who had Micah playing in the hop and pop. All of the sudden, I hear a loud shout from Elliot “It’s a SUB, it’s a SERIOUS SUB!!” I ran upstairs to help, and Micah is COVERED in poop – it is just dripping down his legs. We cover up the changing table with cloth diapers and Elliot starts to clean him up and change his diaper. We quickly realize that a bath is necessary. While Elliot is bathing Micah, I went in to the bedroom to survey the damage to the hop and pop. Amazingly, there is no poop on the seat of the hop and pop. Upon closer inspection, I realize there is a puddle of poop on the base of the hop and pop, nearly 1 inch thick. There is also a puddle of poop on the carpet. I spent the next 20 minutes cleaning up the poop (my biggest fear was that Nugget would find this heavenly mess and dive right in). Ick! I don’t think we’ll play with prunes again – I’ve learned my lesson.

Yesterday (Micah’s 7 month birthday) was a very good day. We woke up in the morning, nursed, ate breakfast, took a nap, nursed again, went for a walk and played on the swing at the park with all the kids at camp, came back home, ate again, went to meet our friends at the pool, swam, nursed, chewed on a teething biscuit, napped, came home, nursed, played for a few hours, took a bath, nursed, had dinner, nursed and went to bed. Okay, maybe that doesn’t sound so exciting to you, but it was Micah’s first day eating three meals (and he ate EVERYTHING), he loved the attention he got from the camp children at the park while he was swinging, and he had a lot of fun hanging out with his friends at the baby pool. What better way can a 7 month old celebrate?

Six Months

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Micah turned six months old today!! Can you believe how the time is flying? Micah decided to sleep in until 9 in honor of his half birthday. We had a leisurely morning, and he did get to listen to a nice rendition of “Happy Half Birthday” from his Grammy and Goppy. We spent the afternoon lounging at the pool with Daddy. It was such a pleasant day – the weather was perfect, the sky was clear, and there was a nice breeze blowing. The pool was nice and warm, and Micah was all smiles.

While Mommy took some time to swim laps (FINALLY getting my act together and exercising again!!), Micah took a trip with Daddy to the store, and napped the entire time. We arrived home around 4:30 or so. We gave Micah a bath (this is the 2nd night we bathed Micah as he SAT in the bath tub!!) and I fed him some dinner (a little milk, some green beans, rice cereal and avocado). Daddy left for work, and Micah and I played for a few more hours before bedtime. Here are some pictures from Micah’s first time sitting in the bathtub (can you tell he likes to eat duck?):




This post seems like a good opportunity to review some of his recent milestones. Let’s start with food. Micah is eating really well – we have now tried peas, green beans, avocado, bananas, squash, sweet potatoes, and carrots. We added a second meal in the past few days because he was getting hungry in the evenings.

He is also sitting really well – still not reliable enough for me to walk away and leave him when he is sitting, but he is fairly sturdy – he can definitely chew on the hooves of his toy giraffe while he is sitting! He is still teething – those bottom two teeth are just dying to break through. After much waiting, he is rolling from back to front with some frequency – in his crib, on the floor, on the grass at a friend’s birthday bbq on Saturday, at playgroup, when he sees a toy he wants… I think he just likes to do things on his terms and in his own way. He is definitely passing objects from hand to hand, and he seems to be exploring the idea of crawling.

So, with that, happy half birthday, baby boy! I’d like to end with a few fun videos of Micah with his duck (press the triangle on the lower left corner to play!):

Swimming, swimming, in the swimming pool!

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On Saturday, we took Micah swimming for the first time! He LOVED it. We just took him into the baby pool. It was a bit cold, and Micah really does not like cold water. I initially held him on my lap for a few minutes to get used to the water, and then I transferred him into his own personal flotation station. He cried when he first got wet, but about 10 seconds later, he was happy and relaxing. We had him in a cute little bathing suit with a matching shirt. Unfortunately, we forgot his sunglasses, pool shoes and hat . . . better organization next time! Here are a few photos for you to enjoy:




Naturally, we took video, too:

On Sunday, we hung out at the park with his cousins Paige and Peyton. They had a great time – Micah even got to share a swing with Peyton!