putting away the groceries

last weekend, mosey and i went to walmart. i unloaded the car and set all the grocery bags on the kitchen floor. moses, of course, started to go through them, but he was really systematic. he took out the creamer and the juice and cans, and set each one neatly on the floor, and when he accidentally knocked one over, he'd say, "uh oh!" and set it back upright. i put one can away in the cupboard, closed it, and started on something else. then he went over to the cupboard, opened it, picked up one of his cans and placed it next to the can i put in there, then he shut the door. WHAT? our child is a GENIUS. he put away groceries without me even asking! then he put the juice away. then he got distracted and started to look for snacks in the cupboard. ha.

also, i don't know who taught him this skill, but he can step out of his pants when i'm getting him ready for the bath. i mean, he holds on to the bathtub and steps out of his pants like a little adult. i don't know. i'm just not ready for this kid to grow up. oh, and he got his first molar last week. wow.

along with these things however, he is starting to throw mini temper tantrums. he throws his head back, kicks, screams, and cries real tears if things don't go his way. it's making me slightly crazy, to be honest with you. sometimes i have to leave the room because it is so irritating. any advice is welcome here, because i just know that i don't want this to continue, but i'm not sure i can think of any way to stop it... usually we let him cry until he calms down himself and then we pick him up and talk to him. however, they've been getting longer and more... dramatic... so i'm not sure what to do.

i still love the snot out of that kid though. this person on the show Ben and Kate said it well when she was describing her daughter, "it's like my heart is just walking out there in the world, outside of my body!"

oh, and also today he gave me his first real intentional kiss on the lips, with the smack of the lips and everything. i loved it!

lovelove,
smelly tak

speed learning

i guess because i don't get to spend all his waking hours with him anymore, i feel like he's growing up like five times faster (and it was already way fast before)! he's learning all these new things at daycare, and i just can't believe it. the first week, i think, he learned to say "ball" and the second week, he learned the word "eye." this, after learning to say just "dada" up until 14 months, i think. i might be remembering incorrectly, but you know what i mean.

last week, i found out he knows how to blow kisses. and this week, we found out he knew how to pinch his cheeks. this was because i asked him if he was trying to pinch the cheeks of some animal in his book, and he responded by reaching up and grabbing his own cheek.  it was unbelievable.  my hypothesis is either that daycare folks pinch his cheeks a lot, or they were talking a lot about his cheeks.  his cheeks were super red last week because of, we think, an allergy to amoxicillin. he had to be on it on christmas eve because of an ear infection, and on the 10th day of the treatment he threw up the medicine each time we gave it and broke out into a terrible rash/hives. a couple days later, he started four days of diarrhea too.  man.  if it's not fever, runny nose, viral rash & ear infection, it's all these other things! i will be so glad when we start to have some health around this house. we actually all three were on antibiotics on christmas eve. what a family! now, i think we need to all three be on probiotics (which CVS is having a rad sale on right now).  (rad? who says rad these days?)

lovelove,
funny bunny

pampers, why have you done this to us?

as i have mentioned before, i am a creature of habit. i'm a loyal customer, i love schedules, i love to know what to expect. but now. something has disturbed our lives yet again. in a hurry some weeks back, i read an email from amazon telling me that one of our "subscribe and save" items wasn't available, and they would send the next best replacement, or something of that nature. i can't really even remember what they wrote, to be honest. i thought it was no big deal.

but the replacement wipes have arrived this weekend, and they are terrible! 

slippery, thin, and weird. none of which you want your baby wipes to be. i mean, it's the one thing between you and a handful of poop. have i said too much? maybe.

anyway, i started to poke around on the internet tonight to see what stores had those wonderful Thick Care Pampers wipes that i have grown to love, and... to my great dismay, they are actually completely discontinued.  NOOOOOOOOO!!!

my world will never be the same again. and neither will poor moses' butt. also, though it doesn't heal my pain (or moses' eminent diaper rash), my search led to me to postings from other devastated moms, and that makes me feel not-so-alone. 

anyone who has any light to shed on this predicament, please shoot me a message.

lovelove,

me

momo and the terrible, horrible, no good, very bad week

this has been moses' first week of daycare.  rough.  that about describes it.  the first day, he got a mysterious scratch/bruise on his cheek.  i imagine he fell off of somewhere and nobody wanted to tell us about it.  the reports said he cried and yelled nearly all day, and even had a low-grade fever at the end of the day.  when he got home, he drank 15 ounces of fluids and a huge dinner!  he must not have eaten or drank much through the day, which i learned was quite normal, what with all the crying they do when they're new to that sort of thing.  the second day (his fever was gone by morning, so he went to daycare), he still cried, but had a bit more peace and even laid quietly on the cot a while after naptime.  the third day, he still cried, but had some playtime with legos and it seems each day is getting better.  the naps have remained but an hour long, which is far too short for this tyke!  which means he is overtired and grumpy for the rest of the day and his night-time sleep is now super affected as well.  last night, after day three, he cried for 20 minutes before sleeping (that hasn't happened at home for night sleep for quite some time), and then he woke up after midnight and fussed for about an hour and a half.  i intervened somewhere in the middle of that, but when i put him down, he resumed the whining.  after shane and i couldn't handle it, we decided to bring him into bed with us (because he was sick and totally not letting up on the fussing), and so.... none of us slept a proper night's sleep, but at least the baby wasn't crying.  he woke up with a fever today, and so we kept him home from the nightmare of daycare today.

i know this is going to be good for him in the long run, and we don't even have much of a choice anyway since i have to work, but it is tearing my heart up.  when i've gone to pick him up, he has been sitting quietly at the table with a snack in front of him, looking more pitiful than i've ever seen that little guy.  when he sees me, he just bursts into the biggest, saddest, wailing tears of his life, which i take to mean, 'why have you left me here all day, momma?'

he's had meltdowns at dinner/bath time these past few days as well, which totally spoils the little time we have together.  i was planning on scooting him to bed early tonight as well, to try to catch him up on sleep, but i decided to just enjoy him instead for as long as we liked.  i read him a story, snuggled with him, tickled his little chest, and told him how much of a joy he is and how happy i am with him.  he smiled really big and seemed to really snuggle into me, which is actually a rather rare occurrence, so it was a real treasure.  i also prayed for his body, mind and spirit, and had a good apology and cry time that he wasn't phased by.  i am profoundly sad about how sad he's been this week.  anyway, after about 30 minutes of sweet baby time, i laid him down in his crib, and he has been quiet ever since.  i guess the snuggles were worth more than an early bedtime.  i wonder if he's just been wondering if we still love him after all these days apart.  what a rough time... for everyone involved.  also, being sick stinks.  also, getting up at 6 every day also stinks a little bit as well.

lovelove,
husky

15-month well-baby business

i went to our county health department this week to get immunizations for our 15-month offspring.  last time, when we got his three 12-month shots, we got them at his doctor's office, where we were charged over $600 out of pocket.  we have this insurance "not-insurance" that doesn't cover well-baby visits, but has them count toward our deductible.  it's maddening, actually.  and it's maddening how much less we were charged at the health department.  we got four shots this time, and it was $8 a shot--a total of $32.  $600 versus $32!!  ugh.  our health system is jacked up, folks.

anyway, he was really brave, cried for a little bit, and then quieted down as soon as the pants came back up.  the after-effects have been rather minimal.  so far, i think the 12 month immunizations were the worst, fyi--lots of swelling, lots of fussiness, lots of sleep disruptions.  there was none of that this time, which is great, and leads me to really be a fan of going to our health department overall.

we went to our regularly scheduled well-baby visit and got some stats:
23 lbs, 6 oz weight, 60th percentile-ish
32 1/4 in height, 80th percentile-ish
18 3/4 in head cir, 60th percentile-ish

the percentiles seem slightly less accurate, because i checked them again myself online, and there is a huge range of where Mosey's at.  all in all, healthy anyway.  also, the doctor seemed impressed that moses went to his arms with zero stranger anxiety.  he has been rather fearless this week.  it's like this walking thing has also come with supernatural bravery and a thirst for new people and experiences.

the doctor also mentioned (after i asked him whether moses is normal for not talking much at this age), that moses will be considered normal, even if he doesn't talk up until 20 months.  20 months!  that seems rather old to me.  i hope it doesn't take him that long to communicate with spoken words.

in other news, i got moses some chick-fil-a after his shots (partly for him, and honestly, partly for me--it's hard on a momma's heart to hear your baby cry!  :O)  he liked the chick-fil-a sauce the best and was generally quite tidy.

we also decided on the daycare we'll be taking moses to.  we cried.  we liked the staff.  moses enjoyed circle time and snack time.  it was a good match.  and a big week!

lovelove,
me me me

my baby's bleeding!!!

i was in old navy the other day, and mosey was kind of whiny and unhappy, but i had just thought he was getting hungry and tired of shopping... but when i looked at him, our baby's mouth was full of blood!  he was eating cheerios, and the one he pulled out of his mouth was soaked!  his little hands quickly turned bloody because he was pushing them in and out of his mouth as he fussed and cried.  he also wiped his face and mouth on the padding of his stroller, and then i pulled out a burp cloth from my purse (i had it there because of his runny nose that day), and that got tinted pink as well.  it was a hot mess.  sheesh.  i was trying to soothe him, clean him up, and figure out where all the blood was coming from, but that all was nearly impossible.  also, i was big-time freaking out on the inside.  i asked the old navy employees whether they knew anything about babies and why ours might be bleeding like he was just in a boxing match.  one person suggested maybe he was teething.  thank God that He didn't make babies' mouths gush blood when they were teething.  it's scary.

anyway, so, i did what any mom-of-the-year would do.  i took my items to the check out and paid for them.  i mean, the sale was ending that day, and i wasn't about to come back to get these few things.  ha.

shane (ER nurse) reassured me via telephone that mo was going to be okay, and after 10 sweaty minutes, things did start to calm down.  i never did figure out what caused the bleeding, but it really did resolve on its own.  oh, and i got the blood out of the stroller using palmolive oxy clean dish soap and an old toothbrush of mine.  worked great.

love,
sweaty shopper

the daycare search is on

so, i haven't really gone public with the news yet, but this blog is hardly public, since there are only three readers, so i feel like i can share here: folks, i have a job!  woohoo!!  i'm starting on november 26th, the monday after thanksgiving.  i'm nervous, excited, humbled, grateful, thrilled... lots of things.  with regard to moses, however, i am terribly heartbroken.  i love that little guy and i'm going to miss him so much.  but feelings aside, i have to find someone to watch mosey.  it helps that i know that this is what God has for our family for this season--for shane to be in school, for me to work, and for mose to be in daycare.  and i know that God loves little mo way more than me or shane, and He has something in store for each one of us during this time.

i've visited two places so far.  one is really lovely but a little too far, and one is dreary and in a perfect location.  i will keep looking, but i am realizing that trying to find a cheap daycare that is on my way to work that is cheery and caring is a bit of a challenge.  i'll keep looking and praying, and in the meantime, i'm soaking in all these precious moments with our son.  he has been sick this week, which has made him slightly grouchy and insanely clingy, boo.  but also extra cuddly, yay!  i love that little guy.

lovelove,
smmmmmellly