Bittersweet Milestones

If there’s one thing I’ve learned in my 9 months as a mom it’s that parenting is full of bittersweet moments. Each time my little guy hits new milestones I smile and cheer and take pictures and call/text everyone to share the good news. But then when the moment passes, I sigh. I shake my head and sometimes even tear up wondering how my baby is already big enough to (fill in the blank). In the past 9 months it’s already happened so many times.

When Easton was born I was delighted that my baby was FINALLY here. But I also mourned the end of my first pregnancy. The end of carrying my boy with me everywhere and feeling his sweet kicks all day long.

I was so excited when he rolled over for the first time. But I was sad that the helpless little newborn I had brought home from the hospital was no longer so helpless.

When Easton outgrew his newborn clothes and was able to fit in the next size up I couldn’t wait to dress him in all of the adorable outfits waiting in his closet. But I cried as I packed up his smallest pajamas and knew he would never wear them again.

At 4.5 months old Easton started sitting on his own. I realized it was so much easier to engage him and play with him when he didn’t need to be laying on the floor or held. But he was starting to need me just a little bit less and that made me sad.

Then he started crawling. And then he started crawling FAST. I loved watching him realize that he could move on his own. He was able to get to his toys on his own and entertain himself more which gave me a little more freedom. But that also meant he didn’t need to be carried as much and he didn’t need my help as often. He could play at my feet but he could also crawl away from me and go somewhere else.

It’s hard to watch my baby get older but at the same it’s very exciting. I know this is only the beginning of bittersweet milestones. One day I’ll have mixed emotions when he  first goes to kindergarten, when he plays his first T-ball game, gets braces, learns to drive a car, or (gulp) gets his first girlfriend. I’ll do my best to focus on the happy side of Easton’s milestones, but I know it won’t always be easy. I guess that’s just what parenting is about.

This and That

- Whenever I plan to write one of these posts I think of a million things to include throughout the day. But when I actually sit down to write it? Crickets. Sigh.

- I’m still on a mission to make some “mom friends” but I’m not someone who makes friends easily. I’ve been taking Easton to our weekly playgroup and a weekly baby story time at the library. It’s been really nice to be able to talk with other moms who are in the same stage of life and don’t make me feel completely boring.

- Joe and I have been on ONE date since Easton was born at that was over 2 months ago. I wish we could get out together a little more often but I have such a hard time leaving Easton. My mom watched him the last time we went out and it went just fine for her but she lives 2.5 hours away so it’s not like she can watch him whenever I want. I know there are other people in our lives that would love to watch him but I’m too neurotic to let them at this point. It’s not that I don’t trust them to take good care of him, because I completely do, I just don’t trust them to take care of him EXACTLY like I do. I told you I’m neurotic.

- Now that Easton is starting to get more independent and seems less like a baby every day I’m kind of sort of starting to get that baby itch again. Just a tiny little bit. I don’t plan on doing anything about it because I would go nuts with two kids right now but it’s still on my mind more lately.

- If you followed my old blog you might remember that we got a cute little kitten named Clyde 3 years ago. He was our baby for 2 years and we adored him. Now? Not so much. It’s really amazing that he is living with us. I feel really awful for being so annoyed with him all the time but OH MY GOSH that cat is obnoxious. He paws at the closet door just outside our bedroom around 3:00 every morning until someone gets up and feeds him or kicks him downstairs. He rolls in my clean laundry constantly, meows right outside the baby’s door right after I’ve gotten him down for a nap, sneaks out onto the deck when we open the door, and hides in closets or under the bed and refuses to come out. He even had a bladder issue a few months back that caused him to start peeing all over the house. I realize that wasn’t his fault at all but it drove me nuts that somehow he always managed to find the baby’s stuff to pee on. I’m trying to be more patient with him but I’m not doing so well with it…

- We have been contemplating painting all of the wood trimwork in our house white. I really love the look of white trim and think it would make our house look a million times cuter and more modern but I’m not excited about all the work it will take to get there. The plan is to try it out in our teensy little entry and then if we hate it or decide it’s too much work we can just replace that small amount of trim.

- Joe started a new job this week! He had been with his old company since right out of college (4 years ago) and he was ready for a change. Joe’s still adjusting to the new place (those first 1-2 weeks of a job are always weird when you don’t really know what you’re doing) but I think it’s going to be great for him. Instead of commuting an hour by train, he now drives 12 minutes to work. That means that he’s home around 5:15 now instead of a little after 6. It’s been so nice to have him here sooner so he can play with Easton before he starts getting cranky.

My Nine Month Old

I’ve been writing down Easton’s monthly updates each month but haven’t gotten around to posting them. In an effort to use this blog as a scrapbook of our lives, I’m going to start including them on here.

Dear Easton,

You are 9 months old already and you are starting to seem more like a little boy and less like a baby every day. It’s amazing to look back and see how quickly you have learned new skills. You have a delightful personality and you are constantly making us laugh over the silly things you do. You have your crabby moments but overall you are a very pleasant boy.

What you’ve been doing this month:

- You wear mostly size 12 month or 12-18 month clothes though you still fit a few 6-9 month things.

-You are still wearing your one-size cloth diapers along with one size medium. You have 2 size smalls but they are about to get packed away.

- You weigh around 21 pounds. I don’t know how long you are but you are tall compared to most of the kids your age at storytime and play group.

- We have continued to do baby-led weaning with you since you hate purees. You are willing to try almost anything though very little actually gets swallowed. Your favorites are tomatoes, cucumbers, bread, cheese, yogurt, apples and pasta. You’ve also surprised us by enjoying some spicy and strongly flavored foods like chicken from a burrito, curried couscous, and marinara sauce. You started drinking from a straw sippy cup last week. I gave you some smoothie in there the other day and you went nuts for it!

-You still love to nurse though you aren’t eating quite as often. You sometimes sign “milk” when you’re getting hungry.

- You have 5 teeth- 3 on the top and 2 on the bottom. One more top tooth is very close to poking through. You hate to let us peek in your mouth but you love having your teeth brushed! You started grinding your teeth and clicking them together so daddy started calling you Chompers!

- You go to bed in your crib every night around 7:30. You still usually wake 1-2 times before we go to bed. When you wake up after we’re in bed, we bring you to bed with us and you sleep very well next to mom. You usually only wake up once more and sleep until about 6:30 in the morning.

- You nap twice most days. Your morning nap is often short (around 40 minutes) but your afternoon one is typically longer.

- You crawl so quickly now and pull-up so easily that it’s hard to keep up with you. By the time I’ve gotten you out of one thing you’re into something else! You like to play in the cat’s dishes and steal remotes and cell phones from us. You try to get to our computers any time you see them.

- You love your baths. You splash like crazy in there every night and love to chase after your bath toys.

- You like to ride on your toy horse and make mommy give you rides on it every day. You also like to play with your castle toy, wooden puzzle, and stacking cubes. You think knocking over towers is the funniest game ever. You constantly pull your board books off of the shelves so you can flip through the pages and “read” them.

Sometimes when I see how quickly you’re growing, I miss my tiny little newborn. But most of the time I’m thrilled to spend my days with my almost-toddler. I love to see you hit all of your milestones and learn new things each day. We love you to bits, Easton!

The World’s Worst Napper

My little guy will be 9 months old next week. Easton is a very happy baby most of the time and he’s truly a joy. He does so well in public, nurses well, eats (relatively) well and even entertains himself well. Family and friends always comment on how spoiled we are to have such a good baby. I smile and nod, secretly thinking they have no idea.

Easton is a good baby, I’m not denying that one bit. But we are definitely not blessed with a perfect baby that gives us no trouble. Our little guy simply saves most of his “bad” behaviors for naps and nighttime.

Getting Easton to go to sleep and stay asleep is truly a nightmare. He did wonderfully for his first 2 months of life but then it’s like a switch flipped and he suddenly became the King of the One Sleep Cycle. For the next 6 months I spent an average of 30 minutes (but occasionally as much as an hour) trying to get E down for each nap. He would scream and cry while I would pull my hair out and contemplate taking up drinking. Finally, he would fall asleep and I would creep out of the room, ready to finally have some peace and quiet. But, like clockwork, he would be up again ready to get up 40 minutes later. Every single time.

A few weeks ago, something changed and Easton finally started regularly napping for an hour twice a day. I know that’s still a short nap for some, but for me it was like I suddenly got to go on vacation twice a day. It was amazing! Not only was he sleeping longer but he was even falling asleep in under 5 minutes in his crib (with me patting his back).

But a week later, just when I started to get used to this new normal, he switched it up again and is now as bad as ever. I still get one “long” nap a day but we’re back to screaming, crying and pitching a fit for every nap. Even worse, he now wants to try out his newest skill of pulling up every time I put him in the crib. It is beyond frustrating.

We have such great days together when Easton is awake and happy, but this napping thing really puts me in a bad mood some days. I feel like I have this mothering thing down fairly well in most other respects but I feel like an utter failure at getting my kid to sleep (and if you’re wondering.. NO, he’s not a good night sleeper either).

I’m praying this is just a phase that he will grow out of soon but part of me still has visions of fighting my screaming 16 year old over bedtime one day.

This and That

- My kid’s new favorite thing to do is crawl over to the cat dishes and play with them. The cat always eats his food right away so luckily there’s none of that to go in his mouth but he still manages to stick the food dish in his mouth, tip the water over or (my favorite) sit down right in the middle of the water if I don’t catch him fast enough. If I see him near the dishes and say “No, not for Easton!” he crawls away, but he tests me on it about 934 trillion times a day. It drives me bonkers! If anyone has a tip on how to keep him out of the dishes, I’m all ears!

- I was the first of my friends to get married and the first to have a baby. The majority of them are still in a completely different phase of life than I am. While it’s kind of cool to be the first one to do things, it’s hard that I don’t have any other mom friends. I’ve started going to a weekly baby playgroup through our school district and a baby story time at the library so Easton and I can meet other moms and babies. Activities like that are SO out of my comfort zone but I’m trying to branch out and I’m actually enjoying it quite a bit.

- My sister graduates from cosmetology school on Friday and my mom, Easton and I are making the 5 hour drive there and back to celebrate. I haven’t had a chance to visit yet in the 2 years my sister has lived there so it’ll be fun to see her city and watch her graduate. That being said, I am NOT excited about being trapped in the car for 10 hours with a baby who hates being stuck in his car seat.

- Last night we were giving Easton his bath when all the sudden we realized he had pooped in the tub! That was definitely a new first. Joe and I thought it was pretty funny. I ended up breaking out the bleach and giving the tub a good scrub (which it probably needed anyway) so now it’s probably the cleanest it’s ever been.

Easton’s First Game

I’m not a huge sports fan, I never have been. I grew up in a family that LOVED sports but I never developed the same interest. Luckily for me, I married a man who feels about the same way. Neither of us cares to watch football, soccer or basketball, though we do both like the occasional baseball game. Baseball and softball were huge in my family and we usually went to at least one Minnesota Twins game every summer. To this day I really like going to baseball games. The beautiful green field, the excited fans, the overpriced hot dogs… there’s just something special about the atmosphere there.

Joe is fortunate to work for a company that has season tickets to the Twins. Every summer they give each employee a pair of tickets to one game. Our turn to go to a game finally came last Sunday and we were both really excited because it was our first time taking Easton to a game.We ended up with all 4 seats instead of the normal 2 so Joe’s friend and his fiancée joined us for the game.

I was a little nervous about how Easton would do, but he was great. He loved watching the people around us and spent most of the first 5 innings just observing. He sat in our laps, snacked on apple slices, sipped from our bottles of water and charmed the people around us. It wasn’t until about the 7th inning that he started getting antsy. At the top of the 9th inning, there was this incredible play where the centerfielder made a diving catch. Naturally, the crowd went nuts. Poor Easton wasn’t expecting the sudden burst of noise and activity and he jumped so high and then started bawling. I felt bad for the little guy, but his reaction was so funny that we couldn’t help but chuckle a bit. He calmed down pretty quickly after that and made it all the way to the end of the game.

We had a crazy moment halfway through the game. The area around us was fairly empty at that point and we saw a couple of cameramen wandering nearby. I have this horrible fear of ending up on the jumbotron so I always cringe when I see them coming. These 2 guys sat down in nearby seats and out of the corner of my eye I swore I saw one pointing right at us. Sure enough, moments later they came by and started talking to us. It turns out Joe and I were the “Powerball” winners of the game (though let’s be honest, they only picked us because we had a cute baby with us!). We got a prize pack with a water bottle, tshirt and $50 in lottery tickets inside. It was pretty awesome. Of course, my greatest fear came true and we had to smile and wave on the Jumbotron while holding up our prize pack and this big red “Powerball” ball. Eek. Oh well, I survived!

All in all it was a pretty successful game. Who knows, maybe having a little boy around will finally make me start enjoying sports after all!

A Change of Plans

Last week I was supposed to start my new career as a Special Ed teacher. That was the plan.

After a year and a half of grad school and 8 months of “maternity leave,” last week was going to be when I finally used my brand new license for the job I should’ve been doing all along. That was the plan.

I was supposed to get up at the crack of dawn to get Easton and myself ready for the day. I was going to drop him off at daycare for the first time, sad to have to leave him but thankful for the 8 months we had home together and ready to get back to work. That was the plan. That had been the plan since long before Easton ever existed.

But somehow, my plan changed.

When Joe and I first started talking about expanding our family two years ago, we wanted to make sure our timing worked out. I was set to finish grad school in December 2011, so we knew it would be best if our baby was born after I was done. The plan was for me to take the remainder of the school year off after the baby came, stay home for the summer and then find a new job to start up in September. We hoped for a January baby to maximize my time as a stay-at-home mom.

Our planning paid off and our little guy was due on January 9th, 2012 (of course, he had other plans and arrived 7 days later). I thought our 8 months together would give me just enough time to really bond with my babe but still get out of the house before I went crazy. Part of me secretly hoped I would be able to work part-time so I could still be home with the baby a lot, but I always assumed I would work in some capacity. After all, all the women in my life were working moms. My own mother worked, so did Joe’s mom. Many of my female relatives were working moms and nearly all of my friends’ moms growing up had full-time jobs. I always pictured myself following that same path.

But something changed. A few months after Easton was born, I started to feel so strongly that I needed to be home with him. The more I thought about it, the more I knew I wouldn’t be happy working full-time at this point in my life. I put off discussing my thoughts with Joe because I was afraid he would be resistant to the idea. After all, we’d been planning on me starting a job that fall for almost 2 years. When I finally brought up the topic, he was hesitant at first, but he came around pretty quickly.

I know staying home isn’t for everyone. I never thought it would be for me. But it turns out, this is exactly what I’m meant to be doing. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a little jealous of the teachers who went back to school last week; I still can’t wait to teach special ed one day. But right now, it’s not the choice I made. And today, when I was supposed to be spending my day in a classroom but instead spent it reading, playing, giggling and chasing my son, I know I made the right choice.