First Hair Cut--Before

My boy got his first haircut.  And I cried.  I didn’t understand crying over a haircut.  Its just hair.  And then I got HIS hair cut.  In a matter of minutes, he went from my baby to a BOY.   I had her leave most of his hair on top–I have spent too many hours pushing that back as he nurses; I’m not ready for it to be cut.  I got it cut at the barber shop on base.  She wanted him to set by himself  in the chair!  HAHA.  He did really well.  I had to hold his head still a couple times.   They gave him his first sucker–orange–and he LOVED that.

First Hair Cut--After

Jim’s parents were visiting earlier in the month.  We spent one week here and then went over to the Big Island for a week.  We had such a wonderful time both weeks.  I did a trip report, posted photos and the link to the rest of the photos on our family blog, if you want to check it out.

If you’re the praying type, I’d appreciate your prayers.  This deployment is doing a number on me.  Mostly I’m doing okay with it mentally but I’m WAY tired and quickly approaching burn out.  And, mentally, I have my moments.  Jim’s leave getting pushed back six weeks was really my tipping point.  On the plus side, we’re half-way done!!!

I’m not sure I’ve talked about it here but we’ve had “issues” with Ben and eating.  He has been taking solids for months now but wouldn’t swallow anything.  I met with the hospital’s feeding team about a month ago.  They strongly suspect, based esp. on the history of all the horrible troubles we had with latching, that its simply a matter of training the mouth and tongue muscles on how to swallow.  With latching, I’d finally get him on well and then, the next nursing session, it would be like he’d completely forgotten how to do it.  So they instructed me to do a positive reinforcement food (they got him to swallow chocolate pudding, so chocolate pudding it is!) every day to help with the training, in addition to continue offering a variety of other food.  Its working!!  He will generally swallow most any foods, asssuming he’s hungry and the food is in really small pieces.  He loves foods with strong flavors–lime yogurt, pepperoni, taco meat, chili, etc.  He doesn’t do well with drinking yet.  He is better with an open-faced cup than a sippy or straw cup.  But, like nursing, its like he forgets how to do it.  After several attempts, he’ll swallow but then has to start again the next time.  But we’re working on it.  I don’t mind if he skips a traditional sippy but it’d be awafully handy if I could get him to take a straw cup at least, especially considering his delight in dumping cups!!

After two crazy weeks, this week should be a bit better. As far as he knows, Jim will have normal days–home in the morning after PT, possibly at lunch and then by 5:30! I’m so excited!!

My goal tomorrow is to read blogs! I haven’t read blogs, really, since before Ben was born. Stopped in on a few but haven’t left but a couple comments anywhere. So tomorrow, that’s my goal!!

One of my 2008 goals is to learn how to dress–how to put full outfits together, how to better purchase clothes that suit my body, etc. I have been putting money back to accomplish this task. Anyone willing to help me long-distance (or hop a flight and do it locally??!)?

Ben is growing like crazy. He’ll be seven weeks in about 12 more hours. He’s about 13 pounds! Elizabeth didn’t weigh that much until she was around 6-7 months old (can’t find her chart). And she was only 17.5 pounds when she turned a year. Mama milk is filling him up (and out!) well. We laughed yesterday–I was holding him on my lap while I ate dinner. All the sudden he let out this grunt/bark type sound and made a move that appeared to be a face-dive for my dinner plate. And then he smiled and laughed. LOL We think he’ll be much more into food than Elizabeth has ever been!

When people talk about having lots of pictures of their first child and then very few of subsequent children…I now understand! We have so few of Ben. I really need to be taking more.

I also now understand why people like to have an adult beverage while cooking dinner and/or a nightcap. Seriously. These past two weeks have just been so long.

Last Monday Ben gave me a 10.5 hour stretch of sleep!! He didn’t get a good nap at all that day, so I think that was mostly it. It was SOOOOOO heavenly.

Pizza night has been a mostly-weekly tradition since we got married. The night has changed at various times. Since we got here, I hadn’t chosen a night. Holidays, then Jim’s parents, Ben’s birth, blah, blah, blah. After much deliberation, I decided on Sunday nights. And we’re going to incorporate a family movie into it too. So pizza in the living room (E will be thrilled!) and a movie. First night tomorrow night and we’re going to watch The Bee Movie. I’m looking forward to getting back into that weekly tradition.

As of last Saturday night, every moment until deployment are new baby moments for Jim. I took him to leave for Iraq about 10pm the night prior to E turning 6 weeks old. I love that he’s getting all these new baby moments. I look at Ben and had forgotten just how tiny she was when he left. 6 weeks old and then he came home just a few days before she took her first steps. So much he missed.

After everyone else is in bed and I have some quiet computer time, I’ve started soaking my feet. Wow! I didn’t realize the power of a warm foot soak. I love it.

Burnt my fingers tonight. I had my stoneware baker out of the oven to stir the potatoes. Without thinking, I picked it up. Without potholders. Then dropped it. On my glasstop stove. OOPS. Thankfully, the stove didn’t crack. My fingers, not so lucky. Three hours after I did it, I was finally able to take the ice off without pain. But I have a few nice blisters and the rest have that shiny burnt appearance.

I’ve found a great new online store. Diapers.com In addition to diapers, they also have baby care products (including California Baby & Nature’s Baby products which I adore) , pacifiers, baby food, wipes, etc. You can mail in your coupons and they’ll store them in your account so you can use them on future orders. I think that is pretty cool! I’m not sure how their prices look overall. They seem pretty good to me but I’ve only purchased a couple packs of disposables with Ben and those were from the commissary. If you spend at least $49, you get free shipping. If you haven’t already ordered from them, you can use me as a referral to get $5 off (and I get $1 credit). Referral code is happygrl. No pressure or anything. (Hannah or any other CDing mamas reading this–they have bumGenius 3.0.)

And because of the total randomness of this, check this out, courtesy of my dear friend Ruth. Lisanne, did you know about this?? (Columbus, one of the towns mentioned in the article, is my hometown.)

Ben had a well-baby appointment today. He’s up to 10lbs even (almost 2.5 pounds over his birthweight). And he’s grown an inch. At four weeks, Elizabeth was just barely a pound over her birthweight. Nursing issues continue but we’re sludging through them. Two bouts of thrush, blanched nipples, high palete (makes it hard to get a good latch), improper suck technique, blah, blah, blah. I haven’t had cracked nipples in two weeks now (woooohooo!) and I haven’t had “I absolutely can’t do this another second” thoughts for exactly three weeks. Pain is still there but its getting much better. The suck training has made a big difference. Despite all the nursing challenges, he’s obviously getting enough milk!!  We are on week 3 of a diaper rash.  It had some yeast in the beginning but I *think* that part is cleared up.  I’ve tried so many things but I can’t get the rest cleared up.  No bleeding or puss, thankfully, just really raw looking now.  Unlike Elizabeth, he really favors just me to soothe him. Elizabeth would really take to anyone but Ben really prefers me (Jim will do in a pinch). Luckily, he’s a very laid back baby. I always knew Elizabeth was a high-needs baby but I had no idea just how high-needs until Ben came along. Wow! If I could have a household of babies like Ben, I WOULD have a household full of children!!

Elizabeth is absolutely in love with him. She wants to hold him constantly. We’ve started putting him in his crib for naps and she does NOT like him being that far away. Several times I have found her playing outside his doorway. She is adjusting well. By 3:30ish, she starts to breakdown when he’s nursing but EVERYTHING is meltdown-worthy to a 3yo at that time of the day. By the time Jim gets home from work, we are ready for his homecoming!! She got a new bike last weekend and she looks much too old on it. *sigh*

My mom came out last Thursday. She’s in love with her newest grandchild, of course. And she’s absolutely exhausted by Elizabeth!!

My body is healing from birth. I’m still much more sore than I thought I would be. I had no idea how sore I would feel!! Still, I feel such joy that I was actually able to push my baby out. It has gone a long way to helping me heal from the trauma surrounding Elizabeth’s birth.

We got Jim’s training schedule for the rest of the year. Seeing the dates makes me ill. With his first deployment, I handled the preparations well. The only part that was really rough was the paperwork where we had to plan his funeral. But now I know what a deployment is really like. And with his position now, the realities are so much more intense. Looking at the calendar makes me want to vomit. War sucks.

<Knocking hard but quietly on some wood…> Sleep has been going SO well this week!! Bedtime is taking less than 30 minutes and she is only waking up ONE TIME! O-N-E T-I-M-E!! It has been more than two years since she has woken up so few times for more than one night in a row. Oh, how joyous it has been! I’m not holding my breath that it will continue but I’m soaking it up while it does happen.

I have a trike-rider! We have a Radio Flyer that has an adult push-handle on the back. Back in June she was getting *so* close to doing it on her own. Yesterday it cooled off and I was feeling decent (only threw up a couple times yesterday!), so we went out so she could ride. It was the first time we have had it out all month. She got on & started peddling w/o me pushing her! She doesn’t quite have the coordination to get going if she stops with the peddles in the wrong spots. It was so fun to watch her go!

When E does her prayers at night, she always thanks God for the ‘bae in ma’s tu’ (baby in mama’s tummy).  Lately she’s started adding thanks for ‘dad take shower’.  LOL  I have NO idea where she came up with that line but it cracks me up every time.

I’m planning a trip to Chicago when we go to IN next month (Vicki, check your e-mail!). But I’m leaving E with my mom. This will be the first time we’ve been apart over night, let alone for an entire weekend. I am SO looking forward to getting to sleep through the night!! Seeing old friends will be a plus, too. I think she’ll be fine with my mom. They are really well-bonded. Mom will sleep with her as she does when my niece stays over. I have lots of family in town, so there can be lots of ways to keep her distracted. And if things go sour, I can make it home in about four hours. Still, its a long time away from me. And me from her!

Tonight we were talking about the baby and what the baby will be able to do/won’t be able to do. She commented that the baby will have to nurse b/c the baby can’t eat popcorn. She then said there isn’t a lot of room on mom’s lap, so she’d have to wait her turn to nurse. Uh, sorry to break it you, but that’s not happening!! LOL Its common for an older non-nursling to want to try. After a few months of not nursing, though, they lose the ability to remember how they did it. So some people recommend letting them try, since they won’t succeed. But even after 13ish months of not nursing, I have no doubt that *my* child would still remember and take back up!! LOL I’m not against tandem nursing at all but, in this case, that’s not a scenario I want!!

My update….I threw up only one time today!!! And I mostly even felt “normal”. I don’t remember the last time I felt even semi-”normal”. Jim leaves for ranger this weekend, so I’m REALLY hoping this is coming to the end of the worst of it.

E & I are adjusting to our new non-nursing status. She’s asked to nurse a couple times in the last 48 hours but, when I remind her that mama’s milk went bye-bye, she accepts it readily and moves on. *sigh* And its been about 12 hours since I last shed a tear about it. Every time Jim sees me crying about it, he shakes his head in confusion. Since she *knows* my milk really is all gone, I think that has helped her transition rather than knowing its there but I just wouldn’t let her have it. When she’s going to sleep, she now cuddles into me or drapes herself across my body. So cute. She’s not sleeping any better, really. I’m not convinced she will even know that she isn’t nursing. But we’re also still in a transition period, I realize. If I could get her down to just 1 or 2 wake-ups a night, I’d consider that a success!! And if I could now get her to sleep through the night, I’d consider that HEAVEN!! LOL

Jim went back to school tonight. We went to Moe’s Southwest Grill (first time, not too bad) and then said good-bye to him. And then we went to do what we do best when he leaves–spend $$! LOL I always feel the need to go shopping when he leaves after more than a few days home though I rarely buy much. Tonight was no exception. We went to Toys R Us (where I got Cranium Cariboo on sale–E loves it!!), walked down to Barnes & Nobles to look for a magazine (they didn’t have it), then to Ross & Marshall’s, where I didn’t buy anything either. Still, it was a nice way to get my mind off of him leaving. And it was nice to be outside. Its cool here tonight but it felt good.