This Is How I MomSolving the puzzle of motherhood one piece at a time

I’m not exactly sure when it happened – I think it might still be a work in progress. But somehow, sometime along the way, a new normal came along. This idea of normal is consistently evolving and is definitely nothing like the normal we used to live before Logan came along. This new normal involves a lot more running around, playing, supervising an emerging toddler, changing diapers, giving baths, waking up early, sleeping early, waking up at night, budgeting free time and soothing an emotional new human.

It is a lot more hectic and active, involves a lot less sleep, occasional frustration and less time, but it is so much more fulfilled and fun than the old normal used to be. But sometime over the course of the last year, we learned to just accept things as they happen and go with the flow. Night with little sleep? Tough luck, next one might be better. I think it’s really important to understand that not everything is in our control anymore and that you have to make the best of things – I have a feeling this will be infinitely more true when we add another little person in our lives (no plans as of right now, but one day!).

Sometimes, even when bordering on zombie state in the morning, it’s important to just enjoy the pretty sunrise you can catch thanks to a certain early bird:

And now that things are fairly predictable, we have time to do stuff like bake birthday cupcakes for a very special person:

And birthday cakes to celebrate that very special person’s birthday with extended family:

Life may not be perfect, but it is fun. So much more fun than it ever used to be. Thank you for my new normal, little boy. I love you.

This is new to me. I suppose Logan’s lack of crawling always worried me a little – he was scooting and rolling, but not reliably getting to where he wanted to be, and all the other babies that I see from my mommy groups have been on the move for a while at this point.

Now that he’s crawling though, I really miss my baby being predictably confined to a space. We have most areas of the house baby-proofed, but there are some things that will need more elaborate solutions.. like computer cables, that are more or less unprotected at the moment. We’re always watching him when he’s around the computer area and do a pretty good job of warding him off.

However, with crawling and pulling up comes greater opportunity for, well, falling and tumbling and bumping and hurting. We’ve seen a great deal of this lately – most notably a very, very scary tumble down the stairs when we neglected to fully close the baby gate after he’d just become mobile. We’re not making that mistake again of course, but the memory is fresh. Logan was completely fine – he had a little bruise and cried for about 20 seconds and that was that. Mommy and daddy on the other hand still feel guilty.

Anyway, that really prompted us to up our awareness and remove potentially dangerous situations. I really want to nail some boards in front of the computer cords when we get a spare moment (probably not until after our excursion to Germany), but we have a pretty good handle on everything else.

Logan’s been developing his motor skills a lot since starting to crawl, and interestingly is babbling a lot less since then. I’ve read that when babies concentrate on one area of skills, other already developed skills may take a backseat until they’ve mastered the new thing. It seems plausible, though I miss the random “mamas”.

We also think he just got over a minor ear infection (the pedi was called, but we were advised that unless things get more severe, he’ll probably get over whatever it is himself), which turned him into quite the crabmonster for a few days. Thankfully, we now have our happy baby back.

It really is true that once you have kids you never stop worrying. Sick babies are stress – not taking care of them, that comes with the territory, but worrying about their well-being and wishing you could take their pain away. I expect the stress and worrying will change as he gets older, but never again disappear. I have so much new-found appreciation for my own mother since becoming a mom myself.

On a more positive note, Logan’s passport arrived! I’m happy to report it only took two weeks, and they processed it despite of a spelling error on his birth certificate (in my name, nonetheless). One less thing to worry about!

The last few weeks have been very exciting! I feel that even though Logan refined all his skills from 7-9 months, there wasn’t that much “new” development. He really cranked it up a notch in the past two weeks, though. Logan can now sit up by himself and crawl, both very proficiently. He’s also starting to pull up on stuff, though that’s largely confined to his crib still. Pretty happy about that.

The crawling really only started yesterday, at about 9 months and 4 weeks. Fairly late, but I must say it’s kind of like he just decided one day that he’s been avoiding it long enough and it’s time to just do it. He didn’t have an awkward learning stage, and he’s had all the different moves down forever. He just put all the puzzle pieces together and decided to go cruisin’. Still baffles me. I was starting to think he’d skip it. Anyway, I ordered cabinet locks today. Much needed.

The sitting up is kind of a blessing and a curse.

In the middle of the night, I wake up to strange noises coming out of the video monitor, and when I look I see Logan sitting in his crib trying to eat it. The first night after learning how to sit up, he was up for three hours at night. Three hours of sitting up. Gah. He’s been progressively getting better about NOT sitting up at night, though he still does at least for a little while. At first, when I laid him back down, he’d just sit back up.

I learned not to lie him back down and instead wait until he either a) gets upset or b) lies down by himself. Works pretty well. He has slightly more trouble calming himself enough to sleep, but 20 minutes beats 3 hours. Beats it by a lot.

Nighttime sleep in general is still iffy. Some nights, he goes 8-9 hours without waking up at all. Other nights he’s up 3+ times. It certainly didn’t help that he had both front top teeth coming in at once a few weeks ago, which made for awful sleep. Usually, he goes to bed between 7:30pm and 8:30pm and is up for the day between 5:30am and 7am. The more he’s up at night, the later we’re up for the day.

Naps are starting to be more sporadic. We’re at the point where we usually have one very short nap (30mins) and one long nap (usually 2-3 hours in the afternoon). There’ve been a few days where we only had one nap. I think in another month or so we might consolidate it down to one nap a day. Perhaps we can delay it until he’s starting to walk, but we’ll see.

His play style has changed a lot. He’s figuring out how objects interact with each other, and how to manipulate them (ie opening and closing things, dropping and picking up, throwing and crawling after it to throw it again, bashing things together, putting things on top of one another). It’s pretty cool to see him figure out concepts like gravity and object permanence.

He babbles like crazy and says dada and mama, usually to the correct parent. The “mamas” are often accompanied by some sort of need (wanting to be picked up, hungry, thirsty, tired, hurt) and looking at me, whereas the “dadas” usually come out when he’s having fun. Figures. Still, there’s nothing more precious than a baby in need babbling your name. His good moods still prevail, he’s a happy baby overall and only really gets crabby when he’s bored or tired or hurts himself on something.

Since he’s figured out how to crawl, he’s bored less often, but hurts himself more often, so I guess the crabbiness evens out.

Eating’s going great. He’s basically had everything I can think of other than honey and peanut butter, and I’m starting to think about how to wean him off formula (probably at about a year of age).

We’ve been enjoying the last few days of summer – Washington state weather declines usually as soon as August winks out – and I’m getting really excited about this fall/winter season. Halloween, his first birthday and Christmas are going to be so much fun, and I can’t wait to see how they’ll evolve over the years.

After our long road trip to Yellowstone, Logan is not getting much of a break. In October he and I are off to – gasp – Germany to visit Logan’s grandparents (my parents)! And yes, it’s only going to be Logan and me. Daddy is staying at home to work. I have truly mixed feelings about this.

For one, I’m going to miss him like mad. We’ve hardly been apart in the last few years – at most two days when he flew out to a job interview in California – and now I’m going to be gone for sixteen days. Sixteen! I’m mad. Absence makes the heart grow fonder, I suppose?

Also, I’m going to have two 14-hour travels with an 11-month old baby boy. An almost-toddler that hates sitting still or being confined to his seat, and of course everyone hates children on flights. Let alone 10-hour flights. I hope all goes well. I think I have been preparing as well as I possibly can given the circumstances, but a large part of how the travel goes is up to Logan and his mood at the time of take-off.

Here’s what I’ve done so far (or is on the travel preparation to-do list):

- Infants under 2 years old usually travel for a small fee on a parent’s lap. Some airlines let you purchase a seat for your infant if you bring a car seat, which is always recommended for safety and comfort reasons. Alas, we didn’t have the money for that this time.

- I’ve done research on airlines and found one that not only flies straight to Germany (with a layover in Frankfurt, but hey, I’m going to be in the right country after just one flight at least), but also has bassinets available for babies up to a weight of 14kg and 83cm, which Logan is under. He’ll be 11 months old, but they don’t have an age limit. Many airlines do!

- I did want to get a night flight, but sadly there was no 6pm+ flight available with the airline I picked out. Instead, we leave in the middle of the day, which should span one nap and a considerable amount of night sleep (4+h).

- I will sleep in on the day we leave, so I won’t get tired on the flight(s). Ideally I want to stay awake the whole time to supervise Logan and make sure he’s ok.

- I called the airline to reserve a bulkhead seat. Infant bassinets attach to these, and they have extra legroom, which means Logan can play on the floor.

- I will buy a completely new set of toys for the flight, and introduce them at about a rate of one per hour.

- I will take his bottle and sippy cup and let him drink during take-off and landing to make pressure acclimation as painless as possible.

- I bought an umbrella stroller to make getting around the airports easier. The stroller can come on board, but flight personnel will take it and stow it away until we depart the airplane.

- I made sure we have an adequate amount of time on our layover (2 hours).

- We have applied for an expedited passport for him. Not all places that normally take passport photos will take infant passport photos. I didn’t know that before!

- I will take two outfit changes for Logan and perhaps an extra shirt for me. Just in case something happens. I will also take infant tylenol and perhaps even nose drops for air pressure equalization in case he’s congested. Ear planes for me. Lifesavers.

- I will take his favorite snacks, lovie and blanket.

I think that’s all I can think of right now. It’s going to be an adventure, and I’m scared. I’m already scared of planes – in fact, most of my worst nightmares involve planes – this is going to add a whole new level. We’ll get through it though, and it’s worth it to have my parents see their grandson. In case of my father, for the first time!

Logan has been sleeping elevated since he was a newborn. Back then, he seemed to sleep the best (and longest) in his rock’n'play sleeper, so we just kind of.. stuck with it. We’ve made several attempts to get him into his crib since, but they always failed. I think several factors played into that. For one, the crib was in his own bedroom, but he wasn’t really used to his bedroom. We’d go in there when he was already asleep or close to asleep, and he never got a chance to get comfy with it. Obviously, the elevation change takes a lot of getting used to as well. So, previous attempts to get him into his crib ultimately ended in hours and hours of crying sessions. We got a 40-minute stretch of sleep out of him, once.

So, through a combination of laziness and busy life, Logan’s been sleeping in his rock’n'play that he has long outgrown. I’ve been thinking that some of his sleep issues have to do with him no longer liking to sleep in it. Two nights ago, little man started wailing loudly out of the blue at about 8pm. I went upstairs just to find him on his tummy. In the rock’n'play. Not good. Not comfy for him, either. Or safe, for that matter.

That was the last straw. We set up the crib the day after, and last night was Logan’s first night in his crib. I want to say it went.. better than expected. I put two blankets under his mattress to help with the elevation change. At 7:40pm, after giving him his bottle, he pulled his lovie over his face and just kind of passed out without further complaint.

At 9pm, he woke up. Not unhappily at first, but eventually disoriented and unhappy about his change in circumstances. I was there to help him, giving him a little more milk, rubbing his tummy, but to no avail. Then, out of the blue, he figured out he can roll on his tummy. Cue instant sleep.

Dumbfounded, I went back downstairs. He slept until 12:30am (!), which is much longer than usual. However, at about 12:30am we hit a rough stretch where Logan was pretty convinced that it was in fact play time and not sleep time. He fell asleep once but woke back up quickly, and we did the whole spiel again. The whole thing lasted til about 3:30am. But, what baffles me is that he was not actually upset, he was just exploring.

He then continued to sleep til 5:20am.

On the whole, I was expecting much worse. I obviously was not happy about the 3-hour awake stretch, but I’m sure that once he really gets used to the crib, that won’t be an issue anymore. I am happy we finally took the plunge, since it’s been something I’ve put off for too long.

On an unrelated note, we also have… teeth! The two bottom front teeth came in, and little guy now has an actual chomp. He’s pretty fascinated by his new acquisitions, while I’m kind of scared of putting my fingers anywhere near his mouth now. Terrible picture – he doesn’t exactly let me get too close to them – but here you have ‘em.

Daytime is becoming really, really fun. Little guy has a blast exploring and playing and I only wish we had more nice summer days so we could go outside more. On the few occasions that it doesn’t rain, we’ve been making good use of the sun.

and feelin’ good! The move really took a lot of energy out of me this month, but I’m happy it’s over. I’m still working on feeling “normal”, but it’s a little better every month. Once I get those last pesky pounds off, I think I’ll be much happier. I know I’m not defined by my weight, but I just don’t feel quite right in my skin when I’m not at a certain weight, if that makes any sense.

Weight loss has been slow this month. I weighed in at 133.7, which means I only lost one pound in May. Still, I DID lose weight and my size 6 pants are getting more loose, so I’ll take it.

I’ve had little appetite lately and some nausea after dinner, so I’ve automatically been eating less. My sweet tooth has been pretty kind and less prominent too, which helps. My exercise still primarily consists of lugging Logan around, lugging Logan up the stairs, lugging Logan down the stairs, taking walks with Logan and running errands with Logan. Oh, and then there’s situps and pushups. Pretty bland, but as busy as life has been lately, I don’t feel at all bad about lounging on the couch with my family instead of running in the rain.

In June, I’m aiming to get at least one or two good hikes in. Seeing as this is my bedroom window view, it shouldn’t be too hard…

Little bugger is still doing great, and I can’t believe how big he’s getting!

I do think getting more sleep would help a lot with my physical well-being, but I know that eventually things will get much better. For now, I just try my best not to fall asleep on the nursery floor for our 2am playdates.

This month went by REALLY fast. I’m sure the move had a lot to do with it. Even though we officially moved in on May 11th, we still had to drive an hour back and forth for 2 weeks to finish up everything back in our old home. This Wednesday, we have a final inspection with the manager, and then we’re finally completely done. As a result, Logan has had to spend a lot of time in the car and a lot of time with a grandmother. Not bad things, but I’ve had less time to monitor and help him with his progress. Not that the bean seems to have minded, since he’s pulled off some cool stuff this month.

We’ve got the sitting thing down! Last month, he was still very wobbly and would only sit by himself for a few seconds, with his hands on the ground to support himself. This month, he sits for minutes and has the balance thing down really well. He picks up toys and looks in all sorts of directions without falling over.

Logan loves to stand, bounce and jump. Sometimes he’s still wobbly on his feet, and he’s not doing any sort of pulling himself up onto objects, but it’s a fun game to him and will usually make him happy even when he’s otherwise crabby. I don’t expect this to progress very far for the next couple months, but we’re having fun with it when we can.

He’s not yet crawling, but he has the mini push-up down and sometimes raises his entire chest off the floor. He also rolls in both directions easily, though he prefers back to tummy. I expect his 8-month update to be a lot closer to crawling (if not full out crawling). We’re getting there! Time to baby proof.

I’m not sure why, but he’s been a lot more joyful even than normal this month, and Logan’s always been a very happy baby. The past few weeks though, almost anything will send him into a laughing fit. Dropping toys on him, splashing water on him, his dad or me yawning, making funny faces at him, saying hi to him, tickling him… it’s incredibly fun and I love to watch how his hilarious little personality is developing!

The sleeping thing is still not going so well. I can’t exactly pinpoint the issue – I’m pretty sure a lot of his wakeups have to do with him being in some sort of pain, but I’m not sure whether it’s gas, teeth, or something else. We’re going to try a different formula for a week or so to try and see if he sleeps better with it. I wouldn’t mind if it was one or two wake-ups, but last two nights we were up to 6. That’s almost like newborn days again! This mommy misses sleep. If it is his teeth, there’s not much I can do… We might use tylenol every once in a while, but I don’t really want to keep my baby drugged up. I’d rather deal with sleep deprivation.

As far as bedtime goes, we’ve made a huge jump this month and are now giving his nite-nite bottle at 7:30pm. He’s usually out by 8pm, sometimes even earlier. That does mean that sometimes he’s up for the day at 5:30am, but usually he’ll at least make it to 6am. Well, and then there’s the night wakings that greatly vary. Sometimes he’ll be awake off and on for 1 1/2 hours before settling back to sleep, which means I am too. Greener pastures await sometime in the future…

I really think we need some more interactive toys. He’s getting to the stage where he’s kind of bored of stuffed animals and the like and wants to explore. I’m thinking I might go on a haul for some more “advanced” baby toys this coming month. His favorites right now are the TV remote, the X-box controller, generally everything with a cord, and everything else he’s not supposed to get into.

Solids are on a temporary hold to find out the reason for the night wakings, but in general he does amazingly with them now. He loves to feed himself, so we do a lot of baby-led weaning, but we also have him eat puree pouches from Plum Organics. He loves most flavors, and my husband freaks out less about choking potential. Still, when we’re out at a restaurant or eating dinner, he gets some chunks of vegetables off our plates and loves it. Most fruits are a hit, and of course oatmeal! He doesn’t have teeth yet.

That about covers Logan at 7 months old. He’s so much fun these days! I just wish we’d get a handle on some better sleep.

We’ll be moving into our dream rental unit by the middle of May, hopefully our last rental until we buy. It has the most amazing kitchen and view of the mountains on both sides of the house (along with sunset/sunrise, also over the mountains). We’re completely stoked!

Sadly, it meant saying goodbye to our little kitty, as the new place has a terrible pet policy on top of already being quite pricey. We found a good new family with 5 kids, a cat and two dogs, and their 8-year old daughter was completely in love with him at first sight… it makes me feel better, but I’ve been bawling a good part of today. At the very least he’ll have a lot of new friends that can pamper him all day long. He’s a very loving and family-friendly cat, so I think it’s for the better overall. Still. I loved that little guy.

Oof. Anyway, we’ll be busy with moving business things over the next few weeks, and Logan’s half-birthday is coming up too! We have a doctor’s appointment on the 1st, and I’ll do a formal 6-month update as well as some photos then.

Once we’re moved into the new place, I’ll take some pictures. It is SO pretty. I can’t wait. In the meantime, I’ll leave you with this:

It seems like finding time for blogging is currently quite a tough thing. Like any stay at home mother, from the time I get up until the time I go to bed my life is dedicated to my son. Since he’s not mobile yet (though we’re working hard on sitting up), he’s mostly in some way attached to me, which makes getting any kind of work or play done hard.

When he naps, I usually try to help my husband with the business side of things or do stuff like, y’know, cooking, which leaves me all of an hour after I bring the baby to bed at 9:30pm. I try to find some time to read or take some photos outside to practice when the time allows, but it doesn’t happen as often as I’d like.

For some reason, Logan used to nap a lot longer when my husband and I were still alternating sleep schedules and I had a lot more time to, well, do stuff. I kinda miss it, but having more time with my husband is definitely a nice trade-off and the overall better solution. Rarily, but at least sometimes, we have time to do things like these…:

…But with taxes due (we don’t get returns, we have to pay – a lot), and expanding the home business, things have been stressful to say the least. Oh well, things are getting better. We did have our 2-year wedding anniversary and picked up this little guy to celebrate!

We named him Nocturne (nerdy gaming reference) and Logan LOVES him. He’s a 10-week old bombay kitten. I also decided to finally give in and get a jumperoo and it has probably been the best baby purchase I’ve made to date. Logan loves to jump and jump and jump and play with the toys for up to half an hour at a time, and that’s HUGE for him. Normally he gets bored and wants to be picked up or otherwise entertained after 5-10 minutes.

Yep. Loves it.

Since the weather has been getting a lot nicer, I’m making an effort to take Logan out more, so he can discover the world. He hates bright sunlight in his eyes and he hates the cold, but he’s been pretty appreciative of spring so far.

So anyway, that’s what we’ve been up to. Times are busy, but the productive kind. I hope that the stressful phase will alleviate within the next few months, so we can enjoy Logan’s first summer to come!

…and feeling pretty spiffy!

Emotionally, I am (and have been) pretty much back to normal. I’m a very emotionally stable person and not used to random bouts of crying and all the less than pleasant emotions that early motherhood brought with it and I’m very glad I got through it.

My husband and I have put our sleep schedules back together and I get up at night with the baby, while my husband gets him when he wakes up for the day after 5:30am. This gives me a chance to catch up on sleep I might’ve missed if Logan has a night waking. It’s been working out pretty well since we made the change 2 weeks ago, though Logan has been waking up at night the past 2 nights and been rather crabby too, which always takes a toll on me. Regardless, it is nice to have my husband around again and spend more time together.

I do bring the baby to bed by myself now, which is usually relaxing and easy, but the past two nights has been hard. Even though he’s tired, he just won’t go to bed! I digress. Physically, apart from the sometimes iffy sleep that motherhood brings with it, I feel pretty good.

The scale, as of yesterday, said 137.2, which is about 10-15lbs away from what I ultimately want to get back to. I’d probably be pretty happy at 127. Looking at myself naked is becoming a lot more bearable. I still have a bit of a jelly belly, but it’s much tighter than it was even 2 weeks ago and my shape is definitely coming back.

I feel pretty strong, though I haven’t started a gym routine back up. We’re thinking about it though, we just have to fit it into our schedule and decide to trust the gym daycare service… which I can’t deny I’m a little weary of.

Logan is probably going on 19lbs and my arm strength is definitely better than ever thanks to him. He spends a good part of his days attached to me via the ergo or me holding him, and it’s a pretty good workout. Since the weather has been getting slightly better, we’ve been taking more walks as well, and my husband comes with us now! It’s definitely a nice change of pace.

I’ve also been getting some work from home done, but since getting back into my job would require a full-time time investment and one of us has to be there for the baby, it’s not feasible. My husband has always had the main income and mine was a nice extra, so it makes more sense for him to continue growing his career and me to take a break. I am however consistently trying to improve my photography and want to see if I can take that from a hobby to an income at some point in the future.

So, in short, things are going well! The only thing I’m still working on is my weight, but I’ve been making good improvements on that front. Life with a baby is ever-evolving, of course, and I don’t think I’ll ever have all the answers, but we’re doing the best we can!