Get up, Stand up

These days he much prefers being on his feet to sitting and laying down.

365

I'm going to try to post a picture a day of our little man to document his growth. This is from a few days ago, but I love it!

Thanks to Rachelle for the hat!

Firsts

Adam and I celebrated our three year anniversary on Tuesday. This also marks 8 weeks of Hunter's life and we're dealing with a lot of 'firsts' which is really fun. This is our first anniversary with a child and it really does feel different to be celebrating it as a family. Especially because it's the leather anniversary and I'm thinking a kinky whip is a little out of the question now that we're parents ;)

Last Monday Hunter and I had our first play date. It was more of a play date with mothers as all the babies did was eat, cry, and drool. It was fun none the less. And great to get out and be around other mothers of similarly aged kids. I have to admit I was a little worried, even though I really like these women, that there might be some judgement on my mothering skills. Of course, the opposite was true, and it was more camaraderie than anything. We were all having or had similar issues and it was nice to discuss those with people that understood.

Hunter and I went on our first hike together on Tuesday. We went to the same canyon I hiked at 37 weeks pregnant, just days before Hunter's birth. We used the Baby Bjorn because some of the terrain was too rough for the jogger to handle. Even though we only hiked for 40 minutes it was quite a work out with 12 pounds strapped to my chest. I was surprised at how much harder it was to hike with him in his carrier than it was to hike at 37 weeks pregnant.

On Thursday Hunter, my mother and I took our first long road trip up to northern California to visit my grandparents. They live near Chico and a normally 7 and 1/2 hour trip took 9 1/2 hours with an infant. I had anticipated it taking longer due to breast feeding stops and diaper changes, but in my head that was about an hour. So I was exhausted by the time we reached our destination.

All in all he was a pretty great traveler since he slept 90% of the trip. The only issue we had was it screwed up his sleeping schedule. He was getting 6 solid hours at a time and during the trip he reverted back to his old schedule of waking every 3 hours. We had a few rough nights but we're getting back on track.

Yesterday I went for my first post pregnancy run. Oh my god, I am so sore! The baby jogger really adds quite a bit of resistance when pushing it uphill. And then the trip down, I was nearly forced to run or it would have dragged me. And I've lost most of my pregnancy weight, but what's left is, apparently, on my thighs because I think I almost started a fire.

Today Hunter got his vaccinations. It was rough to say the least. Adam kept saying to me "It's ok, he'll be tough, just like you." But I saw his little face crinkle up and I lost it. Not so tough, eh? But I got some good advice and nursed him immediately after the shots, gave him some acetaminophen, and now he's sleeping peacefully.

But this was minutes before...

xoxo,

Lauren

Adventures in Cloth Diapering

Diapers, a totally boring subject, but because diapering occupies a large part of my day, I think about it a lot. For the past 2 weeks I have been using mainly cloth diapers. I'll use a disposable here and there out of laziness, but I mainly stick to cloth.

We had been spending $12 every 3 days because the only diapers that fit the lad were the Seventh Generation diapers. $120 each month on diapers is pretty insane. I've spent about $65 on cloth diaper products so far just to see what I like. I've tried all the main types: the basic prefold, the hybrid, and the pocket diaper. Most frequently I use the prefold with a diaper fastener and a cover or the pocket diaper(which i plan to buy more of, because I love them.) But I use all these different types because, truthfully, I think they are all great.

I was a bit ambivalent about the change to cloth diapers because I thought it would be gross as well as time consuming, I've found the opposite to be true. As for the grossness, I just keep a waterproof washable bag next to the changing table and when it's full (every other day) I toss the whole thing in the wash.

So what about the poop? I line each diaper with 1/2 of a biodegradable liner and toss it in the toilet and flush. Almost no mess! Unless... Yesterday Hunter had a huge blowout, which I hadn't experienced yet. So I took the whole diaper off and held it in the toilet stream and flushed. Not so bad, but I did do the wash immediately.

The change to cloth has gone so smoothly I've started making reusable cloth wipes too. I figured if I'm doing the wash anyway, I might as well reduce this extra amount of waste. These are so easy I even use them when I use the disposable diapers. And it's really easy to make your own. I cut up an old t-shirt of Adam's and made my own wipe solution that I store in a travel squeeze bottle. You can search for diaper wipe solution but most of them seemed too oily. Here's my recipe:

1/2 c water

1 T baby wash (I use Burt's Bees)

2 t baby oil (I had a sample of Burt's Bees apricot baby oil, but olive oil will work too)

1/2 t alcohol (leave this out if there is a diaper rash)

You can vary this recipe using different washes, oils (like vitamin e) and you can add in aloe or tea tree oil. Just remember the basic solution is water, cleanser, moisturizer and sanitizer. I've been using it for a week and it doesn't bother the boy a bit. He hasn't had a rash yet but he did have a little redness before I started making my own wipes, and he hasn't had redness since.

xoxo,

Lauren

Good Morning, Sunshine!!!

I'm feeling much more refreshed this morning than I have in a long time, well 5 weeks to be exact. I actually got some real decent sleep. Hunter is a good sleeper, but he's been feeding around the clock without any sort of real schedule. I was warned not to put him on a schedule because he needed to gain some weight. Now that he is above average in weight and 5 weeks old, I decided to start a sleep routine.

We started the routine with his last evening feeding, it was 9:00pm last night and I'm going to try to move it to before 8:30 tonight. Then he got a warm bath which he settled into easily without any fuss, he's usually pretty good but yelps a bit at the onset. He then got a baby massage with some Burt's Bees Baby Bee Buttermilk Lotion, I adore the light scent, and I think Hunter did too. And then it was story time.

Story time was my favorite part because it actually gave me some time to read, and added to my relaxation. I just read my book (The Art of Racing in the Rain) in a soothing voice, and about 3 minutes into the reading both Adam and the dogs joined us, sprawled on Hunter's nursery floor. By 10pm Hunter's eyes began to droop so I swaddled him super tight and put him in his crib and he got himself to sleep by 10:15pm.

The best part was he didn't wake up until 1:45am and he did a really quick feeding (quick by my standards of breasts, bottles, pump) and was back to sleep by 2:15am. And he stayed asleep until 5:30am this morning where he had another quick feeding and was back to sleep at 5:45am. He's just stirring now at 7am.

I know it's not a normal schedule just yet, because sleeping through the night is defined as sleeping from 12am-5am, but it feels normal in the sense that Hunter mostly slept from 10pm to 7am. And I got over 6 hours of sleep!!! Woot woot!!!

I know that I'm writing this too soon and that he's going to be up all night tonight, crying, screaming, with some vomit and projectile poo thrown in. But I feel like we're, at least, on the right track.

Brown Bagging It

Adam alerted me to this blog this morning.

http://fedupwithschoollunch.blogspot.com/

Judging from this, Hunter will be bringing his lunch.

Best Laid Plans

I'm a planner and always have been. And I'm pretty meticulous in my planning, making them far in advance, sticking to them and pretty much always being early. So it's been quite challenging to have this tiny human calling all the shots. I get prepared to do something, get all my ducks in a row, and then Hunter decides there's something much more pressing, such as, puking all over the dogs. I swear he does this just to teach me a lesson. I just saw a quote by Mike Tyson (so he's no Lao Tzu but this is appropriate) "Everybody has plans... until they get hit."

Wednesday was such a beautiful day I decided to take both Hunter and the dogs for a walk. I got the leashes on the dogs and the Baby Bjorn strapped on. I changed Hunter's diaper right before putting him in his carrier. I turned to the side for a split second to put the diaper in the trash and when I turned back I felt something cold and wet on my shoulder. I was hit! White baby vomit was dripping from my freshly washed hair (ok, so it was washed 2 days ago, but that's effing clean these days.) I looked down and it was splattered on the edge of the Baby Bjorn as well. Awesome. But the worst part was the little white chunks hanging off the dogs' faces, necks and front legs.

I don't even know how it happened. How was that projectile vomit so widespread? My walk was inevitably delayed. But the good news is that the dogs got their much needed bath. I think Hunter decided we were all too stinky and it was time for us to bathe. And we do what Hunter says.

His initials are HRH: HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS (as all the grandmas and great grandmas have pointed out)

Happy Month of Life, Hunter!!!

xoxo,

Lauren