Love.

Glow of the nightlight.
Baby eyelashes tickling my chin.
Little fingers twisting my hair.
Soft hair smelling of baby shampoo.
Baby hand brushing my face.
Quiet baby yawns.

Someday he'll be too big to rock to sleep.

Until then, I'll enjoy it every chance I get.

One of THOSE days....

So, it's one of those days.  The kind where it's 1:30 in the afternoon and I'm still in my pajamas (which happen to be the t-shirt and jogging shorts I wore yesterday), have my hair pulled back in a ponytail, and figure that if I haven't showered yet, might as well just wait till tomorrow.  Yeah.  Just keepin' it real, folks.

I can't really complain since it's my fault.  Trey goes to bed at 8, but I often stay up until midnight or later.  Since the hubby frequently works until after 8, I end up staying up so I get to see him.  Last night found us in the living room, me getting my birthday foot rub and playing on Pinterest while we watched Psych on Netflix.  It's not that I'm not tired enough to go to bed at a decent hour, but I've enjoyed the kid free hours to visit with my hubby about our days and probably more frequently, about the aforementioned kid. :-)

Going to sleep that late wouldn't be a problem except that my little Boo is still waking up to eat in the middle of the night.  Really though, it only costs me about 15 minutes of sleep to feed him, so it's not too bad, but some days it leaves me feeling rather like a zombie.  Like this morning.  After his 5:30 feeding, he was kind of fussing when I put him back in his crib, so I laid down in his floor until he quieted down.  One of those Murphy's Laws...if I left the room, he would have woken up, so I just waited in his room to make sure he was back asleep.  Except that my husband came in at 6:45 to find me sleeping in the floor where I had apparently been snoozing for the past hour.  I'm am decidedly less picky about my sleeping situation now that I was pre-baby.  Purely out of necessity, I am sure.

So, it's one of those days.  Tired and grungy, but laundry's going, items are being purged from our closets to the yard sale pile, and I'm ready to play with my little guy when he wakes up from his nap.

For now, I think I'll go change into a clean shirt and pair of shorts and throw on some mascara.  And enjoy being a mom. :-)

Sleeping like a baby

Today was one of those mornings when you wake up wondering, "Was that just a dream, or did I...?"  After confirming with my husband, turns out I did!

The baby monitor is on the nightstand by the bed, and at about 4 am, I heard Trey flopping around.  Apparently my response was to start patting around on the other side of the bed, trying to find him.  That's kind of weird anyway because Trey's never even slept in our bed and isn't even in our room anymore.  Unfortunately for Steve though, he WAS over there, so he woke up to me smacking him on the back and head.  (Not sure why that's how I was trying to find the baby!)  We had a brief conversation along the lines of:

Me: I'm trying to find the baby.
Steve: What???
Me: The baby.
Steve: I'm not hiding him.

And then everyone went back to sleep.

The end.

Five Months!

One month away from the big halfway mark!  It seems like Trey has learned and changed so much in the last month, and I'm glad I get to be at home to see it all!  The poor guy got the other half of his 4 month shots and was a little out of sorts this afternoon, so I waited until he was in bed to write.

It seems like the last month has flown by.  If I were teaching this year, I'd be over halfway through my summer vacation.  I'm certainly glad that's not the case!  Sometimes I wonder if I was crazy to quit my job, but I cannot imagine having to go back to work and leave my little guy, knowing that I could be staying at home!


This month's stats:
Weight: 16 pounds, 9 ounces
Length: to be determined (aka: I'll measure him tomorrow)


Boo, you're five months old!

You're wearing 3-6 month clothes and size 3 diapers.

This month has brought a need for frequent vacuuming because you're becoming mobile!  You went over a month without rolling over after the first time but last Sunday, all of a sudden, you started rolling over.  I think you did it 4 or 5 times in a row.  You still can't get from your back to your tummy, but once you want to, I'm sure it won't be a problem!

You started scooting and pulling yourself forward a while ago, but in the last couple of days, you have learned how to get yourself up on your hands and knees and flop yourself forward.  Sometimes you accidentally send yourelf backwards, but most of the times, you're good at propelling yourself forward!  You have also perfected turning, so you can get yourself pretty much wherever you want within reason.  Callie discovered it's dangerous to lay close to you and lost her first handful of fur today.  Unfortunately for her, you've noticed her and try to catch her if she plants herself in one place for too long!

You've gotten yourself on a really good schedule.  You wake up between 7:00 and 7:30 and hang out in our bed while Daddy gets ready for work.  You usually eat and are back asleep by 8:30 and sleep for an hour or so.  You take another hour long nap in the morning and then usually take either one 2-3 hour nap or two shorter naps in the afternoon.  Bath time is at 7:00, and then we play and read in your room for a while and you eat and are alseep by 8:00.  The blackout curtains seem to help during the afternoon and evenings, and they're pretty cute!

You seem to be done (for now at least) with your yelling stage and actually sound like you're trying to sing sometimes.

Your hungry/tired cry sounds like a whining puppy.

You eat every 3-4 hours.  You are still waking up between 3 and 4 in the morning to eat.  I'm sure it will phase out soon, but I don't entirely mind the extra snuggle time. :-)

When your daddy walks in the door, you are all smiles.

You love to grab our faces.  Noses.  Hair.  Anything, really. 

You are ticklish all of a sudden.  Your neck, tummy, feet, and hips get the most giggles. :-)

Now that you can scoot, you definitely prefer to be on your tummy.

We're still working on sitting.  You lean forward to inspect your toes a lot, so I have to find things to distract you with so that you'll look up and work out those sitting up muscles!  I think we're borrowing a Jumperoo and Exersaucer from Mommy's friend Kari later this week, so it will be fun to see how you like those!

You still try to talk with you mouth closed, and when the air finally escapes, it sounds like you're saying, "boof."

Your favorite books are Little Quack's Opposites and Moo, Baa, La La La.  I think you like Moo, Baa, La La La better when I just quote it to you without the book!  You grin the biggest at the singing pigs and kitty sounds. :-)

Between crawling and introducing solids, the next few months will be a lot of fun, I'm sure!  Love my Boo!

Separation Anxiety

When I think of separation anxiety, I think of a toddler clinging to his mom, afraid to go somewhere without her.  However, I am the one experiencing this emotion at the moment!  Last night was the big night; we moved our big boy to his own crib in his own room.  This was a pretty big deal for me considering he's slept either ON me or right beside my bed for the last 146 days and I carried him for 9 months before that!  The excuses were running slim though, so with the arrival of his blackout curtains to help keep his room a little darker in the evening and morning, the moment had come. :-)

We've already established our evening routine, so at 7:00, Trey got his bath, and then we played and read for a while in his room.  By 8:00, he was ready to eat and fell asleep.  He took a little while to settle in, waking up a few times, but I got him back to sleep and nursed him one last time before I went on to bed.  At around 3:00, I heard him on the monitor and went in to check on him...wiiiiiiide awake.  He's only done that one other time, but this momma doesn't enjoy play time at 3 am!  He wanted to nurse, so I fed him while he tried talking to me and smacking me in the face.  I've discovered that avoiding eye contact is pretty helpful with a wakeful baby in the middle of the night, so I tried to not look at him.  We rocked a while longer, but although he had settled down, his eyes were still wide open.  I laid him down on his tummy in his crib and laid down in the floor.  After about 15 minutes of talking to himself and flopping around, he finally went back to sleep!  Smiley guy slept until 7:00 this morning!  I'm glad he transitioned well and that we did it before he was big enough to know the difference.

Sounds like he's woken up from his nap, so I guess I'll go release him from his baby jail! :-)

Transparency

It's amazing how many new things there are to deal with when you become a parent.  Besides all the obvious things that I expected, there have been a lot of feelings that I didn't anticipate.  I think they're fairly common and definitely understandable/allowable, especially as a first time mom, but sometimes it's just almost comical.

Ask anyone who's known me for a good length of time, and they'll tell you I'm a planner.  I make lists, I ask questions...ambiguity is not my comfort zone.  At JBU, there were numerous times I would work ahead on the syllabus only to have the professor change or cancel work that I had already done, so you think I would learn!  Bring a baby into the mix and cue the anxiety!  It's not the day-to-day schedule/changes that make me anxious; I'm fine with all of that and actually enjoy it.  It's the fact that there is this little person that I love more than I could ever imagine and there's a future full of the unknown.  (It doesn't help that I can be a bit of a Chicken Little and let my imagination get away with me.  Just ask my hubby who got up to get ready for work the other morning and had to unlock the bedroom door because SOMEONE got creeped out when she was up feeding the baby in the middle of the night and somehow thought the door knob lock would keep out the boogie man.)

It's not that I want the rest of my life scripted out with no surprises because that would take all of the enjoyment out of life, but it's just amazing how one little person can make me so afraid about all of the "what ifs."  As in almost having an anxiety attack driving along the Elk River on the way to Neosho a few weeks ago because WHAT IF I careened off into the river like whoever it was that knocked down the barrier that's supposed to keep me on the road! I honestly don't understand how people do it without faith in God because handing all that anxiety to Him is the only way to deal with it.

I've become TERRIBLE about having any sort of quiet time and have been working on being more disciplined about finding that time every day because that has to be my priority.  Thankfully, I have discovered that nursing Trey + You Version on my iPhone is a perfect answer because I can't do anything else, and although my Bible is too bulky to hold with one hand, I can navigate my Bible on my phone with no problem.  I can just tell that even though I have always been a worrier, I really could let it become overwhelming if I didn't just start handing it directly to God when I feel it creeping up on me.  Because honestly, this life is not my own, and even this little boy that God has entrusted to Steve and me is not ours.  He is God's.  Thankfully!  Because what a burden that would be if all of that responsibility were left to us.  There's such freedom in that knowledge!  (Not that we'll let him go run around in traffic or anything, but you get what I mean.) :-)

I better go see what else I can get done around the house before Boo finishes his nap.  Sounds like we're off to Steve's parents' for Round Two of Independence Day festivities this evening, so we'll get laundry caught up and the kitchen clean so we can enjoy hanging out this evening!

Boo Bear

The boy officially has a nickname that's stuck. :-)  I guess he probably won't appreciate being called "Boo" or "Boo Bear" once he's a little bigger, but for now, I think it's pretty sweet.  Following in family tradition, I have even come up with his nickname song.  Mine isn't quite as original as "Emily the Bimblebug," "Ray Dean the Squirrely Bird," or "Little Lydie Largent," as I used the melody from an already existing song, but I'm working with my own skill set. :-)

You are my Boo Bear,
My only Boo Bear.
I think you're silly
And pretty cute.
You'll never know Boo
How much I love you,
Even if you're being a toot!

We've been working on other verses but haven't come up with anything official yet.

Right now he's napping in the pack 'n play in the hallway.  Between the person weedeating outside our bedroom window and the light, the hallway seemed the best place to get him to stay asleep long enough for me to get ready for the family reunion this afternoon and get a little bit of housework done before we leave.  Talking to Mom about whether pre-made black out curtains or making our own will be cheaper is on the conversation docket for this afternoon.

I've got a few topics bouncing around in my head for new posts, so I'll try to get to those soon.  We've got a busy day of family and friends though, so it will have to wait!