Baby Jett - 12 Months

Well...it happened.  My baby turned 1.

We're leaving our baby days behind and entering...TODDLERDOM.  More grammatically known as toddlerhood.

So crazy.

It went so fast and so slow at the same time.  I'm a little bit in awe that we made it through the first year relatively unscathed.

At ONE YEAR Baby Jett:

Weight: 19 lbs. 4 oz - Skinny little bastard - 10th percentile for weight.
Height: 31 inches - Tall little bastard - 85th percentile for height.
Head: 18.25 inches - Perfectly in the middle at 50th percentile.

• He's quite the dancer, he has songs he likes on commercials and when they come on he starts dancing and singing along. He also has a toy that plays a particularly catchy tune that he will dance to whenever he plays with it.
• Has a Love/Hate relationship with the vacuum.  He's absolutely fascinated with it and will point at it and touch it and open the cabinet where it lives if he comes downstairs and finds it closed, but if you turn it on, OH HELL NO, and he starts crying and screaming...even if you're holding him.
• Can suck through a straw.  It never occurred to me to try out straws but someone came over with a sippy cup with a straw and Jett figured it out almost instantly.
• Points at EVERYTHING and I mean EVERYTHING.  We try to tell him the name of everything that he points at but halfway through the day I'm exhausted and feel like I'm going to go crazy if I say "key" "remote" "book" one more time!  Which is obnoxious because...
• He does not talk!  He has ZERO words in his vocabulary so far and the pediatrician said it was fine BUT that she'd like 3 words from him by his 15 month appt.  So now we've amped up the "mama" "dada" "kitty" and I really am going to go crazy if this kid doesn't start talking soon.
• As well as not talking he also blatantly refused to use sign language of any kind.  He KNOWS what the milk sign means and will sit calmly and wait for my boob if I say milk and do the sign for him but under no circumstances will he do it back to me.  If I can ever get him to just do that one sign instead of pulling my shirt down I will teach him others, but for now I've given up on "more" and "done" and am concentrating on "milk".
• He's an eater!  I have found NOTHING that he won't eat now...except his birthday cupcake, which is awesome after his hunger strike.  He definitely prefers to be fed over feeding himself though, BOO.
• Sleeps like a champ.  Naps are still great and he sleeps 11 hours straight through the night.  Only when he's teething does he seem to have trouble.  Even our travels to Oregon have not upset the sleeping through the night.
• Speaking of teething, he's got his 4th tooth!  So we have a matching set of 2 on bottom and 2 on top and a 5th one about to make an appearance on the top.
• Has perfected the fake cry.  He now pushes that bottom lip out and squeezes out some big fat crocodile tears INSTANTLY when you tell him no or take something away from him.  He can also turn it off as soon as he's happy again.  It's impressive.
• He's a climber.  He gets into and UP everything that he possibly can.  He's climbed up the fridge, up the pantry shelves, up the drawers to reach the top of the counter, into boxes and cabinets, up the high chair.  If it can be climbed he will try to climb it.
• Likes to push anything that can be pushed around the house.  He rearranges our furniture on a daily basis.  Garbage can gets moved to the living room, chairs get moved to the hall etc etc.  Every night we have to set our house straight again...fun times.
• As of his official first birthday he was not quite walking just taking a few steps, but just 3 days later he really plunged ahead with the walking and will do about 10 steps now and is really trying to walk places instead of dropping to a crawl immediately.  I'm pretty sure in just a few days this is going to become the new normal mode of locomotion!  Watch out world, here comes Jett!

 I'm glad we're done with these!

 Cousins!  God his hair is ridiculous!  I swear he's not bald on the top there...

 He was NOT impressed with his cupcake.  He wouldn't eat it!

Family Portrait

A shoutout to Leah at Everyday Love for making Baby Jett's awesome first birthday onesie!  Check out her shop for your kiddos!

Remembering the Good

I just found this in my Draft Folder.

It was the beginning of a post in which I was outlining the positives of my hospital birth as I was trying to come to terms with it all and let go of some of the anger.

Since today is the day that I went into the hospital for my induction last year I thought it might be appropriate to share it now.

As a reminder for everyone, I was planning a homebirth right up until 38 weeks at which point a routine prenatal appointment on a Monday turned into an induction in the hospital on Wednesday for preclampsia and a baby in my arms by early Friday morning.

Not what I had planned.

I spent a lot of time being pissed.

You can read about it here and here and here if you'd like.

It took me awhile to not feel anger about the hospital birth and I still mourn the loss of the homebirth experience...hopefully with the next one we can remedy that.

But I realize I never REALLY told you all about what a great hospital I gave birth in and how they worked their asses off to give me the experience I was looking for as much as they possibly could.

Remember this?  Where I discussed why I was having a homebirth?  Well...I got to do the vast majority of the things that I outlined in this post.

So, here goes...the good of my birth at a hospital.

• I hear lots of stories about women being pressured to hurry their labor along (as though we have control over that) but no one on the hospital staff put any pressure on me to get the baby out in a timely manner.  My labor lasted 29 hours, every moment of it in the hospital and by the time we finally had the baby they were SWAMPED, so I'm SURE they needed the room, but not once did I ever feel like I was on an assembly line and that I needed to hurry up and get the baby out so the room could go to the next laboring mother.  I was the laboring mother and it was my room until the baby came.  Period.  My water had also broken early in labor but this did not bother anyone and was still no reason for them to pressure me into pitocin/epidural/C-section etc. to speed up labor.

• Cervical checks were few and far between.  I think over the course of the whole labor I was checked 3 times.  They were very conscious of the fact that my water had broken and they wanted to keep the possibility of an infection to a minimum.  I was checked in the very beginning to confirm I was only 1cm dilated,  checked when I started "bearing down" unwillingly so that they could confirm whether it was time to push or not and then once again after I had the pitocin, epidural and my nap because the screen was showing what looked like contractions conducive to being fully dilated.  All important checks that would have been done if I was at home...except the first one, that one was to decide how to induce me as they prefer you're 3cm dilated before they start pitocin...there would have been no reason to check me in the beginning at home.  But I'm glad this check was done and I'm glad I wasn't given pitocin right off the bat.

• Before the induction took place the anesthesiologist came in and told me about my pain management options including the epidural but then NO ONE EVER OFFERED PAIN MEDS EVER AGAIN.  If you've ever been in labor that is KEY to doing it without drugs.  Regardless of your resolve when you are not in labor if someone asks you in the middle of a contraction if you'd like drugs you're very very likely to scream YES, JUST GIVE ME THE DRUGS!  But if no one offers and you've made up your mind to do it without them it is MUCH MUCH EASIER to stay the course if the drugs are never offered.  I had to come to the conclusion by myself that I wanted the epidural so I could sleep at the very end.  It was my decision alone, there was no pressure and it wasn't even offered, I had to ask for it.

• On that same note, I remember rather distinctly at HOUR 19 when I was having some rather excruciating back labor that suddenly I WANTED THE EPIDURAL and everyone and I mean EVERYONE in the room encouraged me to keep going and not have the epidural.  When I checked into that hospital I just KNEW that nurses were going to try to get me to have that epidural and so I was SHOCKED that the nurse on duty was part of my cheering squad encouraging me to keep going without the drugs.

• There was no restrictions on what I could and could not do.  I ate, I drank, I took a shower, I took a bath.  I spent very little time in the bed, in fact ending up in the bed for a cervical check proved to be my downfall and why I asked for the epidural in the end because I was falling asleep between contractions in the bed!  

• I did not have to wear a hospital gown (I HATE hospital gowns!) and spent the whole time either in my own clothes or naked.  This might seem silly to some, but it was important for me to not be wearing a hospital gown, I hate them that much.

• They treated my midwife with the utmost respect and she was basically my spokesperson.  They did not bother me when I was in labor, they directed all comments and questions to my midwife and let her talk things over with me and then accepted her response as mine.  THIS WAS AMAZING to not be bothered with medical jargon while you're trying to get a baby out because IT'S REALLY HARD TO THINK STRAIGHT.  My midwife would lay things out for me in layman terms and offer her advice and then answered any questions I had, always pausing for a contraction, which the Dr.'s DID NOT DO, twice I remember asking a Dr. or anesthesiologist or nurse or somebody to please not talk to me while I was in the middle of a contraction...midwife always paused to help me through the contraction.  

• Once the baby was out they let us delay the cord clamping.  Which is NOT hospital policy but we had discussed it before the induction and they were on board.  They actually asked my midwife when it was ok to cut it.  That's right they asked my midwife for advice!

• They also asked me if I wanted my placenta.  I WAS going to keep my placenta and make placenta pills and placenta art.  But since my placenta was the reason I was having an induction in a hospital at 38 weeks I had no desire to keep it...it would have just been a reminder that IT was the reason for the failed homebirth.  But cool that they offered to let me keep it.

• The baby was put directly on my chest and left there.  It was HOURS later before they came back to weigh/measure and do the thorough newborn checkup.  I laid there with my boob \ out and the baby right next to it and we took a little nap.  When the baby left to go to the nursery, Dom was with him the whole time and they were back within an hour.  The ENTIRE time I was in the hospital this was the only time the baby was not with me.

• Hospitals don't run out of hot water.  I was in the shower for HOURS trying to keep the back labor at bay, had we been at home I would not have been able to do this!

All in all my hospital birth was not a bad experience and other than the fact that I did not get to go into labor on my own...it was pretty close to getting to experience all I wanted to experience.

I can't believe that was a whole year ago and that Baby Jett is about to turn ONE...do I have to quit calling him Baby Jett now and start calling him Toddler Jett???

Baby Jett - 11 Months

Oh Baby Jett, how are you almost 1 already? I still like you more the older you get but I'm not sure I'm ready to say I have a one year old!

At 11 months Baby Jett:

Is not quite 20 lbs yet, if I had to guess I'd say he's about 19.5?  We don't have our official ped appt until the end of the month, so that will have to suffice.

Is over 30 inches.  Again, haven't officially been measured but we measured him and he's at least 30 inches now.

Still has ridiculous hair.  In the sunlight it looks uber blonde, in dark light it looks almost brown and when photographed the top of his head still appears bald because the hair is so blonde there...I'm still holding out hope that one day it will all even out and be the same color!

Still has blue eyes.

Talks and talks and talks, I can't get this kid to shut up....but he doesn't say any words really, lots of gah gah gahs and da da das and bah bah bahs and ma ma mas and every once in awhile someone will say something like 'wow' or 'hi' and it sounds like he parrots it back to you...but it's rare and it doesn't feel like he's REALLY doing it on purpose.

But he understands basic commands.  Like 'lift up your hands', 'come to mama', that sort of thing.

He can freestand for long stretches of time and can get from the floor to standing without support and can bend down and pick things up and set them back down all without any support...but he won't take steps without at least holding onto a FINGER.  He's barely using the fingers at this point but he refuses to take a step until he has a finger in his hand. I think he's building up the confidence to just plunge ahead with walking.  It feels like instead of taking one or two steps he's just going to one day start full on walking, just like he did with the crawling.

Has discovered the joy of opening and shutting doors.  He can be amused for hours with just a door.  Shut the door, open the door, laugh maniacally.  Shut the door, open the door, laugh maniacally.  Good times.

Easily gets off the bed, couch, steps, etc.  When I open the back door to the yard he now freely goes in and out as he chooses. Sometimes he just sits on the step and goes down the step, outside.  Up the step, inside.  And over and over and over again.

He's started playing with toys instead of just sucking on them.  Rolls balls and pushes toy cars, you get the idea.

LOVES stacking objects and putting things inside other things.  His favorite toys now are little stacking cubes that go one inside the other or pile on top of each other to make a tower.

He can take his shirt off.  Once the arms are out he pulls the rest of it over his head.

Makes the money sign by rubbing his thumbs against his other fingers when you say daddy or he sees daddy.  Fucking hilarious.  I think he's just doing a mini wave?  But it looks like he's rubbing his fingers together, like GIVE ME MONEY!  And he only does it with daddy!

Started throwing tantrums.  It begins already.  If he doesn't get what he wants he makes sure to let us know!

Points to let us know what he wants.  Although sometimes he seems to just want to point at everything and no matter what you hand him he continues to point at everything else.

Finally understands the concept of the sippy cup, ie. you must lift it up to get the liquid out!

Had his first real beach trip and DID NOT eat sand!

Got a 3rd tooth!  Top right tooth came through, that sucker is huge!

 Can you see the giant tooth?

Back to loving the bath.  Thank god!  That crying for baths thing was ridiculous!

Back to eating!  After what felt like forever he is FINALLY eating real food again and he'll basically eat anything.  Through the hunger strike we discovered that he likes to be fed, so we half feed him and he half feeds himself...it's a compromise depending on how tired/distracted he is at any given meal.

Is still a breastfeeding fool.  There's no possible way breastfeeding is ending at one year =)

Sleeping well!  Two 1-1.5 long naps every day and sleeping through the night for the most part.  Generally there's one feed either at 10-11ish at which point he then sleeps through until 6-7am or he starts off the night by sleeping through until about 4-5am then has a feed and sleeps for another 2 hours or so.  I'm pretty sure he's in the midst of a growth spurt as these feeds are true feeds where he hardly opens his eyes just eats and eats and eats and then is easy to put back down when he's done.

 

Why do I even still try to do these?  He won't sit still.

The Best Damn Napper on the Planet

I don't know what happened.

But Baby Jett is now an AWESOME napper.

As in he naps so damn well and so damn long that I have to WAKE HIM UP on a semi-regularly basis because otherwise he would be sleeping way too close to bedtime and way too much during the day to sleep well at night.

Let's say it all together now...WTF?!

He went from the king of cat naps to napping for 1-2 hours twice a day every day.

It's perplexing to say the least.

And I do it all wrong.

I nurse him to sleep guys.  Every. Single. Time.

Every nap, every day I nurse him until he's ASLEEP and put him in his crib.  I don't bother with the drowsy but awake baby like I have to do for bedtime.  But he happily sleeps and sleeps...and sleeps.

As far as I can tell it all started with that rose.ola virus.  He had a fever and I just thought he was tired because he was sick but he slept SO GOOD during the fever part of that virus.  THEN the rash set in after the fever disappeared and night sleep went to shit but he continued with the fantastic napping.

The transition from 3 naps down to 2 seems to have also played a part.

Suddenly 9 month old Baby Jett was The Best Damn Napper on the Planet.

So our new schedule looks something like this:

Wake at 6-6:30am (UGH, he's such an early riser now!)

First nap 9-9:30am.

Sleep until 10:30-11am...so many times I have to wake him at 11am because...

Second nap is no later than 2pm...and baby must be awake for at least 3 hours to be tired enough to nap.

Up from 2nd nap no later than 4pm though I much prefer if he's awake at 3:30.

And bedtime at 7-7:30pm

Regardless of how late he goes to bed he gets up around 6am, so I prefer the earlier bedtime because then he's getting more sleep.

But if he naps until 4pm then he's not tired at 7pm.

OMG, I NEVER EVER THOUGHT I WOULD BE A TIMED NAP KIND OF MOM.  It's so not my style.

Baby Jett led the way though...I just followed.

And truth be told it's not nearly as strict as it sounds.  Some days we still have half hour naps and we just move the nap schedule around, 2nd nap a bit earlier or bedtime a bit earlier.

These are my guidelines and rough nap times that I keep in mind but I'm not overly fussed about naps anymore.

I KNOW, what a difference 6 months makes right?  Remember this?

So, what have I learned about baby sleep?

You gotta ride out the storm and PERSISTENCE is key.

I had to keep putting baby in the crib.  Even if he would only sleep for half hour, I kept putting him in the crib instead of continuing to let him sleep on me.  Again, taking cues from Baby Jett because he wasn't sleeping for longer than half hour when I was wearing him either.

After quite a rough road with sleeping in general we've landed in a great place napwise.

I can only hope that this will continue, I can't tell you how nice it is to have an hour and a half to myself every morning, I shower, get dressed, do some chores, pick up a bit, put makeup on, blog...sometimes I even find I'm bored because I've ran out of things to do!

So we've landed here, fantastic napping...until the transition to one nap...

Baby Jett - 10 Months

First I have to record Baby Jett's 9 Month stats...for posterity sake of course!

Remember how I said I was sure he was no more than 18 lbs.

Mommy was spot on.

At  9 Months Baby Jett weighed 18 lbs exactly, still in the 18th percentile.
And is once again tall at 29.75 inches which is the 85th percentile.

And 3 weeks later at 10 months I'm sure he weighs no more than 18.5 lbs but I'm pretty sure he's over 30 inches which means WE NEED A NEW CAR SEAT.  I can't believe we need a new car seat.  Our car seat has a weight limit of 30 lbs but a height limit of 30 inches.  Crap.

At least this one lasts until he's 65 lbs!  He'll be like 8 by then =)

I feel like I've started 17 different posts over the last few weeks but have managed to post NONE of them, so it looks like I'll just summarize everything here.

Here's what's new this month.

• He waves.  He's been a 2 handed waver for awhile and he would wave for no reason but he finally "gets" waving, as in with one hand and it's when we see people or they're leaving...he really likes to wave at people's backs after they've already left.
• He dances...by shaking his head back and forth when he hears music.  Clearly he gets his dancing skills from daddy because that is definitely NOT how mommy dances.  Sometimes he sings along as well...so cute!
• He learned to go down the stairs, you know backwards as in NOT face first and throwing himself down expecting someone to catch him.  We've been working on this for awhile as there are A LOT of stairs in our house and you know...just lots of stairs in SF in general.
• He "shares".  He'll hand you things but then he wants them right back, sometimes he doesn't even really let it go before snatching it back.  But his face lights up when he offers something and you take it and say thank you.
• He has a new fake cry where he squishes he face up and squints his eyes...real cry the bottom lip sticks out, fake cry no bottom lip.
• He understands how things go IN things, so now everything goes in something, toys in his baby potty, cheerios in the bumbo, bowls in pots, spoons in drawers, booty in giant silver vase that no one would ever think to look for booty in etc etc.  I keep opening drawers to find things that definitely don't belong there and we're definitely starting to "lose" toys as they end up in drawers or cupboards or the above mentioned vase. 
• Had his first virus.  He was sick with rose.ola.  He handled it pretty well, though he was kind of miserable for most of a week, including when grandma and grandpa came to visit.
• Was the BEST SLEEPER EVER when he was sick...it was kind of amazing.  Long  1-2 hour naps twice every day and LONG stretches of sleep at night with only one waking.
• Promptly went back to SHITTY SHITTY SLEEP once he was better.  Although naps stayed awesome.  YES, NAPS ARE AWESOME NOW.  He went back to waking every 3 hours for almost a week.  But now back to one night waking again.  Sleeping seems to always be a work in progress.
• He is suddenly scared of loud noises, he bursts into tears when he's startled by loud noises now.
• Has been on a hunger strike.  He stopped eating meat awhile ago but then he stopped eating bread (which he loved) and then he stopped eating all the veggies that he used to love.  So basically he eats fruit.  Pediatrician said don't worry about it as long as he's still breastfeeding.  Just keep offering.  We waste a lot of food that he doesn't eat these days.
• He still nurses all day long, he basically never makes it more than 2 hours without at least a little snack. 
• Still only has the 2 bottom teeth...which he brushes every night in the bathtub.
• Has learned how to get under the bedskirt and has discovered the wonderland of wires we have hiding under there.

• Suddenly hates the bath.  He used to LOVE the bath...now he makes it about 3 minutes before he bursts into tears and tries to climb out...no idea what happened. 

Now get ready for the piccies of cuteness.

He is so over this laying on his back for pictures malarkey.  Good thing I only have 2 more months of these!

False Alarm

I don't think I ovulated.

I also don't think I'm pregnant in case that was going to be the next question from everyone...ok I KNOW I'm not pregnant because I finally peed on something.

And got a big fat NOT PREGNANT flashing at me =)

Luckily this was in no way devastating like it used to be as I've said before 2 babies under 2 is NOT actually desirable at this point.

Anyway, temp is still up, no period, no BFP, day 18 of high temps...I have no idea what's going on.

But guess what?

There's no way for me to find out what's going on because they don't make a Pee on This Stick to Tell You What Day of Your Cycle You're On.

So instead of obsessing I'm going to go back to not worrying about it until my period shows up.

I'll keep an eye out for EWCM but NO MORE TEMPING.

I feel like the last new mama who hasn't got her period yet at 10 months postpartum.  ALL the new mamas I know in real life got theirs months ago and more and more of you bloggy ladies are blogging about the return of your red friend and most of you have babes younger than Baby Jett.

BUT I'M NOT GOING TO OBSESS ABOUT IT.

Instead I'm going to be thankful that 1) I don't have to worry about dealing with my period and 2) I still don't have to worry about getting pregnant.

Moving on.  It has NOT begun again...now back to our regularly scheduled programming in which all I blog about is Baby Jett.

Excuse Me But Did I Just Ovulate?

Guys...I think I ovulated.

My disclaimer for anyone who has been happily following along while I chat about all things baby and may not have been around before I had the baby, I'm just gonna let you know that before baby I liked to chat about cervical mucus and constipation.   So go ahead and skip this post if you have no desire to read about cervical mucus, from now on known as EWCM (oh the acronyms!)...I'm not gonna talk about constipation.  Though now that I've broached the subject I am going to let you know that it took until 4 months postpartum to poop normally...it doesn't all end with the baby coming out unfortunately!

I've gone off subject... we're not talking about constipation, I'm going to talk about cervical mucus today!

So...ovulation.

I am 9.5 months postpartum, still nursing like crazy and have had very few signs, if any of my period making a comeback. Which I was totally ok with as nursing is our only form of birth control these days and I always told myself that I would wait until Baby #1 was a year old before trying (or thinking!) for Baby #2.

But lately every few weeks, maybe once a month, I would have some EWCM.  It would stick around for just a day or two and then gone.  It was very reminiscent of my cycles when they would last for 90+ days, as though my body was attempting to ovulate, gearing up for it and then just never quite popping the egg out and starting all over.

UNTIL 2 weeks ago I had GOBS AND GOBS of EWCM that lasted for DAYS.  I thought to myself HMMM, MAYBE I'M ABOUT TO OVULATE, but didn't REALLY believe that.  Just the ol' infertile mind coming back to haunt me (I'm ovulating, let's make more babies!)

Then the EWCM disappeared and I decided to take my temperature.  Oh yes, I BROUGHT MY GODDAMN THERMOMETER OUT OF HIDING.  Turns out you can't keep the crazy at bay for long, no matter how much you tell yourself that you're not ready for another baby, the second you think about ovulating you think MUST. MAKE. BABY!

Lo and behold, my temp was up....

Interesting.  But not conclusive.

So I started temping.  Every day.  Well, I'm temping as well as one can temp when one is up at least once every night...I admit my temps might be less than accurate.

But I'm at 10 days of high temps. 

DID I OVULATE?

IS IT TIME TO MAKE MORE BABIES?

Not ideal, but if eggs are popping out on their own, then it's GAME ON. 

Truth be told it wouldn't be the end of the world to get the babies out of the way quickly...my husband isn't getting any younger...and I REALLY didn't like the newborn stage, why prolong that hell, let's just do it now!

As far as I remember I have a 16 day luteal phase...which means I've got 6 more days to obsess over my temperature until AF arrives...or pee on something.

It's been a long time since I peed on something in the desperate search for information.

WHY ISN'T THERE SOMETHING TO PEE ON TO TELL ME IF I OVULATED 10 DAYS AGO?

So here we are, just 9 months after baby and I'm already back writing about EWCM, taking my temperature and thinking about peeing on ALL THE THINGS.

 And so it begins again...I think.