Wednesday, December 16, 2009

Fa La La La La

Dumb title.  Especially since I have no idea what I am going to write about today. 

I lied.  I'm pretty sure I know what I'll write about. 

JANE:

She is CRAWLING!  I am quite surprised.  I did not think she was going to crawl since she has adamantly refused any and all tummy time since birth.  Note to self: don't freak out if any future babies don't like tummy time.  The doctors will act as though they will never be able to function properly without tummy time.  This is a lie.  They will be just fine.  Anyway, she's mobile and it's adorable.  She will crawl with her mouth open in a giant smile as though she's doing the neatest thing anyone has ever imagined.  And it is. 

And on Monday, she started babbling.  Just overnight she decided she would start talking.  This was also something I was worried about.  Those stupid baby milestone books had me believing that she should be talking all the time and she just wasn't.  But now she babbles up a storm, mababamamawawa.  It's also the cutest thing ever to hear your baby's little voice "talking".  Aaah, pure sweetness.

I'm stoked about these two little milestones that she's hit, but also a bit taken aback.  I did not have time to digest the crawling before she started babbling.  And she's already trying to stand.   I am not prepared for how fast they grow the first year.  My baby will not be a baby much longer and she was just born!  I am enjoying each moment like they say, but that isn't helping to slow down time like I hoped.  :(

Jane's sleep is still horrendous.  The last 3 nights have been particularly rough.  She just wakes up around 2 and won't go back to sleep for sometimes up to 3 hours.  It is HELL for me.  I am thinking it is because she is learning so many new things now.  She will wake up and babble or try to sit.  She just wants to be awake all the time.  It's actually quite sweet...she's so happy and she wants to practice all of her new things.  I am somehow making it (despite insomnia as well, which is just adding insult to injury).  I can't believe I am only functioning on roughly 5 hours of sleep a night, EVERY night (often less).  I will say that my memory is shot.  Both short-term and long-term.  I hope I get it back one day.  Until then I will just have to keep writing every thing down.

I don't believe in babies that sleep through the night.  I refuse to believe they exist.  If somebody tells me their baby is a good sleeper, I assume they are lying.  Or, even worse,  I assume they left their baby to cry-it-out so said baby is now defeated and hopeless and has given up on life and their parents.  Whether it is true or not, that is what keeps me from punching these parents in the face.  :-P  If your baby sleeps or slept through the night, please don't tell me.

We are going to visit the in-laws this weekend for Christmas. I am not looking forward to it, to put it mildly. I will not go into it further for consideration of my husband's feelings. :-/ But if I survive this weekend, it will be a Christmas miracle. heh

Tomorrow I am getting my hair chopped off.  I'm sick of the long hair.  It's a mess and Jane is always pulling it.  I hope it looks decent.  I've had it short before but I was much thinner then.  My face is a lot puffier (fatter) now so I don't think it can possibly look as good as it did before.  Short hair will probably make me look fatter.  Maybe it will motivate me to lose weight.  Maybe. 

Speaking of being fat, I am seriously considering the purchase of a treadmill even though we absolutely cannot afford it and don't have the room for it.  Suze Orman would DENY me this purchase in a millisecond.  But there is absolutely no other way for me to get any exercise in the winter.  The only time I have is after Jane goes to bed at night and I can't leave the house because she wakes up so often and only wants MOMMY (that's me) to get back to sleep.  So, theoretically I could get on the treadmill and then run in to her hot and sweaty when she wakes up and just go back and forth.  Otherwise, I am getting negative exercise in my life.  My hips are proof.

That is all for now.  I am caught up at work so I am betting I will write another blog entry later today, especially if I keep drinking the coffee.  Coffee makes me chatty.

Thursday, December 10, 2009

Born in the USA

So I am lying in bed and not sleeping for some strange reason and I couldn't help but think about how lucky I am to live where I do.  It's something I take for granted a lot.  It doesn't occur to me often, but when it does I feel a little guilty about my good fortune in life.  I was listening to NPR the other day and was disturbed by the news of 4 car bombs going off in Iraq killing over a hundred people.  Normally I would hear this and just go on with my day.  Yea, yea car bomb in Iraq.  What else is new?  But this time it really bothered me.  What if this happened in my town?  Wow, that would be something else...  Over a hundred people DIED just like that. 

So I don't really want to talk about how horrible the world is, because that is really beyond this blog, but I do want to focus on how lucky I am today. 

I never worry about my safety.  I wake up in the morning fully expecting to make it through the day unscathed.  Fears of car bombs, terrorist attacks, or any other casualty of war does not cross my mind.  Can you imagine living in constant fear for your life?

I have clean water to drink every day.  I can take a HOT shower any time of day or night.  I can go to the grocery store right now and buy enormous amounts of food if I wish.  I can say I am an atheist and not be afraid of being stoned to death.  I can wear shorts in public (although I haven't in a while...probably has to do with the enormous amounts of food mentioned above).  I have the right to vote, to drive, to get a job.  Not every woman in the world has these opportunities and I am fully aware of that.

And thinking about these things with Jane in mind makes me even more grateful.  I can't imagine how mothers feel who cannot be sure their child will have clean water to drink or food to eat the next day or medicine to make them well, etc.  It makes me sick to my stomach to really think about. 

So while I will whine and complain about little petty things, I always know that I am extraordinarily lucky that I even have the opportunity to whine and complain about these little petty things. 

Wednesday, December 9, 2009

A Numbered List of General Stuff

So since I am so damn good at my job, I am all caught up and have some time to waste.


Let's see...what can I write about???

How about some random comments that maybe only my mother would find interesting:

1. When I was TTC I found these message boards on Ivillage.com. I have been a member of several boards since then and I cannot say enough good things about them. Currently I am a frequent poster on an April 2009 playgroup. It is a place where many women come to post questions, vent, share photos, etc. of their babies all born in April of 2009. Without these women (whom I do not know), I would be lost. I do not have many friends with little babies. Well, none actually. The support I get from this board is absolutely wonderful. As anyone who knows me understands: I worry. A lot. And being able to ask questions about pregnancy, motherhood, what is normal, etc. has really saved my sanity. I love my virtual friends on this message board.

2. Jane is sort of crawling. Two honorary uncles came to visit us over the weekend and she really showed off for them. She took her first little crawl steps and has since started to try it out more. She can only go like one or two "steps" and then will stretch out on her tummy, roll over and then sit up only to do it again. This is monumental stuff here. Soon we are going to have to babyproof the house, which I have been delaying and dreading since before conception.

3. Jane's laughter lights up my life. http://www.youtube.com/Skinnerfamilyvideos#p/a/u/0/_wHCpVDWVsI

4. This weekend is going to be my ONLY weekend to do my Christmas shopping. I have no idea what I am buying for anyone, although most people are getting a framed photo of Jane because I know that is what everyone is dying to have. ;-)

5. Wonder how many times I can fit the name Jane into a blog entry....
janejanejanejanejanejanejanejanejanejane. Wow. A lot!

6. I have never in my life been so content. It's almost unnerving.

7. I guess since I am so content I should be able to get myself together enough to start trying to lose some weight. It's all cold outside and dark early and so my activity level has decreased dramatically in the last month or so. My greatest obstacle is getting enough sleep so I can function well enough to make the smart decisions. (And while I have received some comments about baby sleep training books and do appreciate the sentiment, we are just fine. As I have stated before, no form of CIO will be practiced in my household even if it is guaranteed to work. And, yes, I still reserve the right to complain about not sleeping.)

8. I am making all of Jane's baby food (or most of it) and I am finding it very rewarding and quite easy to do.  I never thought I would do something like this, but a lot of the girls on my message board were doing it so I thought I'd give it a shot.  It's fun and I feel like I am cooking for my baby.  She loves her mommy's cooking (so far). 

9. I would like to thank Karmapearl for inspiring me to jazz up my blog a bit. Hope you like my new background. I also tried adding a video link to the right side but these random YouTube videos kept showing up even though I set it to MY channel. So that has been nixed for now. I used to be fairly OK at stuff like this but I am finding that I become less technologically advanced as each day passes. What I want to know is how anyone understands HTML. And what is it? And is that something you just "pick up" these days or do you have to take a class? Aw screw it...I don't care.

Well, it's close to quitting time.  Hooray I get to spend the next four days with JANE!  :-P



It's DECEMBER!



Thanks everybody for the nice comments on my last blog entry. I sort of feel like it seems I was fishing for compliments but that is not the case. I hate complaining about myself that way and then people say, "no you are beautiful and wonderful" blah blah. It makes me feel uneasy. My intent was not for people to say those things. Just makes me feel better to get my true feelings out on paper. I am doing a bit better. Not walking around with that "bad" feeling all the time anymore.


I will say that I am carrying around about 20-30 extra pounds that are just killing me and I can't get motivated enough to lose them. I know what I have to do to lose the weight and it's simply too hard for me right now. If I lost that weight, I would really feel a lot better. I don't know what's going to have to change in order for me to get motivated, but I wish it would happen already. (she says as she opens a bag of Combos...sigh)

For the first time in a long time, I am excited about Christmas. Yes, this is 100% related to Jane. I know that for her first Christmas she will have no idea what is going on. She isn't even interested in the fact that we brought a once living tree into our house, put weird lights on it and little "toys" on it too. But just the thought of her very soon getting excited and creating these new memories is really amazing. I look back upon my childhood with fondness and I really want Jane to as well. I am hoping she will. She seems pretty happy right now. Let's just hope she doesn't have the genetics for depression and anxiety like her poor Mommy. ;)