Friday, July 30, 2010

Cloth diapers

Okay, so yesterdays post was sad.  I don't want to depress anyone but I had to get it out.  It's amazing the healing power of just expressing yourself. 
So I'm moving the blog on.  Today's topic cloth diapers.  I indulged in a little retail therapy yesterday.  We've moved to full-time cloth and it's going well but I'm getting a little tired of washing everyday.  I'm also worried that it will wear out my diapers faster so I went on to diaperswappers.com and thebabywear.com and searched the forums for some good deals on some fitted diapers and covers.  I love Goodmama diapers but they cost about $30 brand-new so shop the forums looking for good deals.  I found 2!  That will bring my stash up to 12 GMs!!!!  I'm excited.  I also bought some Mother-Ease Sandy diapers (4) and (3) Clover OS diapers.  I've read some pretty good stuff on them and the price was right so we're going to try them.  I also snagged some Thirsties covers.  I even broke down and bought a few pre-fold (which are the old fashion pin-up diapers).  I can't wait for my new stuff to come in!  I'll post pics.

Thursday, July 29, 2010

Grief and birth

I lost a good friend yesterday.  She died after having an emergency c-section.  The baby ended up in the NICU but is doing well.  I'm still feeling a bit numb.  I understand that she is gone but I can't concieve a world without her and I'm overcome with saddness for the baby.  She'll never know that wonderful woman that gave birth to her. 

I know that women die during childbirth.  Death is a fact of life.  I've looked at the stats but B was not a number she was a friend.  The numbers, the odds, the facts don't make me feel any better. In fact I think I'm more scared.  I have two friends awaiting babies and now I'm scared they won't make it through. 

DH has decided to become a doula. He is convinced it was a cascade of interventions that killed B.  I don't think we know enough to say.  He has been talking about it since we started our research on birth after we found out we were pregnant and now with B's death he feels that is something he should do to help out women. 

I don't know how to take it all in.  We just had dinner with B and her husband last month as we were moving.  We were talking about raising babies and both of us planning second babies.  Now she's gone.  We now live so far away we can't do anything to help.  I want to help.  I want to feel useful.  I want to feel something besides sad.  Even moving to anger would be good.  That I can work with.  Saddness is daining and I need my strenght to work and more importantly take care of Audrey.

I know life goes on.  I know Baby J will grow up and her daddy will tell her all about her wonderful momma.  Maybe I'll still get a chance to see her sometime.  But it's not fair.  All B wanted to do is watch her daughter grow up and to have more babies and be a good mom.  She would have been a fabulous mom.  I want an explanation.  I want a reason.  I want to blame someone. 

I know God has a plan but I can't see it.  I know things happen for a reason but I don't feel it.  I know but I'm not sure I can accept.

Wednesday, July 28, 2010

Wordless Wednesday - Time in Texarkana

Just a few pictures from our arrival in Texas, almost a month ago!  Finally found that card reader!

Monday, July 26, 2010

The Audrey you can't catch!

So Audrey is now crawling!  She's only been at it for about 2 weeks but she is moving fast.  I knew there would come a day when she would be moving so fast she would be hard to catch but I didn't think that would be so soon.  She is also standing up on her own. 

It's exciting to see her grow and learn new skills but so sad at the same time. I want to freeze her in time and keep my little newborn.  I'm even taking to swaddling her again!  I'm really treasuring the times we sit and breastfeed.  I feel like time is flying.  I guess all moms have that feeling.  You no sooner have the baby and then it's time to plan their wedding. 

All this growing and moving has me thinking about having another baby.  I know that Audrey will grow up (God willing) no matter what I do.  Having another baby won't freeze this one, it just means another baby to grow up.  Is it sad that I"m missing that little newborn?  DH and I do want more kids but I've always wanted to put about 2 years between them so that Audrey and I can max out our nursing for the full two years and so that she has the chance to be the only one.  With only 15 months between me and my brothers I always felt cheated of my #1 status.  I didn't like to share. LOL!  We'll see about #2.  I guess much like Audrey, we'll just leave it in God's hands.

Friday, July 23, 2010

Audrey up the mini-stairs

I happen to be video taping Audrey crawling around the den and manage to catch her crawling up the mini-stairs in the den for the first-time on July 20th.  Also today Audrey stood up for the first time.  She just push down on a baby chair and she was up on both feet.  She did it twice!  I can't believe how fast she is growing up.  I miss my newborn.

Audrey is crawling

Since we've moved I've been very far behind on blogging.  So I'm hoping this video of my Audrey crawling will make up for some of it.  I missed announcing that Audrey is now a crawler.  According to DH, she started crawling so she could steal the iPad away from her cousin, that was back on Friday the 9th.  She's only gotten faster and faster!

Thursday, July 22, 2010

Who works harder?

Okay so DH is still a stay at home dad but now that we live with my parents, my mom is also taking care of Audrey.  They split the day about half and half so that mom can take over when Ray starts grad school in a month.  I'm pulling a 9-6, which is a bit longer of a day than I use to do.  I come home and spend the rest of the day with Audrey.  I sleep with Audrey and even if I can sneek away she wakes up so I'm with her for the rest of the night.

The other day I asked DH for 10 minutes of baby-free/work-free time.  He told me that no mother gets and to get over it.  Needless to say that was the start of a fight.  I use to feel guilty about leaving him home all day with the baby.  He was the main care takers for 6 months.   I know that was hard but he has help now, the baby is older and I'm working my ass off, can I please have 10 minutes to myself?  After pointing out today that he was getting 10 minutes to himself to do nothing but read for fun and that I too deserve at least that much, he finally took Audrey and I'm spending my 10 minutes writing a blog about the baby.  So maybe not so baby-free but I don't think my life will ever be baby-free again.  I'm a mom, that's life.  I wonder if I'll be able to run off and have a mani-pedi, that would take well over 10 minutes!  We'll see.  I don't think this fight is over yet . . .

Wednesday, July 14, 2010

We have a side-car

I need to post the pics since it is Wenesday but who knows when I'll have time!  So we added the crib to our bed as a sidecar.  It was a bit tricky to get everything lined up correctly but I think we did a pretty good job.  Audrey will sleep in it but she won't stay all night.  We have always switched sides in the middle of the night for nursing so the fact that we switch out to the bed in the middle of the night it's a very big deal.
But there is a bit of a problem going on at night.  Audrey is waking up more than ever.  Right before we moved she was only nursing twice a night and now she's on like 7 times.  She'll wake up around 4 and act like it is super normal to be up and is ready to play!  Then she'll nurse, roll over, then roll back to nurse, then roll away, you get the picture.  We do this for about an hour.  Around 5am she decides it is in fact still night time and goes to sleep!  It's not that hard to deal with but considering that we got use to sleeping just about all night, this change in schedule is not fun!  She's a baby so runs the show but I miss the nights of almost sleeping the whole night thur.

Saturday, July 10, 2010

cloth diaper irony

okay so I've have a cloth diaper issue.  Audrey developed a rash after we switched to cloth.  As you know, or don't know, part of the reason I switched to cloth was to avoid rashes.  Audrey has never had an issue with rashes but after the reports of chemical burns with Pampers, I decided I wasn't going to take any chances.   "Isn't it ironic, don't you think?  A little too ironic!"  Sorry, had a 90's moment.

But yes I do think it is ironic that I switched to cloth and got a rash when I was switching to cloth to avoid rashes.  So we got a rash from the detergent we were using.  Thanks to the wonderful people at Pinstripes and Polkadots, I was able to figure it out.  So I'm including the link to their cloth diaper basics.  It was a wonderful resource.  I would also suggest joining diaperswappers.com and/or thebabywearer.com for forums about cloth diapering and buying cloth diapers.  My entire stash is made up of used CDs.  Mostly Goodmamas because they fit Audrey so wonderfully.  I was lucky I was able to ask the mama's at Triad Tot Toters for recommendations and they let me try them on Audrey.

So anyways, I didn't do quite enough research before switching.  Detergents do matter.  You live you learn.

Wednesday, July 7, 2010

Another word-filled Wednesday

We have now moved to Texas.  I started my new job yesterday and things are going well.  Audrey is loving living with my parents.  She gets all the attention and interacting she can handle.  In fact she is napping more now since I think she is actually worn out from all of the playtime and talking with my parents. 
I am adjusting to the whole thing.  First we've gone full-time to cloth diapers so now part of my daily routine is to wash and dry the diapers before I go to bed.  Despite the daily washing, I"m loving the cloth diapers.  I'm thinking I might go ahead and buy a few more so that I can wash everyother day.  Strangely, DH is liking the switch too. 
Second big change for me has been the return of my period.  After having is gone for 15 months, I'm not happy to see it's return.  It also means a return to strict charting since we're trying to put about a 15 month space between Audrey and getting pregnant with another baby.  We'll see how it goes.
So far all signs point to the move being a very good thing.  I haven't been able to catch up with any of my friends yet but once we're more settled in we'll be taking a trip to San Marco/San Antonio area to visit my besties.