and I did it again

man, how does that much time go by?

I am sick with a nasty cold which Tristan and Ryan and both coming down with, Hubby is next, I'm sure. Hubby is recovering from a little outpatient surgery but luckily seems to be feeling better today.

We had an offer on the house last week, but it was a total low-ball and the guy was not able to get enough financing to meet us anywhere near the middle. Oh well. Had another person in yesterday and hopefully there will be an offer soon that we can accept.

Went to visit my family and friends in the midwest this month too. It was a great visit. My dad played basketball in college and his university honored him with a spot in the Hall of Fame so we all flew back to attend the induction ceremony. It's always fun, as someone's child, to hear about what your parent's lives were like before you came along. We also drove to Tulsa to visit some very dear friends and had a blast. She recently moved into a house with a pool in the backyard and Ryan is such a great swimmer now. He was diving off the diving board and didn't need any assistance in the deep end - so much like his daddy.

Tristan is nearly running these days and just in the last few days his walking is less side to side and more balanced bi-lateral movement. He is less and less like a baby every day and it's so bittersweet. He is using more and more words (not all intelligible to others, but many are) and even though I have been using signs with him for months, he hasn't used them back much until lately. He has started signing 'eat' and 'thank you' in the past week. He is also cutting his canines right now and boy that makes him cranky. Poor guy.

Ryan is doing very well in school, reading way more than I did by early Kindergarten.

The boys are really starting to play together, it's just so much fun to watch them interact.

Bad blogger, BAD BLOGGER...

How in the hell did it get to be nearly 2 months between posts?? Oh yeah, life got busy. Ok, I will try to sum things up so we can just move on.

-after the nightmare camping trip, Tristan somehow regained his weight plus some to make it over the 20lb mark by 12mo check up. Official stats are buried somewhere in the paperwork. He's 90-95% for head, 75% for length, and only 10% for weight.

-all the grandparents, one aunt, and the boys' cousin came out for Tristan's first birthday celebration and christening. It was a WONDERFUL visit that wasn't long enough - seriously.

-Tristan turned a year old.

-10 days later, Ryan turned five. (Zoiks Batman, really, already?)

-4 days later, I turned 35. (woah, now it's getting serious)

-9 days later, Hubby and I celebrated our 8th anniversary.

-we have been busy getting Ryan ready for Kindergarten and I am getting initiated into the world of BTS shopping from the parent's perspective. (Why on earth do the 'pretty' pencils cost $1.00 each? The plain wooden yellow ones work just as well for 12/$1.00, we're getting those!)

-I have been knitting a LOT lately. I will do a post soon (I promise) with pictures of some of my latest work. I am now part of an online store with some other great gals that I chat with online. Our store can be found here: Growing up Green.

-our dearest neighbors moved to Idaho and we miss them terribly.

-my dad got elected to the hall of fame for his university for basketball back in the day and we are all headed to the midwest in October to be there for the ceremony. (Go Daddy!!!! We always thought mom was making things up when she said you were the star of the team, guess we were wrong!)

-Tristan took his first steps yesterday. I will post a video of him 'walking' soon, hopefully tomorrow/later today depending on what time zone you are in.

-Ryan got the training wheels off his bike and is a natural. Video of this to come too.

-Hubby got promoted at work and I couldn't be more proud of him.

-Hubby bought me a new laptop for my birthday - yippee!! (It's pink. tee hee)

-Tristan is sick again, this time a double ear infection. But he was well from that last post to this one, so maybe I should take another leave of absence so he will stay well???? Nah.

Ok, so that about sums it up. If I forgot something, I will tell you later.

Sorry I have been such a bad blogger, I will try not to let it happen again. I will try to read at least the most recent posts from all my blogger friends too. Heather, I got your email, sorry I didn't reply, busy, as you can see above, and then it got buried in my inbox. My bad. Sorry.

Poor sick baby boy.

Tristan is sick again. He developed an ear infection from his latest cold picked up at the gym childcare (oh joy!) and was just getting over that when we decided to go camping for the weekend with our neighbors. He refused to nurse nearly all day on Friday (which made me nervous since he still won't take a bottle and is not taking any version of milk out of a sippy cup yet) and I attributed it to the new surroundings while camping. He finally nursed on Saturday morning and later we got the first of many diarhhea diapers. Four full days later and he is still having diarhhea and today, he started some vomitting. Yuck. I was worried enough about dehydration on Sunday night after not noticing any wet diapers the entire day that I took him into the ER to get checked out. They said he was ok at that point and gave him some nausea meds to hopefully help him feel better and eat/drink more and to follow up with his pediatrician. After the vomitting today, I took him in and his doctor said that he is not quite at the point of needing IV fluids, but getting close to it. He sent us home with orders to give 1 tsp of electrolyte solution every 10 minutes + nursing as much as he was willing and if he held that down, to try a little applesauce for dinner. He ate about 2oz of applesauce, that was it.

The worst part is that he is losing weight from all of this. I was so excited when I took him in for that ear infection to see that he had gained 11oz in 3 weeks! I was sure he would make it to 20lb by one year so we could put a forward facing carseat in Daddy's Pri.us and save money on gas on the weekends, but now that probably won't happen for a bit longer. At that appointment, he was up to 19lb 11oz and as of today, he is back down to 18lb 14oz, nearly a pound lost in a matter of days - 5% of his total weight. He is so darn skinny!

For the most part, he is acting normally. A bit more clingy than usual, but wouldn't you be if your mommy could cuddle you all day long? My chiropractor is going to have some extra work to do after this is all over.

Hopefully we will be able to keep enough fluids in him to rehydrate without needing to go to the hospital for the IV.

On a lighter note, I have finished a few more knitting projects for gals online and I would love to show them off!

no idea why blogger can't figure out to NOT rotate this image. whatever.

This is probably my favorite so far, it is a soaker under layer (like the one above), but a skirt over the top, all in one piece. Took a long time, but sooo cute!

The mom I made the skirty for sent this picture of her little one in it at the beach - I can't STAND how dang cute she looks!!!

11mo old pics & video

This kid is ALL OVER THE PLACE now and he isn't even walking yet. Getting him to hold still takes some serious pre-planning. He specializes in the crocodile death roll during diaper changes. Here are some pics...

No pictures, please!

No really - I mean it - no pictures! Oh, you talkin' to me?How you doin'?

Video to come soon. Gotta get it uploaded.

Summiting Mount Everest - well, not quite...

Hubby caught some video of Tristan climbing his latest peak. Scary how quick he has gotten at it too.

Video: Tristan's First Ascent

and #6 is here now

tooth #6 showed up overnight. Wow, that's a lot of teeth all at once. Poor guy, poor mommy. LOL

Hopefully now we'll get a bit of a break. Too bad he has yet another cold starting up. Thank you to the childcare at the gym for once again getting my baby sick. Almost makes it not worth it to go get a work out.

tooth #5 has arrived

top, right of front right. noticed it today. hopefully #6 will arrive soon so we can get a break. this kid is literally dripping drool, it's so gross.

he also pulled up using his high chair today and proceeded to walk around the kitchen a bit with it. looks like I need to pull the walk behind toys out of the attic.

Ryan's first sentence

Ryan and I were playing around with the foam letters from the bathtub building words a la Word World from PBS and while I was putting Tristan to bed, he surprised me with this sentence. I will translate for you:

9 fox, happy to go.

I couldn't be more proud.

more teeth

right now, this is the best place for me to log things that are happening. I will fill in the baby book later, probably.

anyway, noticed last night that the 2nd front incisor made it's way thru, the next two top ones are on their way, hopefully soon.

Tristan says Car now. Took Ryan to get his hair cut at the barber in town last week and there is a cool classic car shop down the block that Daddy takes him to sometimes. I was in there with the boys looking around and Tristan starts saying "Cah!" over and over. Eventually, I figured out that he was, in fact, trying to say Car.

I am drowning in testosterone around here! LOL

crabcake

Tristan has a nasty cold and is working on those teeth on top, so I decided that this shirt was rather fitting, don't you think? You can sort of see the "faux-hawk" I put his hair into after swim class today too.

Mwa Buh-dee

Tristan now has a 3rd tooth. His top right incisor broke thru officially today. He is still working furiously (and I mean that literally) on the other 3 of the top 4 teeth.

We are taking the house off the market and staying put for at least another year or so - riding out the crappy market and economy. I am actually very relieved, prices are getting so high for everything these days and it will be nice to not increase our mortgage payment at the same time.

Lastly, Tristan has added a few words to his vocabulary. Included are "Buh Bye" with the adorable open/close hand wave and today he was putting his open hand on his mouth and then saying something like "Mwah Buh-dee!" I swear he was blowing a kiss to the dog - how friggin cute is that?? If it becomes a regular thing, I will try to catch it on video.

10 mo old - video and pics

Tristan is 10 months old today. He has been outside of the belly longer than he was in it. Crazy.

He is trying to figure out crawling on hands and knees, but since he gets around so quick on his belly he gives up and just army crawls most of the time. He is really enjoying crawling over things and even up the stairs - eeek! He likes to crawl over to the sofa and pull up to knees and then feet when daddy is lying there relaxing. We have been showing Tristan how to wave Hi and Bye by opening and closing our hand (vs. the side to side open hand wave) and he is just starting to get the opening and closing of his hand, at least the first couple of fingers and thumb. He likes to stick his hand out and say something close to "Hi!" to daddy and to the dog he even adds, "Ha Buh!" for Hi Buddy!

In the last couple of weeks we decided to bite the bullet and I stopped feeding Tristan during the night. It only took about 3-4 nights of some crying and fussing before he figured out that the plans had changed. And not a moment too soon, this morning at 5am, he stirred and got himself up to his knees in his bed and could not figure out how to get back down and cried for a bit. Poor thing, he will figure it out soon, I hope.

Ok, pics and video.

What a happy baby!

Oh, it's you again!

Look at all that hair! Ryan didn't have that much until well after a year.

Mmmmm, bear toes! Yum.

Video: Tristan 10 months old

Lookie at what I made!

I have really gotten into knitting shorties (to be used as diaper cover & clothes at the same time) for Tristan.

Here is the first pair I made:

And on the model:

I finished up this pair today:

How cute is he?

This shirt matches perfectly!

Tristan is SO BIG!

Ah, this kid just keeps getting cuter. And I know all moms think their child is adorable, but I get people saying this to me unprompted all the time so I guess for him, it just might be true. LOL

He now says Mama in addition to Dada. Finally. He also tries to say Buddy (the dog). I will add a video of him talking to the dog soon, once it uploads. For now, here is Tristan's favorite new game.


Video: Tristan is SO BIG!

9mo pics & video

Been too long since I updated - again. Sorry. I suck.

House is on the market, but no action yet. The sellers of the other house did accept our offer with the contingency, so hopefully we can sell this one before that time runs out. We'll see. In the meantime, I get to enjoy my new powder room and my faboo granite counters.

Ok, onto baby updates. Tristan is a very speedy belly crawler, but not yet interested in getting up on hands/knees. That is ok by me, I can still outrun him this way. Swim class is going great, he is such a fish! Top teeth on their way, but no breakthrus yet.

Pics:

What an angel.

Without that gunky eye, his baby blues just jump right out at you.

Videos: (I went back and added video to the 8mo old post too.)
9mo old chatterbox

Video: Tristan 9 months old

Crawling video

Video: Tristan's army crawl

8 mo pics

Sorry it has taken so long, life is crazy busy. We put a contingent offer in on a house and they accepted so we have until next Tuesday to get this house ready to list. We had a bunch of painting done (window trim and floorboards from natural wood tone to white) and a new roof put on and we are waiting on granite countertops. Calgon, take me away!!!!


Anyway, here are some updated pics.

As you can see from the pic above, his clogged tear duct has cleared itself up! We are so unbelievably excited about this because we were really starting to get worried that he would need surgery to open it up. Whew!

He also got his first two teeth in the last few weeks. He is such a cutie pie I could eat him up with a spoon.

Hoping to have some videos uploaded soon too.

Finally, here is video from 8mo.

Video: Tristan at 8 months old

ETA: In response to Alli's question in the comments, yes those are dachshunds, but it isn't a diaper cover, that is the diaper itself. My friend Dana makes them over at Little Luxe Organics. They are awesome! This is the very first dachshund diaper she sold!! Here is another cute picture of Tristan in it.

Cloth Diapering gets a bad rap - again.

Parents Magazine recently published a piece on one father's limited experience with the world of cloth diapering. To say that it was incomplete is an understatement.

The article can be found here.

This is what I posted in the comments:

This perspective is unfortunate. It is unfortunate that this tale is probably what many 'new to cloth' parents have experienced. Cloth diapering has become so unusual in recent decades that the knowledge base has been significantly diminished. Until you seek out information from reputable sources, you might think that this is what a typical cloth diapering experience is like. That cannot be farther from the reality for many cloth diapering parents, myself included.
With my first son, I used 'sposies' because I didn't know any differently. I did give CDing a try when he was about the same age as the child in this article. The diapers I got at the baby boutique were the same basic style and I too was turned off from them pretty quickly and gave up. I wanted so badly to 'do the right thing' by the planet, but it was just not working out.
While pregnant with my second son, I started investigating the vast array of choices in the CD world and felt overwhelmed and said "Forget it!" more than once. But I kept coming back to it because I just didn't understand how anyone could actually WANT to use CDs. Then I started using them - the good kinds - and yes, there are several "good kinds" out there. CDing is fun. Yes, I said it - fun!
I touched WAY more poo in my years of sposies than I have using cloth. I don't do ANY dunking in the toilet. I wash 2 extra loads of laundry a week. When I used sposies, they leaked a LOT and I was washing baby clothes a lot more often than I do now. I also use a HE front loader that uses way less water to get the diapers clean. It takes me just as long to get a diaper on my squirmy baby using a sposie as it does with a CD.
In short, if this article was meant to be anything other than a fluff piece (no pun intended) based in humor then it failed in its objective. This article should not purport to be any sort of factual resource for what the reality of cloth diapering is and it would be a good idea for Parents magazine to do more than publish a few contrary opinions in the front of a future issue. Go to the real cloth diaper users and find out what we experience every day and I bet you would find that many Parents out there would be grateful for the effort.

We have a tooth!

He has been drooling buckets for weeks, maybe months, with nary a chomper in sight. Then today, I am looking in there and Whoa! a tooth has broken thru. It is one of the bottom teeth and I expect that it's mate will be here soon too.

He is soooo ready to crawl! Tonight, I had him spend some naked time on his activity mat (poor guy had a red bum, so I wanted to air it out) and he was getting around so well. Not in a straight line, mind you, more in circles, but he was moving around a lot. He can turn around while on his belly and after one or two loops, finds himself farther away from his starting point. I think he will be officially crawling before Hubby's birthday in March.

He is also sleeping on his tummy these days and I think it is going to be the final piece in the sleeping-thru-the-night puzzle. Last night, for example, he did not stir at all until 4:30 and went right back to sleep afterwards until almost 8:00 this morning.

Got the videos working - I think

My wonderful hubby helped me get the videos to work - with sound! I have added a few more too for the fun of it.

Tristan is 7 months old!

Video: Tristan is Seven Months Old!

This one was a couple of months ago, but one night Tristan just got the BIGGEST kick out of me startling him. It was going on for at least 5 min before Hubby got the video camera out.

Video: Baby Giggles

This one is of Ryan when he was about 2. He got into the habit of asking me over and over and over and over, "Mooom, whatcha doin' Mom??" So I got him back. Cracks me up everytime.

Video: Annoying (a) 2.5 Year Old

And because laughing babies are always funny, here is Ryan at a year old in the backyard pool on a VERY hot summer day.

Video: Funny Baby Laugh

7 mo update - where does the time go?

Tristan is 7 months old now. Already. Good grief time is flying. He has started sleeping better now and usually doesn't wake up until right before 4am to eat and then goes back to sleep until about 7am or so. Boy, I could get used to this. Unfortunately, after all that trouble we had getting him back to the breast, he now looks like he might be trying to reject the bottle! Ah, the irony. I had a home owner association meeting the other night and Hubby was putting the boys to bed. Tristan absolutely refused the bottle and I ended up nursing him at 10:30pm when he woke up so he could get through the night (well, until 4am at least). I still give him a couple of ounces of formula or breastmilk in a bottle every night after I nurse him and he takes it from me just fine, perhaps it has just been too long since Hubby tried offering him a bottle. He only sort of eats well for the babysitter.


Rolling is happening on occassion, but not with any regularity - still so happy hanging out on his tummy that he isn't motivated to roll over much. He has figured out how to scoot around on his back by lifting up his hips and pushing off. Ryan did this too, so cute! It does mean that the bald spot on the back of his head will not be regrowing hair anytime soon. He is sitting up quite well on his own now. I keep a pillow behind him just in case, but he doesn't need it to stay upright anymore.


Here are some pics taken today and a couple of video clips for your enjoyment.

have to get to the videos later, blogger is hanging on me.

well, until I can get blogger to do the videos, here's a link to them.

http://s12.photobucket.com/albums/a203/nickiea/videos/?action=view&current=MVI_3410.flv

http://s12.photobucket.com/albums/a203/nickiea/videos/?action=view&current=MVI_3412.flv

Feeling better now - thank goodness.

The joint pain is gone, the pneumonia is gone, but the cough still lingers. I have a new primary doctor that I like and he is pretty sure that I am not developing rheum.atoid arth.ritis - yay! I am so grateful to be well again. I hope this is the worst I get for a very long, long time.

The one side benefit of being so sick is that I lost some weight. I had been hovering at about 2-3 lbs under my pre-pregnancy weight which was pretty cool, but somehow my body decided it was time to let go of about 10-12 more lbs. Sweet! I haven't been at this weight since long before we started trying to get pregnant with Tristan. Now, to get my butt back in the gym so I can keep it off!

Tristan really really wants to crawl. Really. He likes being on his belly so much that he hardly ever rolls over and just spends his time spinning around in circles to get to other toys and he is starting to scootch backwards some too.

We have started waterbabies classes and last week he went underwater for the first time. This kid is so mellow and easy going (PLEASE let that last!) that he hardly even changed his expression when I dipped him under the water. Can't wait for the next class.

I have really been enjoying getting into wrapping Tristan to wear him. Over on thebabywearer site someone came up with the brilliant idea of picking a carry (way to use the wrap to carry baby) each week to learn/practice. We vote as a group on what we'll do next. Here are some pics of us this morning doing the SHBC (secured high-back carry). Excuse the pjs, it was pretty much first thing.

I hate being sick.

So, that flu that I mentioned the other day turned out not to be influenza, but some other nasty virus that hit me pretty hard. I was starting to feel better on Sunday/Monday and that's when I started up with a secondary bacterial infection - pneumonia. This one really knocked me down hard. Not only have I had the typical cough, shortness of breath and weakness, but I have also had to deal with this unbearable joint pain that even narcotic pain meds could not fully take care of. I have been to the ER twice in the last few days and yesterday's treatment seems to be what I needed to get me over the hump. Now, the key is to finish healing and not push myself too hard too early.

6mo pics and update

No 6mo pediatrician appointment yet, that is next week. But he did turn 6mo old on Sunday - already. How in the world is that possible??


Updates:

-he finally rolled over from tummy to back by himself on Christmas Eve in front of Grandparents and Aunt/Uncle and Mommy/Daddy. Big Brother missed it, but I think he is ok with that. He did it several times that night but has since forgotten how. Oh well, it was fun while it lasted.

-he can sit up somewhat well by himself. I still can't sit him down and move away at all, but he does go for several seconds at a stretch before he topples back onto me or I catch him before he face plants. Getting there.

-we started waterbabies swim class on Sunday and Tristan LOVED being in the water. He did not object at all when I laid him back with his ears under the water - he just pulled his feet up and proceeded to suck his toes. My little fishy.

-I am on day 5 of the flu. Yuck. I did get the vaccine which is why I think I don't have it as bad as you would expect. I am down to the dry hacking cough and headaches at this point. Hoping to be over it very soon because my husband might be coming down with it now too. Of course HE chose NOT to get the vaccine again this year, even after coming down with the flu last year and swearing that he would get it this year. And he refuses to go get meds too. He better not get pathetic in the next few days. So far, Tristan does not seem to be coming down with anything, he is too young for the vaccine but seems to be getting enough antibodies thru the breastmilk. Thank goodness!


Ok, now on to the pics. Oh yeah, his clogged tear duct is getting really gross (will talk to Dr about it next week again) so please excuse the redness around his left eye - poor guy. I will be sending a link to family so you can order copies if you want.