2010 in Review

January: I nursed my way into 2010 with a 1 month old getting ready to take on the year by a storm

February: brought along the beginnings of mobility with rolling and Jeffrey's 1st Valentine's Day

March: A year after our BFP, we celebrated St. Patrick's Day, a standing (assisted) baby and begin to see that he was not as great of a sleeper as we would have hoped for

April: Amidst the TX bluebonnets, Jeffrey learned to sit and celebrated his first Easter by going to our family farm for the first time

May: It was a busy month for us: my 24th birthday, starting solids, ending my "career" at Curves and starting a new one at the church nursery, a new car and going on a big family vacation to Chicago and Michigan!

June: Just a mere month later, our little traveling (and crawling!) baby went with us on a Cruise to the Caribbean while also starting to cruise himself

July: To help cool off in the hot summer, Jeffrey took his first swimming lessons. We celebrated the 4th of July, a first tooth, a first word, first signs, a first illness and standing unassisted

August: In honor of our 2nd wedding anniversary, we got a walker!

September: The focus was on improving walking skills and starting up at The Little Gym while also celebrating  Jony's 25th birthday (which brought us all a big new TV!)

October: Our little 50s boy had a great first Halloween (and his last first holiday) after getting his first real shoes and a small trip to Austin.

November: After Thanksgiving, the birthday boy turned ONE with a birthday bash and a trip down memory lane for mommy- ending up in the hospital with mastitis 

December: Officially a toddler, we celebrated the holidays and enjoyed Jeffrey's 2nd Christmas.

2011, what will you bring?

Wordless Wednesday

A Very Merry Christmas

We had an amazing Christmas this year- far different than the barely surviving, clogged duct exhaustedness from last year! Although, we're still exhausted. Poor little lad decided that the holidays are a perfect time to work on two more of those top teeth. Yuck. Besides our (lack of) sleep, it was so much fun seeing Christmas through the eyes of a one year old! He was in awe of everything and was so excited to be around all of the family. He just soaked it all in. It was a hectic two days with lots of people and craziness around him, but he took it all in stride and just went along with it all. He was so much fun to be around!

Highlights from Christmas 2010:
1. nursing him in the morning with everything all quiet and peaceful; he just looked up at me and was so perfect looking the whole time
2. seeing his face/reaction when he saw his Santa gifts
3. watching him play with all of his new gifts
4. seeing him chow down on my FIL's famous french toast. He LOVED it.
5. watching him and my niece run around and be ridiculous in all of the wrapping paper, cracking up the whole time

We got some amazing gifts that will keep on giving throughout the year (another semester of The Little Gym for Jeffrey, Children's Museum membership, gift certificate for massages, Costco membership, Home Depot gift cards, etc). We are very blessed and thankful after such a wonderful Christmas.

To prove how blessed and thankful Jeffrey is (along with spoiled and loved), here's a photo of Jeffrey with all of his loot. He made out like a bandit, and we're going to be spending Jony's week off reorganizing our house to make room for all of it!

Transitions

They really are the worst part about parenting. I swear, you get comfortable and adjusted to a routine and then- BAM- they change things all up again. That's currently what we're going through. I'm not sure if it's a wakeful period, teething, he hates me or if he's just having a hard time transitioning to a later nap time, but it has been a rough week. He's been taking super late naps (although they've gotten an hour earlier each day, so he finally went down at 2pm today: success!) and having a lot of nighttime issues. That one night of sttn made it worse, I think, because it gave us false security.

Last night was particularly rough after only about 5 hours of sleep the night before, staying at home and inside all day and then refusal to go to sleep again. He finally passed out about midnight, and I got a good 8 hours since Jony got up with him. I'm hoping that by napping at a decent time today, it should be all worked out. Cross your fingers!

In a way, it's a good thing. I was feeling a mad case of baby fever and now that's been put on the back-burner again, at least for a few days!

Wordless Wednesday

Ah, rest

After a little over a week of no good, very bad sleeping, Jeffrey slept through the night last night. It felt so amazing to hear the monitor and turn to see 8:30am on the clock! 9pm-8:30am. It's been a month or so since we got a full night like that, and I'm excited. A Christmas miracle.

Perhaps that Christmas onesie that I got him that says, "All Mommy Wants for Christmas is a Silent Night" made  a statement to him. Merry Christmas to me!

13 months!

We are entering into the era of communication. He's really picking up signs very quickly and is slowly increasing his actual vocabulary.It is so easy to figure out what he wants about 90% of the time, which is really helpful as the independence really starts showing up. He wants to do everything himself and gets pretty frustrated when he can't or if we won't let him. He's gotten really good at the whine, the pout and the starting of tantrums. Overall, though, he has been ridiculously fun to play with and be around. He's so silly and is almost always laughing and smiling. His "cheese" smile for the camera about kills me each time. I love the continually growing personality of this little dude.

13 month stats:

• 21 lbs and 30.5 inches
• wearing primarily 12 month clothes with some 18 month (like pants) and a sprinkling of 9 month
• With the exception of last week, sleep has been pretty consistent. Asleep about 9pm, a waking about 4/5am and then up for the day about 8am. Not bad. Naps have been all over the place, but they've been super long when he finally goes down. I think that can be contributed to all of the holiday bustle, though.
• He's loving his food and has been eating a TON lately. We've been introducing the fork and now he always has to put the food on the fork before he eats it. 
• still just the 4 teeth, but I see two more on the top appearing underneath the gums
• dances and stomps all around all of the time
• will point to his nose when you ask where it is
• loves reading; it's his favorite activity
• can climb up onto almost everything if it's the right height (such as the couch, yikes!)
• runs around the house kicking and throwing his balls
• can dribble his big ball twice

Ball go Bye-Bye

I went to the park this morning to meet with some fellow moms, which is something that I look forward to every month. The moms do things that are a lot like me, and it's nice to just be able to relax and talk about your life/parenting without having to explain that it's not strange. Today was no different. Jeffrey was having a fabulous time eating rocks and throwing dirt with some of the other little boys, and I was enjoying some adult conversation. When I went to get my camera to capture my little boy covered in dirt with smudges all over his face and his mouth area completely covered, I noticed that it had happened. Jeffrey's beloved ball, a Gertie knobbed ball, was gone. It had been sitting right by my diaper bag by the table that we all had our stuff on. I was so upset.

See, when we first got to the park, Jeffrey was kicking and playing with the ball when these three older children came and TOOK HIS BALL! Like it was no issue, they ran off and started playing with it. Their nanny was right behind him, and I was expecting her to say something, and my 12 month old could have his ball back. Nope. So, I went and took it back. I have no doubts that these little hooligans stole my baby's ball. They were gone by the time I noticed. Ugh.

1. How do you take a ball from a toddler?!?
2. How do you, as a nanny, let that happen? Do you just assume that they created the ball in mid-air when they got into the car with it? Way to teach them a lesson and be a good caretaker...

It bothers me way more than it should, but I just can't wrap my head around how the nanny would let this happen. Thankfully, we have another one at home since it's his favorite toy ever. That doesn't change the confused face on my little boy when he started asking to play with his ball before we left, and it wasn't there.

Wordless Wednesday

Decorating for Christmas in TX...

Deja Vu?

Do I have a wee little newborn again? These last few days it's almost as though Jeffrey has day and night all mixed up again. Actually, it's worse than he was a newborn because that wasn't ever too much of an issue for us. Thankfully, last night went better than the night before (where he slept from 9-12pm and then was awake until SEVEN AM!). Last night, he was only up for an hour in between his sleeping blocks (12pm-11am) Thank goodness Jony is off this week. He's the one that stayed up with him. Why? It's his fault. We went to a Christmas party Saturday night. We already knew we'd be staying late and that it would mess him up a bit, but he can sometimes stay up until 11pm on his own accord, so we figured he'd be fine. He was ready to go home about midnight, but someone had been drinking and kept us there until a little after 1am. There was too much activity for Jeffrey to get some snooze there, so he played and snuggled until we left. He's been taking epic naps (it's currently been 2.5 hours), but today's is a few hours earlier than yesterdays. By the end of the week, we should hopefully be back to normal. He has to get up for gym tomorrow morning, so that will definitely help. Especially since he is exhausted afterwards and usually takes a nap immediately. These past few nights have for sure proven how far we have actually come with Jeffrey's sleep!

Something is Off

I just don't feel right. I've been overly tired the last few weeks sine I had mastitis. At the time, I figured it was the antibiotics, but I've been off those for quite a bit now. Yesterday afternoon, my stomach started hurting. It's a strange hurt- kind of like a constant cramp or tightening. Almost like a contraction, I guess. Just never ending. I've also had a pretty constant headache. I keep thinking that AF is knocking on the door, but I wish that, if that's it, she'd just come on in. I'm over the questions. When I first got AF way back when, I was extremely exhausted. My mom actually took me to get tested for mono and anemia because I would just fall asleep sitting there. I ended up starting my period immediately after giving up half of my blood.

Jony just had a virus, so I'm hoping that it's not that. No fever at this point.

Also, I'm about 99% sure that I'm not pregnant. We don't exactly have a bustling sex life, and I last tested on Thanksgiving (negative, obviously).

I just want to feel better.

Wordless Wednesday

To even things out after yesterday's super boyish post...

Our Future Star

Jony was a baseball player. It's always been his preferred sport, and it was always one of my favorites, as well. We've had plans since pre-conception about our son being in Little League with Jony as one of his coaches. However, as Jeffrey gets older and is starting to show preferences, it's becoming more obvious that another sport might spark his interest a bit more. Soccer. He LOVES balls. Even more so, he loves to kick balls. He'll kick a ball all over the house and just follow it and kick it again. It's the best time for him. We've gotten numerous comments about it, so I guess it's not super common at his age? My dad is super excited as soccer is HIS favorite sport. Being that they share a birthday, maybe there's something to that. haha! My sister was a start soccer player and played at Baylor her first year (and then quit because it took too much time). So, I guess it's in the family. We used to go to the Houston Hotshots games when I was younger, and I always had a good time. I can definitely see our future changing to be more soccer than baseball. And, I'm getting excited about it.

1. It's a timed sport. You know when the game will end. Nice.
2. It's a bit more interesting to watch than other sports
3. Soccer players are usually pretty nice to look at (Every mom wants her son to be attractive!)
4. If he goes pro, he could bring in some major bucks, especially in Europe.

The biggest con, though? The season is during the cold months. Thankfully, we live in Houston.

Of course, we'll let him take whatever direction he wants to go (I'd be even MORE thrilled if he went a theatre route), but it's pretty fun to think about being an actual soccer mom for now.

Hilarity

We reached the most hilarious milestone tonight:

Jeffrey farted, looked at Jony and said 'dada'

His first time to blame a fart on his dad. I almost died laughing.

Verbal Explosion

It's gotten loud in our house. Apparently, he's worked out the kinds in his mobility (stomping, dancing, walking backwards, balancing on one leg and running) and is now moving towards his verbal skills. He is picking them up SO fast. It has been amazing to see this little boy learn so quickly, especially remembering how he used to never even make any sounds for the most part! Signing? Whoa. We cannot keep up with him on his signs. He's also doing so well with animal noises. It is SO MUCH fun! My favorite times are sitting with his big pile of books (because book shelves? Those are for loser kids. Books look much more awesome scattered about the floor) and pointing (both of us) and labeling, making noises, signing, etc. You really cannot beat those moments.

Some of his new words:
-dog
-ball
-book
-llama (from the llama llama series- he always says it twice like the book, haha)
-balloon
-cat
-go

Animal sounds he can imitate:
-cat
-dog
-owl
-lion (his favorite!) and any other roaring animal (bear, tiger, etc.)
-monkey
-cow
-fish- because apparently fish roar, as well. This was new to me.

Wordless Wednesday