Yuck!

Last night Jake and I crashed in the chair early, probably by 730. I woke up at 830 and put him to bed and I had to let the dogs out and get ready for bed myself. I forgot to take the trash out that I set on top of a big trash can with a lid on it. This morning I let Sparky out first. I went back to let him in and he had jumped on top of the trash can, ripped a hole in the garbage bag, and was eating poop out of a diaper. I just about hurled. I screamed at him - mind you it was before seven - and he ran away of course. I couldn't catch the little shit! Thank goodness it had rained last night and at least the grass wiped the pooh off him!

I let Molly out and came back in to find Jacob crawling out from my room at a rapid pace. He had something in each hand. As he came up to me I laughed so hard. I tried to get a picture of the crawl but he was too fast. He has a tampon in one hand and an ovulation predictor in the other hand. I did snap a picture of him stopping and banging the two together. I just thought of how many of each of those two items I had gone through before getting the little fellow holding them.

I'm trying to decided what to do for the birthdays coming up. Jake's birthday is on a Friday and Mike's in on Saturday. We will have a party for both on Saturday. (we never have a party for Mike, or me for that matter, so this is new ground). So we can't decide how big to make it. I have asked a number of my coworkers and they would go big for the first birthday. How big? I mean how many people do I invite? Where do I draw the line? I am thinking if I invite very many of my friends I need to just put up a stinking invite at work because I will get into that damn trouble I always do about someone being left out. I don't think anyone other than my friends would come anyway, but than at least I don't leave anyone out. I think it is silly however because it is my son's party. However, I don't recall every having seen a baby's party up there. I don't know. When we look at just inviting a few people, just family(parents, Mike's sister and grandmas) and a few friends it seems hard to draw the line. I don't know and it seems silly. But there is a big difference between 10 people and 40 people. And words of advice? What have/are you going to do???

Eleven months!

We had a busy weekend. I feel like I got a fair amount accomplished. I still don't feel very settled here and it bothers me. There are still a lot of boxes that need to be unpacked. The thing that bothers me the most is not having pictures up on the walls. We kept waiting to decide where to put what and I gave up and just started putting things up. There are some pictures in the hall that need to be rehung but they are up for now. The people who lived here before left a lot of nails up. I can't believe how high all their stuff was hung. The tallest person in the family was no taller than me at 5'5".

That makes it feel a bit more like home but I don't know. I just don't know where to put everything and Mike isn't being much help. I don't know why I thought it would be any different unpacking than it was packing, but somehow I thought he would help me more. I'm just having a really hard time with stuff not have a permanent place and needing to still do so many things. I really want to jump in and start doing work to the house and yard, but I just don't think I can do that yet until stuff has a home.

I did take care of one thing outside. We have a narrow flower bed that runs along the front walk. It is pretty long and it wraps around the front step and continues along the front of the house. I pulled all of the volunteer stuff and mulch up out of the area to the door and I planted irises. I have always loved irises and I have wanted my own. I bought a ton of them and got about half planted. The next area I need to work on has nasty white rock and the black weed barrier that didn't seem to work. It looked stupid because these two areas meet. So I will pick up all the rock, pull up the black stuff, and continue the irises along the front of the house. I spaced them out like you are supposed to, but some day it will be like a fence between our front walk (which is really wide enough to be called a patio) and the yard.

I still can't help but be in a funk. I am feeling very lonely for some reason. Mike has been working a ton and it feels like I have been too. I never seem to get to spend the time I would like with Jake and he can be so much fun right now. He will just giggle and giggle when we play. We went swimming in a kiddie pool I got him and he loved it. I don't know if I could handle being home all the time with Jake, but I sure feel like I miss so much. That makes me sad. He will be eleven months tomorrow. Eleven months! Crap, where has the last year gone??? I'm trying to figure out what we will do for a birthday party and I can't decided how many people to invite and which people. I can't decide what I want to get him as a present.

(I try and try to get this little boy to wear a hat outside and he rips it off in a split second. But he will wear it for half and hour while he is playing in the house!)

a trip to grandma's house

Yesterday was my mother's sixtieth birthday. I called her while I was waiting for someone to show up at daycare to drop Jake off. She sounded pretty good. I know it was a hard one for her though. After I finally got to work and I looked at our light schedule, I asked my charge nurse if I could leave early so I could drive up and surprise my mom on her birthday. I got out of work after a meeting I had that was interesting. I went and picked up a pizza, got gas, got Jake, ran home and packed him some stuff, and then we went and picked up a birthday cake. We headed on out. I waited a bit and then i started trying to call my mother. I couldn't get her over and over again. I kept thinking she was in a meeting. I decided to try her house. It would be like my mom to call in sick on her birthday. She calls in sick every week anyway so why not then. I couldn't get her at home. Then I think she is playing hooky and went shopping somewhere. It involves traveling a couple of hours for her to shop any where so I am cursing about that. Then there is about an hour stretch of road where you have no signal at all. I am sure hoping I didn't waste gas and time on this trip at this point.

So we get to her town. I have to call Mike to tell me how to get to the prison because it is right by the train track. He tells me and I eventually find it. It is four my mom is supposed to work until four thirty. Her car is not in the parking lot. Now I am really mad. So I drive by her house. Not a soul. Crap!!! By this time I really need to pee so that didn't help my temper. I called Mike and started venting. I started heading toward a gas station so I can go to the bathroom and my mom turns around the corner next to me. She doesn't realize for a minute that it is me waving at her.

It was worth the trip. My mom was tickled to death. She was so excited to see us. She liked the camera we bought her. I think she might be able to use it. She tried to stall our being there as long as possible. We ate dinner and Jake was a little stinker. We had cake and I told her we needed to go. Jake was not behaving at all well at this point. He is tired even though he slept the whole way up, THANK GOD!! So I pack up his stuff and she is trying to keep us. She made me take her picture with Jake out front. He wouldn't cooperate very well, but hopefully there was one decent one out of the fifteen I took.

Then we made it out. The interesting thing to me was that it was a pleasant visit. She did not make one of "her comments." I was quite shocked actually. I thought maybe she would have a comment about the camera, but she didn't. She loved it. I was really surprised. She said it was the best present of all for us to surprise her with our visit. It almost made me forget how visits with my mom go. I wish they could all be like this visit.

The drive home kind of sucked though. I drove a tad fast trying to get home. I wanted to get to the road I was familiar with before it got too dark. There are so many deer and antelope along this trip. I really hate dusk when they seem to be out. I did have to come to a hard break. I thought it was a baby antelope or deer up a head in the middle of my lane but it turned out to be a coyote. Not that I really wanted to hit that, but at least there wouldn't be more to run out in front of you like if it were deer or antelope.

So I will have to mark it on the calendar that I had a good visit with my mom. Sadly, there probably won't be another mark like that for a long long time.

Sunday

Jake and I went to church today. I haven't been going much because church is at 9:30. Nap time is basically the same time. I know there is a nursery but I don't want to leave him there. He spends at least nine hours a day in that area of our church and on one of my two days a week that I get him to myself (meaning no daycare) I don't want to leave him there. There was a special service today celebrating the organ player. He has been playing at the church for twenty years and he is wonderful. So we went. Jake loves music. He bounced around to that organ while I was pregnant and he likes it still.

Today these twin girls came and sat in the row behind us with their great grandparents, grandma and mom (who is four or five months pregnant). The twins are one week older than Jake. They came about six weeks early and were born on my due date. So there were lots of baby noises in our area. The girls were noisy at a low level constantly. Jake made some noise but a couple of times he was very noisy. I got up and took him out. We went out in the fellowship hall and I let him crawl around for awhile and then things were better. When the service was over I had two people very rudely tell me that the church has a crying room and they provide a nursery for a reason. I was shocked. We also had countless people tell us how glad they are to hear the youth of the church. Our congregation is pretty old. I would say the average age is probably about 65 - of those at the service it might even be older. They keep having meetings and trying all sorts of things to bring in younger people and families. Anyway I didn't hear anyone say a thing to the family of the twins. I am pretty upset about this. I try to be considerate of others. I know there is nothing more annoying than trying to listen and someone is letting their kid scream. That is why I take mine out. How are kids supposed to learn if they don't practice? I obviously don't mean children as young as Jake.

This really upset me. I don't know if these people thought all of the noise was coming from my child or not. One of my coworkers keeps inviting me to come to services at her church. They have a new minister. It is the Methodist church in the town that I now live in as opposed to the Methodist church that I go to in the town we used to live in. The two towns are connected and I actually probably live farther from the church in this town than the other church. But now I am really tempted to go. The one problem is that service is still at 9:30. She did say that when school starts the time changes and I'm pretty sure she said at 10:30 or 11 so that would be better. I don't know. My best friend's daughter was there with me for one of the people and she was also horrified. The next thing you know her grandpa was told and grandpa is one of the pillars of the church. He wanted to know exactly who those people were and he wanted to have words with them. I didn't tell him. I actually didn't know who the one fellow was. But anyway...

So that has had me down all day. We went shopping after church, like everyone else in town, and that was a horrible experience. I ended up spending over three hundred dollars and it didn't seem like I got that much stuff. I did buy formula though and thank goodness I have been able to breast feed this long!!! The nurse at the allergist's office said Jake would need to drink rice milk and I assumed we could start that at age one. I have been drinking it and using it on cereal since that appointment but it very plainly says not to give to children under the age of 5 without consulting a doctor. So I need to double check at our next appointment which is just before Jake's first birthday. It seems as though I might have typed this before... Anyway, I sure hope we can give him the rice milk because it is a lot cheaper and a whole lot less stinky than Nutramigen! I haven't blamed Jake for not wanting to drink that stuff.

I mentioned in my last post we have had a rough week. I kept telling them at daycare he was teething. They kept telling me they thought he had another ear infection. He does have a nasty nose and he is pulling his ears but both of those can go with teething. I keep telling them that the doctor said he will pull his ears for a long time and that it is now a habit not just a sign of an ear issue. Well his eye teeth broke through. He now has twelve!!! teeth through the gums. He still has a big blood blister over one of his molars that he is working on. Now I'm just wondering if it will make it through before he turns one or not. This child will be able to have steak at his own first birthday party!!!

Big weekend

Getting out of town was a good thing to do. I don't go do it enough. It was really nice that my sister and nephews could come up. I don't get to see my nephews enough and I certainly want the cousins to get to know on another. My nephews really enjoyed trying to teach Jake things to say or noises to make and he thought they were great.

Jake is not the best traveler. He slept most of the way down, but not all of it. He woke up as I was getting into heavier traffic and cried the last forty five miles or so. It was great. Traffic, screaming baby. Two of my favorite things. Actually traffic wasn't that bad and I took the back way down on a toll road so traffic was actually pretty light. It was worth the 34 miles of tolls! I went home on the interstate and it was horrible. I had more than fifty miles of construction and at one point the traffic completely stopped. That was about twenty five miles north of Denver so it wasn't even in the city. I'm not even sure why we were stopped. I watched vehicle after vehicle take the ditch and go over to the frontage road. After about 20 minutes I did the same thing. I probably would have been there between a half hour and hour if I hadn't so I was glad I did. So in the midst of this standing still on the way home Jake woke up so that made it even worse. He eventually settled down and played some.

We stayed in a pretty nice place. We had a full kitchen, two bedrooms, two bathrooms and then a living room with fire place and of course a sofa bed so it worked well for all of us. We were able to easily get carry out and have all the boys sitting at a table to eat. It was great and we didn't have to spend so much time waiting and it was less expensive since we didn't have drinks and tip. Plus there wasn't any whining in a restaurant to put up with.

Jake got to go on his first train ride followed by his first bus ride all to get us to the zoo. We spent six hours at the zoo and it was great. I haven't been to the Denver Zoo since I was in high school. I don't think it was the most exciting thing for Jake though because he could hardly see anything. We did get some nice up close and personal views of the lions and he liked that. He says "kitty" pretty well and now he can roar like a lion. That and make monkey noises. My youngest nephew has the tendency to wander off and that kept being a problem because there were a ton of people there. The hard part was taking the bus and train back, especially because we missed catching a bus by about two minutes and then we had to wait for 20 minutes and everyone was so tired.

We went to the Children's Museum the next day and I wasn't sure what to expect but I think everyone really had a good time. I don't think my sister was thinking her boys were going to enjoy it as much as they did, but they sure did. It had more stuff to do than we expected. There was even a nice area for the littlest guys and that was great. Jake loved it. He had a huge fit when I took him out of the baby area to go find his cousins. We even went back later while they were doing some other stuff and he was just happy as can be.

I got a little bit of shopping in and got some things we needed. I was able to go to a grocery store where I could get some things for Jake that I found on a few allergy websites. It was nice to not have to pay the higher prices and shipping! Now we will just have to try some of these things and see if he will eat them.

My sister brought me tons of stuff. I could barely get Jake and I into the SUV. She brought us a picnic table for Jake, another car seat, a little bike for him, a little grocery cart, books, toys, and bags and bags of clothes. I bought four big tubs to put the clothes in and they just fit. They are a bit big for now but it is going to be great to have so many really nice clothes when we get to 3T and up. We are practically set which is nice.

Jakey got to go swimming for the first time and LOVED it. He was kicking around and just having a ball. We were in the pool for a bit and his lips starting getting blue so I took him out. I wrapped him up and less than five minutes later he was trying to get away from me to get himself back into the water.

The week has been hard though. It has been really busy and we have had a couple of really bad nights. One big thing has changed and I'm not sure how I am dealing with it. Jake has started taking formula. They kept offering it to him at daycare and all the sudden this week he stopped throwing the bottle back at them. This is good since my milk supply (both my personal one and the one it the freezer) is diminishing. It is really hard though. In some respects I am excited. I am tired of being a slave to the breast pump. But this is also something I could do for him that no one else could. So it is making me sad. Part of me wants to keep going for a long time and another part of me is wanting to skip the weening and just be done with it all. I am looking forward to being able to have some peanut butter or peanuts and when I am not at home. To add to my week I have been a touch hormonal. AF stopped by for the first time since having Jake. I feel like all my moodiness from all the missed months has been saving up for this visit. Mike says I'm not that bad, but he values his life and body parts so he might lie.

I just keep wonder what happened to my baby because I suddenly have a little boy. I wonder when he will be

walking. He will walk holding only one of my hands. He has been pushin

g around the cart my sister brought as well as another toy he has and it is killing me. I know he is still using assistance but to see him moving upright without a person is really something. It scares me too. I keep looking around and wondering what he will get into, trip over, bonk, grap, or even worse, climb, next.

We are outta here - almost

We never go anywhere. Our jobs don't allow us much freedom to escape. This weekend Jake and I are making a break for it though. We are driving down to Denver tomorrow and my sister and her boys are driving up. Jake hasn't gone on an overnight stay away before. (we stayed over at my inlaws once but it was because I was on call). I am so glad to get out of town. I have been looking forward to this for quite awhile.

I don't know how much stuff to take with us though. I hope I get it right (I always pack too much). My sister is loading her SUV with stuff to pass on to us so we have to have plenty of room in the back. I love free stuff. I am a bit worried about the trip, however. Jake has been screaming a lot riding in the car and that is just around town. At first I thought he didn't like his new car seat and then it seemed to be fine. I am wondering again if there is something uncomfortable about this not inexpensive car seat.

I wish Mike was able to get out of town with us but it is no husbands. Not that he could get away anyway. He has made all these promises about what he is going to accomplish while we are gone. I am hopeful that he will get half of what he has said done. The garage is still completely packed with stuff - some that we actively need, but I can't physically get to it. There are cabinets up in the garage that he is going to take down to make room for his work bench and he has promised he will put them in the laundry room. I want that more than anything. There is no storage in our laundry room and I want to be able to put the soap and the rest of the household cleaners there, up out of a little boy's reach. I was able to type "little boy" without crying. He is growing up so fast! You can even see one of his molars in this picture.

I haven't seen my sister or nephews since Christmas so I am excited to see them. We are all going to stay in the same suite so we are going to get our share of each other really fast. Jake is such a terrible sleeper. I hope the boys don't keep him up and then in turn he keeps them up. I am excited and my car is even fixed. It had to have some work done that Mike couldn't get the parts to fix without going through the dealer and they flat out told us they would charge us this horrendous amount for the part to buy, but if they fixed it wouldn't cost anywhere as much. Does that make any sense at all??? It cost half what they quoted us for the part to have them fix it and put in the exact same part. I don't get it.

2 years

Today is our second wedding anniversary. Our lives have changed so much. Mine more than Mike's. I'm a little worried that Mike is afraid to take care of Jake on his own. I had to work last night and Mike took Jake over to his parents' house as soon as I left. He stayed there with Jake most of the time but Grandma fed him and changed his diaper. Mike said he played with him most of the time, but I worry about that.

But anyway, two years and we have been together just shy of ten years. There were lots of times I never thought we wouldn't make to this point. Wow! I wonder if this is what Mike saw for himself ten years ago. I will have to ask him.

Happy Fourth of July!!!

Happy July 4th (at least it was still the 4th when I started this). This has always been one of my favorite holidays. I'm not entirely sure why, but I would say it is probably because it was one of the time all my family would get together at my grandma's house. We would at Easter too and that wasn't such a big deal to me. I don't know but the 4th was almost as big as Christmas and honestly it might be my favorite holiday now. (I tend to get sad at Christmas because I miss those family get-togethers so much).

I happen to live in a state that allows fireworks so things have been nuts around here. I don't know how people can afford to set them off every night but some of the neighbors seem to. That isn't so great when the baby is trying to sleep and at 10pm the people across the street are lighting up the roll of 500 fire crackers! The law is that you are supposed to stop at 10 except for on the 4th when you can go until midnight. That law is hardly enforced. How can they? Mostly the police just try to keep people hurting themselves. So those of us who keep early hours suffer for a week or ten days (I don't remember how early they are allowed).

We usually get fireworks for just the fourth but Mike knew he would have to go to work some time tonight so he got some last night instead. We never go nuts like some people, but we spend our money where it matters. He always does such a good job. The way he arranges them and sets them off really is outstanding. Most years he uses a cigar to light them, but this year he impressed everyone by using his portable blow torch. (you may notice I said his portable blow torch - he does have one that is not easily portable. why?) So it was funny, there were people across the street setting some off from their backyard but they stopped and watched Mike's display and continued with theirs. The people directly across the street came out after a few minutes and sat and watched. It was funny because last night was the only night they didn't have any of their own (dad was at work). I just couldn't help but think that the neighbors should just get together and have a really nice display all at once.

We are still working on getting settled. I hate it and can't wait until the last of the boxes is unpacked. There are two things apparent to me. The first is that we have too much crap and the second is that I just don't have enough time to unpack stuff and spend quality time with Jake. So things are getting slowly unpacked. We are very happy that we are down to just one place as of the first of the month. We were still cleaning and having to take care of the yard there so now we can focus all of our attention here.

Jake took two really good naps today so I was able to get some work done. I finally have only one box in my kitchen that is full and it isn't going to be unpacked for awhile. We still have some kitchen boxes in the basement but things are looking much, much better. I took a load of collapsed boxes out to the trash in the alley and there was a party going on at the neighbors. I was walking back to my yard and someone yelled my name. It turns out the "dumba**es that are putting their fence up wrong" (according to Mike) across the alley are family of one of my friend's/coworkers. Her stepson, his wife and their baby moved there a few months ago. I didn't know. They were having the baby's first birthday party. My friend came over and wanted to know where Jake was and I told her he was napping. She said she would really like to see him and she would love for me to bring him over when he woke up. So when he woke up later I called her phone. She didn't answer and I kind of peaked at what was going on. Things had quieted down so I thought they were finishing up, no big deal. Well she called me back and said to bring that baby over right away. I thought we were just going to the fence so she could see him and show her husband because he hasn't seen him in a long time. She holds him and says come on in. I felt a bit uneasy about that. I was dressed in my grungy clothes and I didn't want to crash the party. The next thing I know that is exactly what we did. There were tons of people there and several that I know. In know time flat Jake is settled in on "Grandpa Dave's" knee and they are getting ready to open presents. So we watched. I didn't know how to make an exit. I felt bad. I got a less than pleased look from the baby's mom and from the other grandma. It just so happens the other grandma is a nurse at the hospital in OB. We ate no food and consumed no beverages, but I still feel bad. I am thinking that we will go and get a small gift and drop it off and apologize for crashing a baby party. Our boys are the same age and live right across the alley. I want to get off on the right foot! I just hope Mike hasn't done something stupid also.

So we came home and ate dinner and then when it came time, we went to my best friend's parents' house. They live about one block from where the town's firework display is set off. Her parents where gone but we still hung out there. I was amazed at Jake's reactions. He wasn't scared at all! He sat on Aunt Jojo's knee or her daughter's the whole time and watched. People were setting them off everywhere, including Joy's husband. I mean right there and he just loved it. I thought he would cry at the noise or be startled, but no, not one bit!! He even loved the sparklers we did at the end. I couldn't believe he stayed up so late either! He had a ball. I'm just sad Mike couldn't have been there to see it.

One of my coworkers had a baby yesterday and I thought I would make her dinner. That is the thing that I appreciated the most when I had Jake. I'm not sure what

to make. She has a two and half year old. I don't want to make something totally wrong. If

I ask her what she would like me to make she will tell me not to make anything. Any suggestions?

I took all of these pictures today. It was our progression through the day. The two pictures with Molly were taken at different times. She is so good with Jake!

Not there yet

Well, we are mostly moved in. We have a bit of stuff left at the other house. Now we are living in mountains of boxes. I have been trying to unpack but it is hard. Tomorrow is my day off but I need to go work on getting more junk out and cleaning! We have tons of cleaning to do. I can't wait until it is down to just one house and just one mess. We can't even start adjusting because we can't find anything.

Are we done yet?

The answer is no. We are not done moving yet. We have moved tons of boxes and crap, I mean stuff over to the house but no furniture in place. That comes this Saturday and I can hardly wait.



I'm trying to figure out where I want everything and how I want to put everything away. I am not going to sleep well until the last box has been unpacked or put to storage in its proper home. I'm a bit OCD like that. I'm not a neat freak by any means, but it makes me anxious to know all my stuff is everywhere and no where at the same time. I've got to know where my stuff is!!!



Jake is being a little monster. We have been helping a coworker of mine out some lately. She is caring for her granddaughter for an undetermined amount of time. This sweet little girl is a couple of months younger than Jake and goes to the same daycare. I have been picking her up and keeping her when grandma has to work late shifts. This little girls is just a dream. Jake likes her and frequently behaves better when she is around, like he has to impress her or something. Well, I picked them both up today and she played quietly in the car on the way home and Jake screamed. I don't mean cried, I mean SCREAMED for almost twenty minutes. I could find no reason. Nothing was pinching him or too tight. He is just a giant crab. He is working on both of his bottom first year molars and it is going to kill me. Both sides of the gum are swollen to crazy amounts and have giant blisters. They aren't blood blisters like the first two but they are still ugly. He isn't eating worth a darn. I don't know what to try to give him.

He has been a terrible stinker about taking his allergy medicine too. He just hates getting medicine. It is a battle to get any in his mouth. I draw up 1.5 doses and hope he swallows half of that. His skin has been worse lately, but I have been eating things I shouldn't I haven't been able to give up dairy completely. I love dairy. My mom brought some brownies last week and they were loaded with eggs. On top of that, Mike brought home a container of my favorite ice cream. That is my weakness. I love ice cream. So I think the worsening of Jake's skin is because of that. I have felt so bad that I am doing much much better about what I am eating. I feel guilty that I am making his skin itch.

Update

Jake is doing so much better. He is happy and ornery. I love it. He is still teething and drooling like a fool. We are doing better on the tantrums. He realizes that I'm putting him back to bed now.

Some changes have happened at daycare. One of the women is no longer there as of the end of last week. She could be a bit difficult. She liked knowing things and not sharing that information - like my son's allergies. She liked doing things her way, even if that isn't how the daycare wanted it done. My son liked her. I liked her, yet was afraid of her. I knew I didn't want to tick her off. One day she was there, the next she wasn't. Okay. So two girls - her kids were high school age - took her place. One seems eerily nice. She is always smiling and just loves babies. That is good. She just gives me the creeps a little. She just always seems to be about two feet away from me and she is tiny and startles me. You don't see her coming. She is just suddenly there smiling up at you. This isn't bad, I know. My son seems to like her. The other girl... not so happy with. I don't know if she still works there even. She started Monday. She was there with the director when I got there and she seemed fine. Tuesday morning I got there and no one was there. I didn't have a clue what to do. I didn't know a number to call. I was panicking. I called my husband. He was in bed but was going to drag himself down to wait so I could go to work. When she got there it wouldn't have been pretty. She showed about five minutes later. The fog was bad and she had to come from about forty miles away. Not okay, but... what can I do. Yesterday we had to wait but she was there to unlock the door at 6. Today? Nothing. No one!!! I got the number for the director after what happened Tuesday. I called her and said there is no one here at 0610. The church was unlocked because the men's group has a breakfast and bible study on Thursday mornings. I went to see who was there. My best friend's dad and the husband of one of my L&D nurses were two of the men there. They said they could watch him. (their faces lit up when they saw us). They were worried about me getting to work on time and they said they would be happy to take Jake until someone got here. (I actually called the director after I saw them the first time). In the mean time, one of my coworkers showed up with her granddaughter who is six and a half months old. We talked to the director and waited until we couldn't wait any longer and left the babies with the men. The director chewed out my coworker for our doing that. I don't think she understood how well we know these men. I barely made it to work on time. We get severely penalized for being one minute late.

So what will tomorrow bring? We will see. Thank goodness we go an hour later. I think I might blow a gasket if there is no one there again. I NEVER once had that problem with the other woman. Not once, not even when the weather was awful.

Must keep packing. We were hoping to make the move this weekend, but that isn't going to work out. We can move boxes to the garage and the basement, but the carpets have to be cleaned still :( Not what we were hoping for. It will probably rain anyway.

Nine months old!

Jake is nine months old today and I can't believe it. Guess how we spent our day? Waiting, waiting and waiting some more. To make it even more fun, we were waiting on an empty stomach. Jake had tubes put in his ears today. The doctor was almost three hours behind schedule. I thought it was going to be bad to have to wait with a baby until 11am for surgery. Well that is nothing compared to waiting until almost 2pm with a hungry baby for surgery. I would have rescheduled, but this is the only time I could get it in for the next six weeks. We couldn't have waited six weeks!

So it went well and he is doing better. Hopefully now we won't have to be on antibiotics all the time. Hopefully now Jake will feel better. Hopefully now Jake will put on a little weight and that will make the doctor happy. He dropped under nineteen pounds with this last bout of illness. I just can't believe my little baby is nine months old. He is going to be a year before I know it!

He is doing so many new things. He pulls up on whatever he can. He walks on his toes with help. He gets his legs into his army crawl now. My favorite new thing is what he is doing right this minute - temper tantrums!!!

Yippee!

Well, I have great news. We are moving. I am so excited except for the packing, moving, and unpacking part of it. I just can't wait to get out of this house!!!

Back in January an opportunity presented itself to us and we thought it was wonderful. A former coworker of mine approached me about renting/buying his house. We talked and he said come and see the house and we will talk. Well, right now, I have a short list of things I don't like about the house and that is it. They are also livable things that maybe someday we can take care of.

There is so much more space and we NEED it! All of the rooms are bigger than we have now. The basement is so much nicer. There are three bathrooms! The kitchen has a ton more space and the back yard is completely fenced like a normal yard. I am so looking forward to being able to put the dogs out to play. I will be able to PARK IN THE GARAGE!!!! There is central air. You can't see a breeze coming in the windows. There is insulation in the walls. I have also know the last two owners and I know they both have taken good care of the house.

I hate packing. I really, really hate packing. I have packed fifty boxes as of yesterday and you can't really see that I have done anything (if you don't open closet doors or kitchen cupboards). That is depressing. Mike took a day off to help me. He has packed a big fat zero boxes.
I have to get back to packing but I thought I would just stop and write a note. As you can see, meal time often ends in the bathtub. I think Jake makes a mess just so he can get in the tub. He cries when you take him out now and not when you put him in. Saturday was his first time playing in the yard and Mommy got out some bubbles. He wanted to get the bottle out of my hand and try and drink it. He thought the bubbles where pretty cool if he couldn't see the bottle.

Here I come!!!

Jake is a man of motion. He is all over the place now. But it is a funny crawl. It is kind of a modified army crawl. It works for him though! You have to watch out. That boy is across the room in no time. He is trying to wedge himself in the tinniest of spaces too. He sure is funny to watch. I would worry about his legs if I didn't know how well they work because they don't do much work at all in this crawl. His upper body is sure going to be strong!




He really needs a hair cut and you can tell in these pictures. His hair seems to be getting a lot thicker and growing so fast!



In the last picture you can see the glow of Ophi's eyes. There seems to be one animal or another always watching Jake move at a not too far distance. It is funny. I don't know if they are trying to see what he can do or watching to see if he is going to get into trouble. Molly is really funny because she gets behind him as he goes and if he stops she licks his head. I don't know if she is praising him or encouraging him to keep going. It is funny either way.

Birthday cake

For my birthday I had something that totally goes against everything Jake can eat. I had this lovely layered - devil's food cake, ganache, cheesecake, ganache, devil's food, slathered wit more ganache and topped this chocolate pieces. It was to die for! I ordered it from New York. It cost about as much to have it sent as the cake did and I don't care. I loved it.

However, I ate it alone. Mike was home and had been home all weekend. He took a nap all evening!!! I had to eat leftovers on my own and then eat cake on my own. I was so mad at him. He got up just in time for me to go to bed, that turkey!

At least the next day I went out with some friends after work to a Mexican restaurant and had margaritas and ponchos and leftover cake. My friends enjoyed it! That was nice at least.

Happy Mother's Day!!!

Happy Mother's Day to all! I wish this day were going a little different for us, but I am still grateful that I am a mother. Jake is sick. Again. I'm sick. AGAIN. We are waiting for the urgent care to open right now. We believe we will actually get to see a doctor today and not one of the PA's. I sure hope we don't have to see the PA we saw on Wednesday because she was a freaking pump on a log. I have gotten to cuddle Jake a lot the past few days. (he won't sleep at night unless I am holding him). Maybe it is the lack of sleep, but it still seems a bit surreal to me. This is my little baby. This IS my little boy. This is MY baby. I am so grateful to be his mother and we will make it through all these bumps in the road. We have each other.

Poor baby!

Poor Jake had allergy testing done today. Normally they do the skin testing on the back, but we couldn't. I was hoping to do blood work but they wanted immediate answers because the doctor only is in my town once a week. We would have to go back and get our results. So we had to use poor Jake's thighs to do the test because the eczema on Jake's back was too bad. They only did 17 different things I think. I was just sure he was going to be allergic to the cat and dogs but luckily he isn't. On the drive to the visit I was mentally making my plan of what to do with my animals and I was so relieved not to have to do anything!

So that was the good or even great news. It goes steeply down the mountain from there. Jake is allergic to milk, peanuts, and eggs. They had to redo some of the food tests because his reaction to eggs was so large that it covered the tests beside it. So then we had to do them on his upper arm. Those went much better. He actually fell asleep while we were waiting for those to react. But those results just confirmed the milk and peanut allergies. This sucks big time. I already knew about the milk. I figured that one out. He is still allergic to grapes but they didn't test for those. Anyway, is there a chance he could out grow these allergies???? Milk - probably. Eggs? The doctor said not likely because of the severity of the reaction. I am really, really hoping he is wrong. I do tons of baking. Eggs and dairy are in so many things. Peanuts - the doctor said he is doubtful. I feel bad for Jake, but we can work with this one. Peanut butter is one of my favorite things and I have limited it over the last year and a half because of Jake. I had some early when I was pregnant because there wasn't much protein I could eat. Now I'm told that may have been the cause. Well, if I hadn't had protein wouldn't we have more serious problems at the moment? So they (the nurse, not the doctor) tell me that soy is closely related to peanuts so we shouldn't have that either. Holy shit!!! I think she knows what she is telling me, but that means he can pretty much eat fresh veggies and fruits and meat, and then everything else has to be made at home so you can be sure what the heck is in it.

So I read the stuff they gave me. I got onto some of the websites from which the readings were obtained. I discovered that about 20% of small children with a peanut allergy will out grow it. That is better than I thought. I also read that only about 5% of the children with a peanut allergy also have trouble with soy. So this mommy is not cutting the soy yet. He doesn't even eat much but he still manages to get soy. If need be I will, but not freaking yet! Probably milk, maybe eggs, and a small possibility of peanuts. This is going to be hard for awhile but we will work it out. The doctor said he will retest in one year and see what is happening.

So what does he get to eat now? Still on breast milk, still trying not to take hypoallergenic formula, the stinker. Now I am supposed to eat around his allergies. MY LIFE WITHOUT DAIRY?!?!?!?! Awhile ago I opened the fridge door and looked around. Top shelf - yogurt, pudding, applesauce, dessert wine, milk x 2, butter sticks, spreadable butter, water, breast milk, mango baby food, and pear juice. Great. Next shelf - sour cream, cream cheese, something else dairy that I can't remember, fat free half and half, chocolate, tortillas, pizza, leftover chicken, leftover beef, and more butter. Bottom shelf - beer, eggs, a tube of breakfast sausage, more butter, applesauce, something from Mike's lunch in aluminum foil (yikes!). In the drawers - carrots, onions, garlic, cheese, cheese and more cheese, and deli ham and turkey. It was cottage cheese on that other shelf. I LOVE dairy. I can drastically limit eggs and avoid peanuts, but no dairy will kill me!

I just have to figure something out for my sweet boy's birthday cake. That is what keeps running through my mind. I know substitutes for eggs, but eggs and butter?? I have to figure something new out. Poor little guy, but hopefully we can get his skin well now. We did get daily allergy medicine, a different cream, and an epipen just in case...

It's hard

This morning was hard. We get into patterns and it is hard to deviate from the routine especially when you are only half awake when you get started. I am used to getting up in the morning and letting Lois out of his kennel first and then going to the bathroom and he would follow behind. I would pet him as I peed. Then I would let Molly out and take her for her walk. Well, we have been leaving Molly out at night the last two weeks since there have been strange things happening in the neighborhood. Besides she can handle it now. This morning it threw me off to open my bedroom door and walk out in the hall and almost trip over my giant dog. But then I went to let Lois out and I just stood there. I made Mike throw his kennel away before I came back from the vets and from taking Jake to the doctor for yet another ear infection. I just stood there. Molly nosed my hand a couple of times and snapped me back. So I went to the bathroom and took her out.

I kept going with my routine, but when I went to take a shower I stood there and held the door open and waited. Most mornings Lois would beat me to the bathroom for my shower but sometimes he would be behind, but either way he had to be in the bathroom while I was taking a shower. I don't know why but for all the years I had him this was a pattern he set. He used to have to check on me by peaking in the back of the shower but he stopped doing that regularly a few years back. It hit me really hard this morning when he didn't come that he would never be there again. I got in the shower and cried. Mike doesn't understand. He has always had a dog around but he doesn't form the attachment and the bond that I do. But the animals don't bond to him so much either.

I know there are animal people and there are people who don't like animals. There isn't a whole lot of middle ground. I know there are people who love dogs and can't see what a person could possibly see in a cat. There are some people like me who love them both and other animals too. It is hard for nonpet people to understand that it is very much like losing a human member of your family. I just miss him. I know I needed to do this but I was really hoping he would be one of those cats that lives into their twenties. Lois was the kind of cat that people that hate cats don't mind so much. He was really good with people. One of the things that is so hard now is that whenever I was upset he would try to comfort me. Now I don't have that.

Goodbye my friend

I had to do something very difficult today. I had to put a cat to sleep. Lois, a male cat, has been sick for awhile. He had digestive problems and he kept losing weight. A couple of days ago, Mike yelled at Lolo to get down. I fell asleep rocking Jake. I looked around because I thought he was up on a table or on Jake's jumper or something (he liked to go places he knew he wasn't allowed to go). Mike told him to get down again and at that point I realized he was on me. He was so light that I could not feel his weight on me at all.

He was a good cat with an ornery streak. He came to me when he was about 2 years old. It was when his first owner took him to be neutered that they learned he had been incorrectly named for his gender. When I got up the very first morning he had living in my house, I found him hanging in the curtains. He was snagged up in the sheers and the rod and bent in a V. He was fat then. He wasn't used to other cats and it took a bit of adjusting for him to fit be comfortable in my home. There were three cats then. If you scolded him at all it deeply hurt his feelings and he would hold a grudge something awful. I got a kitten two weeks before Lois came to live with me and very quickly they formed a bond. He raised her. He let her "nurse" on him. She actually found a teet and suckled. He groomed her and played with her.

He was very playful. He loved to lay on you. He was very friendly. He loved to greet guests. He always reached out and touched you with a paw to get your attention. He would get on your lap and then he would very slowly work his way up so that he was up as high as he could be on you. He was a bit sneaky and thought you wouldn't notice what he was doing. I got another kitten shortly after I had to put my oldest cat to sleep. Lois raised her also. She was a little pistol and went to live with my mom. She still sucked on Lois even though she was five. She sucked a clump of fur on his chest. She would come push up to his chest and he would groom her. He was a care taker. He even gave his people a bath. I was very sad when I had to start closing him out of the bedroom after Mike came to live with us. I didn't think it was fair because the cats had been there first, but Mike claimed to be allergic to cats.

Good bye my dear friend, Lois. You will always be in my heart. I am sad that Jake didn't get to know you better. You were so good with kids. I love you and I'm sorry.

My boy!

I can't believe how fast he is growing! We seem to take two steps forward and one step back though. He will do well with his sleeping and then like this weekend he will be horrible about going to sleep at night. Then he will SCREAM in his crib so hard he makes himself sick. Mommy is so tired. He got me up at three and I was finally able to go back to sleep about 3:50 but my alarm went off at 4:20. Mommy has been the walking dead today. She should be in bed because Jake is actually still in his bed.

He has cried and fussed a ton too. He doesn't want to be put down unless it is in a shopping cart or stroller. Then you have to keep them moving. He will play for awhile and then stop and cry at you. He is really yanking my hair again right now and gets my glasses off as soon as he can get anywhere near my face.

He is growing and changing so much though. He does sit and plat with more complex toys. He still doesn't crawl yet but he is so close. He will scoot backwards or turn in circles on the floor until he gets where he wants to be.

He hasn't gotten any more teeth, but I think he is working on it. So I think that was some of the problem this weekend. That and he was having trouble being constipated. Now that he is eating so much he is having a little trouble. Baby food with meat seems to be the worst.

He hardly takes his pacifier anymore. He does chew and suck his left thumb a lot now. My mom is just going to eat that up. She wants him to be left handed. I wouldn't mind it just because I am so left handed. It is easier for me to help and teach left handed.

I can hardly keep my eyes open. I have to go take the dogs out before I start drooling!