Moving

So since blogger won't let me upload more pictures I have decided to move my blog.  This is its new home.

The Absence

My temporary absence from the blogging world has been due primarily to my inability to load photos onto my blog.  I sat down a few weeks ago to blog about Elijah's 2 year old birthday party and was told by blogger that I was over my quota for photos.  I have tried again a few times to do the same post, but it is still not allowing me to post photos.  I don't really get it since I know other people who have way more photos on their blog than mine and, as far as I know, they don't pay for photo storage.  Anyway, that's why this post is going to be sans pictures and just a quick update of how things are going lately.  I still haven't decided if I'm going to try to continue this blog here or if I'm going to have to move it to another location that won't suddenly tell me I can't put photos on my blog anymore. =/

But here's what's been going on.  We had Elijah's birthday party and while it turned out okay, I was pretty disappointed because it ended up being primarily Mike's family.  Hardly any of our friends made it, none of our friends with kids came, and my mom got sick and ended up in the hospital that weekend so she wasn't able to make it either.  She's better now--at least better enough to not be in the hospital anymore and back at work.  I don't think she feels completely recovered, but at least she got to come up this past weekend and see the boys since she missed the party.

In addition, I have been having a miserable time trying to get Simon to nap during the day.  With Elijah he was a good sleeper until we quit swaddling him and then, at least, I could get him to sleep in the bouncy chair.  Nothing works consistently with Simon.  Not the crib, not the pack and play, not the swing or the bouncy chair, not even holding him or putting him in a sling and wearing him keeps him asleep when he needs to sleep.  It really is crazy-making.  The Sunday after Elijah's birthday party when the whole weekend had been a giant ball of stress and Simon wouldn't sleep no matter what and everything, in my mind, about the birthday had gone wrong, I spent pretty much the entire day crying and twice I had to put Simon down crying in his crib and go into the other room and punch a pillow because I was so frustrated and exhausted.  So my doctor concluded I have post-partum depression and put me on zoloft.  I am pretty sure I had it when I had Elijah, too, but it just wasn't diagnosed.

So then we had Simon's two month appointment where I was told he is laying on the right side of his head too much and that I need to do more tummy time with him and try to get him to lie on the other side of his head when he's on his back.  Yes, I have plenty of time to worry about tummy time with a speedy gonzalez toddler running around the house!  And she suggested we start weaning him off swaddling because he might roll over soon.  So as if sleeping wasn't enough of a problem now we're swaddling him with one arm out and trying to get him to lie on the left side of his head.

However, the big kicker came when I told her I was on zoloft.  She said that it was more important for me to take care of myself than anything else, but I did NOT like the way she reacted when I told her since Simon apparently is getting it through my breastmilk.  And I think I could go off it and do all right if I could just get him on a consistent sleeping schedule, but I don't want to just let him cry it out, especially not at two months old.  So I guess I get to pick my guilt: guilt for letting him cry to sleep or guilt for pumping him full of drugs through my milk?

Honestly I'd be willing to try some sleep training like we did with Elijah (where he cries but isn't left alone to deal with it all by himself) if he were only a couple months older.  So do I 1) feel crazy for a month and risk losing it with either child but not get him to sleep and not pump him full of drugs or, 2) pump him full of drugs but not get him to sleep or, 3) get him to sleep but not pump him full of drugs but force him to learn to sleep through crying when he's only two months old.  I don't know.  I don't have any idea what the solution is.  It is the quintessential no-win situation.

So that's what's been going on with us.  Cheery, eh?  I wish I could share some cute pictures of Simon smiling to lighten the mood but blogger is being a bitch. ::gives evil eye:: TTFN!

The Sound and the Fury

So even though I was an English major in college, I never actually read that book, but I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that it was not about a stay-at-home mom trying desperately not to make the same sleep blunders with her second baby that she did with her first and having little success because her older child keeps getting in the way.  But that's what my story is about.

Raise the roof

You can probably read earlier blogs and get a fuller idea of my difficulties getting Elijah to sleep.  One big problem is that he was so used to being swaddled that when we had to abruptly stop swaddling him, he couldn't adjust to lying down and going to sleep without the swaddler.  That isn't the current problem with Simon.  As soon as he loses that Moro reflex, I am going to start weaning him off swaddling, but we're not there yet.

 Tummy time

The other problem I had with Elijah is the same one I am now having with Simon--it takes 20 flipping minutes to get him to go to sleep during the day for a nap and then he only sleeps for 30 minutes.  It makes no sense to me that he can sleep for 3 to 4 hours at night but then during the day, he can only nap for 30 minutes.  I have read tons of stuff and I know that 30 minutes is a sleep cycle, but if he can put himself back to sleep after a cycle at night, then why not during the day?  I'm assuming part of the problem is that he is used to going to sleep in my arms and then being put down.  And all the sleep experts tell you to put them down drowsy but awake, but with both my boys all that ever did was cause them to wake all the way back up.  I've been trying to get Simon to fall asleep on his back in bed (either his crib or the pack and play bassinet downstairs) but this where Elijah throws a wrench in the works.

Mike's old Daniel Boone cap

See, I am willing to take the time to "train" Simon to fall asleep in his crib or pack and play by picking him up and soothing him and then putting him back down until he learns.  I happen to know it works because I have managed it a few times in the pack and play while Elijah is napping.  But this will take a long time at first until he gets it and it's impossible to just buckle down and put in the time it takes when you have a toddler running around making a ton of noise.  I could go upstairs and shut Elijah out of the room but that usually upsets him, like he thinks he's being punished.  Plus, I don't like being unable to see what Elijah is doing for longer than like 2-3 seconds.  That's how you wind up with crayola walls.  However, I can't do it with Elijah present because he makes too much noise for Simon to fall asleep and after awhile I get fed up.  But something's gotta give because right now Simon is demanding so much of my attention because he's fussy all day because... drum roll please... he's not getting enough sleep!

What a merry-go-round.  Actually, I guess "merry" isn't a good adjective.  More like a crazy-go-round.  For most things I just think we just have to make it until Simon is a little older.  But if the sleep habits start bad now then it's going to be way harder to fix them later--I know from experience.  *sigh*  Well Simon is asleep now and if it wouldn't wake him up, I'd probably go bang my head against the wall, but I don't want to wake up the kids.

Elijah Language 104

Pool
pih = pig
duh = duck
ah-ooh = apple
sit (this usually sounds like there's an "h" in between the "s" and the "i" but whatever)
clock (sounds like the "l" is removed)
how = house
yeehaw
cow
fow-wah = flower
ah-ja-ja = alligator
tow = towel
puh-poo = purple

And here's the chunky monkey to round it off.

 At least I think he's chunking up finally.

It's Never Easy

The other day I started a post but I was in a really low place so it started to just sound like me throwing myself a huge pity party so I trashed the post.  It was mainly because I was ready to rip my hair out because Simon was crying all day long and nothing would calm him down except nursing.  And while I am grateful that at least I could get him to stop crying by nursing him, it is really difficult to be stuck sitting down with a baby attached to your boob when your toddler wants attention, too.  Elijah, fortunately, doesn't act out against Simon when I can't get up and play with him, but he does start acting more rambunctious, especially towards the dog, in order to get my attention.  Another thing I have to be grateful for is that our dog is such a low key pansy that he generally just walks away or accepts the clobbering, but of course that makes me feel bad that I can't protect him more from Elijah.

But back to Simon's cryfest.  Well, Monday he had his 1 month appointment and while we've had plenty of wet and dirty diapers, he apparently didn't gain very much weight.  This is somewhat upsetting because apparently all the crying was due to being hungry, but I was also glad to know what the problem was because then at least I know what I need to fix.  How to fix it is another issue, though.  While we were at the doctor he got hungry again and so I nursed him there (no small feat since they don't exactly have comfy chairs to sit in or pillows to help you hold the baby up to your chest) and afterwards the nurse weighed him again to see how much he'd consumed and I don't remember the exact number but it was apparently plenty.  Both she and the doctor were pleased with the amount.  So, thank you God, that it wasn't a matter of my milk supply.  I think it's simply that the little stinker keeps falling asleep at the breast so a lot of time he's just comfort nursing and not really consuming the milk.

What kills me is that at night he doesn't seem to have this problem.  He wakes up and nurses well and then goes back to sleep.  That leads me to think he's not getting enough sleep during the day and that's why he keeps falling asleep while nursing.  And of course, there is little to nothing I can do about the noise of Elijah goofing around.  If Simon was a bit older I could try to get him on a napping schedule so that he could nap upstairs in his crib while Elijah and I played downstairs but the napping is so erratic right now it's not feasible to put him upstairs or I'd have to be going up to get him every five minutes.

Soooo... that's where we are.  On top of that I am really stressed out about money and losing weight.  We have debt that we acquired due to junk like our garage door breaking and the hospital needing a payment before we left after we had Simon and we have other medical bills coming, I know.  I really want to be debt-free but it seems like every time I get our credit card paid down to the point where it's almost paid off, something comes up like the garage door and we can't ever get it paid off completely.  And we really need to have some work done on the house that's going to run about $4500.  We were planning on next spring doing it with Mike's Christmas bonus and our tax refund but those won't cover all of it and so we were going to have to put some of it on the card but if we can't get it paid off before then, I just don't even want to think about swimming in that mess.  And I know the debt we have is minimal compared to some other people but I just try so hard to be responsible with our money that it feels like I'm being unfairly punished.  Like I could almost accept the stupid debt if it was from our shopping sprees or elaborate vacations, but we NEVER do either of those things and we still get debt.

And then there's my lack of weight loss.  I know it took me nine months to gain all this weight so I should plan on nine months to get it all off, but when you diet and deny yourself things you want all week and then you don't lose anything, you're still at the same weight, it again feels like unfair punishment.

Well, this post wasn't supposed to be another pity party so I apologize.  I promise the next time I post I'll have fun pictures of the boys and something upbeat to talk about.  In the meantime, here's a picture of Simon saying "Word!"

Elijah Language 103

sah = sock
faw = frog
soo = shoe
two
ah! ee! = uh oh
Certain letters = A, B ("bee" can also refer to any bug he sees), C, D, E, I, O, P, Q, R, T, V, Z
Pie
boo = blue
ee! = eat
pay = plane
ha = hat
koh = squirrel
how = house
pea = please

Playing in the Sprinkler

Mike's mom got Elijah a funny elephant sprinkler and yesterday we tried it out.

Got some water in the face.

Up the nose!