Time to lower the crib mattress!

Swinging and Swimming!

We took Chase on a few adventures this week once his medicine kicked in and he was feeling better.

On Wednesday, we took him to a nearby park and let him try out the swings.  He just loved it.  He didn't really laugh or squeal with excitement or anything, but he just looked around and studied everything from his new vantage point while giving us a big smile whenever he looked back at us.  I didn't get the sharpest pictures ever.  I forgot to put my camera on sports mode...I haven't had to use that setting yet with Chase.  Please forgive the dried slobber on my sleeve. :)  I can honestly say I don't care what I look like when I go out in public anymore.  So scary!

We also gave the slide a shot.  Drew went down with Chase once (I caught that on my video camera, not the still camera).  Chase was so distracted by the slide, that he refused to look up for a picture.  He really wanted to eat the slide! 

 Then on Friday we took him swimming for the first time at Nini and Papa's house.  He really enjoyed it!  We were surprised.  He loved splashing in the pool like he enjoys splashing in the bath. 

Getting sleepy...

8 months

Chase turned 8 months old on Friday.  Gosh, these first 8 months have been so much fun!  It's hard to believe that he's grown up before my eyes.  I take these weekly pictures and I see him growing, but it still amazes me.  I don't remember it happening.  It's like he was born, I blinked, and here I am today!

This should be an interesting next few months.  Now that he's 8 months, we get to try a whole new variety of foods, including finger foods!  He just recently had peaches and once we finish trying those in a few days, I'll figure out what's next.  I'm in new territory so I need to start reading and researching what we should try next.  While I've been off work, I've made tons of baby food, but it's amazing how fast we go through it!  He eats apples nearly everyday.  I think that's the easiest fruit to give him since I usually make his pear sauce fresh since it turns brown in literally 5 minutes.  The worst part of making applesauce is peeling the apples.  It takes me about 30 minutes to peel and core 10 pounds of apples.  That makes about 5 ice cube trays of apple cubes and that will last about 2 to 3 weeks.  I've been scanning the internet and Bed, Bath, and Beyond for apple peelers that are easier than my peeler, but haven't found any!  It's so worth it though.  I've had a lot of fun making his food!

I think we are on the brink of mobility!  Chase is really wanting to start crawling now, but can't quite figure it out.  Currently, when he's in a sitted position he'll rock til he's on his knees and then land on his stomach (this is only when he's on a bed...I haven't let him explore this on the floor).  He'll then begin kicking his legs but then just rolls over onto his back.  Then he rolls back onto his stomach and tries again.  This usually continues until he begins bawling!  Now that he's discovered there is a big world around him, he's just itching to start exploring and he gets frustrated that he can't get there on his own.

8 month stats:
Unofficial weight: 20 pounds
Clothing size:  Pretty much wearing all 6-12 month clothes.  We bought him a few 12 month pajamas recently.  They are two piece pajamas!  He's growing up!
Diaper size:  We're on the last of the Pampers size 2/3.  We recently bought a big box of Huggies size 3 at Sam's.  We've liked them so far.
Eyes:  There has been no change in eye color over the past month. I would say it's official - he's blue eyed!
Hair:  Still a shade of blonde.  Drew thinks he's noticing a little texture to his hair in the back.  Will he be curly/wavy headed like me or will his hair be stick straight like Drew?
Favorite toy:  Definitely his new Fisher Price Silly Town thing.  This is a toy he saw at his second cousins' birthday parties a couple of weeks ago.  He just LOVES it!  Drew and I went on a bit of a shopping spree for Chase early this week and bought him this.  Best purchase ever!
Favorite foods: Still the same as last month.  He can't get enough of his apples, squash, and sweet potatoes.
Least favorite food:  He wasn't totally loving the tartness of the peaches when we started those a couple of days ago. I fixed that my alternating bites of peaches and sweet potatoes and he ate everything up!  Sounds like an awful combination to me, but he opened his mouth wide each time I gave him a bite!
Words:  None, unless you count "ooh" and "whoo" as words!

Also over the course of the month, we've fully made the transition to generic brand formula.  I struggled with this decision for a while.  I know all regular formula is the roughly the same because of FDA guidelines, but I kept thinking I would be shorting him if I gave him "cheap" formula.  Heck, I don't even give him cheap diapers, yet I was actually considering giving him a cheap version of his main nutritional source?!  I asked Chase's doctor about it and he said as long as he's drinking it and tolerating it, any formula on the market is great.  So, I bought the Sam's Club formula and haven't looked back!  The first week of our transition I had one scoop of Sam's Club brand and 3 scoops of Similac in each bottle.  Then the second week, I did 2 scoops of Sam's Club and 2 scoops of Similac.  I did this until it was all Sam's brand.  He spit up a little the first week, but after that he did fantastic.  He loves it, it's about 50% cheaper than the Similac, and the can is so much bigger, so it's less trips to the store!  Win, win, win!

I'm stilling struggling with the transition from nursing.  I said I was going to end that 2 months ago and I'm still doing that part time.  I'm having a harder time with it than Chase is.  Chase couldn't care less.  All he wants is food and doesn't care the source.  I'm really going to try to phase that out over the next few days/weeks, but I get a little emotional when I think it's "the end".  Gosh, I would have NEVER thought I would have thought that about 7 to 8 months ago!

Hump Day Happy

Total Rookies

We are total rookies at this whole parenting thing.  Yesterday I was all worried about the inhaler, but what I should have been worried about that that freaking steriod.  I have a whole list of words that aren't blog appropriate for that steriod.  That steriod turned my sweet, normal, smiley, sleeping angel into a screaming, not-sleeping, angry little demon.  Poor boy had ROID RAGE.  No joke.

Last night was miserable.  He slept from like 7:30 to 10 and then started waking up every few minutes.  I held him for around 11 to midnight while he slept and I played on Facebook.  Then the hours of midnight to 3 were the worst.  Just constant screaming and thrashing around.  I did not recognize my child at all.  I almost felt like I needed to turn in my "mommy card" during the middle of the night.  I had to keep reminding myself that the screaming little boy that looked like my baby was not really him, but a drug-induced version of himself.  All three of us were in tears at some point in the night.  Drew was the hero though and took the brunt of the screaming last night as he took Chase upstairs and swaddled him around 3 and let Chase sleep on our guest bed while Drew slept on the floor.  I think both got about 4 to 5 hours of sleep that way.

You can tell I was desperate when I called the doctor this morning asking for permission to take him off that medicine.  They sympathized, but told us he had to keep taking them.  The nurse said she has children with asthma, so she's all too familiar with the change in personality, and that since he's only 7 months old it may be affecting him pretty strongly.  She suggested giving it to him earlier in the day, but she said if we took him off of it, we would run the risk of this turning into something more severe.  With that, enough was said.  I'm sure I'll take the night shift tonight to deal with our little roid monster.  I'm totally dreading it!  The fact that we have to do this through Friday night is a little too hard to comprehend right now.

34 weeks

In my previous post, I've pretty much summarized everything for the week - sick.  It's been rough for little dude.

This picture makes me laugh because this is TOTALLY a face that I would make!

Weezie likes to chase, Chase likes to wheeze

Chase is sick again.  It would appear he caught whatever I had a couple of weeks ago, even though I was for sure I had caught it from him. 

It started last Wednesday.  After a fairly successful day cleaning the upstairs, I got a call from the daycare that Chase was fussy, hadn't slept, was losing his appetite, and had a huge projectile vomit.  I saw his outfit that they changed after the vomit.  I would say that it must have been legendary based on how every square inch of the outfit was covered!  Drew picked him up and when he got home Chase seemed fine (I was expecting the worst based on the phone report I got)!  Smiling and napped like a champ, but you could tell he didn't feel fantastic.  He was very clingy and wanted to be held, which is unlike him.  That night after we ran some errands he was very flushed and looked like he had a sunburn.  We took his temperature and it was 102.2.  I took him to the doctor the next morning (not our regular doctor since he had his day off).  They didn't see anything wrong with him.  Maybe it was a virus, but since he was able to be comforted by me, we were just going to proceed giving medicine to reduce the fever as needed.

Over the course of the day and this past weekend, his cough got worse and was really causing him distress.  It's very similar to his coughs back when he had bronchiolitus.  When he coughs, his face gets super red, he seems to have a hard time getting the breath he needs to cough, and if he gets a coughing spell soon after he's eaten, a good majority of his milk will come up with the cough.  Thankfully, I've never been the type to get grossed out over vomit, because I've seen lots of it the past few days!

I scheduled another doctors appointment this morning with our regular doctor.  He definitely heard some wheezing in his lungs that concerned him.  We did a breathing treatment in the office to see how Chase responded.  I got scared when he brought out the machine.  I'd never seen such a thing since I've never had these type issues as a kid.  It wasn't a big deal though.  He put a little Albuterol in this machine and then it turned into a vapor that Chase breathed in for the next 5 to 10 minutes.  He responded well, so now I am to give Chase an inhaler of this medicine every 4 hours for the next few days to relax the passageways in this lungs and a steroid.  I'm a little freaked out about the inhaler.  I'm due to give it to him in a little while.  Whether or not he goes to daycare any this week depends on how well he takes this medicine.  Of course I read all the warning literature they give you at the drugstore and now I have a big long list of things that could go wrong that I'm freaked out about!

I asked the doctor if this wheezing means he might have asthma.  He said it's too soon to tell right now.  This could just been a one-time episode.  I'll keep my fingers crossed I don't have to see this inhaler again!

Here is a picture of him yesterday eating some squash.  I discontinued all solid foods on Thursday so we could focus on getting as much milk in him as possible since it was more important.  But he was hungry yesterday so I thought I would try some food out again.  Poor thing.  You can tell he doesn't feel right. 

 In the middle of a cough.  :(

 This is a picture from this morning right before his nap.  His poor little red cheeks!!

Needless to say, illness is the hardest part of being a parent that I've come across. Even if it is something minor, I just hate seeing him sick. He can't communicate what he's feeling and I can't tell him everything is going to be ok. It just sucks. Plus, it's very difficult to entertain a child that doesn't feel well.  It's been a long weekend!  Hopefully now that we have some medicine, we're going to get back to normal!

33 weeks

Gosh.  33 weeks.

What have we learned this week?

Well, Chase had rediscovered his tongue.  He first discovered it shortly after his tongue was clipped when he was 5 days old (he was born tongue-tied - which sounds worse than it really is).  Since then he almost always had his tongue on the roof of his mouth.  This week we've seen him chomping on his tongue (it looks like he's chewing on gum).  And we've seen him rolling his tongue like a little burrito and just slightly sticking it out of his mouth and getting a cute little "o" shape to his mouth.  It's hilarious to watch him make these faces.

We've learned that Chase has the ability to stand on his own for brief (very brief) periods of time.  I've been testing this out and letting him hold on to the side of his exersaucer, coffee table, etc and just let him go (spotted of course!).  He can stand there pretty well when he's gripping onto something for balance.  Ultimately, he then starts to lean sideways and then you need to scoop him up and try again!  He has so much fun doing this though.  He just grins all the way through it.  Even if we let him gently fall on his bottom, he just grins!

We've learned that even though he likes bananas, he doesn't really like them.  I think the texture is a bit much for him.  Over the weekend, we gave him bananas for dessert and I think the last bite I gave him was just a little too much.  He started gagging and spit up a little of the banana.  Then a few seconds later, round 2 of the spit up.  Oh.My.Goodness!  It was like something from the Exorcist.  Banana and Sweet Potatoes.  All over the place.  I can still see it vividly!! Yuck!  Chase just smiled afterwards.  He acted like nothing had happened.  So long story short, I learned I won't be trying anymore bananas with him for a little while longer.

We learned today that Chase will be going to daycare part time this summer.  The original plan was that we would take him out over the summer when Drew was out of school.  Then the more we thought about it, we thought it would be nice if he could keep the routine and he could continue to see his sweet teachers over the summer.  Plus that would give Drew time to get some stuff done over the summer (mow the grass, clean, exercise, school work, clean...hint, hint).  The daycare really doesn't do part-time, but we asked them about it anyway and they checked their schedules and there was room for him!!  I'm very glad that we had that option.  I can't say enough how much I love our daycare.  I'm very glad we stumbled across that place in our search.

What else is going on?  He's still trying to crawl, but he still rolls over instead of moving anywhere.  We're nowhere near hearing any words from him.  We were saying "la tortuga" to him today (it's on his activity mat) and it sounded like he was saying "la" back to us, but I think that was just in our minds.

I've been trying to push his bedtime back slowly over the past few weeks.  We are having photos taken of Chase at a nearby park on June 1st at 7pm.  His bedtime is normally 7:30 or so, so I'm very nervous about this.  Most of this past week he's gone to bed after 8, but he can have some serious cranky episodes if we push him too far.  I'm really looking forward to the photos, but I'm dreading his possible mood!!  I just hope I can get him to nap a ton that day!

On to the pictures -

Sweet smile.  Showing his awesome tongue in the second one! :)

Maternity Leave Part 2

When I returned to work in January, I still had 2 weeks of parental leave left to take.  I'm taking those weeks beginning tomorrow.  SOOO looking forward to it!  The next two weeks are devoted to getting my house as clean and organized as I can during the morning hours and playing with Chase during the afternoon hours.  After I drop Chase off at daycare, I'll be tackling my one room a day (minimum) cleaning/organization plan (my "14 rooms in 14 days" plan) to slowly but surely get this house back in order since no true deep cleaning has been done since at least the month before Chase was born.  I cleaned the guest bathroom on Saturday to get a head start.  Oh, it's so refreshing to see it clean again!!

Then after Chase gets picked up in the afternoon the plan is to do as many fun activities as we can outside.  Walks around the block, maybe a trip to the lake near the BPAC to see the ducks, or a trip to a park to see how he does with the swings.  Who knows!  Poor kid hasn't been anywhere so I want to do as much as I can these next two weeks.

I'll leave you tonight with some cute pictures from this afternoon.  We attended a birthday party for two of Chase's second cousins who are turning 1 this week.  It was a pool party so Chase wore his swim trunks and a matching Polo (too cute!).  Chase didn't go into the pool because mommy and daddy didn't want to get in a swimsuit in front of anyone, but we still had fun!

This pictures spells out some trouble we're going to have with Chase.  He was trying to take over this toy from the birthday boy.  Mercy!  It was a reminder that we're someday going to actually have to start parenting, rather than just keeping him alive!

Pictures from Mother's Day weekend

Attempt at a family picture.  However I didn't use my Chi that morning and Chase was fussy, so I looked rough and this was his best pose out of 8 attempts.

Drew taking a nap after lunch with his baby doll! :)

I shamefully realized I didn't have a picture of my grandfather with Chase a couple of weeks ago.  I made that a mission this weekend.

I then tried to get my grandmother in the act...

Here's a picture of my sister and her beautiful family.  It's hard to believe the boys were acting wild just a few seconds before this picture was taken!

I then asked my nephew to smile for the camera.  I guess I should have been more specific.  It made me laugh though!!

Here's a picture of my mom with Chase

That's all my pictures from Mother's Day!

There is one last picture from Monday night that I have to post.  It's just precious to me!

32 weeks

We're at 32 weeks!  Wow, time really just flies by.  I'm looking at Chase more and more and not seeing my little baby anymore.  He's starting to look and act more like a little boy.  It's so strange!  Overall, it's been a very easy-going week for Chase.  Nothing really new to report, besides that I finally saw him roll over this evening.  I think he's beginning to try to crawl, except that he keeps rolling over when he moves his leg forward. :)

All cheeks and eye lashes. 

This is a picture from today.  He started a new food today.  I originally wanted him to try peaches for the first time today, but Kroger is out of peaches.  Apparently they've been trying to get them in for 2 weeks now unsuccessfully.  Maybe next time.  So without peaches, he started green beans today.  The look on his face would seem to indicate he didn't like them, but he warmed up to them pretty good!  But when I looked at this picture, I noticed one thing...HAIR.  He's getting a little shaggy on top!

Also related to food, I broke a rule today!  The books tell you to wait 3 to 4 days before introducing new foods (to help determine whether he has an allergy or not).  Well, almost immediately after I gave him the green beans he was fussing a little like he always does when he gets done eating his fruits and veggies, so I got a little bit of a banana and mushed it up for him.  I was fully expecting for him not to like it since it would have a little bit of a texture like the avocado.  He liked it though.  He spit out some of the more chunky bits, but he didn't fuss at all!  After this though, I'll try not to break anymore rules!

First Mother's Day Present!

When I dropped Chase off at school today, I received a Mother's Day present from Chase.  LOVE IT!  It's already my favorite thing ever!  The picture is so cute!  He looks like a big boy!

One year ago today...

Last year while others were celebrating Cinco de Mayo, Drew and I were sitting in a doctor's office keeping our fingers crossed that our baby would expose him or herself to the ultrasound technician.  After lots of poking and rolling me over from side to side (to side to side), we learned "IT'S A BOY".  Or according to the way our ultrasound technician spelled it "It's a boyt!"  I don't quite understand when you only have to spell certain words on screen - "feet", "hand", "head", "girl", "BOY" (I know I'm oversimplifying her job, but whatever), that you could mess them up. Our lady misspelled at least every third word she wrote that entire day.

Sorry Chase that I'm posting your business on the interweb, but this picture is all we had to go by for the 5 remaining months of my pregnancy.  I was still convinced that our boy could be a girl and that the thing being pointed to could have been a toe or something.

One year later, I'm now staring at my child as he tears up my legal pad full of work notes and as he has squash spit-up stains all down the front of his pajamas.  Couldn't imagine it any other way!

31 weeks

What a long, awful week it's been!  We thought Chase was teething earlier in the week, which caused at least 2 nights where neither Drew or I slept very well because he kept waking up every 15 to 20 minutes.  It's been super busy at work which literally means there aren't enough minutes in the day to get everything done that needs to be done...which means that sleep is the first thing on the to do list that doesn't get done.  Then partly because of the lack of sleep and busy schedule, I somehow manage to leave a half gallon of chocolate milk in my trunk for 6 (very warm) days.  One can of Oust and Febreze later, it still stinks.  I'm just waiting for Chase to start gagging when I put him in the car in the morning.  Then I get sick with a fever and possible strep.  Chase was then showing some signs of sickness (runny nose/coughing), but it ended up being nothing major - just a cold with some nasal drainage which was causing a nighttime cough.

Good news though - we (except healthy as a horse Drew) are all on antibiotics and on the mend, work is about to slow down, I've got my two remaining weeks of maternity leave scheduled for the end of May, and Chase is cuter than ever!

31 weeks!!  Before I know it, I'll be having to start trying to find invitations for his first birthday!

Some things to note this week:

• Chase is developing little lobster claws. Since he's exploring everything around him, his fingers are constantly grasping (and pinching!) for anything within reach.  Drew and I often get caught in the cross fires.
• Chase moved to the "big boy" side of the room at daycare this week.  We think it was mainly due to lots of new little babies on the other side of the room, so Chase was the next in line for promotion.  I've also been bringing food for Chase to have at school for breakfast- pears and apples thus far.
• I'm afraid Chase is lazy - a trait he picked up from both his mother and father.  He has no interest in crawling or rolling over to his belly (which by the way I haven't yet seen).  When I place him on his belly to try to crawl, he almost immediately rolls over and starts playing with whatever else is around him.
• He loves peek-a-boo.  He will have the biggest belly laughs when we duck beside the bed or changing table and pop up and surprise him.  Most of the time, poor thing, he literally jumps because he's so surprised.
• He got scared of "mirror-mama".  After each bathtime, Drew wraps Chase up in a towel and then they stare at themselves in a mirror and they laugh.  Tonight, I came up in the background and started dancing around and making silly faces.  Chase cried!  Drew turned him around so he could see the real me and then he smiled again.  Too funny!

Picture time -

We've had to resort to putting the sign above him because of this...

Sorry no other pictures this week (because of the aforementioned week).  I hope to be back on my game in the coming weeks.

On a side note - Mom, I changed my blog layout just so you could read it again!  Happy Mother's Day! :)