not again!

ugh. mr. o was up at 4:40 this morning (yes, that's right, twenty minutes till five in the MORNING!!!!!) i could tell by the way he was coughing that something wasn't right. i called the pediatricion as soon as they were open and got an appointment for basically first thing this morning. we are now down to just a single ear infection (so new and stronger meds) and we will be having the "to tube or not to tube" conversation at his 15 month check up next month. in addition to the ear infection, he also has croup. that will likely mean a long couple of nights these next few nights until things start clearing up. at least since croup is a viral thing, there isn't really any medication we need to give him. just home remedies like sitting in the bathroom with the shower running for 20 minutes to let the steam help loosen things up, running the humidifier in his room, if the shower thing doesn't seem to work, we can go stand outside for 15-20 minutes, we can give him warm apple juice as well. should be fun... i'm fully prepared to spend the night with him in the living room either on the couch or in the chair tonight. one end of his mattress is elevated so that will help a little bit with the congestion he has going now too.

getting his meds was interesting this evening. jeffy stopped by the drive-through pharmacy but they didn't have the Rx in stock and since the Rx was faxed in, they wouldn't give him a written copy of it so he could take it to another pharmacy. i called the on-call doctor and he phoned it into the grocery store pharmacy that is right up the street. luckily they had it and we've taken our first dose. we even used the dosing spoon instead of the syringe. :-) what a good boy!

one of the holiday traditions i grew up with is having a picnic dinner in front of the tree on christmas eve. our traditional dinner for christmas eve is homemade hamburgers, potato salad, and milkshakes. tonight jeffy stopped by our favorite burger place and got burgers for dinner since we will be spending dinner on sunday at his parents house and not doing my traditional thing. he is so sweet! we'll still do my family's traditional christmas morning breakfast - picnic-style by the tree. coffee cake, scrambled eggs, bacon, and liquids of some sort. owen will be in his little portable high chair while we eat over a table cloth on the floor. it's a good compromise.

Santa!

We went to see Santa today. We got there at about noon, and there was quite the line. Santa goes to feed his reindeer from 1:00-1:45. At about 12:30, one of Santa's helpers came to make sure that Santa didn't work past 1:00. They closed the line right in front of us, but said that if the people in front of us in line made it through and it wasn't 1:00 yet, we'd get in to see him. We did. Owen did great. He didn't fuss, or even look at Santa funny. We bought the smallest package (enough pix for us and the grandparents) and were able to also take our own pictures, which I did. It's posted here.

As for Owen's latest tricks and milestones, he has 14 teeth (all four of his 1-year molars, plus his two right eye teeth.) We also are just about through with our latest round of antibiotics (another double ear infection). I have figured out what to look for in him for ear infections, as I caught this one before either ear drum burst!!! Yay Mom! Owen can also climb onto things (like the sofa, which is great, or the coffee table, which is not so great.

Owen is really signing now. He has one sign, "more". He can also say the following words: mommy, dada, more, please, and cat.

Eating isn't going so well in terms of variety of foods he will actually eat, but at least he'll try them. One of his funny little quircks is that if he sees fruit on his plate and something else as well, he won't touch the other thing until he's eaten the fruit. I guess I can't really complain about that, can I?

Christmas is four days away. Owen still hasn't figured out the presents under the tree. I think that's a good thing. :-) Christmas morning will be lots of fun this year. He's making a killing from just us, not to mention from grandparents, aunts and uncles.

Oh, we survived the windstorm last week with no loss of power. We were very lucky. I had a program at school last Thursday (the 14th) which we decided to postpone until January due to the storm. Good thing we did that as the school lost power.

Have a very blessed Christmas, everyone!

sleep, glorious sleep!

'nuf said

figuring things out

and by that, i mean all three of us are learning. jeffy and i are learning that owen likes to be in control of his world, which can (and has of late) mean that he won't eat what is put in front of him at meal time (but we have that figured out - put it there, and act like it doesn't matter if he eats it or not. usually he will eat it eventually. just not always immediately) he will also spit out foods he doesn't want to eat, which is better than the gagging until he pukes method he used earlier. last week, owen and i went to lunch with some friends who have a little boy who is about 6 weeks older than owen and i didn't take any baby food with me. i ordered for owen off the menu and he ate part of his lunch. :-)

in addition to being in control of what he eats (or not), owen is also learning new ways to communicate. he can now shake his head "no" and last night he took my hands, put them under his armpits (which means "pick me up", he's been doing this for a few weeks at least) and then patted my lap, as if to say, "i want to sit on your lap, mama." very cool. the last few nights he has not slept the entire night. sunday night he was up until 12:30 a.m. on MONDAY morning, and last night, he went down at 9, then was up at about 2:30 this morning and stayed that way until 5:00 or 5:30. jeffy and i made a pretty good team in coping with it. it's nice to have a partner in this. in the past, i've been the one getting up with him regardless, mostly because jeffy tends to sleep pretty soundly and doesn't hear owen so guess who ends up getting up with him...mom... i wonder how much sleep we'll all get tonight. i'm betting on 5-6 hours. i really don't function well on that multiple nights in a row. one isolated night and i'm ok. two or more , i need a nap after lunch. or a Coke. can you main-line caffeine?

that's all for now!

what a week!

and it's only tuesday... owen was pretty lethargic on sunday, and i ended up taking him in to the emergency room at about 11:00 sunday night with a 102-degree fever. we were home by 1:00 monday morning with instructions to alternate tylenol and motrin every 3 hours (so he was getting each on a 6-hour cycle). i woke jeffy up when we got back and he and i had a complete conversation, he asked and answered questions. come his alarm at 4:00 (had to be in to work by 6:00), he had no recollection of the conversation. it was pretty funny, actually. good thing i woke up and had also left a note for him on the counter reminding him to give owen motrin. we follow up with the pediatrician on friday afternoon, which is fine since there is no school on friday in honor of veteran's day. i won't have to take yet another day off.

yesterday we both stayed home (i ended up getting a 24-hour stomach bug) and were both horizontal for the majority of the day. owen slept most of the day, something he hasn't done since he was brand new, but since i wasn't feeling too hot, it worked out well. he slept through the night, and has been pretty good today. we both stayed home again and now he's back to his usual happy, silly self. :-)

the reason for the temp and the lethargy, come to find out, is two brand new teeth! he cut his first molar (upper left) on sunday and i discovered the second (upper right) today. i can tell that he is feeling much better. i've missed my little boy. we're both going back to school tomorrow. it will be good for both of us, i think. thank goodness for e-mail, because that's how i've had to get my sub plans into school the last two days. that plus i didn't really want to go out in the deluge we had yesterday. it was crazy wet. the wind was blowing the rain up onto our porch, which normally stays dry.

bilateral otitis media...again

well, isn't this fun!? i think i've figured out what all of the fussing has been about. last sunday morning, owen was screaming practially inconsolably and tugging at his right ear. i called my sister, i called the doctor's office, and decided after talking with both of them that i'd wait it out. he got better around 11, and we went to the playgroup halloween party like we had planned. he was back to his normal, happy self. then monday morning comes around. i go to nurse him and notice that his right ear is pretty goopy. i knew immediately what had happened. i called in sick (got a sub 45 minutes before i was supposed to start - surprize!), then he and i went in so i could do sub plans. we went to the doctor, got our diagnosis and prescriptions (one for an antibiotic, one for a diaper cream incase the antibiotic gave him a rash, luckily we still had the drops left over from last time so i'm just using those - no need to get another supply, though i did take what we had in with us just to be sure they were what we needed to have), and came home. he was cleared to return ot daycare on tuesday and we have been good to go since then. he's even learned not to fuss or fight us with the ear drops, which is nice. he'll just lay there and let us put them in his ear. no more wrapping him up like a burrito, which is what we had to do at the beginning of the week. we do the drops until monday morning, and the antibiotic until it's gone, which will be thursday morning, i believe.

the exciting discovery (by me) this week is that owen now has three words: mama, dada, and dih-da, which is owen's version of "kitty cat" he'll go after max, with both arms out saying, "dih-da, dih-da!" max just runs the other way. it's pretty funny. owen is at least getting more gentle with the cat.

night time is getting pretty amusing. owen has a favorite book that we have to read every night. he won't sit still for any other book until we read this one book. its' "don't let the pigeon stay up late" by mo willems. follow this link: http://www.mowillems.com to find out more. we have all of the pigeon books and i can't wait to get his other books. eventually, i'd love to have the whole collection. apparently, the pigeon works his way into all of mo willems' books. when owen gets older, we can make a game out of finding the pigeon.

halloween was pretty fun this year, too. owen was a cow. we went over to j's parent's house for a little bit, where we saw j's sister, brother-in-law, and our niece and brand new nephew. o was in his costume, of course. we'll go trick-or-treating next year, i think.

poor little guy

owen is not feeling too good right now. he's getting those first molars and that's not a fun thing at all. today we got home from daycare (where he ate nothing but fruit or veggie puffs) and he spent close to 2 hours snuggled up on my chest while i played games on the computer. he did eat dinner (rice cereal and a small thing of squash) and i think he finished most of his bottle tonight (which he only gets on rare occasions and soon won't get at all because we'll be out of formula). hopefully he'll get a full night's sleep tonight, but the airbed is fully inflated in his room in case he has trouble sleeping tonight. i can just go climb into bed in there and he can sleep with me. right now he's snuggled up with daddy.

a year and a week!

I can't believe my little man is a year old already! He is walking all over the place, chattering up a storm, learning to eat table foods (though this poses a little bit of a challenge...), loves reading (will gladly sit and listen to a story over and over again, or is happy to have a book in his lap, where he is pointing at the pictures and chattering away as he looks at the pictures), and is becoming quite the mama's boy. not that I'm complaining about that right now.

Owen has also moved from the infant house at day care to the waddler house. He loves it! He apparently is eating just about anything they give him to eat there. Wish he would do that here...

So on his first birthday last week, we had three parties scheduled, but only two actually happened. The one on Friday was with friends from playgroup (from the mommy group at the hospital) and it was fun. One of the little boys in the group has the same birthday as Owen so we co-hostessed the party. Saturday was a very busy day. We had pictures at The Picture People at 10:20, then a party with family at 12:30 (I think all told, there were 18 people here, and for those of you who have been to our home, you know that was a very tight fit). After the party, J and I went back to the picture place and got his pictures while O stayed at home with Gramma to nap, though the nap didn't happen. During this time, we also found out that the friends party that evening wasn't going to happen as people called to cancel for various reasons. Looking back on it, it was actually better that way. We were all exhausted. I'll try to post pictures here in the next week from his party.

Hope all is well with all of you! Go TIGERS!!!!!!

Back To School

What a first week back. First of all, I'm back at the school where I've been for the last four years.

Last week started out pretty good. Friday, however, was a different story. I get to school and find that the street in front of the building has been taped off with police crime scene tape. At the other end of the block, there is a body under a bright yellow tarp. Apparently, this young man (24 years old) had been shot multiple times sometime late Thursday night or early Friday morning. He was not from our neighborhood and the police, at least as of Friday, have very little to go on. It's pretty sad and scary. School went on as planned, because it was determined early in the investigation (which began shortly after 6:00 Friday morning) that we were in no danger and that the only connection to our school was geography and chance. Kids were ushered into the building immediately upon arrival and a parent meeting was called at 9:00 for those interested, with the police in attendence to give accurate facts. News crews were camped out all day long across the street and classrooms along that side of the building (mine is not) had to keep their blinds closed all day and the rooms closest to the scene also had to keep their windows closed and paper was put over those windows to keep kids from peeking through the blinds.

One of the things that annoys me about what happened Friday is that some parents are viewing the tragedy as an extension of our school, despite the fact that the victim was not even remotely connected withour school and that the crime happened in the middle of the night. Grrr...

Hopefully this week will be more normal.

Owen turns 11 months old tomorrow. I can't believe it! THis is happening too fast for me. I realized the other week that I no longer have an infant, he's progressing onto the toddler stage. I miss my teeny tiny baby boy, but I love my big boy! We went to the Puyallup fair yesterday - Owen's first - and he got to ride the carousel and pet a goat and a sheep in the petting farm. He loved both. He wasn't too sure at first on the carousel, but once it got going, he held on and smiled through the whole ride! Yippee!!!

I'll tell you all something. This little boy of ours has an unbelieveable amount of energy. I get exhausted just watching him go. We're gonna have to get him into sports that require lots of running (soccer, football, basketball, etc.)

Eek!

It's been nearly a month since my last post. Lots has happened in the last month. Owen has reached the following milestones:

standing unassisted (did it a few times one day, hasn't really done it since)
walking unassisted (ditto, took two steps last sunday, hasn't done it since)
clapping when he hears (a) applause or (b) someone saying "yay!"
understands "no" (but doesn't always obey)
is being gentler with the cat, but he still has a way to go.

As for me, I'm looking at changing schools and put in for two music jobs here in town at different schools in my district. the job postings closed on wednesday and i got a call on thursday from one of the principals asking me to come in for an interview. i did that yesterday and feel really good about how it all went. even if i don't get the job, i am satisfied that i did the very best i possibly could have during my interview. i was a little nervous, but not too, and it was a pretty relaxed environment. i even laughed a couple of times with the principal and teacher who were interviewing me. one of the questions that i used humor to answer was "how would you teach a 90 minute reading block?" since i've never done that, i said, "with training." then went on to tell them that i've never been at a school where i've been asked to teach a reading group but also that i am willing to do it. i came out of the interview totally jazzed. hopefully i'll hear by the end of this coming week. i also need to find a daycare for owen this week. yikes!

tonight i get my anniversary present. jeffy and i are going to the pbr (pro bull riders) at the puyallup (pew-AL-up) fair grounds, about 20 minutes from here. I'm really excited. I love watching bull riding! next month we get to go to the rodeo - it'll be owen's first!

it's after 11:00 a.m. i guess i should get showered and dressed, huh?

Five

We now have five teeth. The latest tooth (one of the top central incisors) cut through on Monday. This morning, Owen realized that he can push his lower jaw in and out and click his bottom teeth and top tooth. Really cute!

We have a cold. It's mostly his nose, which is really runny and can be quite nasty at times. I've ended up having to wrap him up in a blanket to tie his arms down and use the nasal aspirator. The good thing is that with his arms tied down (or wrapped up as it is), I only have to fight with his head, and he's learning that he should just let me do it because then it's over quickly AND he can breathe easier. He is still his normal happy self, which is good. It would be emotionally draining on me if he were crabby and lethargic, too. Plus Jeffy started a new job this week so it's just me from the time we get up until about 5:30 every day.

Yesterday, Owen spent a good part of the day chasing the cat. Max is getting the idea that when he sees Owen coming, it's time to go elsewhere. He really likes curling up in the rocking chair in the living room, but Owen can reach him when he's in the chair so I watched Owen chase Max around in circles, from the chair around the coffee table, onto the couch, and back into the chair where the whole thing would start again. I was almost getting dizzy! I think it will be easier and better when Owen learns to pet instead of grab and pull...Ugh.

Swimming with my mom. Once he got used to the temperature of the water, he was fine!

Waiting for the fireworks to start in Denver on July 3. We're sitting between the left field foul line and the warning track at Coors Field. Owen is sitting between Jeffy and my dad. The game was our father's day present to my dad.

With our new friend Ethan in Salt Lake

With our new friend Benjamin (on the right) in Denver.

130

posts, that is.

we are back from denver. after the first day, there was no real excitement on our trip. we did manage to stay busy, though. between a picnic in the park in miles city, mt with family, including one of my cousins who drove in that day from red lodge just to see us, the zoo, museum of nature and science, swimming, going to a rockies game (see the picture below), getting together with friends from high school and their little boy who is about 5 weeks older than owen, and the drive back to tacoma, we stayed pretty busy. pictures will be coming soon.

the day of the game, we drive to the park-and-ride and take the light rail into downtown to meet said friends for dinner. as soon as we get on the train, it starts pouring - for the first time in a long time there - and by the time we get downtown, it is really coming down. we still have several blocks to walk to get to the restaurant for dinner and by the time we get there, owen is soaked, my jeans are drenched nearly to my knees, and it's to the point where we can't get much wetter. we dried off by the time dinner was over, and the rain had stopped. after the seventh inning stretch, we left our seats to meet my friends so they could take us behind the scoreboard. after the game, we got to go onto the field to watch the fireworks. owen was ok for some of them, but not for others. he really didn't like the big barrages. he clung to me and whimpered while they were happening (too loud for him i think) but would look at the less-intensive explosions and seemed to enjoy that.

probably the coolest thing that happened during the trip was owen's development. he figured out how to really crawl, plus he can now pull up onto everything. yesterdray he actually climbed up onto the coffee table using my leg as a step. he was pretty proud of himself. (and i was proud of him too...) i quickly got him down before he took a header off of the table.

i can't believe that my little man will be 9 months old tomorrow. incredible. parents always say that their kids grow up too fast. now i know just how fast 'too fast' is. what happened to my little newborn? i look at pictures and those days seem so long ago, but they were only 9 months ago. it's really crazy. october 12 will be here before we know it. he'll be walking and talking (or maybe it's running and talking). my m-i-l won't even recognize him when she gets back next monday. she's been gone for a month in upstate ny helping my s-i-l recover from surgery.

we have errands to run today so i should get going. i need to eat before we go (and owen is asleep right now so it's the perfect time.)

at the rockies game on july 3. jeffy is holding owen out of one of the slots in the manual scoreboard (it's way cool!) and my dad is taking the picture.

Vacation

We are in Denver right now. We head home tomorrow (Wednesday). O is a real trooper. We learned quickly (like on the first day) that I need to be in back with him. Joy. This at least makes it easier to keep going and not have to stop every hour or so to either feed or change him (or both).

Road trip with us are always, um, interesting, shall I say? On day one, we were about 1/2 way across the top part of Idaho when we blew a tire. And I mean that sucker blew. Tire shreds were being strewn about on I-90. We made it to the side of the road where Jeffy changed the tire and we made it into Kellogg, got a hotel room and four new tires. Nothing else exciting has happened on the road since.

We spent time with Jeffy's grandmother in Missoula and my grandfather in Miles City (both places in MT) and both loved meeting their great-grandson. We've been with my dad the last week and we've been really busy. O's been to the zoo (he loved the fish!), made friends with Benjamin (the son of a couple of friends of mine from high school. Benjamin is about 5 weeks older than Owen.), been to the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, and to a Rockies game where he got to go behind the manual scoreboard (and out one of the holes for a picture after the game, too! Be looking for that a little later on...) and onto the field for fireworks. He kinda liked the fireworks, though he clung to me when they were going off a bunch at a time. He was ok when it was just one or two going off at a time but the big barrages were too much for him.

Today we took Owen swimming for the first time in the pool at my mom's apartment complex. Once he got used to the water temp and figured out that he was going to be ok, he had a blast. He splashed quite a bit, turning his head and stopping when the splashing got his face. It was really funny. He also started frog-kicking a bit and was having a blast.

Before we went to Mom's apartment, we went to the Body Worlds 2 exhibit at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. It was fascinating. Real human bodies that had been injected with plastic so they would not rot were the entire exhibit. There were some really cool things to look at and learn. One of the most interesting parts was the fetal growth area. I was able to see how small both Owen and Jacob were when we had our first ultrasounds with each of them, there was also a fetus in a uterus at 3 mos. gestation - right about when I lost Jacob. It was a very interesting exhibit. Probably the coolest part was the exploded body - hung from wires and everything was being shown. If it comes to a city near you and you haven't seen it - go. It's totally worth the money (I think our tickets were something like $10.) I wanted to see it in Chicago when we were there last summer, but we didn't get the chance.

O slept through most of the exhibit today, which was just fine by me. That's why I brought the sling into the museum. Easier to carry him in that than just on the hip.

He's really getting up and crawling now - more the regular stuff than commando crawling now. He's also starting to pull up and say, "Mama". He prefers to be up on his feet than down on the floor. He's even let go a couple of times without realizing that he can't balance himself yet.

Bedtime for Little Man.

Sum, sum, summertime!

at last! i've been out of school since Thursday at 12:30. the kids left at noon. i did bus duty, and sang as the bus pulled away (na na na na, na na na na. hey hey hey. good bye!) it was an odd year. it really didn't seem like the school year should have been over yet. probably because i was really only there since january. it was like i had a short (6 week) school year, then summer break, then another truncated school year. not that i'm complaining, mind you. i'm loving being a full-time mom to baby o. he is so much fun these days. he's giving kisses and hugs, chattering like crazy, and even has the start of a few words: mama, dada, baba (bottle). he can say these words, though he's not using them as lables as yet.

solids are coming well. we had real banana pieces yesterday after breakfast. the mess was pretty big, but he ate the pieces just fine. he's also getting pretty good at self-feeding. he likes veggi puffs, fruit puffs, and bananas so far. he's not too wild about cheerios. (michele - can we give him the yogurt burst cheerios?) he had one at church on sunday and pretty much spit it out.

we now have four teeth. two on top (lateral incisors) and two on bottom (central incisors). i wouldn't be surprized if he cuts a few more over the next few weeks. we go in for our 9 month check-up on the 17. i can't believe it's getting close to time for that already!

o is now able to crawl. he still will do the commando thing, but he can get himself pretty easily from point a to point b on his hands and knees. his favorite color currently seems to be red. he goes straight for anything red.

a better picture of the toofers!

zerber baby!

cutie pie with teeth!

Surprise!

We were at the annual Bryant (my school) Block Party last night. It was a blast. Owen and the daughter of another teacher (she's about 3 months older than Owen) were giving eachother hugs. It was so cute! I was talking with another mother, who asked if he was getting his top teeth (lots of drooling, chewing on fingers, etc.) and I said they were starting. I put my finger in to feel and guess what I felt! Not a central incisor but his right lateral incisor on top! It's definately through. That could have been part of the issues we've been having this last week or so. What a surprise! Needless to say, this most recent bit of teething has been nothing compared to the first. If this is how the rest of his teething goes, bring it on!

I've told Jeffy what I want for our anniversary at the end of next month: tickets to see Wicked when it comes to Seattle in September.

mobility!

he did it! he's crawling! and i watched him start! before long, he'll be all over the place and quickly. i'm just waiting for the day when little man crawls away, looks at us, grins and giggles as we chase him down. "chase the baby" will be our new favorite game! right now "peek-a-boo" is high on the favorites list.

i'm crying happy tears. he's so proud of himself. no more commando crawling (or minimal commando crawling)! i got it on video tape! max (the cat) had better watch out, because o thinks the cat is the coolest thing.

Learning Limits (I made him cry!)

Last night, I was sitting at the computer playing a great game (Lemmings Revolution) and had Owen in my lap. He decided that it would be fun to grab onto and yank my hair. I told him "No" with a pretty forceful tone in my voice. He scrunched up his little face and started to cry. (I'm such a mean mommy!) He got over it pretty quickly, though. He also hasn't yanked on my hair since.

Last Saturday, we learned a new trick. Owen can now sit up from being on his tummy. He did it once in the middle of the floor and again under the coffee table. I thought the latter was pretty funny.

No school tomorrow or Monday for the Memorial Day weekend. We'll have our niece for a part of the day (her day care center got closed down so we've been day care for the last two weeks. We love having her!) It's supposed to rain, otherwise I'd take the kids to the zoo. Maybe we can go to the history museum...dunno we'll have to wait and see. I'm gonna want to get out of the house, at least. As of today, we have 12.5 more days of school. Only one more full week, plus two partial weeks. Our last day is June 15. Yay!!!!!

I ordered a great DVD set today, though I won't get it until early August, since it's not going to be available until July 25. (Animaniacs!!!!!) Can't wait to get that and watch it! I used to come home from high school and watch that show every day.

Have a safe Memorial Day weekend, everyone!

Commando!

i'm typing with one hand and holding a sleepy 7-month-old boy who doesn't want to go to sleep in the other.

little man is so close to crawling. his current preferred method of locomotion is commando crawling, on his belly pushing with his legs and pulling with his arms. it's pretty effective. he's also an expert roller. he is frequently up on all fours, rocking, practically sitting up, and can move one or two limbs (usually arms) off of the floor with ease. one other thing he is getting good at is 'walking' while holding to my hands.

we've outgrown the carrier (too long!) and have moved into a convertible car seat (that can go backward facing, forward facing, and will also serve as a booster when he gets older.

***And now a word from owen!***
hk.v iv,ufk uv g fd y

A Sign?

I'm thinking Owen is starting to communicate with us now. Last night as he was having his bedtime bottle, he let go of the bottle and waved his arm around. He's never done that before. We've been signing to him, and "all done" is signed by shaking both hands...he was pretty close to that. I took the bottle away from him and he didn't protest at all. We'll see when he does it again. I was told in the Signing with Baby class I took that they will often do approximations before they do the real thing, especially if the motor skill required are a little more than they have. I'd say this is a pretty good approximation.

We got his convertable car seat yesterday, too. The nice thing is that it will go all the way up through a booster (until he's 80 lbs.) since it has the shoulder belt positioning things on the sides. One less thing to buy. I think I'm going to a seminar at the children's hospital here in town on Thursday to get a second one. For $35, you go to the 90 minute session and they give you the next size car seat that you need. Not a bad deal! This way we'll have one in my car and one in Jeffy's truck and we won't need to switch them back and forth.

Changing Every Day!

Wow. I'm amazed at how quickly Owen is growing and changing these days. It seems that he has a new trick every day, sometimes two new tricks. Take yesterday for example. He not only got up on all fours and rocked for a few seconds, but he also earned himself a hose-down in the kitchen sink. Jeffy tried the bathtub first, but then I mentioned the sprayer in the sink, which worked beautifully!

Owen is getting so mobile and he's not even crawling yet! He can roll anywhere. He will also "flop" (go from tummy to back or vice versa but moving his legs to face a different direction. Basically doing rotations and revolutions), do the inchworm thing on his back, and do an army crawl on his tummy. Time to get anything we don't want him to get off of the floor!

Owen's other big news is that he now has two teeth. He cut his second tooth on April 22. He has chomped down after nursing a few times. That's fun...

Growing so fast!

Two quick things:

1 - Owen nearly got up on all fours last night!

2 - Owen cut his first tooth last night! No wonder he's been so fussy lately!

Easter

Owen's first Easter is going quite well. Right now he is asleep near his mat. He did very well at church this morning.

As you can see below, there are new pictures. The first is of the quilt my mom made for Owen. The top left hand is my mom's, the top right is Jeffy's mom's, we are the next row - me, Owen, Jeffy - then the two on the bottom are our dads' hands - mine on the left, Jeffy's on the right. Above Owen's hands is his full name, below is his birthday. I designed the quilt last year and my mom made it. We looked through books and books of quilts but couldn't find anything I really liked so we designed our own. I really like the way it turned out. Mom has been bugging me for about two months now to get a picture of it up. (Sorry it took so long, Mom!)

The second picture is of my new haircut. I had gotten sick and tired of my long hair and all I was doing was pulling it back into a ponytail to avoid Owen grabbing it and to keep it from getting supper staticky (which it had been doing lately). It was time to cut it. I told my stylist to give me something (1) short, (2) easy to take care of because I'm lazy and (3) that I can style but that I don't have to style. I think she did a great job. I was the talk of the school on Friday - people kept coming in to see my hair cut because other people had told them the needed to see it. I love it!

The last picture is of Owen today, just so you can see how much he's grown. We went in for our 6 month check-up on Friday. He is now in the 97th% for height (28.5"), and at about the 30th% for weight (16# 7 oz.) He's nearly doubled his birth weight, which is just where he should be at 6 months. He's just about 3 oz. shy according to the scale at the ped's office.

Wednesday was actually his half-birthday. I took the day off, not because of that but because I had an appointment with an orthopedic doctor. I've been having lots of pain in my left foot for a little over a month now. I went in to my regular doctor a couple of weeks ago and he sent me into the orthopedic guy. Turns out I have a stress fracture in my left middle metatarpel. I was walking around on it for four weeks without knowing what was going on. All I knew is that it started to hurt something fierce on March 9. March 8 was a waiver day. That means that the teachers had to be at school but the kids had the day off. I took advantage of the fact that there were no kids there and burned off a little bit of energy running down the halls and sliding in my socks. That's what broke my foot. I'm a little embarrassed to say the least. The good news is that it's healing nicely and should be all healed in another couple of weeks. I'm not to go walking for exercise for another 4 weeks. I'll test that out on May 11 when we go to the symphony (4th and 5th grade classes go and we walk the mile each way. Downhill going, uphill coming back, and a picnic at school when we return. It's one of my favorite days of the school year.

Ok, more about Owen. He's been on solids for just over two weeks now. He loves them! Friday night we introduced a new food - carrotts. He's pretty excited about them. I think he's just excited about any food. We've eliminated two formula servings during the day now, which means we are sitting at 2 feedings a day where he gets formula. That is going to decrease even more as we work toward three meals a day with solids, plus nursing.

We are headed over to Jeffy's brother and sister-in-law's for dinner in just over an hour. Have a wonderful Easter!

Owen playing. What a great smile and laugh!

My new haircut. I love it! I think I chopped off about 7 inches...maybe more!

Owen's Quilt - designed by me, made by my mom. The hands are (top to bottom, left then right) my mom, me, my dad, owen, jeffy's mom, jeffy, jeffy's dad

cereal and lessons for mom

Over the teeth and past the gums, look out stomach, here it comes! Owen had his first experience with rice cereal last night. Boy, did he like it! He started opening his mouth starting with bite two or three, plus he 'helped' me bring the spoon into his mouth. He also fussed when I took the spoon away to get more cereal on it. He was definately ready to start solids!

One of the things I learned last night is that I should nurse him completely (meaning on both sides) and *then* give him the cereal. I tried giving him the cereal between sides last night and he wanted very little to do with the second side. The good news is that he slept through the night last night, something he hadn't done all week - he had woken up hungry in the middle of the night the previous couple of nights. The other thing I learned is to make sure that the spoon is on top of his tongue instead of just inside of his gums. Anything on his tongue made it down his throat. Anything just inside of his gums and under his tongue came right back out.

funny boy!

owen made me laugh so hard yesterday. first, he dirtied his bath water (both ways he can do that!) then last night he managed to roll clear off of his play mat. i'm talking a couple of full revolutions, here, not just rolling one way. when i saw what he did, i said, "look what you did!" he looked up at me and flashed me this great big grin as if to say, "aren't you proud of me, mom!" we need to keep an eye on him and get stuff off of the floor now! watch out for little man!

we've decided that for several reasons we are going to make our own baby food. any suggestions on books to get or other things we may need or need to know. (kristen?) we'll be getting a food processer sometime early next month and we'll likely start owen on rice cereal some time during spring break (next week for me). owen turns 6 months old in two weeks so we're getting close! we have our next check-up on the 14th and we'll ask the pediatrician what order to introduce foods in. i figure at that point that we'll have been doing the rice cereal for about a week.

bilateral otitis media

or in laymen's terms, a double ear infection. we noticed last week that owen had lots of goop in his right ear. i cleaned it out thursday morning and saw that it was slightly runny and darker than i would have expected for just ear wax. when i came home on thursday, the area around that ear was crusty. same thing friday morning. i asked jeffy to call the pediatrician but he didn't see any more stuff during hte day so he didn't. auntie doc (my sister) came in friday night, took one look at his ear and said, "call the doctor." we went in saturday morning and found out that he has a likely ruptured eardrum (nothing to worry about) in his right ear - hence all of the goop oozing out - and a pretty red and swollen left eardrum. poor little guy. the most interesting part is that he gave us no indication that he wasn't feeling well. he was his normal happy self. he's taking the medicine pretty well (amoxicillan and ear drops)

several times this last week i have come in to get him in the morning and he is on his tummy - which is NOT how we put him down. he has officially mastered rolling over from back to tummy, and also from tummy to back. he doesn't even seem to think about it anymore. he is also pulling up from laying down to sitting by holding on to my hands. he doesn't give this a second thought either. he just does it.

it is so much fun watching this little boy grow and change. what a miracle and a blessing!

Ugh

We have only managed one full night's sleep since the week began - that was on Monday. Last night, Jeffy was up with Owen once. We seem to be going back to the 11:00, 2:00, 5:30 thing from earlier in Owen's life. I was pretty snotty to Jeffy last night as I was up with Owen at 11:30, rocking him to sleep, giving him medicine, etc. I was exhausted and frustrated with the prospect of another night of little sleep. I laid a pretty big guilt trip on Jeffy because that was all I could do in my mood. I apologized this morning a couple of times. I also thanked him for getting up with Owen in the middle of the night.

On a better note, Owen is at least smiling a little bit and even laughing at/with/for us. I've missed that part of my little boy this last week. He is usually so fun and smiley. I'll be glad when we have that and can sleep through the night again.

It's Friday!!! Yay!!! Signing class with baby tomorrow morning. Should be fun!

We found the problem!

And it isn't a cold. Owen is teething. Joy. Sunday night, like I mentioned in my post yesterday, he was up every two hours. Yesterday afternoon, I went out and got several products that help ease the discomfort that he's feeling. I also tried to give him a teething ring that was in the freezer. He didn't take it, I think it was too cold for him. It's now in the fridge instead. The good news is that last night he slept through. Jeffy was up with him until 10:30 or 11:00 (I went to bed at about 7:30), then put him down. He fussed for a couple of minutes, but put himself to sleep for the rest of the night in about his normal time frame. I think Sunday night tired him out pretty good. I know it did me! lol

It breaks my heart to have him so uncomfortable. I wish I could just take the pain away from him. He probably doesn't know what's happening. To him, his mouth is just all of a sudden really sore. I hope these teeth cut through pretty soon. I've heard that the first time is the worst, so things will hopefully get better in the future. I hope he sleeps through the night again!

A Long Night

My poor Little Man. He is either teething or has a cold. We (all three of us) were up about every two hours last night. Owen has never done that, not even as a newborn. At least we normally get lots of sleep so this isn't horrible on us. He'd rock to sleep on my shoulder, but as soon as I would put him in his crib, he'd wake up and start crying again. We ended up switching who got up with him. At around 4:00, I asked Jeffy to rock him so I could get some sleep. Jeffy put him down in his bouncy chair where he fell asleep and stayed asleep till about 6:30. He nursed and slept most of the day yesterday. I'm at work today (it was easier than making sub plans!) I'm a tired mama. At least it's a relatively easy day today. Only 6 classes.

Four months old!

has it really been that long already!? he is now reaching for us at times, when i go down to kiss him before leaving for work, he arches up and gives me a great angle. this kid is growing so quick!

we went to the pediatrician on monday. owen is now in the 45th% for weight (up from 20th%), the 70th% for head circumference, and still at the 95th% for lenght. he weighed 14 lbs, 8 oz on monday and is now 26.5 inches long. long and lean! he really looks like he is just going to get up and crawl away.

we are so lucky he is such a good baby. last night he and i went to be silent observers at a school consolodation committee (my school is on the short list of 6 that will be narrowed to four next week) and he did great. he got chatty toward the end, but that was after 2 1/2 hours. he did great! we spent the last 30 minutes out in the hallway outside of the meeting room. people kept telling me what a good baby he is. :-)

Rolly Poley Owen!

Since I talked with my sister last night, I can now tell you all what Owen's latest trick is. He went over from his back to his tummy! This morning when I went in to get him, his head was still pointing the same direction I had set him in, but he was on his side. The bumper kept him from rolling completely over, I suspect. He's a very active child when he's asleep. Much like his daddy was (according to my mother-in-law at least). We can no longer leave him on elevated surfaces.

What a fun kid he's turning into! I'm really loving this motherhood thing! :-)

AAARGGG!

A continuation on my last post. The same thing has happened twice (!!!) this week. Granted the first time was at the school I'm at on Mondays only and there was no sign on the door, the door was just closed. At least it was two women who had been in my position before. And then, just five minutes ago, the night custodian walked right in. The sign was on the door and he ignored it. Luckily for both of us, I wasnt' pumping yet because I kinda thought he would do that. (Locking the door isn't even an option with him. He has keys!) I'm afraid I was kinda short with him ("The sign is there for a reason. I put it out when I'm getting ready to pump.") We'll see if it happens again with him. He's put me into panic attacks before on program nights by not setting up the chairs like he was supposed to. (Didn't I blog about that last year? I think I did.)

Anyway, enough ranting. Yesterday when I got home, Jeffy told me that Owen managed to get his sock half-way off during the day yesterday. When he (Jeffy) went to try to figure out how he did that, he realized that Owen had done something else! You'll have to wait until my sister calls me though to find out what it is. (Is that a big enough hint, kiddo!?) ;-)

I can't believe he will be four months old on Sunday! Wow! He has grown so much so fast.

Anyone know what color the Pittsburgh Steeler's 12th man flag is? Not that we're upset or anything here. No, not us!

Frustrations

Do Not Disturb
Thank You!

This is what is printed (in red) on a sign that I hang from my door at school when I am pumping. Twice, so far, I have had people just ignore the sign and walk right on in. One was an adult who walked in and said, "I hope that doesn't apply to me. I just need to get my water cup." (It does, and she is in my room in the afternoons for the afterschool program.) Then this morning, I had a 5th grader open my door and start in. I stopped her at the door, but it was a bit awkward nonetheless. I don't lock my door because I often forget to unlock it and then leave and close my door with the keys inside. Why don't people read and comprehend? It's not that difficult a concept!

It's A Good Thing He's So Cute!

We were up at 3:45 this morning demanding to be fed. Joy. It made me a little late to work this morning because even though we were done feeding by 4:15, I didn't get back to sleep until close to (or maybe even after) 5:00. It was rough getting up this morning. Hauling my hind end out of bed in the morning is harder the closer to Friday we get. Add being up for an additional hour-plus this morning and it was harder yet. Like I said, it's a good thing Owen's so darned cute. At least it's not an every night sort of thing.

One thing I forgot to mention in my last post is that Owen was baptized a couple of weeks ago. My parents came up from Denver, my sister from Omaha, plus we had a bunch of family and friends who live in the area who came. It was a good weekend. It was also too short of a weekend. I would have liked to spend more time with my family. The Sunday morning, as we were getting ready to leave for church, my parents came over and the first thing they said was, "Well, we're not at X hotel anymore." There was a fire in the kitchen at their hotel so they were up in the middle of the night finding a new hotel. There wasn't much damage done to the hotel, which is good. It just reeked of smoke when we went back on Sunday afternoon to figure out the money issue. (They were only charged for the Friday night, and not for Saturday or Sunday nights.) During the actual baptism, neither Owen, nor the other baby who was being baptized even flinched when the water was poured over their heads. We decided that it had to have been somewhat warm. Owen slept through the whole thing! Brunch was at our home afterwards. It was nice. I'll get a picture of the quilt I designed and my mother made once we get it up in his room.

Back in the Saddle Again

Back to work as of two weeks ago. It was rough the first day. I'd really rather be at home with Owen but, as Jeffy says, "Gotta make that money, honey." It's good incentive to get home as soon as the workday is over. I even get to nurse Owen right when I get home on Mondays. :-)

I've had a technologically frustrating return to work. I turn on my computer on Jan 3 (the first day back after the holidays) and have no network connection at all. This means I don't have internet access in my room and it also means that I can't print from my room. I can't even save to Global Shared (the school network) and print things from my computer on another computer. To access e-mail, I have to go to the lab, which is right next door. It's still a pain because there are three 10 minute chunks in my day when I am essentially stuck behind my desk (pumping) and am unable to do anything else. I like being able to use that time for e-mail or other productive computer usage. After two weeks and three many phone calls to tech services, I finally got things fixed yesterday. I called the first day back, nothing happened the first week except for a brief uninterruption of internet service on the 6th. I then called the next week (last week) a couple of times and was finally told that someone would be out either Monday or Tuesday of this week. Seeing as Monday was a holiday, the tech guy came out yesterday. I told him that it wasn't my computer, that it was the box (he confirmed my diagnosis). All it took to fix the problem was switching out one part that has had a habit of "going stupid" (to quote tech guy #2) in the district. Nice to know that it's a quick and easy fix. :-)

Owen continues to do well. He's putting on the baby fat now. :-) Giving the supplimental bottle is definately working. I can see a difference in him. He's still way cute! Daddy is going well with him at home. The most enlightened thing Jeffy has said to me since I've been back is "Having him sure makes it hard to get things done around here!" I simply replied, "Yeah, he does." It's good awareness on his part.

Homeward bound! I can't wait to see that precious little piece of heaven!