To cry, or not to cry?

Let me tell you a story. A few weeks back I noticed that the peanut was sleeping during the day mostly in my arms. This was not working for either one of us. The peanut was not getting good sleep, and was very cranky. My arms were killing me, and I was not getting anything done.

I called the peanut doctor, and she confirmed what I was thinking. The peanut needs to sleep in his crib after every feeding. She told us to put him to bed drowsy, and then let him cry. She also told us that within a week he should get the hang of it.

Well...its been a week, and things are still not going well. He gets drowsy, we put him to bed, he screams...and screams...and screams. There have been many times this past week that I have wanted to pull my hair out! There is only so much screaming one can take!

I'm going to give it another week. At some point he has to start sleeping on his own, right? On Friday we go back to the doctor, and I will see what she thinks.

So what do you think? Should babies cry themselves to sleep, or should the parent get the baby to sleep?

Stroller Strides

Has anyone heard of Stroller Strides? Let me tell you, its the coolest thing ever!

I remember along time ago my mom mentioned something about it, but at the time I did not really think about it. Then Niki was talking about it on her blog, and I thought I would check into it. I have now been to two classes, and love it.

Its a workout program that you do with your child and stroller. There is walking, cardo, arm work and more. After the first class I really thought I was going to die! Right now the class is inside because of the weather, but in the spring and summer, its all done outside.

The best thing about the class is being out with other moms. Mom's who know what its like to have a two month old who does not like to sleep. Mom's who know that staying home all day with your baby can drive you a bit insane! :-)

Peanut

I have come to a new conclusion. The peanut has personality. When I mentioned this to both my mother, and Donnie they both just laughed at me. They claim the peanut does not have personality traits this early. I highly disagree. I see distinctive personality traits.

So what do you think? At two months does our peanut have personality?

Book Review

As I posted about before, I got the book "I was a really good mom before I had kids" for my birthday. I was very excited to read it, and I was not at all disappointed.

Everything in this book I could totally relate to...the guilt, the judgment of others, just saying no and so much more. I really felt like everything I have been feeling these past two months was in this book. The good, bad, and ugly.

What I will take away from this book is that moms tend to have unrealistic expectations for themselves. This creates guilt, and guilt is not a good thing.

If you are a mom, I would totally recommend this book!

Faces of Mad

I feel that the peanut spends a good amount of his day screaming. If he is not eating or sleeping, chances are good he is screaming. So the other day (election day) Donnie decided to document his screaming. Donnie says that these pictures will be coming out once Josiah brings girlfriends around.

Enjoy!

Happy 2 Months!

Today the peanut is officially two months old! Time flies when your having fun!

Problem

The peanut has a problem. He is too long and skinny!

He has a lot of sleeper type outfits that are one piece with feet. Now these are all sized 0-3 months but they are too short for him! I think two piece outfits will fit him much better from now on.

(please ignore the red eye on the peanut!)

More Birthday Fun!

This past Saturday I got to have more birthday fun! My friend Katie has season tickets at the Fisher Theater, so we went to see Avenue Q. It was SO funny. When I got home I made Donnie watch all the clips of it I could find online. If you are in the Detroit area I would definitely recommend going to see it!
After we saw Avenue Q, Katie and I met our friends Courtney and Emily for dinner. We ate at Pronto in Royal Oak, and it was really yummy. The hummus was out of this world!

It was so nice being out with friends! Although I love the peanut, it is nice to get away for a bit.

Presents!!!!

This past weekend Amy, Donnie's cousin came to visit! She was very excited to meet the peanut, and she brought presents!

Look at this shirt she found! Is it not perfect? I LOVE it!
She also got him a baby book. This is not something that I had, and I have had a great time filling it out!
There is even more! She gave me all the fixings to scrappbook! She gave me SO much stuff. There are even stickers that light up! How cool is that?
Thanks Amy!

Did You Vote?

Yesterday we went and voted as a family. Did you vote?

Happy Birthday to Me!

Yesterday was my 29th birthday! Sadly the day did not start off to well. I fed the peanut around 2:30am, but he would not go back to sleep. He did not really fall asleep till like 9am. That means mama was up from 2:30am on.

I was SO tried all day I thought I was going to fall over. My mom came over so I could run a couple errands, and everything that could go wrong did. As I'm sure you can figure out I was not in a real good mood.

On Monday nights we normal have bible study at our house, but I was feeling to crummy so we canceled. We did however, have cake! My mom had bought a cake, and some icing to write happy birthday on it. The icing came out really thick so all I could get on the cake was the word happy. It was sorta sad.

My mom even brought candles for it! (there were not 29, they would not have fit!)
So Donnie and the peanut sang happy birthday to me,
and I got to blow out my candles.
Then I promptly went to bed. :-)

Guilt

I have discovered something that I think comes along with motherhood, and that is guilt. I find myself feeling guilty ALL the time. I will make a list for you.

1.) I feel guilty that the house is not clean. I think if I stay home all day I should have time to clean the house.

2.) I feel guilty when Donnie helps with the baby.

3.) I feel guilty when I leave Donnie alone with the baby, even if I'm just going grocery shopping.

4.) I feel guilty that my mom is helping so much. I feel that I should be able to do everything on my own, and not need any help.

This is the short list. I'm sure I could come up with more if time permitted. However, I'm saying NO to feeling guilty. (or at least trying to)

Its okay that the house is not clean.

Donnie likes to help with the baby (most of the time), and he is fine when I leave him alone with the peanut.

I do need extra help and that is okay. I'm not wonder women, and I love having my mom here to help out.

So I'm saying no to guilt. What about you all? Any ones else experiencing guilt?

Happy (early) Birthday to me!

Today Donnie and I celebrated my birthday! (its Monday)

The day started with a present! Donnie and the peanut wrapped and presented me with a wonderful gift. Please note in the picture that the present is wrapped with paper from our printer, and held together with painters tape. I love my hubby! :-)
Also note that in this picture that the peanut is holding onto the present! How cute!!
And what was the present? The book "I was a really good mom before I had kids". I was so happy to get this book! I had seen it in Target, and even blogged about it. My hubby remember all this and bought me the book. How sweet is that!?!
Then it was off to church. Because it was cold out, we put the peanut in a winter coat for the first time. He is SO cute in it. And you know what? He was quiet all during church today! What a blessing that was.
My wonderful parents met us at church to take the peanut so Donnie and I could have some time alone. They are SO good to us! So after church we headed to my favorite restaurant, Sweet Lorraine's for lunch. It was very very very yummmy.

After that we headed home for a bit. Donnie was planning on taking me to see High School Musical 3 (I have really wanting to see it), but being home with no peanut was so nice I did not want to leave. So we ended up sleeping, and enjoying the peace and quite. It was wonderful!

Hallowen Fun!

As I posted earlier, my mom and dad came over to help us last night with Halloween. This was very helpful. My mom was on peanut patrol inside while Donnie and my dad took turns helping me pass out candy.
Before the trick or treaters came Donnie and I carved a couple of pumpkins. He carved Dracula, and I did a ghost. They were a big hit!
The peanut was asleep for the vast majority of the night. He missed out on all the fun! However, to be festive, he did have his Halloween outfit on!
And of course Frankie dressed up in his bumblebee outfit. He only kept the hat on for the pictures, then he shook it off. :-)
We had a great night! It was fun to see all the neighborhood kids dressed up. It was also great to be outside in this great weather!

Happy Halloween!

I have been so bad about posting this week! But rest assured all is going well here.

Not only is today Halloween, but its the start to my birthday countdown! Tonight my mom and dad are coming over to help take care of the peanut, so Donnie and I can pass out candy! I'll be sure to take lots of pictures!

Frankie's Weekend

While we were in Ohio, Frankie got to spend the night with his puggie cousins. As I have mentioned before, Donnie's family LOVES pugs, so Frankie has MANY pug cousins. Word on the street is that he had a GREAT time, and was playing the whole time with the other pugs.

This is something that I would not believe, but Donnie got to see it first hand. I really think Frankie did not want to come home! However, when he did come home he had a sweater! How cute is he!

What a weekend!

This weekend Donnie, my mom, Joshia and I went to Ohio to visit some family. I'm not sure if this is something I want to do again anytime soon. :-) I have learned that taking a peanut away for just one night can be a lot of work! Here is the problem; the peanut was pretty fussy for most of the trip. Now when I'm home, him being fussy does not really bother me, but when I'm someplace else it stresses me out! I'm happy to be home!
We did have a good time introducing the peanut to his family. We spent some time with his great grandma, and I think she really enjoyed that. (when he was not screaming. hehehe) She even got to feed him lunch!
He did enjoy sleeping on daddy's shoulder while we were there. I think it makes his tummy feel better being like that.
I thought it was great that we had four generations together, so you know we had to document this occasion.
We did have a great time with family, but I'm sure happy to be home! :-)

Doctor Time!

Earlier this week my mom and I took Josiah for a check up. He was 8 pounds 16 ounces! I'm sure by now he is over 9 pounds! On his first visit to the doctor he was only in the 5th percentile for his weight, but now he is in the 25 percentile! The doctor is very pleased with that!

In other news, Josiah had a bath today and he did not even cry! Wowie wow wow!

Diaper Update

As most of you know, before the peanut was born Donnie and I bought over 3,000 diapers to get us though the first year. I have good news to report! We have started to use them! Before this week we were still using newborn diapers. I did not buy any newborn diapers because I thought he was going to be big.

Donnie's cousin Amy did however get us newborn diapers. Those lasted the first couple weeks. Then we had to do the unthinkable and buy newborn diapers. Good thing I still had some coupons! :-)

So, now we are using the size one diapers. They are still really big on him, but I'm not buying anymore newborn diapers! I'm very curious to see how my whole diaper plan is going to work out!

More Pictures!

Some of you commented that there are no pictures of the peanut and me. I thought over this past weekend we could take care of that. These, again, are pictures that my mom took last Sunday. In the picture above both of us look happy.
In this picture, not so much. However, it does make me laugh every time I look at it!
Donnie also got some pictures of the peanut on my shoulder. In this picture he is doing his pirate impression. He does this often.
And this is my favorite picture of the day. He looks so sweet!!!