12 weeks

12 weeks ago today i became a mother for the first time. He will be 3 months on 11/5/08. People say and it is so true that time goes by so quickly. He is going to be a baby for such a short period of time. And yet, it feels like he has been in my life forever. I can't imagine what i would be doing right now if he wasn't in my life(ok, i would be at work). i look at his baby pictures and he has already changed and grown so much. I know him so well that when he is sick or out of sorts i can tell without him being able to speak. I love how i can make him smile and laugh. I love the faces he makes when he is tired and doesn't want to wake up in the morning. I love the cuddles. I love seeing him figure how to reach for a toy, or kick in the bath water. I love watching him see things for the first time. I love his little personality and own identity - he is growing and isn't just a baby anymore, but a person! I love how much i love him. Being a mom in many ways is very healing. we all have pains from our pasts and we have all felt injustice in some way. But knowing no matter their faults that my parents must have loved me in this same way is healing. Knowing that they tried their best all the time, as i try my best, is healing. Mason is not just now a part of my life, he is my whole life now. I have loved in the past, and i love Kurt as i have never loved someone else before. But your child - that is a whole different ball of wax.

I really wish i could stay home with him full time and be his mom. But in January i must go back to work. It will break my heart! But living with the in laws and me working full time are all to get rid of the debt so that maybe i can stay home more and be more of a mom. Because really, that matters so much more to me than my career. I use to be so driven to get to the next level, to be promoted, to be the best at what i do. and i just want to be the best mom. i want Mason to know that he is loved and important and supported. I don't ever want him to doubt that his parents are there for him.

Kindermusik Outing

http://www.musicwithmelissa.com/

Today Mason and i went to Kindermusik.

I am tired of sitting in the house, or going shopping, or for a walk. These are all good things to do - but every once in a while i need something different to do. There are exercise classes where you take the baby with you - but that ends up being neither fun or mom or baby, how can you do yoga when the baby wants to be rocked? (Besides when is exercise fun? i have signed up for a pilates class all by myself - but i wouldn't call that fun - just necessary! since my body is in a state of never before seen flab) so i started googling and looking for classes. This class was geared for babies (birth -20 months) which is unusual and they offered a FREE trial class, which is great these days.

It was so much fun! there is singing and dancing and signing and instruments and flags. Most of it is done by the parents with the kids participating as they are able. But it was awesome to interact with mason differently, see him watch the other kids, to be with other moms - and just get out of the house. I am sure Kurt is glad that i will learn new songs - i have been singing the same 3 songs that i only remember half of for the past 10 weeks - often with my own words made up - a change in that department will be nice.

Of course after 4 days of no poop, in the middle of our class Mason decided to end that issue - 3 times. Murphy's Law!

So starting October 30th Mason and i are enrolling in our very first mommy and me class. And i am so excited!

4 daily tasks

Everyday there are 4 things that I attempt to do, however i think only once have i gotten all 4 done. I am not short on time, but somehow just as i start doing one task that is the moment Mason needs my undivided attention - and when that moment passes i must start again with the task.

1. Go for a walk: This means Mason must be full, clean, and dressed. I must be dressed. I need to choose which dog gets to go. (With three dogs, i can't take them all - and i don't want just one to feel like the reject so one gets to go. Depending on where we are walking, and what i expect to encounter - horses on a trail, other dogs, loose cows on a hillside, horses behind a fence - i either stick with the rotation or skip around to set myself up for success. Of course if i choose the non-dog friendly dog i will encounter dogs where i never have before!) THen mason must be strapped into the jogging stroller - much easier to push than regular stoller especially on trails! Then we walk for an hour. With my current very out of shape condition this is quite the task!

2. Shower: To decrease the chance of a screaming baby mid shampoo - mason needs to be recently changed and fed. The bouncy chair needs to brought into the bathroom. Then hopefully i will get about 30 minutes to shower and get ready.

3. Eat Lunch: I am lucky enough to have Kurt work only 5 minutes from the house with an incredibly flexible schedule. More often than not he is able to come home and either make lunch for us, or hold mason so i can make lunch. On the rare occasions that he is not here i try to make lunch for myself while mason is asleep around 11:30. ABout half the time i choose to skip lunch during a nap time and check e-mail or do one of the other 4 tasks that need to be done - or i will pay bills or check e-mail and have Hattie time. on those days i eat a yogurt or something that can be picked up easily! If i choose to actually make a sandwich, i must not only make it, but eat it and clean it up before mason wakes up.

4. House chore: I try to pick one task a day to get done: clothes laundry, change the sheets, vacum the house, sweep the hardwood floors, clean a bathroom, baby laundry, put laundry away. More often than not this does not get done. Often i say, when kurt gets home i will do the laundry. Then when kurt gets home i say, i think i will go to the bathroom, or brush my teeth - or something that has also been neglected in that day's list.

Extras: Things that must be fit in some way into this daunting list of 4 tasks include - play time for mason, tummy time for mason, bathroom time for mommy, cooking dinner - i need at least one meal a day.

Now that i am starting to go out the world more - to grocery shop, or go to babies r us, or some of the classes i have signed up for, or church - a shower is a must (darn social standards lol) - but it also means less of the necessary 4 tasks get done. Oh well. I think it is better to have a normal life than a clean house! Thank goodness i have a very patient and understanding husband who after a full and busy day at work comes home to a disaster of a house and takes no notice. He says you have been busy keeping the baby alive. Which is such a big task i do understand....but shouldn't i be able to have clean clothes too? I mean it is just one not very mobile baby. Women manage to care for multiple mobile children and get all this done - plus make their own baby food.

I use to feel successful and fufilled when i was able to make budgets, and develop programs, and help old people learn how to get dressed again, or out of bed, after an injury. Now - just being with mason, even if i don't accomplish half of those tasks makes me feel fufilled. I in some ways do want to go back to work and have that working identity again. However - i really just want to stay at home and raise mason to be a happy, healthy kid!

Vaccines and procedures

Let me preface this by saying i work in health care. I support Western Medicine. i use antibiotics, and get my shots. However....people do your research and ask questions. I don't necessarily think there is a right or wrong answer as long as you are well informed, and the decision is yours. It is the people who don't know better and just to what doctors suggest that frustrate me. They don't know any better - and it would never occur to them that one should independently research - after all, don't doctors know best? Doctors make us sign informed consent waivers - but really how informed are we?

Here is an example - after i gave birth the doctors wanted to give Mason eye antibiotics to prevent chlamydia in his eyes. Mind you i am married, and they tested me for this in the beginning of my pregnancy. They know i am negative - yet they want him to get antibiotics. And then people wonder where these super bugs who are immune to antibiotics come from.

Another example - after i gave birth the doctors wanted to give Mason a hep B shot. Hep B you get from sexual activity or IV drug use. I know kids do things SUPER early these days - but as an infant i am reasonable sure he will not be sexually active. I will bring him in to get the shot at 12, heck even 10 - before these issues come up - but when he is bigger and older and his body can better process all the toxins in the vaccine.

Now i get that it is a public health issue. That women who can't afford health care may never come back in when the child is 12 to get the shot. I get that women who say they are healthy are actually not - and you want to protect the child. I understand why they make these things mandatory. But - they are not needed for the average child. And very few people do the research. When medicine is needed it is wonderful - but when it is not, we are exposing ourselves and children to things they don't need. i had to sign waivers for 4 (as i deemed them) unnecessary vaccines/ procedures.....but the nurses all agreed with me

Mason is scheduled for his first vaccines today. I am not anti-vaccination. But i have done my research on the risks and benefits of each individual vaccine as well as the combos they want to give...how they are made, what metals and preservatives are in them, in addition to what they are meant to prevent. Some i have opted not to expose him to - the risk in my opinion is greater than the benefit. Some he will get as scheduled. Some he won't get at all. Maybe after you research you decide to follow the AAP recommended schedule - great! All i am saying is do your research, know what you are exposing yourself and your kids to. Don't leave it to the well paid doctor to decide what is right for you and your family.

8 weeks old

so, 8 weeks have passed - amost 9, and today he is 2 months old! So much has happenedand changed that i honestly can't believe that it has only been 8 weeks. He sleeps through the night about half the time (10 pm - 7am), the othr half he wakes up once. He is smiling and cooing and singing. Kurt and I feel like our life is complete now, and perfect. not that it felt empty before - - just so much more full now.

We have made the decision after much discussion and prayer to move in with kurt's parents. The past two years of real estate and the ever ellusive promise of it getting better any day now have caught up with us.We bought and remodeled a house, planned and paid for a wedding and honeymoon, and had a baby, all while thinking any day now it will have to get better and the pay day will come....so far it hasn't. We would like for me to be able to stay at home with mason and his siblings eventually, to get a bigger house, to allow Mason the ability to do all the extracirculars his little heart desires.....so we will take the next year to pay off bills and become financially more free - for the sake of our family. There were all kinds of reasons not to do this - but they were all selfish. We are keeping our house, and renting it out to our current roomate, and he will find roomates. At the end of a year we may sell this house or continue to rent it - if it makes sense. I know debt is the american way now - look at the failing banks - but it makes me feel like i can't breathe. knowing that there is a way out - even if it means living with parents - allows me to breath again!