Toddler Talk - "Owww my boobs!"

Since Carina seems to be obsessed, let's talk about boobs.

When I'm engorged, she'll look at me and say "Mommy has big boobs!" Ha, it's the only time I have big boobs ;)

While romping, she often elbows me in the boobs to which I reply, "ow!! My boobs!" She has begun repeating this when she falls down or gets bumped. Hearing a 2 year old yelp, "owww boobs!" makes my day. Every time.

I don't pump at home very often, but when I do, she is intrigued. She stands next to me, watches, and exclaims, "Mommy pumping!" A few times now she has climbed up on the couch after I finish, put her hands on my chest and pushed on one boob, and then the other...over and over again. "Mommy pumping!" I guess she thinks she's my manual pump?

Got any toddler boob talk to share? ;)

Go-Live or Go Home

We spent a long weekend in Cape Cod with my family. It was relaxing. Well, as relaxing as it can be with 5 kids under 5 running around the house ;)

I've found myself spending less and less time on my personal computer (read: blogging & social media) as I've become more and more attached to my work laptop. Our Go-Live begins on Thursday, which means that one of the hospitals in town will start using our software for the first time. This is the most stressful event I will probably encounter in this job, and it will require me to work 12 shifts of 12+ hours over the course of the next 2.5 weeks. Yikes. And did I mention they are night shifts? Yeah. 6 PM until 6 AM. Even on weekends. But I chose this -- nights over days -- because it means I'll actually see the girls for a few hours each day.

All hell can break loose during Go-Lives. Otherwise polite people might yell at you, possibly throw things, and apparently some have even caused nervous breakdowns. The death stares from users can be never ending when they see your telltale {rather unflattering} brightly colored "I work for/on the computer system" polo shirts. But I'm hopeful that I can help things go more smoothly and that I'll survive it all.

It could never be that bad when I have these sweet (and hilarious) faces to come home to...

So if you see a flurry of Twitter activity from me at like, 3 AM this Saturday night it might mean that things are going better than expected and I've found myself with a few minutes of downtime. Not likely, but a girl can hope.

Weaning fail

No, not Aurelia.

Me. Zoloft.

I'm one of those obnoxious procrastinators who waits until their medication has run out before requesting a refill. After working as a Pharmacy Technician for years, you think I'd know better...but anyway, so I order it online and go to pick it up last Tuesday. Except they tell me there were no refills left so I'd have to come back. I requested they check the original prescription because I knew there were refills, but they couldn't because their computer system was down. Awesome.

So I forgot about it...one day, two days, three days. On Saturday I told myself that no matter what I had to go get it. And then we got sidetracked. Monday came around but hey, I thought to myself, I've been feeling pretty good. Maybe I could just stop taking it?

Well, here we are just over a week since I've had my last pill and today was the nail in the coffin on my attempt to let go of SSRIs. I've been anxious as work is beginning to demand more of my time than I'm able to give and people are pulling me in all sorts of different directions. Tonight I have to do a ton of laundry and pack us all up for our trip to visit my family in Cape Cod this weekend. And both girls won't stop screaming; it's almost 9 PM and they're both still awake, PISSED. I feel myself beginning to shake and panic and I know it was stupid of me to try this.

All I want to do is crawl in a hole and fall asleep...only to wake up on the beach this weekend where I will hopefully get the chance to relax. Nothing is going to stop me from swinging by the pharmacy and grabbing my prescription on the way out of town, though.

I so badly wanted to not need it, but I'm just not there yet. le sigh.

The pros of working

After re-reading my last post, I realized how negative I sounded. It's not all bad. Promise.

In fact, things are pretty good.

Yes, I'm exhausted. Yes, the girls are having some difficulty. But...

I'm getting to use my brain again. I really like this job and not to toot my own horn, but I think I'm pretty good at it. I'm attacking the queue of outstanding issues and resolving them quickly; the Pharmacists are so grateful.

My anxiety has diminished. I am calmer and more relaxed than when I was at home. I'm equally stressed {but for different reasons now, of course} but I find that I'm dealing with the stress better. Along the same lines, the agoraphobia is completely gone. We're going out every day and having so much fun. Dare I say that I'm enjoying the girls more than before?

The money. Money isn't everything, of course. But this job means that we'll be able to save a hefty down payment for a future home. We can now afford a second car and are living comfortably. It's nice to not have to worry about money for the first time in a long time.

Last, I feel productive and fulfilled...I'm helping other people out and contributing to our family at the same time. But I miss my little princesses. If I'm able to negotiate for a ~25 hour workweek (half at home, half onsite) come July, I think I'll have the best of both worlds.

These girls <3

Thanks so much for all of your messages and words of support, and for sticking with me despite my sad sad lack of posts lately. And I think I'm a few weeks behind in e-mails. I'm sorry! I promise I'm not ignoring you.

Oh and apparently Top Baby Blogs just reset (who knew?) Me lurve you long time if you click below and send a vote my way ;)

The cons of working

We're slowly starting to settle into our new routine. There have been a number of difficulties including the fact that Mike and I are both exhausted all.the.time and the house is a dump since cleaning is the last thing I want to do when I get home after a long day. But, the worst has been how it has affected the girls.

When I leave in the morning, Aurelia fusses and Carina gets upset. For Carina, it ranges from just a sad pout to full blown tantrum depending on the day."Momma gotta stay", "Mommy snuggle!" and "Nooo Mommy!" are what I hear most often. We had been slowly weaning her from the binky but now she has started regressing; the Nanny told me today that she wants it most of the time. We're down to only 1 and we were hoping to avoid buying more since Aurelia doesn't take them. I'm not sure if cold turkey is the way to go, though. I can't believe it's almost a year later and we're still dealing with this...

Teeny went from chillest baby ever to whiny and fussy, freaking out if I turn the corner into the kitchen to cook dinner. She won't let me out of her sight when I'm at home. Fortunately, she has taken to sippy cups and is drinking enough breast milk during the day. She's also developed a fond love for food and is close to eating whatever we're eating for meals. I'm glad our bottle troubles are behind us; it was a rough first week until we tried sippys.

I LOVE FOOD

Their sleep is regressing. Both girls went from sleeping 7 PM until 7 AM straight to waking multiple times a night. Carina calls out for me and I usually end up bringing her in bed with us so she doesn't wake the baby. It's also taking them longer to fall asleep in the evening, and they often wake early. Aurelia was up at 5:30 AM yesterday. Uhmm BRING MOAR COFFEE.

I'm hoping this becomes easier for them soon. Probably just in time for my contract to end, though, right? Doesn't it always happen that way? Although all signs point to the probability of them keeping me on board longer than mid-July. I'm hoping to negotiate to part-time at that point. ~12 hours onsite and ~12 hours working from home would be my ideal situation. We'll see. I think that kind of a schedule would be easier on all of us.

How was adjusting to working for you?

On top of the world

I apologize. Cheesiest post title ever, as we were actually on top of a mountain yesterday. Well, not a mountain, but the rather large peak just a few minutes away from our house. We had never been, despite its proximity.

My Mother's Day began with Mike letting me sleep late and making me a lovely breakfast of coffee, eggs, Nutella on toast, and a chocolate chip croissant. Me likey chocolate. After Carina's Noontime nap, we headed out to West Rock State Park. It was beautiful out and Carina had a blast running alongside the stroller (BTW pushing the stroller up the hill was quite the workout). What we didn't realize was that it would take us 45 minutes to reach the top. We were exhausted, but had a nice picnic once we reached the top.

Aurelia was hungry?

Teeth!

For dinner, Mike grilled salmon and shrimp and sauteed 2 lbs. of mussels - 3 of my favorite foods. Dessert was some chocolate fondue and Moscato while we watched Game of Thrones. I couldn't have asked for a better day. My gift was a Garmin GPS -- something I've been wanting for quite some time now. And yes, we used it when we traveled to the park, just 1.5 miles away ;)

How was your Mother's Day?


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This week's Toddle Along Tuesday topic is Mother's Day! What did you do? There are no rules here, except that you link up a relevant post (old or new) rather than your whole blog.

What I do all day

Oh hi there, blog. It's been a little while.

Most nights this week I crashed as soon as I put the girls to bed or had so much to clean I didn't even get a chance to turn the computer on. No matter how much laundry I do or dishes I wash, a few hours later there are more. I hate those chores that you can't ever be finished with. And even more I hate not being able to find a way to construct a sentence so that I don't have to end it in a preposition. Ugh. Oh, and yesterday we drove 2 hours each way to Mike's Grandfather's interment at West Point. That part of New York is one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen. But I digress...

A few of you have asked what I actually do at my job. So here, it is...with a warning. It's probably pretty boring to the majority of you, unless you get turned on at the thought of electronic medical records. And yeah...said no one ever.

My days are spent in a cubicle, making my way through a queue of outstanding issues from the most recent Go-Live in the health system for which I work. I read through the problems and then tweak the build of the software system as appropriate. Sometimes changes are quick and easy, like adding a button so that a physician can order a 10 mg dose of a certain medication or specifying that a medication can be dispensed at a particular pharmacy. Other times, the problems run deeper and I have to spend hours investigating what went wrong. In truth, I love these issues. The ones that require me to run queries and search through line after line in an attempt to identify the problem get me all hot and bothered. Okay, not really, but you get the idea. When I finally find that pesky root cause I mentally high-five myself {yeah, I'm that cool} and triumphantly respond to the user who reported the issue, letting them know it will be fixed shortly.

One afternoon a week I go to the hospital and meet directly with the Pharmacists and help solve their issues and explain aspects of the system to them. I'm hoping to do this on a more regular basis since it is so productive, and the hospital is less than 10 minutes from home (versus a 20+ minute drive to my office).

In many ways, it's very similar to my old job. I'm working with the same software and investigating issues much like I did before. Except now, I'm trying to fix the problems rather than cause them! In Quality Assurance, we basically did everything we could to make the software not work as intended. Now, I do the complete opposite.

It's been easier than I thought it would be to jump back in after 20 months away. My boss has been really impressed with my efficiency and told me today he wishes he could hire me directly. I'm feeling confident and happy that I can help them whittle away at their list of 400+ issues. And I'm making more money than I ever thought I would.

Carina is still having a hard time when I leave in the morning, and they have both regressed a little bit in their sleep schedules. More on that when I'm not about to fall asleep myself ;)

Here comes Carina!

Toddlers say the best things, and Carina is no exception:

• When she hurts herself, she says, "Mommy kiss it!" And magically, after I kiss her arm/leg/head it's all better. Yesterday she had a mild diaper rash and demanded, "Mommy gotta kiss the bum!" I told her that no, Mommy wouldn't be kissing her bum...to which she replied, "kiss it just a little bit?"
  

• Zooming off in the car or stroller, she yells, "here comes Carina!" While walking to Mike's soccer game this weekend I began pushing the stroller and preemptively announced, "here comes Carina!" Instead of repeating it (like she usually does), she added, "and baby sister!" ::heartmelt::


• Each day when I return from work she asks me to take off my coat and shoes. Then she proceeds to step into my shoes (usually heels) and walks around in them exclaiming, "Carina's so big and strong!"


• Her favorite treat in the whole world is Orange Sherbet. Of course, that's not what she calls it. To her, it's "Clementime Ice Cream".


• She's going through a bit of a nudist phase, and would rather not wear clothes. She'll take off her shirt and then come up to me and say, "oh no! What happened to Carina's clothes?" No idea, love. No idea...

 

What awesome things do your kids say?


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This week's Toddle Along Tuesday topic is things your kids say! Cute, funny, weird, gross, ...whatever you'd like to share. There are no rules here, except that you link up a relevant post (old or new) rather than your whole blog.

Baby led win

You might remember that we had a lot of trouble getting Carina to eat enough early on. She started out chunky but when I first returned to work back in May of 2011, she went on a bottle strike, thinned out, and never recovered. She still probably doesn't eat as much as she should.

I'm sure you can imagine that we want to do our best to avoid a food battle with Aurelia, so we were a little disheartened when we gave her her first bite -- roasted sweet potato puree -- and she gagged and drooled and spit it all out. She either didn't like it, or didn't appreciate being spoon fed...or both.

So, we tried something else. Many of my friends have been successful with baby led weaning so I did a little reading and figured it wouldn't hurt to give it a try. Baby Led Weaning simply means letting your child feed him/herself from the beginning. No spoon-feeding purees or rice cereal. "Weaning" in this sense doesn't mean stopping breastfeeding, it is referring to the British word which means "adding complementary foods". You give baby small pieces of food and let them have at it. We were a little nervous at first that she would choke, but she's done unbelievably well.

Aurelia at just over 7 Months is already eating better, and more foods, than Carina was at 1. She's had toast, sweet potato, avocado, rigatoni, pastina (re: last two, we're Italian, so they're two separate categories), cucumber, banana, applesauce, apples, yogurt (which she feeds herself), cheddar cheese, mozzarella cheese, American cheese (can you tell we like cheese?), pancakes, mango, hot dog (the fancy nitrate-free kind), and puffs. And I just might have let her try her first {very tiny} taste of cupcake today ;)

Sure, it's messy, but she loves feeding herself and it let's us eat our own meals while she eats hers. I wish we had gone this route with Carina. No stress. No fuss. Just happy well-fed baby.

Since returning to work, she has rebelled against the bottle just like Carina did, but after a suggestion from a reader (thanks!) we tried sippy cups and it's actually working pretty well! I guess we'll just skip the bottles altogether. And with how great of an eater she is? I'm not worried at all :)

Has anyone else tried baby led weaning? How did it go for you?

The most technologically advanced baby wear out there!

This is a sponsored post, but all opinions are my own; you cannot have them.

It was likely only a matter of time before some of the cool technology currently being used to make clothes entered the realm of baby wear. What could be better than combining cute styles with geeky antibacterial and moisture resistant properties?

Meet my lovely sponsor Julieta, co-owner of SanBelle:
Together with my father, we have created a family business focused on introducing the concept of health in clothing. Babies are in contact with their clothes all day so why not offer clothing that protects baby and keeps him/her comfortable at the same time?

Tell us a little bit more about SanBelle:

SanBelle is a unique, innovative new brand of infant clothing (newborn to 12 months) that uses textiles made with nanotechnology that protects babies and keeps them comfortable. We are the only brand on the market that use this kind of technology for baby clothing. Our soft, comfortable fabrics, which are imported from France, contain tiny particles of silver, making them:   

• Antibacterial: Using freshFX technology, our fabrics help the skin maintain a healthy balance of microorganisms which work to prevent irritations and infections, and fight bacteria and fungus.

• Moisture resistant: CoolMax technology makes our fabrics fast-drying and helps keep babies (and their clothes) moisture-free.

• UV resistant: The fabrics we use contain permanent UV 50+ solar protection, meaning it does not come out in the wash - perfect for babies with sensitive skin that cannot tolerate sunscreen.

• Static resistant: Our clothes repel dust and animal hair, ideal for babies with allergies.

What is your personal favorite item?

I just love SanBelle pajamas, they are really soft and adorable!! Babies look so cute in them.

Here's Aurelia sporting the long sleeve bodysuit. It's pink with white trim, and is super soft and slightly stretchy. The material is reminiscent of a more lightweight and flexible swimsuit. It's breathable and keeps Aurelia comfortable. The 12 Month size is just a little long on her arms and leaves plenty of room for her to grow.

SanBelle long sleeve bodysuit

I love that the clothing provides sun protection because I have been known to forget the sunscreen (oops!) and repels animal hair, as our two rather long-haired kitties get hair everywhere imaginable. 

SanBelle clothing is available on Amazon and you can find them on Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest.

So comfy!

Living for the weekends

Since beginning work, I've realized that I took advantage of my days at home. Partly due to the agoraphobia I'm sure, but also? I confess...I was lazy.

Days upon days to do anything and everything spread out before me, with no end in sight. There was no sense of urgency to make sure we did something fun each day. To hoard all the snuggles I could. To experience enough giggles and "Mommy I love you!"s and milk drunk boob-hugging naps.

I know I still get these things, but they're just in small doses until the weekend comes. I feel like I'm living for them now.

Last weekend:











Until the next one...