Audrey's Blog

New Year’s Commitment #1 – Update

As we near the end of Q1, I can’t help but look back and see how I’m doing on my New Year’s Commitments – specifically my very first commitment to take better care of myself – get to gym, lose some weight, take time for myself in my studio.  I’d really like to say that I’ve been successful in all of those, but 2 out of 3 ain’t bad, right?

Let’s start off with my biggest challenge – getting to the gym.   I know I just have to make it a priority, but as we all know there are just 24 hours in a day and I’m only human so that just hasn’t happened.  On the upside, the “lose some weight” goal has been going pretty darn great.  I can’t remember exactly where I was at the beginning of the year (I’m not at home to go check the mirror in the bathroom where I’ve been tracking all of this), but I do know that since November 17th – the very first day I dared to actually record a weight since Logan was born – I was 18 pounds heavier that I am today.  I also know that I’m 9 pounds lighter than when Logan was conceived.  Woo hoo!!!  Ideally, I’d like to shed another 20 pounds before the summer, and I feel like that it’s completely possible!  I’ve finally cleared out all of my old maternity clothes and am slowly making my way back into the clothes that I was wearing pre-Logan.  In fact, I’m almost ready to retire the clothes I was wearing immediately pre-Logan and dig out the pants that are a size smaller.  Right now, I can put them on without too much pain, but, in another 3-5 pounds, it won’t look like I’ve been poured into them.  (Like so many women, I’m pretty sure I have 3 or 4 different sizes in my closet.  Ugh!)  That’s a HUGE woo hoo!

As for the creative part of taking better care of myself … well, that hasn’t gone that great either, BUT I’m thrilled to say that I have taken Logan’s 7 & 8 month photos.  That’s pretty huge.  Before that, I had relied on Angie to come over and help me out with those.  She has done a phenomenal job and you should really check out her work (www.pointandpray.com).  I’m just thrilled that I finally have the energy and umph to do them myself.  And, even as rusty as I was with my camera, the results were half bad (Logan at 7 months & Logan at 8 months).  The other thing that I’m really excited about is that I have creative play dates scheduled with both Angie & Dana in the coming weeks.  Yea for girlfriend time!

I’m looking forward to continuing to work on my priorities in the coming months.  Here’s to renewing commitments!

Operation Baby Proofing: The Gates – Part 1 of 3 Complete!

Watch out … he’s mobile and he’s dangerous!  Our little man has been keeping us on our toes or at least on our feet trying to keep him out of trouble.  It’s our own fault for not following through with our baby proofing plan that we started in January.  We did a whole lot of talking about what we were going to do.  Too bad we didn’t get around to actually doing anything until just now.  

We actually had a bit of a challenge.  We decided that we were going to confine the little man’s movements to the living room.  That’s where we spend almost all of our time and even if we’re in the kitchen, we can see what he’s up to in the living room easy enough.  Doing that required 2 gates.  The catch is that both gates needed to be extra wide AND one of them needed to go between 2 non-parallel surfaces.  That may not seem like that big of a deal, but apparently it is because we only found one viable option that happened to solve both problems: the KidCo ConfigureGate.  It got good reviews and since it was our only real option, we went ahead and ordered one from Amazon.  We wanted to make sure it really would work out the way we hoped before we bought the 2nd one.  We were relieved when it showed up yesterday just 3 days after we ordered it.  Chris was determined that it would be installed before we went to bed, and it almost happened that way.  But, isn’t it always the case that you don’t quite have everything you need for a home improvement project???  Turns out we were a couple of sheet rock anchors shy of being able to complete the project.  But, we are very pleased with the results.  It was easy to install and we believe it’s sturdy enough to stand up to our little Konan. 

 

We actually have 2 more gates to install – 1 leading out of the living room into the entry hall that will complete Logan’s confinement & 1 around the entertainment center.  We’d been struggling with how to keep him away from the components and speakers.  Sans going and spending a fortune on new furnature, we decided that gates might be our solution here, too – especially after we found the HearthGate from KidCo.  Who says it has to go around a fireplace???  That was actually the next one I ordered.  Hopefully, it’ll be here in a week or so (after having to factor in the weekend, grrr!).  He hasn’t been as apt to crawl down the hallway as he has been to slither into the kitchen or mess with the shiny objects in the entertainment center (what a little man, right?). 

Now I just have to treat you to an adorable photo of him playing on the floor.  As soon as I picked up the camera to take a picture of the gate, he started smiling for it.  What a ham!!!

 

9 long ... I mean, blissful years!

Yup - 9 years ago today we said "I do" ... tied the knot ... got hitched ... took the plunge ... <insert your favorite euphesmism here>

And, leave it to my Star Wars loving husband to find the perfect anniversary e-card at Hallmark: http://tinyurl.com/c2pk5m.  God I love that guy! 

Logan's 8 Month Update

Logan’s 8 Month Update
I’ve noticed that my answer to the often asked question “How’s the baby?” is almost always the same – “fat & happy, what more can we ask for?”  It’s true … we are so ridiculously lucky.  There’s almost nothing that can really ruin his mood.  In the past month, we’ve hit a few bumps – his first case of the croup, his first ear infection (which we just can’t seem to shake), & a nasty bout of teething.  But, in general, he takes it all in stride and always comes back to his baseline – fat & happy.  
Here are a few highlights:

• The headline, of course, is that on his 8 month birthday, he started to crawl and then almost immediately started trying to pull up on everything.  Now, he’s into everything, and he knows no fear.  Unfortunately, that’s lead to a few more bonks & bruises, but he’s a tough little guy.  Very little stops him.

• When we say “fat”, we’re not kidding.  The little man is tipping the scales at 24 ½ pounds.  We get our works at home doing “baby bench press” & “baby bicep curls”.  Logan loves it, and it’s a good workout. He’s busting out of his 9 month clothes.  I’m heading to Carter’s this afternoon to stock up on 12 month summer stuff. 
• We’re adding in more “solid” foods.  We’re on to Stage 2 foods along with baby yogurt, and just this past Tuesday, we gave him his first crunchy fruit puff.  He wasn’t entirely sure what I was shoving into his mouth, but he caught on really quick and gummed it just like he should.  He’s not quite at the point that he’ll take them out of my hand or off his little tray, but I’m sure he’ll get that soon enough.  Now that he’s eating out of bowls more, he’s convinced that all bowls are meant for him just like he still thinks all bottles are his. 
• It looks like ear infections may be a problem.  When we took him in for the croup in February, we discovered that he had the very beginnings of an ear infection.  We did a 10 day round of amoxicillin.  He never seemed symptomatic so we didn’t think anything of it.  We went back a month later to check on it, and it hadn’t cleared up.  In fact, the other ear was a little infected, too.  So, we left the doctor’s office with an Rx for augmentin.  Little did we know what was in store for the little man.  The pediatrician and the pharmacist both recommended that we give him yogurt and probiotics to try to offset the fact that the antibiotic would kill off the good bacteria in his tummy, and we did start off giving him a container of yogurt a day (which he loves!).  But that wasn’t nearly enough to ward off what one doctor called “augmentitis” aka huge, massive, blow-out BMs multiple times a day.  That in and of itself is merely annoying to have to clean up (again, thank God for Oxyclean).  Strangely enough, Logan seems relatively unbothered by the dirty diapers.  However, the result of having to clean up that many very dirty diapers is a raging case of diaper rash – the kind that makes an otherwise happy baby scream bloody murder when you make the slightest move to take off a diaper because they know what’s coming.  Pathetic doesn’t even begin to describe what the little guy has gone through.  On the advice of our wonderful team of care providers at our daycare, we headed over to our local pharmacy (a real live apothecary, I know … almost unheard of in this day and age).  The sell a homemade concoction called Super Dooper Diaper Goop, and it’s a miracle in a white tub.   This wonderful goo combined with upping his yogurt intake to 2 containers a day plus adding in ½ a packet of probiotics to each container has given his little baboon butt a chance to heal.   We only have about a day left of the antibiotics and then we’re hoping the worst is behind us.
• Logan is talking so much!  “Da Da” is his favorite phrase right now.  We’re pretty sure it’s just his version of baby babble, but at least once I’m almost certain he looked right at Chris and said “Daddy” and it was witnessed by his Aunt Angie and her parents so I don’t think I was imagining things.
• Bath time is play time.  It seems to be his mission during each bath to see how much of the water he can kick and splash out of his tub and onto us.  It's adorable and annoying all at the same time.  :-)
• He’s gotten to the point that he has times when he definitely has a preference of which one of us is taking care of him.  More specifically, there are times when I’ll do, but he’d much rather have Chris.  I’m not sure that I’ve noticed it the other way around, but maybe I’m just watching too closely to see it.  Who knows?

What I really can’t believe is that we’re already tossing around ideas for his 1st birthday party.  Crazy, huh?  Oh, well.  Back to life with a fat & happy baby!

License Plate Chuckle

A Volkswagen Rabbit with the license plate ML8 ML8.  Think about it. 

Temporary Baby Blockades

We probably should have put up the baby gates long before now, but it just didn’t get done.  While we’re solving the problem of how to pen in our roaming munchkin, we’ve devised a couple of temporary measures to keep him in a somewhat child-tolerant, if not completely child-friendly, zone – this being one of them … a temporary baby gate made of clean laundry.  Just another wonderful excuse not to fold clothes!

Logan's 8 Month Photos

Thank goodness for great holidays that give me a wonderful excuse to take even more embarassing pictures of our little man.  You can see the result of the entire shoot here.  But, I couldn't resist posting a couple of my favorites.  Enjoy!

 

Nothing will ever be the same

At 1:18 Sunday afternoon (8 months & 46 minutes after he was born), Logan took his first purposeful, non-lunging/scooting crawling “steps”.  No more leaving him on the floor in the living room and expecting him to be in just about the same place when I come back.  The animals won’t be able to sit just out of reach and openly mock him for not being able to grab their tails.  It’s only a matter of time until the Xbox has something other than a DVD shoved in its disc tray.  <sigh> Nothing will ever be the same …

Oxiclean to the Rescue!

With so much going on, you’d think I’d find something better to blog about than a stain remover, but nope - this is what’s on my mommy mind right now.  :-)

Last Friday, I put Logan in his adorable Baby’s 1st St. Patrick’s Day onesie (it’s white & with shamrocks all over it complete with a big shamrock on the butt).  Unfortunately, the little man decided to have one of the biggest blow outs he’s ever had.  It was one of those blow outs that makes you wonder how in the world did that get there???  I was devastated.  This was the onesie that I intended to take his 8 month photos in this week.  But, never fear … Oxiclean to the rescue!!!  This is the single most amazing stain remover ever.  The WHITE is WHITE again.  Hallelujah!  

Now I’m sure that I’m not supposed to be using this particular non-baby friendly formula, but I have been.  However, in finding the photo of the bottle for this post, I found that they make a  baby formula.  Woo hoo! Wish me luck on finding it somewhere reasonably priced!

PS - Thanks for the coupons, Mom!