My Mama Bear Hour

The internet is suddenly out, so it seems like the perfect opportunity to write a blog post. When I’ll be able to post it is another matter entirely, but we’ll deal with that later. For now, the dogs are in their crates (because they weren’t mindful of the baby), the baby is sound asleep (though for how long is the ultimate question), the husband is at work, and I’m enjoying this extremely comfortable couch in absolute silence [save for the clicking of my keyboard and the humming of the baby monitor].

Last week we went to Oklahoma for my sister’s graduation from Basic Training for the Army. Even though traveling with a baby is something I strive to always avoid, it was wonderful to be there with the family. My parents flew to the states for the occasion, so we all got to be together for three days or so.

[What the heck? First, I type that my husband is at work and then thirty seconds later he texts me that he’s on his way home for dinner. No problem, I like it when he comes home. But then, two minutes after typing that the baby is sound asleep—a sleep that took all of one minute to happen a mere 15 minutes ago—he’s now awake and standing in his crib and crying. I don’t even know what to say. I have got to learn to stop typing these things! It’s too risky! Now I’m just sitting here, staring at my laptop.]

OK, the husband is back at work. Our internet is working again, but I can put off watching Gilmore Girls for the umpteenth time until after I finish this post. Hah.

So back to Oklahoma and my sister’s graduation. Overall, the trip was great! We discovered that Logan is quite the extrovert and knows no strangers. (He literally reached for a random woman at the graduation ceremony and sat on her lap for a good ten/fifteen minutes. No joke.) No matter how little sleep that baby got, as long as there was a room full of people, he was the happiest baby on the block. He made me look like a crazy new mom for insisting that he needs two naps a day, because even after missing one or both of his naps, he was still smiling and having a blast. He was exhausted—but happy. It wasn’t until we got home and all the people were gone that his exhaustion caught up with him and he suddenly became quite fussy and inconsolable. We got back to Waco on Saturday afternoon and that night, he slept for nearly 15 hours. (Not straight through. Don’t get too excited.) Speaking of baby sleep, since I’ve been so obsessed with the topic lately, it only makes sense that my very first “mama bear” moment came as a result of baby sleep—or lack thereof. Thursday morning at 10:00 am, we attended Fort Sill’s Family Day. Well Logan typically naps right around ten most mornings. So he had to skip his morning nap. Once Brittany could leave base with us for the rest of the day, we went out for lunch. It was a long wait because we had a big party and the food took a while to come out, but Logan was doing fine, so we just took his lead. Once he started getting a bit fussy, we decided to leave the restaurant a bit early and get him down for an afternoon nap. Once we got to the hotel, he was asleep within two minutes of being in his pack n play. Two minutes! Poor baby was exhausted! Then twenty minutes later, because everything in the entire world conspires to ruin baby sleep, the fire alarm in the hotel started going off. It was LOUD. However, after five minutes of continuous alarm-ing, my sleeping child still hadn’t woken up. It was amazing! I was about to go deaf, and he was still asleep. I called the front desk to find out if it was a fluke or if we actually needed to evacuate the building to which the receptionist said that we had to leave the building. I had to WAKE MY BABY UP because there was a supposed fire. I was a bit cranky about it, but you know, fires are bad. After the fire alarm was turned off, we went back inside and I tried in vain to get Logan back to sleep. I knew he wouldn’t put himself back to sleep, but I had hopes that I could nurse him to sleep in the bed. Just as he was dozing off, the fire alarm went off again. I was no longer cranky. I was livid. He eventually sat up and was far too awake for any more napping. I called the front desk again only to find out that they had only been testing the system all along. It was just a test. I yelled at the woman on the phone, informing her that I wasn’t paying good money to stay at a hotel where I couldn’t even let my baby nap! But even after yelling on the phone, I was still on fire. I decided to go yell at them in person (Travis went with me just to make sure I stayed relatively calm) in the lobby. The general manager told me there was nothing she could have done because when the fire marshal says they need to test the system, they have to test the system and she told everyone at dinner the night before and breakfast that morning that it was going to happen. My response? I WAS AT DINNER AND BREAKFAST! NO ONE TOLD ME ANYTHING! If I had known, I would never have left lunch early to get my son down for a twenty-minute nap! She apologized. I left still angry. Logan was smiling with the family upstairs. I looked like a lunatic. Eventually I got over it. The manager gave us an apology gift and I felt pretty bad. But I experienced my first mama bear moment. I don’t know that I want to experience many more. Hah.

I’ve also now experienced the “grandparents/aunts/uncles/etc. will feed your baby anything” thing. Logan ate chocolate-chip cookies, chocolate, ice cream…we’re limiting his sugar now. Hah. He also ate some fruits and veggies every once in a while. J We have some great pictures of him eating a huge strawberry. He loved it and he was a complete mess.

For the rest of my Logan news, I’m switching to bullet points. It’s faster. 

• Logan is now very adept at walking with his walker. It makes me nervous that solo walking is right around the corner. 
• Despite all the fun animal-shaped bath toys Logan has, the only toy he wants to play with now is the water dipper. The one bath item that’s for me to use is now his favorite. Figures. 
• He waves now! Not so much at appropriate times, but he loves to wave and loves it even more if you wave back! 
• We had our first “poop in the bathtub” experience. Could have done without that one. 
• Today was like a flying unicorn kind of day. Logan hardly fussed all day. He took two 1 hour, 15 minute naps. He sat on my lap for about ten minutes and giggled every time I said, “Puh-puh-poof!” [What can I say? I’m hysterical.] He sat in his high chair happily for over half an hour while I made his and my dinner. He ate some yellow curry with rice and seemed to like it. The dogs ran into him while going through the doggie door and he only cried for a little while—scrambled eggs and some bites of a biscuit made it all better. He loved my “Zaccheus” song and didn’t cry when I took him out of the bathtub. And for the first time maybe ever, I didn’t want it to be bedtime yet. Flying unicorn days may not be very frequent, but I sure loved this one.

In other news, we had to get our AC fixed in our good car, so I’ve had no car for the last two days. I had to drive Travis’s awful car this morning and couldn’t seem to get it into gear. I have no clue how or why, but I kept maxing out at 40 mph even when I was in fifth gear. Travis says I obviously wasn’t in fifth gear, but I don’t know what else I could have been in. Fifth is the furthest gear you can be in. I’m not saying that “user error” is an impossibility, but I drove that car for a year to and from work every single day and I never had this problem. Granted it’s been a couple years since then, but driving a stick is like riding a bike, right? Anyway, we get our car back tomorrow morning. Yay!

If you like chocolate, you should make Pioneer Woman’s chocolate pie filling recipe and eat it as chocolate pudding. [Same same.] I made a whole recipe on Sunday and finished eating it this afternoon—and I’m not even sorry. UH-mazing! 

When "Naps" Fall into the "Miracle" Category

I have cookies in the oven. We discovered that we had four containers of oats, so I decided to make some chocolate chip/raisin oatmeal cookies. I spent a lot of time researching how to make the best thick, chewy amazing regular chocolate chip cookies—and we now have a wonderful chocolate chip cookie recipe. I’ve shared it with my mom and sisters, and they agree that the cookies are out of this world. But see, I don’t have a wonderful amazing oatmeal cookie recipe… and I hate making bad cookies. I actually hate making bad anything. It makes me hate cooking, but I’m working on it. Anyway, moving on.

Today I used an ottoman, two laundry baskets, a toy box, and Logan’s toy/walker to block the fireplace and dining room. There are only so many times I can chase that kid down and he’s beyond obsessed. And he thinks putting dog food in his mouth is incredibly funny. I think he actually just thinks my reaction is funny, but I’ve been dealing with that my whole life. I’m an easy target because I react so dramatically—and the louder/more high-pitched I sound, the bigger his smile. He also got to try mashed potatoes today and loved them. And he ate enchiladas for dinner. Hah. We’ve discovered that he prefers grown-up food to his baby food. He’s thrown a bit of a fit here and there when we won’t give him more of our food. It starts when we let him taste our food, and then don’t give him more…he gets upset. Silly babies. He’s also decided that naps are beneath him, so his naps only last about half an hour or so. On special miracle days he’ll take a one-hour nap, but those are few and far between. On the upside, he now falls asleep in his own crib by himself within four minutes. He doesn’t stay asleep all night, but it’s much better than holding him down in my bed while he screams and tries to get out of my grip for forty-five minutes just to get him to sleep, and then we have to stress about him crawling off the bed and…it wasn’t going well. And you want to know how we did it? We let him cry. I gave in. I got to a point where he was screaming when I tried to put him down and he was screaming if I left him by himself. It was horrible for a few days and then suddenly he just started going to sleep all by himself. And it was kind of magical. Am I a big cry-it-out advocate now? Not necessarily. But if you’ve tried everything and nothing has worked, then I’d say it’s worth a shot.

OK, so it’s a new day now. Last night got late and sleep became more of a priority. On the upside, I can now tell you that my cookies actually turned out pretty good! They’re better today than they were fresh…which works out well since they’re only fresh for a very short time. I know you guys were on the edge of your seats. You can rest easy now.

Logan woke up at 6:45, nursed for half an hour, and then played with my eyelashes and eyebrows for about twenty minutes. Then he fell asleep. He absolutely loves playing with my eyelashes. I have no clue why or how he even picked out my eyelashes over everything else on my face. But it’s sweet and cute. I can’t for the life of me figure out what I used to talk about before Logan was born. My dogs?

My sister graduates from basic training next week. A bunch of family will be there, and we’re excited to all be together. A nice four-hour drive with a 9 month old should be fun. Hah! But we’re driving in the evening, so hopefully he’ll sleep as much as possible. He’s going to have a blast being around family and getting a lot of attention. He loves attention. You should see him in a restaurant—he tries to stare people down until they look at him. He’s a goof. J (There I go again! I can’t even go one paragraph without circling back to Logan. Goodness gracious.) My other sister visited us this past weekend. It was so wonderful having her here. We've tried to convince her to transfer to Baylor and live with us, but she's a bit resistant to the idea. I haven't given up all hope though. Logan and I are very persuasive. ;) 

You know how I said one-hour naps are few and far between? Well Logan has now been sleeping for an hour and fifteen minutes. Sometimes BIG miracles happen just when you've given up on them. [And he just woke up. Hah. Never speak (or type) your miracles out loud.]