A Letter to My Secondborn

Dear A,

You are 8 months old now.  You weigh almost 22 pounds.  You are a big baby with a really big personality.  Today, you had your very first rolling-off-the-bed incident.  It was very scary for you, but you're doing just fine.

You are crawling (on your belly) all over the place!  You are a baby on the move!  And you are a funny baby who does things like squint your eyes and belly laugh because you know it'll make everyone around you laugh too.

I want you to know that just because you're the second baby doesn't mean I love you any less.  You also co-sleep with us and it's tough sometimes, but we're (mostly) ok with it.  And I want you to know that I love all the same things about you that I did the first time around.  And I'm So so so very thankful.

And we're really trying to enjoy you while you're little and chubby and lovely and squishy.  Today while I was feeding you, I laid my head down on yours so I could stare with you down the barrel of a bottle and look at your stubby baby fingers moving and be in awe of them along with you.

I'm making a herculean effort to take lots of pictures and video of you.  Time is going so so way too fast!  And it's my job to do what I can to record everything I can!

I'm also making a herculean effort to pump for a full year, even though I fantasize several times a week about quitting and living on what we've got in the freezer.  You are worth the work it takes and you're what keeps me going.

Today, while I was feeding you, you grabbed my finger.  It made me think of when you did the same thing, just minutes after you were born.  I hope that long after the chubbiness has faded from your little hands, you'll still hold mine and be my buddy forever.

I love you so so much!

 ~Mom

Big Little Baby

I've decided my baby has "fat man in little coat" syndrome.

Hear me out.

Dada puts this baby to sleep almost every night. Momma swoops in and gets the privilege of carrying the sleepy baby to bed, with a boppy little walk to our room and short slow dance in the dark. Then, just before laying him down, my heart starts tapping out a secret code against my chest, hoping for a safe transfer into his chest, heart, being: "I love you. I love you. Oh, how I love you!"

The other night when I laid him down, I lingered at the bedside, my eyes caressing his little baby body. I realized how small he is, really, in the scheme of things. That his big-baby body is really quite small is a realization that surprised me a bit. That his 8 months of life have seemed to be set on fast forward shocks my motherness to its core. But standing there, in the dark, looking him over, I realized something.

This baby seems bigger than he is because he has a HUGE personality.

He insists on near-constant movement and activity. (What two-month old do you know gets chafed on his elbows and legs because he wiggles so much?) He is a maven in the walker, with deft turns and speedy straightaways. He and C play bumper cars, with C in his truck and A in the walker. Then they laugh themselves silly, which is probably one of the greatest sounds a mother can hear.

He's starting to get up on his hands and knees. He has to be switched between tasks because he gets bored easily. He's a baby on-the-go!

He's chooses his words carefully. Right now, he's practicing his "ba" sounds. Mostly, he listens, but when he wants to talk, he makes sure you hear him. We trade screams all the time. I help him practice his pitch. He loves it!

He's cuddly AND he's ticklish. This is really the best combination ever. He's ticklish in all the right places: under his neck, on his sides, upper thighs, and - best of all - on his back. He's got a pretty great attention span for cuddling, all things considered. When he gets bored of being cuddled, though, look out. He immediately starts whipping his head around, looking for things to touch or get into and if nothing can be found, hair is always fun to pull. My hair is ALWAYS in a ponytail for this reason.

He always has a laugh ready for his older brother. The most random stuff makes him laugh too (the Netflix start up screen, for instance?). His laugh is just the best. Tinkling fairies and all that.

Yes. This big baby (20.5 lbs!) seems bigger than he is. . . but mostly because he has this big personality that's just busting at the seams.

And I love him. I love him. Oh, how I love him!  

~Nichole

Baby Face

I am a woman obsessed.  Not by choice, mind you.  It's because I am a mother.  I think.

I lay next to C tonight, reading a library book we've read together at least 15 times, so I know all the parts where I need to be patient so he can count things, and the exact parts that will make him giggle, and the parts that he gets so excited he shouts out in one-word bursts, and the parts that I don't need to read because he will recite them himself.

And at the part about the jelly bean car - the giggly part - I recited the words from memory so I could look over at his face and watch as his eyes creased with laughter, as his mouth opened and emitted a giggle, as his body gave a little wiggle of delight as it lay there next to mine on his bed.

And then, there it was again.  That nagging little feeling.  That pokey, brain-prodding question of how well it is I actually remember how it is that this little face I love so much grew from a fresh, soft, squishy, chubby newborn face to the slender, beautiful-for-a-boy three year old face of today. 
"Do you REALLY remember?" asked that shrew of an inner voice.  And then I would desperately try to remember if I remembered the thing I was supposed to remember because I am The Mom.  And when I thought I remembered, when I drew up mental images of his newborn face, of his 18-month-old face, that shrew would dash all hope: "Nope! That's from a photo.  It's a reflected memory, you twit."

It's that same nagging feeling I have when I look into A's face and will myself to memorize it in its entirety, to make mental bookmarks of this place in our history together so that I can remember what 6 months and 2 days old was like - today - as he sat there in his walker while I cooked dinner and positively beamed at me each and every time I turned my attention his way, entirely thrilled to be exploring the world from a sitting vantage point and on his own steam, fat legs and long feet bumping his body from the ground upward, all the while my inner voice anxiously willing me to remember how his voice trills as he's trying out new sounds and finding his voice.

Then, there's the voice of sanity that creeps in. . . softly, carefully, diplomatically.  And She saves me, gives me a Get Out of Jail Free card with a simple "Why this stress?" and gently reminding me "Your memory's not so great anyway, you know.  You LIVE in the moment.  Give yourself credit for that.  Besides, do you remember what M's face has looked like every day from the moment you first met?  No? Just a few vivid momentary recollections, then? So, why put this on yourself as a mother?" 

Then, I breathe a sigh of relief.  For about one second.  Then, the obsessed lady turns to the sane lady and says "BUT don't you KNOW that this time goes SO QUICKLY!? DON'T YOU KNOW that one day this will ALL BE GONE!?!? And OH how we'll both MISS IT, you and I.  OH how we'll miss it!"

And then?

Then those two ladies cry together a while before going and kissing their babies in their sleep.  Then, they pinky swear each other to give even more kisses tomorrow, right before beginning a new day's study of those babies' faces.

 ~Nichole

Three Years. . .

Thanks, you wonderful little dude, for making me a momma 3 years ago! You are amazing - a whole world squished into a skinny, little boy body. I love you! ~Mom

Mom Zombie

The 4-month regression has become the 4.75 month regression. It ebbs and flows. But mostly with the flowing.  After almost EVERY sleep cycle.  {That's every hour and a half, folks!}

It's to the point where I'm PRAYING my kids will sleep. {But then maybe cursing in whispers when they don't?}

And the 2.9 year old?  Well. . . well, just last night, for instance, he fell asleep on the livingroom floor at 6:00 {What!? no dinner?}.  He refused to be woken up and I dressed him in jammies and carried him to bed at 9:00.  He proceeded to be awake from 2:45 to 4:00 this morning, demanding (in a loud let's-wake-everyone-up voice) that I lay with him - and not being very patient about it when I got up to help his brother get back to sleep TWICE. 

{Did I mention the middle of the night pee/diaper/bed soak and diaper changes times 2?  No?}

And this morning, for the first time in weeks (?), the almost-three-year-old is sleeping in past his normal waking time.  So, technically, yes, I guess "sleep begets sleep".  Sort of.

Oh it's a zoo! 

And I'm head zombie.

The cute pterodactyl screeching of my baby morning bird makes it a little better.  His round smiling face makes it a LOT better.

And reading things like this helps me know I'm not to only one who fantasizes about sleep.
And that it's just the way it is.  {I apparently just FORGOT.}

My work day's gonna be a looooonnnnggg one today.

QUICK, please tell me I'm not the only one.  AND how DO you moms with more than 2 do it???? 

~Nichole

Sleep Glorious Sleep (We're Not Getting It)

I am having fun with this little bruiser (hello! 17 pounds, 26.5 inches at 4 months!) who is currently sitting next to me wide-eyed and wakeful at a stupid time of morning after a night of almost constant wakefulness.  This, after weeks of waking due to teething pains, and I'm starting to go nuts/worry/panic/younameit.

After a night like last night, a mom does one of three things: beats her head against the nearest wall, collapses into a crying heap in the corner, or hits up Google to figure out whether this is the dreaded 4 month sleep regression. . .

I did the latter.  Here's what I found: a great article by Clever Father and a possibly even better article by Alexis Dubief.

If this doesn't end in a few weeks, I really will go nuts.  Until then, patience dear (sleep-deprived) mother, patience.

~Nichole

The Sum of All Kisses

I was slow dancing the baby to sleep tonight and I looked down at his face and wanted to kiss it and kiss it but I knew that one loose strand of hair would tickle his cheek and wake him up and we'd have to start the dance all over again. . .

So instead, in my head, I did what every mother must do at the end of the day: I asked, silently, "were you kissed enough today?  were you hugged enough today?  were you loved enough today?"  That timeless question that connects us with an ageless line of mothers before us.

My heart feelers reached out to touch the hearts of my children - the one I was slow dancing into sleep and the one I had just laid down to sleep, our heads touching, trading whispers of "I wuv you bery much momma" and "I love you very much my son" - to take their love temperature.  And in my mind, I replayed the kisses of the day.

I know I loaded C up with kisses right before bed, and in the quiet moments getting him dressed for bed, but he had to ask me to "put the baby down and hug me!" today.  He gets significantly less face time from the momma who used to rush in every morning to rouse him and hold onto him like the world might end in 10 minutes and then I would hug and kiss him into full wakefulness.

And the baby somehow always gets less mom time when Dada's off and C's afoot.  He misses me.  I'm calmer when I'm with him and he's calmer when he's with me.  We were made for each other.

We were ALL made for each other.  C has taken to saying "we are family!" when saying his "I wuv" yous.  And indeed we are. . .

I am blessed enough to be able to bear witness to these lives - to provide every kiss and hug, to make a mental tally, and write the record in my heart.

And in theirs.

And when all is written, I hope it is complete.

~Nichole

The August of My Awakening

Sometimes. . . .

Well sometimes I am just so so tired. 

And sometimes. . . .

Sometimes I remember how lucky I am. 

Usually when I am kissing C’s cheeks at night. 

Or inhaling the newborn baby scent off of A. 

Having Baby A here with us makes me remember all over again what a blessing it all is. 

I look at my sons and when I really allow myself to think on it, I am absolutely mystified.  The fervency with which I love them astounds me sometimes.  

But what has me really, truly awestruck is that I get to be these boys’ mother, to watch their personalities unfurl themselves right before my very eyes, to stand witness as the pure, undiluted essences of their beings flourish and fill up their growing bodies.

Words stumble and fall weak in the knees, daunted by the task of expressing the emergence of a body, the rushing forth of spirit, the creation of a whole new being, and precisely how it is that one becomes a mother.

Yes, the creation of a body is an extraordinary wonder to be sure, but guiding the development of these souls?  

It is THE miracle of my life.

~Nichole

On BFing

Alternate title for this post? "BFing is making me effing crazy!"

Oh the things you learn with your first baby. . .

For instance, I learned that being nonchalant about breastfeeding (i.e. setting in your mind that "I'll just pump, no biggie" while you're pregnant) is not necessarily the best approach.  People (including every LC at the hospital) are a strange mixture of aghast and amazed that I pumped exclusively for a full year with C.

This time around, I have been more committed to making breastfeeding work.  Then, I had a baby who literally did NOT know how to suck.  We had to finger feed him in order to train him the proper way to suck.  Going from finger feeding to bottle feeding was a huge triumph, and going from bottle feeding to nursing with a shield was also pretty awesome.  (Why oh why didn't I know about shields with C?)

Only, my kid is an inefficient nurser.  So, he takes a LONG time to nurse, then doesn't get enough because he quickly tires and falls asleep since he has to work harder at breastfeeding than he does at bottle feeding.  So, then he cluster feeds, sometimes every half hour for hours.  Which makes me a bit crazy.

Take yesterday, for instance.  With C on a field trip to Nana & Tata's house, I took the opportunity to nurse (and hold my baby) as much as I could.  Which was pretty much all afternoon.  At one point, he nursed for a full hour, then took another ounce and a half by bottle, then still woke up for more within an hour.  The babe ate every hour between noon and 5 p.m.  At which point I was pretty exhausted, in need of a bonafide nap, and also sort of all what the what?

I sent a dispatch to my friend asking for moral support:

I need some reassurance that it's not awful that I prefer pumping and bottle feeding because I have an inefficient nurser who not only needs a shield to nurse and cluster feeds, but takes FOREVER at the breast . . .

And that wonderfully seasoned mommy of four did what friends do: she reassured me.  

Then, something sort of magical happened.  I gave up nursing for the day and Baby A started routinely eating 3 ounces every two hours and sleeping in between.  (Hello two week-old eating pattern we've been waiting for!) 

I'm not giving up!  I'm going to try every day and continue to hope he finally "gets it" the way I've heard some babies magically do.  In the meantime, I am thankful for a body that remembers how this went last time and has made a fantastic supply in response.  (I seriously freeze about 8-12 ounces every day.)

Oh.  Also saving my sanity?  Besides wonderful in-laws who take my kid?  The swing.  Hooray for the swing!

~Nichole

Things You Miss

My pregnancy with Baby A was much easier than my pregnancy with C in almost every way (save morning sickness).  Even so, toward the end, I was still feeling a little bit "done".  The high bp certainly didn't help.  Oh, and the swollen feet.  And the feeling huge.  And my missing mojo. 

While pregnant, you truly think it is impossible to miss a single thing about. . . well, being pregnant.

And you'd be wrong.

Here are some things I'll truly miss:
-thick, long, luxurious hair that does not shed or fall out
-no menstrual cycles for 10 months (I somehow always forget about that part)
-no need for birth control
-most excellent skin
-not having to suck my stomach in


~Nichole