Playing on the Mat.

Natalie and I (Lauren) hung out all day long because Kevin had a bit of a stomach bug or food poisoning or some such ailment. It looks like the worst is over for him now, so that's a good thing.

The activity mat in the picture is one of Natalie's favorite things. It was a recommendation by my friend Miriam who has tested the product out on twins with raving reviews. My question is, who designs this stuff? Who sits there and thinks that an archway with a rainbow colored pineapple with legs dangling from it would be loads of fun for a baby? Hmmm... I'm thinking drugs are definitely involved in the design process. =)

Natalie spends most of the time on her back because she's mastered the rolling over thing (from tummy to back). We've yet to see her roll from back to stomach, but she manages to get around the floor if she wants to by scooting on her back. (Hmm... that's where all the hair on the back of her head has gone!)

I love this photo... she doesn't look at ALL surprised to see a purple sea lion in her bedroom. I mean... if pineapples can have legs, the sky has no limit!


Oh, in case I havent mentioned it to you, Natalie is about 11.5 lbs at the moment (10th percentile for her age). Although that seems small, she has increased from 5th percentile in weight from the last visit. So things are looking up! And she managed to sleep another long night last night. So exciting! Maybe we're on to something!

WHOOOO HOOOOOOO!!!!!

Last night Natalie slept from (get this) 7pm to 630AM!!!!!!! Gosh...we are just so proud *sniff* our little pumpkin is just growing up so fast. Makes me long for the newborn days all over again.... WHAT AM I TALKING ABOUT?!?!!? I got a full night's sleep for the first time in 4.5 months!!!!! Woot!

What's Been Goin' On Lately

Not much to report here, other than the fact that Kevin got pooped on three, count em three days in a row. But when the pooper is such a cutie... who can really be too annoyed? =)

One of the times was on a trip out to Super Walmart. Kev and I had just spent the morning and good part of the afternoon staring at the wall trying to figure out what we could do with an infant in the middle of January. We desperately wanted to get out of the house so we ended up opting to go to Super Walmart - of all places. Funny what kids do to you... we were really excited! So we'd gone through the dry goods section of Walmart and were making our way through the groceries. I had JUST passed Natalie off to Kevin because my back was getting sore from carrying her and she wasn't content to sit in the infant carrier. Somewhere between the lettuce and the fruit, Kev turns to me and says, "she just dropped a big one". We looked down and the diaper had completely failed. Poo was running down her leg, covering Kevin's jacket and staining her sock. I lost it and started laughing uncontrollably drawing a lot of unwanted attention to a pretty embarrassed Kevin. Ha! What else could you do? Poor kid had to wear the outfit all the way home and then it was into the tub for the third bath in three days. Ahh.. well at least she likes baths.

She's been doing well sleeping. She's regularly going to bed around 630pm and then we wake her up before we got to bed (around 10pm). Then she'll wake up once on her own anywhere between 4:30am and 630am... Then she'll go BACK to bed until Kevin wakes her up to go to the sitters (730am) or sleep until about 930 if we dont stir her. Kev and I were commenting tonight that even though it would be nice to keep her up longer at night, it IS nice having time together. We've tried keeping her up later to hang out with us and it is a disaster! She definitely gets beyond the tired zone and gets so overly exhausted that she can't go to sleep. It ends up being a big cry fest and a VERY long night.

Speaking of long night... I need some good sleep tonight so I'm going to sign off. But before I do... what's your favorite two player card game to play? I've been wanting to play cards for the longest time, but I don't really know any fun two-player games. **Kevin hates speed games, so if you have any non-speed game recommendations, offer them up!

The Attack of the Stealth Poo-bomb

Kevin here... thought I'd share my morning working from home while caring for our
little lovely, flowery, precious princess... via a little poem. :)

Here it goes...


The Attack of the Stealth Poo-bomb

Working from home and enjoying it so
Natalie started crying, why I didn't quite know
Its time to change an innocuous “pee-diaper”
I new it was time, Natalie was getting quite hyper
Pee I thought, by my normal sniffing habit
Knew it must be, as my trusty nose would have it

Hastily I set about taking off to put on new
when behold I found an abundance of oozing, gooey poo!
Whoa momma I said, as I saw the carnage
the diaper wasn’t just wet, it was slightly orange!

Oh Crap! I said as I lifted her bum
then seeing her back I felt kinda dumb!
twas all over her and her changing pad
was a big huge mess that smelled pretty bad!
“Sigh”, I did and the clothes came off
but seeing her totally poo-covered now, I started to scoff!

Only a bath would fix this now
but with only me at home (and poo-covered), I wasn’t sure how
to wash little Natalie all by myself
I’ll tell you what, I coulda used a house-elf!

It wasn’t easy but soon we were done
and now Natalie’s clean and its time for some fun!!!

I Don't Read.

I'm actually quite embarrassed to admit this since my Mom has a library science masters... but I dont read. My parents and my sister love to read, but me... I dont read. This has bothered me for some time now, but I've always had the excuse of being too busy. Well, its actually bothered me a lot recently. I cant hold my concentration when reading a little article now without my mind wandering from topic to topic. so I've decided I REALLY need to attempt to reign in my brain and increase my vocabulary and general knowledge. I'd like to start with some reading candy... something to keep me interested and that I'll be able to speed through. My brain isnt quite ready for "war and peace". So, I'm open to suggestions. What have you read that you just couldnt put down???

Responsibility.

Do you ever struggle with feeling boring? (i.e. Would I like to be friends with me?) I think I've decided that no... I wouldnt like to be friends with me. I'm too busy at home to be spontaneous anymore and the stuff I've got to talk about is diapers, nursing issues and when I'll have time to scrapbook. Um...when did that happen? Ok, "4 months ago" probably would be a good answer, but I guess what troubles me is that I feel like it happened a while before that... before even being pregnant.

If you dont know this about me already, I'm a bit OCD. My house has to be clean (its not at the moment, but its driving me mad), I love organization, I have a spending problem when it comes to groceries and stocking the pantry/freezer, I can be militant about working out and dieting and I'm a bargain hunter to the point of insane. But I look back to my pre-marriage days and I was fun and much more carefree - not afraid to drive liberally over the speed limit, order a pizza at 11pm, sleep in until noon on Saturdays, plan spontaneous trips/outings, etc. Maybe its the whole "being an adult" thing that's squelched my creativity, but the reality of fines for traffic tickets, extra lbs, needing to care for family and get things done has set in. Ahhh.. if only I could blame this on Kevin, but sometimes I think life just happens. And with this stage of life come lots of responsibility. And maybe you could say that with responsibility comes "boring". =)

Dont get me wrong... I like my life. I love being married, having a baby and taking care of our home. I just cant help but feel that I might be a little boring to others at this stage in the game. One of my New Years resolutions was to blog more.. well I've wanted to blog several times this week and really been at a loss for what to say. Natalie's been hitting the hay around 530 every night. I have a big scrapbook day this Saturday and am busy getting pictures together for it. Every night we come home and stare at the fridge and say... "whats for dinner". Why cant we be the Jetsons? Where's Rosy when you need her? Last night we went to bed at 930. You see my dilemma? Hmmm.. so just hang in there folks. We'll be back to the land of the un-boring one of these days. I'm committed to finding it again. Because being "responsible" is really just no fun!

Ahhh... Sleep at last.

Well, one night of it so far. =) We tried the rice cereal thing and it didnt really add hours to her night of sleep. It was fun to watch her try to eat off a spoon though. She was REALLY wanting to feed herself and kept trying to grab the spoon from Kevin's hand!

So last night we just put her to bed around 530 (I know...early, but she was so tired) and she slept until 1230. She was up for 15 minutes to eat and then slept until 630 and then went BACK to bed until 10am. WOW! Now if she can just do something like that on a night I have to go to work the next day!

We normally keep the house around 65 degrees when we sleep at night and with all the stuff you read about babies suffocating with blankets in the bed you have to be really careful about how you bundle. I get a kick out of the gear she wears to keep her warm and I thought I'd take a picture...

It's amazing to see the development she's had within the past week even. She's been grabbing at toys and her feet and seems more aware of her surroundings. She'd love to sit up on her own, but that's still yet to come. The Bumbo seat is a great thing and propping her up seems to work too. This picture reminds me of Lilly Tomlin in the big rocking chair...

New Years Eve was the most uneventful its been for me since 2001 (when I first moved to MD). We were supposed to go to a party, Natalie in tow, but we were both so exhausted and she fell asleep rather early so we opted to stay in and eat the dip we had planned to take to the party and watch movies. We both kind of made ourselves sick on dip - although it was good - and drifted off to sleep around 1130. That's right folks... we couldnt even make it to midnight! Ah well. Welcome to life with kids!!!