Some days, parenting can be tiring, lonely, annoying, or just plain hard. Yes, it can rewarding, beautiful, hilarious, and heartwarming, too. But some days, it’s just a tough gig.
There are endless bottles to make, diapers to change, naps to protect, blankets to find (or wash), stuffed animals to love on, toys to pick up, laundry to do, tiny shirts to fold, and matching shoes to locate when you’re trying to leave the house. There are moments of sheer exhaustion hearing the 28,562nd question from your toddler, or waking up the fourth time in the same night with your infant whose sleeping has regressed. There are moments of, “I’m totally fed up!” when your little nurser just won’t take a bottle from her Daddy, or when your toddler’s twelfth tantrum of the day just pushed you over the edge. There are times that you pack up and go to the grocery store when you don’t need anything, because you might run into an adult you know, and be able to speak in complete sentences without being interrupted.
I know there are days (like today, in fact) that I want to lock my kids in their room, turn on some loud music, drown myself in ice cream, and have a few minutes that I’m not hearing them bicker over toys, or cry because they’re tired but won’t nap. Do I do that? No. But that doesn’t mean the thought never crossed my mind. I also know that when they’re in middle school, or when they’re teenagers, I’ll have days like that for different reasons. Forgotten homework, squabbles with friends, discipline problems at school, attitude problems and messy bedrooms could all be contenders in the race to make a mama crazy. I’m under no illusion that once all my kids are wearing underwear instead of diapers and going to school till 3:00 pm, my “problems” are over.
But I also know that I love my kids well. They know I love them, that I’m there for them, that I’ll dry their tears, kiss their boo-boos and sing them a song (that I made up, about a car driving by, at the request of my daughter). They are secure in that, even on my bad days, when I just want to plop them in front of the tv, and zone out. Or when we have cereal for breakfast. And lunch. And dinner. We survive those days, the kids and I, and I dare say we aren’t any worse off for it. Because hey, being a parent is no joke.
That’s a statement that (if you know my kids well) would get me stoned by many. My kids rise between 7:00 and 8:00am. I know there are a LOT of you with kids that get up WAY earlier. But this is still a struggle for me a lot of days… because I’m just not a morning person. Now, if I can get up (after several alarm snoozes), take a shower, make myself breakfast and coffee, and have a while to myself, I’m not so bad. I mean, I taught school for 6 years and was fine by the time I got there. But that’s an hour or more after I woke up, and frankly, before that, I’m not worth seeing.
My kids, however, often get the blunt end of my morning crankiness. I try not to be mean or anything, but often I’m blase and awkwardly quiet – avoiding using my voice at all costs. They are chatterboxes, full of life and cuteness no matter what time it is, and I’m giving them 10% (unless you count the 90% of my strength it takes to change the inevitable poopy diapers and not choke).
I have heard from a lot of my stay-at-home mama friends recently that they’ve made resolutions to get up before their kids. The reasons are different for everyone: chores, quiet time, uninterrupted shower, breakfast with their husbands, working from home, or any combination of these. For me, it sounds great. It sounds like the perfect solution to not getting much alone time, needing a shower first thing to wake me up, and being able to ingest some caffeine before I had to speak out loud.
But in practice, it just isn’t going to work.
For one, my kids each get up at different times than the other kid and at different times every day. There’s almost no way I can plan on how to give myself thirty minutes or an hour without accidentally giving myself two hours or negative twenty minutes. I might have one up by 6:15, and one sleep till 8:00. I might have them both up between 7:15 and 7:30. On the rare occasion I need to be up to leave the house early, and don’t set an alarm, because the kids will definitely wake up, I will wake up all on my own around 8:05. Of course.
Secondly, if I knew I had a guaranteed hour (let’s just say I would), I’d probably be arguing with myself over a shower, a whole pot of coffee, two loads of laundry, a kitchen deep clean, and three new blog posts. And that list completely left out any quiet time in the Word before the rest of my world distracts me. See! Too many things vying for my attention before my people are even awake.
But at night, like right now as I write this (it’s 9:57pm) I’ve written several blog posts, done a load of laundry, and I have some one-on-one time with the Hubby planned. I’m not even tired yet! I mean, my pregnant body is sorta sick of standing up, but I’m not sleepy. I could probably keep going for several more hours, or until I lay my head down. I don’t have trouble falling asleep when I let myself rest. I just have trouble waking up, no matter how much sleep I’ve had. That’s got to be a problem, right?
The only exception to this weirdness about not waking up well is when I have a newborn. Somehow my hormones or my motherly instinct is jumping that first couple of months of my child’s life. It’s like my body knows I’d never be able to support a newborn unless I made a change. I can magically pop out of the bed when I hear the hungry cry of a baby, and after a quick pee, I’m rushing into the room, changing a diaper, whipping out my boobs, ready to nourish my child. That energetic waking goes away the first few nights of sleep I get uninterrupted. God forbid the sleep schedule should regress a little…
But most days, I man up. I don’t roll over and beg my late-night-working husband to do the morning routine instead. I love those little chatterboxes, and their ridiculously chipper morning attitudes, no matter what time it is. It’s tough, but so are a lot of things about being a mother. I’m sure I’ll do tougher things. But for now, my daily struggle of waking up in the morning, compounded by pregnancy and my night owl tendencies, will continue to be blown away by the morning blessings of my cuties, their smiles, their smells (am I right?!), their snuggles, and their relentless need for breakfast. I love those guys.
my two chunkers, with their buddy Styles, who refused to smile 🙂 As a continuation of my breastfeeding journey with EK, my journey breastfeeding J was much easier. Already, I knew the pain I’d feel in those first few days – and I was prepared mentally this time. So that was less of an issue. He had a MUCH better latch than she did, and so we started off much better. My milk came in more quickly (while I was packing to leave the hospital, in fact!) and so he got the full effects of that more quickly.
However, he was a sleep-nurser, which in turn made him a little less efficient. Therefore, he didn’t gain as much weight, so the pediatrician was worried about him, so I was worried about him, and we went through everything we could think of to keep him awake, get him to eat instead of pacify, and get him to gain some weight. That basically turned into me pumping and giving him some bottles more often (he’d finish a bottle without stopping, just not nurse for very long without sleeping) and eventually supplementing formula.
He continued being a good nurser once he started gaining weight and we were doing bottles as well as nursing. It didn’t take him much longer to find a rhythm, get the benefit of breastmilk as well as formula, and be a chubby babe just like his sister was. He continued doing bottles with breastmilk and with formula while I was working, and nursing while I was home until he was 8 months, when I had stopped making very much milk (I had stopped working by then) and he just weaned himself. He stopped being interested in nursing and just wanted bottles, and my milk dried up. Since he was so old, eating food as well as taking bottles well, and was clearly not having any weight troubles anymore, I didn’t press the issue and let him make his decision.
I don’t have any regrets about this process. I don’t regret giving him bottles and formula to help his weight gain. I don’t regret letting him wean himself at 8 months. I don’t regret a moment of our journey. He’s a healthy, sweet boy, and we have bonded and have a wonderful relationship. I have loved every moment getting to know him more and more, and I know that our initial bonding with breastfeeding helped that along, but isn’t the only thing that mattered in our relationship. Bonding can happen without breastfeeding. Bonding can continue after you stop. Make the best choice for you and your baby, and whatever that looks like, good for you!
I want to start a series. I don’t know often it’ll be added to, or what I might put in it, but I’d like to call the series of posts “My Journey as a Mother”. Instead of snarky things my toddler says, or cute things I’ve baked with friends, I want it to be honest and personal, about my unique journey as a mother. Since my kids are so young, I doubt I’ll ever truly run out of things to talk about, and I can add things as often as I feel led to write about them.
Something I’ve been thinking about a lot recently (as I’m preparing for the birth of my third child) is something I don’t think I’ve blogged about at all – breastfeeding. This can be a really hot topic, one that many women/mothers/caretakers feel passionately about. I don’t want anything I say to be a “persuasive article” or “offensive rant”. I just want to share my story, my struggles, my successes, and my hopes for the next breastfeeding journey on which I’ll embark.
When I was pregnant will EK, it was a no-brainer that I would nurse her. It’s widely accepted as the healthiest thing to do, so of course it would be what I did for my daughter. Where her birthday fell during the school year (mid-April), I knew I would have several months of potential nursing before I would have to go back to school in the fall and likely into a routine of more pumping than nursing. I was looking forward to April-August being able to mostly nurse, and introduce bottles and scheduling a pumping routine as I went back to work.
This, as you might imagine, wasn’t how my perfect plan worked out.
EK had trouble latching right off the bat. I know now that I didn’t do everything I could have, but she also had a few problems as well. I’ve already accepted this and moved on from it with no guilt, so I will suffice it to say that nursing, after a painful, tedious six weeks or so, just didn’t work very well for the two of us. However, being a mama who wants to do the very best thing for her children, I decided the exclusively pump. This turned into the longest five more months of my life. At first, my supply was good, I was even able to freeze some milk, and never worry about my baby being hungry. She never shied away from a bottle, and seemed very pleased to be fed by whomever offered the bottle to her (just an early glimpse of her hungry-hippo nature that still exists). I got more sleep when Hubby was able to feed her a bottle at some point during the night (or late night before he went to bed, as it often was) and we didn’t know any better than to think this was our best possible situation.
But after a couple of months of pumping several times a day (and sometimes during the night if I got too uncomfortable) for almost 45 minutes each time (looking back, I’m appalled by my slow letdown and need to go through several letdowns to get what my baby needed), I was growing tired of the chore. I was eating oatmeal everything, drinking water like a camel, drinking a dark beer a day, using warm compresses before I pumped, and everything else I knew how to do to up my milk supply and make it worth it to keep going.
It seemed like the harder I tried, the less milk I made. The more I tried to find times to pump at school or during the night, the less milk I got at each pumping session. It was truly disheartening to feel like I was failing at feeding my child the “natural” way. Finally, after a few months of “supplementing my milk with formula” I released myself from the pump’s shackles.
I cannot TELL you how this freed me! Pumping several times a day wasn’t bonding with my baby. It was hardly getting her anything she needed. She was eating enough by the time I stopped at six months that I was barely getting a bottle’s worth in an entire day. It had been such a struggle to force myself to keep going, when I wasn’t yielding enough to nourish her. I was becoming emotionally wrecked about it, and I just couldn’t shake the feeling I was failing. But when I finally let it go and switched to 100% formula (well, she had started purees by then as well) it was a load off of my shoulders and my heart.
And let me tell you – this gal was healthy. (Does the baby in that photo up there look like she’s not getting enough to eat?!) She IS healthy. She is smart, beautiful, well-adapted (as much as toddlers can be) and we do not have a lack of bonding in our relationship! I can confidently say that I made the best choice for her, the best choice for me, and the best choice for my poor Hubby who would lose me for several hours a day to the pump. We were all much happier when we made the switch.
So here’s a little encouragement: breastfeeding, while widely accepted as “healthiest” and “best” and “why wouldn’t you do it?!” isn’t for every mother and every baby. If it was easy, we’d all do it. If everyone was able to be with their baby 24/7 and was blessed with great supply and didn’t have any problems latching and was never treated as inferior by a lactation consultant (that happened to me, also) I’m sure that all mothers would breastfeed. But folks, it just isn’t that way. And that’s okay. Thankfully, there are many ways to have a healthy baby, just like there are many ways to deliver a healthy baby, and there are many ways to raise a baby. Let your mama instincts take over, and do what you believe is best.
I’ll post a little bit about my journey breastfeeding J soon. I hope you were encouraged by my experience with EK.
Did you choose to breastfeed? What was your experience?
I was excited to attend a baby shower over the weekend for a friend who is due with her first baby in June. There were a total of 6 of us (out of maybe 17 or 18) at the shower that were pregnant. Even knowing that a shower is typically a lot of gals around the same age, I felt like that was a lot! But it was SO fun to see gals in every stage of life – and several stages of pregnancy – getting together to celebrate my friend and her new little life she’s expecting.
I think one of the most important things we can do is celebrate pregnant women. Celebrate women in general, obviously, but there are so many unique ways that you can celebrate and bless women who are expecting. Whether or not they have supportive families, if they got pregnant on the first try, or tried for years, new lives are worth celebrating. As a mother of soon-to-be three, I believe that feeling celebrated for every single one of my pregnancies was really special for me. It wasn’t necessarily a shower or gift or party that made me feel special – it was friends’ and family members’ reactions to our announcement, and meaningful things they said (and are continuing to say) throughout.
Women need encouragement. Expecting mamas and new mamas often need it even more. They need to know that they are made for what they’re doing, that they will figure out the best way to raise that little one. Does that mean it’ll always be easy and come naturally? No. But it does mean that we should encourage all mothers in their journey.
I saw something recently about how a mother who had experienced a long journey with infertility and finally was blessed with children through IVF felt the need to defend her children against someone who said her children were “synthetic”. Who on this earth has the right to say that to anyone? To suggest that babies, children, humans are anything but God-given and made of DNA and cells and souls just like “the rest of us” is the most awful thing you could say. So many mothers today are faced with insecurities and fears, not to mention the ever-growing plethora of choices about every single thing to do/be/get for your baby… why would one then start attacking the babies themselves, saying terrible things about how or when or why they were brought into the world?!
So this is where I feel a call to be encouraging, supportive and just plain loving to mothers of all experience levels, all walks of life, and all kinds and numbers of babies. Whatever the reason you become a mother, you should still be celebrated, supported and encouraged. If you know a mama, or a woman who is expecting, do something nice for them. Say a kind word, pop a note in the mail, or pick up their coffee. If you’re close to them, get them a gift, throw them a shower (or sprinkle!) or pray with/for them. I guarantee you, each of them needs a little love, a little encouragement, or just to be seen, known, and loved.
It can be hard… pregnancy, waiting for an adoption to go through, enduring fertility treatments, having little ones, or struggling with teens. All of those things can be hard on a woman, and I know that sometimes a little encouragement can go a long way. That nice thing you do for the mom? It’ll benefit the child, too.
I’ve had a few friends who are expecting their first baby ask for a little advice on how to prepare for the bundle of joy. So here are a few things that I figured out either with EK or with J or because a wise woman told me so.
This was when a friend and I took our collective three kids on a walk. Only two are mine, but she was saying since we knew we’d have another, it was only a matter of time until it was me without a friend…
1. When placing your nursery furniture, to important to make it look nice. It’s also important to make it convenient for you to use each of the pieces in the room. For instance, when you wake up to the cry of your newborn at 3:00am, walk in the nursery, and immediately smell something… terrible… you know that you’re gonna need to change a diaper, and probably clothes, blankets, and maybe sheets. You pick up your sweetie, move to the changing table, and roll up your sleeves. Within arm’s reach, you want to have that extra change of clothes, as well as diapers and wipes, of course. So when arranging your furniture, it’s good to have your dresser (or wherever clothes are kept) within easy reach of the changing table, so you don’t have to walk off and leave the baby!
2. Speaking of changing the sheets, all moms know that changing crib sheets is a giant pain in the booty. So how do you make yourself have to change them less often, even though your baby will have messy poops, incredibly sized pees, and spit ups that stink to high heaven? One word: layer. My wonderful mother-in-law introduced me to this idea, and it’s saved my sleepy or busy self more times than I can count. So what you do is have 4-6 sheets AND full mattress-sized waterproof pads, and layer them into the mattress. I like to take the mattress completely out of the crib to do this. That way, I just peel off the offending layer whenever there’s a mess, and toss it in the laundry, and there’s already a sheet on there, ready to go! Of course, 1/6 times, I’m screwed. But I’m saved the rest of the time!
3. When someone offers to make a meal calendar for you, take them up on it. When they ask for email addresses, give them every single one you know. If people don’t want to help/are too busy, they just won’t sign up. But everyone else? Let them feed you. Lots of them (like me a lot of times) will just ask what you want from your favorite take-out place. It’s a win-win. And sometimes, it’s a sweet friend, who comes bearing dinner, and does some dishes or some laundry while she’s there, because it’s somehow easier to do someone else’s than your own. ((If you need help with this one or don’t have someone to do it for you, email me and I’ll help you out.))
4. Related to #3, stock your freezer. If you’ve got a meal calendar set up with people doing dinners, stock the freezer with pancakes, waffles, muffins, breakfast sandwiches, sausage, bacon, etc. Another great idea is to pack individual baggies with everything for a smoothie in them. Put in your fruit, kale, spinach, oats, flax, or whatever you like in there, each in an individual Ziploc bag, and then all you have to do for breakfast (or lunch, or a snack) is put it in the blender with the liquid of your choice, and yogurt or peanut butter if that’s how you roll. For lunches and dinners, spaghetti sauce and chili are easy things to make and stock up on, as well.
5. Get the book Happiest Baby on the Block or at least skim it in Babies R Us one day. Cliff notes: When they are fussy, swaddle them, let them suck on something, swing or bounce them, hold them positioned on their side or stomach and make some loud white noise (loud “shh”, vacuum, hair dryer, etc). Y’all are thinking I’m crazy. Try it.
6. Start letting baby put himself to sleep even when he’s a couple of weeks old. When he’s fed and diapered and snuggled (and swaddled, in my opinion), lay him in the crib and leave the room. Learning to go to sleep on his own will make everyone’s lives easier in the long run.
7. Something I didn’t do until recently (mostly because I think they didn’t have it when EK was a newborn) is sign up for one of those Amazon or something diaper subscriptions, where they just send them to you. I’ve got it now that my kids aren’t growing out of diaper sizes too quickly (and they’re both in the same size), but here’s what I did. I took all those coupons for creating registries at Babies R Us and Bed Bath and Beyond, and bought diapers – a couple of cases in every size. I waited till they were on sale (since before you have the baby there’s no rush, right?) and used the coupons. Babies R Us is great at mailing you stuff monthly, and almost every time there are coupons for diapers. I only bought one box of newborn size (they grow out of those the quickest in my experience) and two boxes of the rest (stopping at size 4) just in case. I felt totally prepared, and if I did run out of diapers, I at least had some in the size up they could wear so I was never completely and totally out.
8. Find a good stain remover. This is a total must, because your baby is going to be causing stains on everything. I really love Babyganics, and it really seems to work on everything from poop and spit-up to red wine and coffee (and those are the four most common stains at my house).
9. Use the heck out of those annoying and wonderful Bed, Bath and Beyond 20% off coupons you get all the time. Use them on carseats, strollers, toys, nursery furniture, pillows, swaddles, and anything else you can buy there instead of a baby store. Our BB&B recently got a major baby section upgrade, so I get tons of stuff there with those super coupons.
10. Don’t refuse the help. Yes, there’s a line between letting a thousand people traipse through your house every moment of the day and accepting the help of well-meaning friends and family for a few days, or a few days a week if they’re willing to keep it up for a little while. But if someone offers to snuggle the baby and let you nap, or let you shower, let them. If someone offers to do a load of laundry or pick up some groceries, let them. These things are so nice and helpful, and often it’s a chance for a friend or aunt or someone to meet your little bundle. A win-win for everyone!
All you almost-mamas, I hope this helps! Pass it along to anyone who might need some words of wisdom before their little babe gets here!
Do the veteran mamas have anything to add to the list?!
That moment when you look at your kids, and they’re playing nicely together.
That moment when their plates are empty, and haven’t been flung to the floor yet.
When they say please and thank you.
When they ask for an extra hug and kiss.
When they blow your mind with their brilliance, their intuitiveness, and their stinkin’ cute curls.
But also, that moment when she pushes him down.
That moment when all the stuffed animals are in the toilet.
That moment when you aren’t sure how much they ate, because food seems to multiply when it hits the floor.
When you’re sure your kids had friends over while you went to the bathroom, because two kids couldn’t have done that by themselves.
When you didn’t finish your breakfast, or your coffee, or shower.
When they refuse to nap, refuse to eat, refuse to be held, and refuse to be put down, simultaneously.
That moment, you are a mother. Yes, you’re always a mother, but you might wear a hundred other hats in a day… wife, sister, chef, friend, housekeeper, daughter, co-worker, chauffeur or any myriad of other jobs you may sometimes hold. But that moment, you’re simply a mom.
You are more than just a busy woman or even a slightly sticky, exhausted human. You’re a mom who provides fully, loves deeply, tries hard, and picks herself up when she slips. You’re a mom who kisses booboos, fixes hair, wipes noses, and cuts crusts off sandwiches. You’re a mom who molds minds, chases dreams, encourages personalities and shapes the future.
The other day, I posted this article from Scary Mommy on my Facebook. It was “liked” by several parent friends, obviously because it’s snarky, hilarious, and true. I also had one not-yet-a-parent friend who commented her things she thought (was afraid?) would be true about having a baby. Here they are:
1. They will be constantly peeing.
2. They will poop all the time and smell like poop.
3. They will cry all the time, especially at night.
4. They won’t want to breastfeed OR bottlefeed, somehow.
5. They will grab my hair and pull it hard, frequently.
6. They will drool on things constantly.
7. They will cry whenever I put them down and I won’t be able to get a break from them.
8. I will feel trapped and at the mercy of a crazy baby.
Unfortunately, I had to tell her that these are all sometimes true. No, they’re not blanket statements that are true all the time. But are there times I feel like all I do is change diapers? Yes. Are there times that all I seem to hear is the sound of crying? Sometimes. Yes, babies pull hair (and clothes and earrings). Yes, they poop a lot (especially newborns) and you will smell it (especially toddlers). There are times I feel like I need a break from the little humans I created. Yes, there are times you may feel trapped in the nursery, with a baby who is endlessly crying, who doesn’t want to eat or sleep or play or be put down.
In short, yes, motherhood is hard. Raising kids is tough, no matter what age they are. (I’m told it doesn’t really get easier.) But are you immediately and totally consumed with love for this tiny, helpless, red-faced thing you’ve created? ALL OF THE YES. Do you sometimes watch them peacefully sleeping, and remember the moment you first saw them? Absolutely.
And in response to where I think people get these ideas before you have a baby/kid of your own… If you aren’t close to any kids, or friends with kids, all your experience with them is probably related to times you were at a restaurant and there was a crying baby at the neighboring table. Or the time you were at the grocery store, hearing the squalling kids from several aisles over, strapped into a racecar shopping cart full of juice boxes and goldfish crackers. But the truth is that you’ve been around babies and children way more often than that. It just didn’t occur to you, because those kids weren’t throwing tantrums or making messes. Sometimes, that happens. They behave! They eat their dinners! They draw on their menus instead of throwing the crayons to the next table! But those moments when they’re “behaving” or “acting normal” are just less memorable to you. They don’t stand out in your mind. But they happen.
So yes, having a baby is difficult and wonderful. It will rock your world in the fullest meaning of the word, in good ways and bad. Yes, you should be ready before you decide to have one. And “ready” looks different for everyone. There’s no way to fully prepare yourself for the change in your home, and the change in your heart.
When you’re pregnant, you’re a planner, and you’re OCD like me, you want to name that baby. Specifically, you’d like to name that baby so you can speak about it without saying “it” all the time. Hubby rarely wants to talk names until we know the gender around 20 weeks, which I guess I understand, but still… isn’t it fun to think of names?! Even really silly ones you know you’d never use?!
Naming a child is serious business. They keep it forever… they can truly become the name. It helps mold them into themselves. The pressure is on, in other words, to choose wisely.
When naming EK, I knew immediately the route I wanted to take. I’d had a dream about four months before I got pregnant with her that I had a baby girl named Ella Katharine. I specifically remember in my dream that Katharine was spelled like Katharine Hepburn (and yes, that was the association in my mind). However, when we got pregnant and started talking names, we wanted to use family names. So I started looking for something approximating Ella and Katharine in our families. And of course, nada for both. However, I came up with a way to honor two wonderful women, and mostly keep with the name for my daughter that I had dreamed of. EK’s full name is Elena Kathleen, and we call her Ella Kate. Elena is my mom’s first name (who goes by her middle name, by the way) and Kathleen is my ,om’s mom’s mom’s name – my maternal great-grandmother, Mamaw, whom I knew and loved for my first 18 years. I was so pleased with the full name, the nickname, and the whole idea of it that I knew it couldn’t be topped.
When naming our son, we had a different thought – no dream this time to help us out. We still wanted to use family names though, and when we found out it was a boy, we had it narrowed down to two options. We knew his middle name would be Stevens (Hubby’s mom’s maiden name, and middle name of Hubby’s middle brother) but we had two first names we’d tied with. Both were family names, and both had been used a few times within the family. We ended up choosing Joseph, Hubby’s dad’s name, and also Hubby’s eldest brother’s first name (which he doesn’t go by). We literally covered all Hubby’s immediate family with his full name, Joseph Stevens. It worked out really well!
Now that we’ve used two names from my family and two names from Hubby’s, we haven’t decided whether we want to use more family names (we have several more we’d love to incorporate) or whether we want to go completely out of the box. Obviously we don’t know gender yet, so Hubby hasn’t made too many contributions to the conversation, but my mind is spinning with possibilities, options for pleasant-sounding double names if it’s a girl (I do love a good, southern, double name.) or strong, handsome boy names.
image from birth.com.au
The main problem I have thinking about baby names is the same problem I had picking tile for the bathroom floor, and paint color for the walls: I like everything. I literally like so many different things that it’s difficult for me to choose. I love Biblical names and their accompanying history. I love Celtic names and the way they sound when you speak them. I love strong, traditional, common names, that everyone will know how to pronounce and spell. I love family names and the honor we can give to people we love. I love non-traditional, unique names – to an extent. But let’s be honest: I shan’t be using “Apple” or “Blue”.
I came across this app (now I can’t even remember where I read about it) called Baby Name Genius, and it took over my life for a little bit. A name pops up, you give it the “thumbs up” or “thumbs down”, and it generates a name you might like, based on your previous opinions. I wasted several minutes (read: hours) throughout a couple of days giving my approval or disapproval of names, until I felt like it was giving me the same names over and over again (including ones I had thumbs-downed!). Bummer. It says the app has tens of thousands of names. I didn’t see that many. Anyway, I’ve been doing random research reading lists of celebrity baby names, names for girls based on adventurous women, names for boys based on sensitive men, you get the idea. Reading short lists is better than starting at “A” on nameberry.com.
All this is to say that I’m going to post a few fun or funky lists of names that have caught my eye for one reason or another. But you’ll have to wait. I don’t want to give it all away in one post! How dare I? Make you come back?! I know. I’m stringing you along, aren’t I? Hopefully these baby-naming posts will culminate in an actual decision about what Hsu Baby #3 will be called! If you’d like to weigh in with a suggestion, leave it in the comments!
I can’t promise I’m going to do these updates every week, what with renovations and kiddos and all, but I can give it a shot!
I’m happy to say I have some energy back I’m still accidentally taking naps here and there, but at least not so exhausted that I have to nap every day. I’m glad to be able to do my thing without headaches and everything. I haven’t gained much weight – only about three pounds – but I’ve definitely got a little more belly than usual. Too bad it doesn’t look like a cute little bump yet. It’s mostly just a “did you eat a large dinner?” sort of belly. Yikes.
Yesterday, we went for our first ultrasound, and it was so awesome. That never gets less incredible, no matter how many times you see your unborn baby on that screen. It’s amazing to see hands and feet and a button nose, that looks just like Sister’s. Another thing that was totally adorable was EK, pointing at the screen, saying, “My baby! That’s my baby!” I pretty much cried, seeing the ownership she’s already taking of that little soul. What a good sister.
Our little jellybean, with the cutest button nose, waving hello!
The one thing we did find out at the ultrasound is that our screening for chromosomal abnormalities came back positive. They took some blood, and I will get those test results back in two weeks. So pray that the blood test comes back totally normal, and that we won’t have any chromosomal disorders to worry about. My doctor didn’t seem worried to see the first screening positive, so we are trying (as hard as we can) not to worry either.
Our basement renovations are going well! There are lots of things happening, and more than just demo now! Temporary walls are going up, plumbing is being moved and updated, wiring is being secured, and we are seeing lots of progress! Here are a few pictures so you can see some of the craziness:
This one long room used to be Hubby’s music studio (on the far side of the stairwell) and will now be two bedrooms! The perspective is from the family room (former and future).This was today’s project: Jackhammering through the floor to lay a new pipe for the laundry room. The fireplace there looked like that after they removed the veneer. Disturbingly messy brick laying, but the contractor says it’s strong and sound, so they’re leaving it.
We’ve been spending every other day or so at Hubby’s parents’ house, which serves a double purpose… our kids can nap, and we can also get some laundry done while we’re here. It’s a nice way to be away from a loud and dusty home!
So there’s a little life update for you. What’s going on in your life?!
There are endless bottles to make, diapers to change, naps to protect, blankets to find (or wash), stuffed animals to love on, toys to pick up, laundry to do, tiny shirts to fold, and matching shoes to locate when you’re trying to leave the house. There are moments of sheer exhaustion hearing the 28,562nd question from your toddler, or waking up the fourth time in the same night with your infant whose sleeping has regressed. There are moments of, “I’m totally fed up!” when your little nurser just won’t take a bottle from her Daddy, or when your toddler’s twelfth tantrum of the day just pushed you over the edge. There are times that you pack up and go to the grocery store when you don’t need anything, because you might run into an adult you know, and be able to speak in complete sentences without being interrupted.
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