i know, i know, i say it every month, but HOLY COW! can you believe that my tiny baby is just two months shy of a year old?! i absolutely can't!
i started writing this blog on saturday night, which would actually have been ON TIME for her 10 months, but the internet died sunday, and we didn't get it back until yesterday, so i'm just now getting around to the post. oh well! c'est la vie when you have a kid!
i'm trying to think of what all has changed between 9 months and 10 months. since i've been working and trying to take a little time for myself here and there, i feel like i'm missing stuff (or just don't know every little minuscule detail of every single day). but there are definitely two developments tess has made, first off...
she can climb the stairs. every single one of them. talk about mommy freaking out. apparently when i went to work on saturday, tess started trying to climb up them with daddy, so he TOOK HER TO THE TOP OF THEM??? (no clue why this was a good idea) to see if she could actually climb them... and she could. then (as depicted in the video), the next day, i decided to see it for myself, and she literally climbed up each and every stair, ALL the way to the top. i nearly had a heart attack. now i'm thinking that in addition to the baby gate between the living room and the rest of the house, we need one at the top AND bottom of the stairs! it's going to be like living in an aqueduct.
oh, and it's not the second major development, but another thing she has begun doing is pulling things down on herself rather than pulling herself up... like the grate in front of the fireplace. yowza.
but the second major accomplishment is...
drumroll please...
on 1/26/2011
tess took her first step!
i doubt she's going to be full-on walking anytime soon, but it was very exciting nonetheless! she has been trying to span the gap between pieces of furniture recently, and i see her reach from one piece to another and ponder how to make the distance, but always, she either does some sort of dive to the floor, or she sits down and crawls. this time though, it was different! tess was standing, holding on to the large ottoman in the living room, like she usually does, pulling things off of it, like she usually does, and trying to hand them to me (a relatively new trick). so she grabbed an envelope, and reached to give it to me. i reached out, but had not yet grabbed it, or her hand, when she took one step towards me and then plopped down on her bottom. it all happened so fast that i had to process a moment before i realized that she had taken the step all on her own. i started squealing and clapping and telling her what a great job she'd done, though i'm sure she had no idea what was going on. it was pretty awesome, and i was so excited that i got to see it! of course, i have no picture or video, since it was a total shock, but i'm sure we'll get something soon enough.
as far as daily life goes, tess eats TONS of organic baby food along with cheese, puffs, yogurt, pasta, and some of pretty much anything i'm eating. we nurse in the morning, sometimes in the evening, and sometimes during the day, but she drinks 6oz formula bottles several times a day as well. and all that leads to TONS of pooping. i mean this kid is a poop champion. in a 24-hr period, she poops no fewer than 3 times, usually 4. people talk about their kids "getting backed up", and the other day when i told mom i was giving her cheese, she asked if that would happen - i started cracking up. we can only hope such a thing would happen! i mean i'm not complaining about having a child with an amazing digestive system, but 1-2 a day would be just fine with me!
sleeping and napping is off and on. most nights she sleeps from about 7:30pm until 7am, waking once or twice, but a week or so ago, we had several sleepless nights when she woke up practically every hour. andrew and i blamed it on teething, but so far we still have yet to see those suckers make their triumphant entry into the world. she's also been napping pretty regularly between about 10 and 11, depending on when she wakes up in the morning. unfortunately, as that nap has gotten longer, the afternoon one has begun disappearing, apparently backwards of what most kids do, but this is tess we're talking about.
she is now wearing 9-12 month clothes, which seems right on track to me, since she is between those months, and yet supposedly she is still a shrimpy. oh well, so are her parents.
as far as stats go, we're majorly estimating this month:
head - who knows. cute though! starting to grow SOME hair :-)
length - maybe half an inch longer than last month? not much taller though. :-/
weight - based on our scale/weigh, add baby and weigh again method, we're going with 18 lbs. we WILL make it to 20 lbs by birthday!
...and now the beast has awakened, so i must go keep her from climbing the stairs or pulling things on top of her head. perhaps pictures to come? we shall see!
Saturday, January 22, 2011
Friday, January 14, 2011
hi, my name is mama.
recently i have wanted to blog. sometimes, i even have time to blog! and with a baby growing by the second and fast approaching the 1-year mark (eep!), i'm sure i have ample material about which to blog! and yet... no blog. i guess i must have bloggers block. or possibly, i'm just sticking to the thumper rule. not entirely sure which.
see the thumper rule in my life, dictates that i not blog about personally unhappy things that involve others - for example, issues in my marriage, at work, or with my family are off-limits. but i've always been pretty open about blogging about issues in my own head. and i've had a lot of those recently. so why no blog? ...i guess i don't want to sound like i'm complaining all the time. one time a friend told me my blog was "manic-depressive". i looked back through it, and i agreed, but what's the point of writing about the mediocrity? the good - blog! the bad - blog! the mediocre - meh.
i have lots of online friends who keep tabs on baby tess through my blogs and facebook status posts, and i feel like they only know the bad stuff and the frustrations, because, since there is no one who actually lives near me to physically go to, and no one who's off work or available to talk to on the phone whenever i'm having a breakdown or major frustration, i tend to put it out there into cyber-land. and i have realized that the people who read this stuff probably think i hate being a mom, or that i don't love my daughter, or some other awful things like that. when the truth is that i LOVE being a mom, and i honestly believe that i have the best daughter in the history of the world. i, lovingly, believe that she is also one of the worst nappers and most social (great with people, cries without them) kid ever as well, which can be tiring to a person who is alone, in the middle of nowhere, with no other adult to interact with, for a minimum of 10 hours a day. in fact, it is only within the past two weeks or so that she has begun taking naps longer than 35 mins in her own crib, and that of itself has been kind of amazing.
that being said (and the baby still sleeping!), i shall delve, but a bit, into the crazies in my head. i feel lost and frustrated and alone. i feel cut off from friends and family, and i feel abandoned by many of them - whether realistic or not, it's how i feel. i feel like i work so much (either at work or at home) that i am constantly exhausted, yet my house is a disaster, and i'm always running late. i don't like the way my body looks, but i don't have the money to buy healthier food, and i don't have the time to work out. you might think i'm just saying that i don't have the time, but unless i were to do it at 4:30am or 10pm, i really can't. and i've thought about the 10pm option, but i'm just so tired by then (and know i'll be woken up in a few hours), that i can't pull myself off the couch to do it.
i'm frustrated that i stay home with my girl a lot, but i don't feel like a good mom. i constantly wonder if i'm giving her all she needs, if i should be trying to teach her more, if she should be weighing more, why she isn't sleeping more, why haven't i been teaching her sign language, why don't i make her food at home anymore? and i have no answers.
lots of people have asked me recently if i miss teaching. "no, i don't", i say. i miss students, and i miss impacting their lives, but i don't miss institutionalized "teaching" at all. there was a time when i felt like i was in the right place, doing the right thing, being a great teacher. then, it turned into "holy cow, how will i make it through the next 2 hours?" and then, "how will i make it through this day?" and this week? and this year? and every second was torturous, waiting until the day was over, and i could not be at work anymore. when that happened i knew it was time to leave teaching. many days i feel like that at home. i count the hours, then minutes, until 7pm when andrew arrives home. and it isn't that i don't love being with my child, and it isn't that i want a "new job", or that i want to go back to work full time. i don't really know what it is other than perhaps i'm frustrated that *all* i am is mama.
i'm so in love with the fact that tess can say mama, and that she means she wants me when she does. when she falls down - mama! when she wakes up - mama! when she's hungry - mamamamamama! when i've left the room - mamamamamama! when i've gone to take a shower, and dada's watching her - mama! when she's laying on my chest, and i'm pretending to be asleep so she'll get sleepy, and i sense her looking at me, and i open my eyes, there's her sweet face, inches from mine, mouthing without sound - mama - and smiling. i love it, and i love her, and i love that she loves me. but there's no emily left. and i think i'm struggling with that.
emily was in shape. emily rode horses. emily made money. emily had time for friends. emily made great dinners and enjoyed going out to fancy restaurants. emily sang at church, taught colorguard, played he guitar for summer camp, and danced around like a fool to country music and rode the bull at bars! emily was fun and wild and spontaneous.
and mama? people ask me what i've been up to. and i say, "work and taking care of a baby" - and they look at me, expecting more. "yeah but what else?" exactly.
see the thumper rule in my life, dictates that i not blog about personally unhappy things that involve others - for example, issues in my marriage, at work, or with my family are off-limits. but i've always been pretty open about blogging about issues in my own head. and i've had a lot of those recently. so why no blog? ...i guess i don't want to sound like i'm complaining all the time. one time a friend told me my blog was "manic-depressive". i looked back through it, and i agreed, but what's the point of writing about the mediocrity? the good - blog! the bad - blog! the mediocre - meh.
i have lots of online friends who keep tabs on baby tess through my blogs and facebook status posts, and i feel like they only know the bad stuff and the frustrations, because, since there is no one who actually lives near me to physically go to, and no one who's off work or available to talk to on the phone whenever i'm having a breakdown or major frustration, i tend to put it out there into cyber-land. and i have realized that the people who read this stuff probably think i hate being a mom, or that i don't love my daughter, or some other awful things like that. when the truth is that i LOVE being a mom, and i honestly believe that i have the best daughter in the history of the world. i, lovingly, believe that she is also one of the worst nappers and most social (great with people, cries without them) kid ever as well, which can be tiring to a person who is alone, in the middle of nowhere, with no other adult to interact with, for a minimum of 10 hours a day. in fact, it is only within the past two weeks or so that she has begun taking naps longer than 35 mins in her own crib, and that of itself has been kind of amazing.
that being said (and the baby still sleeping!), i shall delve, but a bit, into the crazies in my head. i feel lost and frustrated and alone. i feel cut off from friends and family, and i feel abandoned by many of them - whether realistic or not, it's how i feel. i feel like i work so much (either at work or at home) that i am constantly exhausted, yet my house is a disaster, and i'm always running late. i don't like the way my body looks, but i don't have the money to buy healthier food, and i don't have the time to work out. you might think i'm just saying that i don't have the time, but unless i were to do it at 4:30am or 10pm, i really can't. and i've thought about the 10pm option, but i'm just so tired by then (and know i'll be woken up in a few hours), that i can't pull myself off the couch to do it.
i'm frustrated that i stay home with my girl a lot, but i don't feel like a good mom. i constantly wonder if i'm giving her all she needs, if i should be trying to teach her more, if she should be weighing more, why she isn't sleeping more, why haven't i been teaching her sign language, why don't i make her food at home anymore? and i have no answers.
lots of people have asked me recently if i miss teaching. "no, i don't", i say. i miss students, and i miss impacting their lives, but i don't miss institutionalized "teaching" at all. there was a time when i felt like i was in the right place, doing the right thing, being a great teacher. then, it turned into "holy cow, how will i make it through the next 2 hours?" and then, "how will i make it through this day?" and this week? and this year? and every second was torturous, waiting until the day was over, and i could not be at work anymore. when that happened i knew it was time to leave teaching. many days i feel like that at home. i count the hours, then minutes, until 7pm when andrew arrives home. and it isn't that i don't love being with my child, and it isn't that i want a "new job", or that i want to go back to work full time. i don't really know what it is other than perhaps i'm frustrated that *all* i am is mama.
i'm so in love with the fact that tess can say mama, and that she means she wants me when she does. when she falls down - mama! when she wakes up - mama! when she's hungry - mamamamamama! when i've left the room - mamamamamama! when i've gone to take a shower, and dada's watching her - mama! when she's laying on my chest, and i'm pretending to be asleep so she'll get sleepy, and i sense her looking at me, and i open my eyes, there's her sweet face, inches from mine, mouthing without sound - mama - and smiling. i love it, and i love her, and i love that she loves me. but there's no emily left. and i think i'm struggling with that.
emily was in shape. emily rode horses. emily made money. emily had time for friends. emily made great dinners and enjoyed going out to fancy restaurants. emily sang at church, taught colorguard, played he guitar for summer camp, and danced around like a fool to country music and rode the bull at bars! emily was fun and wild and spontaneous.
and mama? people ask me what i've been up to. and i say, "work and taking care of a baby" - and they look at me, expecting more. "yeah but what else?" exactly.
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