3 Sisters 7 Days

My two youngest sisters, Jeanna and Terri, are 11 months apart; their first children were born nine months apart. No two people from the same gene pool could be more different in coloring and temperament. Yet they were “joined at the hip” (or cheek) from the start. I don’t think Jeanna scored a solo photo once Terri arrived on the scene!

Terri’s been staying with Jeanna this week and took the kids out for a run today. This shot their “babies” sure brings back memories.

This is Everett’s 9 month old picture. I think it gives some insight into what kind of child I will have. He’s growing and developing so much these days. He’s not quite crawling yet, but doing a little bit of the military crawl and finding himself stuck under our couch all the time! I’ll get a good photo of the event one of these days. He’s starting to pull himself to his knees, so we don’t know how interested he is in crawling, but we’ll see.

I swear he says “Mmmmom” and I’m rolling with it. No, he doesn’t say it directly to me, and he doesn’t attach a person to that word, but I hear it and that’s all that matters .
He’s starting to sprawl out while sleeping. I find myself and Sammy on 1/3 of the bed while he is sound asleep with hands and legs stretched out as much as possible. I don’t know what we’ll do when Maz is back in town. I’m afraid to touch him, just in case he wakes. One thing I’ve learned with Everett is that if he’s sleeping, then leave him! Sam and I sneak away in the morning so we can have some peace and quite time before he wakes.

He’s growing quite a bit too, and I can see a little belly. He’s quite fond of graham crackers, toast, banana bread, and cookies. We have a sweet tooth on our hands. Luckily I don’t have to worry about cavities just yet since he doesn’t have any teeth! He’s been teething for months and NOTHING. I’m taking it as a blessing, though, because this child already has a bite like a turtle, and I can’t imagine the feeling when teeth are involved.

I feel like each day he is developing his character and I can’t wait to see what month 10 brings…

The Steamboat Springs Marathon was seriously the hardest run I’ve done to date. I think it was a combination of running colliding with motherhood.  I did the minimal amount of training -  long runs on the weekends, and shorter 4-6 miles during the week, pushing the Bob. Race day, it was 80 degrees out, and I ran 26.2 miles of almost all downhill. My legs started aching at mile 15, and there was no “energy” to the run.  There were less than 300 runners and nothing but scenery – it was beautiful, I need more than trees to keep me company on long runs. (My previous marathons featured rock bands, themed water stations, and/or scenery changes every mile or so.)  It got so bad that I actually made phone calls during the race!  Only having Everett there at the finish made the run worth it!

For now, I’m putting marathons on the back burner…thinking 1/2 marathons for a while.

Resources:

Things to consider when training for a marathon while breast-feeding: http://breastfeeding.about.com/od/faqs/f/marathon.htm

Thoughts on how to fit training in: http://fitnesscheerleader.com/fitness/running/how-i-balanced-breastfeeding-and-running-to-train-for-a-half-marathon/

When to start training: http://babyfit.sparkpeople.com/articles.asp?id=785

Nursing can be way harder than it looks, and it’s a much bigger and longer term commitment than I ever imagined.

I’m tired, physically spent, more often than I like to admit. And I’m tired of people telling me that I wouldn’t be so tired if I stopped nursing my nine-month-old son, Everett. “Just put him on a bottle,” they say, “even if it’s just at night.” That way I could, at least, “sleep through the night,” they tell me. “Feed him!”

“No!” I want to scream. I AM tired, and I KNOW Everett would be more likely to sleep through the night if I filled him up on baby food and formula at night. But I’ve decided to let Everett lead the weaning process. This means that I’m going to wait until the little guy becomes better able to feed himself and consumes enough calories to offset his need to nurse. I expect weaning will coincide with independence in other areas of his life, like learning to walk and talk, so that he doesn’t abandon the breast before he is confident enough to do so, and able to find comfort somewhere off of my chest.

For now, it’s just this I want to get off of my chest.

Lately, I’ve been texting “Good morning” photos of Everett to my family. This morning, one of my sisters asked, “Can you get my kids to be that happy in the morning?” Believe me, if I could bottle the mojo that makes my baby boy wake up like this, I would. I’d make a fortune.

This photo was taken at 5:30 AM,  after I’d been up for almost an hour trying to get the little guy back to sleep.

This child just doesn’t sleep when he should.  Sure, yesterday he slept through a chainsaw that was operating just 10 feet away from him, but heaven for bid I roll over in bed and BAM! he’s awake and fussing.  I do have to say, though, that last night he did sleep fairly well considering I only woke up once, maybe twice, to feed him before his final wake up call at 4:30 AM – thanks to a leaky diaper; his jammies were drenched . No amount of nursing could get him back to sleep, so while he was up, I figured I should go ahead and suction out his nose…I mean, he was already pissed about the jammies, so I thought I’d torture him some more and open up those nasal passages.

I gave up after an hour, and got up for the morning. I put the coffee on. I’ve just had a drank a few sips. With my usual luck, Everett will be ready to take a nap in about 30 minutes…just when the caffiene starts to kick in!

California, here we come! This is almost seven-month-old Everett, weighing in at just over 12 lbs., with his 200+ pound daddy at the airport.  Just when I get used to the idea that my baby boy is really growing up, Maz provides a reality check.

Because Maz is gone Monday-Thursday working out of town, I often have to run only on Friday-Sunday. Sam and I look forward to our runs every weekend, and Maz is more than willing to accommodate us both.  This is a view I caught while getting ready for my morning run.

I’m not really sure where I would fit into this picture…

Last week was my first day back at work – REI – since Everett was born. It was a short four-hour shift that went surprisingly well. There were no tears on my part, and I successfully pumped during my fifteen-minute break.  Maz, meanwhile, did a great job watching the baby, though he had a bit of a struggle with the bottle.  He managed to get Everett to take 2oz, but it took well over an hour to accomplish.

That night, I more than made up for the time I missed. Everett ate every hour from midnight to 5am! It turns out that there is a term for that behavior: Reverse Cycle. When a baby misses Mom, he makes up the missed time overnight! Who knew?!

Anyway, since I have a bit of a shopping habit, I didn’t waste anytime getting Everett a nice souvenir from REI.  Luckily Maz doesn’t mind my spending money on our little pride and joy.

This is the very first photo of my little Everett without oxygen. Tubes attached to the little guy’s nose have been part of almost every picture since he was born, until now.

Everett did have a few days in the hospital when he didn’t need oxygen, and that was wonderful. I remember he was just a few days old, maybe a week old, when he no longer needed it…It was the same day they took him off the lights for Jaundice. That was the very first time I was able to hold Everett for longer than 30 minutes! He was so small, not even 2.5 lbs and it was almost unheard of for such a little baby to go without oxygen so soon.

A short time, maybe five days, later, he was put back on…I remember the day and I cried.

Up until a few weeks ago, Everett always had some help breathing. It has been the biggest pain, but we all dealt with it knowing that the little “puff” he was getting was helping him.  I couldn’t tell you the amount of times we tripped over the cord, or Everett spit up through his nose and into the tube. He even tried to “eat” the tubing or put the tubing on top of his nose.

All I can say is that my little boy clearly comes alive in this picture.