She's 4 months now! In some ways it seems soo long ago that I had her in the hospital, but at the same time I feel like she grew so fast. She's not a newborn anymore....definitely in the baby-phase. She's happy and content, smiling and laughing all day . She only cries if she's hungry or tired. So all I have to do is either feed her or swaddle her up and lay her down. She's not the best sleeper, but who is in my family. We all pretty much suck at it. I have high hopes of sleeping through the night, with all three of my kids sleeping through the night, on the SAME night. Someday....
I did get 5 straight hours of sleep last week sometime. It was incredible. I may sound sarcastic, but I'm serious. I felt so refreshed in the morning that I got a solid chunk of sleep that night. It hasn't happened since, but I still look back with fond memories and hope and pray (honestly I do) that she'll do it again.
Things are getting easier. The last 4 months have been hard, but I really feel like it's getting easier. Elle is taking good naps, all the kids are usually down between 8-8:30pm which gives me some time of silence before the chaos erupts again the next morning.
Few things:
- Shad's been teaching Kate how to swim. She's still scary, but getting pretty good for a three year old. She can swim under water really well, but she prefers to doggie paddle. Her doggie paddling skills are not so hot.
- Shad took Tanner to a Padres game last weekend in San Diego. I can't believe I have son old enough to do stuff like that. He's getting so old.
- Elle has thrush for the 2nd time. A major bummer. I'm hoping it goes away for good this time.
- I haven't been eating sugar for 2 1/2 weeks. I know that's not a real long time, but for me, that's huge. Eternity. I was and am completely addicted to treats. Specifically homemade baked goods. Let's get more specific....warm chocolate chip cookies and brownies. Those are my downfalls. My goal is to not eat treats until July. That will make about 5 weeks total. I'm hoping, my addiction will be easier to control after abstaining for a while. We'll see....
- The kids are totally and completely obsessed with Toy Story, Batman, Scooby-doo and Pirates. They play with the figurines, act out the stories, read the books, watch the shows, etc. We're going to Toy Story 3 as a family on Saturday....I'm really excited. The kids are going to love it.
- In addition to being obsessed with the above, Kate is also a full-time Mom. She usually has her baby with-in arms reach all day, along with a stroller and a princess purse (Mom, the one you got her... she loves it). She nurses her baby, burps her baby, puts her in Elle's swing, Bumbo and bouncer, feeds her bottles, swaddles her and takes her on pretend errands to the library, the gym and Disneyland. I'll hear her having the exact same conversations with her baby, that I have with Elle or with Kate.
- Tanner is turning into a greedy little guy. He used to do chores for stickers, then quarters, and now he wants dollars. Yeah. Right. I don't think so buddy. I asked him to unload the dishwasher and he said, "will you give me a dollar?" I said, "No, but I'll give you a sticker on your chart or a quarter, your choice." He said, "Then I'm not doing it. I want a dollar." So we've been to Disneyland 3 times in the last couple of months and he looks longingly at the toys but has no money to buy them. We go to Costco and he'll ask for a cool coloring book, and I'll ask, "Do you have any money?" Silence. We'll be at the grocery store and he'll want some random toy in the check-out aisle and I'll say, "How much money do you have?" When is he going to give in and just do chores again? He used to be obsessed with doing them. I'm thinking it's time for a family night about chores....the ones we had constantly as children. Where Mom would read the scripture in D&C about being organized and then she'd tell us how we're part of the family, so we do chores and then she'd whip out her chore chart and we'd wait dreading but at the same time sort of anxious, to find out what our new chores were. Yep. I think it's time I had that family night.
- We started eating dinner in the dining room every night as a family. It's made such a HUGE difference in our family. We believe in eating together as a family and always tried, but the kids would always get hungry before Shad got home, and they wouldn't eat what we were eating anyway, and they'd run around the room playing and it was sort of a stressful time of the night. Now we set the table in the dining room and we eat dinner together. When we're done we read the Book of Mormon together. I am loving it. The kids are eating more of the normal dinner food, and since we're in the formal dining room, their art and toys are out of their sight, and they don't get distracted as easily. And reading the Book of Mormon as a family is amazing. Not the actual time we spend reading it (there's usually a fight between the kids about where they're sitting and who's by Elle and Kate pipes in every 10 seconds about things that have nothing to do with the scriptures), but it has really brought the spirit into our home. I can totally tell a difference. We're all happier, we get along better and there's more love. Just like the prophets promise us.
- Elle is totally and completely sensitive to dairy, just like my other two were. I keep trying to add in a bit of dairy into my diet here and there, to test it out and without a doubt, every time, she's up all night groaning. And the last two times I had dairy (and I mean a little tiny bit, like a 1 teaspoon of butter) she had blood in her diaper. That same thing would happen to Tanner. You'd think I'd stop "testing it out" and I have after the blood happened, but it's really hard. It's in everything. And for selfish reasons, I miss the cheese on the sliders at Yard House, I miss the cheese on pizza at Sammy's, I miss using real milk with my cereal, I miss having my yogurt smoothies, I miss having blue cheese on my salads, I miss having cottage cheese as a major staple while dieting and when I start eating treats again, I will miss having a glass of milk with my chocolate chip cookies, baking with REAL butter, and eating vanilla ice cream with homemade hot fudge sauce.