The Last Two Months

It's been a long ass time since I did a substantive update. I honestly think the last two--well, one month really, have been the most challenging for me as a parent so far . . .

Started crawling at 7.5 months, a week later was pulling up, a week later was cruising. Since then it's been a lot of all of those things: lots of balance and strength training. For the first couple weeks he was just CONSTANTLY falling with bumps and bruises all over his head. Thankfully he's better at it all now and, also, I think, more used to falling.

And so baby proofing began. Add this to the mental list of things I said I wouldn't do and am now doing. The main problem here is not that my house wasn't baby proofed, but that it wasn't CLEAN. And, I've learned by now that some people apologize for the state of their house and really it is immaculate? I'm not like that. If my house was semi-clean, I would admit it . . .

I'm a "throw things to the side when I am done with them willy-nilly" sort of person. And a "out of sight is out of mind" sort of person. And a "I won't look down" sort of person, LOL! Add all these together with having a husband that is the same and four cats? And an ant's view of my house would be like "cloudy with a chance of meatballs (and cat hair)."

The first few weeks/days of crawling were like . . . I would look away for a second (to try to clean and/or baby proof something, usually) look back, and james would be bringing a (clump of cat hair/bit of stale food/leaf/etc) to his mouth and I would run over and excavate. Or I would look away for a second, and then hear a thump and he'd be crying with another red lump on his head . . . or pulling on wires, or pulling the vacuum on top of him, or climbing the stairs, or eating cat food or . . .

If it was JUST baby proofing--JUST figuring out what he was able to reach and making sure it was safe for him--well, that I think I could have handled? Or not even done!

But it was more like, all of my life I've been trying to:
-Have a daily routine
-Get exercise
-Keep my house clean

And in the last two months, finally I've achieved it. (Almost). But it was a hard transition for me. It's a lot of work to keep your house clean. I see now why I avoided it for so long.

But we are pretty much done, now. Well, what I am learning is that you are never done. BUT, our entire downstairs is now pretty much safe and accessible to james. And honestly I like it. I love it. It's nice that I can turn my back on james for awhile now, without worrying about what infinitesimal speck of poison he was able to eat.

And honestly it's sort of awesome to have a clean house. AND to have a routine. Another thing that happened over the past two months. Here's pretty much what we do now:

james wakes up between 5-6, nurses awhile, crawls all over us until we get up.
Dad changes the baby's diaper
I get up between 7-7:30, dress me and james
Then I take james on a walk--I'm up to about 1.5 miles a day!
He falls asleep on this first walk, sleeps 8-9 outside in his stroller
While he sleeps, I start laundry, straighten the living room, eat breakfast if I'm lucky, etc.
james wakes up, play a bit
Nurse and Pump around 9:30
After nursing, eat breakfast
While he eats, I load/unload the dishwasher, deal with the breast milk, other kitchen cleaning
Clean up baby, possible sink bath, possible outfit change, change diaper at least
Read books
james takes 2nd nap, 11-12
While he sleeps, I eat again or for the first time, do laundry and other cleaning.
Wake up, nurse, play, read books
Back to sleep at 2--if I'm lucky this is a long nap. I need a real break by now but if I was really smart I would use this time to prepare dinner?
Wake up, nurse, eat food again around 4:30
Clean up baby, possible sink bath, possible outfit change, change diaper at least
And then I'm not sure because I think he's dropping his evening nap, and lengthening the afternoon nap? (I hope!) Anyway, we eat dinner in there somewhere, sans le bebe.
Dad changes into nighttime diaper and PJ's, reads books, Momma nurses
Baby sleeps 7:15-8:30 in swing
After wakeup, LONG NURSING in bed with Momma to sleep.
And then ideally he would sleep until we went to bed at 11-12 and then nurse again.

So yeah, I think we are doing pretty good!

But it has been a challenging few months. I was prepared to take care of a newborn, for some reason (well, I had an easy one, too!)--I don't mind nursing a lot, or holding a little baby, or changing lots of diapers. But I don't think I was prepared for the adorable baby to become mobile. I was in denial and totally held out . . . I saw he was starting to learn to crawl--I should have started baby proofing then! But I didn't realize how fast it would be.

I'm slow. I do house projects on several year time lines (hence the fact that our "nursery" is still full of random crap). But babies don't grow slow. They grow fast. So I'm continually getting kicked in the pants but HONESTLY? It's good for me, and I appreciate it! But change is hard.

And learning how to take care of my house, my self, FINALLY, after 28 years? Is hard, too. . . it took a baby to motivate me, but it feels good . . .

BUT it's not the only thing I need to take care of my self.

I'm realizing that I need this blog. I need to write, I need to take pictures. While I've been baby proofing and cleaning and organizing my entire life and house, something else inside me has been neglected. Things stir which have not been released.

So, in the words of Yoda: Balance Find I Must.