Officially inducted into parenthood: Merry Christmas!

My inlaws told Paul and I that we have officially been inducted into parenthood because we caught Brandon's stomach virus and on a holiday.  Luckily it was only Christmas eve, but it looks like the bug has spread to Grandpa.  So Grandma is the only one to not have caught the stomach bug.  The only good news on this bug is that it's only 24 hours.

According to the weather men for the past two weeks they were predicting a white Christmas for NY and NJ, but they were one day off.  Today we are munching on left over Christmas dinner and dessert while the snow falls and falls and falls.

Before the snow started I ran out to the baby store to buy a sleepsack to help Brandon sleep better at night.  We remembered EVERYTHING except the sack!  For the past 3 nights Brandon has been waking up due to gas, blanket kick offs, and being cold.  I am hoping this purchase will ease our sanity for the next couple of days until we go home.  So far B is napping with the sack and seems to be in dream land.

Paul and I have were busy at work preparing for Santa to come 2 days early to VA. You could not imagine the negotions I had to deal with from the North Pole. Santa does not like to make early stops. But the morning of the 23rd he came through (the secret is pistachio and vanilla bean macarons)! We had Christmas Eve at Aunt Dana and Uncle Stevens house and then Christmas Day at Grandma and Grandpa Kelly. Santa visited everyones house with gifts for him. I can no longer say this little guy has no toys. I was telling Paul that I think we need to buy a toy chest for the amount of toys Brandon got this Christmas.





Our beautiful Tree in Virginia the morning of Dec 23rd




brandon loving his Dutch wooden toys



Playing with his NEW remote control surrounded by his other toys from Santa

Awesome portable highchair!  turns almost ANY chair into a highchair!  A MUST have for MOMS

Thanks Aunt Dana and Uncle Steven, Dan, and Shannon!!



playing with papper




more toys?



Suit up!



And how do I look from this angle??




Do I have to wear these shoes Ma?




Alex helping me feed Brandon




All of Brandon's little cousins on Christmas Day.  Brandon Not pictured because the Prince needed his beauty sleep



Day after Christmas...not sure if he's playing or searching for more presents?

Caution: Stomach virus details

Sunday night Paul went into Brandon's room around 3AM because he was moaning.  After a diaper change and lots of flatulence Brandon let out an explosive diaper.  Paul called for me to help him get the soiled clothing  off B.  It turned out the only way to get them off was to cut them off unless we wanted to smear poop all over Brandon's head.  After a change of diaper, onsie, and pajamas we started calming him down with a little bit of a bottle.  Well this was a mistake because after just 3oz.  he vomited all over me, the rocking chair, and himself.  I couldn't believe it.  This meant it was time for a bath (at 4AM).  After a bath, we changed him into a new diaper, onsie, and pajama.  Brandon slept for maybe 1 hour until he was up again.  I gave up getting him back to sleep and took him downstairs to try and hydrate him.  Well after maybe 2tbs of oatmeal and 2oz of formula 5 minutes later is all came up again in Mommy's face and hair.  I hope no one has to ever experience getting vomited on in the face, I was grossed out, but I was more concerned for Brandon's health.  At 6:30AM  I called the advice nurse to leave a message.  She got back to me at 8:30  You can only imagine my freak outs for the next two hours as Brandon keeps having everything exit his body from both ends.  I called my friend Aneta who has two children to get advice and she said to stop giving formula because that just dehydrates them more as they throw up.  And after I spoke with her the advice nurse called me back and said to give Brandon water 1 teaspoon at a time every 15 minutes.  Then after a couple teaspoons so give a teaspoon of pedialyte.  Brandon and I had to go to the store to get pedialyte and a dropped to feed him 1 tsp at a time.  AND get ready to take a trip to the doctors office because she was concerned that he wasn't having any wet diapers.

Well after the 15 min increments of water and then pedialyte I gave B some pedialyte in his sippy cup (he drinks slower out of this rather than a bottle)  Brandon was still not feel good at the doctors, but I think he was on empty and exhausted from barely sleeping.  The doctor said he'll be fine (which he is) and to just let him eat when he wants to and it should pass in 24 hours.

I am so happy that our doctor was right.  This morning at 3AM Brandon woke up starving for a bottle.  Then this morning he ate his normal breakfast.  He is 100% back to normal, just in time for Christmas!!

New bedtime

We got so used to putting Brandon to bed at 8:30 we never thought twice that maybe it was to late of a bedtime.  But recently he has been sleeping horribly.  Waking 2-3 times a night.  I decided to google search this problem we've been having and found out this.


"In their efforts to encourage their baby to sleep better, one approach that many parents use is to put their baby to bed later in the evening. They think, “If he’s “really tired” he’ll sleep better, right?” Wrong! This often backfires because Baby becomes overtired, and chronically sleep-deprived.  In the majority of cases, a baby’s biological clock is preset for an early bedtime. When parents work with that time, a baby falls asleep more easily and stays asleep more peacefully. Most babies are primed to go to sleep for the night as early as 6:30 or 7:00 p.m.  For babies, early to bed does not mean early to rise! Most babies sleep longer with an earlier bedtime. Many parents are afraid to put their baby to bed so early, thinking that they will then face a 5 a.m. wake up call. But keeping your little one up too late backfires, and more often, a late night is the one followed by that early morning awakening. 

 I was not 100% sure if we put Brandon to bed early he would be up at 4AM ready to play.  But this web information was correct.  Last night we put Brandon down at 6PM when he was rubbing his eyes and exhausted right after dinner.  He didn't even drink a whole ounce of milk before falling asleep.  After 40 minutes he woke and drank the rest of the bottle and then was in dream land until...drum roll please.... 5:30AM.  Then he took a bottle and slept again until 7:45AM.  I've also noticed an improvement in his mood.  He is no longer grumpy and needing 2 morning naps, just one nap before lunch recharges his battery.

It was also really nice to be able to spend some time with Paul without Brandon in front of us.  It's been months since we've had a whole evening to ourselves.  Hoping this new bedtime is the answer to all our sleep problems.

TV

Brandon loves to watch TV.  But recently he loves to hold the remote control.  At first I tried to keep it away from him, but the screaming just wasn't worth it.  Now we make it a game of putting it just out of reach on the floor so he has to crawl to it.
This morning he got the remote and started with putting it in his mouth.  Then he started to press the buttons.  Daddy loved this because he changed it from Nick Jr. to college basketball then to pre-game NFL talk.  But just as we were laughing about this he changed it once more to On Demand movies and pressed a couple buttons to be only one click from charging a movie to our account.  Daddy caught him before he ordered the movie, but it got us thinking that maybe we need to put some locks on the TV.  Too soon??

Standing

2 seconds after this was taken he fell down

the hicky

In the morning Brandon is always extra groggy.  He normally wakes up early and then takes a nap before lunch.  Well on Friday morning when he was starting to fall asleep he latched on to my shoulder for 5 seconds and started sucking.  Later that morning while I was getting ready for the gym I found this on my shoulder. 

My son gave me a hicky!

December Brandon fun facts

1.  Mommy has taught me to wave bye bye

2. I said Mama for the first time today.

3.  All I'm asking Santa for this year is my first tooth.

4.  I can eat rice and cheerios

5.  I love to throw the cheerios

6.  I get to use my sippy cup everyday and starting next month I'll use it twice a day!!

7.  Mommy and Daddy took out their silly Christmas hats from Germany and Austria and I laugh whenever I see them.

8.   I had my first babysitter (Aunt Lindsey) last weekend while Mama and Papa went out for the night

9.  I like to try to pull myself up to standing while close to the coffee table...mommy doesn't like this because I bang my head on the table.

10.  I love napping in the car even if it's only for 5-10 minute car rides.

11.  Mommy joined Washington Sports Club and I joined the baby club there!

12.  I weigh 22lbs and am 30.5 inches long!

13.  I wake up so early every morning that  I need 2 morning naps before I'm ready for my day.

14.  I met santa and didn't like it, so don't be fooled by the picture because that was the only second I was not crying.

unperfect parent

Today was one of those "Mom Moments" where I wanted to crawl into a dark room and hide.  We were at the mall shopping with friends and around 11:30 after his friends met Santa Brandon started to freak out in an I'm thirsty and hungry way.  So I went to give him his sippy cup, but I looked in my bag and it was forgotten.  I went into TJ Max and got a new sippy cup while B was moaning for his juice.  Well he eventually got his juice and happily drank for about 5 minutes when he looked down at his cup, took it out of his mouth, and proceeded to scream at me.  I knew we wanted some lunch so I sat down and gave him some Gerber apples.  Well after that he was still hungry so I cracked open the rice cereal.  Brandon was still freaking out while eating the cereal.  Well after a couple more minutes I gave up feeding him the  cereal and starting walking with my stroller to the food court to get Brandon in a high chair to feed him properly, he was eating in his stroller and didn't seem to be enjoying it.  Well the high chair was a failure too.  THEN I realized he had not had any formula since bedtime last night.  I quickly made a bottle and got him comfy in my arms to drink up.  He fell asleep by the end of the bottle and had a nice nap while we ate lunch.

I felt so horrible that I forgot to give Brandon a bottle in the morning when he woke up.  But the reason I forgot is that Brandon slept all night (8-7:30 straight!!!!) and he hasn't done this in weeks.  I'd gotten used to feeding him in the middle of the night and he was used to not getting a bottle until the afternoon. 

I'm a little hard on myself for these things, but it was so frustrating to not know how to stop Brandon from screaming.  He was getting so upset that his forehead was red with spots.  Luckily for the rest of the day B was back to the angel baby he is normally

A teething Foodie

Brandon loves to eat.  In the past 2 weeks he's been introduced to cheerios and rice.  The cheerios are a messy snack because Brandon loves to throw them around the dining room (he loves it).  Tonight we had some left over apple slices.  We figure anything big enough for him to gum and not choke on is safe.  The apple didn't work so well.  I'm thinking after he gets a tooth or two he'll like them better.  It's so much easier feeding Brandon table food.

One food that is the best are Earth's Bests teething biscuits. They make a mess but Brandon loves to gum and suck them down along with playing with his sippy juice cup.  Brandon loves the afternoon because he knows it's sippy time.  He loves having his juice cold (which I think is weird, but I guess it helps with teething).  I'm so proud of how fast he is learning his coordination.  He's the sippy cup King!!

Brandon asking santa for lots of Toys

WSC

I am trying A FREE week membership at Washington Sports Club.  I went with them because they have babysitting (they call it the Kids Party room) for $1.50 per 30 minutes.  Everyone I've spoken with said that's an awesome deal compared to the gyms they go to.   Today was my second time going but 1st time with Brandon.  I was a little worried because B was not the best sleeper last night (up at midnight to play...ahhhhhh!!!)  but I plopped him on the floor and all the little 2-3 year olds came close to him to meet the new kid and Brandon did just fine.  For today we only did 30 minutes.  But the next day we get to go he'll go in for a whole hour so Mama can do a yoga or pilates class.

My first trip to WSC was crazy.  I went on Saturday because I wanted to try the yoga class.  I'm not even sure why I went on Saturday, I know once I have the membership I won't go on weekends, but I think I was just very excited to get one step closer to being back in my routine.  Well at yoga an older man was doing the class.  It was his first time ever doing yoga and he had some health issues.  The instructor told him to not try all the poses we were going to do, but he didn't listen.  30 minutes in he got stuck in one of the cat poses and luckily a doctor was in the yoga class with us, but he ended up making the older man cause a scene and getting management to take the man out of the class.  Soo a nice and calm yoga class was not what I received that Saturday morning.  I was also worried about the babysitting area.  I saw 6-7 kids with just one babysitter, YIKES!  The children were ranging from 3 months to probably 8 years old, but that's still a lot for one person.  I decided to give them a second chance since I will never be bringing Brandon on weekends or evenings.  Today was much much much better. 10 kids with 2-3 babysitters.  I'm glad I gave them a second first impression because after Saturday I was ready to find a new place to workout.

Hopefully adding some exercise can help boost my adrenaline to keep me going all day.  I keep getting these bursts of exhaustion around 4PM, it could be my lack of moving around, the winter, or the fact I'm entertaining a 7 month old all day long...maybe it's all 3?  I need a red bull!

busy bee

I already can see that this month is going to be even busier than our first month back in America.  Between regular daily routines we are throwing in holiday shopping, decorating the house, and tons of traveling.  So this leaves opera-mommy less time to blog and post pictures.  I felt terrible that I forgot our camera in VA during our visit in NY, we bought a cheap camera at Wal-mart to use for the week but the quality was not even close to what we are used to.  So I am making it a priority to start packing for our trip to NJ/NY a week in advanced and not just 12 hours, Brandon had everything he needed, but I'm surprised I had enough to wear for 6 days.  On our way home from Thanksgiving dinner I was down to my last outfit (which was my dressy clothes) I was praying B wouldn't spit up or wipe his dirty hands down the front.  I was lucky and he kept me clean.

I've found that with Brandon being more rambunctious it's so hard to get a lot done in one day.  The past couple nights Paul and I have been able to do one thing a night.  It took 2 evenings to get 2 baby gates up.  One evening to get the lights on the Christmas tree.  And I'm hoping tonight we can decorate the tree because tomorrow Brandon has a play date with his friend Nick and mommy Laura.   I could not be happier that we're not flying this year because I don't think I could add that stress to our already full plate.