A Broken Woman

Things have not been going well for me.  If you remember a while back I blogged about how I have a herniated/bulged disk in my spine and how I was getting epidural steroid shots to try to make it better.  Well it hasn’t gotten better, in fact the third shot that I got about a week and a half ago has made me so much worse.  I’m at the point right now where I can’t sit, stand, walk, sleep, or do pretty much anything for more than a minute or two without being in horrible awful pain, and that's with me taking prescription pain killers.  To give you an idea, I took a shower just now (been avoiding doing that for the last two days) and I took the fastest shower I possibly could and then had to just lay in bed in my towel for 15 minutes before the pain subsided enough for me to get dressed.  Needless to say I can’t really take care of Jude like this, so my wonderful friend Tara is here this week helping me with Jude and driving me to appointments because I can’t drive myself.  Today I’m going to go see my pain specialist doctor and then to the chiropractor.  I’m seeing the chiropractor everyday this week, possibly starting physical therapy and I’m getting an MRI done on Wednesday.  I’m hoping today my doctor can prescribe me something a bit stronger for the pain so I can at least function a little bit.  Ugh, this has been a nightmare for all of us.  For going on 9 months now I haven’t been able to be the mom, wife, or person that I want to be.  I’m praying for some relief, for a fix, for something to get better.
-Liz

It’s Nap Time...

And all is quiet in the house.  I’ve taken a shower, checked Facebook and my blogs, am sipping on a cup of iced coffee, and just in general enjoying the peace.  I love nap time, though it never seems to last long enough.

Not much going on here.  We have successfully transitioned Jude off of formula.  He now drinks only organic whole milk.  The sippy cup thing though is a work in progress.  He likes to drink water out of them and play with them, but he is still drinking his milk out of bottles.  And I’m ok with that.  I want him to be off bottles by time we have our 15 month check up and that seems like a reasonable time frame.  I hate that in parenting it seems like every time you get used to something or I guess the baby gets used to something, it’s time to give it up.  From swaddling, pacifiers, being rocked to sleep, to bottles, formula and so on.  Can’t we do what works for as long as it works?

The other thing we are working on is getting Jude to eat anything other than fruit.  He is a fruit only kind of guy and pretty much no matter what I try or how I try it, if it isn’t fruit, preferably grapes right now, then it goes on the floor or worse, ends up with Jude screaming and pushing everything away from him.  It is a battle and I worry now that he isn’t drinking formula that he isn’t getting the nutrition that he needs, not to mention what so much fruit does to his digestion.  We have had some crazy poos to say the least.

We have also had some pretty crazy separation anxiety come up at bedtime.  About 3 out 5 nights he is totally hysterstcial and screams and cries and goes crazy for up to an hour most nights, despite what ever we do and despite how tired he is.  This is the house of screams, as Jude also screams though 90% of diaper changes, when he doesn’t get his way, for no reason sometimes, etc.  Lucky for him I have developed (for the most part) an ok tolerance to his screams, though I can’t say the same thing about our poor roommate.  Hopefully he is just going through a rather scream-y phase and this will all someday stop.
-Liz

Happy Valentine's Day My Loves!

It’s hard to believe that this time last year our little man was so very tiny!  Now he is such a big boy that I dare say he is almost a toddler!  He is officially walking now, he has been taking steps here and there for a long time now, but just this week he started going full force, walking across the living room and down the hall and where ever he wants to go!  It’s so cute, each step is so slow and deliberate, you can tell he is thinking about how he needs to be careful so he doesn’t fall.  This time last year he couldn’t even hold up his head on his own!  My what a difference a year makes.

This morning Jude got up at 5am.  Erg, not what you want to happen when he was up till almost 9 last night (we’ve been having a hard time getting him to bed these days unless he is up late).  My sweet sweet wife got up with him so I could sleep in (she has been working later hours so she has been getting up in the morning with Jude so she can spend some time with him before she goes to work).  Then when she woke me up several hours later, it was with breakfast in bed from my favorite breakfast spot, Kirby Lane!  Such a nice way to start the day!  

I love her so much and I just don’t know what we would do without her.  She drives over two hours a day to work so she can make the money she needs to support our family so I can be at home with Jude.  She gets up early in the morning so that I get a break and they get some time together.  She works out on her lunch break so when she is at home she is there 100%.  She takes out the trash, she helps out around the house when she can, she gives Jude a bath and put hims to bed every night.  She does so much for us and gives herself totally to this family and we wouldn’t be a family without her.  We love you S!  Happy Valentine’s Day!

-Liz and Jude

All Grown Up

Jude’s birthday was so much fun!  We had so many people come and show their love for Jude, it was really touching.  His party was car/truck themed, as those sorts of things are his favorite right now.  I think it turned out pretty dang cute.  Here is the cake that I made him.

I think it turned out pretty cute!  And of course, Jude loved his first taste of sugar, though he was a bit danity at first.

But then he tore into it!  And he loves to share his food, so of course he offered me and S a few bites.

He was in such a good mood for the whole party, clearly having the time of his life.  It was so great.

Jude had his 12 month check up today and he is currently 21 lbs and 30.25 inches tall, which puts him pretty perfectly in the middle of the size chart.  The doctor was happy with his growth and development.  He was all over the check up room, crawling and walking all around.  He can do so much now!  He isn’t full out walking, but he is getting very close.  He will take a step or two between toys and will walk to you if you arn’t too far away.  But he still mostly prefers to crawl.  He is really into climbing right now.  Yesterday we were playing in his room and he climbed up and inside of his toy chest.  I love the little proud grin he gets on his face when he manages to do something like that.  He also loves to point at things.  He claps, gives kisses (sometimes), hugs, makes a large variety of noises, says Mama, dog, cat (sometimes), and baba.  He will sometimes sign when he is hungry and we are working on the signs for all done and more.  He dances when he hears music and if it is something really catchy he will try to sing along.  

His temper tantrums have gotten better.  We really appreciated everyone’s advice on it and so we are sticking firm to our “no”s and either going over to play with something without him or ignoring him all together when he starts to have a fit.  I think it is helping and in general we haven’t had too many tantrums lately.  Because of his fits though, he has really perfected his ear piercing scream, which makes S and I both so very very crazy, as I’m sure it is intended to do.  He likes to scream like that when it’s time to go down for naps now and it is getting really hard to get him down, especially in the morning.  I think that we are going to work on transitioning him to one middle of the day nap this week and see if that helps.  We are also going to be trying to wean him off the bottle and from formula to whole milk this month, so things might get a bit crazy.  But it can’t be as bad as the week we went cold turkey on getting him off of being swaddled and pacifiers.  What a nightmare that was.

All in all, Jude is the light of my life.  He is the best thing that has ever happened to us and I love him so much more that I could ever really express.  This year has flown by and I can’t wait to see what this next year of Jude brings!

-Liz

Our family with Jude at 1 year old

Our family with Jude 1 hour old

52 Weeks!!!

Jude’s 1st birthday is today and my mind is blown.  I have so much to blog about but so little time today with Jude’s birthday party this afternoon to get ready for.  But here he is, 1 year old!