Things That Annoy Me

1. World Market. Normally I really like the store. Normally, I don't have two kids that need to be in a cart.
This week I took the girls out, and my plan was to go to World Market to get a few baskets to go in our entertainment center. There wasn't any up-close parking available, so I walked with Charlotte while I carried Lena in her car seat. Charlotte walks like a sloth. (I've never actually seen one walk. Just hang. But I imagine they walk slowly. I wonder if Kristen Bell knows all things sloth.) We make it into the store to discover that Lena will not fit in the shopping cart. So I walk back out with them to load them up in the stroller. Charlotte falls in the parking lot and skins her knee. But she's a lot like the Honey Badger. She don't give a shit.
But once I got out the stroller, she was ticked! I finally restrained the flailing little bugger and head into the store, but the aisles do not accommodate my double stroller. (file this under: why I shop online).
I make it to the back of the store where the baskets are, and this is what I find:

awesome.

2,) Finally getting a restless over-tired baby to sleep only to have them violently fill their diaper. It's sort of like the kid in a snowsuit saying they need to go to the bathroom, but in the middle of the night with a little baby that you just.want.to.go.to.sleep.

3.) When people say "supposably". That is NOT A WORD. Read more. If you pay attention, you'll realize that you've never read that word in your life.
Maybe I should lighten up. After all, it was I who thought these guys:

were actually called "Haulin' Oats" until like 5 years ago. And I never knew how to say Don Quixote so I just didn't. Clearly I have issues with things involving oats. But yeah. Stop saying supposably.


I know I should be blogging more meaningful bits of my life, but I know how much you guys like a rant.

What words or phrases did you have wrong for way too long?
I have a friend who thought a rum & coke was called a Roman Coke until she saw it spelled out at a bar.

Lunacy

Last night when I was up with Lena, a series of events occurred that resulted in what will become literary birth control. 

If you're bad at remembering to take your pill, just bookmark this post and read it every day for 5 days, until you can be sure your prescription is doing its job again.

Small print: That is not a surefire way to prevent pregnancy. I am not a doctor, but I watch a lot of TV and use google for everything. Also, the following is not a complaint about my sweet angelic Lena, rather it's stating the awesomeness that comes along with parenting. 

Back to normal print. 

Around 11:45, my husband brought Lena to me to be fed. It was one of the first nights where she was peacefully sleeping for about an hour before midnight. Usually she's quite restless between 9-12, so I was pleased I was able to actually get about an hour and a half of sleep before that. I was feeling really hopeful because of this, since the night before was sort of a challenge where she didn't want to go back to sleep after both of her night time feedings. 

We shared our Johnson & Johnson moment of peaceful nursing and calm quiet eye contact, when BOOM. Biggest burp and milk explosion all over me, her, and everything in between (as it turns out, that's not a whole lot.) I didn't want to rouse her by being all dramatic about it all, so I'm trying to tip toe around the creaking floors and find a burp cloth, screw that, an entire change of clothes, but she wakes up anyway. 

She went back to sleep about 40 minutes later and I climbed into bed. 2 hours later she wakes and she's ready to be fed again. She's in need of a diaper change, and being the smart cookie that I am, I change her first, so she can comfortably nurse and go back to sleep. 

For some reason though, she's just really ticked and I find it odd. Stop crying so loud, kid. I'm right here, I'm getting the job done. 

This is the sequence of events that then took place:

I change diaper, discover our last package of wipes is in Charlotte's room.
Find other* object to clean child.
Retrieve pacifier that keeps falling out and bouncing (those soothie brand are bouncy!) off someplace
Child pees all over while diaper is not on because I wasted too much time looking for something to clean her with.
Find new blanket to swaddle her in, as previous blanket was all wet.
Retrieve soothie (they really shouldn't make them in that clearish material. Impossible to find in a dimly lit room.)
Calm her down and get comfy to feed.
<15 minutes go by>
Big grunt, bigger poop. Ohhh...that's why we change diapers after a feeding.
Glad I changed swaddling blanket. I don't need to unwrap her arms, I can change her without startling her too much!
Dammit, still no wipes!! Use a different other* object.
Locate and retrieve rogue soothie.
Sit back down and attempt to rock her back to sleep without nursing, but end up needing to nurse.
Notice her arm looks funny.
Is there something wrong with her shoulder?
Am I swaddling too tight?
Is that why she was crying so loud earlier?
Holy crap is her shoulder dislocated?
OMG we need to take her to the ER!
Do we need to go to the ER for this?
What will we do with Charlotte?
Can it wait until tomorrow?
Will she be able to sleep if she's in pain?
I need to check out her shoulder!!
That means I need to unswaddle her and ultimately wake her up again!!!!
<unswaddle>
Realize I wasn't feeling her shoulder, but it was her elbow. (that would have been pretty crazy had her shoulder been way down there. It was 3am though. I get easily mixed up when I'm tired.)
Re-swaddle, re-paci, re-rock, cross fingers and put her down to sleep.
Climb into bed.

WAH. <wait>
WAH. <go in>
Repeat every 10 minutes for the next 40 minutes.

Decide to go downstairs and try the swing, and I'll sleep on the couch.
Snort, grunt, wah, sniffle, grunt
Repeat constantly until 6.
Good morning!!

*remind me to do laundry today, and also to bring wipes back into Lena's room.

Whenever we have nights like this, I wake up and think there's NO WAY I can make it through the day with a toddler and a newborn, but it's like when the sun comes up, my sanity comes back and I don't get body parts mixed up anymore. So weird. 

Do you get crazy brain when you're tired?
One time, when my husband was in college, I asked him why he had a box of cheez-its next to his bed. He told me that the night before he was coughing like crazy and he thought the only thing that would get the coughing to stop was by eating a ton of cheez-its. I think it may have worked...so if you learn anything from today's post it's that cheez-its cure whooping cough.

Baby Shower Games and The Cold Hard Truth

Have you ever played the baby poop game at a baby shower? You know the one, melted chocolate bars in diapers get passed around while unsuspecting shower guests smell them, examine them, and either make silent promises to themselves that they will never have children or proclaim "I wish baby poop was this yummy!" and then discuss the cold hard truth about their precious angel's dookie.

#1 really should see a doctor.

As much as I'd love to deny it, parenting a newborn involves a lot of poop. I could pretend that I don't think about it, but when you're changing a poopy diaper every 3 hours there's no avoiding it. So then of course, when it starts to look different, I try to play it cool and be all "that shit is normal." (But I don't refer to my baby's waste as such. The dog's? Yes. Very shit. Baby's? sweet little angel poopies.) (yeah, I'm blogging about poop.) 

But in reality, if a few days go by and said poopy is still not normal, I take to the interwebs to diagnose my baby! She doesn't even need health insurance. I got this. Don't worry baby, mommy has the internet, your measles should go away real soon. 

But yeah. Poop. A normal baby poop (from a breastfed baby) is yellow. Lena's is green. And it got greener and greener for a few days. It's from a foremilk/hindmilk imbalance/over supply, but don't worry everyone. I've got it under control. Don't lose sleep!

But googling it was pretty awesome!

love those descriptions! 

So whether I like it or not, my life is consumed by what's in my baby's diaper (and sometimes what makes it's way up her back.)

yum!

What's for dinner tonight?

A New Decade, an Old Emily

I celebrated a birthday this weekend. I use the word "celebrated" loosely since it was a mix of mourning and enjoying the attention.

I turned 30. I'm at the age where I think I'm supposed to start lying about my age. I'm not at all disappointed with where I am in life at this age. It's just the number that I don't like. And the knowledge of what happens now. Apparently it's harder to lose weight now. There are skin care lines targeted to people my age. I think there's an official rule about not being allowed to shop at Forever 21 and Charlotte Russe. Not that I've been there in a very long time (wait, I got some things at Forever 21 last fall...) but it's an unspoken understanding.

When I was pregnant I was feeling sorry for myself since I threw my husband a birthday party for his big 3-0. I knew that I was going to have a new little baby and I probably wouldn't want to do anything at all to celebrate, or I'd want to do something but wouldn't be able to. Well, as it turned out, I have no problem getting Grandma to babysit so we can go out and have a good time.

We went to two of my favorite places. We started at Reserve downtown for a charcuterie and cheese platter and a flight of bubbly! The Tigers were playing so Marcus was checking his phone a lot, but I had my smoked meats to occupy me. It was so awesome being able to enjoy unpasteurized cheeses, room temperature sliced meat and sparkling wine. I love being not pregnant.

It was another friend's birthday the day before and a group of friends were out at Ruth's Chris so we were going to stop by just to say hi and maybe have a drink, but we ended up staying for dinner. Fancy schmancy, I tell you. Marcus and I shared a 15 pound cut of beef and a small salad. The salad was the only non meat or cheese item I had eaten all day.

It actually turned out to be a really great day, especially since my expectations were really low. :)

Leaving my 20's behind isn't easy. They were a lot of fun. I'm not so sure my 30's will come close, but they say the best is yet to come. I guess I'll just have to find out for myself.

no pictures. sorry. they're on facebook.

I Jinxed It.

Stupid frickin blog.

I am not joking. The day I wrote my last post about my sweet, angelic newborn, she decided to be a night owl.

Every night from about 11-2:30 Lena refuses to sleep. And she's mad about it too. And I get a little frustrated as well. Though I don't prefer she do this at all, if I could choose a time, it would be between 8-11:30. Oh well. whatever, she's a newborn. get over it, self.

Over all though, it's still pretty great.

In other great news, my sister had her baby too! We were due two days apart, and the babies are 13 days apart. I'm so happy he's here and glad my sister is out of her pregnant misery.

13 days is a big difference in newborn land.

I'm keeping it short today, but I just wanted you haters to love that everything isn't going as perfectly as it was a week ago.

Have you ever jinxed yourself or attempted rituals in hopes of recreating the perfect situation?

I usually do rituals,  but only for things that I feel I have control over. Not like wearing the same shirt or drinking from the same cup every time Michigan plays football...like certain family members of mine. :)