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The thought of my daughter learning to spoon feed herself gives me small coronaries. The more I think about it, the more I get until I am in a full blown heart attack. The mess that goes along with learning to spoon feed yourself is a given and I know you know exactly what I am talking about. But, if there is one thing I am learning as a parent, it is that sometimes you just have to live in the moment and let them get messy. Sometimes you have to ignore the pretty white shirt that just got splattered with spaghetti sauce or the adorable pants that just became victim of a blow out.

So when I made spaghetti last night I decided that I would strip Zoey down and let her have at it. I mean, what is more fun that making a mess and eating spaghetti?

She loved it! As soon as I put the tray down with the cut up spaghetti noodles and sauce on it, she started hitting the tray like a wild maniac. Noodles were flying everywhere. She would pick noodles up by the handful and throw them or drop them on the floor. And…

That was the happiest dog in the universe last night. She sat there, patiently attentive. Waiting. Yearning. Begging. PLEASE DROP MORE!

I had to spoon a few noodles into her mouth so she would realize that this is stuff that you can not only play with but also EAT! And YUM! It is delicious! Once she had a bite, she realized what it was and started eating them. It took some serious concentration and a level of hand eye coordination that she didn’t even know she was capable of but she would eventually get a noodle into her mouth. I even witnessed her splurping a few noodles up.. I had no idea she knew how to slurp a noodle! And by the way, slurping noodles is annoying and I hate when I hear people do it.. but when my sweet peanut is doing it, it is the cutest thing ever :)

You know, it is a little more challenging these days to feed her. We don’t give her baby puree very often anymore and I try to give her whatever we are having for dinner. Making sure she is getting a healthy, well balanced diet is not an easy task. I’m sure it would be easier if I was making sure my husband and I were always getting a well balanced diet but sometimes it is hard to remember to take care of yourself when you are so busy taking care of someone else.

Candy :: Mar.08.2010 :: Baby Food, Parenting, Zoey :: 1 Comment »

When did she get old enough to eat real people food?

And drink out of a “big girl” cup?

And shovel said cheese into her mouth by handfuls?

Sometimes I feel like every time I blink she grows another inch and learns a new facial expression, new skill, or makes a new sound. People warned us about time flying. They warned us to cherish each moment because they are going off to college before you know it. There was a lot of eye rolling when given such unsolicited advice but now I see. Now I understand what they were saying. Now I find myself warning others of their fate.

Now we are approaching her very first Easter. And not too long after that, we’ll be celebrating her first year on this earth. How??? Someone please pause the clock. Just for a second. My heart desperately needs to catch up.

I love her. More than I ever thought possible.

Candy :: Mar.06.2010 :: Baby, Motherhood, Zoey :: 3 Comments »

So… There is this episode of Family Guy that…

Wait.

What do you mean you don’t watch Family Guy? Oh, you say your maturity level is above this show? Well, you may have stopped by the wrong blog then because that kind of 14 year old prepubescent boy humor is right up my alley! Anyway, back to what I was saying:

There is an episode where Stewie is standing next to Lois, she is laying in bed exhausted and he is trying to get her attention, “Mom! Mom! Mom! Mama! Mama! Mama! Mum! Mum! Mum! Mum! Lois! Lois! Lois! Lois!” Lois jumps up and shouts “WHAT?” and Stewie mischievously shouts “Hi!” and runs off laughing like a mad man. I felt like I lived this exact same scene today, except on a completely different level.

You see, last night I only got about 4 hours of sleep and only in two separate 2 hour increments. I was exhausted this morning and Zoey was especially fussy. She would constantly follow me around the house, whining and fussing, sometimes hollering. At one point I put my feet up on the coffee table and decided to have myself a little Mom Break because I felt like I was about to lose my grip with sanity at any given moment.

You’re laughing at the Mom Break comment, aren’t you? Because we all know there is no such a thing. There are variations. But not really.

So within just a few nanoseconds, Zoey was standing next to me, holding on to the couch for dear life and half crying, half fussing and half sweetly saying “Mamamamamamama.” (ok, so maybe you can’t technically do half of something three times, but c’mon just work with me here) At about that point I didn’t know whether to be annoyed or overwhelmed with the cuteness. She was doing her fake-sad squinty face (the one she does to get attention. did I mention that her genius is starting to scare me?) and interchanging between three different moods. All I had wanted was a break and just moments earlier I was feeling on the edge of desperation, but that adorable little mad squinty face and cute babbles just erased every single thing that I had previously felt and all of a sudden I was picking her up and snuggling her, giving her More Than She Bargained For Neck Kisses and blowing raspberries into her tummy.

She got what she wanted: my attention. Again, the genius thing comes back into play. I’m afraid I’ve been wrapped around a tiny, chubby and mostly slobbery finger. Send. Help.

Candy :: Feb.06.2010 :: Baby, Motherhood, Zoey :: 5 Comments »

Diaper change time has turned into an Epic Battle. Every single time we lay her down, whether it be on the changing table, the floor or the bed, she will instantly start screaming and thrashing around like we are about to torture her to death. This Epic Battle has resulted in us doing any and everything we can think of to take her mind off of the task at hand. From plastic bottles, shoes, toys, funny faces, funny noises all the way to blowing raspberries on her tummy AS we change her diaper (that is one thing no one ever tells you when you are pregnant- you will become a GREAT multi-tasker once you have children). Tonight was no different than any other night and when I heard the “belly laughs” coming from Z’s room, I had to grab the camera and run in there. I got in on the “end” of it so she was getting tired from all of the laughing but I did get some of it on camera!

Candy :: Jan.31.2010 :: Baby, Video, Zoey :: 2 Comments »

Zoey was outgrowing her baby tub. Gene would try giving her a bath in it and she would do everything she could to try to climb out of it, making bath time a real pain in the neck! So, I went to Target and bought the famous inflatable duck tub! I have heard amazing things about it and I thought it would be just perfect for her. Um.. think again! She hated it. I mean, downright loathed the thing. Scared to death of it. Gene would go to put her in it and she would kick and scream and throw a huge fit. I kept it in the living room for a couple of days to see if she would warm up to it and she still would go nowhere near it.

Finally, one late night I was laying in bed, trying to fall asleep and I had the brilliant idea of just putting a bath mat down in the tub and letting her sit in the tub like a big girl. She can sit up on her own just fine but I am very nervous about her slipping because she tries to move around so much. So anyway, we tried it and it worked and we are back to having fun bath times!

She can now crawl around, play with lots of toys, make big splashes and just generally do whatever she wants. To say she loves it is an understatement. She gets so excited when we put her in the bath tub now and would play in there forever if the water stayed warm and her skin didn’t wrinkle up.

The only problem is that it causes a bit of trouble when Gene is trying to wash her and she wants to crawl around the tub and play with toys. I overheard him say “This is too difficult now” while he was bathing her earlier.

Candy :: Jan.30.2010 :: Baby, Zoey, Zoey's Firsts :: 3 Comments »

Z and I are on the mend but boy this past couple of weeks sure were a doozie. It started with Z being extremely congested and ended with me catching her awful cold. She had a good week long bout of awful sleeping, waking multiple times through the night, and crawling around whining and fussing. Every time she would bump her head, even if it was just a slight bump, she would melt down into hysterics. It was quite the pitiful sight, if I say so myself.

Well, now that she is feeling better, I was finally able to see that her top 2 front teeth are peeking through her swollen gums. I had the biggest “Ah ha!” moment of my entire life when I first saw the white specks on her top gums. Everything just made total sense! The crying, the whining, the not-sleeping, the fussiness and the sensitivity to Everything. That. Came. In. Contact. With. Her. just made complete and total sense to me. It all added up and I suddenly felt enormous guilt for not giving her teething tablets and Ty*lenol to ease her pain. Here I thought she was just battling an icky cold and come to find out she was battling an icky cold on TOP of some hardcore teething. Parenting fail!

Ever since we made this discovery we have been able to stay on top of her discomfort with teething tablets and the occasional dose of grape flavored infant’s Ty*lenol. She is in much better spirits and I no longer feel like I am going to lose my mind. It is a win-win situation, really!

I think the version of Z’s cold that I received was about a bajillion times worse. I got The Cough. It has been awful and even though I am starting to feel a lot better, I still have The Cough. I’ve been taking everything over the counter that I can and I even dug up an old bottle of antibiotics that I never finished (yes, I know, shame on me!) and have been sucking those down as well. Mu*cinex, Del*sym, Extra Strength Ty*lenol, Al*eve, Ny*quil, Day*quil, the list could go on forever. I am so drugged up on OTC medication that I should probably look into a detox program when The Cough is finally gone for good.

So that my friends is my unnecessarily long excuse of why I haven’t been around. I still want to blog more frequently and still have great aspirations to keep up with this thing.

Sidenote: Z is pulling up to standing position on EVERYTHING, regardless of it being a stable surface or not. There is a lot of head bumping and falling over going on at our house but surprisingly, we have yet to get any bruises. She is starting to learn that she can move her feet and I have a feeling she’ll be cruising along the coffee table or sofa in the upcoming weeks. She can crawl pretty fast now and has a love for any and everything that is not a designated toy (for example: the remote, the cell phone, cups, kleenex, shoes, breakable home decor, etc.). I am officially going to pack up all of the pretty decorative stuff in my living room and put it away in the garage until after we no longer have little children in the house. It’s a sad day but I realize that is what comes with the territory. It is either that or invest in one of those baby gate / makeshift jail house things and I just feel bad doing that!

Candy :: Jan.28.2010 :: Baby, Health, Parenting Fail, Zoey, Zoey's Firsts :: Comments Off

It’s 3 AM. I wish I could say that I was drunk-writing a blog entry after being out on a wild night on the town or a great party but sadly, that is not the case. Oh no, I am writing this because a certain little peanut woke up crying at 2 AM. Hubby rocked her while I dosed up some infant’s tylenol, teething tablets and a bottle. It worked but hubby was concerned about her breathing while she was asleep so we ended up waking her up while trying to administer saline drops, suction her nose and give her a sauna-esque experience in the bathroom.

Suffice it to say, I think Z and I may be going to our respective doctor’s on Monday. I am still so sick and she is still pretty congested as well. I have been taking Muc*inex, Tyl*enol, Del*sym and whatever else I can find over the counter to help with this monster of a cold but it just doesn’t seem to be working. The coughing and congestion in my chest is really what is starting to get to me. The constant coughing almost always triggers an asthma attack which has caused me to take one too many puffs on the ol’ inhaler one too many times.

This is one thing I hate about being sick when it lingers.. I never really know when to just suck it up and “wait it out” or give in and go see the doctor. I absolutely hate when I go to the doctor, give them my hard earned $20 co-pay for them to tell me to go to the store and buy a $20 bottle of Muc*inex over the counter.

Right now I am sitting here in tears. Because I am just sick of my sweet little girl being congested. I’m sick of her teething and being in pain. I am sick of MYSELF being sick because I feel like I don’t have the energy to even take care of her. I just want us all to be back to our normal selves. It was much easier that way!

Sidenote: This last week has been the WEEK OF HELL! The hardest week EVER in this parenting gig, so far. I think to add to Z’s congestion and cold, she has been teething. Her bottom 2 teeth just came in a few weeks ago but her top two are now peaking through the gums. You can just barely feel them through her swollen little gummies. She has been drooling excessively, whining almost 24/7, crying a lot and waking up a LOT at night. Today was the best day she has had yet.. Not much whining or crying, she was a happy little soul and it was sooo good to see my sweet baby again that I know oh so well! We hung out with Grandma and Grandpa almost all day so maybe that is why she was in such good spirits? She really loves them!

Candy :: Jan.24.2010 :: Baby, Parenting, Zoey :: 5 Comments »