Book Review Time!



So I just finished this book...it came highly recommended from a number of different sources, the most recent of which had a baby a couple of months ago...

Overall I give this book a SOLID thumbs up. The whole thing is based around a specific premise of scheduling/feeding your baby called "parent directed feeding." Now, my lay interpretation of this whole idea is that you should simply *think* when your baby cries about what you should do next...haha it sounds so simple!

But I think that a lot of what this book says will be helpful when I actually have a baby and am trying to figure out feeding/scheduling the first few weeks. I imagine I'll feel the same way about this book as I did about "The Monks of New Skete" which I relied on heavily when we first got our weird little puppy. Both have model schedules, ideas on how to think about feeding/scheduling baby.

The other big thing I liked about this book is something I know my parents did and something I know I will do...it has a HUGE emphasis on sleep hygiene. Now "sleep hygiene" is really just helping babies (and really adults too) figure out how to go to sleep successfully. Practically for little ones, what it looks like is a crib with NO toys/distractions/music/light and the idea that you put your little one to bed while still awake so he/she can learn how to fall asleep all by themselves....This is a tough and valuable skill to learn for all of life, and if it can be learned earlier then you end up with someone like me :-) who can fall asleep ANYWHERE at ANYTIME with no warning. Hence, I love sleeping!!

But really, these are the two big practical lessons for me when I think about taking care of a newborn (which I have done, but it has been a while!) There are LOTS of other practical tips and I think I will be having this book with me probably as soon as I get home from the hospital and maybe even in the hospital....

Any other thoughts?

Next on my review list: "Sheparding a Child's Heart." I'm about half-way...Also reading a recommendation from a friend called "Baby Bargains" trying to get some direction in putting together my registry!

Early Morning Snow Day

My week was a bit unusual...I had the privilege of having my mom come visit...she and a good friend of mine are so sweetly planning a shower for me :-) So we did some shower planning, visited a VERY expensive baby boutique and looked at shoes for babies that are more than my shoes!!

But ran into an interesting lady, who was with a little girl with a feeding tube. My mom and I were standing (looking somewhat confused I'm sure) in front of oh, about 50 different car seats and she just starts chatting with us. Wants to know if it is my first, what I'm having, what names I have etc...She really wanted to talk is how it seemed. So we chatted and asked her if the little one with her was her first...turns out that the little girl had had a liver transplant just over a year ago and this was the FIRST outing that was not to the hospital for she and her mom. Kind of explained why she wanted to chat. You just never know what people's stories actually are.

Anyways, the week was also complicated by a HUGE testing snafoo. Seriously, let's just say paying $800 for a test doesn't guarantee that you will take it when you schedule it or that it will be fixed in a timely manner. Seems crazy to me!

But to end on a fun note, this morning, given the forecast of lots of snow and Mark's good ideas, we took a very early morning trip out to one of the parks and I went snow-shoeing and Mark did some AT skiing. It was beautiful and snowy...with no one but us (and our rambunctious dog). These are two pics, but we couldn't take more cause the camera was getting wet!


Happy Thursday!

Baby Bump!

Here are two photos, I'm now at 21 weeks and Mark, every week keeps asking me if I'm pooching out my belly! I promise, I'm not, it is just sticking out more :-)





She keeps growing! Unfortunately, I think she has pushed me to the end of my running :(
I know there are ladies out there who run all the way, but I tried to run this week and couldn't do it anymore! Too much extra weight and kept getting belly pains...huge bummer. Guess it is the elliptical for me from now on!
Happy week!

Why Phoenix is a Weird Dog (and other random Saturday morning thoughts)

1.

We have one patch of sunshine that comes through our kitchen window in the morning, and she does everything possible to be in that patch. Sometimes it means standing against a wall, sometimes it means sitting on the stairs with her butt above her head, but anything to get a bit o' sunshine.

2. Pregnancy Dreams.
Are ODD! Last night I dreamt about the little one, she was cute and brown-haired brown-eyed. Now that is not strange, but the night before I dreamt that the planet was going to be destroyed and I had to get out. My sidekick was a giant head that could spin and shrink (no one I actually knew, mind you) and we had to break into the castle of the person who ruled earth and take the special spaceship to another planet where we would be safe. Fortunately the giant head could spin and shrink to break us in.
Yup, pregnancy dreams are weird.


3. Baby P says hi to Dad!
I have been telling Mark for about the past week that he will be able to feel the baby kick.....now, this is complicated by (brace yourselves all you squeamish) placental placement. When it is on the front of the uterus it acts like a big pillow and buffers all the movement that you feel on the skin...so it has taken a bit longer BUT on THURSDAY night the little one gave a mighty kick to say hello to dad who was waiting :-)
Very exciting!

Hope all you weekends are well and fun.

Maybe an Opera Singer....

Yesterday I had some spare time on my hands (crazy I know, but one of the perks of being on ER) and I thought I would dust off some of my classical vocal pieces from college. You see, back in my glory days, when I did lots of other stuff besides work, I studied classical vocal music, which meant I sang a bit o' opera. Now, I'm what I would call a mediocre opera singer, not terrible, can usually hit the notes, but I imagine listening to someone like me is somewhat like watching amateur skating, you hope it goes well but you know that an inevitable and spectacular crash is in the near future...but since Baby P is literally a captive audience I figured I would do some serenading...



Turns out she loved it! I got lots and lots o' kicks when I was singing, more when singing then just playing the piano, but it was fun nonetheless! Maybe if I start her early she'll have a good sense of pitch like my hubby :-)

In side news, if you want to really get them ahead, you should probably use one of these.


haha, don't really...but funny if people actually buy this stuff!!!

Also, if you like blogs and want to see a better belly series, check out my friend Cate's blog it is fun :-)

Happy Monday!

Bloopper of the Day.

Woke up at 8am this morning after getting home from my ER shift at 11:30pm....made coffee, got the dog in the car and drove to the airport to pick Mark up...



only to realize he was coming in at 8:40 PM.. sigh, not AM.

Bummer!

So now I have all day to fill! I started to look at baby registry stuff but am slightly overwhelmed-anything I should definitely have on my list?

I'm open for suggestions!!

While the Hubby is Gone....

So Mark is gone this weekend in Dallas to watch the All-Star Game. A few ironic things have occurred thus far.
1. Dallas has gotten more snow than SLC and Mark's flight almost didn't leave to get there.

2. I got a new sleeping partner:



She smells a little bit and doesn't shower as regularly as Mark but sure is warm.

3. Our dishwasher flooded 3 times. The first time, we discovered it when we woke up and cleaned up and thought it was fixed. Then I went back to bed after driving Mark to the airport super early...when I woke up, the flood re-occurred. I should have known this was a bad sign...Cleaned it up one more time, went to work then...came home from work to the biggest worst flood. All under our cabinets, soaked through to the basement, etc...not so pretty. Mind you, it is 7pm at this time. Called Mark, he scheduled an emergency plumber to come over, then I called the Sullivans to keep me company so a strange plumber and I wouldn't be alone, and they brought dinner. And Jared came, turned my water off to the dishwasher and left $95 richer AFTER he gave me a $50 discount that normally gets charged to after hour calls.
Why wasn't I a plumber again? Here's his card: note the website:



Sigh. What a day! And the little one just keeps kicking :-)

The Verdict is In!

The Parretts are going to be having a little girl!!
She looks great on the ultrasound-everything is perfectly normal and she is right on for her size...she doesn't appear to have short legs yet either :-)

Here's my baby bump photo for the week:

19 weeks 2 days

Now, the view from the inside!




These are feet...not blobs :-)


Mark thinks this looks like me!!!
We will have to see...

I'm feeling lots more kicks too and think that Mark should be able to feel them soon too.
We're excited!!!

girl or boy?

we find out this afternoon!!!

Thumbs Up/Thumbs Down

It is book review time! One down about childrearing 200 million to go...or something like that. There are many many books written about exactly what you should and shouldn't do when raising a child and what your likelihood is that you are going to permanently mess them up and some of these books seem to hinge all of this on things like...swaddling vs. no swaddling or blue sheets vs. animal print....
I guess my initial thoughts are (and the are probably relatively useless since I'm not ACTUALLY a parent...yet) it depends...on everything.
This being said, I just recently finished one of the aforementioned books: "To Train Up A Child."
Here's my review:


Reasons for Thumbs Up:
1. He is a huge advocate of CONSISTENCY and EXPECTATIONS. That little ones understand and thrive with structure and responsibility in their lives in ways appropriate for their ages. YES. I agree.
2. He thinks family time is also very important-that everyone shares in making everything run smoothly.
3. Hubby/Wife relationship ALWAYS comes first-this is the core of a successful family
4. No one gets punished in anger-any punishment comes from failed obedience and is handed out in a reasonable way...(speaking of which, I always just tried to make my mom laugh if i was going to get in trouble...laughter ALWAYS works....)

Reasons for Thumbs Down:
1. He thinks homeschooling is the ONLY way to properly educate your kids and you are kind of a bad person if you send your kids to any type of big school (Christian, secular, private, public-didn't matter)
2. He also thinks no women should ever work outside the home and trains his daughters to be homemakers-expecting them to know how to cook, clean, etc as their primary responsibilities.
3. His favorite tool? The switch...yeah.


Ok so that's the brief synopsis...thoughts?

No more Tummy Time for Mom

I am a belly sleeper (not *dancer*) but sleeper. I always have been....nothing quite like curling up on my belly and nicely drifting off to sleep...
HOWEVER
I was recently informed at my last visit (and I had been dreading this news) that it isn't ideal anymore to sleep on my belly cause I'll "put pressure on" aka squish the little one's spot. I knew this was coming and have been trying to get ready for it, but it was a sad day indeed. Not to mention that I proceeded to wake up repeatedly to shift position only to have to remember the no more belly time....I think this is a statement on shifts in childhood practices cause the little one's used to HAVE to sleep on tummies, now there is more information that back is the safest position to prevent SIDS. Oh well, farewell tummy time for mom....



And in other news, in case anyone out there still believes that autism is linked to vaccinations, read here: CLICK THIS LINK!!!
SO VACCINATE YOUR KIDDOS PEEPS!!!!

Baby P is doing well with a heartbeat going strong at 140 bpm today, and baby is also kicking the heck out of my wife!! Exciting though I wish I could communicate with the little person.

I already have my Baby Bjorn ready to go and the question is how active can a new father be with baby strapped to? XC skiing is universally accepted - how about mild alpine touring? How about hiking with some scrambles? I think in the end this will make our baby all the more rad and we'll have the next Dean Potter or Shane McConkey on our hands if we expose them to awesome adventure at a young age.

Whatever the threshold baby p is going to have a sweet time playing with dad in the mountains...

...and maybe in vegas too:

Baby Bump



18 weeks 1 day....

Bout Time.

So my shirts were slowly becoming "cropped" and any lifting of the arms revealed a bit o' belly...I figured it is about time to at least start with some shirts to accommodate the growing belly. Under the direct tutelage of "A Girlfriend's Guide" I tried to find someone about my size who had been pregnant at some point...one of the other residents in my program came to mind and I asked her if I could borrow some clothes...below is the box and pile of GREAT clothes that she lent me...note the box title.


I also went to Old Navy and found shirts all for under $15 and a dress..my only items left to procure are some pants...namely because my legs are too short to wear the nice pants lent to me! This may end up having to be an online purchase...
Also, wanted to include a pic of my baby daddy...whom I hope passes on his beautiful eyes!!!

He's so hot....