Your Son Is a Giant . . . Oh, Wait, Maybe Not

So Alex had his 18-month checkup today (8 days before he's 19 months). It's always fun to have him weighed and measured and see how he's growing. Ever since his 2-month checkup, he's always been on the tall-side wavering between 60% and 80% in height, which is cool, and we love that he's tall, despite the challenges it presents (i.e., he can reach more things and climb on more things).

Alex's 15-Month Checkup

So recently Alex had his 15-month checkup (albeit when he was 16.5 months). It's always fun to go to the doctor's for a checkup and see how much he's grown. When he was 14.5 months, they measured him at 24 pounds and 32 1/8 inches (though they didn't measure correctly. He was actually 31.5 inches). At this appt, he measured at almost 26 pounds and 33 1/8 (but again I'm pretty sure he's actually 32.5). So he grew an inch in two months, which is pretty good. That puts him in the 75% for height compared to other boys his age, which is pretty exciting. With Aaron not being that tall (5'7"), I really want Alex to get my family's tall genes and be around 5'10" (my grandpa was 6'2", as well as my uncle, and my brother and dad are around 5'10". It's just easier for guys, I think, when they're not too short.

Peanut Allergy

So it's pretty certain that Alex has a peanut allergy. Obviously as of yet, we haven't had to deal with this too much since he's so young. He also doesn't seem to have an extreme allergy, which is good (I've heard of some kids who can't be in the same room as peanut butter). Still, we've had to deal with some things.

Update on Last Saturday

Here is an update of what happened Saturday after I posted. Because Alex got down for his nap late, I ended up having to wake him up around 3:30 p.m. He seemed fine when I got him up, but a few minutes later he was standing on the couch and threw up. I was a little surprised. I grabbed him off the couch and put him on the floor in the living room. Then he threw up some more (luckily not much). We keep a blanket over the couch, so I grabbed that and threw it into the laundry room and then cleaned up the throw up, and changed him for the third or fourth time that day.

Drama Saturday

Today's drama began at 1 a.m. Aaron woke me up because he realized when he went to go to bed that he was out of a prescription that helps him sleep. He really doesn't sleep that well when he is on the medication, and off it he doesn't sleep at all, and it's pretty much worthless the next day. Needless to say I was pretty upset that he woke me, especially since I'd gotten to bed about 45 minutes late as it was, so I'd only been asleep for an hour or so. I think he mostly wanted comfort, but I was just like, "And what do you expect me to do about it at 1 o'clock in the morning?" I know, not very supportive, but I dare you to do better in the same situation. It took me awhile to get back to sleep.

Update and Google Reader

News on Me

So, I think this post will be really random. First of all, I'd like to say I'm sorry for not updating my blog much. I have a lot going on to talk about, but the issue is I don't have a lot of time, and when I do have time to write for my own enjoyment, I usually don't want to.

Why? Because I've been writing for a job lately. In February, I applied for to be a writing intern at a media company in Draper, Utah. This has been basically my only source of income for the last few months. It's been consistent enough that I no longer get unemployment (though I assume I could sign up again if this work ends). It's been pretty good and I've enjoyed it for the most part. They even wanted to hire me, and proposed to their higher ups to hire a writer, but they denied the proposal. So until I find a more permanent job, this will help. If you want to see some of the writing I've done, you go to Purity Tox-X, Purity 12 Tri-Factor, Purity 12 Green Tea Metabolizer, Skin Care article, and Purity 12 Blogs. Those are just a few of the things I've written. Most of what I have done for them hasn't even been used yet.

What else is cool is they're paying me to learn about search engine optimization. They don't pay me much to do the training, but it's such good information to know, so to get paid to learn about it is great. I'm also doing some other training on my own to learn how to use Dreamweaver--which I can hopefully use to create my own site or something. So things have been going pretty well.

News on Alex

Crawling, Christmas, and Everything

Well, a lot has gone on in the past couple of weeks. First of all, three days before Christmas, Alex really started getting the hang of the whole crawling thing. He now can get anywhere and everywhere (well, except he's not going up stairs yet). This is frustrating because he doesn't want to be kept in his play yard (not surprising) and yet if I'm doing something (like pumping or cleaning), I need to know he's safe. Luckily he can be very patientat times. But it is exciting to see him crawling around everywhere. He's growing up so fast.

Crawling (I Guess) and Sitting

So Alex learned a new thing this week. He's figured how to sit back down from being on all fours. It used to be that if he fell onto his stomach or his back, all he could do was roll around until Aaron or I put him back into sitting. Now when he falls onto his stomach, he can go onto all fours and then sit back down.

This was a surprise to me one morning when I noticed he had fallen onto to his stomach and then when I left and came back, he was sitting. I was just like, "Hey, how did you get that way?" I tried to think if I had put him back to sitting but had forgotten, but was pretty sure I hadn't. Then later Aaron saw him get himself into sitting.

Now that he's been rocking on all fours for awhile, he's gotten so he can kind of get around, but I don't know if I can say he's officially crawling or not. He can't crawl across the room in a straight line, but he definitely can move around wherever he wants by sort of crawling, rolling, and scooting. He seems to be better at crawling backwards, then forwards, though.

It's pretty fun to see him progressing, though.

Six teeth!!!

So I was checking Alex's mouth to see how close his two front teeth are to coming in, and I discovered that he has four more coming in (two on either side of his two front teeth). I didn't know they came in so quickly like that!! And as far as I can tell, there still are no bottom teeth in sight. Weird.

EDIT: I just wanted to edit this and say he now has two top teeth in and two bottom teeth. It turns out the bottom ones are harder to see coming in. I found them when Alex bit down on my finger and I felt them. The other 4 teeth on top haven't cut through the gums yet so I guess he doesn't officially have those teeth yet. 

Also, when Alex had his 9 month checkup, we found out he's over 21 lbs (thought so!) and 29 inches tall. He just grows and grows.

A Way to Keep Track of Alex

Lately Alex has been working on crawling, and despite the fact that he doesn't know how yet, he still seems to be able to get wherever, and we know that once he actually does crawl, he'll get there even faster. So we talked about getting a play pen for Alex to play in when we are doing other things and can't keep a close eye on him. So the first thing I did was check Craig's List, since we don't have a lot of money. That's when I ran into this:

Teething and Life in General

So Alex is now officially teething. We can see his two top front teeth coming in. It hasn't made him very happy and he's needed extra comfort, which is hard when I'm trying to make dinner and such (yesterday I was carrying him around as I was trying to get dinner on the table and he got heavy fast. I'm pretty sure he's over 20 lbs now, maybe even closer to 22 lbs, but I guess we'll find out next week at his checkup). We try to do our best to keep him supplied with cold teethers, but sometimes even that's not enough. Poor little guy. On the bright side, it hasn't seemed to affect his sleeping. He still takes great naps and sleeps through the night. In fact, lately he's been sleeping till about 6:45 a.m. or 7 a.m. It's been consistent enough that I even changed my alarm clock to 6:30 a.m., so I get to sleep in a little. Yay!

Last Friday Aaron and I moved our furniture all around, so that we can use our computer even when Alex is sleeping. This has been nice because it's allowed us to move the arm chair upstairs. It previously occupied the space next to our dining table blocking two chairs and only leaving one. Since we moved it, we've been able to eat dinner at the table together, with Alex in the highchair. Even though he's not actually eating with us, it's obvious that he likes being near us as we eat.

So things are going all right with the job search. There aren't tons of jobs I've found to apply for, but out of the five I have applied for, three have asked for interviews. Unfortunately, no one really wants to hire right now. They're just looking now for someone early next year. So it doesn't look like I'll be able to really get anything before the end of the year, but hopefully things will work out by mid-January. I have a phone interview tomorrow for another technical writing job. Let's hope that if it would be a good job for me that it will work out.

Goodbye Job, Hello Unemployment

So last Thursday, I was at home working, as per usual, when I get an email from my manager's boss (who was my manager until 3 months ago) asking if I could come in for a meeting that morning. In that very moment, I had a sinking feeling. I don't know how I knew what was coming, but I was pretty certain, though the whole time I was trying to rationalize why it wasn't what I thought it was. I went and told my husband that I would be going to work because my boss asked me to come in and I found out later that for some reason, he knew what it was going to be about as well, though he was hoping he was wrong too.

So I drove in, and went into my former manager's office. I could tell it was hard for him to tell me what he had to tell me, but the jist of it was that my company was cutting costs and my position was being eliminated. He emphasized that this was not because of performance and he, and my current manager, would have loved to keep me if it were in their power to do so. This made me feel somewhat better. What also helped was they were giving me a severance package which would give me time to find another job and give me health insurance through the end of the year.

Still, despite these positives, I was in shock. I had not expected it and had only heard that day that there might be layoffs (which may be why I had an inkling of what the meeting was about). The rest of the day I felt like I was in a trance and could barely concentrate on anything.

Friday came and I hit the ground running so to speak. I updated my resume and started searching for jobs. I applied for three: two writing jobs and an instructional design job. I heard back from two jobs that day and scheduled two interviews for today, a phone interview and a regular interview. That was pretty exciting to get interviews so quickly.

So today was the phone interview and it went very well. From what I understood from the interview, there are a lot of applicants for this job and the manager is interviewing everyone by phone (he thinks he needs to give every one a chance, I guess). He said at the beginning he was going to narrow it down to the best half dozen applicants and then bring them in for an interview. At the end of the interview, he said that I would definitely be called for another interview. Unfortunately this won't be until December and he's projecting hiring someone in mid-January. When he found out I was laid off, he realized that basically that would mean I would be trying to find something ASAP and asked if I would take something else if I were offered it first.I had to be honest and say that I would if it were best for my family. If I were guaranteed a position, then yeah, I'd wait, but I can't wait just in case (I didn't say that, though). He seemed worried that he might lose me, so I guess that's a good sign. He told me at the end that I should hear from him or his assistant by December 8 and, if I didn't hear, I should call him, so I figure that's a good sign! He said I was a very strong applicant. He also said that I had the coolest resume out of all the applicants. It's exciting to feel wanted.

But we'll have to see what happens with my other applications. I applied for two more jobs today, so 5 jobs so far, and I'm looking into other avenues as well. As part of my severance package, I get to have the help of a career transition service to help me find a new job. Additionally, I'm going to look into what LDS Employment Resource Services cand do to help and sign up with my previous temp agency to see if I can get some temp work. They're actually the ones who got me the job with Altiris in the first place when I was just out of college, so I figure they're a good resource and, if they remember me, they probably like me. I mean I worked as a temp for 18 months straight before Altiris hired me, so I was a good asset for them in the past.

I'm also going to look into government assistance in the meantime, such as WIC, Medicaid, Workforce services, unemployment, and possibly CHIP (though it's very possible I will have another job by the time my insurance runs out, or at least soon after). I just need to find out what all is out there to help me.

In the meantime, Aaron is looking into switching majors. He's been going for computer science, but it's going slowly because all he has left are major classes (except one general ed. requirement that is left), and it's hard to take four computer science classes at once. Ultimately, he just really wants to teach, so although he really wants to teach college, he's considering switching to elementary ed. and teaching school instead (and maybe going back for his master's and doctorate degrees later). This would allow him to finish quicker because he would more likely be able to go full time. He's still not sure yet, but he's planning to go and talk to a counselor in the Elementary Ed. department to find out what the requirements are and how easy it would be. He also wants to find out if there is a way to get your teaching certificate after his bachelor's degree in computer science is complete. This might be an alternative because even though it would take him awhile to finish, he wouldn't have to wait till getting his doctorate to be able to teach. And if he was ever able to go back for his master's he would more easily do that (I'm not sure how easy it would be to get into a computer science master's degree program when you graduated with an El. Ed. major). But we're still not sure because it would depend on how long that would take. Basically, he realizes that I don't want to work for the rest of my life and if he were able to teach then I would hopefully be able to quit working outside the home and just concentrate on getting freelance work to bring in extra income. That would be cool for him to start working sooner, but mostly I just want him to have a job that he's happy at, so I can be a happy stay-at-home mom.

Alex is doing great and is just a happy baby. I posted some new pictures here: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=61014&l=e2ea0&id=759557984. New pictures are on the third page. We just love him lots and are so grateful for him. He's a real cutie.

Well, please pray for me to get a job. I need all the help I can get!

Alex and Sleeping

So after two months of feeding Alex at midnight, Aaron (understandably) was a little sick of it and wanted to wean Alex from his nightly feedings. I was basically waiting for Aaron to say he didn't want to do it anymore before we tried because how can you tell when a baby is ready to make it through the night without a feeding? We tried at the beginning of September and he wailed at 2 a.m. for hours because he was so hungry. I didn't want that to happen, so I waited as long as Aaron was fine with it. I don't blame him for wanting to wean him, though, and he said that Alex was getting more restless during the feeds (maybe like he wasn't too happy and being woken). As we started, I prayed that it would work and Alex would be fine without eating. I'd been keeping track of how much he ate at night hoping he would start to taper off naturally and basically wean himself, but that didn't happen.

So we started the process of weaning. I wanted to go slow, so we planned to reduce the amount he ate by .5 oz each night, but the first two nights, Alex didn't even finish the amount in there, so I lowered it even more. Once we got to 2 oz, I went right to 1 oz and then nothing (seemed stupid to wake Alex up for a half an ounce). The night we gave him 1 oz, I was crossing my fingers. I figured if he could make it with just 1 oz, he could make it with nothing. That night he slept fine and I woke up in the morning and realized that he had gotten through the night without crying.

This gave me confidence that he would make it through the next night without anything just fine as well, but I was still a little worried. Well, that night, not only did Alex make it through the night fine, but he slept till 7 a.m.! Then this morning he slept till 6:50 a.m. I guess waking him up during the night to eat disturbed his sleep, or something. If this becomes a habit, I may just change my alarm clock to 6:30 a.m., rather than 6 a.m. I'm not getting up if he's not. So that was pretty exciting.

In addition to weaning Alex from the nightly feeds, Alex has been indicating that he no longer needs his late afternoon nap, which was only 15-30 minutes anyway. So for the last couple of days, I've been keeping him up a little more between waking up and his nap and between each nap so the naps are later. He's still adjusting, but seems to be doing fine. This is great because it gives me time in the late afternoon to go out with Alex and do stuff, where before he was only ever up for about 2.5 hours at a time, and once you feed him and change his diaper and such, that doesn't leave much time to go out.

So overall, it's pretty exciting. I'm glad my boy is such a good sleeper. That Sleepeasy Solution really worked for us. I'm glad I found that book.

Sitting Baby and First Word?

I've been meaning to post for awhile, but haven't had the time or had the pictures ready, so this is somewhat old news. The first bit of news is that Alex can now sit on his own without accidentally falling over. He will fall to his belly if he's reaching for something out of reach to the side of him, but other than that he stays sitting. This was a revelation a few weeks ago when I put him down in a sitting position and a half hour later he was still there. Yay! I'm really happy about this because it makes putting him down easier and he can just sit and play.





The second bit of news is Alex said his first word--well, you be the judge. He babbles a lot, as they do at this age, and most of it is mamamama mamam amama, etc. Well, there have been a few times where he has said mama, and I know it could just be babbling, but at times it has seemed like he knew what he was saying. For example, I came home once and he and Aaron were in the living room. Aaron was holding Alex standing and when Alex saw me, he said mama. Then another day, I came in the room and said, "Hi baby." Then he says, "Mama." And there are other times where he says, "Mama" looking right at me. When I searched online, it said that children at this age don't comprehend the meaning to words, but deaf children taught to sign from birth can sign back as early as 6 months. Don't tell me they don't know what they're signing (although interestingly, deaf children will babble with their hands). I think it's more that it's harder to form words with your mouth than signs with your hands. I think Alex understands a lot, but can't control his mouth and voice enough to say a lot of words. If this is true, then Alex has said his first word! If you want to see a video of Alex babbling, go to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1nPEtsIrlrA.

And finally, Alex has decided to do a very annoying thing: he rolls onto his tummy while in the crib. I wouldn't mind so much if he would just sleep on his tummy, or if he knew how to roll onto his back from his tummy (he's done it a few times, but can't do it when he wants to). He actually has slept on his tummy at times, but for whatever reason, doesn't do it all the time. This morning I heard him at 5 a.m. So I went in and he was pushing up on his arms fussing about being on his tummy. So I turned him over and went back to bed, 15 minutes later, he's on his tummy and fussing about it again. Then during his morning nap, instead of sleeping his usually 2 hours, he's up and fussing because he's on his tummy. I turned him over to see if that would help, but I don't know if he'llgo back to sleep. So frustrating! And I don't know how to teach him to roll to his back. He learned how to get to his tummy by going on to his side, reaching for something he wanted that was out of reach, and the basically falling forward onto his tummy because he lost his balance. But how do you teach a baby to go from his tummy to his back. He's not going to fall onto it because he's reaching for something, and he doesn't seem to get how to shift his weight to do it. Ugh, I don't know what to do. I think most babies just do it (I mean, he rolled over to his back the first time at 4 months. Don't ask me why he can't do it now).

Textured Quilt and New (Used) Exersaucer

So yesterday I finished my first quilt ever. It's a textured quilt, which basically is a whole bunch of different fabrics put together with different textures, colors, and patterns for Alex to feel and experience. Because I was basically doing it on my own (with some email help from Janci), I don't know how much of it was done right, and it's a little, um, crooked, but for my first attempt, I think I did pretty well. I'm just glad it's small. I think it was a very good thing that my first quilt was a small one. Because it has a lot of different fabrics, they don't really "go" together, just so you're warned.

Here's a pic:


Also, yesterday, after searching Craig's List and KSL for the past month, I finally found an exersaucer that was close to where I live, in my price range, and in good enough quality (there was one being sold that had no toys on it. They said you could just put your own toys on top, and I'm like, but the point of the exersaucer is he won't lose the toys like he does when he plays on his high chair since they're attached. Not only that but they wanted $20 for it). So I went to take a look at it. It's older, at least 2 years, but probably more, but I got it for $12, so no complaining here. Alex is enjoying it so far. I spent some of the day yesterday cleaning and sanitizing it, so it was all ready for him to play with. Here's a pic:



If you want to see more pics of Alex from the last month, click here.

PS: I don't know a good way to make my pictures smaller so they aren't so large in my entry. If anyone knows an easy to make them smaller, please let me know. Thanks.

Sleep-Training Conclusion

Or at least I think it's concluded. Last night Alex slept through the night! Well, he actually fussed a little at 2:30 a.m., but then fell back asleep before I went in to do a check-in, and then he fussed some between 5:30 and 6, but I'm not supposed to get him out till at least 6, and he wasn't fussing very loud or very much, so I wasn't sure if he was all the way awake and I should do a check-in, or if he was partially asleep, and I should wait. But basically he slept through the night!

The Sleepeasy Solution Training Continues

Okay, so the last two nights have been rough, but I can see progress, so I'm happy.

Two nights ago, Alex went down fairly easily. After crying for 50 minutes the first night, I wasn't sure what to expect, but he only cried for 20 minutes. But then, unlike the night before where Alex slept other than when I got him for a feeding, Alex woke up at 1:30. I was planning on giving him a feed at 2, but because he woke himself up, he needed to get himself back to sleep without a feed. So I got up and started doing my check-ins (basically I go in and say something like, "Alex, Mommy is here and it's okay to go to sleep. I love you, and I'll come back in a little while to check on you"). So  I did that 5-10-15 minutes and then continued at 15 minutes. Well, he continued to cry and wail for an hour and a half. Talk about hurting my little mommy heart. I did not enjoy hearing it! But I kept reminding myself that he would be better for it and that I would be better when I could get a full night's sleep. But I like that I go in every 15 minutes to remind him that I am here, I am not ignoring him, I haven't left him, and that I love him. I think that's better for both parent and child then just letting the child cry it out.

Sleep-Training Continued and Homemade Baby Food

So today's been pretty eventful. First of all, the sleep-training is going well so far. It took Alex 50 minutes to fall asleep last night, but at least it wasn't longer, and it should get better with time. I woke him up twice to eat (1/2 hour before he got up the two nights before) and although he squawked both times when I went to put him in the crib, that was the only sound he made (assumably, he went right back to sleep). So that was good.

The first nap of today was not so good. Alex cried for the whole hour, but the book does say that it's harder to get the naps worked out and I know it's partially my fault because I put him down a half hour late, and he fell asleep in the car seat while we were walking around the store; the book says that falling asleep for even 5 minutes between naps can really cause problems with the baby getting to sleep for his next nap.

Six-Month Checkup and Sleep-Training

Yesterday Alex had his six-month checkup. Checkups are always bittersweet. It's great to find out how Alex is progressing--how much he's grown in height and weightand such--but I don't look forward to the immunization shots. So yesterday morning kind of got away from me and I realized I only had 15 minutes before I needed to leave. So I was rushing a bit and totally didn't think to bring a bottle with me. Alex usually takes a bottle after he gets his shots to calm him down, since he won't take a pacifier. So I get to the doctor's office and realize this and I'm like great. So I ask if they have any samples; they do, but not in bottles (like they had at the hospital). So I'm just crossing my fingers and hoping Alex will be okay.

Highchair

So now that Alex is 6 months, we've started him on solids. The week or two before that, I was looking in to getting a highchair. I looked at the store and gagged at how the good ones were about $100, so I decided to look for used. If I'd been smart, I would have been looking since Alex was born, but I didn't know for sure if I even wanted a highchair, or if I just wanted a booster seat that attached to a dining chair. Once I decided on getting a highchair, I could finally start looking. So I went on Craig's List and KSL, but I didn't see anything promising near where I live. But I kept looking every day and eventually I found one that looked good. It's a Graco Meal Time chair (found here). It has different heights, reclines, and wheels around. At first I wasn't sure if I liked that it has wheels, but now I am so glad. I wheel Alex around everywhere. When it's time to eat, I wheel him in the kitchen to feed him. If he gets fussy, I wheel him into the living room to watch Baby Signing Time or I can wheel him next to where I'm at so I can interact with him. It's wonderful.