Wednesday

Today has been a difficult day for little William. He is teething again and his upper gums are super sensitive to the touch. He uses his fingers as a teething ring and cries out when one of his ultra-sharp teeth bites down on his fingers. He doesn't realize that he is doing this to himself.

At the start of the day I had many high hopes for what would be accomplished today. So far we haven't even gotten out of the house because William is so uncomfortable while awake and sound asleep when asleep. He has been sleeping more than usual today and I'm guessing this is probably teething-related.

Last night we had a good night. We've actually had two good nights in a row, thank goodness. He only woke up once last night to eat and slept in his crib!! We've gotten him attached to a little blue/brown chenille blanket that is working miracles with helping him get to sleep on his own. He likes how it feels and presses the blanket up to his cheek and nuzzles it. It's really cute.

Today I ordered a Flip camcorder from amazon.com and I can't wait to get it in the mail. It takes moderate-quality videos and fits in your pocket like a cell phone. I am excited to use it during excursions to the park, zoo, mall with William. There are so many things that I want to capture.

This afternoon I booked my flight to Santa Fe, NM to visit Holly for a long weekend. I cannot wait to see her! This will be the first time that I am away from William for longer than a couple of hours. I have mixed feelings, but I know it will be good for me to have a little friend-time all on my own! I can't wait. We may go horse-back riding or rafting or hiking or shopping; any and all of this sounds good to me!

I've gotten a few books on triathlon training and I've been finding the reading to be really interesting. I forgot that my roommate from college has done many, many triathlons and was able to chat with her on facebook last night. She trained all on her own and lost 90 lbs in 9 months. I have about 60 lbs to lose and if I'm training for a triathlon I should be able to lose it in about 6 months. That would take me to just after William's first birthday in October/November. I might try to do a triathlon every couple of months and it would be fun to do some triathlons with my best buddy, Holly. Today, while chatting with my friend, Beth, I found out that she has also done a triathlon in the past. She is asking around to her friends to see if any of them want to join me in training for the triathlon. Beth is even considering doing the Danskin Triathlon with me. I'm really hoping she does. It would be really great to have a training partner!!

...I just got back from an Organizer's Meeting and Mom's Night Out. I am so glad I went. I can't emphasize enough how important it is to connect with other moms after a difficult day all by yourself with a teething infant. I posted the photos from tonight at the top of this entry.

Newsie news

This is more a post about me, than William.
I got an email today from REI with a link to their events calendar and as I was reading along I noticed that there were quite a few events scheduled that were triathlon-related. Now, I've been wanting to do a triathlon for over 10 years and I said to myself, "Hey, I want to do this, my best friend, best friend's sister and my brother-in-law are all doing triathlons this summer, why shouldn't I do a triathlon?, seize the day, right?" So I decided right then and there that I needed to stop making excuses and needed to get to it. Life happens while you are making other plans, eh?! So there are two women's triathlons coming up this summer. There is the Danskin Triathlon in mid August and the Subaru Triathlon in early September. Three months is enough time to be in decent enough shape for a sprint length triathlon! I have the time, money and need to do this. I NEED to lose this weight for the sake of my cardiac health. There really is nothing more important than improving ones health.

Catching up

Sorry. I haven't been that good about posting this week. With William being almost 7 months old, I thought we'd have his sleep schedule worked out by now. He used to sleep for 11 hours at night. Now that we've hit 6-7 months we are back to a brutal newborn-style schedule again. It seems as though his painful teething and new found mobility is keeping him awake. He rolled over to his side today for the first time. He does this by kicking his legs up and then using that momentum and the weight of his legs to pull him to his side. He also started squealing/shrieking today. It seems as though this is a happy noise for him. It's different than his discontented noise that sounds like a sheep bleating.

Last night and the night before were particularly brutal with William waking every couple of hours for us to comfort him back to sleep. He has recently begun to fight the swaddle off and gets very mad if we put him in it, so we've decided to stop swaddling as of last night and I think that had a lot to do with the increased frequency in night-wakings. We are trying to help William sleep by having an earlier consistent bed time of 7-8pm, adhering to a nap schedule, not using the bottle as the only way to get to sleep, having a lovey for him to cuddle, and by playing music in his crib with the crib aquarium. Since he won't take a binky or the swaddle anymore, we've had to shift our approach to helping him to sleep. What used to work like magic before is of no help now.

Today we went over to Mark's house and had our first official bbq of the season. William loves watching Maya play. He just stares at her with a look of amazement on his face. She's very cute with him. She gave him a kiss goodbye this evening. She knows my name now and comes to sit on my lap and cuddle. She's such a cutie pie.

Tomorrow we are going to go out on the boat so that the men can practice manning the boat. We've also got Lukas' 1st birthday party to attend in the afternoon. This should make for a busy day.

The weather was so gorgeous today. Sunny skies and warm temperatures made for a glorious day.

Wednesday

William is still sick. He's got nasal congestion and an occasional cough. Today I had to get out of the house, since we couldn't go to the play date and expose our germs to helpless infants, so we went for a drive. We never did get inside of Target, as I had planned. We drove out to Snoqualmie Pass and turned around since they were blasting for avalanche control. Gotta run, the munch is not pleased with hanging out in his exersaucer.

Here is a photo from a baby playdate we went to last week. Notice William smiling and reaching out as if to say "Come on Mom. Enough talk. Let's go! I want to run around and play!"

Here is William trying to swipe some of my dessert:

Another rough night

Last night was another rough night for William and me. He was up every four hours to eat and had a very stuffy nose. The nose sucker bulb is certainly getting a lot of use these days. I am so bummed that we are sick. I was really hoping cold/flu season would be over by now. I'm keeping track of our sleeping schedule right now, so feel free to stop reading now.
145am up for feeding 3 oz
210am back to sleep
6am up for feeding 6 oz, change diaper
745am back to sleep

William and I are feeling a little bit better

William and I had a better day today. He had a hard night last night because of his stuffy nose, so I ended up sleeping in the rocking chair with him in my arms. I think sleeping upright did us both good. He was a lot less stuffy and I was still stuffy, but no longer feverish. Nothing is worse than a fever!
Tomorrow we have a play date in the afternoon. I hope we are feeling good enough for that.

William is getting very good at sitting and can hold himself up while he is standing by grabbing onto something solid. He had his first exposure to squash today and really seemed to like it. He is now able to pass a toy from hand to hand and loves to suck water out of a washcloth during his bath. He rolled over a couple of times today. Both times he was sitting on his own and did a faceplant and rolled off of his tummy to his back. He also is spending more time on his tummy now that he has figured out how to rest his head on his arms when his neck is tired. He loves to wash his hands in the sink after eating breakfast and dinner. I think he is going to be like me with regards to my love of water and swimming.

That's all for now. I just wanted to give a brief update so that I didn't fall too far behind in charting his progress.

I want to record his sleeping schedule so that I can follow the advice in the "No cry sleep solution" book.
530pm fed 3oz bottle
630pm started night time routine, fed solids, played downstairs
7pm bath time
730 fed bottle (5 oz) and rocked to sleep/put on crib aquarium-left on, he was unswaddled and ended up turning it off and getting upset that it was off (at 830)
830 woke up, Andrew fed him 1 oz bottle/swaddled/rocked him to sleep
10pm woke up with poopy diaper, changed him, swaddled him, rocked him to sleep

Short post

This is going to be a short post because I'm sick with a fever/cold and William has been super cranky/whiney today. The weather out here is really, really, really getting to me. It rained/snowed/hailed this weekend and there was very little sun to be had. I need a vacation to a place that is dripping in sun, not rain!

Debunking the myth that mercury in vaccines causes autism...

Here is a video that features the father of an autistic boy, who happens to be a doctor, that discusses the results of numerous research studies on the relationship between mercury and autism.

6 month check up

Today William saw Dr. Hung for his six month check up. He weighs 16 lbs and is 25 3/4 inches long. Dr. Hung and Tami (her medical assistant) both said that William's cheerful smile was "a ray of sunshine on a rainy day". William handled his vaccinations well. After his appointment we met Autumn and Lucas at the Nordstrom Cafe and had a nice lunch. William was very tired and a bit fussy from the vaccinations so we decided to keep the shopping to a minimum and headed home. Once we got home he napped for a little bit and woke up crying inconsolably for 15 minutes and gradually calmed down once we walked around the house for a bit. Andrew took a couple of photos of William during bath time this evening that can be seen at the start of this entry. He continues to love bath time and enjoyed trying out apples and apricots with rice cereal for lunch and dinner today. Tonight he started learning how to use his sippy cup and seemed to mistake it for a teething toy until he realized that juice can come out of it. This evening we got a fair amount of snow and we've been hearing the snow plows make their way down the street a couple times so far.

Video from yesterday.

In this post, I've included a couple of photos of me blowing glass on Thursday evening. I can't say these are flattering photos, but they show you what it's like to blow glass. I was surprised at how difficult it was to do. It was like blowing up a very, very, very stiff balloon. I think this photo was taken during the first of my three attempts at making a suncatcher. I will take a photo of it once I pick it up from the studio in a few days.

Here is a video taken of William last night during his bath in the big tub. He seemed to enjoy floating for the first time in his new life vest. He's recently figured out how to splash in the tub and is enjoying practicing this new skill.

Oh Mr. Sun, please shine down on me.

It's been a rainy couple of days...Not much to report in terms of fun activities due to the weather. Yesterday we went to Costco in the middle of a torrential downpour. I decided not to go out last night because the roads tend to get flooded with that much rain and the memory of seeing a huge SUV spin out of control on I-90 is still fresh in my mind from last week.

William has been developing rapidly over the last week. Now he is able to pick up his bath toys with one hand and bring them to his mouth. Last week he was still working on picking them up with two hands. He has also discovered the joy of splashing in his tub. Bath time seems to be pure joy for him these days. He is enjoying sitting in his bath tub and will sit unassisted for short periods. He can also stand while holding onto something unassisted for short periods as well. Here is a photo taken this evening of William trying out his new life vest in the big tub.


Last night he slept through the night from 8pm to 7am. I hope that this is the beginning of an old trend he had from 2-5 months of sleeping for 11 hours at night. He is eating solid foods twice a day and seems to love almost everything I give him. Today he enjoyed trying out pears for dinner. Bananas and sweet potatoes are favorites with apples seeming to be a bit bitter for his liking. Yesterday, we had a visit from our neighbor, Tara. She got to watch him eat breakfast and play the piano as part of his morning activities. This afternoon, we had a play date where we got to spend time with some other babies that were close in age to William. We also had a bunch of errands to run in addition to keeping the laundry going throughout the day. Tomorrow, we are having PEPS here at our place and will probably hang out with Autumn and Lucas in the afternoon. Thursday evening I get to go to the glassblowing studio again to make sun catchers and hang out with friends. I can't wait, it's gonna be a lot of fun.

Happy Birthday Andrew!

Today is Andrew's 31st Birthday. We enjoyed a great birthday weekend complete with a visit to the zoo and walk around the neighborhood on Saturday, a short time at Mark's Thirty-One-sie party on Saturday night and then a visit with the landscaper and nice drive and family birthday celebration on Sunday. William had his first taste of sweet potatoes on Sunday and really seemed to like it. Here are a couple of photos of Andrew and William taken during our first visit to the zoo as a family!





And here are a couple of pictures of William and Andrew sleeping in on a weekend morning.


Today Andrew got to cuddle with William before heading into work. Tonight we will have a nice family birthday dinner together. Happy Birthday Andrew!!

A day at the park.

Today was the kind of day I dream about during the long, dark rainy winter. It was sunny, warm and well, perfect. This afternoon we had a park playdate at one of the local parks as part of the SnoValley moms group. William really enjoyed swinging at the park today. This was his first time on a swing which worked out great once I put his big fluffy blanket behind him to help him hold steady. He loved swinging next to the other kids and being able to look around so that he could watch the bigger kids play.

Earlier this afternoon we met Vi and Chloe at the mall to have lunch and do a little shopping. It was fun to see the two little ones together and interacting with one another for the first time. They are both such happy, smiley babies.

Tomorrow is supposed to be another gorgeous day and Andrew wants to go to the zoo with William and me. Later that afternoon, William is going to get to spend time with his grandparents while Andrew and I go to Mark's birthday party.

C is for Clouds

William,

Today you napped from 8-10 am after getting up to eat at 6:30 am. I wonder if this is a new routine. You used to stay up until 10 am. We'll have to see. You are currently napping peacefully in your papasan swing after 2 hours of playing with mom and dad. You are very enamored with your toes and will stare down at them longingly when you are standing up. You have been arching your back quite a bit lately and this morning I found you throwing yourself/wriggling around in your crib using this technique. You have figured out how to turn on the aquarium in your crib and this seems to be part of the theme of your push for increased independence. You laugh more readily these days and this evening you surprised your daddy by squealing/squeaking with delight while he was playing with you.

Today we got to visit with Layla and 2 week old baby Alyse while we had lunch at Got Rice. It was great to see them. This afternoon we went for a drive so you could nap and then we popped in to the Redmond Target for a bit. Afterward, we got the car washed and you slept during the entire thing.

The weather ranged from sunny to cloudy to raining lightly. I am so tired of this weather and am trying to convince Andrew to take us somewhere sunny for a long weekend. Wish me luck.

Cute William, Six Months Old

The last couple of days haven't been very exciting. On Tuesday, William was pretty crabby due to painful teething. After Andrew got home, I went out to get my hair done and then to a SnoValley Moms Night Out at Felicia's. It was a lot of fun and I stayed out later than I should have. The time just flew by with all the fun conversation.

Today, the house was cleaned beautifully and then William and I went out for coffee/bottle at Tully's and then drove around for a while and popped into the Big Red Barn Nursery to look at plants. This evening we went to Mike's and William cuted-out everyone we met with his big dimples. I am doing much better and William had a great day today. His two bottom teeth are getting bigger and bigger. They are so cute. William enjoyed eating bananas and applesauce and rice cereal today for breakfast and dinner.

I'm a bit late in writing William's six month letter...

Dear William,

You turned 6 months old on April 5th. You have grown and changed quite a bit over the last month. You are now able to stand straight with us holding your waist or hands and on your own while you hold onto something for support. Your two bottom teeth are getting bigger and are adorable. You are eating rice cereal, apples and bananas and you are able to drink out of a cup. You just learned how to spin yourself around in your exersaucer today and you are very enthusiastic about moving around busily. You can sit up in your bathtub and you just started to be able to grab your bath toys and to put them in your mouth. Over the last few days you have begun to swing your arms forcefully almost like you are learning how to punch something. This said, you are still a super cuddly little guy. You love it when I munch on your cheeks and tickle you and sing to you and play Pat-a-cake and turn you upside down and make funny noises. You are quick to show your adorable smile complete with smiling eyes and dimples. People notice your dimples and comment on them every day. I have to agree that they are super cute.

Let's see. You have found your feet and love to munch on your toes if given the opportunity. Today I caught you munching on your Robeez shoes when I was trying to put you in your carseat. As soon as I sat you down, you lunged forward toward your feet and commenced the munching. You have also found your ears and today you started rubbing your hand over your hair.

You are sleeping in your crib quite happily these days, but you still seem to sleep better if you are swaddled. Most nights you find a way to break out of your swaddle and end up waking yourself up when you move your arms. This week you haven't been sleeping through the night as well as before. You are waking up at 3am and 7am for feedings. You usually go back to sleep right away after your 3am feeding but you stay up until 10am after your 7am feeding. Today you napped for 2 hours at 10am. You seem to have adopted a pretty consistent napping schedule and here is your current daily schedule of naps, playtime and feedings:

7am feeding (bottle 6oz and solids), playtime
10am feeding (bottle 6oz), naptime
12pm feeding (bottle 6oz), playtime
2pm naptime
4pm feeding (bottle 6oz and solids), playtime
6pm bathtime
7pm feeding (bottle 6oz)
8pm sleep
3 am feeding (bottle 6oz), back to sleep until 7am

This adds up to about 14 hours of sleep and about 36 oz of formula per day.

You are very curious about Rowan and will perk up when you see him and reach out to him when he comes near. He likes to lick your hands and face and you love to grab onto and touch his fur.

Daddy has been enjoying sharing his love of baseball with you. He bought you a bunch of baseball cards and plans on doing this for each year of your life. He can't wait to take you to Mariners' Spring Training and baseball games next year.

Today, I felt myself reach a whole new level of love for you. Just when I think I love you as much as possible, I feel a surge of even more love for you. Today when I walked around with you in my arms, you would snuggle in and I would tell you all about what was going on and about how much I adore you. I melt when you look at me and smile with your big (mostly) toothless grin with complete trust and joy in your eyes and hope that you still look at me like this when you are older. I am going to do everything I can to give you a happy, worry-free, joyful and interesting childhood. There is nothing more important to me in this world than ensuring that you are happy and healthy and living life to the fullest.

With much love,

Mama

A better day

I'm happy to say that William was feeling much better on Saturday. He only had a low grade fever and seemed to be almost back to his normal self. His smiles and giggles and curiosity were back and he was in his normal easy going mood. Saturday was a busy day. I dropped Andrew off at his friend's house to help him move in and I went and did a few errands. After lunch, I picked him up and we did a bunch of errands--Target, Costco, Dania, Costco Home...We are trying to find a large square coffee table for our living room that is large and heavy, yet in keeping with the formality of our current living room furniture. We are also looking for a toy box for William and found a nice one at Costco home that might work.

William is getting rather good at sitting and standing. He loves to stand because it gives him a different perspective from which he can view the room. He loved going to Red Robin on Saturday because there was so much going on for him to observe. Not a very interesting day, but super happy that William is feeling better.

This Sunday morning, we went to Mike's for a nice breakfast and were done before 11am!! That's a record for us Memming-Robinsons. Right now I am taking a break from cleaning our house/doing laundry/changing bed sheets/organizing etc...Later this afternoon we will have a visit from Andrew's parents and I'm hoping the house will be clean when they arrive.

I'm hoping that Andrew and his dad will switch out the rocking chair for the chair and ottoman in William's room so that I can rock William to sleep in his own room now. He's been doing really well with sleeping in his crib. He's actually sleeping there right now and this is awesome because it gives us the opportunity to get a ton of things done while he is sleeping without the worry of waking him. With that said, William has slept in our room in his papasan swing for the last couple of nights because he has really needed to be propped up to help him breathe through his stuffed nose.

I framed a collage of photos of William from the first six months of his life. They are all cropped to 4x6 so that should make it easy to download and print them if you'd like to do that. Here they are in no particular order.








C

Baby with a fever

Little William has not been himself the last two days. His fever has peaked this evening at 102.5. He is super stuffy and has oral thrush. He hasn't been sleeping well, eating well or even playing well. I took him to the doctor today and got him an Rx for the thrush and to make sure he didn't have an infection that required antibiotics. Andrew has been taking care of him and letting me catch up on sleep since I've been up the last three nights in a row. Time to try and get more sleep, I just wanted to give a little update. Oh yeah, he weighs 15 lbs 5 oz. Also, baby Motrin works sooooo much better than baby Tylenol.

Not such a great day

William had a hard time today. Pretty much everything in his environment had the potential to make him cry. His cow toy made him cry when it "mooooed", he cried when I made a silly face at him, and so on...

At first, I thought he was just having a difficult day and that his head was especially warm. I thought maybe he was teething again and gave him some Tylenol. This didn't really seem to help much and by the afternoon his temperature was 100.9 F. After a second dose of Tylenol and a few naps, he still wasn't feeling any better so I called the Pediatrician once his temperature reached 101.5 F. They recommended baby Motrin and a visit tomorrow morning to make sure he doesn't have an ear infection. The Motrin really did the trick this evening and he is currently sleeping peacefully in his crib. We'll see how this evening goes. Last night was another rough night with wakings every three hours or so after a 6 hour "nap" from 5pm to 11pm.

This morning we had PEPS and Vi prepared the most delicious meal with "make your own pizzas" and an awesome salad and dessert. I wasn't really able to enjoy the get together because my little guy, William, was so unhappy. Here's hoping he sleeps well tonight and wakes up feeling much better tomorrow morning. I feel so badly for him when he isn't feeling well. It seems especially cruel for such a little one to feel so terrible.

C

Sunny Wednesday

The sun is shining brightly in the sky. William is napping. I hear the Roomba downstairs doing it's thing. Rowan is laying on the floor next to me. I am peering over at the video baby monitor to see if William is waking up because we need to get going so that I can meet my friend, Serena, at Starbucks for coffee soon. And...he's awake.

I'll post more later. Yesterday was a busy, fun filled day. Got to meet Jodi Picoult and listen to her read from her book "Change of Heart". Gotta run. Little guy is fussing.

...This morning we had a great coffee date with Serena and then we headed over to Layla's house to meet her beautiful little daughter, Alyse. A little while later, we headed out to North Bend for a Baby Playdate and met a bunch of mommies with babies under the age of 1. It was a busy day for us both and William has been napping for three hours now!!! I hope this doesn't interfere with his night time sleep routine. He went to bed at 8pm last night and woke at 12pm for food and 2am for a quick snuggle with mom and then was up at 7am for the day.

Yesterday, we headed over to the outlets to meet a couple of PEPS mommies for coffee and then did a little shopping and then some brisk walking with Melanie and Milo. After that, it was mid-afternoon so we headed home for a bit and took a nap. Last evening, I picked up my friend, Stacey, and I drove into Seattle to the Seattle Library to attend a reading and book signing by author, Jodi Picoult. She was a great speaker and took some time to answer questions after her reading. She is a very down-to-earth woman and hysterically funny. Stacey and I joked that we wanted her to be our "BFF for eva" (Best Friend For Ever with a thick New York accent). Here are a few photos Stacey took with her cell phone. Not bad photos for a cell phone in a poorly lit auditorium, eh?





C