Crawling!

So Nathan will be 9 months old in a week and I honestly thought he would never crawl. I know that seems a bit dramatic, but seriously, when he is on his stomach, he screams. I am not kidding. He lays there and throws his arms and legs out and just screams. He just recently started getting up on his hands and knees/feet and rocking. And last night I witnessed him on his hands and feet and he moved his feet towards his hands, but then got stuck and just laid down and cried.

So, I guess I shouldn't be surprised that today he actually attempted to crawl. He moved his hands and feet and actually went forward a bit. He's by no means "mobile" yet, but he can at least get a toy that is out of reach. Which you would think would make him happy, and yet no. Even as I witnessed him attempting to crawl tonight, he cried through the entire procedure. He is seriously unhappy in a horizontal position.

Now, the bittersweet part. While he has finally started to crawl, I didn't see it happen. Yet again, he did a milestone in the presence of a babysitter. (He also rolled over for the first time at daycare.) I can't decide what makes me more sad, that I didn't get to see him crawl for the first time or that I know I didn't get to see him crawl.

When Lauren was a baby, she stayed at a home daycare that had been in this business for a while, so I have no doubt that Ms. Ashley witnessed many, if not all, of Lauren's firsts, but she never told me. So I have always just assumed that I got to see Lauren do everything for the first time. As for Nathan, I have been told in both cases that he preformed a milestone without me seeing it first.

I think for a lot of moms that work, there is a constant struggle with guilt over not being there. So when your baby does something momentous and you miss it, it just makes the guilt worse. I think one of the fun parts of being a parent is teaching your children. It is so fun to teach them to walk or to say their first word, and when someone else steps in and takes over that role, it is a very hard pill to swallow.

So, while I am trilled that Nathan is finally starting to crawl, I am also incredibly sad that I missed it. I hope that I get to see his first steps... or at least that his babysitter will not tell me that she saw it first.

Stress

So, I have a new job. About a month ago a job posting came up in my company for a manager position and I applied and got it. Two weeks ago was my first official day in my new position. I manage a team of web and vb.net developers at my company.

So far I have been so overwhelmed. The area that I moved to supports a bunch of systems that I have never worked with before. So, not only am I trying to get used to managing people, but I also am trying to learn several systems. It's hard. I hate not knowing what I am doing. It is so frustrating to spend my whole day not having any idea what people are talking about. I get emails all day long and most of the time I have no idea what they are talking about. Luckily the other managers on my team are fantastic and are so helpful. They are always willing to stop what they are doing and explain an email, or give advice about who should work on something or point me in the right direction for problem resolutions. My team that I manage is equally helpful. They will explain their systems to me in great detail and help me to understand what they are working on.

My days just fly by. On Tuesday, every time I looked up it was an hour later. I feel like I barely get anything accomplished during the day and I have yet to be able to leave work on time. I will be so glad when I start to settle in to my new role and things start making sense.

I wish I could see the video surveillance...

So, on Sunday I asked Brian to run to the store to pick up a few things for dinner. Lauren begged to go with him and he agreed thinking that they could spend a little time together without Nathan. About 30 minutes later, I hear them pull up and Lauren gets out of the car crying and Brian is mad, mad, mad. He tells her to go sit in her room and he'll come talk to her in a minute.

Of course I'm pretty confused, so I wait until she is upstairs and I ask Brian what happened. He begins to tell me about the horrible trip to the store they had. She ran up and down the isles and would run from him when he tried to get her. She was touching EVERYTHING in the store. (By this point, I'm thinking, "This isn't that unusually for her.") Then they get up to the checkout counter and as Brian is putting the groceries on the conveyor belt, my daughter walks up behind him, grabs a hold of his pants, and yanks them down! All the way to his ankles! He was just wearing little elastic-waist shorts so it wouldn't take a lot of effort to get them down. Brian said he calmly reached down and pulled them up. Luckily there was no one in line behind him, but I bet the cashier saw the whole thing.

I laughed and laughed. I laughed so hard I cried. He, of course, didn't think it was as funny as I did. Man, I wish I could see the video surveillance camera of it happening!

Update

A few updates...

Nathan has two teeth! The first broke through the skin last weekend and the second is almost through. I knew he must have been teething with all the fussiness and general discontent. He is so much like Lauren. She was also 7 months when she got her first tooth and she got two at the same time like him. The main difference is that she apparently has a higher tolerance for pain. She was never as unhappy as he is. She fussed a bit, but once they broke the skin she was over it. Not Nathan. He is cranky. All.Day.Long. Our poor sitter, I'm not sure how she is holding up. I guess lots of Tylenol. ;)

Lauren attended her 2nd gymnastics class tonight. She is doing so great! She went right in this time and didn't throw a fit. She actually participates with the other kids. I am so impressed with her. It's funny, she is the tallest girl out there. I don't think I realized how much bigger than other girls she was until this. She says that she really likes going. The bars are her favorite part. Tonight the teacher helped her flip over the bar. She's been wanting to do it since she saw another kid do it, but she's been nervous. She also loves the balance beam. She is getting really good at waking on it. Overall, I am really impressed with the place she is going. The teachers are great with the kids. They are so patient and they try to teach them real gymnastic moves.

Brian went tonight and he said he had fun. It's hard not to enjoy yourself when you are watching a bunch of 3 and 4 year olds do gymnastics.

Gross

I never knew how thankful I was that Lauren, as a baby, was not a spitter until Nathan. Nathan has reflux and, in most cases, it is silent reflux. That basically means that his milk comes back up in his throat without actually coming out of his mouth. He has been on Prevacid since he was three weeks old and it has really helped make him a much happier person. However, more recently he has started spitting up after just about every time he eats. Spitting up isn't even an accurate term. Anyone with a baby that has reflux knows that the volume of milk that comes back up far surpasses a baby that "spits up."

Tonight I had one of those moments that just makes you say "Gross." Just plain, monotone, no excitement "Gross."

Nathan was laying on his changing table getting ready for his bath. I reached down and picked him up and I heard the ominous burp. You know this burp. It's not the normal "I swallowed a little too much air" burp, it's the deep, wet gurgle burp that makes most people start looking for a burp rag. Unfortunately, tonight I didn't have time to find a rag. In one swift motion I picked him up from the changing table and as I was bringing him to my body I heard the burp followed by the splat of "spit up" (I use that word loosely) hitting my cheek, neck and chest.

All I could do was freeze as I felt the warm, stinky milk hit me. I shouted for Brian to "HELP!" and as he walked in he smiled followed by gagging. I quickly handed Nathan to him and walked into our bathroom. When I looked in the mirror, I had chunky, yellowed formula down my cheek, all over my neck, and slowly sliding down my chest to pool up in my bra. Gross.

I've been spit up on before, but never like this. Most things about my children don't gross me out. I can handle snot and boogers and pee and even poop. Drool doesn't bother me even when it is laced with baby food. I can pick up one of my kids from a high chair when they are covered in food mess from head to toe and it doesn't bother me. They're my kids. Nothing about them is too gross. Except for throw up. Yuck. That's all I could say as I was cleaning myself off. Yuck. Yuck. Yuck. I really hope he out grows this soon.

Lauren... The Vain One

Lauren has been asking for about a month to take a dance class. I'm not sure where she came up with this, but I have wanted to enroll her in something but I was worried it would go the way of the swim lessons from last summer.

Sidebar: We enrolled her in a 2 week, 4 days a week for an hour, swim lessons at the YMCA last summer. I think we made it to half of the lessons. Lauren would either cry through the whole swim lesson or cry before we would leave. She decided she was scared of the water and even though we were in a Mommy and Me class with babies, she acted like the biggest baby out of all of them. Seriously, there were a couple of 6 month olds in our class.

Anyway, I have been dragging my feet about starting a dance class because I know my child and I know she will not participate for most of the class. I decided we would not enroll her in any sort of professional dance place because I didn't want to waste our money. Everyone at work talks about a place called The Little Gym (we are having Lauren's birthday party there this year) so I called them today and they let us come for a free class to see if we would like it. The dance class consists of 30 minutes of tap and ballet and 30 minutes of gymnastics. When we left there Lauren had decided that she did not want to take dance but did want to take gymnastics. So tomorrow will be our first day of gymnastics. Hopefully she will warm up to it and have fun.

We went to Target tonight to get her a leotard. We had to try them on to make sure we got the right size. I have been in the dressing rooms with Lauren a couple of times now and I am shocked and horrified. :) When she is trying on clothes she struts and spins and really checks herself out in the mirror. Tonight was no different. Once the leotard was on, she immediately turned around, stuck out her butt and really admired herself. She then announced that the one she had on would do. After we had tried them all on (none of the others met her liking) I told her to put her clothes back on. She spent the next several seconds admiring her naked body (she only had panties on) in the mirror. Lots of bending over and lots of sticking her butt out.

I have no idea where this comes from. She hasn't seen Brian or I do this. She is very into what she looks likes. Her vanity definitely comes from Brian, but he certainly doesn't stick his butt out in front of the mirror and check himself out. She's crazy! And very entertaining. ;)

Nathan Like Me?... Scary

I've realized over the past few weeks that Nathan is so much like me it's scary. I have lots of querks that I really hoped would never get passed on. ;) Beside the fact that he currently seems to have my physical characteristics and build (on the shorter side and prone to extra weight), he seems to have several of my other traits.

I am one of those persons who gets hot very easily - always have. I blame this for the main reason I disliked sports so much growing up. I can just look out the window on a summer day and start sweating. I get all red-faced and sweaty just sitting outside in the summer so you can imagine what I'm like if I am doing any sort of physical activity. Lauren seems to have gotten Brian's traits. Brian is one of those people that can run a mile in the middle of summer and barely look like he's worked out. It takes a lot for him to get hot. He never get's red-faced and while he does sweat he doesn't look like I do - hair wet and matted to the side of my face like some sort of cat that has been dunked in water.

Anyway, it became very clear to me on our Seaworld trip that Nathan is, sadly, much like me. Poor thing. Just sitting in the stroller at Seaworld and he was drenched in sweat and his little cheeks were bright red. We shared several water bottles trying to keep cool. While Lauren and Brian were off seeing all the animals at the zoo, Nathan and I were trailing behind panting in the heat and trying to cool off. We were miserable.

We went to the beach this past weekend and he seems to have more of my traits. He sunburns very easily. Lauren has never been sunburned, partially because I lather her in sunscreen and partially because she has Brian's olive-ish skin.

(Soapbox for a moment - I hate seeing young kids burned or darkly tanned. Sun tanning is bad for your skin. I know too many 20-somethings that have had cancer cells removed from their bodies because of all the sun exposure they had in their teen years. As long as I can control it, my kids will be white. Okay, back to my blog.)

It takes a lot for Brian to burn - he usually just tans. So while I am lathering myself with SPF 50, Brian doesn't put anything on and he is just fine. The same seems to be true for our children. Poor Nathan, 15 minutes into our beach trip and he is hot and sweaty and sandy and unhappy. Very much like me as a child. (I hated the beach and still do.) To me there is nothing worse than having dried salt water all over yourself and sand in all kinds of areas sand shouldn't be.