Been there, Done that, loved it, doing it again.

I don't know how it works, but it seems every weekend for sometime, my daughter and husband sleep in (its almost 10am!) and I wake up early (okay 8am) and get a few things done and enjoy a quiet morning alone.  I really like it!  So why not blog on this beautiful Saturday morning?

With my belly growing larger I have been getting questions about what I will do differently this time around.  Well... not a lot.  Chris and I just have been talking about it and we just have a great kid.  Its hard to imagine doing things differently when things have worked out pretty well as it is.

One little thing of course is where we will have the baby.  I already blogged about the back and forth decision between birthing center and home birth.  The decision is home birth.  I'm looking forward to not having to drive anywhere while in labor or having to drive back while in recovery.  I just watched "More Business of Being Born" and watched the episode called "Special Deliveries: Celebrity Mothers Talk Straight on Birth."  I'm not huge on following celebrities, in fact I had to google who half of them were!  But I correctly assumed they wouldn't be showing any births and for some reason I just have no desire to watch births right now!  Some of the women had C-sections, some had a no-intervention or little intervention hospital birth, and some had a home birth.  They were all positive stories though.  It really encouraged me and gave me a little more excitement about home birth.

Priceless moments, sweet sleep for both.

Since we've had several tiring nights over the past couple years, people always ask if we are going to do sleep related things differently... assuming we will say yes.  Well, my answer is- just a little bit different.  I did know we even had a sleep "problem" with Adelaide till she was maybe 6 months old.  I was waking up A LOT with her.  We started off with her sleeping in a basinet next to the bed which worked great for those first few nights when she needed to be fed every 2 hours to establish a good milk supply in me and a good breastfeeding relationship for us, and of course breastfeeding went great. But doing that started a habit for her falling asleep at the breast and getting used to nursing to sleep and being held to sleep.  Now in a natural wonderful world that would be okay.  But unfortunately, unlike the early days of humanity, we don't have a community that expects a mother to give 100% of her time to her baby.  In those days it was extremely important not to let a baby cry in the night or it could put the tribe in danger of attack.  Community would help the mother with cooking, cleaning, and sometimes even breastfeeding each others children.  Ah, but we do not live in this society and we live in a wake up at 7 do your business 8-5 and go to bed by 10... children at 7.  So as natural as it may be to let the baby fall asleep at the breast, it just doesn't fit into how life works in the USA.  So I will only make MINOR adjustments to sleep patterns.  If I were a mom that had to work 8-5 I may beed do more adjustments but since I do have flexibility and my working husband has a very flexible work schedule, we don't need to stress too much about it.

montessori bedroom- worked great for all of us.

I got my hands on a book called "The No Cry Sleep Solution," when Adelaide was a little too old for the easy newborn tricks.  I think they may have worked.  Like when I see her starting to doze off at the breast, go ahead and take her off just before she falls asleep and put her down.  Also, putting her down to sleep alone more often than holding her as she sleeps.  Though with this second baby, I probably will do both- hold the sleeping baby and let him/her fall asleep at the breast because it is so sweet and I want to cherish those precious moments!  I am just going to attempt to do it much less.  But yep, still not going to try the cry-it-out, still occasionally going to sleep with the baby, still going to meet the baby's night time needs (emotional and physical) just like we would in the day time.

Self feeding at 6 months

She got into my underwear drawer
and tried them all on;
also put on my flip flops
"being mommy"

Will we still put a mattress on the floor instead of a crib?  YEP!  Still going to allow self-feeding normal rather than baby food or cereal? Oh yeah!  Will we still let this one explore things in our house (making sure all dangerous things are way out of sight) even though it creates more trouble and mess for us?  YEP!  Will we let this one help us salt the food for dinner even if it makes dinner taste like it took a bath in the ocean?  Yes indeed!  Will I let this baby crawl on the floor in the mall, and walk away from me a pretty far distance at Target (where I can still see) even if it causes people to ask "where is your mommy?" It may just be her personality or it may be because we gave her all these opportunities, but this kid has become very confident and feels she can accomplish so much.  One day, I was preoccupied with something when she asked for me to get her some taco meat for breakfast.  "One minute baby."  After a minute, I turn around and she has scooped her meat (left over from night before and in the fridge) into a bowl, and was taking it to the microwave!  I think if she could have reached the microwave she would have opened it and pushed start!  We are just so amazed at this 2 year old, its hard to imagine doing things differently.

Elimination Communication at its cutest. 

Still going to do Elimination Communication?  I mean Adelaide isn't even potty trained still!  Yup, still going to do that too.  Only this time I will adjust my expectations that held us back last time.  I saw EC as a way to get the girl out of diapers by the time she was one year old.  That might could happen, but its pretty difficult in our society.  I'm not going to put that pressure on myself and get disappointed if it doesn't happen.  But doing EC was so fun with Adelaide.  I loved that experience of getting to have a method of communication with my baby even if it was about poop and pee.  Not to mention it saved hundreds of diapers!  If anything, I think I will just keep it up next time instead of giving up.  But I do think it is why she is not afraid of the toilet and has not been resistant to using the potty now.

Rock climbing at the Grand Canyon

Oh, and on that topic, I sure hope I don't give up cloth diapers at one year, but keep it up till potty trained.  No promises there, but cloth really is so much cheaper, better for the environment, and better for the baby; they are also super bulky in the diaper bag!

Naturally the second baby is going to be different than the first.  It is just impossible to do everything exactly the same considering the first time around we didn't also have a 2 year old in the house!  On top of that, you never know ahead of time what the baby's personality will be.  They might like other things than the first, or have different needs or different emotional reactions to events.  We just gotta see.  But for now, we don't see why those basic ideas of what to do with a baby from age newborn-2 years has to be much different than the way we did it with our beautiful sweet baby Adelaide.