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.

Baby Wise

I am mostly posting this blog for myself- so I don't forget.  I often read over my blogs as a journal for my forgetful self.  But honestly I also hope someone, maybe someone pregnant, adopting or hoping to someday do one of the two, will stumble upon it as well.  Maybe someone who is crying as she listens to her baby cry out of fear and loneliness in her crib because that's what the "Christian book" said to do.  I hope mothers and fathers can discover that this author does not represent the biblical way and will find freedom in throwing it in the fireplace... Or just the trash can if you live in Austin, Texas where you never need a fireplace!

Imagine some guy at church with no medical or scientific background, no phycological or early childhood training came up to you and told you how you should breastfeed and train your child.  Then you also find out that he was once on staff with the church but was asked to step down because of some character issues.  Would you be ready to pick up a book he wrote about how to raise your children?  I'm guessing not.  But so many very smart and well meaning people are following a man with these qualifications in a cult like manner.

Understand that I know you can find something negative about anybody on the Internet.  Even my favorite person Fred Rogers has negative stuff out there by terrible people just out to try and ruin his reputation.  However Mister Rogers' negative press can be debunked where as Gary Ezzo's is backed up by several resources that make me very concerned for the many Christian parents I know that think his book is the parenting bible. Do a simple google search "Gary Ezzo" and you'll find plenty out there.  But here is a link to a timeline I found about him and his wife sited with many sources to back it:

http://ezzo.info/resources/timeline

I simply could not subscribe to this style if feeding my child by someone who has no medical background, no B.A. no B.S.  not even an Associates degree!  Only a Master's in arts from a theology school that does not require a previous degree to enter their program.  And to see the kind of person people in his church and ministry found him, makes him no person I'd take parenting advice from.

A site I really like, though it could really use a good web developer on it, is Gentle Christian Mothers.  Below is a link to their website and the second is a link to more info and support for people effected by this method of child-rearing.
http://www.gentlechristianmothers.com

Unprepared for Parenting

http://www.gentlechristianmothers.com/topics/unprepared.php

Support and information for those affected by the Ezzos, the Pearls, and other punitive and adversarial methods of child-rearing. They claim to be Biblical, yet they misuse Scripture and weaken and strip parents of an essential God-given gift--their intuition, and leave them unprepared for parenting.

Setting boundaries with a nursing toddler... for people who are terrible at setting boundaries.

Yes, I am "still" nursing Adelaide.  When she was born I began the practice of feeding "on cue."  This practice is not for everyone, but for us it created a quick bond in breastfeeding, helped give me confidence, and feel connected with my daughter as we were mutually communicating with each other from the start.  I believe it really got her off to a very healthy start- her weight gain was perfect.  But somewhere along the line... I think maybe close to her one year mark, "on cue" became "on demand."  Le Leche League uses the two phrases synonymously, but I find there to be a difference.  "On cue" describing more of the innate reactions to being hungry, and "on demand" describing wanting the milk and demanding it, regardless of hunger.

Being so used to our perfect breastfeeding relationship I don't think I really picked up on it.  In the mom groups I'm a part of, its actually not even looked down on so it didn't occur to me to be a problem.

But finally it started to feel like breastfeeding in general was a problem.  I just couldn't handle it any more, I tried to quit cold turkey twice.  I would go one or two days without it and she would be so sad, and I was so sad too.  There are several health benefits to continuing breastfeeding into her toddler days so I didn't REALLY want to quit.  But feeding several times a day was becoming too much, and feeding at any hour and any place was getting to be a real difficult situation.  Picture a toddler in the seat of the grocery cart just at breast level, lounging out of the cart, fussing "milk! milk!" as you walk down isle 8.

Boundaries.  That's what we were missing.  I stink at setting boundaries.  And telling her "wait till we get home" wasn't working either.  She didn't understand when we would be home.  Sometimes I'd feed her in the car, sometimes in a restroom.  We lacked a consistency.  Sometimes at home I had time to feed her, sometimes it just wasn't a good time... i.e. while cooking or going to the bathroom.

Here's the part where I tell you how I did it....

So I found a way to set boundaries in a way that kept me more consistent and in a way that she could understand.  I bought an alarm clock intended to help children understand when to stay in bed and when it was okay to get up in the morning.  It has a red light (red stay in bed) that stays on till the alarm (noiseless) goes off and turns green.  So I set the alarm for when I will be ready to nurse her again.  I also try to keep in mind when she typically wants to nurse which right now is about 4 or 5 hours after the last time.  When we are sitting on the couch and she wants to start nursing (her habit is when I'm sitting she crawls in my lap and start nursing if she is bored).  So as she starts going for my shirt I say in an excited way, "go look at the light."  She runnnnnns to her room and looks at the light and if its red she simply goes on with her day.  Sometimes she so cute as to say "awe mannnnnn" with a smile.  If it is green she runnnnnns back to me happy as can be and pulls me into her room to nurse.  Sometimes she is so excited that the light is green that she stops nursing just to smile at the light and say "light greeeeeeeen."  She loves it.  I think she isn't even that upset about the fact that it is red so often.  It seems to be something she looks forward to.  I love it when she discovers it green without me prompting her.

The first day we did this I set the alarm often so she could learn that every time it is green she gets to nurse.  I also kept telling her, "okay, we're going to nurse in your room from now on any time the light is green."  So she has somewhat got that idea down.  I remind her often, but when she remembers she doesn't get too upset.

And thats that.

Sometimes when we are out she still wants to nurse and I just ask, "what color is the light?"  She looks around and I say, "the light is at home, we will have to wait till we are home to see the light."  And then she more or less drops the subject.  She might bring it up again in 10 min, but its okay, we're still working on it.

One more thing.  I got some advice from someone who weaned her 2 and a half year old not long ago.  She said she kept it very light and not too serious and it went over pretty easily for her daughter.  I thought that was excellent advice so though I'm not 100% weaning right now, I am trying to keep this process pretty light (no pun intended) as well.  So I never say "the light is red" with a serious face.  If I don't get too upset about it she won't either.

Small, simple, and easy diaper bag... That does not look like a diaper bag!

A few months ago I left my wallet in the car with the car unlocked and the next morning my wallet (and GPS on an unrelated note) were gone.  This huge frustration led me to think about the question "WHY did I leave my wallet in the car unlocked?"  As I broke it down, I realized the reason was because I had way too many things (along with one beautiful toddler) I was lugging in an out of the car every day.  The evening I left my wallet in the car, I thought, well that's one less thing I'll have to carry to the car in the morning.  Dumb.  

So I needed a new solution.  I felt my huge diaper bag with 7 cloth diapers in it, and everything else I needed to take care of a baby on the run, had to go.  Plus, I needed to buy I new wallet.  So I hit the mall, hoping to spot just the right thing.  And I did!  

In Hallmark Gold Crown Store of all places, I found the perfect bag, not at all marketed to be a diaper bag!  The brand is baggallini and I have since seen it in many other shops.  They come in many styles and colors, and I tested out all the ones in the store by putting diapers in them, and all my other junk just to see if it would fit, and this one worked.  

The one fall back is I had to give up cloth diapering... at least "on-the-go" which was a slippery slope that led to no cloth diapering ever.  My little one refuses to wear them after I took a long hiatus.  Hopefully with baby #2 (coming this Holiday season) we can get back on the cloth wagon.

Regardless, let me give you a tour!

Okay, I have my messenger style bag hanging from my Jeep because the jeep actually plays a role as you will see in the final pictures.

The first little front pocket holds my little things... lip gloss lip stick, a pencil, teething medicine, sometimes a crayon or two.

Here is the wallet section.  Regularly used cards are easy to get to and the less frequented are all in one zipper.  There is a great little change pocket, and then a whole other pocket not even utilized.  Sometimes I hold receipts or a check book there.

I am not anti-pink, but its not one of those colors I identify myself with like some women.  However, the bright pink interior does make it easier to find things than in my previous bag that had a black interior.  

Change of clothes.... I have a pretty neat baby so we rarely use this spare, but on occasion we pull it out and I'm glad to have it.  I pack the lightest outfit she has for this so it isn't too bulky.

The middle pocket without a zipper holds snacks and sometimes a small water bottle.  She can come up to my bag and get it herself if she wants.

Here are the diapers and wipes.  It can hold about 4 or 5 normal size diapers though its only picturing 2 thick night time diapers because I really need to go buy more.  Seriously we currently own 3 clean diapers in the world right now- next stop is the diaper store!

I THINK it could hold about 2 prefolds if I wanted to.

The back pocket is zipperless so I keep my phone here so it is quick and easy to get to when its time to snap a picture of cute little Adelaide doing something adorable... Yes, I rarely use this as a phone!  Also, some hand sanitizer. Sometimes I throw these two items in the "wallet" section so I can fit a book in there.  For the most part, if I'm reading a book it is through the kindle app on my iphone.  Consolidate!

And just because I like to keep it dorky, I keep my keys on a carabiner on a loop on the outside of the bag.  For just a touch extra of nerd, I sometimes clip my purse to my belt loop so it doesn't slide around as I bend over during play time at the museum or the park.

You might be thinking... that is not nearly enough stuff for a whole day's adventure away from the house!  How does she do it???

The secret is keeping a stash in the car.  Very rarely am I away from the car for so long that I would need 10 diapers, 2 changes of clothing, a trash bag, bandaids, etc.  So I keep a surplus in the car at all times.  Its is very easily stored and organized.

Reused a Tide Container for a trash can.  (Don't forget to empty when you get home!)

A change of clothes, plus a spare bag to put the dirty clothes in.  Again, don't forget to take out when you get home.  I left some vomit clothes in a bag for a week on accident and the mold was disgusting... I just threw the whole bag in the trash, clothes and all.

Of course a thing of wipes.  I refill it every now and then, usually part of my car cleaning routine.

This is a dish washing detergent container re-used to store this and that little things.... snack, boogie wipes, Neosporin, bandaids, teething med, sun screen, etc.  

Another re-used container that holds diapers.  It can hold about 20.  Right now it holds the 1 other diaper we have.  That's right, all the diapers we have in our possession right now are pictured in this one blog post.

And that is it!  I've been using this method for roughly 6 months and I am extremely pleased and have not run into one problem.  Even when I go out sans-baby, I tend to carry the whole bag with me, and it is no larger than the bag of someone without any children, so it doesn't look odd or feel heavy either.

I did find an added bonus to the diaper box in the car.  When we have grandparents take care of her at their house while we go out on a date, we just bring the box in, and with everything so well labeled and organized, it makes it super easy for them to find everything she needs.

I've wanted to blog about this since I got it because I know someone out there is googling "diaper bag that is not huge" and I hope you find this blog!  Email me if that is you!  (or if you like the idea)

The Cost of Being Born

Oh second pregnancy.  Morning sickness hit me hard the first time around, but not as bad the second time around.  Unfortunately, not as bad, is still pretty bad.  Especially when you have a very exciting toddler on the move.  I try my best to think of fun games that involve me laying down in a curled up position while she runs around the house.  I also have a little help here and there.  Earlier this week, a friend took her to the park while I just took a nice shower and a nap.  And in the afternoon a middle schooler helps me out with her so I have pretty good support.

First time around, I saw the doctor at just 4 weeks pregnant.  I had an ultrasound by 5 weeks, medicine, by 6 weeks... the ball started rolling fast.  This time around, I still have not decided on a care provider at just over 9 weeks!  I haven't even had an appointment.

My first birth was done at a birthing center, which I LOVED.  I didn't appreciate the care I was getting with the OB, I went to two different ones, and with both I had LONG waits (once I waited 90 minutes past my appointment time while sitting next to a sign that said if a patient is 15 minutes late they must pay for their appointment that would be cancelled for tardiness) and I had extremely short appointments with rushed doctors.  When I switched to the care of midwives at Austin Area Birthing Center I had max wait times of 5 minutes and 30 minute appointments- I rarely took the whole 30 minutes, but if I had a lot I needed to talk about, it was totally fine to chat for a long time.

2nd Time around it would seem an easy choice to go with the Birthing Center again.  But now that I have a toddler my thoughts are leaning toward a home birth.  If the baby comes in the middle of the night, little Adelaide can sleep in her room while the baby is being born on the other side of the house and wake up to a new sibling.  There is no fuss about where to send her, or worries that she will miss us from being gone so long.  Sure, this isn't that big of a deal, many kids do just fine, but I thought I'd look into it.  There is a group in town called Heart of Texas Midwives that I visited with.

Heart of Texas Midwives is a group of three midwives that I would meet with throughout my pregnancy and one of the three (whoever was on call) would attend my birth.  I like all three of them a lot.  One of them was even a midwife at the birthing center during the time I was pregnant with my first.  Their prenatal visits are about an hour long- the first one will be an hour and a half.  I really like my interview with one of the midwives.  I brought Adelaide along and she was pretty grumpy from having a pretty terrible night of teething and just wanted outside so badly.  So the midwife suggested we just have our appointment outside!  We went for a walk holding Adelaide's hands and swinging her between us.  I loved it.

I LOVED the birthing center and I LOVED the home birth midwives... but I was starting to think maybe since my insurance didn't cover midwifery I should try just going the normal american hospital route.  It wasn't as exciting or beautiful as a birthing center or home birth but maybe I should just hang up that idea for the sake of saving a little cash that could be rather used on fun things for the baby.

I called up the insurance company and found out the cost of a birth assuming I have a no complication vaginal natural birth.  I was surprised to discover that using insurance (Aetna) would not save me any money at all!  I would actually be spending a ridiculous amount more.

I'm glad I called the insurance company rather than just assuming it would cost less!  Keep in mind we don't have the BEST insurance.  We have a $2000 deductible plus we have to pay 40% of the cost after the deductible is met.  On the plus side, even though they don't technically cover midwifery, they will pay us back 10% of what we paid after the baby is born.  So that actually brings the cost down even more.

Now this is all assuming I am able to have a normal natural birth.  There are always chances that things could become complicated, but my chances are lower since I have already had one natural birth.  I do think if I started in the hospital it would be a higher chance, as I'm not sure I could deny an epidermal.  I might even order a c-section!  Having a baby is a really painful thing!

I hope this is a helpful little guide for someone who was trying to find the lower cost option.  This is just true of these certain places in Austin and with our particular insurance, but take the time to figure out the cost in your town before you jump to the conclusion that you should go with what your insurance covers.

Now I just have to decide which midwife group to choose.  Two great options!

A New 4 List Plan

We gave our four list plan a few weeks, and it went very well!  But after actually watching the Alton Brown episode about it we realized we could make a few changes.  The heart behind it was to be sure to eat certain foods that are very good for you.  If you focus on eating those good foods, you won't have much room for the bad.  And the "bad" which were on the once a week or never eat lists could use a little altering for our personality.  Like Alcohol is something we rarely drink so it really didn't need to be on the once a week list.  And we never ate canned soups or diet things anyway so why waste the space putting that on our "never eat" list.  Actually we realized we didn't really even need a "never eat" list, but rather a special occasion list.  

So here goes another go at our own version of the Four-List Plan!

The Guilbeau Gifts Rule of 4

Chris and I considered putting this out there for Adelaide's first Christmas, but then we realized... well we don't want to have to go with the rules too, so we can't hold her to them.

This year Santa found all three of us on the super nice list; we all found tons of great presents under the tree.  This only makes it more difficult to start the discipline of keeping a simple set of gift giving and receiving rules.  But with my birthday being the first in 2013, I have decided I will be the first to abide by the rules.

It's simply a guideline for us to follow for giving & receiving gifts.  For Chris and my birthdays, we really don't have to worry much about our parents or anyone giving outside the rules, but we do have to work hard with each other.  Birthdays are when the two of us kinda go out of control with showering each other with gifts.  I think having this set of rules will actually make it more fun though.  Instead of just giving him everything I can possibly think of that he might want and I can afford, I can be more mindful about it and try to get everything on the list maybe... though I might just have to skip "1 thing to wear" for him... my man likes to shop for his own clothes!

It will be a fun practice for the three of us to do for each other, but we are also going to ask everyone else to be a part of it.  We're not asking everyone to give each of us 4 gifts, but just asking that anyone who wants to give us gifts gives no more than 4 and no more than 1 of each category: WANT, READ, WEAR, HEALTHY; and nothing outside of those categories.  And if we end up with more, the task is to give it away.

So I have a feeling a game will be made of these rules like trying to make an excuse of how something fits a category that really doesn't..."yeah, this movie is a "read" just turn on the subtitles!"  I have a family member I can totally hear say that already.  And if someone tries that, its not the end of the world; in the end there are still only 4 gifts so it works itself out.  It might even be part of the holiday fun making something "fit" into a category.

If you've seen this list on Pinterest you might be thinking, something sounds different about this one.  Well, the list that is getting pinned everywhere is a little different instead of "Healthy" they have "need" which actually has better rhyming to it, but "need" just sounds too dramatic to me.  As middle-class Americans with just one kid, we don't really have any needs that aren't being met.  Healthy sounded like a fun alternative to me!  There is a lot of wiggle room there too.  I'm thinking of how my mom used to put oranges, apples, and nuts in our stocking- that's an obvious healthy!  Or this might sound like a stretch, but my this year my sister-in-law gave Adelaide some reusable snack bags (super cute) and I think we could put that under "healthy."  And while toy vegetables can't be eaten, maybe we can even sneak that in as a "healthy."  And my Christmas gift to Chris this year, a Nike + iPod could have easily gone under healthy OR wear!  (Its something you wear on your shoe that tracks your running stats.)

Well, there is about 6 months till the big 2 year birthday for Adelaide which is the BIG DEAL in the family (yeah, I'm turning the big three-oh but I'm pretty sure the 2 year old will still get the bigger party).  So this is the official announcement with 6 months notice for The Guilbeau Gifts Rule of 4.

Has anyone else tried this, or something like this?  How did it go for you?