The best alarm clock

I heard Clark's foot steps on the stairs - softly creeping up to the top. The baby gate swung open as he passed through it and closed with a soft thunk. He waited now, choosing his prey. Sometimes it was us, sometimes it was Iris. (our rooms are opposite each others on the landing). Then I heard the barnyard door of our room softly creek open and tiny little feet pad across the room. They stopped at my side of the bed, but I was still mostly asleep and non-responsive. The feet abandoned me and padded around the foot of the bed to Tom's side. I heard some whispering and then the creak of the bed springs as a body was added.  A minute later I felt his fuzzy head nestling in the crook of my arm.

A few minutes later, the bed creaked again as Tom got up. I heard the shower run - then the soft moan of the baby waking.  Doors opening, doors closing. Tom's feet coming over to the bed.  Clark scoots over to let Iris in.  My eyes are still closed while Iris nurses, all of us still mostly asleep.  Clark's tender voice says, "our sweet baby, she's a little sweetie, just like a little baby sweetie." I can feel him patting her head.  Then his weight added to ours and I heard his kisses above her ear.  Iris says, "ma ma" and we roll over so she can nurse on the other side.

My eyes open for a second and I say, "good morning, Clark".  Now Iris is on his far side, so he climbs on my shoulder so he can look at her.  She only nurses for a second more as Clark hands her a sippy cup of milk - his from last night.  She takes the cup of milk and drinks heartily.  Clark starts blowing zerberts on my arm.  Iris rolls up until she is sitting.  She wants to play too. Clark blows on my shoulder. Iris blows on my belly.  I open my eyes and smile. 

oh, just about everything

Iris can...

• ba like a sheep
• roar like a lion
• indicate who she wants by saying "ma ma" or "da da" 
• sign: nurse, pick me up, all done, more, feed me
• she's actually starting to walk more
• make a "cheese" face when she smiles for the camera - although I've never captured it properly. It involves her scrunching up her eyes and nose, and opening mouth for a giant smile. 



Super Cheese Face: head kicked back, face scrunched up, mouth big.

• clap, keep rhythm on her legs, and shake eggs to rhythm
• get whatever she wants whenever she wants it
• not sleep through the night yet. =(

I actually went into her room the other night and gave her a pep talk. it went like this, "I know you like to wake up and cry and then nurse back to sleep, but we're gonna be all done with that. I'll come in here and hold you, but you can nurse in the daytime." It amazingly seemed to help and for the rest of that night, and last night she enjoyed snuggling instead of nursing. This has cut down our nighttime visits from hour long snoozes on the mattress in her room to 2 minute cuddles. We'll see if it helps.

Inspecting the bath tub

______________________

Clark is pretty amazing. Almost 3 is a cool age, he's smart and remembers stuff, and makes things up.

The other day I said, "Clark tell me a story" This was his story.
"Once upon a time......
there was a bad guy....
and he stole our pig....
wait, he was a good guy......
there were two good guys.....
and they went in their car...."
(and he drives his car off of a cup onto the counter in a big downward swoop)
"and bbbrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr (engine noises) ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh (screaming noises)
down
the end"

he's very creative.

We are reading Little House in the Big Woods by Laura Ingels Wilder. We read a chapter a day. I'd like to get the activity book from the library and do an activity for each chapter. The first chapter was about killing the farm animals to have meat for winter, the second chapter is about killing wild animals to have food for winter. The third chapter is about cleaning Pa's gun. Then Christmas, then how boring Sundays are, then a story about 2 bear encounters.  I'm enjoying it.  I think Clark likes the cuddles best.

_____________________________________________________
Well, we definitely have a gluten problem of some sort, and I'm bringing the kids to a specialist tomorrow. I've been glutenating them for the past few weeks.

little Iris rash from "cross contamination" - things that said, "made in a facility that also processes wheat"

the following week after having many things that were contaminated, and a few bites of gluten

and now after having cake and donuts and croissants.

this is Clark.

this is Clark too. =(

They are pooping more frequently, and covered in rashes.  It stinks, but we are enjoying all sorts of previously terrifying foods like cake, croissants, and we went to Dunkin Donuts!  I hope we get some good samples for the testing. I'll keep you updated about any outcomes.

Tom and I are also feeling "foggy" and tired this week, almost like a hangover, and having more tummy troubles. Boo this stinks!  We are all looking forward to being gluten free again, and eating our healthy diet of vegetables, fruit and meat!

Iris, you're doing it wrong.

 Here are the cuties, Clark is being Precious and Iris is being Adorable - just as they are named.

I get what I want.

Home Improvements

Wow! What a busy time we have been having lately.

On the weekend of July 11th, Andrea, Jake and Sophia moved back to San Diego. Now we have no family out here =( and have to fend for ourselves =( From what it sounds like, they are happy they are there and even went to the beach today! Here is a pic of Andrea and Clark the day they left.




Since they left, we've been pouring our energies into Clark's sleeping abilities (as written in the previous week) and working on our home.

Clark has amazing sleep powers now, and we are really proud of him. Because he can roll off of his back, it is now safe(r) to allow him to sleep on his stomach. So he is doing his sleeping on his tummy now.

We still go in and check on him quite a bit. He is happy to hang out in his crib and move around, playing with toys, his feet and sucking on his hands/arm. I am trying not to nurse him to sleep for naps, but he still misses the sucking and has been sucking on his arm quite a bit. We noticed some bruising on his sweet little arm and didn't know what it was. We now know that he is giving himself hickeys from all of the sucking. I honestly am not sure if I should be letting him do this or not. Will people think I am giving my baby an Indian burn? Any comments from other moms? It would be better maybe if he stuck to his hand/thumb.

This week Tom set up a rain barrel in the front yard!

yay!



This is the view from the kitchen window. He got a movable arm to bring the gutter over to the barrel. Then he prayed for rain. It poured last night and ......

We got water!!!!!!!! Here is a picture of the water coming out of the hose! yay!


After we took these pictures it poured, poured, poured and the 55 gallon barrel is almost full now! We will be going to the Pepsi distribution plant to get some more barrels and making our own. The one that you see in these pictures was purchased for bou coup bucks, but looks nice to have in the front yard. The other 3 barrels will be in the back yard. We get a $50 rebate per barrel from Montgomery County for having the barrels, plus we know that we are using less city water to water the plants in the garden and preventing the water from running off into the street and polluting Rock Creek Park!

Tom has also been working on his garden. We have a jungle of tomato plants in the backyard now, heavy with green tomatoes. I can't wait until they ripen! I know I posted a picture of Tom with his plants, but now at least two of those plants are taller than him, maybe even 6.5 or 7 feet tall!!! Here you can see the closest plant is almost as high as the roof eave.



Here is another plant, can you see the whole tomato plant? ITS ALL ONE PLANT!!!!



And here is its fruit!



I continue to contribute to the garden by composting all of our kitchen waste... and eating whatever Tom lets me eat! Thank you!!!

I have also been working on helping to make our house more energy efficient. I got these two books from the library and they have been my guide. For less than $25 at Home Depot, I have contributed the following:

A solar and thermal powered clothes dryer is now set up on our back porch.

Putting Sashes on the doors to keep the cold/warm air from leaking under them.


I insulated the hot water pipes under the house.


I turned the hot water heater down to 120 degrees.


My next DIY tasks are: figuring out what to do with these crawlspace vents that are under the house. Any suggestions? I heard that we should have them open in the summer and close them in the winter, but do we honestly need them at all? There are 3 under the house. They are icky. The crawlspace is also very cool and it would be great to insulate everything down there, but that's a future job.


My next big job is going to be putting up fiberglass insulation in the laundry/utility room and then putting drywall up over it. I'm not going to do it fancy and make it look good, I'm just going to do the insulation and then nail up the drywall, no drywall tape, no paint (at least I dont think so).





I also want to close off these portholes in the utility/laundry room that go into the house. The living room is on the other side and we lose heat/air conditioning through them into the utility room which is uninsulated! AHHH! The way they built this house is driving me nuts!


I have had contractors over this week giving us quotes for our heating/cooling issues of the upstairs. IT typically is 10 degrees hotter/cooler upstairs than downstairs. If it is 65 down in the winter, then it is 58 up. If it is 75 down in the summer, then it is in the 80s upstairs. IT looks like insulation will be over $15,000 and they will have to rip out our walls, the $15,000 does not include ripping out the walls, putting them back in, nor painting them. I dont think we are going that way. I've been meeting with A/C people and they have suggested putting in a few more returns and vents upstairs, this costs less than $1000. It looks like the way to go. I'm going to talk to a few more people and also look into getting a house fan that will suck the air out of the house and replace it with new air. This is a great idea, because the hot air keeps getting trapped upstairs when the downstairs is really nice and cool. I don't know how it will work in the winter, but we need more warm air upstairs so it sounds good for that as well.

Day 1: sleep

Today went pretty well for helping Clark learn to fall asleep on his own. He cried for less than one minute for 2/4 naps, a lot for 1/4 nap and not at all for 1/4 nap. The one where he did not cry he slept for 3 hours-waking briefly to have a snack then falling back asleep. For bedtime, we created an elaborate ritual of bath, nursing, books, nurse and singing. He cried when he hit the crib, but the second I'm downstairs, he stops.
I'm glad he is adjusting to this and to life. I've been reading lots of parenting books regarding sleep and my fav is the Greenwell fav: Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child. Other ones I have read are the Dr Sears Sleep Book and Babywise.
Babywise seems to think that babies can be trained like a dog, and will only need to be "trained" once. The attachment parenting books seem to think that sleep is frightening and scary. Healthy Sleep Habits thinks that sleep is healthy and normal, like eating. There are lots of options to try and he constantly reminds the reader that if it is too difficult or that the baby resists too much, to try again later when the baby and parent are more ready.
We decided that Clark was ready to sleep on his own because: he was starting to consolidate sleep on his own (turn a 45 min nap into a 3 hour nap) but erratically. We would like him to be able to do this regularily if that is what he wants. He was also starting to get "addicted" to nursing to sleep. In the past, he would spit the nipple out when he was asleep, but lately he would nurse until his nap was over. This made me a slave to his naps, I dont need to nap/sleep 16 hours a day, but Clark does!
In conclusion: day one went well. Lets see how days 2 and 3 go.
Oh! Clark also says, "hi" and "eye". He doesnt know what those words mean, but we can teach him!!!
He is close to rolling over on his own, watch for updates on that!
He can sit on his own for a few seconds before falling over.
Last night was the first night he slept unswaddled (except for when he was in the hospital) and he only woke up 2 times (which happens about once a week anyway!)
bye!