Worries of a mother

It's hard to be a mother and not worry. Some worry is normal and good. Without worry we wouldn't try to improve and grow as a mother. However, it seems like a mother today has too much to worry about and we never do anything right.

It starts as soon as we see that plus sign on the stick. What if we don't eat right, read the right books, take the lamaze class, register for the right equipment, take the right vitamins, get enough exercise, get to all of our appointments, get enough sleep, etc, etc. And if we don't do everything right we feel like we've screwed up right from the beginning.

Then time to deliver. Natural or drugs, midwife or doctor. Vaginal, c-section, water birth, hospital, home... What is the right way?!

Then you have an infant. If you don't breastfeed them have you screwed them up for life, dooming them to a life of illness and obesity? Should you let them cry it out to sleep to learn independence? Co-sleeping (will you make them too dependent), pacifiers (will they suck on them for life?), thumb sucking (are they going to have crooked teeth forever? Looming orthodontia bills!). Is your carseat installed correctly? Have to see a fireman to make sure, cause we can't do it ourselves! Disposables vs. cloth. Will I ruin the environment single handedly with all my kids' diapers?

Starting solid food. If I start too early will it lead to obesity the rest of their lives? What should Istart with? What if they won't eat veggies? What foods are they not supposed to eat? There's too many to remember! Will starting with fruit rather than veggies really make them like sweets more, dooming them to always hate veggies?

Toddlerhood: Are they walking too late? Are they talking too late? Are they eating enough fruits and veggies? Are they eating too many sweets? Do I brush their teeth enough? Too much juice? Enough exercise? Am I reading to them enough? How do they compare to other children? Playing enough? Am I handling discipling correctly? Will they grow up to be hoodlums because I failed at discipline?

aaaaagggghhhhhhh! It's enough to drive a person insane! How are we supposed to do everything in a single day that we are supposed to be doing? Homecooked meals (heaven forbid we feed our children processed or restaurant food), exercise (us and them), breastfeeding, reading, playing, appointments, cleaning, laundry, grocery shopping, clothes shopping, bill paying, yard work, work, sleep, eat, baths, showers, clipping coupons, birthday parties, playdates, church, diaper changing, potty training, relaxing. But really, when do we have time for the last one? hobbies (Waht are those again?) date night (an endangered species)

There is just not enough time in the day to do everything. And it feels like we are attacked on all sides. We hear about how we are failing from dentist, doctors, magazines, internet, friends, family. Nothing we do is good enough, and there is always something we could be doing better, or doing something we shouldn't be doing, or something we're not doing that we should.

Good luck to all moms out there!

Echo and Mommy's little helper

Today Iliana had her echo to check on how she's doing. And everything looks good! Blood flow through the aorta is good,VSD is small, bicuspid valve is not leaky, and I was told that the vein leading from the brain to the heart is usually on the right, but hers is on the left! Who knew so many things could be different but still be ok. So we'll just keep watching with routine echo checkups. She was so cute during her appointment. She started licking the tech and the doppler wand with her super long tongue. She has no desire to move at all. She sometimes rolls over from front to back, but has never rolled over from back to front. But for the most part when I put her on her tummy she just lays there, but she doesn't scream at the floor at much as she used to. We got an exersaucer from my friend, and she really likes to play with the toys on it. Oliver likes to play in it too.

Oliver, in between ornery spells, has become such a good helper. On Saturday I wanted to do something with him to see how grown up he is, so we decided to try to make chex muddy buddies with him. Easy to make, and I gave him his own bowl and spoon to mix the cereal with chocolate and peanut butter. He didn't really get the hang of mixing it together, and really just wound up crushing it with his spoon. Then it was time to shake it up with powdered sugar in a bag. I thought he might just crush it some more, but he shook it up pretty well. The other day he saw that Iliana had spit up before I caught it, and by the time I noticed and got a towel, he had already gotten a towel and started to clean her up! I love my little man.

Solid food and terrible twos

In an attempt to stave off having to buy formula, we decided to try Iliana on solid foods on Sunday. We have had two attempts and they have not been successful. She wants to try but can't figure out how to swallow the food yet. Oliver likes to watch her eat, and then he thinks he wants some too, so I let him try rice cereal and he just made yucky faces. But he loves to feed it to his baby sister! It's his new favorite thing to do. So I think we're going to stop and try again in a few weeks. I have no problems using formula except the cost, and frankly I am tired of breastfeeding. I know all the benefits of it, and it's great for her and me, but oh, my, gosh, it hurts so much! This girls has the strongest suck ever! But I will keep breastfeeding to keep Iliana from getting sick, and to spare us the expense of formula.

Oliver has very much started his terrible twos even though he's only a year and a half. His favorite words right now are "mine" and "no". Oh my goodness some days are so hard! Sometimes I think to myself, I don't even like him. And then he does something so cute, or has a really good day to make up for the bad ones. Today is one of those good days. We went to the doctor's this morning for Iliana to get a syneges (sp?) shot, and then straight to a birthday party for a little boy in our ward, and he hasn't given me hardly any trouble. Then we came home he ate the rest of his breakfast, some lunch, and then played quietly while I started dinner, and did the dishes. It's heavenly when he behaves this way. On top of that, Iliana is taking a long nap. Life is good. He certainly can throw a tantrum though. Church has become a time when we try to teach him how to not jump on the bench instead of listening to the talks.

Family reunion?

So weddings and funerals are a way for my extended family to get together for a reunion. On a similar note, my grandmother died last Thursday after she was brought to the hospital. My uncle took her in because she stopped taking care of herself. There they found a mass in her heart, but since she was so frail, they decided not to run further tests. Later, on Thursday, things got worse really fast, and was suddenly she was gone. To me, this would be a relief for her. Now she gets to be with my grandfather, her mother, and sister. She will have her healthy body and mind again. So by Sunday night many on my Utah cousins were in town. So the older people, our parents, met at our grandma's house to discuss the funeral arrangements, while we young people met at my parent's house to talk and have fun. So we talked and had fun and ate "free" pancakes. Ok, so the story behind that is we were talking about where to eat on Monday, and Kathy said that we could go to IHOP and get $5 pancakes. I said that we could eat free pancakes here because there was a big bag of pancake mix sitting on Mom's counter. So as the night wore on we got hungry so we had pancakes. We also discovered that night how much alike we all were.



On monday we went to the Jelly Belly factory in order to entertain Michelle and Lua's children. Later that afternoon, I went with the Utah cousins to Old Sac and we wondered around and bought candy. Then we all went out to Golden Corral for dinner, and took up about a quarter of the restaurant. There we met up with Doug and Echael, and Michael, and Ben and Kim, who had come into town by then. Then we went to back to The House, and Julene had come into town. We discussed the funeral schedule for the next day, then went home.

The next morning (Tuesday) Nolan had to take Iliana to the doctor's to get her RSV shot (which they only offer on certain Tuesdays of each month, and require an appointment), while I took Oliver with me to the funeral. We got there a bit late, but in time for family prayer. At least I got there before the cousins who got lost using a GPS (Pam, and Kathy!). The funeral was very nice. AFter the funeral director locked the coffin he handed the key to Uncle Dave which I thought was very strange. Later I found out that Kathy had presented her dad when they were on their way to the funeral home, and so that was basically the only thing that worked. Uncle David gave the eulogy, but he had found Grandma's journal, and inside was an entry where she basically gave her life story; so he just read that. I thought that was cool, because then we got to hear about Grandma in her own words. Then we drove to the cemetery and Uncle Larry gave the dedicatory prayer. Then back to the church for lunch. It was nice to chat with everyone there (some had finally arrived that morning) and see a new baby that no one had known about! Then we went back to the House to have a small birthday for Kieran since it was her birthday that day.

The next few days were spent cleaning out Grandma's house. And man did it need cleaning! Grandma seemed to have spent the last few years just buying stuff from DI, and that's where most of it went back to.

kid updates

Iliana had her 4 month appointment today!
here are her stats:
13lbs. 14.2 oz (55%)
25 inches (76%)
head: 16.5 inches (75%)

Here is a little about her:
-she loves to laugh and smile at anyone who will pay attention to her.
-she hates tummy time
-I got her a bumbo to sit in, but she doesn't really like that either, but she does like it more than tummy time.
-she loves it when Oliver plays with her. Even when he squishes her face.
-has more clothes than she could ever use.
-rolled over a week ago but hasn't since.
-does not eat nearly as much as Oliver did.
-drools, a lot. (her clothes are always wet.)

Oliver is 20 months. Here is a little about him.
-loves his little sister. he gives her kisses all the time.
-can say: I don't want to, ice, eyes, nose, hair, up please, juice, water, mama, dada, Spongebob, watch, caca (his word for bird. I think he's really saying cockatiel), Peter, car, shoe, poo, book, baby, outside.
-was able to jump with both feet off the ground recently
-is brave enough to go down big slides
-can climb a ladder
-still has trouble going down stairs
-makes growling and monkey noises
-gives hugs and blows kisses
-makes us laugh everyday

Turning and nodding

Iliana turned over for the first time yesterday. Nolan helped her the first time, then I flipped her back over and then she did it by herself. She turned from her stomach to her back. Scream at the floor time (which is what Nolan calls tummy time) should get more interesting now.

Oliver is getting to be such a big boy. This week he has started to nod his head. I noticed him today just putting raisins into a trash bag. I asked him if he was putting raisins in the bag and he nodded! woohoo! Maybe it will be easier to know what he wants now. Poor thing has also been sick this week. But I got to have a cuddly boy for a while.

Cars and skates

Last Saturday, we finally had time to go car shopping. We had been down to one car since the Mustang was stolen the Sunday before Iliana was born. Luckily we've been able to borrow my father-in-law's truck once Nolan went back to work. We dropped the kids off at my in-laws, and went for it. We stopped at one place and didn't find any we liked in our price range, but I did find a nice convertible that I liked. The second place we went to didn't have anything we could agree on. So we went to a place that we drive past all the time. We found a lot of cars in our price range, that we liked. But we saw a black Ford Taurus that drew us in. It only had 63,000 miles on it, and looked nice, and it was within our budget. So we looked around some more since we weren't entirely sure yet. I found a minivan for $20 thousand that had a sunroof, built-in navigation system, and DVD player. That was really not in our budget. Nolan found a truck that he fell in love with, but it was even more expensive than the minivan. So we fantasized a bit, and said that we would just get both cars. Then we came back to reality and looked at the Ford again. So we talked to the guy there, and found out the gas mileage was decent, so we went for a test drive. We would up going over to Beth and Mike's so Mike could check it out for us. He said it was a good car even with how old it was (it's a 1999). So we drove it back, and with some help from Mike talked down the total price from $8 (post taxes and fees) to $5700. We had most of the money in the bank, so we wrote a check, and then discussed how to pay the rest. Nolan's parents had offered to help us back when Iliana was in the hospital, so I told Nolan that we should take them up on the offer, and then we could pay them back instead of taking out a loan. So we called them up and they transferred the money into our account. So we wrote out a second check with a contract saying that they wouldn't cash it until a week later. So we drove away with our new car, got to my in-laws to pick up the kids, and then realized that we left my car at the dealership! oops... So we drove back and grabbed our car with very red faces.

So we picked up the kids, and drove over to my parents house. I was trying to keep from Nolan what the plans for the rest of our night were, but Dad pretty much told him right when we walked in the door. We had been trying to go ice skating for a while. We wanted to go to the outdoor rink which is seasonal, and so we were quickly running out of time. We had tried in December, but it was raining. We tried again last Wednesday, but it closed earlier than I thought, and by the time Nolan got home from work it was too late. We finally got to go Saturday night. We got there, laced up our skates, and got on the ice. I had only been once, and Nolan had never been at all, but he had experience on roller blades. So of course Nolan was good right away and started off. I clung to the wall a lot until I came to other people on the wall who wouldn't move. He really just would lap me over and over again, but Nolan pretty much is good at whatever he tries. Every once in a while he would slow down and do a lap with me. I only fell once, but my calf still hurts from it. I did manage to do one lap without touching the wall or relying on Nolan so I was pretty proud of myself.

I love my husband so much!