Wednesday, May 19, 2010
Day 110: Laughter is the Best Medicine
I work a lot and I have a good deal of stress with owning my own business and dealing with clients and subcontractors and financial matters. It all goes away though when I hear Elliott laugh. When I come home and finally have a chance to sit down with him, I do whatever I can to get him to laugh. I get a lot of smiles, it's easy to make him smile, but eventually I'll hit the sweet spot and I'll get a whole bunch of little laughs in a row. And every once and a while Ill just crack him up and he'll really get going. That just makes my day. I feel like if we were living on the street with no food I would alright as long as I could hear him laugh.
Monday, May 17, 2010
Day 108: Get In My Belly!
Yesterday was Elliott's first solid food. He has been hungry more often so we thought it was time to get him a little rice cereal. Krystal mixed it up and we gave him just couple spoon fulls. We're starting with very small amount to let his tummy get used to it and to see if it upsets his stomach at all. He's at the age where his digestive system might not be fully ready, but he's grown so much faster than what is average I was pretty confident that he was ready.
He got the food off the spoon pretty well. He still has the reflex to push things out with his tongue but he eventually got the rice cereal down. He seemed pretty happy about trying something new. After a few spoonfuls he never developed any signs of an upset stomach so maybe today we can step it up another spoonful.
It's another activity that is adding a whole new series of little funny facial expressions to his repertoire. It's so crazy that he's a little mini person with little mini expressions and gestures. So he'll be eating more real food and then crawling and walking and talking and those will add so much more.
He got the food off the spoon pretty well. He still has the reflex to push things out with his tongue but he eventually got the rice cereal down. He seemed pretty happy about trying something new. After a few spoonfuls he never developed any signs of an upset stomach so maybe today we can step it up another spoonful.
It's another activity that is adding a whole new series of little funny facial expressions to his repertoire. It's so crazy that he's a little mini person with little mini expressions and gestures. So he'll be eating more real food and then crawling and walking and talking and those will add so much more.
Monday, May 10, 2010
Day 101: Same 'Ol Situation
Not much new activity has been happening. I've finally got jobs caught up and am taking weekends off. It's finally getting nice out so I've been able to work on cleaning up the house more. I took a load of stuff to the dump yesterday. I still have more debris in my trailer from past jobs. I need to take that to the dump and then clean out the garage a bit. I bought a weedeater not too long ago and was finally able to tame the back yard. Normally I would mow but there would be a bunch of longer grass around the fence and the cinder blocks that separate the two levels of our yard. Now I've got it all clean. Some day Elliott can play in this yard maybe.
Elliott is growing fast. He's already wearing six month old clothes. We've been getting boxes of hand me downs from our friends Brian and Erica up in Seattle. It's nice because we don't have to buy clothes, but also the clothes they've been sending are really cute. Thanks guys! He is looking at stuff and grabbing for it now. Still holds his head up fine but hasn't quiet got the hang of sitting up on his own. He's pretty good with a little assistance. He's still a generally happy baby. He thinks I'm freaking hilarious. All I have to do is look at him and he starts laughing. Is that a good or a bad thing? I don't care.
Elliott is growing fast. He's already wearing six month old clothes. We've been getting boxes of hand me downs from our friends Brian and Erica up in Seattle. It's nice because we don't have to buy clothes, but also the clothes they've been sending are really cute. Thanks guys! He is looking at stuff and grabbing for it now. Still holds his head up fine but hasn't quiet got the hang of sitting up on his own. He's pretty good with a little assistance. He's still a generally happy baby. He thinks I'm freaking hilarious. All I have to do is look at him and he starts laughing. Is that a good or a bad thing? I don't care.
Thursday, April 22, 2010
Day 83: What I Don't Miss
There are a lot of people who, when you tell them you are having a baby, and then tell them something like, "we're using cloth diapers" or "we're not buying a stroller", they go, "Oh you'll get tired of that." Basically because they are idiots who think, just because they can't make a decision and stick with it, nobody can. So here are some things that I don't miss. And I know it's only been three months, but I don't feel any of these items would make my life any easier.
1. Stroller - We take the baby out and Krystal puts him in a wrap or I put him in the Jeep carrier. I couldn't imagine folding up a big ass stroller and loading into the trunk and then pulling it out when we go on a outing where we'd be walking around a bunch. It seems backwards. It seems like the stroller would be more work than just having the baby in a carrier.
2. Disposable Diapers - I don't get disposable diapers. And people going, "Oh, it's so much more work to use cloth diapers. You'll get tired of that fast". Those people are crazy. First, how much money do you waste on disposable diapers? And, no, cloth diapers aren't cheap. But when he outgrows some, we sell the small ones and buy some bigger ones. Can you sell your used disposable diapers? No. It costs WAY more to use disposables. Plus the clothes diapers are SUPER easy to use. A lot of times you open up the outside diaper and just change out the pad inside. Some extra loads of laundry, big deal. Plus, since the invention of disposable diapers, the percentage of babies with diaper rash has gone from 7% to like 84%. Because disposables are to absorbent, cause two problems. 1) the baby doesn't feel wet as fast, keeping the pee (which is ammonia) on it's skin causing diaper rash. 2) making the baby not feel wet as often (ie. making the baby uncomfortable) which makes it more difficult to potty train. Not to mention the sheer wastefulness of disposables. I know the "most of our garbage is disposable diapers" idea is a myth. They account for only 1% of our garbage, but it's still a lot of waste considering how much we make in a year.
3. Changing Table - We have a couple changing tables. One's called the bed, another is called the co-sleeper. I need a whole other piece of furniture for that?
4. Baby Monitor - He sleeps in our room in a co-sleeper. So when he starts stirring, Krystal hears and tends to him. It seems funny to me that people put their baby in a whole other room, close the door and then put a microphone next to it so they can hear it.
5. Nanny / Daycare - I know that a lot of people I know don't have (or are planning on hiring) a nanny. But to the people who do, why did you have kids? The kid is so in the way that you need to hire someone else to watch it all day so you can go back to your 'normal' lifestyle. Just like daycare. I'm going to have a child, then hire someone else to watch him all day so I can try to go back to how my life was before I had a kid. Why am I one of the few people that thinks that's ass backwards? If you want your life to be exactly the same as before you had kids, you shouldn't have kids. It's a big change that you need to make adjustments and sacrifices for. It's much harder financial in our family with Krystal not working and she liked working, but we make sacrifices that benefit the baby.
6. All The Other Unnecessary Items: Breathing monitor: you're paranoid. Bath tub temp gauge: You can't touch the water and tell how hot it is? You might need to see a doctor because you have nerve damage or something. Pacifiers that say "Reduces SIDS": How? How does the company know that and how could a pacifier possible reduce something that the doctor's can't figure out what is causing it. They just print that shit on there to scare you into buying their pacifiers.
Basically, we're sold a lot of unnecessary stuff all the time and number 6 is an example of that stuff. But there are some things that are so ingrained into people minds that you have to have for your baby that I think some people don't realize how easy it is without these things. Even easier some times I think. So they get all shocked that you are going to not use this common item that they have no problem displaying their lack of confidence that you will stick to your decision. And it's not like I'm forcing myself to not use some of these things out of spite, I had to really think to come up with these items because I had forgotten all about them. Imagine someone with a baby that forgets about the use of a stroller. It must not be as important as people make it out to be.
1. Stroller - We take the baby out and Krystal puts him in a wrap or I put him in the Jeep carrier. I couldn't imagine folding up a big ass stroller and loading into the trunk and then pulling it out when we go on a outing where we'd be walking around a bunch. It seems backwards. It seems like the stroller would be more work than just having the baby in a carrier.
2. Disposable Diapers - I don't get disposable diapers. And people going, "Oh, it's so much more work to use cloth diapers. You'll get tired of that fast". Those people are crazy. First, how much money do you waste on disposable diapers? And, no, cloth diapers aren't cheap. But when he outgrows some, we sell the small ones and buy some bigger ones. Can you sell your used disposable diapers? No. It costs WAY more to use disposables. Plus the clothes diapers are SUPER easy to use. A lot of times you open up the outside diaper and just change out the pad inside. Some extra loads of laundry, big deal. Plus, since the invention of disposable diapers, the percentage of babies with diaper rash has gone from 7% to like 84%. Because disposables are to absorbent, cause two problems. 1) the baby doesn't feel wet as fast, keeping the pee (which is ammonia) on it's skin causing diaper rash. 2) making the baby not feel wet as often (ie. making the baby uncomfortable) which makes it more difficult to potty train. Not to mention the sheer wastefulness of disposables. I know the "most of our garbage is disposable diapers" idea is a myth. They account for only 1% of our garbage, but it's still a lot of waste considering how much we make in a year.
3. Changing Table - We have a couple changing tables. One's called the bed, another is called the co-sleeper. I need a whole other piece of furniture for that?
4. Baby Monitor - He sleeps in our room in a co-sleeper. So when he starts stirring, Krystal hears and tends to him. It seems funny to me that people put their baby in a whole other room, close the door and then put a microphone next to it so they can hear it.
5. Nanny / Daycare - I know that a lot of people I know don't have (or are planning on hiring) a nanny. But to the people who do, why did you have kids? The kid is so in the way that you need to hire someone else to watch it all day so you can go back to your 'normal' lifestyle. Just like daycare. I'm going to have a child, then hire someone else to watch him all day so I can try to go back to how my life was before I had a kid. Why am I one of the few people that thinks that's ass backwards? If you want your life to be exactly the same as before you had kids, you shouldn't have kids. It's a big change that you need to make adjustments and sacrifices for. It's much harder financial in our family with Krystal not working and she liked working, but we make sacrifices that benefit the baby.
6. All The Other Unnecessary Items: Breathing monitor: you're paranoid. Bath tub temp gauge: You can't touch the water and tell how hot it is? You might need to see a doctor because you have nerve damage or something. Pacifiers that say "Reduces SIDS": How? How does the company know that and how could a pacifier possible reduce something that the doctor's can't figure out what is causing it. They just print that shit on there to scare you into buying their pacifiers.
Basically, we're sold a lot of unnecessary stuff all the time and number 6 is an example of that stuff. But there are some things that are so ingrained into people minds that you have to have for your baby that I think some people don't realize how easy it is without these things. Even easier some times I think. So they get all shocked that you are going to not use this common item that they have no problem displaying their lack of confidence that you will stick to your decision. And it's not like I'm forcing myself to not use some of these things out of spite, I had to really think to come up with these items because I had forgotten all about them. Imagine someone with a baby that forgets about the use of a stroller. It must not be as important as people make it out to be.
Thursday, April 15, 2010
Day 76: The Baby is a Tool
I mean the baby is a tool for my entertainment. Not like my baby is a tool that's on that reality show Jersey Shore. We were playing with Photobooth on the Mac.
Day 76: All's Well
Things are going pretty well with the baby. Krystal spends the days encouraging him to sit up and roll over and he's doing really well at it. He was able to hold his head up on his own fairly early. Of course that's compared to what the "norm" is which I think is a bunch of bologna. I think a lot of parents just wait for that certain age to start teaching their child to do stuff. If the norm is 3-4 months before it can hold it's head up completely, so that's what you wait for. Well, we did things to encourage him to hold his head up and his muscles developed faster and he holds his head up fine at 2 1/2 months. Kids start school around 5 years old. Why? Who decided that? Why not start teaching you kid as soon as you can? But people wait for those "milestones". They're just arbitrary numbers that baby industry made up. That's why we want to home-school. We will have complete control over when we teach our kid what. And we'll be able to make sure the information he is taught is accurate, which unfortunately in public school it isn't.
We have a while until then, but for now we just keep helping him on his way and he's taking to it with surprising ease.
We have a while until then, but for now we just keep helping him on his way and he's taking to it with surprising ease.
Sunday, April 11, 2010
Day 72: Share the Love
I'm working on a DVD to send out to family members with some videos and a picture slideshow on it. I got one that works well in our DVD player, but then I tweaked a few things and burned another one and it doesn't work right. I hopefully have the problem solved and can make some copies. I'm downloading a new version of iDVD so I'm ready for the next time I want to make a DVD. Hopefully the newer version will work better.
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