Dead Arm

Today, Jadon woke up from his nap a little early, and he was crying. He was obviously pretty upset about something-- it was obvious by the type of crying he was using. So I went up to see what was wrong, and I opened his door and he continued to cry a little, which is unual. He usually stops crying the minute the door starts moving opened. As I moved further into the room, I see him SITTING in his crib... also unusual... he normally stands up the minute he wakes up. Also unusual was the fact that he had tears on his face... he rarely ever crys in a way that requires tears.
Anyways, so I asked him what was wrong, and he points to his left hand immediately and wimpers some more. So I picked him up to see what was wrong with his hand, and couldnt find anything out of place or any ouchies or anything abnormal.
I brought him downstairs and he sat on my lap, and started sucking his fingers (on his left hand). It was then that I noticed the great big red mark on the underside of his arm... like he had been laying on it while he was sleeping. So i'm 99.9% sure that he woke up and had a "dead" arm and it probably scared him and probably hurt a little too. I know it always hurts me when my arm falls alseep!
So anywho, it was just the cutest thing and I wanted to share the story with you all! He sleeps in the weirdest, most uncomfortable looking positions most of the time, so i'm not surprised that he slept on a limb and it fell asleep on him.


Here's a picture of one of his most popular sleeping positions... not sure how having your butt up in the air like that can be even the least bit comfortable!!! :)

Eating like a big boy

So, Jadon's eating has greatly improved lately! He is eating with a bowl... let me rephrase... he's eating with a bowl that doesn't suction to the table, and not throwing it! He does start to play with it after he starts getting full, but we just take it away from him then. We are finding less and less food on the floor (hallelujah!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) and more going into his tummy.

Since we've been having such great luck with his eating, a couple days ago we started letting him use a spoon to eat, and to our joy, he uses it just like he's supposed to! We have tried a spoon in the past, and he just wasn't able to get the hang of it. I've been working with him and his spoon in the mornings with his oatmeal, and daddy taught him how to use his little fork to stab foods. He is doing really good! I'm so proud of him! I was afraid we were never going to get out of the horribly messy eating habits stage, but I think we are on our way finally! Don't get me wrong, meals are still messy, but at least i'm not on my hands and knees for 10 minutes cleaning up the floor anymore!

Here's a couple pix of him this morning eating his oatmeal.... I tried to load a video, but for some reason it would never load, so you'll have to settle for pictures unless I can figure out why the video wouldnt load.

Lord, Have Mercy!!!

So the last few days i've tried shortening Jadon's nap to see if it will help him go down at night better. Here's how its gone so far.

Monday, I shortened his nap to an hour and a half. (He has been known to take 3 hour naps during the day). That night he went down very well, without a complaint!

Tuesday, again I tried an hour and a half nap. Didnt go as well that night... he would not go to sleep until late again. Grrrrr!

Wednesday... so after the night before, I thought ok, i'll shorten the nap another 15 minutes. So one hour and 15 minute nap. Last night didnt go well again. He would not go to sleep when we put him to bed.... was screaming like he was dying or something, it was horrible. I was so frustrated that at 9:30pm I decided I needed to clean the refrigerator. Cleaning always gives me a sense of control and helps me think through my frustrations. So I pulled out all the food, all the shelves and washed everything down by hand and dried it. Finally about 10:30pm Derek got Jadon to sleep. (He woke up again at 1am, and thats another problem we will be working on after we get this going to bed thing solved.)

So, today, Thursday, I am going to try a half hour nap and see if that makes any bit of difference. Or we could just keep him up until at least 10pm every night! He's like the energizer bunny at night, I swear!! Hopefully mommy wont lose her mind with this short nap!

But, at least I have a clean refrigerator now! :)

18 Month Check-up

Jadon had his 18 month checkup today. I'm always so excied for his appointments to see how much he's grown, and see how well he's doing. This appointment didn't end up being as good though.
He grew a little bit (is 33 inches tall now), but barely gained any weight... just a few ounces. That's pretty normal since he's so much more active now, and he's always been a little on the tall/skinny side! You have seen his daddy, right????? ;)

Anyways, everything is looking fine! No shots today! He was supposed to have a Hep A shot, but was just 2 days too early to get it done, so he will get it done in November when he gets a flu shot.

A hot topic of conversation at his appointments has always been his sleeping issues. Lately, Jadon has not been wanting to go to sleep at night, and has been up until midnight some nights before finally going to sleep. She said he might not need a nap anymore, or we just need to shorten his nap, or make it earlier. (UGH!!!!!!!!!!) So, we are going to try shortening the nap some. The pediatrician said to never let him sleep longer than 2 hours. So, i'll be waking him at 1.5 hours to start with. This was not the news I was hoping for! His nap time is also mommy's "lunch break" time where I get chores done around the house and relax a little!

Random

Derek and I do the Blockbuster movie rental thing for $4 a month. We get to watch two movies of our choice every month, and they mail one to us, we watch it, then mail it back, and then they send us the next movie. Two movies a month is plenty for us, plus its so nice to not have to go anywhere to get a movie!
But anyways, a couple nights ago, we watched Meet The Robinsons (another Disney movie). I remember seeing previews for it when I was pregnant with Jadon, and they always made me laugh. So we finally got to see it, and I was a little worried that it wouldnt end up being that great, but it turned out to be a really good movie! It ended on a "feel good" note, and I always like that! Anyways, 2 enthusiastic thumbs up to that movie!

On a different note, I'm trying to decide if I want to enroll Jadon in swimming again, or if I want to do something different. He is 18 months old today, and there are a couple things in the Albany Parks and Recreation activity guide that he can do now. He could do a music class, but im afraid it would end up being all girls in the class. Theres also a Lil' Kickers (soccer) program for 18-24 month olds..... I thought about doing that... its on saturdays, so Derek could do it with us as well, however its $100 for just 10 sessions. Swimming is $50 for 10 sessions. So, i'm not sure what to do....I have to decide fast though because classes start in a week!! Yikes!!!

Locks of Love

So my hair has gotten pretty long again. Its just a couple inches shorter than it was on my wedding day, which is pretty long! Anyways, I've always wanted to donate my hair to Locks of Love, and thought about doing that this time. They need 10 inches off of your hair, so I thought i'd grow my hair out a few more inches so that I could have a long enough bob when I cut it off that I could still pull it back into a ponytail. However, I went to their website to read about the other qualifications your hair has to meet in order to be acceptable to donate.

It turns out, they accept colored or permed hair, but not highlighted hair (because its bleached). Stink! I guess my horribly crappy $6 summer highlights were a complete bomb afterall. So, I dont know what to do now. I really do want to donate but I dont know if I'll ever have my hair really long again (afterall, I am a mom now, and the more kids you have, the shorter it gets.....or so i've heard!) ;)

So, I'm bummed.

Signing

So Jadon's beginning to pick up some signs, and im so excited! He always does the sign for "dog" almost everytime he sees a dog now! He will also do alot of signs after he sees them done on TV or by me, but doesnt quite associate the sign with the object yet... other than dog. Its really cute and exciting though!

As for me, I know well over 50 words now! I stopped counting at 50 a couple weeks ago. Even Derek used a sign the other day, so I know he knows at least one sign! :)

What a weekend.

Well, I was looking forward to a nice, quiet, uneventful weekend after having had a busy week.... I should know better than to think that a quiet weekend would've actually happened!

It all started on thursday night when Jadon got diarrhea. I thought it was because he had had alot of juice last week, and we dont normally give him juice, but Jadon's great-grandparents were here visiting from Florida, so we had been eating away from home alot, and he had more juice last week than he's had his whole live! Anyways, after a couple diarrhea episodes, he was fine, and was back to solid poo's by friday.

Friday evening at about 8pm, Jadon started throwing up. Then about 30 minutes later, Derek starts to feel sick and ends up throwing up as well. Jadon threw up every 15 minutes until about 11pm, then I finally got him to sleep... to which he woke up 45 minutes later to throw up again.... then went right back to sleep until 1:15am when the freezer made noise and woke him up. We were downstairs sleeping surrounded by towels because Derek was upstairs throwing up every 2o minutes or so for the entire night! Anyways, at 1:15am when Jadon woke up, he was requesting water, and so I gave him a few sips every few minutes. But he was also starving to death and was wining and begging for food. I was hesitant to give him anything because I didnt want him to throw it back up again, but after he was able to keep his water down, I decided i'd give him some yogurt. We took it very very slowly, and he kept that down, and then started playing! Kids are so resiliant! The next day, he had a little bit more diarrhea, but other than that, he was fine!

Derek on the other hand continued to throw up at least once an hour all day saturday. He wasnt keeping anything down, not even sips of water. Thanks to this Gilberts Syndrome, everytime he gets stomach bugs, he usually is out of commision for many days. Today is tuesday, and he is still home from work trying to get his strength back, but he is eating and drinking now, and has an appetite.

After the last time Derek had a stomach bug several years ago, and we took him to the E.R. because he wouldnt stop throwing up, it was then that I decided that I would become a major germaphob and strive to keep the house and everything in it as germ-free as possible, and constantly remind Derek to wash his hands before he eats lunch, etc. Since then, we have stayed pretty darn healthy!! But now we have Jadon, and everyone wants to kiss him on the lips and feed him from their spoons, and let him put his hands in their mouths, etc. At the risk of sounding like a majorly freak germaphobic person, i'd like to request that you keep your kisses to his cheeks, and your spoons to yourselves, and don't let him put his hands in your mouths. I know, he is a kid and the germs will find him, but i'd like to do as much as I can to ensure that we keep these stomach bugs away for Derek's sake. I appreciate your cooperation even if you do think that I am a nutcase.... but I know Derek feels the same way about the germs, especially after the weekend he had!

Anyways, back to the story. I ended up with a migraine and the runs as well on saturday. Jadon was horribly clingy for the whole weekend, and I couldnt even go to the kitchen without him throwing a tantrum. I spent Sunday and Monday trying to clean up the house and doing laundry. By the way, is there any special way to get vomit out of carpet? I think I did a pretty good job, got most of it cleaned up fairly well immediately after it happened, then I went back over it yesterday and scrubbed the daylights out of it to get the odor out, and a few lingering stains. Now it looks like new carpet compared to the rest of the carpet!

On a positive note, I lost over 5lbs! On a negative note, Derek also lost over 5 lbs! lol!

Well, this is a slightly depressing sounding post, not to mention its not very pleasant, so i'll stop here and post more pleasant things later on! :) Hope the rest of you had a much better weekend than we did!