Where does the time go?

I am so bad. It's been months since I've blogged. Or atleast it seems like it. Life is so crazy busy right now its hard to find the time. I feel terrible I haven't updated things and I don't want to look back and have nothing to show for months at a time....

Things have been picking up alot for me at work and I have been super busy there. So after I get home from work, play with the munchkin, make dinner, clean up the kitchen, play some more, then put the munchkin to bed, then do some more chores, I am usually too tired to get on the computer. I always say I am going to make more time, and I really would love to, but we shall see....

I will try to get things caught up without going on for too long.

We have been in the new house for a little over a month now and we love it. The past year was hard as far as our living situation, but everything definitely worked out for the best and we couldn't be happier about it. We are pretty much settled. Everything is unpacked and put away. All that is left to do is hang some more things up on the wall. Right now my computer room is full of stuff that still needs to be hung up or set out somewhere. I just leave the door shut and most of the time pretend its not there. And since I rarely go in there to get on the computer anyway, that's not very hard to do.

Things are also getting much busier for Joe at work. This is great in many ways obviously, but since he is going to school now as well, lots more paperwork and lots of homework is alot to juggle. He is doing great though. I am so proud of him. His grades have been so good and he has been working really hard.

I have been on a new diet. I have been doing the HCG diet. Some of you may have heard of it, but if you are like me you never knew anything about it before. My sister decided to do it and once she told me about it, I thought she was crazy and that it sounded like a ridiculous idea. So I got online and researched it so that I could tell her it wasn't a safe diet, but the more I researched it, the better it sounded and I decided to try it myself. I am on day 25 and I have lost 18.5 lbs!! They are drops that I take under my tongue 3x a day, along with an extremely healthy low calorie diet. I am doing the homeopathic version, so it is safer with absolutely no side effects (there are also injections and prescriptions that you can get from a doc, but this is a little different) and I gotta say, I am feeling fantastic and my baby fat is finally going away! The diet is way to complex to explain right now, maybe I will try to dedicate a blog entry to it later. If you are curious though, just google homeopathic HCG diet. Or check out this link for a quick synopsis: HCG Diet Its absolutely crazy how amazing this diet is and how it has changed my life. Not only is it getting ridding of my stubborn baby fat, I have increased energy, and even my skin and hair are looking better. I wouldn't believe it if I wasn't going through it myself!

Update: Knowing what I know now, however, I would NOT recommend the HCG diet as a healthy way to lose weight.

Saturday is Joe's 30th birthday party. I am so excited. We rented out the top floor of a bar that we used to hang out at alot and there are a bunch of people coming. Some people we haven't even seen since the munchkin was born. I can't wait!! My friend Sarah is making his birthday cake and I am sooooo excited to see how it turns out. I will definitely post some pics. She is an amazing cake artist and I am always amazed with her creations. Joe is a huge Grateful Dead fan and she is going to design his cake in 3D to replicate the little train station from the cover of the Terrapin Station album. I can't wait to see it!

The munchkin is growing so fast, I just can't believe it. She is pulling up and walking along furniture, but not quite walking on her own yet. I expect that she will be doing that very soon though. She can crawl so fast, its crazy! She just starting feeding herself a little. I give her little gerber puffs and she can stick them in her mouth. For the longest time she would hold them in her fist, bring her fist to her mouth, but then she wouldn't open her fist. She would get so frustrated! So just last night she made a breakthrough and seems to be finally figuring things out. She is starting to get her pincher grasp going. She still has NO teeth! She is doing pretty good at mashing up some foods in her mouth, but I am kinda wary to give her too much without any teeth. She has started to clap a little bit. She babbles all the time. It's like she is having entire conversations in her little baby language. She has kinda started saying ma-ma-ma and da-da-da but I'm not totally sure she is really talking about us. My friend Gina watched her last week and worked on signing the word "more" with her. She actually seemed to be getting it!

I am so inlove with this little girl, I just can't believe how much she has changed our lives and how happy she has made us. I just never knew you could love someone this much. She just turned 9 months on the 9th. I can't believe that she is going to be a year old in only 2.5 months... time really does fly!

We are LOVING LOVING LOVING our new babysitter situation. First of all, it takes me 6 minutes to get to Stacy's house from mine, so to say she lives close is an understatement. I get up for work in the morning and give the munchkin her bottle, I then dress her and get her ready for the day. Then I put her in her pack n play with some toys and I leave for work. Joe finishes getting ready for work, then he feeds her breakfast and takes her to the sitter. I get off work at 3:00, then head straight to the sitter. I arrive around 3:15 to 3:30 depending on traffic. She is usually just waking up for her nap or still sleeping when I get there. I have known her sitter since high school so we were already friends. So sometimes, when she is still sleeping, I will just hang out and chat for a while until she wakes up. Once she does, I give her a bottle and we head home. She loves playing with Stacy's little boy and there is another little girl there too. She seems really happy there and everything is working out great. When Stacy needs a day off for vacation or whatever, the munchkin goes to her original sitter's house (our very first one) who she loves too and gets to play with her little girl Ada. It is so great to have such a wonderful back up as well and to have people that I really like and trust taking care of my little baby.

Here she is going swimming for the first time!! She was so scared and nervous at first, but then she finally warmed up to it.


Here she is with her little cousin.


And I will leave you with this video. Her little cuz kept trying to chew on her ear. It cracks me up....

Third times a charm... Another New Sitter, a 7 month Birthday, and Lots of More Changes...

Well the little munchkin had her 7th month birthday last Friday. I can't believe I haven't blogged since she turned 6 months... well, actually I can.... since I was having issues keeping up with my blog anyway...

Alot has changed in the past month! We finally closed on our house, March 17th. It was the best St. Patrick's day ever. I can't even describe the relief I felt signing those papers. It felt so good to close that chapter and put that behind us. The villa has been working out okay, although we are already ready to move again. We have a 6 month lease, and we are really thinking we might move again when its up, which is at the end of June. I love the neighborhood that we are in, mainly because when me and the munchkin go for our walk each evening, we stroll through beautiful streets with very different and unique homes that all wrap around a huge lake that you can see for a good chunk of most of our walking routes. There are also so many different directions we can go in and different things to see, which helps to keep things interesting. The court our villa resides on, however, is not the best location. There are about 100 kids that live on the same court and they are usually all outside for most of the day. When we come home, their bikes are laying in our driveway and we have to sit and wait while they move everything out of the way. I am not kidding, they are everywhere. And they are rude. Nothing like walking out of your house and getting dirty looks from a kid standing in your drive way. Yep... time to move on. And before the munchkin is old enough to meet any of these little shits.

We also have a new babysitter. Our third one. And I am really hoping that this one will be for a long time. Our first one told us she couldn't babysit the munchkin anymore. We were devastated, but one of my good friends, Laura, stepped up and told us she would help us out and start watching her and for the same very discounted price that our previous sitter was watching her for. We were so relieved. We were still paying all of the utilities at the other house and had zero room in the budget for any more expenses.

Things seemed great at first, but after a while I began to realize that it just wasn't a good fit for us. Laura also has 3 beautiful children that are turning out great, so obviously she is a great mom, but she just has a completely different parenting style then I do and different ideas of how things should be done. And maybe my little one just has a totally different personality then her kiddos, but whatever the case, it wasn't working. Our main issue was with her naps. Half of the time when I would pick up her up, Laura would tell me that she didn't get a nap in that day. I then had to prepare myself to spend the evening with a very crabby baby. Often she would pass out in the car as soon as we got in it and I would find myself driving around for over an hour just so she would get a good nap in before we got home. This was getting expensive in gas money alone!

I guess I was hoping she would be on more of a schedule. Not a strict schedule, just a loose one... where she would get her bottles in and take a good nap (or two) and have lunch around the same time each day. She really thrives on this kind of schedule and when she is on one, it makes each evening so much better and she is in such a better mood. When she eats more solid foods during the day she also sleeps better, and sometimes Laura's busy schedule didn't have time to get all of this stuff in. The munchkin was more along for the ride when she was at Laura's house, and Laura is a very busy person, so there was really no way to have her on any kind of schedule. Plus it was really hard for the munchkin to sleep over there. She likes it to be quiet and dark, and that was just impossible at Laura's. Between her kids being home from cycle break or just off from school half the time, her dogs barking at the wind blowing outside, and there not being her own space to take a nap, the odds were just against it.

Last Friday, was when I finally decided it was time to make a change. Laura's daughter had strep throat and she took the little munchkin with them to the doctor and had her sick daughter giving her a bottle in the car on the way there. She called me and told when when they were already on their way to the doctor's office. I was freaking out! When I came to pick her up, I asked her if she would call me earlier next time so that I could come and get her because I didn't really want her around anyone with strep throat. She kinda laughed at me like I was being paranoid and said that it wasn't like her daughter was drinking out of her bottle. All weekend I was worried she was going to get sick. It's scary for a little baby to get strep throat. It's highly contagious and although infants don't usually get it because of their small tonsils and the antibodies they are born with, it can cause alot of problems for a baby, especially if it isn't diagnosed right away. Then munchkin is 7 mos now... so she is kinda moving out of the "infant" age anyway.

So last Thursday was her last day at Laura's. And all though it was sad to say goodbye, and very hard to tell her, it is very obvious already that we made a very good decision. And she is still at an age where the transition wasn't very bad at all. Infact, she seemed to not mind one little bit. I am glad this happened sooner rather then later, because as she gets older, uprooting her from her babysitter and sending her to a new one is going to be much more difficult. It's amazing how fast things can change. Starting last friday, I began working on "her" schedule. And I really do mean her schedule. She has been wanting one so bad and now that I have been following her lead and sticking to it, she has been so incredible happy. With her getting better naps and eating more during the day, I have been going in and rubbing her back and giving her a binky instead of a bottle during the night and she is now sleeping through the entire night! She is now sleeping 11.5 hours straight! Every night! And we are going on 5 nights in a row! I am so freaking happy about this. We are all getting sleep and every one is so much happier.

So here is a rough outline of her schedule:

7:30am - 6 oz bottle
8:15am - breakfast, oatmeal
10:00am - 6 oz bottle
10:15am - nap (1-1.5 hours)
12:00pm - lunch, veggies and fruit
1:00pm - 6 oz bottle
2:00pm - nap (1-2 hrs)
4:00pm - 6 oz bottle
5:00pm - dinner, veggies and fruit
7:00pm - 6 oz bottle
8:00pm - down for bed

I have been waking her up at 7:30am and giving her a bottle. I leave at 8 and Joe feeds her oatmeal before he leaves to take her to the sitter. Who knows how long this will last, but I gotta say she seems incredible happy about it. She seems so giddy... like literally bursting with joy half the time. It is so funny. She finally switched to 6 oz bottles once she started sleeping through the night too. Before that she was getting a 4 oz bottle every 2 hours. Its so much easier having a 3 hour window now between her bottles.

When I picked her up from Stacy's, our new sitter's house yesterday, she had the munchkin sound asleep for her 2nd nap in her pack n play in their spare bedroom. The room was nice and quiet, dark and with a fan going. It was perfect. I could have kissed her. She was sleeping so soundly infact, that I ended up staying and waiting around for 45 minutes while she finished her nap. When she woke up, I gave her a bottle and we were on our way! And we had such a good evening. When she gets her 2 good naps in at the sitter's house, she is wide awake and in a good mood the rest of the evening until it's time for bed. So the time I get to spend with her in the evening is so much better then her being crabby and me having to fight to get her to take a nap, and then she doesn't go to bed as well either. I had given Stacy the outline of her schedule and she was able to follow it with no problem, because really it was what the munchkin wanted all along. Stacy also watches another little girl that is about the same age as her own little boy, who is about 1.5 yrs. She has the other two napping at about the same times already, so the munchkin seems to fit right in with their schedule too. So she has a total of 3 little children there now. I think it will be more fun for her there, having the other little kids to entertain her.

Our new sitter is also more expensive and since we are looking to find a house to rent, in a better area for us, and maybe something a little bigger and with a yard, I had to go pick up some more hours at work. I am also working again on Wednesdays and although I am going to miss having this day off with her, I am happy that it is all working out for the best. I am now working 8:30 - 3:00, M-F (I was previously working 9-2 with Wednesdays off). Picking up the extra 12.5 hours a week is making a big enough difference in my paycheck so that we can afford the new sitter and spend a little more towards our rent. Now we just need to find a new place! And it has not escaped me how fortunate I am to have a boss that is so flexible with me and willing to work so well with my ever changing schedule.

The munchkin is now sitting up like a pro and has started to work on her crawling. She is so interested in her toys and is handling them really good back and forth with her hands. She will sit on a blanket and play with her toys forever. She still lets me know when she wants me to pick her up though. It's still her favorite place to be. She has her bottom teeth starting to show through her gums but they haven't broken all the way through yet. She has been getting much better at eating her solid foods, but she still doesn't quite get what they are for. If she is hungry she gets mad and lets me know that she wants a bottle... so still doesn't realize that the food serves the same purpose. Her favorite veggie right now is a mixture of butternut squash and corn and her favorite fruit is pears. She is not a big fan of sweet peas. She is still in the 95th percentile for her height and is in the 75th for weight. She is a big girl! Her feet are still super small though. She is still wearing the hand me down socks that her younger cousin grew out of months ago! She loves to laugh and will squeal with delight if you tickle her or bring her in close and make noises in her ear. She has really become such a happy baby. And for the most part, unless she is tired or hungry she is usually in a really good mood.

We have been walking in the evenings around 5 or 5:30 and will usually walk for 2.5 - 3.5 miles. The munchkin loves to look around and see everything. Sometimes she will fall asleep half way through and sleep the rest of the way. And if the sun is in her face she will get really mad and let me know right away! Luckily, our stroller has a great shade on it that can be adjusted to block the sun from pretty much any direction. Sarah, our original babysitter, and her little girl Ada join us for many of our walks and will often stay afterwards to hang out and eat dinner. This has been great, especially the nights Joe is at school. Sarah's husband is usually at school in the evening too, so it works out well for both of us really.

The past weekend I finally got to get out and get some adult time... and I really had a blast! Friday night I left Joe at home after I put the muchkin to be and went to a party at a friends house. I only had 3 drinks but I couldn't drive, and had to leave my car behind while a friend took me home. What a lightweight! Then Saturday night, my mom came over to babysit while Joe and I went to a friend's 30th bday party at a bar. The Captain and Diet Cokes were flowing and I couldn't even tell you how many I had! Some of my girlfriends came up to meet us and we tore up the dance floor. It felt so good to let loose and not have to worry about anything but having fun! And since my mom was at home with the baby, I didn't have to worry about her at all. When we got home, she said that she went to bed around 8:00 really well for her and hadn't heard a peep from her since. 7:30 am came quick though and it was really rough getting out of bed... good thing she was sleeping through the night now though.... no more middle of the night bottles.... Yay!!!!

Here were some pics taken by others throughout the night. Yes, I was completely out of control.

There's me and my gal Toni on the far right.

It was our friend Cort's 30th bday and there's his fiance Brenda between us.

Here I am motorboatin' Toni...

And here's Nicole, me and Toni. I am a little intoxicated as you can tell.

This is what happens when you don't get out enough!

Sorry for this very long-winded catch up.... but there has been so much going on and I really wanted to try to get some of it down. And with my new hours at work, I am here longer, so it's not so crazy busy and I actually have some time to blog again. Woo Hoo! I am going to work on a photo update tonight!!

New Year... New Life

I have been missing my blog... and my bloggy friends! Do you guys even remember me? Things have been so crazy busy lately... I barely have time for anything. My list of things to do is always filling up faster then I can mark things off. So many things have changed in our lives recently and I have been feeling so displaced and overwhelmed. Where to start...

We moved into our new villa on the 11th. We were a little nervous about moving out of our home before we had sold it, but have you ever had a house on the market with an infant? It's impossible to keep things ready to "show" every day. Each night after putting the munchkin to bed, I would have to have then entire house cleaned, and ready to go incase anyone wanted to stop in for a showing while we were at work. It kept me up very late and ofcourse, I was still getting up through the night to feed the baby. The day we moved it was about 5 degrees outside. Our helpful friends were loving us, I'm sure. Luckily we had about 8 guys and 4 girls, so things went much faster then we expected. And since we were only moving 2.5 miles away, that made things easier too.

Here we are, all bundled up getting ready to move!

So we are now in the villa, along with all of our worldly possessions. We are anything but unpacked and settled. Having an infant also stunts the progress on this as well. I try to complete atleast one project per evening, if I can accomplish anything more it's a bonus. I have to get everything done at some point this way, right? Also trying to fit an entire 3 bedroom house into a 2 bedroom villa has been a challenge as well. Still at the old house, I have a huge pile of things headed to a friends for a garage sale we are going to have in the spring and an even bigger pile of things to be dropped off at Goodwill. There are various piles of things placed throughout the villa that I have yet to determine where the heck they will end up. Luckily we have a basement, but it is about a 1/4 the size of our previous basement.

Our bedrooms our now upstairs as opposed to our ranch. This has me all mixed up. I have never lived in a 2 story home. I have never wanted to either. I like having everything on the same level. Especially with a baby... everything is just so much easier to access. And with our laundry room now in the basement, the clothes have to be taken down 2 flights, and then back up 2 flights. This is a huge adjustment! My husband has already lost 12 lbs since we moved. Seriously. His office is set up in the basement too, so he is constantly climbing stairs.

Yesterday we finally got an offer on our house!! The closing date is set for March 29th. It's farther away then we would have hoped, but we certainly aren't complaining. There's finally a light at the end of that tunnel!

So the same week we moved into our new place, the munchkin's babysitter tells us she couldn't watch her anymore. We were devastated. With everything else going on... I thought I was going to lose my mind. We had based the location of our villa and how much rent we could afford on where her babysitter lived and what our budget was with how much she was charging us. Which was less then your average daycare. We thought she would be there for a long time. For a couple of years... till she went to preschool or even till kindergarten. Definitely longer then 1.5 months anyway. When we first found out, my husband thought he was going to have to put off starting school, and probably get a 2nd job so that we could either afford to send her to a new daycare/sitter or so that I could stay home full time. That night I called my friend Laura, who had offered to watch the munchkin while I was pregnant. I told her what was going on and she (thank god) offered to watch her for the same price. We were so relieved. I was very nervous about switching her to a new place. Munchkin really seemed to like where she was and with all of her reflux issues, and all the other major changes going on.... I just wasn't sure how she would react.

So far so good. She seems to love Laura. Laura couldn't watch her on Wednesdays, so I have added an extra hour to my work schedule on the other days so that I could now have Wednesdays off. I am loving this new schedule and so far the transition seems to be going pretty smoothly. She doesn't babysit any other kids right now and recently quit watching a little boy she had for 4 years who she lost to preschool. She misses him terribly, so the little munchkin is coming just in time to cheer her up and steal her heart away :)

Here she is meeting Laura's kiddos for the first time. She has 3 kids all in junior high.



Joe just started back at school this week. He has to start with some basics and then will be starting the nursing program once he is finished with that. He has classes Mon through Wednesday so by the time Thursday got here, I was really missing him! Its another big adjustment....

So there's a quick update on our crazy lives lately. I am hoping things start to calm down soon. I am going to try really hard to write a blog in the next day or so with some more pics and an update on how the little munchkin is doing. She has changed soooo much in the last couple of months. She is getting so big so fast, I can hardly believe it sometimes. Here's a few pics till then.

Joe with the munchkin and her cousin.

Me holding the babies.

Merry Christmas!

Giving her monkey a big hug.

Okay... back to work!

“Those who wish to sing always find a song.” ~ Swedish Proverb

I warn you, this post will be LONG. I have a few things to update today. I have some good news about my job and the compromise my boss and I have come up with. I also have a pretty good idea of who will be watching my little one while I am working. But before I get to that, I have got to tell you all about the maternity pillow that the fedex driver delivered to my home yesterday. Please see last post for a photo.

I was skeptical at first. When I first unleashed what I am now going to refer to as The Beast, who was stuffed into an impossibly small box, I was concerned he (the beast is male, ofcourse) was going to take up too much room in the bed. I did get a little frustrated when I wrestled with him to remove his case for washing. I found later it was even more difficult to put back on, but I managed. When my hubs got home from his softball game, he stared warily at The Beast as it eyed him from the bed. He too was a little concerned about giving up some of his space. We have a queen sized mattress, but my hubs is 6'3" and tends to need a little more then his half. But at the end of the evening, we all climbed into the bed together and I settled into the arms of The Beast, a little unsure of what the night would bring. The Beast and I managed to stay within the boundaries of my half of the bed. The Beast was soft, but not too soft. He was firm, but not too firm. He felt just right. I could feel my stomach and my back being supported simultaneously, as my head comfortably rested at the top. One leg over, one leg under, and everything was being lifted, held in and fully supported. I was very hopeful and amazed. But the true test would be sleeping through the night.

My typical night as of late, has been spent tossing and turning, going from one very uncomfortable position to, at best, a slightly less uncomfortable one. In the morning I rise to deep throbbing pain in both of my hips, my shoulders ache, and I have terrible back pain.

But last night, I slept on a cloud.

I vaguely remember waking up in a foggyy haze, maybe twice, to go pee, then quickly drifting back to sleep when I returned. I haven't had such a good, restful nights sleep since.... well since before I started looking pregnant. I may have even been more comfortable then before I became pregnant. When I woke up, I had absolutely zero back pain, and even though there was a faint dull feeling of pain in my hips, it was barely noticeable, and it may have been an impovement still over how they had felt before I got into bed in the first place. I woke up refreshed and ready to go!

Lets just say I am ecstatic over how wonderful The Beast made me feel last night! I can not wait to return to his healing arms this evening. If you are pregnant, or if you know anyone that is, get this pillow! It is worth every penny, and many more! I am sure this pillow would do wonders for even those who are not pregnant, but have other issues that may cause them to have a hard time getting comfortable in bed. I don't know how easy it will be to give up The Beast post-pregnancy. He may just be around for a while.

If you are interested, you can find this amazing pillow here: The Beast

As far as my job situation after the munchkin is here, things are looking much better then they did last week. Its' amazing how things can seem so terrible at one moment, then nearly resolved the next. Yesterday morning, I came to him with some new ideas. I proposed that I come into work M-F from 9-1. I had originally been hoping to work 7-11, which would work much better for me, but 9-1 would allow for there to be someone else here when my boss was gone for his 11:30 - 1:00 lunch break every day, so that my coworker would not be left alone to hold down the fort. Supposedly, we have an office manager, but she is hit or miss... its a long story. I told him that I would then dedicate 4 hours each day to work from home as well. I assured him that my work would get done, that I would still have my head in the game, and asked that we atleast give it a try. He agreed! I wanted to cry, I was so relieved! Actually I did cry... these hormones make me cry pretty easily though.

So, for now, that is the plan.

I am still going to have to figure out how & where to breastpump atleast once during that time frame, but I am not going to worry about that just yet.

I have also been trying to figure out what to do about daycare. I will need someone to watch munchkin from about 8:30 - 1:30 each day. An actual daycare, with tons of kids running around, and minimum wage paid teenagers trying to keep them under control, totally FREAKS me out! I am actually very fortunate to have a few other options. I have atleast 3 friends that babysit already from home and have offered to babysit for me as well. But munchkin will only be 3 mos old when I have to start taking her to stay with someone else, and I have been freaking out about what will be the best situation for her. She will be a newborn and I really want her to go somewhere where there aren't alot of other kids already, as she will need lots of love and attention. I also needed someone that would be patient with me and my ideas for what is best for my baby (e.g. cloth diapering, organic and homemade baby foods, etc.) What are the chances of finding someone like that?

I dare say, I think I have found someone exactly like that.

I have a friend named Sarah, that I have known since highschool. We didn't hang out alot back then, but we had classes together, and we liked each other. A few years ago, we were reunited through myspace (ahh the wonders of online social networking sites) and quickly became good friends. I saw her for the first time in almost 10 years at her baby shower and over the past couple of years we have been hanging out. Our hubbys get along great and I have come to adore her little baby girl (who she lovingly refers to as Goo). Our personalities are actually alot alike and I have come to think of her as sort of a kindred spirit.

A couple months back, she mentioned that she was going to be staying home full time with Goo again (she went back to work for a short period of time), and to keep her in mind for babysitting. I wasn't sure how serious she was, or what she really meant by it, but she was immediately moved to the #1 spot on my list of hopeful babysitter situations.

So 2 nights ago, I called her up and talked to her about it. I won't bore you with all of the details, but she really seemed excited about babysitting for me! I went back and forth with her the next morning through email, and I was seriously crying as I read through one of her emails. Here is an excerpt:

I would do everything I could to help you feel comfortable when you leave her each day. I would take lots of pictures for you and camcorder everything so you wouldn't have to feel like you were missing out on anything for those hours each day you were apart. I'm sure it's so hard to try and come up with the best daycare arrangements. I totally understand how hard it could be to imagine leaving your infant with daycare workers making minimum wage and with so many other kids to watch and not being able to give as much attention and care to yours. Plus, all the sickness and colds and ear infections and everything that goes along with being in childcare. Goo hasn't been sick since she was born, while her friends her age have had everything from the croup, flu, colds, ear infections, sinus infections, stomach viruses, etc. She has never had anything like that. I am never sick either. I haven't had the flu in 20 years. Therefore, I feel you would be able to feel comfortable that your baby wasn't always being so exposed to so many germs and viruses constantly.

I would totally feel comfortable with whatever routine you wanted for her. For example, if you only feed her organic or homemade babyfoods, or certain sleep schedules or playtime allowances or certain rules. I would feel comfortable with whatever routine you needed. Also, being a breastfeeding mom myself, I understand that whole routine as well.

I just can not express how good I feel about Sarah watching my baby. Its not just knowing her like I do, and the things she said to me in her email. Maybe call it intuition, but I just feel really really good about it. For the first time since we had to face the idea of me not being able to stay home full time, and what the heck we were going to do instead, I feel like this might just be okay after all.

So there you have it. After all of the ups and downs I have had over the last couple of weeks, it feels so good to be able to write about some really positive things going on. As I type this, the little munchkin has been moving around more then ever and I am really feeling her movements! I guess she is excited about the turns of events as well!