failing, mommy style - Ari's Black Eye

I had to send John the following text message this afternoon:
                "I accidentally gave Ari a black eye" 
It's true.  I gave my ten and a half month old a black eye. Obviously not on purpose, I don't go around purposely punching my baby, but man it certainly was a big Mommy Fail moment...

We had another showing this afternoon, thankfully John did not have to be in the field today so he was home with me to assist in the pre-showing mad dash around the house.  We worked out the logistics of who was going where with what - John ended up taking his car and running some errands, I took our SUV loaded with the pack & play (we try to de-clutter the living room when we leave), the baby & the dogs to go hang out in the mall parking lot while the house was being shown.  I realize I probably look like a crazy person sitting in the parking lot, crocheting, with two dogs and a baby in the back, but it is what it is.  I digress, anyway when I came home John was still out running around, so I unpacked the SUV and brought everything/everyone back in the house.  On a normal day, one of us puts together the pack & play while the other entertains Ari.  Since I was flying solo and I didn't have a second set of hands, I figured it would be easier to put the kid in his "pod" on the couch and put the play pen together.  For whatever reason this seemed like a better idea than putting him in his crib upstairs, honestly because I didn't feel like going back and forth.  I plopped him in his pod and started putting the play pen back together.  I was 99.9% done, all I was doing was putting the sheet on the little mattress and when it happened.  Ari leaned too far forward in the pod to try to reach for something on the coffee table and he started to go over head first off the couch.  I reacted and tried to grab him and in doing so my right thumb went right into his face.  He was startled, but I think I cried more than he did.  I felt, and still do feel, horrible!  Thankfully it hit him where it did because a little higher and my nail would have gone into his eye.

Thanks mom.

All said and done, it probably won't be a full on black eye but you can already see the slight bruise and cut from where my nail hit him under the eye.  Poor guy!  John is doing his best to make me feel better, reminding me that part of growing up and exploring will sometimes lead to bumps and bruises.  FACT: Ari will get hurt and there will be nothing I can do about it.  John also told me that 50% of parents drop their kid in the first three months, so if we've come this far and this is the only injury we're not doing too bad!  He might have made that statistic up, but I really don't care, it did make me smile!  I know the entire experience upset me more than it upset Ari - in fact as I was holding him, crying and repeating "mommy is so sorry" over and over again, he started playing with my nose and laughing.  I think the kid is ok and I'll manage, that is until my next mommy mistake.  

well rested - shhh

I'm actually afraid to talk about this, so I figured writing about it would be a good way to celebrate without running the risk of jinxing it.

In November we drove down to Florida to visit with John's mom.  The drive down and the subsequent stay there really threw off Ari's sleep schedule.  Up to that point, he kind of just created/maintained his own sleep schedule, he was a really great baby and had been sleeping through the night (for the most part) since I had returned to work in June.  The Florida trip threw everything out the window.  When we got back it was to the point where he would only sleep if one of us was holding him.  Although one of my favorite things to do is take a little nap with him, sleeping in the twin bed in his room with him is a far cry from "taking a little nap".  After heeding the warnings from some of my Mommy & Daddy, Auntie & Uncle, (and one "uncle" who happens to be a pediatric nurse) friends on Facebook, we decided we needed to kick this bad habit before it developed into a 6 year old Ari crawling in bed with us.  We started the Cry It Out (CIO) method around the middle of December. It really worked to get him to go down for the night, though the first few days were horrible. Basically we'd let him cry for 5 minutes before going back in his room to comfort him and we'd repeat these intervals until he fell asleep. Thankfully the longest was a total of 40 minutes, but possibly the 40 longest minutes of my life! John was the one going in to comfort him but listening to my baby cry without going to him was really painful.  Anyway, CIO lasted about a week and Ari started going to bed without much complaint each night since the beginning of January.

After successfully living through a week of CIO, with the exception of a few 'I can't find my binky' freak-outs moments,  Ari started sleeping through most of the night but he was not sleeping very late in the AM.  Without fail he would get up between 5:30 and 6:00 every morning and he was quick to let you know that he was ready to be out of his crib - read as: screaming like he was being murdered in the face - so we'd run in with a bottle to calm him down (and keep the neighbors from calling DYFS).  Not a big deal for me since I get up at 4:45 and I'm usually out the door by 5:30, but I know John would definitely like to sleep past 5:30 considering he has the toughest job in the world - he works from home full-time and takes care of Ari.  Many nights John is up into the wee hours of the morning catching up on work he couldn't get done during the day, though he admits sometimes this is due to the fact he just rather play with Ari than work but still, 5:30am-1:00am is a really long day regardless of the circumstances.  This past Sunday night, Ari went down at 8:00pm and got up at 7!  When he woke up, he didn't cry, he just played in his crib until about 7:30 when John grabbed him!  The same happened yesterday.  Today, my work from home (WFH) Wednesday, he slept until 8am!  I still woke up early (6ish) out of habit, but I was able to go back to sleep until about 7 when I decided to get a jump on the day and I was nice to get up because I wanted to, not because I had to!

excited - the house is up!

We're no longer getting ready to list the house, the house is officially for sale!  As of last Friday our wonderful a little "Alimmatiris Estate" went up on the market.  Within a few hours of the listing two separate realtors contacted Joe about seeing our place.  Within hours!  So we had two showings on Saturday, one on Sunday and another one yesterday.   4 showings in 5 days in a crap economy, with our house being priced higher than the one down the block...  I'm cautiously optimistic, which in Andrea speak means "slightly less pessimistic than usual". But hey, so far so good.  I honestly was really worried the house was going to go up and we wouldn't get any hits at all, so I'm definitely pleasantly surprised.  If you're interested, take a peek at the listing.  Better yet, take a peek at the listing and then tell all of your friends who are looking to buy that they should buy the house because honestly, it is pretty great & the people who live there are freakishly awesome (so I hear) and the awesomeness is now apart of the house.  Seriously though, if you're looking for something in the Philadelphia area, give Big Joe a yell.  He came highly recommended by a woman I both trust and admire, and so far John & I love working with Joe & Stacey.  Now if I'm still sitting on this same couch in this very same living room in June 2013, I might have a slightly different opinion (Joe if you're reading this I'm only slightly kidding).

In other real estate related news, John & I are doing exactly what we shouldn't be doing and are obsessively searching through listings on Realtor.com for houses in NJ.  Though we won't be actively looking until we get an offer on the house, we are actively researching (researching = finding nice houses on Realtor.com then spending lots of hours in the car driving around South Jersey looking at the neighborhoods).  We're not sure exactly where we'll end up!  So far I'm leaning towards Swedesboro/Logan, Woodstown/Pilesgrove, & Mullica Hill to start.  Its rather ironic that 12 years ago all I could think of was getting the hell out of South Jersey.  Now I can't wait to get back.  Until Ari, I never realized how important it would be for me to be close to my family.  We spend almost every weekend driving back & forth to Alloway (about an hour and forty minute drive each way) so Ari can hang out with his aunts, YiaYia & Pops.

It wouldn't be a post without a picture of Ari, so here's the obligatory baby photo of the evening.  I was sitting on the floor messing around with my camera and he kept reaching over and trying to tap me on the head.  Actually what I interpreted as "I want to tap mom on the head" was probably more like "I want to rip mom's hair out by the roots", but whatever.  Anyway, he looked adorable peeking over the side of his pack & play, so I took a quick shot.  Don't you just want to eat his little face!

recovering - Ari discovered the stairs!

My little man is ten months old today.  I know this isn't the best photo, but I just had to share.  Ari lunged at the camera when I tried to take it - we were nano-seconds away from having a drool covered camera.  I think this is a great shot to commemorate his 10th month here.

Today was the first official day of my nice 5-day weekend.  I'm happy to report I got to sleep in for an extra hour and a half (don't get too excited, I got up at 6) before diving into a rather hectic morning.  After spending a few hours working - when am I ever really off - John and I dove into finishing up the last minute preparations before our realtor, Joe, and his wife, Stacey, arrived to take photos.  Thankfully the weather cleared up enough before they arrived!  The photos won't be sunny, which is a bummer, but I'm sure they got some pretty decent shots.  Before they left Joe put a lock box on the door - our house is almost officially for sale!  I will certainly be posting links to the listing as soon as I get my grubby little hands on it.  Although it has been a hectic week trying to prep the house for photos, it is really nice to sit back in an ultra-clean and mostly de-cluttered house.

House listing aside, my life as I know it is completely over.  Ari has discovered the stairs.  More accurately, he's discovered how to climb the stairs.  I'm sitting here recovering from the excitement and ensuing panic that I feel regarding this discovery.

Hey, you mean you don't HAVE to carry me?

This is pretty cool mom.  

Safety First!  Thanks Dad!

Almost there.

At the top!

The first trip up the stairs was a success!  Now that he has been returned to the confines of his pack & play, I can finally exhale!

getting ready to list the house!

Some super exciting news this week - J & I decided to just bite the bullet and list the house.  On Wednesday met with a really awesome realtor, Big Joe McCarthy.  Joe was highly recommended to us by my boss and I can see why!  His personality fits right in with J & I, he was able to keep up with our witty banter.  J & I liked him immediately.  Joe and his wife are coming out next Thursday to take pictures and our happy little house will be on the market next Friday.  As excited as I am about listing the house, I'm also a little bummed.  We are going to take a rather large hit on the resale - we're listing for less than we bought our house for in 2007!  So right off the bat we're losing money.  On the flip side, this is the time to buy a house so the money we're willing to spend will go a lot further than it would if the housing market was still booming.  What I'm truly bummed about is that we'll be saying good-bye to our first house together.  As much as I complain about this place, I really do love it.  It is our first home - we got engaged here, our first child was born here (well at the hospital, but you know what I mean).  This is where our life together really started, so it will be a little sad to say goodbye to it, but saying goodbye here means we get to say hello to our forever home. 

In other unrelated news, I found a few pictures on my memory card that I forgot to load to Flickr.  I love this picture of A3 in his little emo baby outfit!

I can't believe how much bigger my baby has gotten since this picture was taken on 10.29!  It is absolutely amazing to me how much he changes.  Just this week he went from being able to stand without holding on for only a few seconds at the begining of the week.  Today when I got home from work, he just stood in the middle of the pack & play 'chatting' away!   I feel like I miss a lot when I'm at work - I'm super jealous that J gets to spend so much time with him, though I will never envy J for having to work & take care of a baby all day.

making her 2012 resolutions

Before I get into 2012 resolutions, lets do a quick recapp of how this whole thing started. I initially created this blog in January of 2011 after my dear buddy Pinds started her blog last year, which she created to keep track of her projects. I decided to steal that idea and keep track of the adventures of my pregnancy and experiences as a new mom (among other things). One thing you will quickly realize about the difference between Pinds and I is that she is insanely creative. And crafty. And grammatically correct. And far more organized than any other human being I know. Although I stole Linds' idea last year, I did not steal her organization and follow through (nor her ability to properly use the English language). So here's to hoping that in 2012 my follow-through and procrastination will look a little more like Pinds and a little less like me (I can never hope to be as crafty or creative, so I'm not even going to try).

Now on to those resolutions.

• Blog: Let's actually get this done this year Andrea! I am committing to posting at least once a week. I think I can do that!
• Take pictures, lots and lots of pictures:  I took a ton of pictures of A3 in the beginning.  The first 3 months of his life are very well documented.  However, once I went back to work the photos started to become less and less frequent.  The majority of the photo's I've taken since June are on my iPhone and aren't that great.  I need to actually use my awesome new CoolPix L120 and I hope to spend sometime with my trusty D80 but if I can just get in the habit using the point & shoot vs. my iPhone at least once a week I'll be a happy gal.
• Obligatory 'lose weight' resolution, with a twist:  So I had a baby in 2011 (FYI).  I gained a TON of weight (50 pounds) with the kiddo, not to mention I gained about 20 pounds right before I got knocked up.  With that said, I'm not going to set myself up for failure by setting some unrealistic goal.  My resolution is to simply be healthy.  I'm going to start using MyFitnessPal again, which helped a buddy of mine lose a bunch of weight last year (it really is a good app, if you're interested).  I would like to get to the gym ideally five times a week, realistically I'll be happy if I go at least once.  I would like to eat better, cut out the fast food and super snacking and if I'm lucky, I might even be able to get Mr. A to conform to using normal portion sizes when he crafts his culinary masterpieces for dinner. 
• Knitting / Crocheting:  I am committing to finally finishing at least ONE project this year.  I know that isn't a big number, but I've been working on the same baby blanket since I found out I was pregnant (July 2010 in case you were wondering).  Best part?  The blanket is ugly.  So it is time to scrap it and start over.  I think a class at Y-Knot Knit might be in my future. 
• Get Organized:  Pretty straightforward, but I need to get my life organized again (both at the office and at home).  

I know 5 resolutions might not seem like a lot, but I case you haven't noticed I have a hard time with actually following through (hence this is really the first post in almost a year).   Wish me luck kids!  Here's to a blogging, photograph taking, knit project making, healthier, organized me in 2012!   Cheers!