10:24 pm

Tonight at 10:24pm, Kyle had stayed in his bed for a total of 4 whole minutes. Now 24 minutes later. He is still in bed and asleep.

It only took me 59 times of putting him back in bed. Although by the end, I was telling him, "get in bed," instead of the recommended calm and silence. He would often get out of bed while I was walking out the door. Before the 59 times there was the hour of rocking, trying to calm him to sleep, several attempts at just putting him back in bed, sitting next to his bed to make sure he stayed in and such.

I'd like to add though that the first two days of the bed, he only had to be put back twice or not at all. I am seriously hoping that this only takes a few nights because last night after 23 attempts to put him back in bed, Evan and I caved and just shut him out of our room. After 30 minutes, he was asleep in his own bed. Today at nap, I just shut him in his own room. After 90 minutes, he was asleep on the floor.

Words

(shoe love)

So it occurred to me that Kyle has several words the other day. He can say, "eyes," "ball," "shoes," "bye-bye," and "mama." But he only says mama when he wants something or got hurt. He used to say "hello" when playing with his cell phone, but he lost that long ago. He can also point to his head, eyes, and nose, and will stick out his tongue when asked where it is.

However, I never kept good track of when his sounds became the words and he was able to attach meaning. So what do I put in his baby book for first words and when does a sound become a first word? Evan doesn't think they need to know the meaning, but I disagree. Any opinions? Kyle is rather good at imitating or trying to imitate our words so I find it hard to know when it becomes a word. Evan and I definitely agree that "shoes" was first. Although when, who knows? Oops.

We also had a break through today while we were reading, he pointed to a picture of a ball and said "ball." We haven't been able to recreate it, and it is definitely his weakest word, but he said it.

Balloons

Kyle and I went to Silverado (Evan's work) to pick him up on Saturday. While we were there hanging out with the residents and other staff, Suzy brought him a balloon. Kyle was very excited and played with it for a long time with the little dog who also loves balloons.

We came home and went down for a nap. Suzy had tied the balloon to monkey in order to keep it from floating off. Because it was 4pm and both Kyle and I were super exhausted and tired. I just left the balloon tied to monkey and prayed that my "bad" mommy moment would not cause any damage.



I thought it was too cute to pass up the opportunity for a photo. One hour into the nap, Kyle woke up screaming (pretty usual for him) and I went in to comfort him back to sleep. The only thing that I ended up doing was untie the balloon from monkey. While it didn't seem to make one difference to him one way or another, he went right back to sleep. Maybe balloons, although we love them, give him bad dreams. Either way, we've decided that Evan will have to bring balloons home from work regularly!

Validation

I am a stay at home mom (the majority of the time). I don't often feel like a good stay at home mom because the house is not usually as clean as I think it should be or the laundry didn't get folded the day it was done or Kyle is still in his pajamas (or I am) at 3pm in the afternoon. Then I feel guilty when I want my husband to help out with things that I deem to be "my job" like dishes, bath, or diapers. I am under the impression that this is how it goes for a lot of stay at home moms (if you are a better stay at home mom than I---Mallory, Amy, Rachelle, etc.---please just don't tell me about it :)

I don't do craft things. I have found that even though I try, I fail at coupons. We only have the car twice a week, so we don't do cool things like walks at lakes or play grounds or much of those things. And (shamefully hanging my head) we watch too much tv when at home.

Well, it is spring break for Evan, so although he has to work all his usual days this week. He got to be around for my Monday routine and will be for my Wednesday as well. Usually on school days he leaves at 7:00 am (before Kyle is awake) and returns at 9:30 pm (after Kyle is asleep). This morning, we went and got gas, went to have the new car seat checked at the hospital, visited Grandma while there, went to both banks, went to see the midwife, had lunch, napped, went to Costco, and then Walmart. He got to do it all with me, and it was a pretty typical Monday.

At 7pm on the way home, when we still had to unload all the groceries, make dinner, clean up and put Kyle to bed, he looked over at me in the car and said, "I didn't know that you did so much while I was at school. (Quickly trying to backtrack and make it sound better) Not that I thought you didn't do anything, but I just didn't know how physically hard it was and tiring."

For someone who always thinks that her husband works harder and longer than she does, it felt dang good to hear that.

Conversations with a Ridiculous Man

Usually, Evan and I switch off bath/bed nights. So the nights where I am working, Evan does all the bed routine and vice versa (although Evan is at school). Then Friday is my night, Saturday Evan's, and Sunday is whomever feels more generous or guilty about something. This has worked really well.

Yesterday, we ended up putting Kyle to bed together and tonight we did all of the bed and bath routine together. We decided that we liked this way better and concluded that Friday, Saturday, and Sunday we would do so.

During the bath part, I scrubbed Kyle down and Evan sat and watched. I mentioned that I am always a little worried the soap doesn't make it on to his skin on his legs when they are under the water.
After I was done, Evan said: "Do you always wash him like that?"
Me: "Yes."
Evan: "Oh, I didn't know it was supposed to be that intense."
Me: "What do you mean?"
Evan: "Well, I don't do it like that."
Me: (concerned) "What do you do?"
Evan: "Well, I wash his hair and bum area."
Me: (laughing)
Evan: "Have you always done it like that?"
Me: "Yes."
Evan: (incredulous) "Even when we bathed him in the sink?"
Me: "Of course, especially in between his fingers and toes. He is just like you and me, you know, he needs to be washed everywhere."
Evan: "Well, I guess I'll do that from now on."

Honestly, my child is 18 months old and has only been really bathed when I washed him. Cracks me up, but at least we all know now how Kyle is supposed to be bathed. Good thing we didn't keep switching nights for the next 5 years or so. I'll have a cleaner baby I guess :)

Boys

Well,

So we are having another boy: Aiden Dillon Young

And because I regret not taking more belly pictures with Kyle:

That is 20 weeks, the half way point. However, I know that I look terrible and it took me several weeks to decide if I would even keep it. But that's what I look like, so Aiden and Kyle and all of us deserve to remember :)

Bad Blogger

Hi! I'm a bad blogger. I am not sure that it matters to me though. I started blogging mostly for a way to show pictures (since it's not like I ever get around to printing them) and for posterity, as I am not a journal keeper. It has turned out to be nice because sometimes, Kyle and I just watch videos of him on the computer for fun. He thinks it's entertaining.

But I have not done well on keeping things up to date. Kyle no longer allows me to be at the computer if he is awake and when he is asleep, it's usually the last thing I want to do or should be doing. So I will probably still post things from over the fall, eventually.

I love to read others' blogs and I guess that I should reciprocate by being more up to date and prompt with my posts, but I just can't seem to do that. I downloaded the pictures from my camera today and found only 30 which spanned over three months (including Christmas and Evan's birthday). So I think we've settled into a routine and most of our life is mundane. I don't even take that many pictures anymore (plus, Kyle won't stay still for them or even look at the camera).

So I am declaring myself a bad blogger and that I just don't care.