Parenting Practices - Part 1

One of the things that no one really tells you before you have kids is how you will question everything you thought you ever knew. It's probably because those people know that whatever they say won't really matter until you have kids of your own. BUT before I had kids, I thought I would do things just. like. this.. 

and I would never do that, *covering your mouth so said parent of child performing heinous deeds can't read your lips*

oh yeah, and what your kid is doing??

Abominable...

until my kid does it every day...and then? Perfectly acceptable.

I am being a bit facetious but seriously, I don't think I'm alone. Even after one becomes a parent it's still pretty common to look at another mother and wonder "what the heck is she thinking??" but then, at least now, I know to quickly remind myself that she is doing what she feels is best and it probably is the best for her child.

That's another reason no one tells you about the great "brain transformation" that occurs after you have your own child -- every kid is different and requires special treatment uniquely suited to their needs, temperament, etc...

So yeah, surprise doesn't adequately describe what "former self" would feel if she were to fast forward to see what "current self" is doing on a daily basis. It makes me wonder what my children will be thinking before they have kids. Will they remember how they were raised? Will they have developed an "oh no she didn't!" mind-set about other parents only to find themselves doing the same thing a few years later? I want to be able to remind them how they were raised and how I, as their mother, used what may seem to be unpopular parenting practices in order to parent them in the best way I knew how.

Also before I get started on my list (which I decided to post as a two part series because the post became rather long), I have to also add that even in the 2.5 short years of parenting, I have already changed my mind about certain mothering "policies". Is that bad? Maybe to former self from 1.5 years ago, but to current self, no. It's about being flexible and adequately changing to the needs of your family.

The Players in this comedy called Parenting:

 The Parents

 

Child #1 aka Jayden Noah - 2.5 years old

 



Child #2 aka Ava Grace - 10 months old

(Photo taken at 9 months old)

 

So without further ado, my current parenting practices - PART 1:
(I will be rating each practice according to what former self felt about such practices PK [pre-kids])

Breastfeeding: Unrated as I hadn't really thought too much about it until I was pregnant with my first child. If anything I would say I would have rated it as "the normal thing to do".

I really can't remember thinking too much about breastfeeding PK other than to think, oh my gosh that woman is feeding her kid right there in the middle of all those people!!!!!!!!!! How uncomfortable...poor thing...

LOL!!

I mean to former self, it was less about feeding a kid and more about the "nudity" aspect. Like, "you better cover that up!" I do remember seeing someone nurse their walking toddler in the middle of the forest once when my family and I were out rock climbing and I just tried not to stare.

As far as nursing older babies/children, I would have definitely rated that a GINORMOUS NO.

Now...I would say to each their own.

For myself, although open to the idea of nursing as long as child #1 wanted to (that is, once I reached the 6-9 month mark, since before that it was a mental, and sometimes physical, challenge to even get to the 6 month mark), I became pregnant with child #2 when child #1 was 11 months old and could only stand it another 4 months before saying "Enough!" I couldn't handle the sensation anymore given the current state of my extremely sensitive everything...i.e. boobs, hormones, personal space...15 months was the end of my son's breastfeeding adventures. Child #2 is now 10 months and I want to at least make it to the 15 month mark so I don't feel that I've given her any less than her older brother and then we'll see how it goes after that. I do think about the fact that there are MANY people out there promoting breastfeeding to at least the age of 2 (current World Health Organization suggestion) but I look at my 2.5 year old and cannot imagine how I could possibly still be breastfeeding him. I mean, ew. I don't know if it would be different if I had never stopped but I can't even really wrap my head around that because all I can think about is "ew". That's just weird to me. (Note that it only became "ew" once I actually had a 2 year old myself who had not been breastfeeding for several months. AND that only applies to ME breastfeeding MY 2 year old. I don't think "ew" when I see other people breastfeeding THEIR 2 year old...or 3 year old. Seriously. I really feel like "to each their own".)

Co-sleeping: Rated a big NO-NO in my pre-children days

This next practice lends itself naturally to breastfeeding so makes a perfect second practice to discuss. Co-sleeping in our family started out as an "accident" but has become something that I am pretty passionate about. Initially it was a way to get. some. sleep. Something that I took for granted just days before my son was born, when my one and only all-nighter in college resulted in me sleeping the entire following day to catch up. Yeah, that doesn't happen once you have kids. So you find other ways to cope. For me, that was co-sleeping. Child #1 was not a good sleeper in terms of being able to (1) go to sleep on his own and (2) stay asleep on his own. So I found nursing him to sleep was easiest and he was often held while he slept. I loved that and everything I was reading was saying that was great. (Granted I was not reading books like "Babywise" or Dr. Ferber's book - the great "cry-it-out" advocate -- or any other books out there that said that you must teach a child to sleep on his own. One of the first books I read was "The Womanly Art of Breastfeeding" produced by La Leche League and I can probably thank them for all these "crunchy" tendencies that have since developed.) So when it came to nighttime sleeping, I couldn't very well hold him because I become rather limp when I sleep so the next natural step was to lay him next to me. He got to eat whenever he wanted to, I didn't have to get myself out of my oh-so-comfy bed to get him when he cried (which would have been all. night. long. since he didn't like being by himself) and I hardly had to wake up to attend to his nourishment needs.

So those were the early days, but since then...I have discovered other great benefits of co-sleeping...

(1) Breastfed babies thrive in the presence of their mother and the risk of SIDS goes waaaay down. The baby's breathing becomes regulated and they often wake more frequently which helps to avoid "failure to rouse" which is theorized to be linked to SIDS. (Failure to rouse is terminology used to describe a very deep sleep when it is difficult to wake the baby - almost like a coma.)
(2) When they make little noises and you're not sure if all is well, you can just peek an eye open and see yep, they're still breathing and go back to sleep.
(3)  When they puke in the middle of the night, you are right there to turn them over and make sure they don't choke. (Yes, this has happened and I was SO glad that we were right there to attend to his needs.)
(4) There is more time to bond with the baby especially when you work full-time, like I do! This one has always eased some of the mother guilt that I have from working full-time. (A mother is always measuring the minutes she spends with her children, as if there is some chart out there that says a certain amount of minutes spent with children equates to being a good vs bad mother...)

And those are just a few of the benefits, there is much more scientific evidence that I've discovered as well but those ones up there ^^^^ are the most important to me.

Part 2 of Parenting Practices will continue mañana...that's tomorrow...

10 Months

My baby girl is 10 months old today! BOO HOOOOO!!! I am seriously very sad about how fast she is growing up because I LOVE having a baby in the house and it certainly doesn't help that she is the easiest baby in the whole wide world! Here are some updated stats on my sweet Ava Grace.

Teeth: 2.5
Ava has the two middle teeth on the bottom in and has for a couple of months but she is just now getting another tooth on the top right in the middle. I'm hoping they don't all take this long to come in because the teething has definitely bothered Ava more than it did for Jayden at this point. Poor baby will wake up crying and I just feel so bad for her!

Mobility: Speed crawler and starting to take steps with the assistance of furniture
Yesterday DJ told me that Ava pushed the kitchen chair from one side of the kitchen to the other which was a first!

Food: Lover of all things edible.
This girl can eat! I haven't found a food that Miss Ava won't eat and although she will have meals where she's not totally into her food, she usually will eat everything we put in front of her. I won't list everything that she's eaten but she has had multiple foods from all the food groups, with the exception of dairy. I have only given her plain greek yogurt once and she did eat that but it's so messy (because she feeds herself) that I haven't given it to her again. Unfortunately because she does gets so much solid food though, it has made her mildly constipated. :-( I have been trying to give her more fiber in the forms of whole grains and fruits and green veggies but it will probably just take time as her body gets used to these new foods. Thankfully it doesn't appear to bother her too much at this point.

Ava continues to refuse a bottle, which she has done since we returned from our Christmas vacation so her weekly nursing schedule goes like this:

8:00 am              Nurse before I take her and Jayden to daycare
12:00-12:30 pm  Nurse her at day care
4:30 - 5:00 pm    Nurse her when I pick her up
6:00 pm              Nurse once before bed
7:30 pm              Nurse to sleep
9:30 pm              Wakes to nurse, goes back to sleep
11:00 pm            Wakes to nurse, goes back to sleep
Will also usually nurse a few times during the night

This schedule may seem abnormal/inconvenient to some but since she doesn't take a bottle during the day and I want to make sure breastmilk continues to be her main form of nutrition at this point (as it should until she turns a year old), I'm ok with the night feedings.

Weight: (Last measurement was at her 9 month appointment) 20 lbs 6 oz.

Height: 28.75 inches
Surprisingly (or not so surprisingly I guess since Jayden was actually bigger), these measurements put her in the 90th percentile!

Sleep: Still a great sleeper!
Although there have been moments in time over the past 10 months where I've wondered if my luck has finally run out and my good sleeper is becoming a not-so-good sleeper, the phase always passes (so far) and my good little sleeper returns. One thing that I find funny/cute about Ava's sleeping habits is how much she rolls around in her sleep. She is all over the place!

Ava's naps have been interesting lately. For awhile over the past 2 weeks, I was thinking that she might be eliminating her morning nap as she was refusing to go down when she normally would in the mornings. But I'm very grateful that we seem to be back on schedule and she's taking two naps again although sometimes they can both be pretty short (around 30-45 minutes each).

Typically her daily sleep schedule goes like this:

7:00-7:30am    Wake up
10:00 am         First nap (Has been lasting anywhere from 30 minutes to 1.5 hours, usually depends on how well she sleeps the night before)
2:00-3:00 pm   Second nap (Again the length varies from anywhere from 30 minutes to 2.5 hours. Her afternoon nap usually is longer than her morning nap unless she's at daycare, then it's never longer than 45 minutes.)
7:00-7:30 pm   Bedtime (Although she goes to bed for the night at this point, she will usually wake up a couple of times to nurse before I go to bed around 11 pm.)

Clothes/Diapers: 12 months and size 4
Wellll, I never did get started on the cloth diapers for Ava. I have to admit that the whole finding-the-perfect-cleaning-routine intimidated me and I didn't want to deal with the diapers not absorbing properly because of our extremely hard water. I just felt like I finally found a good routine where I had time to do laundry, keep the house in order, make meals and spend time with my kids on top of fitting in 40+ hours of work and adding another element of diaper washing would overload the schedule. Now I just want to sell the diapers which means I need to prepare them for that... Disposable have been the best option especially considering the amount of time that Ava spends either at day care or my friend's house while I'm at work

We're phasing out the 9 month clothes because they are all becoming much too tight and stocking up on 12 month clothes. I'm not sure if we'll make it through the summer with just 12 month sizes or not. I'm hoping so because her weight gain has started to plateau but there's always the possibility of a growth spurt!


At the risk of sounding cliche and cheesy, I have to be honest. Ava continues to be such a ray of sunshine in every day to all of us. Even Jayden will randomly decide to give Ava hugs and kisses because I think he just loves having her around. Of course it's not always like that and he is learning to share his toys and be gentle with her but I am so proud of the way Jayden treats his sister. I am starting to think about her first birthday but am not wishing it to be any sooner than it is! I know better than ever at this point that these sweet baby days are such a blessing as the toddler years can be...more challenging...ahem...can you read between the lines there?? So, I am enjoying every moment to the fullest with my girl!!

"Twinkle, twinkle...T, U, V..."

I love this video so much. Jayden is so funny as he tries to sing "Twinkle Twinkle" and gets the words confused with the "ABC song". He was doing so many cute things that night and I didn't get it all on video but I'm glad I got this much!

Belated Post - 6 months

During the weekend of Thanksgiving, I decided to take some photos of my Ava in the same fashion that I had done for Jayden when he turned 6 months old. However, it was not to be nearly as successful as when I did it for Jayden. For whatever reason neither child was in the mood for pictures and that coupled with a very wrinkly sheet and a little girl who decided to start making a rather unattractive new facial expression, we ended up with far more bloopers than frame-worthy photos. But honestly I know I won't care when I look back in 16 years. I will just be glad I took the time to take some photos!

Here are some of the bloopers, er, best shots! (Note that I did not take the time to edit these since they won't be going on the wall. As much as I love them, I'm not sure I want to explain the situation every time I have someone over, which I inevitably will feel like I need to do.)

 (Her new funny face, LOL. She made this so many times and I just had to laugh!)

That's a mouthful

We started Ava on solids officially on her 6 month birthday but, like Jayden, she has not really taken to purees so now that she's able to pick up foods on her own, we offer her foods that she can feed herself. Today, the lady that watches Ava on Tuesdays and Thursdays couldn't watch Ava because her own daughter was sick, so I got to spend the day with my girl. We had lunch together and Ava had carrots and kiwi! She has started to eat puffs really well but up to this point, has only been into playing with "real food". I was so excited that she enjoyed her carrots and kiwi!

Forgive the girl's hair, that's her momma's bad. It's actually remnants of a ponytail from yesterday. Oh, and she just started clapping her hands on Friday when we say "Yay!"; I just think it's the cutest thing!

Winter 2013

We're going back and forth between warm(ish) weather and freezing bitter snowy cold this winter. We had some pretty snow off and on this past week but then it warms up and melts it all off right away. And then we have days like yesterday where the wind just blows and blows and makes us all want to dig a hole and hibernate. But I can't properly enjoy spring until I've had some of this freezing cold so I say, Bring it! 

Besides the weather, here's an update on what's been going on around the Martinez household:

• Ava is over a bout of RSV, praise the Lord! It didn't even last very long although it was very "not fun" while it lasted (about a week). She wheezed something awful and it made my heart sad to hear her breathe like that! This little girl is giving us a lesson in infant illness though. Jayden had his first sickness after he turned a year old and already Ava has been sick probably 7 times. Ugh, I can only hope this means we will have less sickness after she turns a year old!

• Jayden and Ava are adapting to a new daycare facility. Jayden more so than Ava. This is Ava's first time at a day care because fortunately we were able to avoid it for the first 7 months of her life but it came down to necessity and I really needed consistent child care so daycare it was. Because the daycare could only get her in part-time though, she is also still being watched all day on Tuesdays and Thursdays by my neighbor and friend. (It's a longish story about why we have this new system and why they're both in a new daycare, different from the one that Jayden went to from 14 months up until Christmas this year, but I'll possibly get to that story another day.) Anyway, Ava doesn't really eat or sleep while at daycare because there is so much going on and she's quite the social butterfly. However, thankfully, she makes up for both of those things just fine at night. Also currently, she is only at daycare for an entire day on Mondays so that day is quite long for her with the no-sleeping, no-eating thing but the rest of the week is manageable. If we're away from each other for the entire day, I go nurse her at noon. Jayden actually seems to like this new daycare better than the one he attended before so I'm so happy about that!

• Jayden got his two year molars in (or is still getting them in, but they've both popped through) and Ava has gotten her first two teeth in the past month so we have two teething kids but actually it hasn't been too bad!

• Ava crawled for the first time last week and I was there to see it! It actually was way more exciting than I could have anticipated because well, we have anticipated it for so long! She has been on the brink of crawling for months. Also I wasn't there to see Jayden crawl (or walk) for the first time so this was a first for me too! She is getting more and more mobile and we all get a kick out of her moving her legs that way. She also is really enjoying trying to pull herself up on things. She still gets wherever she wants to go mostly by scooting on her tummy or rolling.

• We are getting some good family time in these days which is a VERY nice change from the Cowboy football season. There's been swimming (indoors, of course), walks, basketball games, puzzles, family movies, and lots of toy playing going on. And for DJ and I as a couple, we're also getting to spend more one-on-one time together which is more overdue than one could ever imagine! We started going to a small group at church, and have found time to make some new friends, some of which we got to hang out with a couple of weekends ago (sans kids!). So whereas some people find winter dreary and confining, I actually sort of look forward to it since it means a break for us as a family.

• We have no trips planned which is actually nice for once. We spent the fall going somewhere almost every. single. month and let me tell you, that was fun, but also very exhausting! So for this winter, we've been somewhat intentional about deciding not to go anywhere. Sometimes it's nice to just stay home and enjoy being home!

• Work is going well for both DJ and myself. I am finally truly and completely caught up with my work after taking my maternity leave this summer. Oy vay. If there is a "next time", I think I will work until I have the baby, go have the baby and then return as soon as medically possible. As much as I SO enjoyed taking that time off and spending it with Ava, I'm not sure I can ever do it again. It took me 5 months  to catch up and it was not fun. I am forever grateful for my job though and the fact that I can work from home!
• DJ is splitting his time between football, golf and soccer this winter. One of their trainers had a baby a couple of weeks ago so they are all picking up the slack. Normally DJ would just be overseeing a little bit of golf this time of year in addition to football. He will be headed to California for his annual golf trip with the team and I have no doubt it's a trip he looks forward to every year. The big news at work for DJ is a new water facility room in the UW training room. He and his boss designed this water room, which includes hot and cold tubs (which used to be located outside, by. the. way, brrrrr), and it took several months to finish the project. They spent the entire fall working in only about half of their training room since the other half was closed off while it was being renovated. Even I, as a non-sports minded, non-athlete type, can appreciate how nice this must be for them to have for the use of rehabilitation and performance management for their athletes. 

• A few other noteworthy pieces of news...I am having a much anticipated craft party this coming weekend with a whole bunch of new people that I've never met...at my house...but I'm actually really really looking forward to it. I have really missed crafting and have gotten to do a little bit here and there but am looking forward to meeting some people that are also craft-minded so we can possibly do this on a more consistent basis!

• I am in love with warm boots, wool socks and cozy hats right now and cannot stop buying this stuff for me and my children. I have to admit, I do love living in Wyoming because we can legitimately wear wool-lined well, anything, and have a 'durned' good reason!

•  My mom and in laws made the trek to WYO this past weekend to watch the Super Bowl to play with the kids. We all had a great time and the weekend went incredibly fast. But one aspect that will stand out for me was the church service that my mom went to with me and the kiddos. They performed baptisms during the service and it was unlike any baptism service I had ever been too. We have three services at our church and the first service was the only one that no one had "signed up" to be baptized. So our pastor just said that if anyone felt like God was speaking to them to be baptized right now then they could come up front and "be dunked"! We prayed and I asked God that He would give people courage to come forward if that's what they felt led to do. And guess what?? FIVE people walked forward, in their church clothes, hopped into the water, and were baptized right then and there that morning. It was seriously so amazing to watch these people obey God's calling right in that moment and actively see them walk to the front in courage and announce their desire to obey God because they love Him. We all had tears in our eyes because, if you are a Christian, you know that God can call us to do some scary things and although walking to the front of your church in front of people who love and support you is not one of the scariest things you will do, it is definitely a big step in the Christian faith. And when you allow God to give you the courage to take those scary steps that He will ask you to do, it is a RUSH when you learn that God will indeed walk every step with you! And you will succeed because of it! Awesome.

• During the baptisms, Jayden announced loudly during a quiet moment that those people were "taking a bath." LOL

And that's about it for now! I'll leave you with a video of DJ and Jayden playing the Sesame Street Matching game...

For clarification, "Roweeta" is Rosita...lol...you may notice DJ has trouble remembering the proper pronunciation at one point too.

Jayden Memories {27 Months}

Jayden is at such a fun age right now (however terrible the twos may be at times, they are equally, if not more, terrific!) He is learning words at a whopping rate and is putting together some great sentences. He continually amazes us at the way his brain puts together thoughts and he continues to get better at expressing himself through verbal communication as opposed to taking our hand to show us what he's saying or at his worst, a temper tantrum. He is very patient with himself as he tries to get new words out and will try a few times if he has trouble with a word until he gets it right. I just find it completely fascinating and always find myself comparing it to when I was learning Spanish. It's a continual process of practice, practice, practice!!

 Some fun words/phrases that Jayden says lately are:

"flagango" {rhymes with mango} = flamingo
"Ooo nice and warm" Usually said when we're putting on clothes lately since I like to tell him that to encourage him to get dressed faster.
"Coozy" Said in reference to his blanket that his Grammy knit for him.
"Where Daddy go?" Said every. single. morning. when Jayden wakes up and looks over to where DJ sleeps (which is empty since DJ leaves much earlier before the rest of us are awake).
"Bob!" Not so much a fun word as it is a very very common word since Jayden wants to listen to Bob every time we get in the car. Bob is Bob the Tomato from Veggie Tales.
"I did it" When he does something by himself or figures out something all by himself. He's always so proud!

Some cute things that Jayden does lately are:

-Pulls his tummy up, up, out of the way, to get his diaper off. When it's time for his bath, I ask him to take his diaper off, so he hefts his tummy up, pulling at it with his hands (which, by the way, has slimmed up significantly so there really isn't much to "heft") and then he searches with his fingers for those darn diaper tabs that always seem to evade his reach way beneath his belly. I get a kick out of it every time! Lol

-Reads to Ava from his books. He'll sit right in front of her or sometimes half on top of her if she's in the bouncy seat, and "read" his books. Ava usually attempts to eat the book if it gets too close to her mouth but Jayden does a really good job of staying patient with her.

-Looks at me with utter surprise when he encounters a new sound (like a train whistle) or learns something new (like unscrewing the top of a water bottle). I love watching this sweet boy learn.

-Also love the look of questioning that Jayden has perfected when he wants to do something and asks me permission with a look and a little questioning noise. I don't know where he learned it but it's hilarious!

-Loves to come to my office and type on the computer. He absolutely gets a kick out of this! Funny thing is I remember when I was just learning to type and doing the same thing on my Dad's *ancient* computer and how fascinating it was so I can totally understand his excitement!

Some of Jayden's favorite foods are:

Cheese of any kind
Peaches
Fruit snacks
Raisins
Crackers, bread, any grain product
Yogurt

He actually does really well with just about any food but these are the foods that I try to limit because he would eat them all day, every day if I let him!

Activities that Jayden is enjoying these days:

Puzzles, puzzles and more puzzles
Books
Trains
Cars
Movies - Cars, Elmo, Polar Express
TV Shows - Dinosaur Train, Sesame Street
Stickers
Helping clean (the other night in the bath tub, he was insistent on making sure the tub and his plastic boat were spotless before he would get out)
Watching football with his daddy, especially after this past Sunday when they attended the Bronco game - their first football game together! (Since DJ is always on the field working, he doesn't obviously get to sit with us and enjoy the game with his boy.)