Rex's first tooth!

I though Rex was teething starting at 4 months because he's been putting everything into his mouth since then. I'm not sure if he really started that early, but the final results are in. Rex has his first tooth. It has broken through on the bottom right side of his mouth (his right). And now it actually hurts when he grabs my finger and gnaws on it. He also turned 7 months yesterday.

Time is definitely going faster with Rex than it did with Fay when she was a baby. And now that I'm back to work, it will go by even faster. I must remember to take plenty of pictures and videos.

Here's a good one. Rex was being super chatty and noisy, so I decided to make a video. Then it turned into a completely different video....He's been a little stopped up from the new formula.

Back to Work

Next week I will return to work, part-time. I was freelancing before Rex was born, so I'm not returning to the same company. The job search took me about a month and the nanny search took me about 2 weeks. And now, it seems a little surreal that I will be working next week and leaving my little baby boy with a nanny for three entire days! When I returned to work after Fay was born it was earlier than I would've liked. Fay was only 4 1/2 months old. This time I had the luxury of getting to the point where I want to return to work. I crave the stimulation and I am itching to leave the house. Rex is almost 7 months old. But that doesn't mean I'm not sad about the decision. I've been breast feeding Rex since he was born so we've been attached at the hip. Of course I've had my moments away, but never longer than one feeding. So it will feel very strange to be away for 8 hours that first day.

We've been weening this weekend -- yesterday and today I missed one feeding. Tomorrow I will skip two feedings and Tuesday I will go to work. I had some anxiety about him accepting formula instead of my milk. But he is a hungry guy who likes to eat and he had NO PROBLEM with the formula. Pretty funny.

I don't feel all that stressed really. However this morning I woke up with the most painful jaw. I think I must've been grinding my teeth in the night -- no doubt related to this big change. I could barely eat my breakfast this morning it hurt so bad to chew.

I'm really happy with the nanny choice. I think I've gotten really good at this interviewing thing. I used two websites that specialize in child care. I talked with maybe 6 girls and brought three into my home. And one was the clear choice. The qualifications are the easy part -- does she have experience and good references. The hard part is finding someone that I like and can invite into my home every morning. The new nanny, Stephanie, and I ended up talking for two hours during her interview because we were waiting for Rex to wake up from an unusually long nap. So I got to know her really well. We had surprisingly few awkward silences for strangers.

I'm also really excited with my job choice. I will be working for http://playphilo.com They make an iPhone app -- but I will be doing Java on the back end. And since I am part time they have said that I will be doing little independent projects. Which sounds perfect. Autonomy, seniority, part-time. Hopefully its as ideal as it sounds!

Rex wants to be three and Fay wants to read!

Its hard to be a second child. I should know. :) Rex seems be to suffering from a case of the want-to-be-three-s. He has never been fond of tummy time. He cries almost immediately, and from about 4 months on, I've given up on forcing him to have tummy time. Instead, I have propped him in a sitting position. Now he can pretty much sit on his own, so he can play contently for spells at a time. But lately, he has become unsatisfied with just sitting and playing. He will whine and complain until I come over and when I reach for him, he arches his back and stiffens his legs and desperately tries to stand up. So if you support him and help him stand, THEN he wants to walk. He doesn't have much leg control, so he sorta twitches his little feet forward. And at this point you should see the smile on his face. He is just so tickled to be "walking". He is a big boy, and just like his sister.

I was happy to help Rex walk for a while because it was so cute and seemed so ambitious. In little time, it became back-breaking and tiring. But now that he has experienced the thrill of walking he is totally unsatisfied just sitting.

Luckily, my mom came to visit last weekend and she was not happy with the idea of a baby that wouldn't crawl and hasn't rolled over. (I told her I'd read that some babies go straight to walking without crawling). So she looked up some exercises and started rolling Rex around on the floor with his blanket. He got a lot more tummy time this weekend, and I think he is starting to be ok with it again. So, I will try to keep it up.

Fay may have read her first word last week! I know her teacher works on identifying letters and teaching their sounds. But I'm not sure they have really worked on linking letters together to sound out words. So I may be reaching a bit on thinking Fay "read" a word. But I have to write down what I saw because it was just so exciting!

Fay and I were standing at the bus stop waiting for the bus after school. She looked up at the store behind us and said "O"..."Ooop"..."OopN". I just about fell down. I said "Fay are you reading?!" She said "Mommy what is that word?". I said "Open!" She said "No, it says closed!". Always a smart aleck. She gets that from her dad. Then I gave her a huge hug and told her how proud I was that she is reading.

I told Fay's teacher about it the next day and she was cautious to believe Fay was reading....saying that perhaps she remembered the word from class...more of a memorization than sounding out. Seems possible. But I don't really care. It was really fun to be there at the moment of her first read word!

State of Rex

 

I don't write nearly as much on this blog as I did pre-Rex. I was thinking of blaming this on 2nd kid syndrome. In other words, the second kid never gets as much coverage as the first kid because as a mom....I've been there, done that. Perhaps taking photos this time around is just not as interesting. BUT, this is not the case. If fact, I take a ton of photos and videos of Rex....because he'd so cute and because he changes so quickly as babies tend to do. The problem is that I have no time to actually get these photos up on the blog. Not because its not a priority -- just because I have even less time than before, caring for two kids instead of one.

HOWEVER! This week, Rex hit a major milestone. He is sitting up for loooong periods of time without falling over. I wouldn't call him a professional sitter just yet, but he definitely has his amateur status and is improving daily.

The really cool thing is that Fay hit this milestone at almost exactly the same time. So I'm going to show some videos and photos side by side to show you just how crazy similar they look as babies.

[If you are reading this on Facebook, you will have to jump to the blog o see the videos.]

http://eastriverbaby.blogspot.com/2010/12/state-of-rex.html

sweet fay memory

This is a brief post of a moment that I want to be sure to remember. Tonight we returned home from 5 days in Florida. Both kids had a long travel day and they were both troopers. Especially considering that they both picked up colds during our vacation.

Rex was extremely tired when we walked in our door at 6:30. He had been crying for the last 10 minutes of the cab ride because he was sooooo tired. I nursed him to sleep right away. He seemed to fall asleep, but was up again at 7pm and then at 7:15.

Rex and Fay started sleeping in the same room about one week ago. But we've been putting Rex to bed at 6pm. For Fay, we switched to reading our bedtime books in our room and then sneaking into her room around 7:30pm so as not to awaken Rex. Tonight, because of the travel circumstances, we got our first experience of putting both kids to bed at the same time.

When I left the room after putting both in their beds, Rex was pretty noisy. I expected Fay to get mad or frustrated at not being able to fall asleep because of the noisy baby! But instead, I heard her trying to soothe him to sleep "It's ok baby, you're ok..."

I was so touched. She really does love Rex so much; she constantly surprises me. What a sweet sweet sister she is.

sleep

I think sleep deprivation is starting to take its toll on me. Its been about three months now of no more than 2-3 hours of continuous sleep. I suppose moms have done this for ages, so I guess it won't kill me in the end. But I think its making me a sad and crabby person.

I'm normally quite the morning person. Ryan jokes about how annoying it is to see me upbeat and smiling in the mornings when it takes him a couple hours to crack a smile.

Now, on about 5 hours of cumulative sleep, I wake up and get Fay breakfast, play with her, tend to Rex, and some days, get Fay off to school. I feel like a zombie in the morning. With a baby in one hand and a doll in the other, I feel like I'm just going through the motions. I am not enjoying the playing and the cute moments with Fay. I'm just getting through the morning or the day.

On the days when Fay is not in school, I watch the clock, hoping for 1pm to come soon so I can hopefully get a nap when Fay sleeps. If Rex is not interested in sleeping, I'll convince him by putting him on the boob next to me while I sleep.

Of course all that is not as bad as when I get irritated by my little Fay asking the same question 10 times over. Or when I snap at her for not listening to me when I'm trying to get her clothes on. The minute it happens, I want to take it back. I want to be the patient and calm mom that I think I am.

And all this makes me terribly sad. I remember having an identity crisis when Fay was born and I was trying to understand my new role as a mom. Now I am trying to maintain my identity as a good mom. One that listens to her child and plays with her and enjoys her.

Rex's first shots

Rex is 10 weeks and we had his 2 month checkup today. That means he got his first shots. :(

But first the happy stuff. Rex weighed in at a whopping 14 lbs! He was born 7 lbs 11 ounces, so that is a heafty increase. A baby is supposed to triple his weight in the first year. If Rex continues to gain at this rate he will definitely surpass that goal.

He is now 23.5 inches long (compared to 21 inches at birth) and his head circumference is is 41.5 cm (35.1 at birth). So he is a growing boy.

The shots were heart wrenching. Rex did not like them at all. He took two shots to the thigh and immediately let out an angry and sad cry. His face was bright red and he wailed like I haven't heard since he was born. Rex was naked from all the weighing and measurements. And after a couple minutes of crying, he peed, all over me. (I'm not sure why the pediatrician didn't think to tell me to put on his diaper..I'm sure this happens a lot).

As soon as I got Rex's diaper on, I was able to nurse him and calm him down. Then he conked out and I took him home. He slept for a while, but then about 4 hours after the shot he became inconsolable. He didn't want to nurse, he couldn't fall asleep, he did not care if I held him or laid him down. He just cried and cried and cried. I couldn't soothe him at all. It made me think of colicky babies. I can't imagine how hard that is on the mother to not be able to soothe her baby. I remember Fay being a little irritable after her first shots, but not this bad.

Finally I took Rex outside for a walk and he calmed a little and fell asleep for about a 1/2 hour. Then he was up again and crying. Finally at about 6pm tonight he broke his first smile since this morning....and I knew it was over (at least I hoped I knew). The inconsolable period really only lasted for 2.5 hours, but it seemed to last forever.