Grandparents

Growing up, I really never knew my grandparents. Two of them passed away by the time I was 2 years old, and of course I have no memories of them. The other two were there, but not really around. They weren't really the 'grandparent' type. Even though we lived with one of them for quite awhile, I don't actually have very many memories of him because he was hardly ever there. This isn't meant to be a pity party for Leah, because it doesn't really make me sad. I think it bothered my parents (my mother especially) a whole lot more than it ever bothered me. In the end, it's not really a big deal. I just didn't know them. They are both passed away now and so technically I'm grandparent-less. I never wanted for grandparent affection though, I had sort of 'adopted' grandparents. My cousin's grandparents always treated me like one of their own, which made me feel very special, and my dad had a secretary who worked for him for years, right about the time his mother passed away, who became a sort of surrogate mother to him and a grandparent to myself. To this day she is my 'grandma' Marlene, and Gabe will know her as his great-grandma. When I told her, that she teared up and it was one of the sweetest things I've ever seen.

What is the point of this ramble about grandparents? I got to thinking about it when we went to visit my parents this weekend. Watching my parents dote on Gabe just fills my heart with Joy. They absolutely adore him, love to hold him and play with him, comfort him when he is sad...it makes me so happy to watch how much they care for him. It's the same with my inlaws. Every time my father-in-law sees him, he says what a beautiful baby Gabriel is, how SMART he will be, how ADVANCED he is for his age (I love my son, but he's just right on time for all his milestones. If you asked my father-in-law he'd say that Gabe is just the smartest little baby he's ever seen). Both sets of grandparents spend way too much money on him and just love to spend as much time as possible with him. Sometimes my inlaws call asking if Nathan and I want to get out of the house - just so they can watch Gabe.

It's pretty obvious that Gabriel's grandparents are going to spoil him rotten, and I wouldn't have it any other way.

My little mover

Today CG came home early (yay!) and decided to bbq hamburgers. Well he'd only been outside a minute when he came running back in yelling something about the bbq blowing up in his face. i ran after him to see if he was ok, leaving GT on the boppy on the couch. I always do this. He likes sitting on his boppy and I've never had a problem before. CG is thankfully fine, just some singed hair lol. I came back to the living room to find this.



Guess I won't be leaving him unattended on his boppy anymore...

Another successful night

Gabriel has, for the last few weeks, been only sleeping through the night about every other night. And even when he does, he's up between 2 - 3 am fussing and needing his pacificer back. Often at that point he'll fuss on and off until he finally wakes up at 5 - 6 to eat. Well we are now on 2 nights in a row of not hearing a peep out of him between 10 - 5. Today he made it until 6:30. I love sleep. It makes me such a happy person. :-)

Introspective

Do you ever have those days where you spend a large majority of the time looking into yourself and just thinking about life? How it used to be...how it is now...and compared to how you thought it would be when you were little. Today is one of those days for me.

Gabriel is currently napping (after an AWESOME night of sleep btw, not a peep out of him from 10 - 5) and I'm looking around at my house, the life that I've built with my husband, and I am just so thankful. It's nothing like I thought it would be when I was in high school. I was such a different person then, I had different goals. At the time, I wasn't even sure I wanted to ever get married, and I definitely didn't want children. I was certain that I would go to college after high school and then after college I would be a psychologist or something along those lines, and spend a lot of time in community theatre. I never pictured a family and the life I have now. And I definitely never thought that I would someday come to know and love Jesus. I was one of those people who tended to think Christians were a little off their rocker for believing in someone who, in my opinion, could never have existed.

How thankful I am that my life did not turn out the way I planned. That God led it in a totally different direction. God is so good. My life has been very blessed and today is one of those days that I just couldn't be happier.

Caffeine

I have promised to blog more, and therefore I'm posting this entirely pointless blog. I honestly wasn't sure what to blog about. But the coffee cup to my right served as my inspiration.

I love caffeine. Without it, I think I would be a very grumpy morning person. I was able to kick the habit during my pregnancy (thus the title of my blog) but it wasn't long before I went back to it. So now I'm thinking the title of my blog really need to be changed, but I'm not quite sure how to do so.

That being said, I'm off to refill my cup and enjoy a few more quiet minutes before Gabriel wakes up from his nap.

Surprise visits

Today after church I got a random call from my cousin, asking if she could come and visit today. I love surprise visits! No, that's not sarcasm, I really do. I hadn't seen my cousin since she came to visit me in the hospital after Gabriel was born, and she hadn't been to my house since probably last January or February. So she came down with a good friend of hers, and her friend brought her dog - who was super cute and reminded me how much I want a dog of my own. We had a great time going out to lunch and then spending time on the beach and walking around downtown Manzanita. All in all, a great day. And here is a fun picture of my cousin holding GT. I'm so jealous of her awesome tan. She makes GT look pasty white, lol.

Success

Well I think I can report that we offically have success in weaning GT from sleeping in our bed to sleeping in his bassinet. Not that it was a hard switch. To be honest, he hardly seemed to notice. It's mom who had a more difficult time with it. After I hurt my neck on Friday we decided it was time, too hard to have him laying next to me and take care of him while I was hurt. He took to his bassinet like a charm (excluding last night, which I'm sure was a fluke...SURE was a fluke...and repeat again). I, however, have spent upwords of an hour every night just laying there, listening to him breathe. I have quite a noisy breather on my hands, but now and then his breathing will get very quiet. I lay there, telling myself I do not need to check on him. That he is fine. But in the end I sit up just to watch his chest rising and falling. It's easier than battling with myself to be sure, lol. After a short while in his bassinet, we are going to start trying to put him down in his crib for the night. A much harder move for me since his nursery is on the other side of the house. Enter one the picture above, the angelcare delux movement sensor and sound monitor.

Oh yes, I purchased a monitor that will send me an alarm if he stops breathing for moe than 20 seconds. Overkill you ask? Yes, probably. My only excuse is that I'm a very paranoid first time mother who really feels she needs this in order to sleep at night - without getting up 20 - 30 times every night just to make sure he's still breathing.

I also came across a really funny baby item that...really...is not that necessary. But. I wanted it. And it wasn't expensive. Enter the itzbeen baby timer. Yes, there is a timer for all your basic baby care. How long it's been since you changed baby, fed baby, baby has been napping...etc. I honestly still keep a log of this information, 13 weeks later. If I don't, I find myself constantly asking, "When did I feed him last?" "How long has it been since I changed his diaper?" Not a big deal you say. Just feed him when he is hungry and change him when he's wet. I know, I know. But I like having a record. I thought for sure CG would take one look at this and laugh at me for wanting it. But I forget, he is a computer geek and he likes little gadgets. He got all excited and told me to buy it. Of course, this could just be becuase he's tired of writing everything down - pretty sure he thinks my log is silly, but he keeps up with it for me.