Thank Goodness for Yo Gabba Gabba

Do you not know this Yo Gabba Gabba I speak of? I will let you in on my shocking secret: I allow my 14-month old to watch television. I know, I know, the horrors! So lets move past the judgment part where you are thinking I am rotting my kids brain and I will let you in on the magical thing that is Yo Gabba Gabba. This show on Nick Jr. saves me some days. When the opening music starts and my son starts to feel the music and starts his shoulders shaking, I take a deep breath. I know that I have at least five minutes to do anything I want. I can actually load or unload the dishwasher without the help a little munchkin throwing all the silverware on the floor. I can go to the bathroom and not fear what kind of disaster I might come to find a minute later. Yo Gabba Gabba is a completely weird show with DJ Lance and some toys that become real and learn dancey dances. There is something about the show that just draws my son in and captures his full attention at least for a little while. You would realize how incredible this is if you understood that at all other times of the day my little guy is on the move. If he is awake he is getting into everything. That means I am always on the move. So when you have five delicious minutes to yourself, it is AWESOME! Jon has joked that he is going to be DJ Lance for Halloween and just the thought of that makes me want to start laughing. Anyway, if you have a little music lover like I do, you should check this show out.

The Little Entertainer

So this morning was a bit on the rough side, so I thought I would round things out with a little lighter post. Tonight at dinner my sister brought over KFC. Hudson really wanted to hold the bucket. We emptied it out and gave it to him. He proceeded to put all of his little bites of food in it. Every once in a while he would take a few bites back out and eat them. Then he decided to dump all the bites on his head. Of course we all laughed so he just kept putting the bucket on his head. It was hilarious. He always manages to entertain us. Another funny thing he is doing lately is trying to drink the water while in the tub. He just laps it up like a puppy. The last few days he has been saying hi constantly and waving. We love that little guy, bucket head and all.

Okay Monday, You Win

Well today is Monday and that has been made clear to me. It started out innocent enough. Hudson slept through the night and woke up at 7:00. Pretty great way to start off the week. We hung out and I fed him breakfast. I started to think that, yeah I was ready for the week, ready to tackle everything I needed to. I went to pour a bowl of cereal, a brand new box. When I got out the milk I decided I would take a sniff first. I am a little paranoid when it comes to food spoiling. I quickly discovered the milk was sour! I was happy that I least discovered this before I put a heaping spoonful into my mouth. After that things took a turn for the worse. Hudson began fussing and I realized that he was already showing the tell tale signs that he was needing a nap. So I followed the routine and tried to get him down. He refused to go down. I tried all my tricks and no luck. I finally gave up, which I don’t do very often. He started playing with his toys on the floor and I think he was secretly celebrating the fact that he had won the battle. To rub it in he decided to have a major diaper blowout. This had not happened in quite a while and it took me by surprise. It was the kind of diaper that made my mind start racing trying to think what I could have fed him that would result in such a disgusting mess. I know, this probably isn’t the subject matter that you want to read about on your Monday either.

The second attempt at a nap was no better than the first. It is so frustrating to see your little one so tired and they just won’t give in. It is just going to be one of those days. When this little one does finally decide to take a nap, it will feel like a huge accomplishment for me. I figure things will have to get better today, right? Or at least if I can survive Monday I am sure Tuesday will be kinder to me.

A Candid Look at Motherhood

I love my son more than I could ever imagine I would. He is the most incredible gift I have been given. I love that I get to spend my days with him and watch him grow and discover every second. That being said, being a mom is the hardest job I have ever taken on. The first year of my son’s life was the most exciting time in my life. It also was the most sleep deprived time in my life. I could title the last year as “A year with no Sleep” or “My Year as a Walking Zombie.” I pulled all nighters in college but this was months of that. You don’t truly value sleep until it only comes in one hour segments. My beautiful baby boy never wanted to sleep through the night. This I was told would last for just a short time, maybe a couple months at most. That was not exactly the case. Sleep became this elusive thing in my life. When I got even a small chance to take a nap I would choose that over any other thing such as showering, getting dressed, brushing my hair. When I would be walking around Target to pick up diapers or just to see the outside world, I would be shocked to see other moms who looked like they had it together. How did they find time to put on makeup? It is in those instants that I would wonder if I am the only one feeling overwhelmed. The only one who was having a meltdown because they couldn’t figure out why this little one was crying. The only one who couldn’t remember the last time I showered. The only one that couldn’t find the magic recipe that would get their child to sleep through the night. When I tried to talk about my lack of sleep with other moms I was usually confronted with advice about how I needed to just get my kid on a better schedule. This wasn’t that helpful. What I was really looking for was for someone to tell me I wasn’t alone. That I wasn’t failing as a mom because I couldn’t get my kid to sleep for more than a couple hours at a time. I also just wanted to hear that other moms had things they struggled with.

I think we as moms are totally in love with our kids and we never want to give anyone a reason to question or doubt that. So we end up only talking about the joys of motherhood and never really get into the other side of being a mom. The sleepless nights, the frustrations and struggles. I wanted to start writing this blog as a place to lay it all out on the table. I hope that other moms reading this might feel like someone else is in their corner and that it is okay to admit when things get hard. I hope you enjoy reading about how I navigate through motherhood.

Here are some honest truths of my experience as a mom:

I had a traumatic labor experience. I truly believe that Pitocin is the work of the devil. People always told me that labor is hard but once you have the sweet baby in your arms you will forget about the pain. Or they say that within a few days or weeks you will hardly remember the experience and will be ready to think about having your next kid. Let me tell you that I have a vivid memory of my labor and it made me seriously doubt whether I want to go through that again.

My son didn’t consistently sleep through the night until he was a one year old. We would get him sleeping for a little while and then he would get a cold or another tooth and it would pull the rug out from underneath us and we would be back to waking up several times in the night. Even now we have off nights where he ends up getting up in the night.

I was excited to stop breastfeeding. It was a hard skill to learn. Once I got the hang of it, things were fine. It was time consuming though and by 12 months I was ready to have my body back.

I am still struggling to find a balance in my life that allows me more time for myself. I have put my son first in every way this past year. My down time and time to be creative and work on my own artwork was placed on the back burner this past year.

I am tired at the end of the night. My son is on the go at all times which means so am I. When I get him to bed, I just want to take a breath. My to-do list isn’t appealing when I finally get time to work on it.