Demolition Derby

Over the last two days we've been doing a bit of demo... ripping out trim, carpet and linoleum in our main floor.  It's been a bit of work, but soon enough will be well worth it.  Once all the carpet is gone we'll lay hardwood and re-trim the main floor.  

Jack and Ross are both Tebowing.  Needed inspiration to push through the painful linoleum demo.  

A day for firsts

Yesterday was a special day with Jack.  They are all really nice days with him, but yesterday included a couple of "firsts," which is just exciting.  In the morning, Jack rolled over for the first time.  He has been flirting with it, rollin from his back to his sides with regularity.  But yesterday, I was kissing his neck while he was tipping back and forth, and he rolled all the way over and got his arms out from underneath himself.  So, he first rolled from his back to his tummy.  He doesn't seem very close to rolling from his belly to his back, but I'm sure he'll surprise me with that sooner than I expect.

Jack and I also took Ozzie for a run for the first time.  It wasn't my first run with Ozzie since having the baby, but it was Jack's first run in the stroller alongside Ozzie. It definitely kicked my butt, but Jack did GREAT!  He stayed awake, took in all the sights, did a little cooing, and even hung in there patiently while I talked to one of our neighbors at the end of the run (more patiently than Ozzie in fact). What a good baby.  I adore him so very much,and I know how lucky I am! Hopefully more of these running outings to come, but it'll have to wait for tomorrow's snow to melt away.  I was a bit overzealous on the pictures, but he's just so adorable!

 

This is one of the rare photos without a tongue :-)

Preparation

We are currently preparing to lay hardwood floors on the main floor of the house.  There will be a ton of work going on in the next couple weeks, including furniture moving, demo and then installation. Our house will be chaotic, and we'll have to live on subfloor temporarily.  But it'll be so worth it.

So... any takers on helping out?  :-)

Chitter Chatter

Jack is starting to find his voice and it's really fun having little conversations with him.  Half the time we sound like just a bunch of cavemen grunting at each other, but there's something really satisfying about having two way conversation with your child regardless of how insignificant the words being spoken are.

City Pumpkin

Saturday the family took a little excursion to Parker to visit a Halloween fair and get some pumpkin's.  We thought about driving all the way out to a pumpkin patch, but figured Jack really wouldn't remember it so the authenticity doesn't really matter.  Anyway, it was a brief trip, but pretty fun all in all.  There was a petting zoo, corn maze, pumpkins, and a bunch of other stuff for kids who could run around.  The corn maze was fun, bu ultimately a little too easy because I could see over half of it. 

 

Smugglin Teeth

Tonight I got back from the land of maple syrup, hockey and Molson.  I was only gone for three days but, long enough to know something was different.  While Jack and I were doing our nightly Tiggerfest on the bouncy ball my finger caught a sharp edge on his gumline.  Sure enough he's cut a tooth on his lower fronts.  He's been pretty mild tempered, so we didn't really see it coming.  Well on closer inspection its next door neighbor is showing some white too and doesn't look too far behind.  Hopefully he tolerates it because I've heard horror stories about it keeping babies up nights.  If you ask Sonia I'm a real pill if I don't hit my REM ;)

4 Months

Jack officially turned 4 months old yesterday. So today we went to the doctor for his 4 month well baby visit. I was so excited to see how big he's gotten, as I feel like he's grown nearly everyday lately. Justin couldn't join us this time, as he was at the airport preparing to leave town for work, so Jack and I went at it together. We arrived on time (which is sometimes a huge feat), and the appointment started with with the weigh in...

Jack is currently 25.75 inches long (75%ile), he weighed in at 16 lbs. 1 oz. (70%ile), and his head circumference was 41.5cm (80%ile).  I was so thrilled to see that his weight gain was keeping pace with his height increase. It is just nice to know for sure that he is getting enough, which I had little doubt about considering he has burned through our milk freezer stash like it was going out of style.

I am so grateful that I have been able to breastfeed Jack exclusively for these 4 months, but I'm sad to say it seems that reign has come to an end. Regardless of my efforts, I will need to begin supplementing about 6 oz of formula for the 3 days he's at daycare. I hope to keep it to only that, but it means that I continue pumping 3 times everyday at work, and it means that I continue to get up every night once to pump, which is difficult when baby Jack sleeps through most of the night (he's gone about 11 hours from beginning of feeding to beginning of feeding the last couple nights - but he is getting up and crying once or twice in the middle of the night, I believe for some attention and love).

Breastfeeding has been the most challenging part of this whole experience for me. I've never wanted to succeed at something so badly, so part of me can't help but feel like I'm failing. I've even doubted whether returning to work was the right decision, considering it is only in being away that I fall behind. But I try to continue to look at the bigger picture for our family, and my job plays a role in our future. And I try to remember that Jack is growing, healthy, and absolutely perfect. He is such a joy, and I love him so much.

Next up... introducing solids.  We got the ok from the doctor to start, now we just have to get ourselves ready for that adventure. As with all adventures with Jack, we are looking forward to it!

Chair Mountain Ranch

This last weekend, all 4 Bucks headed to the mountains, hoping to catch some great fall colors.  And boy did we.  Our friends the Kraft's organized a weekend away, and found a location that had multiple little cabins available.  The place was called Chair Mountain Ranch, located near Marble, CO (Website:http://www.chairmountainranch.com/)


Each little cabin had two small bedrooms, a full bath, a kitchen and gathering space. It was all we really needed.  Ozzie was a welcome guest, and he really enjoyed himself running freely in nature (not listening to a word we said). There were 2 other families, the Kraft's of course, and the Root's.


So, our trip does have a funny story.  I had to do a survey the morning of our departure, so Justin worked hard to run the necessary errands to get us ready to go.  I had developed a short list to help him, and he even surprised me with a visit at my survey to bring me coffee. Very sweet. We got the car loaded up, utilizing a rocket box borrowed from Justin's
boss, so that Ozzie would have ample room in the back of the vehicle. (We continue to be surprised by how much "stuff" comes with a baby!) So, as soon as we pulled up to our cabin, we immediately realized what we'd forgotten; the Pack N Play!  Yeah, what rookies we are! I'd forgotten it on the list, and Justin hadn't thought of it either. Oh, and we also forgot Ozzie's bed, but he's just a dog, right? We made due with a little sleeping bag and blanket for Ozzie, and Justin's ingenuity shined in creating a safe sleeping environment for the baby.  Check it out!

So he used the mattress of one of the small beds, slid it to the corner of the room, and posted up the box spring as the other side. Afraid it might fall on him (not that it would, the thing was sturdy), he attached it to the other bed with a ratchet strap. Oh, and we were sure to temporarily remove the photo hanging on the wall above him. Well, Jack slept fine, and so did we, even without our handy video monitor to constantly check in on him.

We had a wonderful time, and again enjoyed taking Jack along on yet another little adventure.  He did great, slept well, and was in good spirits (at least until we were stuck in traffic coming home Sunday afternoon, but traffic makes us all a little grumpy). More pictures can be found on the Picasa page.