Punky is eight months today...time for a proud mama update!
Eating: She still hasn't refused a single thing. My girl is serious about her food. When she's hungry, she's cranky (just like mama). She is loving all the stage 2 fruits and veggies. She's had some samples of table food, like toast and potatoes. She loves her snacks, too. Mum-mums and the Gerber puff things. I got her apple-cinnamon last week and she loves them. She isn't too crazy about the yogurt melts; she eats them if offered but the look on her face tells me she'd rather have something else (again, just like mama...yogurt...yuck).
Teeth: Nope. Zip. Zero. Zilch. Poor girl. I swear she was two months old when she started really gnawing on things. Once one finally breaks through, I'm sure they'll come one right after another. Some days she drools and is cranky like she may be hurting a bit, but then other days she is fine. She's about a far as she can go food-wise without any chompers, so I hope for her sake she gets some soon so she can move on to new tastes and textures.
Mobility: Non-stop. All day. Go, go, go... Mama gets worn out chasing after her. She's fast, look away for one second and she disappears. Needeless to say, we now keep all bedroom and bathroom doors closed at all times. I thought she might take her first steps on her own by eight months but she didn't quite make it. She is close though. She cruises a bit along the furniture, and she is starting to let go with one or both hands while standing. She does it in her crib over and over again: stand up, let go with both hands, stand for two seconds, wobble for three seconds, fall on the hiney, giggle, repeat. It amuses her though. She tries to climb up on everything like a little monkey. I've officially lost count of the number of head bangs now. It's crazy how much that little noggin gets in her way now that she's mobile. She needs a helmet. No matter how closely you watch, it's impossible to prevent at this stage. Or else I just really suck at this...
Bath time: Loves it more and more with each passing one! Splash, splash, splash. It's hard to get her washed now because she just wants to play. Last time, she soaked me, the counter, the kitchen floor, the dining room rug, all in a matter of a three minute bath. She is almost too big for her baby tub so soon we will be switching to the big bath. My lower back spasms just at the thought of it...
Play time: She loves her toys and really plays with them. In fact, at the ripe old age of eight months, I think she is already bored with most of them. She seems really curious to figure stuff out, but once she does she gets bored quickly. My little smarty pants. So, lately she's been playing with toy replacements for something new to do. The basket full of container lids is currently her favorite and it keeps her busy for a bit.
Sleeping: Really well most of the time. The last six weeks or so, she has been going to bed between 8:30 and 9:30 almost every night, and waking up between 7 and 8 a.m. She has a rough one here or there, but stays on schedule for the most part. Twice in the past week she has woken up in the middle of the night soaking wet. She lays on her tummy, but then pulls her knees all the way up under her and sticks her hiney in the air. Then, when she pees, it runs right out the front of her diaper and soaks her all the way to her collar bone. It takes forever to get her back to sleep after that. Now, nap time is another story. Some times they are long, sometimes short, sometimes once a day, often twice, once in a while there's three...and last Saturday there were none. That's right, I said none...no naps at all. I spent over 6 hours doing almost nothing except trying to get her to nap. I really got so upset over the whole thing. The plans for the day were shot. I felt like a bad mama for not being able to get her to sleep. Finally by 5 p.m. I gave up trying. It was too late for a nap then anyway. She actually made it up until 9 that night. It totally blew my mind that she could go that long at her age without a nap, but she really wasn't even cranky. Wish I could say the same about mama...
Misc stuff: She still insists on shoving her fist in her mouth after almost every spoonful of food (usually the right, but once in a while the left). When I grab the fist, she turns her head and licks the side of the high chair instead.
We just entered the "I need to touch my hoo-hoo every time you open my diaper" stage. Not really an issue except for the messy ones, and mama sucks at remembering to give her something to hold to distract her with before opening the diaper.
She has developed the "clingy" thing now. Before she was mobile, she didn't have much of a choice, but now when she's tired or hungry especially, she follows me from room to room like a puppy, and if I stop long enough she grabs onto my legs and whines to be picked up.
In the last two weeks, she had her first restaurant visit where she sat in a high chair like a big girl and also her first time in the shopping cart like that as well. The restaurant...not bad...the shopping cart...not such a good idea. She bent over sideways and...you guessed it...sucked on the side of the cart. Yuck! Then, as we walked through the store, she was able to reach and grab way too much stuff...and it all went right in her mouth...from fuzzy pink coat sleeves to a packet of soup mix.
She got so tall all of a sudden that she's about an eighth of an inch away from needing a new car seat...and it's not in the budget this month so I hope she slows down a bit. I wish I had updated weight/length stats, but we still have a month before the next doc visit.
Her favorite things right now are her music table, the frog stuffy she sleeps with, the old turtle puzzle thing from when I was a kid, and just about anything she's not supposed to have.
"No no no!" has quickly become the most heard phase at our house. Often followed by "Ah...Punky..." And then an occasional "What a mess..."
She still smiles so easily, and so often, and now she laughs to herself about stuff. Although it's apparently an inside joke and we have no clue why she laughed, we can't help but to start laughing with her cause she's so darn cute.
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| Eight Months |
Nothing on TV really catches her eye except the start of the news, an annoying Friendly's commercial, and Jeopardy. She stares at Jeopardy. Almost like she's trying so hard to think of the answers. Makes me wonder sometimes...
I can't believe how fast the time has gone. Two-thirds of a year already. It's so apparent now that she is no longer an infant. She's on her way to toddlerhood now. How can something so very sad be so incredibly wonderful at the same time?
I always held it together fairly well, even during life’s crises. I stay on top of things. I organize. I prioritize. I remember. I’m punctual. I do what needs to be done. I keep my head above water. I rule my world with a level head and plans out the ying-yang.
Insert baby here.
I have the occasional breakdown. I’ve slid down a few rungs from the top. I live with clutter. My prioritizing always starts with baby…and ends with myself. I forget. A lot. I never get anywhere on time. What “needs to be done” has been redefined. I’ve swallowed a few mouthfuls of water. Punky rules my world; trying to plan is a waste of the little energy I have.
This morning, as I stared at the dried toothpaste that‘s been on the counter for weeks, I vowed to take ten minutes this weekend and clean the bathroom. But, it’s probably too far down the “needs to be done” list and will inevitably be bumped by something a bit more urgent. Let’s face it, that toothpaste isn’t really hurting anyone so screw it. Yeah, it won’t get done, I can bet a pinky on it.
Then I wandered out to the living room and saw the toys scattered all over. Looks like a toy store exploded and the debris landed in my house. How did this happen? She is only seven months old. What the hell is her room going to look like when she’s a teenager?
My eyes jumped over to the stack of mail…okay, bills…desperately needing my attention. I can almost hear my wonderful credit score falling down the ladder in the distance. It’s not the money. It’s the time. I need to make time to take care of this stuff. Hell, maybe it is the money. I have no clue. It’s been too long since I sat down and did the math.
A kitchen sink full of baby bottles. A dryer full of wrinkled clothes. A half-eaten banana on the counter. My god, did I finish one thing I set out to do before going to bed last night?
This evening after work I will start again at the top of the “to do” list. The three short hours I have with Punky before she goes to bed pass quickly. During that time, I am all hers. It’s all the time I can give her during the week so I make every minute count. Once she’s asleep, I’ll tackle that list with a vengeance…
I could’ve gotten killed this morning. How, you ask? One dirty word… Minivan.
There I was, minding my own business, cruising at a comfortable 50ish as I approached the first light in the city. The speed limit is 55 along that stretch, so I was well within the law. I had the green light as I approached the intersection, and since it had just changed to green, I knew I had plenty of time to make it through.
I swear, as my front tires entered the intersection, some moron in a white minivan decides to make a right on red and pulls out right in front of me! How the hell could he not have seen me? I was right there! I mean, I could have spit and hit him…I was that freakin' close.
Needless to say, I had to slam on my brakes and swerve into the passing lane to avoid crashing into him. Thankfully, there were no cars along side of me. If there were, I would’ve hit the van plus a car in the passing lane. With luck on my side, I made it safely around him.
As my heart threatened to beat through my chest, and my brain sent every signal it could to make me take a breath, I glanced the moron’s way. There he was, calm as can be, chatting away on his cell phone, completely oblivious to the fact that he almost made Punky grow up without her mama. My blood started to boil! I called him every name in the book, cut in front of him, and flipped him off repeatedly. I couldn’t control myself…you know how I feel about minivans to begin with…and my road rage came on full force.
As we sat at the next red light, the idiot behind me still yapping away on his phone, it took every ounce of strength for me to resist getting out of my car, storming to his, kicking the shit out of the front of it, and then…when he would naturally roll down the window to yell at me…grabbing that damn cell phone out of his stupid fingers and throwing it under the next passing car. Grrrr…
Get… off… the… damn… phone! There is a reason it’s illegal, moron. Tell your homely, chubby, curler-wearing, soccer-mom wife that you love her before you leave in the morning. Get up five minutes earlier so you have time to answer whatever dumb questions your dumb offspring (no doubt a chip off the old moron) need to ask you. Tell the boss at your dead-end job not to call you on the way in…you’ll be there in ten freakin’ minutes. And I’m sure you’re no rocket scientist or neurosurgeon, so whatever it is can wait.
Yeah, that was mean. I'm not proud of myself, but I feel much better now.
Okay, so this is way overdue. What’s my excuse? Well, I can list a whole bunch of crap, but suffice it to say there isn’t a good one. Life’s been happening and I’ve been slacking. I suck.
First off, he is back to work. No more SAHD. He’s thrilled, and I guess I am, too. We definitely needed it financially. He was only off for about 6 weeks and, even with the unemployment compensation, we were right at the point where we would’ve begun falling behind on bills. He got called back just in time. It may not be permanent, a lot is still riding on the economy, but they have to keep him working at least six months before he can be laid off again.
I thought I might get a crack at SAHM myself. I’ve been having this feeling that I am soon to lose my job for almost two weeks now. Then, yesterday, we found out we lost a huge account, so my gut intuition was correct as usual. I was told it will not impact my job, but that remains to be seen. Part of me was disappointed to hear that. Losing my job would definitely land us right back in the financial hot seat, but at the same time, I would love to spend more home time with Punky, and getting paid while doing it would be great. We wouldn't have money for much, but I'm sure we wouldn't starve.
I had to take Punky back to the doctor on July 30th. I was convinced she had thrush. I kept seeing white on the inside of her mouth, and it wasn’t wiping off… Apparently it was all my imagination. The doctor saw nothing and gave me that look that oozed “crazy, paranoid, over-protective, hypochondriac, first-time mom.” Ah, bite me. I am new at this, and if I think something is wrong, I want a doctor to see her. It’s times like these I am happy to be wrong. Better to look like an idiot than have them find something horribly wrong with my sweet baby girl. Besides, I rarely get to be wrong, so it’s a good opportunity to see life on the other side of the fence. Boy, that was sure smug…all in fun though.
The doctor appointment wasn’t a total waste. They checked her ears to see if she still had the fluid they saw a few weeks ago and nope, it has all disappeared. Great news. So, I was able to cancel the follow-up appointment she was supposed to have next Monday, August 17th. Her weight was a whopping 14 lbs, 3 ozs., which was actually a rather large jump in the short time between visits, but it was a different exam room, different scale, and when you are talking ounces there is a lot of room to be off a bit. The doctor said her 9-month appointment will be a breeze because she could tell Punky already hit all of her nine-month milestones and she had just turned seven months old two days earlier. My little over-achiever...
Good grief, she has been wearing us out and there is no end in sight. I fully expected this stage, but I thought she would reach it more around the ten month point. It’s exhausting. She has been crawling well over a month now. She pulls herself to standing with anything she can grab…footstools, dining room chairs, her high chair, swing, jumper, other toys…anything she can get those little patties around and push with those strong little legs. She is starting to cruise a bit on her own while standing, and she loves when you hold her hands and let her walk. It is back-breaking though. I still think she may take her first steps on her own before eight months. She’s got 17 days left; we’ll see if she makes it.
She really plays with her toys. It’s amazing to watch. We picked up an activity table at a yard sale for seven dollars. It has all kinds of buttons and levers. It plays music and also does numbers, letters, simple commands, colors, etc. in both English and Spanish. She stands up at it all on her own and plays forever. She knows how to make all the gadgets move to make sounds. And when she’s done, she learned how to gently get back to her butt instead of just falling over. She’ll crawl away and get into trouble for a few minutes or play with another toy, but then it’s back to the table for another round. She loves it. Seven dollars well spent (and a hell of a deal…sells for $40 new in the stores). Yay mama.
Her innocent little raspberries have become loud, forceful sessions lasting minutes at a time. Her whole face turns red and she spits over everything. I think the vibrations from it help to numb her gums. She is still struggling with the teething thing; her gums are all bumpy and you can feel the teeth, but none have actually broken through yet. Sometimes she gets really cranky and I feel so bad for her. Anyway, I noticed when I give raspberries back to her, I get a numbing sensation in my mouth so I imagine she does, too. It’s a wet and sloppy past-time, but adorable none the less.
We are still dealing with the eczema issue, but it has gotten better. Every time I see a flare up, I rub on some Cortaid and it helps control it. I am really starting to think that it is connected to what she eats, and it’s looking like carrots are a definite trigger. I will be able to confirm that later this week. She really loves carrots, so I hope I’m wrong. But, as mentioned above, that rarely happens...
So, the class reunion I blew off was this past Saturday. I was a bit sad that I didn’t go, but from what I can see on FB, hardly anyone attended. All of the pictures posted are of the same people over and over again. It doesn’t appear they had a very good turnout. I guess in the end I’m glad I saved the money and skipped the drama. Maybe I’ll go to the next one. If there is another one. If I am skinny...
A memory just flashed in my head: I remember when my parents attended their 20th reunion. I was around thirteen, and damn, my parents seemed so old to me then. Out of school for twenty years. Two whole decades. Ancient. Now it’s me…out over eighteen years…close enough to twenty. I am about the age that they were then. And I thought they were old. How old will I seem to Punky by the time she is thirteen? Shit. Getting closer to the box.
