My little barracuda

I was recently flipping through the American Academy of Pediatrics, The Complete and Authoritative Guide Caring For Your Baby and Young Child Birth to Age 5. I know, I know, I'm a dork, but it has some really good information in it. Plus, I feel guilty reading a real book, when I should be reading my class materials, so this makes for a good bathroom read. Moving on, there was a piece in there about getting to know your baby's feeding patterns and it was comical. Anyone who has ever breastfed should enjoy this and should be able to "label" their child. Apparently it is from Yale University researchers who "playfully" attached names to the eating styles. The book also gave advice on how to deal with each style, but I'm only including the actual style.

"Barracudas get right down to business. As soon as they're put to the breast, they grasp the areola and suck energetically for ten to twenty minutes. They usually become less eager as time goes on.
Excited Ineffectives become frantic at the sight of the breast. In a frenzied cycle they grasp it, lose it and start screaming in frustration. They must be calmed down several times during each feeding.
Procrastinators can't be bothered with nursing until the milk comes in. These babies shouldn't be given bottles of water or formula. Continue to put them to the breast regularly.....
Gourmets or Mouthers insist on playing with the nipple, tasting the milk first and smacking their lips before digging in. If hurried or prodded, they become furious and scream in protest. The best solution is tolerance. After a few minutes of playing, they do settle down and nurse well. Just be sure the lips and gums are on the areaola and not on the nipple.
Resters prefer to nurse for a few minutes, rest a few minutes, and resume nursing. Some fall asleep on the breast, nap for half an hour or so, and then awake ready for dessert. This pattern can be confusing, but these babies cannot be hurried."

So, which type is/was your baby?

The one where all I talk about is poopy

The most amazing thing happened last night. While I was doing my homework, the hubs was in charge of the kids. Amazing right? Just kidding, the amazing thing happened while he was watching them. I heard Hannah exclaiming that she had to go poopy. Unfortunately everything is poopy to her. Anyway, they went running into the bathroom and he put her on the pot gave her some books and walked away. About that time I had finished my homework and went to check on her. As I walked in the bathroom, I noticed she had her game face on so I quietly left. A minute or two passed and I walked back in, she looked up and told me to leave. Apparently she needs her privacy. Anyway, she sat there for probably 10-15 minutes before I was allowed to enter. I looked in the pot and broke into a poopy dance, because there really was poopy in there. She was really excited to flush that one because she got to say bye to the poopy. We then placed two stickers on the potty chart. Two because pooping is definitely worth more then potty. We danced and sang, we called grandma; it was a big old party. Then right before bed she wanted to go again, this time it was just potty but at least she is initiating the bathroom trips now. I say that, except today she did not want to wear big girl underwear, nor did she want to go on the big girl potty. At least we're getting somewhere though.

The Epic Tales of Potty Training

We have been working on potty training with the girl lately, and by we I mean me. She is doing pretty good with the potty. Most of the time when I sit her on it she goes and we have no accidents. However, sometimes she doesn't want to sit on the potty. Usually a little bit later she comes running, "Uh-oh, I potty, I potty!" Meaning that she started to go, felt the wet and stopped herself. Which, is a good step because then she will finish on the potty. It's the stinky that we have problems with. She has yet to go poopy on the potty. Since she usually goes in the evening I thought I would watch her and when she runs off to do her business I would throw her on the potty. So, last night I caught her in the act and we went running to the potty. We made faces to "push out the poopy" and nothing happened. So, I decided we would try reading books. Seriously she sat for like 20 minutes reading and nothing happened. By then it was bedtime and I told her we would try again later. She made a serious face and pushed and I really thought she was going to go. She did go potty, just no poopy:( It was so cute though, when she got up she had the red rings on her booty from sitting there so long!
Uncle Matt would be proud, these are the books she read while trying to go!

So Sweet

Thanks Uncey Matt

Hannah absolutely loves her new Dora couch and big Dora doll. Although Uncle Matt wasn't with us for Christmas, he still got the nieces and nephew typical Uncle Matt gifts. We call them Uncle Matt gifts because they are usually not a typical birthday or Christmas gift. For instance for Hannah's first birthday he got her a wooden picnic table. For her second birthday it was a Dora Big Wheels. Very nice gifts, just Uncle Mattish. Anyway, Hannah likes to lay on her couch and watch her movies in her new Dora T.V. that Mommy and Daddy got her for xmas. Her latest thing is that she has to be covered up with a blanket while watching. It is so cute that we had to capture it on film!

Holidays

We are happily home from our extended trip to Ohio and things are finally settling down around here. We had a wonderful trip and enjoyed spedning time with all of our friends and family...however my children are quite spoiled now! The trip home was, hmmm how should I put it, AWFUL!!! The normal 12.5 hour trip took 16.5 hours!! Which would not have been so bad if it weren't that we were driving two seperate vehicles and I had the children with me for the first 12 hours. See, we decided to buy me a Mom car when we were in Ohio. That's right I now drive a minivan, WOO-HOO! Anyway, the deal was we would keep both children in the minivan and the dog in the car then switch drivers each time we stopped. Unfortunately, that didn't happen and we stopped plenty of times. Alexander still eats every two hours, so by the time I would feed, burp and change him we would have approximately an hour and a half of driving time. Not to mention the times when we would stop for an extended ammount of time then have an even shorter driving window. Then there was the fact that Alex HATES his carseat. So, I got to listen to my fair share of him screaming because he was unhappy. For the most part Hannah did really good, but often when Alex was screaming she would get upset and then start whinning because he was crying. I would call Hubby on the cell just so he could hear what I was going through. The worst part was, when Alex was hungry I would call him to let him know we needed to stop and he would say, as soon as he found someplace....or in the next 20 minutes. Funny thing was when I finally forced him to take over the van, the second Alex started crying he would pull off. Then he was saying how miserable he was because he had to drive them. Oh, poor baby had to ride four hours with crying kids....welcome to my world for the past TWELVE!!!! Oh, I don't want to forget the fact that we drove through some pretty heavy fog in the mountains. So heavy that you could barely see the car in front of you. I already get a little anxious when driving through the mountains, add a little fog and I was a basket case! Did I mention that we were driving on New Years Eve? How's that for smart travel planning? Add all of those ingredients together and that is why it took us an extraordinarily long time to get home. So, even though we left at eight that morning, we were still driving when the ball dropped. In fact we were on a strip of road in the middle of nowhere surrounded by the National Forrest. Happy New Year! I hope that you had a much more peaceful one then I did!

Changing

I can't believe that it has already been three months! He is cooing and laughing so much these days and he loves to play on the floor with his big sister. This little guy is getting sooo big already; just look how much his face is filling out. I just transitioned him into his 3-6 mos clothes the last few weeks of December and I think I should have done it a little earlier. This was the first time he wore the above outfit and he is so long that I don't think he'll be wearing it much longer.