July has been one busy month because …

… my cousin Vanessa was in town for a visit the first week of July.

… we went on vacation to the mountains.

… my cousin, Cristina and her husband, Marcio, were in town this past week.

BUT it’s been a GREAT month because of so much time spent with family!

When family is in town, we stay with my parents because it is just easier to stay with them rather than drive back and forth between their house and ours every day in order to visit the family in town. Plus, we can put Little Bug to bed on time and still have more time to visit with family.

We’ve been gone now for almost two weeks (a week in the mountains and then a week with my parents). Tomorrow we are going home and it will be good to get home, get unpacked (I am tired of living in a suitcase!) and get back to our normal routine.

I have several goals I want to achieve with Little Bug starting in August:

• Establish a new schedule/routine with her. She really isn’t off her schedule (even with all the traveling & being away from home!) but I really really really want to find a solution to the nap problem that has been going on since she turned one. I might attempt dropping the morning nap and seeing how things go. Although, today we skipped the morning nap because of a birthday party. After we got back to my parents’ house I laid her down for a nap and she took the usual 1.5 hour nap. She wasn’t her normal self as the evening wore on, so I don’t think one nap is going to cut it quite yet. (Unless she started taking a 2-3 hour nap in the afternoon, which she did not do today.) I will be SO HAPPY when we pass this phase and figure things out!
• Start doing Independent Playtime (IP) with Little Bug. I’ll probably write a post soon about IP but I’ll just say this for now… I admit when I read about IP in the babywise book when Little Bug was a newborn I thought IP was for the birds, not babies. However, now that I have a 14 month old that will hardly ever play independently and relies on Mama’s 24/7 entertainment, I am seeing the reason behind IP and I can see that Little Bug (and myself) will benefit from the skills babies/toddlers learn from doing daily independent playtime. So, I plan to start implementing some IP into Little Bug’s daily routine.
• Continue work on manners! Overall, Little Bug is doing GREAT with her manners. Like Babywise says, I see her pitching the fits only when she has not had enough sleep!

Until we get settled back in at home I’ll leave you with this:

My big girl eating her dinner with a fork for the first time tonight at dinner!

We went to Dave’s parents’ house outside the city for the 4th of July!

Little Bug likes to watch the neighbor’s horses.

This 4th of July Little Bug enjoyed running around the yard.

There was no stopping her!

Then Little Bug went swimming with her friend Tristan.

Little Bug tried to drink the water from the hose.

And because I like to compare pictures from the past … Last 4th of July. Little Bug was only 5 weeks old!

Every age Little Bug has been has it’s positives and negatives. Like when she was a newborn … there is nothing like holding a brand new newborn baby girl, but the waking to eat round the clock every 2-3 hours? I don’t really miss that too much nowadays! Ok – I don’t miss it at all, to be completely honest.

Anyways, now that we have hit the one year mark I am noticing a “negative” that comes along with this age bracket.

First some background (that if you’ve read my blog for long is probably old news to you):

I’m a neat freak. I like my house orderly and clean. It can (and does) get out of order and dirty but I always clean it up eventually. And the reason it gets out of order and dirty is mostly due to the 2 foot tall little person that toddles around the house all day long. (Obviously, I don’t mind the messes this little person leaves behind at all!)

However in recent weeks – since Little Bug started efficiently walking – I have noticed that getting ready to leave the house to go somewhere has become a huge production. It is mainly because, for the past 3 years, I’ve been in the habit of leaving my house clean and in order before going somewhere so I don’t come home to a messy house.

Well, it only literally takes Little Bug less than 5 minutes to pull out twelve toys from the toy basket and have them littered all over the living room floor and it takes her just about the same amount of time to add about a dozen books to that mix. Not to mention, if she finds her way into my bathroom while I am trying to get ready to leave to go somewhere she will have that room in disarray in no time as well!

If I were to try to clean up before getting out the door, Little Bug would be off in some other area of the house making a mess there! It just comes with being almost 13 months old, I guess!

I’m just going to have to let it go during this season of life!!

If we leave the house and all the toys aren’t in the toy basket and all the books aren’t in the book basket it’s okay!

Part of our getting ready for naptime routine is to “clean up”. Little Bug is learning how to put her toys away in the basket. She gets so proud when I tell her, “Little Bug, go put your ball in the basket.” and she walks over there and puts the ball away! So, twice a day the house does get cleaned up.

And for now, that’s just going to have to be my new standard of clean because Little Bug is on the GO!!

This is probably going to be a random post because I’m finished with chores for today and I’m just waiting for Little Bug to wake up from her morning nap.

I’ll tell you what happened last night…

Last night I put Little Bug to bed and she went right to sleep. Then about 15 minutes later she hollered out for literally a second, which she sometimes does in her sleep, especially when she has a cold. So, I just assumed she was repositioning herself in bed and when I didn’t hear her again I knew she was back to sleep.

Before I go to bed, I always go and check on Little Bug and make sure she is breathing. I can’t help myself. When I went in last night there was this peculiar smell in her room. I went to our bedroom and told Dave. I was wondering if it was the humidifier.

Dave got up to go see if he could figure it out. He came back and said it wasn’t the humidifier or the diaper champ.

He got back in bed but there was no way I was going to sleep without figuring out what in the world that smell was! It smelled like the smell a vacuum cleaner leaves behind when you vacuum. Know what I’m talking about??

We laid in bed for a little bit and it was really bothering me that I couldn’t figure it out.

Dave finally said, “I’ll go see if I can figure it out one more time.”

He came back a few minutes later and said, “Well, it is definitely coming from Little Bug and the crib.”

I told Dave, “Take my cell phone and shine it on her and see if you see anything.”

Less than a minute later he came back and told me, “There is puke in her crib!”

POOR BABY!!!

I jumped out of bed and we went back to her room. Sure enough, on one side of the crib there was a puddle of puke and Little Bug was sound asleep at the other, clean end of the crib. We looked Little Bug over and her PJ’s didn’t appear dirty. I checked her real good to make sure she was breathing fine. And then we cleaned up the puke side of the crib and laid a towel over it incase she migrated towards that end of the crib during the night.

I have no idea why she puked! Too full I guess. Or maybe she had air bubbles and when it came up the night time bottle came up too. Who knows?

I’m just so glad we discovered the problem so the poor baby didn’t sleep with her puke all night! I wish she would have cried after she puked because we would have known something was wrong and we would have gone in there to clean her up right away. But Little Bug puked and then just went to the clean side of her crib and went back to sleep.

Makes me feel awful that she slept with her puke for about 2 hours, but I guess it didn’t bother her since she just found a clean spot and went to sleep anyway!

Three years ago today was my wedding day.

My family

My Gracie was the flower girl

My Bridesmaids…all very special women in my life.

Dave’s family

The Groomsmen

The Mother-of-the-Bride enjoying every single moment of that special day!

Committing our lives to one another forever

The two shall become one.

Mr. & Mrs!!

My Grandpa & Shane (Grace’s dad) officiated the wedding.

The funniest picture taken that day!

Dave, I am thankful that God blessed me with a man like you. We’ve been through some tough times already in just three years but our marriage has never waivered. It has only strengthened. Thank you for loving me as Christ loved the church and for loving our little girl.

Love, Elaine

Cake!

We were clobbered by some bird seed!

May 20, 2007, is a beautiful day in my memory. My wedding day was perfect in every way possible. I have such fond memories of wedding planning with Mama. She is a big organizer and had everything organized so well so I didn’t have to worry about anything and could enjoy that season of my life.

The wedding ceremony portrait our hearts. We simply desire for God to use our marriage for His Glory. Little did we know at the time, but He would soon use our infertility and then the miracle that brought us Little Bug for His Glory.

It is hard to believe a day that every girl dreams about is already three years behind me. These three years have been filled with great sadness and an even greater joy, but the overall theme has been a faithful God that has walked with us every step of the way.

I know I am blessed. It’s not every day you find a marriage where husband and wife are committed until death do you part.

Last year our 2nd anniversary was really just a blur. We were anxiously awaiting the birth of our Little Bug.

She was born exactly a week after our 2nd anniversary.

Praise God from whom all blessings flow.

On April 30th my dad retired from his work with the railroad of 37 years!

His company had a Retirement Celebration for him that morning.

His boss began the Retirement Celebration by talking about my dad’s integrity and excellent work ethics. His boss mentioned that my dad is a man of faith and that because of this my dad was an excellent employee and will be missed.

Here is my dad receiving his retirement plaque.

The Engineering Department took up money donations from the employees to get my dad this gift certificate. The amount alone speaks volumes for how much my dad was appreciated and respected by his boss and coworkers.

The floor was opened to allow coworkers a moment to stand up and say something about my dad if they wished. Several stood up and it was very obvious that my dad has a reputation around the office of being a very reliable resource for information. Many people shared if there is a question that needs an answer everyone always says, "Go ask Roy."

My brother, Wesley, stood up and mentioned three things that he admires about his father: 1) he has an excellent work ethic, 2) he always kept his family above work and yet was still very successful at work, 3) he taught the family about safety (CSX is big on safety and that has spilled out to everyday living with my dad. He is very safety conscience!)

Little Bug played with the contents of Grandma’s purse …

… but it wasn’t long and she decided to make a great escape!

So under the table she went. Grandpa’s boss caught the little runaway and returned her to her family. (Can’t take this girl anywhere without her getting into some kind of mischief!!!!)

We are so proud of our husband, father, father-in-law and Grandpa and are SO THANKFUL that God gave him to us.

My dad had this chart where he counted down his weeks left to work since May of 2009! Every Friday he would check off one more week! My dad and I are very alike. I had a calendar that I used to count down my last year of teaching.

April 30th, 2010, he checked off his last week.

What a job well done.

I am proud of my Daddy!

… when you can play with a Reader’s Digest magazine??

I had a bag of toys for Little Bug to play with on our trip to my Grandpa’s house on Saturday. However, this Reader’s Digest provided her the most entertainment!

I’ve noticed something. Little Bug likes her toys but she loves to explore objects found sitting around that aren’t considered “toys”. As long as what she is wanting to explore isn’t dangerous I let her have at it.

Look at the level of concentration on Little Bug’s face in this picture! She is seriously into this Reader’s Digest!

When we arrived at Grandpa’s house we went out to the backyard to let the dogs run around. It was Little Bug’s first time sitting in the grass!

While she did stop to smile for a picture, she was mostly enamored by the grass!

We went to my Grandpa’s church on Sunday. Which is also the church my parents were married in and the church I attended the first 2 years of my life until my dad was transferred with his job and we had to move.

I can remember my grandma taking me to this rose garden on the church grounds when I was little, so I wanted to get a picture of Little Bug there.

Here is Uncle David!!!

Other than being about 20 pounds lighter from the last time I saw him in November, he looks as if nothing happened 3 months ago.

He is finishing up therapy and is actually hoping to return to work later this summer!

His recovery is simply amazing!

Thank you so much to everyone who has prayed for him.

Why do you call your daughter Little Bug? I know that is obviously not her real name, and thought maybe you wanted to protect her privacy. Is that the reason?

You nailed it on the head! Yes, my daughter is called “Little Bug” on the blog to protect her privacy. In this day and age, I just did not feel comfortable putting her real name on the blog. I also recently made some changes to the blog to make it more anonymous and to protect the privacy of my whole family. And just incase you are wondering, my real name is Elaine and my husband’s real name is Dave. I felt it was okay to use our real names as long as our last name isn’t on the blog.  

Do you have any ongoing contact with Little Bug’s birthmother or birthfather? Do they read your blog?

Our adoption was labeled “semi-open”. This means before Little Bug’s birth we were in constant contact with Little Bug’s birth mother, Tracy. I talked to Tracy on the phone, went with her to doctor appointments and Dave and I even took her to dinner one evening. I am forever grateful for this contact I had with Tracy before Little Bug’s birth simply because one day I can tell Little Bug all about my time with Tracy if and when she is ever interested in learning about her birth mother. I am also eternally grateful that I got a chance to know the woman who chose life for my daughter. We were in this constant contact with Tracy for 7 weeks. We never met Little Bug’s birth father during those 7 weeks.

After Little Bug’s birth the agreement was that I would send a letter with pictures to the agency for Tracy every 3 months for the first year of Little Bug’s life.

Because of certain circumstances that I just cannot disclose on an open blog like this, ongoing contact is not in the best interest of this particular adoption. (Little Bug’s birth family does not read this blog.) Every adoption is so different. Until reading blogs like Heart Cries, I really wasn’t even aware that open adoptions are becoming more and more common these days. I think open adoptions are a beautiful thing, but it is just not an option for my particular situation.

I do feel in my heart that I will one day reunite with Tracy. I have no clue if it will be in the near future or decades from now. She will forever hold a very special place in my heart and I find myself thinking about her and praying for her more than I ever thought I would before Little Bug’s birth.

Were you concerned about allowing Little Bug to cry it out in regards to attachment?

I am so glad this question was asked because there are so many misconceptions out there about letting a baby cry it out!

Sleep is a skill that must be learned. God naturally made our bodies to go through sleep cycles, adults and babies alike. Every 45 minutes or so a baby transitions from light sleep to deep sleep and often times wakes during these transitions. Adults do the same thing, but know how to get themselves back to sleep. Babies can learn this art too!

If a baby does not learn the art of putting self to sleep this scenario, or one very similar, inevitably happens: Baby is asleep. Baby transitions into deep sleep and wakes during the transition. Baby starts to cry. Mom mistakes waking as “baby must be hungry”. Baby suckles on bottle/breast for a little while and falls back to sleep only for this cycle to be repeated again soon. Baby soon learns that to sleep he/she needs the bottle, breast, paci or whatever else parents are doing to intervene to get baby back to sleep. The end result? You have a baby who does not get an uninterrupted night’s sleep, which is so important to the developing baby’s brain and a very tired mommy who is also not getting an uninterrupted night’s sleep. A baby who can self sooth back to sleep gives a precious gift to not only his Mom and Dad but to himself as well.

Let me clear the water right now on something! I am not saying everyone must let their baby cry it out! What I am saying is that each family must figure for themselves what works for their family. How you go about achieving uninterrupted sleep is up to you and your family.

I chose to teach Little Bug how to put herself to sleep and stay asleep by letting her cry it out.

Contrary to what some believe about letting a baby cry it out, I did not plop Little Bug in her crib one day and let her cry for hours on end until she fell asleep!

Choosing the cry it out method did not harm the attachment/bonding process between Little Bug and me because I did it in a very strategic, responsible way. Little Bug was 3 months old when I started sleep training her (letting her cry it out to learn to go to sleep and stay asleep). I already had Little Bug on the eat/play/sleep routine. When I saw her sleepy cues and knew she was needing a nap, I would go through the naptime routine with her (which at that time consisted of a diaper change, swaddling her, turning on her white noise sounds, telling her “night night, take a nap” and laying her in the crib drowsy. I set the stage for sleep to take over and I never (and when I say never, I mean never) laid her down for a nap if I thought there was any chance that she could be hungry, wet, sick, etc… and was crying for any other reason than being tried. If there was a possibility (even a slight possibly) that she was hungry or wet, she was given an opportunity to eat or had her diaper changed before being laid down. This way if she did cry I could be 100% confident her cries were cries of “I’m so sleepy.” and I would let her cry until she fell asleep, which typically was never more than 10-15 minutes when we were in the heat of sleep training. As a result, Little Bug gets between 10-11 hours of uninterrupted sleep during the night and takes two naps (ranging from 1 to 2.5 hours) during the day. Now that Little Bug has learned the art of sleeping, I can take her to her crib, lay her down and she may talk or whine for no more than 5 minutes and then she drifts off to sleep until time to wake up. I am not up during the night trying every trick in the book to get her to go back to sleep. She has learned the art of sleep and it is a beautiful thing for all of us!

I could go on and on about CIO and the benefits of having a baby who has learned the art of putting self to sleep and staying asleep! Feel free to ask even more questions about CIO if I haven’t covered your question already above!

A day before Little Bug turned 10 months old, I decided I better introduce to her the Sippy Cup! I put some water in it and gave it to her. She pretty much knew what to do with it. I just had to help her hold it up.

“Can you help me, Mommy, please?”

Here she is trying it on her own!

Swallowing the water from the Sippy Cup!

I really believe Little Bug did so well with the Sippy Cup because her Grandma has let her drink water from her water bottle before.

Little Bug loves drinking water from Grandma’s water bottle and now she gets very excited when I bring out her Sippy Cup!

Perfect timing because with the hot heat of summer just around the corner, Little Bug might need some extra hydration between bottles!