As Requested, More Finn Crawling

Here are a couple more videos of Finn crawling. I hate my voice on the one, but for you, I will put it up. Enjoy!

School me on Schedules

Mamas, I need help! After another day of variable napping and a horrid time getting Finn to bed, Sean and I are left feeling like we are doing something wrong. When Finn was very young, I took the "on demand" philosophy very seriously and I just tried to feed Finn when he seemed hungry and let him sleep when he seemed tired. Well, at almost eight months, I think this way of going about things is leaving us with no regularity and is actually working against us. We would very much like to ease him into a schedule. We have tried previously, but it always seems like it never works. I don't want to be inflexible, but I think we need more specific eating, napping and bed times. So, what are your thoughts on this? Are schedules too rigid or are you pro-schedule and why? How did you go about getting your loved one on a schedule? How did you even determine what the schedule should be? I am seriously at a loss. We were trying to put Finn to bed at 7:30, but then that seemed too late because he was getting crazy fussy, so we gradually moved it up to 6:30, but then there are some nights he doesn't seem tired at all and we can't get him to bed until 10! If you are trying to put them down, but they fight and fight, do you give in and let them stay up longer or do you stay the course? Naps for Finn are so variable it is unbelievable. Some days he will seem to need a nap every 2 1/2 hours, other days he will stay up 4+ hours before I can get him to sleep and the times are all over the place. How did you determine when nap times should be? For eating do you have set nursing times and set meal times? Or do you nurse whenever, but just schedule meal times? Any help all of you can give me would be awesome. I know every baby and family is different, but Sean and I are at a loss right now and would love to hear some real stories of what you find works. Please comment in the blog or email me! THANKS!

He's Mobile!

Finn has had a very exciting week indeed! He learned to get from his belly to a sitting position. Then he learned to crawl. Then he learned he could crawl to furniture and pull up! It all happened so fast. His crawling is very funny. It looks a little stilted. He drags his left leg and uses his right foot for momentum. Here is a video. It isn't a great example, but you can get the form.



One big perk in learning to crawl is the ability to get to very fun stuff, like Lily's water dish:
And he likes to crawl to Lily herself so she is none too pleased with the new situation.

Thank goodness we are moving in the next few weeks so we can baby proof the new house as we move in. On the other hand packing is going to be a horror show! We got the title search back on the house and were given the "clear to close" from our lender so I think we are good to go! We have a walk through scheduled tomorrow afternoon and then we close at 10am on Tuesday. We went to Lowe's yesterday to check out paint swatches, tools, and fencing supplies. It was wonderfully domestic.

Strawberry Picking

The start of summer means strawberry picking! Mmmm...the berries are so ripe and fresh right now. Finn and I met Aunt Carrie and Libby and Liam and our friends Judy and Summer and Sky. I went with them last year when I was pregnant so it has officially become tradition!

Finn and I picked close to eight pounds of strawberries and I have been eating them all day long. They are SOOOO good! I am going to make some muffins too and freeze a few.

HAPPY FATHER'S (yester)DAY!!!

I am afraid I am perpetually behind on just about everything these days, but better late than never....Happy Father's Day! First, a big shout out to my most fantastic Dad. Daddy, I love you!

We had a really nice Father's Day. It was laid back and we just hung out and grilled pizza (white bean, italian sausage and rapini...yumm). Finn surprised his dad with a photo collage and some of his first finger paint artwork:



There was also some napping involved. Ignore the blatant advertisement of Old Mil. They do not sponsor this blog.

Finn worked on his crawling a lot. He is working so hard lately, but still no forward momentum. He tries to bear crawl:

He tries to cross crawl:

And then, he falls down:

Lily is doing much better. Still a little favoring of the leg, but it is not very noticeable. We think it likely she just sprained it having too much fun. She is on her pain meds for another 5 days and I hope they aren't masking anything. I can't wait until we can walk her again. She doesn't understand why she is on house arrest and she guilts us every time we put on our shoes. She gets so excited thinking we are suiting up to take her for a walk and then she looks at us so sadly with those big brown labrador eyes when we leave without her. So we have been showering her with love and affection and ridiculously giant bones:

We met with our lender for the house today and got our bank commitment letter! Yippee. I am waiting on a call from our closing agent to hopefully get the last minute items taken care of. Sean leaves for NY tomorrow and when he gets back, we are buying a house! Crazy!

Well, I will leave with another very Happy Dad's Day to all those amazing fathers I know and a very Merry Summer Solstice to all!

Finally Fabulous Friday

Oh, the difference a day makes. We had a really nice day today (made even more so in contrast to yesterday) and it passed quickly. Sean made it home today and we had our homemade pizza night, which we do every Friday. We try to create something new each week. This week it was chicken fajita pizza with tri-colored peppers, cheddar cheese, tomatillo salsa, and cilantro on a masa/chili powder crust. It was very good!

Finn has also become interested in the kitchen. He has a grand time getting out the bread pans and tupperware from the cupboard and banging things around. It is nice because it allows me a few minutes to get his lunch ready.

A Thoroughly Thorny Thursday

Man, it has been a tough day! I don't know why, but everything seems to have gone wrong. First, Lily woke up with a bum leg. She wouldn't put any weight on her left hind leg and she almost fell down the stairs as I was trying to take her outside this morning. We were out in Northwood last night and she ran and ran and swam and swam, so she obviously did something. Of course, we were up at 5 am so I had to wait forever for the vet to open so I could talk to them and that just left me tons of time to worry. Plus, Sean is out of town and he has been working nights so I had to try to wait for a decent time until I could call him.

Then, I realized that I had several messages from our realtor from the night before. Just when I think we are smooth sailing on the house, more craziness comes up. Apparently there was a bunch of confusion regarding what needed to be repaired on the chimney and how it was to be done. Originally, Sean and I were going to take care of the chimney, but then we traded the chimney repair with the sellers and so they were supposed to do it. Well, I guess what needed to be done was lost in translation somewhere. Luckily, our realtor caught it, but I have spent much of the day making phone calls trying to figure out the problem and come up with a solution. And many of the phone calls have landed on answering machines so I am still waiting to resolve it all. I realize this is a completely vague paragraph, but I could seriously write a novel if I were to catch you up on the specifics. I am sure it will all get worked out, but I just don't need this kind of stress.

I came up with what I thought was a simple and cute gift from Finn to Sean for Father's Day. I have been trying to get it prepared and in an effort to distract myself for a bit today, I decided to pack Finn up and head to the store to order some photos for the project. I get us all the way there only to find that I didn't properly load the photos on my USB and I can't order them. A frustrating and pointless trip.

We took Lily to the vet. Good times to get a baby and a lame dog loaded in the car in the rain to go the vet. The vet said that Lily's knee is definitely swollen, but she can't tell if it is just a sprain or a minor tear or a full tear. If it is a sprain or minor tear, it is likely to heal itself. If it is a full tear, then we are looking at surgery! Pray for the former! So, she is on orders for no exercise for the next two weeks and they put her on pain meds for 10 days. I gave her the first one after dinner and she promptly vomited everything! Poor thing. She is going to be a complete pill without her daily walks too. I feel so bad for her.

I was proud of myself having successfully gotten Finn to bed tonight and I was looking forward to decompressing a bit. He woke up once at the half hour mark, which is common, and I got him back to sleep. He woke up again at a half hour and I was rocking him back down. It looked like he was going to go back down, but then our lovely new neighbors decided to throw a bookshelf off of their porch causing a big bang as it broke into pieces. So, Finn woke right up and would not go back to sleep at all. He is now happily taking all of his books off the shelf and "reading" them to me with no signs of sleepiness whatsoever. Who knows when he will get to bed, which means who knows when I will get to bed....

Ah, I swear I will post about puppies and rainbows next time.