Princess Candy Corn

The boys are pretty generic superheros this year for Halloween, but I wanted to do something fun for the Princess. I think her candy corn dress (candy corn tutu? candy corn costume?)  turned out super cute.

Picking a Baby Name, both for real and online

Picking your baby's name is one of the hardest part of pregnancy, or was for me anyway*. You want to find the perfect baby name, one that one get her teased, that won't be #1 on the baby name charts, that won't relegate her to a lifetime of Bella H, that won't immediately link her to the year she was born (Hi, Lisa!). If you're like me you pored over the baby name books, double checking the meanings and then checking the Social Security Administration charts to see where it ranked this decade or last decade. You choose the perfect spelling (please just use the "normal" one, will ya?) I used this website a lot, it was by far my favorite online resource.

We really struggled with naming both the boys. The Pirate was our first and we were unprepared for the pressure of choosing the right baby name for him. We had a name in mind for much of the pregnancy, but even as I was in labor we were reading baby name books. We narrowed it down to two and a few hours after his birth decided on one. The Bug was 4 weeks early and while we knew he would have his grandfather's name. we didn't have a clue what name we'd actually call him. We finally named him mere hours before his release- and it turned out that we named him a very popular name for his year (in the top 20, top 10 the year after his birth!)  We did not have internet access at the hospital.  I still love it, and it fits him perfectly.

Girl names were more fun for me. My family had a tendency to give girls the L sound in their names so I kept looking for a good L name. Fairly early on I realized we could name her a name with the nickname "Ellie" that would fit the bill. I fell in love with both Eleanor Frances and Ellis Katherine.  I was 99% sure she was one of those. The weekend before her birth Mike asked, "How do you feel about...?" and I liked it, but not more than the other two. The baby was born on Tuesday and what do you know, we named her the new suggestion. For the record, it even starts with an L! I'm a bit worried that it dates to the 80s and 90s, but it is still in the top 50 last year. It is, however, more of a classic name (think Mary or Caroline) than a trendy one (MaKayla or Bella.)

While I don't post my kids names on my blog, it's no secret what they are. If you google me even a tiny bit you'll find them. I don't go to extremes to keep them private and fairly openly refer to them by name in email. I considered actually calling the girl by her name on the blog, but to keep things uniform, I'll be choosing a blog name for her. I haven't done so yet, because nothing really strikes me. She'll be 8 weeks old tomorrow and it's about time I decided on something before she becomes "baby girl" by default. The Pirate wants me to call her The Princess (he really loves his sister, can you tell?) but it seems like such an easy answer. I considered calling her The Pea, from The Princess and the Pea. I'm still undecided, so I'm taking suggestions. What should we call our baby girl? It doesn't have to follow the pattern of "The ____" but it needs to be cute. If I get more than one suggestion, I'm make up a poll of my favorites.  I'll start. I suggest we call her The Princess.

*Yes, there are some people, usually girls, who choose names in 8th grade and never waver. This boggles my mind.

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Diaper bags: Take it all or just a diaper?

I'm sure we've all seen (or been) the type of mom who lugs around this diaper bag (or one similar). It's big and bulky and contains every possible thing that your baby might need. Every. Possible. Thing. This is usually the same mom who is also carrying her own purse alongside the diaper bag. I am not that mom. In fact, I never really was. Here's what I do instead-

This is my purse. Yes, I carry a giant purse. It's convenient. Plus always important to have room for your book,right?

(review of The $64 Tomato: How One Man Nearly Lost His Sanity, Spent a Fortune, and Endured an Existential Crisis in the Quest for the Perfect Garden to come)

You can see my wallet, my book, the edge of my planner, and the edge of cute little bag, with animals on it.  This is what it looks like when you take it out of your purse:

And this is what you'll find inside it:

Mine has two onsies, two size 1 diapers for the baby, one or two size 4 diapers for the Bug, and a burp cloth for a changing pad. You could also fit a small disposable package of wipes in there, if you only had an infant to deal with. I go through way too many wipes and keep them separate.

Here's the thing. You don't NEED all that other stuff, especially if you are breastfeeding.  You don't need lotion and clippers and full outfits and butt paste every time you leave the house. You need a couple diapers and an outfit in case of a blow out. For most errands, you won't even need that! Surprisingly, a baby can live an hour or three without a diaper change. Shocking, I know. 99% of the time, she won't need fed.  I regularly take the Pirate to school, stop by the bank and the grocery store, or maybe the library, and never once have to get out her diapers or feed her.

Sure, if you know you're gonna be out of the house long enough to feed her you'll want to take a bottle (if she's bottle fed), but you don't need the whole can of formula. And here's the trick to that- leave it in the car. Take that giant diaper bag you got for your shower, and fill it with duplicates of all that stuff- spare outfits, extra bottles, formula, what ever it is you might need- and stash it in the trunk. Just remember to pull it out every so often to add larger clothes as your baby grows. (Though to be completely honest, I don't even do this any more. I do have spare clothes in the car for them.)  Once you've lugged that bag everywhere for a few months you'll realize how little of it you really need. Just take the basics, anything else you can come home for or buy a new one since you're at Target anyway. Make sure your purse is big enough to toss this little bag in and you're good to go!


(Want one of your own? Email me. They're cheap.)

I am an Amazon Associate. As such, any purchase you make at Amazon.com after following a link from this blog will earn me a (tiny) percentage back as income. Thanks.

Preparing for Baby, Part 2. At home.

The second of my three part ramblings. You can find part 1, at work, here.

Ok, so in addition to having your office ready to abandon it, you (if you're me) need to have your house in some semblance of order. First there's the whole "where are we gonna PUT this new person?" question to answer. In our case, the boys will stay in the room they are in (technically The Bug's room) and the toys will stay in the room they are in (The Pirate's room) and the Baby will live in our room. For a while. I expect that we'll keep her in there until Christmas or so, at which point we will hopefully have some bunkbeds for the boys.  I'm hoping that a gradual introduction will work better with the Bug, instead of just tossing him out of what he knows when this small loud person appears.

This still leaves the matter of all the baby STUFF. I've spent the past few weeks moving clothing from one dresser to another and moving dressers from one room to another. This gave us more dresser space for the boys and freed up the built-in closet (more or less) for the baby. Most of her clothes will be in there, along with the majority of the blankets and extra stuff. A small basket of clothes, her diapers and wipes, and a handful of receiving blankets will reside in our room.  I bought a new little folding cradle for our bedside (which obviously I have not yet tried, but it looks awesome) and I expect that we'll use our little cosleeper like we did with both boys. (The First Years Close and Secure Sleeper, Colors May Vary, it has a little light on it for middle of the night checks and everything. I *highly* recommend it, even with that ugly link.)  I'm not planning on buying bottles at this time, and we already have most of the other baby gear we need.  We will need to do something about the current car seat, maybe recover it, maybe replace it.  We have a good stock of diapers on hand. If the baby arrived tomorrow, WHICH SHE WON'T, we'll be ready enough.

The last part of getting the house ready is the hardest and most ongoing part. I don't want to bring my baby home to a messy house. Worse, I don't want to call someone (Grandpa!?) in the middle of the night to come stay in my messy house while I jaunt off to have a baby. Every day I'm cleaning a small section and trying (haha) to keep on top of the clutter. I figure another couple months and I'll have it under control. (Ignore the fact that I expect a baby in less than a month.)  I'd like to have the yard mowed before then, so Mike doesn't have to think about it. It would be nice to have the car all clean and shiny when we bring her home.  I need to buy some paper plates so I can avoid dishes for a few days. The list is never ending!

While I haven't quite succumbed to the traditional freak out of nesting (yet) I fully expect to go home one day soon and start scrubbing floors with a toothbrush.   With the Pirate, I had to clean out the garage the weekend before his birth. The weekend before the Bug was born I found myself disassembling the hood to the microwave because that grease HAD to go!

If you have kids, did you have a day of full out cleaning panic that signalled the baby's imminent arrival? What household changes did you make to make room for them? Were you prepared or did the baby catch you off guard, as the Bug did to us?


I am an Amazon Associate. As such, any purchase you make at Amazon.com after following a link from this blog will earn me a (tiny) percentage back as income. Thanks.

Preparing for baby, part 1, work.

It seems like I get asked a half dozen times a day if I'm ready for this baby.  I typically make a joke and laugh, but the answer is really no. I'm about as ready as I'm going to be mentally, but there is just so much to do on an ongoing basis to ever say that yes, I am ready.  I'm at 32 weeks today, so it could realistically be anywhere from 4 weeks (when the Bug arrived) to 9 weeks (counting to 1 week late. I have no idea what this would be like!)

Today's example? Work. We've had a bit of reorganization in my office lately, my assistant and friend left to pursue other options and we hired a new person who will be doing my  job while I'm out. In the very short term, this effectively doubles my work. In the long term, it should even out.  In the context of getting ready for baby- it sucks. This means that every night I need to plan to leave my office in a state that anyone could walk in and pick up where I left off.  I am very bad at accomplishing this. I am extra bad at doing this when the person who will be walking in to take over isn't yet fully trained. I've been making a terrific effort to have my files done and notes left on pending stuff, but it's hard to get into the habit on doing some things that could be left until morning. This is not to say I shouldn't always been doing this anyway, but the sense of urgency is that much greater. As someone pointed out today, I need to leave every night assuming that I won't be back for 6 weeks. 

How do you handle something like this?  It feels incredibly overwhelming to me. What do I tackle first? How do I get it all done? Am I really that far behind? I feel like I'm working every moment I'm at work. I don't spend a ton of time gossiping, I don't venture out of my little office much, I don't stand around chatting with our members (customers/clients), and I take very few personal calls. Do you have any brilliant tips on how to leave your office ready for someone to step in? Let me hear 'em cause I could use the help!

I am an Amazon Associate. As such, any purchase you make at Amazon.com after following a link from this blog will earn me a (tiny) percentage back as income. Thanks.

Picture of the week

I just had to post this one!

This is the end of my second week back at work. It's gone pretty well so far, but by about 3:00 in the afternoon I'm just dying to go scoop the baby up. I'm really happy this is the end of the week, I'm looking forward to holding him for the next two days. He's sleeping so much better at night now that I'm not drinking any coffee at all (wah!) He's plumped up nicely too (almost ready to eat) and I can't wait to see how much he weighs next week.

One more week

I have one more week of maternity leave. I plan to take a little break from blogs for the week. The baby is getting so big and is just now getting interesting and it almost breaks my heart to go back to work. I need to wallow in him for a few days.

Hello there baby!

I had an eventful week, how about you?

The baby decided that April 10 was just as good a birthday as May 10 and surprised us on Wednesday night. We did not have a bag packed, a name chosen, clothing washed, a firm plan on what to do with the Pirate, nothin'! He arrived in a mere 6 hours from the time my water broke at home until he was in our arms. For not quite 36 weeks he's healthy- weighed in at 6lb 1oz, 18 inches long. We finally named him yesterday when he was a full 48 hours old. He has a touch of jaundice and is spending his time cuddling with a biliblanket, so hopefully they won't readmit him tomorrow. Otherwise, he seems good. He looks exactly like his brother did at birth. The pirate is thrilled beyond belief, if you can't tell from this picture. Now he just needs a blogger nickname...

Weekly Recap. (On Thursday) (the parenthetical version)

SO busy and tired at our house this week! Saturday we went to the Home Show to browse hot tubs (not that we're in the market, just that 75% of the show is hot tubs) and lawn tractors (also not in the market, unless you are a two year old.) We hit up Target and the mall with the small boy to see what he was in the mood for when it comes to toys (his party is this Saturday) and to purchase more socks (the checker at Old Navy told me that they were retiring navy and khaki little boy socks for the summer, and that they do it every year, thus the $.49 socks. While I appreciate the price, I think she's mistaken as the monkey has only ever worn the ON socks and navy and khaki are always available.) By Saturday night the muscles holding up the giant belly were very angry, and even now on Thursday, I am still paying for this excess of walking.

What else? Preparations for the Pirate party are well underway (unless you count cleaning, and I'd rather not, thanks.) The baby's room is 90% done (or 90% of what I had hoped to be done is done, not counting the other stuff we haven't done. God I love that sentence.) The quilt is done (100%!) The pillows are done (ditto.) Just need a little more shelf straightening and it will be ready to go for the party. Eventually, I'd like to make some little canvas baskets for toys, and some pillows from the leftover quilt pieces, but neither of those were on the original list.

I spent Sunday evening in bed reading (see above for bellyaching) and managed to get a decent chunk of The Battle for God read. I also read the first 1/3 of Toddler and 5 or 6 chapters of Fool Moon by Jim Butcher. I'm not so sure about Harry Dresden. He's a bit annoying in his superiority (false modesty? something annoying about him though. I'm up to chapter 15 or so now, and the annoyance has not yet abated.) I'm also still reading Heat Stroke, and the other morning added Take Me by Bella Andre. None of the others were at hand and I NEEDED something to read. One day I might actually finish a book. (Ha.) (And no, I don't get them confused.)

This weekend is the party, and then the monkey turns 3 on Monday. Seems crazy. My offical due date for the baby is 38 days away. Things are happening too fast these days!

Weekly Recap 2

Anyone else notice that I didn't post anything in the meantime? So what was I doing to take my attention away from here? Good question! I was sick for much of it. I had some kinda of sinus thing that definately would have keep me out of work, except that my counterpart was on vacation. By Friday night I was in bed crying about how much it hurt. Thankfully, on Saturday it began to clear up and I thought I might live.

Bookswise- I didn't read much. If it was quiet enough to read it was quiet enough to sleep and so I did. I did review Iron Kissed on the other blog, go check it out. I really loved it. I also finished up a romance novel re-read of In the Midnight Rain by Ruth Wind. This is one of my very favorite books and happily, it held up. It's got a little mystery (not too hard to figure out), the blues, a sexy broken hero, and a nice little falling in love. I am still reading the other books I was last week, and miracle of miracles, have not started anything else.

I am 31 weeks pregnant and my due date is less than two months away (May 10). My son's 3rd birthday is April 7th. My self-imposed goal for baby readiness was his birthday party. I want the nursery to be DONE at that point. So what did we do this weekend? The basement. On Friday night my husband and two year old ripped out all the old nasty carpet while I laid in bed whimpering. On Saturday we swept and mopped the bare concrete and then put all the furniture back where it was. We have one large rug in the couch/tv end of the room, and a smaller rug on the sewing end. The rest is bare, unpainted, concrete. Amazingly, it looks much much better.

This morning my husband went and built two big platforms for the box springs on our bed. Whoever designed it thinking that two little metal supports was enough on a king sized bed was crazy. It was the creakiest, shiftiest thing. So he built these big boxes and we replaced it. It's so much better. I don't feel like it's gonna collapse every time I roll over. We celebrated by taking a nice long family nap.

I did manage to iron all the pieces of the baby's quilt. I wish my library book would come in so that I could start sewing. I have a bunch of sewing projects planned for the near future. Now that the basement is ok to hang out in, perhaps I'll get some done?

A Happy Announcement.

FINALLY! I can spill. After weeks of misery and secrecy, today I finally had a doctor's appointment and got to see the cause of all the trouble- it has been confirmed that I am indeed growing a whole 'nother person! I am just over 12 weeks along, and if the visuals today are any indication, it's a little troublemaker! Flipping and dancing and swimming and carrying on in there! Due date looks to be early May, so the monkey will have just turned 3. We are both thrilled and terrified.