I'm not ready for the Summer to end!!

This summer has been awesome! I'm super excited for cooler and less humid temperatures, but bummed about the summer ending, especially bc Joel will be way busier with traveling very soon. But,.. such is life! Here are some end of the Summer tidbits from our side -

Cloth diaper update
about 2 months into it, here's a vlog (video blog) I took to explain some of the ins and outs.




Caffeine causing fussiness?
Luther has had an amazing month. He just started rolling over and he has turned into such a sweet, snugly, and happy baby! But it wasn't always that way...around 2 months old things were getting bad. He was still sleeping very well at night, but was super duper cranky during the day. Spitting up constantly, crying a lot, not napping well. Something's gotta change. I looked into my diet, and realized I had been drinking about 3x my normal amount of caffeine. ugh. Seriously. I don't want to give that up. Anything but that. The next day I went cold turkey and was slightly comatose all day long.  Ok, not really, but almost.  The first day there was a drastic improvement in the amount that Luther was spitting up. The 2nd and 3rd days there was a drastic improvement in his overall demeanor.. no crying! Shoot. I mean.. good!  I've also added infant probiotics to the daily routine, and I've noticed that when I skip them he is fussier (spit up amount is the same).  So, since about 1 month ago, I've been caffeine free.  Unfortunately for the rest of the family the dinner meals and other housework has for sure suffered.  Hm... I guess I cannot do it all. Maybe someday my body will adjust to less sleep.  Currently I am skipping my nap to write this post, it took me over 1 week of having it on my to-do list to muster up the strength!

Here's a video of Luther rolling over




Does TV promote a consumerism in a 3 year old??
Joel 3 had a blast watching the Olympics for 15 mins each night when they were on.  He would sing the "Olympics song" everywhere he went.  I think he's pretty depressed that they are over. Interesting thing to note, Joel has never in his life used the expression, "I want..." until, about 2 or so days into having the Olympics on TV.  We don't have a DVR so we actually have to watch TV live, and that includes commercials. We mute the volume during the commercials, but apparently that isn't enough to counteract the poison put into the child's brain during that time. But in all seriousness, he wasn't with any other kids, we hadn't been speaking differently, he just all of a sudden had a desire for more things, a covetousness, that he did not have before.  We went to the grocery store and he pointed at some random item and said "Mommy I WANT that."  Um.. excuse me?  How sad.  I took the time to speak to Joel the importance of attitude of thankfulness and contentment.  I explained to Joel how God is our Father who provides for us, and how much it hurts Him to complain about what we have and want more.  I am not sure he got it, but he knows he isn't allowed to say "I want ___" anymore.

I spoke to a dear friend (who also strictly limits her kids' TV watching) about this phenomenon.  She confirmed my suspicion saying that her kids have indeed said the same things after watching more TV than the normal 1/2 hour show once or twice a week.  She also mentioned that, to my relief, it can go away when the TV is off and things are back to normal. Yeay!!

Bye Bye consumerism, we will see you again in 4 years! ;)

A bad strain of Hand Foot and Mouth
Last week we encountered a nasty strain of hand, foot and mouth.  It started with Joel who's tongue sores were so bad that he didn't talk or eat for 3 days.  Oh.. yeah and he was also waking up between 2-6 times per night crying in pain.  Oh yeah, and he wouldn't nap either.  So, we were pretty desperate by the end of the 3rd day, so desperate that I actually took him to the doctor! ha. He said that it was probably hand foot and mouth disease and to give him a drink of benedryl + maalox combo every 6 hours. (which I already knew from this thing called the internet...) Not sure that was worth the $110 out of our HSA, but at the time, like I said, we were desperate.  Sure enough, by the 4th day he was back to his normal, very talkative self.  However, Judah was very very whiny.  We looked into his mouth and saw a huge tongue sore, just like Joels.  I looked at his hands and feet and saw small dots on his hands. Oh no.. I am not sure we can handle 3 more days of this, and potty training on top of it!

Here's a quick video of poor Judah, I thought it might help someone who is wondering if their child has hand, foot, and mouth disease.



Judah has had hand, foot and mouth 2 other times and this is by far the worst.  Apparently there are different strains of the virus so it is totally possible to get it more than once.  This was so bad that even I had small, sensitive bumps on my hands, and Joel had 5 mouth sores.

Judah is potty training!
Judah is just a few days shy of 23 months and has taken to the potty VERY well! It all started about 2 weeks after we put him in cloth diapers.  We saw him strain to poop and asked him if he was interested in sitting on the potty (not a technique I would recommend).  He emphatically said "Potty!" and so we put him on and sure enough, 15 or so mins later, there was poop and pee in the potty.  Um.. how did this happen? No training at all, all of a sudden he goes in the potty.  Its a total mystery.  So, I thought to myself, with Joel traveling soon and not wanting to surpass the 28 month mark (I've heard bad things happen if you try to potty train after 2 1/2) I decided it was time to take up full-time training using Julie Fellom's "potty training in 3 days or less" method. Just like we did with Joel.  He has done an incredible job.  By his 4th day he had no accidents.  This training actually coincided with his horrible hand, foot, and mouth disease.  We figured since he was contagious and cooped up anyway, we might as well train as we had planned.

I've heard, of course, that the second child is so easy to potty train.  But I had no idea just how easy it really would be.  I mean, we spent hours and hours on the potty with Joel 3 before he finally even put 1 drop of pee in there.  It has been nothing like that with this one! Don't get me wrong, there's been a lot of whining, cleaning up pee on the floor, and testing our patience, but overall, I am shocked at how easy this kid has gotten 'it.'