How It's Been Lately

I know it's been a minute since I've posted anything, and that's mainly due to being the parent of a newborn!  There's nothing like having a second kid to make you think - wow, having just one was a walk in the park compared to this!  If I had a real maternity leave, I'm sure I'd think things were easier right now. Because I'm self-employed, there's no one to take the place of me and no paychecks coming in, if I'm not physically out there doing the work myself.  I started showing houses within two weeks of having Jude, and I went back to my part-time accounting job by the time he was a month old.  It's a tough balancing act. Thank goodness I have a super committed husband and helpful family nearby.

Jude's strong suit has not been sleep these past two months. I can't think of more than maybe two occasions where he has slept for more than 3 hours at a time. When he's going through a growth spurt (we presume), sometimes he wakes up hourly wanting to eat. It's exhausting. Meezy and I have an overnight system where he takes the "shift" from around 10pm to 2am so that I can get a good 3 to 4 hours of sleep, and then I am in charge of Jude for the rest of the night.  Sometimes that means I can still get 2 to 3 more hours of sleep, if Jude cooperates. Because I'm nursing though, there's no set and easy path each day/night. If I haven't pumped right before going to bed at 10pm, then you can be sure I'll be awoken before 2am with my body telling me it needs relief. Instead of sleeping, I have to pump. Direct breastfeeding doesn't work well for Jude (for a few different reasons), so sometimes I'm having to pump right after giving him a bottle at 2am, which means I don't get back to sleep until after 3am.  If I'm lucky, Jude won't wake up until 5, but that doesn't always happen. Considering every night is like this, I still am amazed that I have any energy throughout the day and get anything done. On the contrary, I actually get a ton of things done each day, which means I don't take any naps. I guess my body has adjusted and decided I can totally function on a few hours of choppy sleep. We'll call it a win!

In other news, big brother Dutch is about to turn 3!  I've just started planning his birthday party and I'm excited about what's in store. He's the cutest freakin' kid around, but he also knows how to push our buttons. I think we avoided the terrible twos but didn't skip the tumultuous threes. He definitely likes to push boundaries and see if we'll follow through on threatened punishments. That means his toys have been seeing a lot of time-out lately. (Yes, we put his toys and beloved items in time-out, as opposed to him, because his toys can't try to leave the area designated for time-out. It works for us). He has an insane amount of energy and never seems to get tired! We are so ready for consistent pleasant weather so that he can spend lots of time outdoors and on his playground. He needs more physical outlets, so we signed him up for Stretch N Grow at his daycare. I'm thinking of enrolling him in a karate class at daycare as well, once he turn three. When he's not being a smart ass to us, he's just plain wicked smart. The kid grasps so many concepts that you would think would be over his head, and he makes us laugh daily with some of the things he says. He recently made great strides in toilet training and wears underwear to school every day now. When he's using the toilet at home, he tends to spend a lot of time on it, and his mouth is like a running faucet.  The kid just talks and talks and talks. After a few instances of me cracking up at the conversations we were having and sharing them with Meezy, I decided to start filming them. You can catch up on his antics by subscribing to his Youtube channel here: Toilet Talks with Dutch  

After having baby Jude, I was so ready to get my old body back. I was definitely over maternity clothes and not being able to to work out. After I lost the initial weight related to the actual delivery, and got the all-clear from my doctor, I decided to start a weight loss challenge among friends and family to see if I could motivate myself to drop the extra weight. I needed an extra push, so I started a game on Dietbet. It is a site where you bet money that you will lose a certain percentage of weight in a certain amount of time, and you invite others to compete with you. After the prescribed amount of time, if you successfully complete the challenge, you split the total amount that was bet with the other successful contenders.  If you didn't lose the weight you were supposed to, you forfeit the amount you bet. I signed up for a $25 challenge, and said I could lose 4% of my body weight, so it's not much at risk, but would be a nice reward. I found 13 other people to do it with me, and our challenge ends on February 9th. I'm pretty close to my goal and feeling confident that I'll succeed. I might sign up for another one after this is done, because I could stand to lose an additional 4% after this!

Much more going on, but that's all I have time to write about. Gonna try to get outside while the weather is still fantastic!