What If...

What if you had a party and no one came?

So remember how I got all collegey and geeky about making new friends in the neighborhood? 

And I got over it and organized a meet-up at the local cupcake shop?

Well, those have been happening weekly.  And we've added group walks on Tuesdays.

So tomorrow we're hosting a holiday brunch for the neighborhood babies and families.  We've met almost 30 new parents through the meetups.

And I'm feeling all college-y and geeky.

What if no one shows?  At least we have a decorated tree?  And that'll leave all the red velvet cupcakes for me..

"We Be Rollin..."

"We be rollin'..."

TBD on whether Mom and Dad "be hatin'".

Tonight is the trial on no miracle blanket.

But what else are you supposed to do when you look down and see your baby stuck like this?

That's quite a bit of froggie cuteness.

(Oh yes, you are supposed to master tummy to back before back to tummy, but our little guy seems to have that reversed... so when he rolls, he gets stuck.  And starts wailing.)

SIDS

SIDS, ya'll.

It's for REALS.

But chalk it into one of those categories of "things that neurotic moms should worry about, but that this neurotic mom has tucked into the back of her mind because all the crap life has dealt her about babies is already going to happen...right?"

One of the first new mom meetups I went to in the neighborhood we spent almost an hour talking about SIDS.

AN HOUR.

Apparently it is most common from 2-4 months of age...

Don't do the bumpers on the bed (I didn't)

Sleep on the back (Got it)

Fan on in the room (Did it)

No smoking around baby (Got it)

And 5000 other things that apparently can make you crazy with worry.  They have monitors you can buy if you baby's breathing changes.  But they often have false positives, which would apparently have you waking up in the middle of the night with a false alarm.  Can you imagine that panic?

The first time Rob slept through the night was early on.  I sent Shawn in to get him in the morning just to make sure he was alive.

I have only compulsively have checked on his breathing five times or so?

Maybe that makes me a bad mom? 

I was out with my Greenville girlfriends this week and recounted a baby incident from this week...

Baby was hanging out.  Cat napping like he does in the middle of the day.   I look over and he's got his eyes WIDE OPEN.  But sleeping?  And I have a minute of "Oh schizz, my baby is dying of SIDS...right NOW."

He wasn't.

Motherhood can give you a crazy sometimes apparently.

Three Months- REALLY?

I can't believe we have a three month old.

On the other hand, I feel like he's been a part of our family for a long time.  Not in a cheesy way... but if you think of the amount of waiting and normalcy that goes into the average three months in life, it seems FOREVER.  But then, you have this BABY thing and poof.  Time flies.

(I'm not sure that makes sense to anyone but me... but 14 weeks... REALLY?  Three months?  REALLY?  Seems almost time to phase in the Rob name.)

I see him every waking hour, so I have a hard time seeing changes in Rob (Robbie?). Whenever friends/family comment "yadda yadda yadda (grown) yadda yadda yadda (change)", I say "REALLY?"

What has changed in the last month?

• We have an AWESOME sleeper.  Like awesome.  To the point that I think, why can't you be MORE awesome and stretch that 10 hours into 12.  But then I don't want to mess with the awesomeness with things like an earlier bedtime (which we need to do), or losing the miracle blanket (which we also need to do)

• Poor buddy had his 1st diaper rash.  It looked like how I imagine herpes.  Gross.  I was traumatized.  He didn't seem to notice.

• He continues to love and watch other babies constantly.  I'm not sure who looks forward to play group Fridays more between the two of us.

• I'm starting to make some friendships with Moms in the neighborhood.  I still feel all geeky and college freshmany and "will you be my friend-y", but we're getting there.

• He likes a bath.  Big time.  (Insert Cute nake-y baby picture with red solo cup added for irony)

• We've locked in, for now at least, a daycare.  I just needed to get rid of the anxiety of not knowing where we were going.  We are 259th on the waiting list at our top choice.  In the 150s at our 2nd, 3rd and 4th choice.  So we're going with convenience.  But it turns out some of the other neighborhood moms are starting in the new infant class at the local daycare with us, and that brings a great deal of comfort to me.

• Babies need toys!  I didn't have any.  I felt terrible.  We now have toys. 

• He like the color red.  People wearing red.  Toys in red.  Red diaper bags.  Blankets.  I'm sure that's a developmental milestone in one of the parenting books I have that I haven't cracked.  (More in another post on coming to terms with and figuring out what the hell a parenting philosophy is from this very type A person who turns out to not be so type A when it comes to parenting)

• We have a rolling over dilemma.  He seems to have forgotten that he knows how to roll from tummy to back.  He learned in the last two days how to roll from back to tummy.  This means time to wean off the awesome Miracle Blanket swaddle.  Back to worrying about messing with my awesome sleeper.

So there.  Complete with the obligatory three month picture.  (And the two and one month below).  I still can't tell the difference.